calvary Summary and Overview

only in Luke 23:33, the Latin name Calvaria, which was used as a translation of the Greek word "Kranion", by which the Hebrew word "Gulgoleth" was interpreted, "the place of a skull." It probably took this name from its shape, being a hillock or low, rounded, bare elevation somewhat in the form of a human skull. It is nowhere in Scripture called a "hill." The crucifixion of our Lord took place outside the city walls (Heb. 13:11-13) and near the public thoroughfare. "This thing was not done in a corner." (See GOLGOTHA T0001522.)

[See GOLGATHA]

CAL'VARY (skull), the place where our Lord was crucified, so called from its conical shape. There is no Scripture warrant for the popular phrase "Mount Calvary." It was simply an elevation. Tradition places the site at the modern church of the Holy Sepulchre, within the present walls of Jerusalem. This view is stoutly maintained by George Williams, Ritter, Krafft, Raumer, Rosen, De Saulcy, Sepp, Tischendorf, and several of the members of the British Palestine Survey. It is as stoutly disputed by Robinson, Tobler, John Wilson, Barclay, Thomson, Bonar, Meyer, Ewald, S. J. Andrews, and others. The arguments turn chiefly on the course of the second wall of Josephus -- whether it ran so as to include or to exclude the present church of the Holy Sepulchre. The evangelists place Calvary distinctly outside of the city in Matt 28:32; Heb 13:12;John 19:20, 1 Chr 4:41. The church of the Holy Sepulchre is inside the present city, which is much smaller now than in the time of Christ. To establish the traditional site it must be proved that the second wall excluded the church, which is quite improbable. Mr. Schick and Bishop Gobat of Jerusalem locate Calvary near the Grotto of Jeremiah, north-west of the Damascus gate; Fisher Howe and Conder, on the Grotto of Jeremiah; Barclay suggests a place near Gethsemane. As in the case of Moses, so in that of Jesus, it may be best that the exact place of his crucifixion and burial remain unknown and out of the reach of profanation and idolatry.

(Luke 23:33). The Latin translation of the Hebrew GOLGOTHA, "the place of a skull," a place of executions. A fit place; in death's stronghold the Lord of life gave death his deathblow through death (Hebrews 2:14). There is no "mount," such as popular phraseology associates with Calvary. It was simply "a low, rounded bore hill" outside the N. gate of Jerusalem (Ewald, Gesch. Chronicles, 434, quoted in Ellicott's Life of our Lord.)