Articles
How A Ladder Became A Symbol For Division?
There is an old cedar ladder resting on a ledge at a church building. Commonly known as
the “immovable ladder,” it has been left in almost the same position for hundreds of years as
rival church denominations could not agree on what to do with it. The ladder is famous because
it’s located at the Church of the Holy Sepulchre in Jerusalem.
No one knows how it got there or who put it there, although presumably it was used for
repairs. References to and drawings of the ladder date back to the early 1700s. The first known
photographs of the church depict the ladder in the 1850s.
An edict in the early 1850s by the Sultan of the Ottoman Empire stated that the church
was to be shared. The Greek Orthodox, Roman Catholic, Armenian Apostolic, Coptic, Syrian,
and Ethiopian Orthodox Churches were all given rights to use some parts of the building.
It was never agreed upon which group should take possession of the ladder. The mundane
object became a symbol of the divisions within Christianity itself. The ladder then became
“immovable,” because to be moved, all six groups had to agree to it.
Arguments and violence did occasionally break out in the building. In a dispute in 2002,
a Coptic Christian monk moved his chair slightly into Ethiopian Orthodox space. Eleven people
were hospitalized after the fighting ended. In 2008, fistfights broke out between Armenian and
Greek monks in the church and the riot police had to be called.
When we take our eyes off Jesus and it stops being about living by the word of God, then
it becomes all about me and my opinions. Let us live a true Christian life and strive for the unity
that Jesus prayed for us to have in John 17:20-23. Don’t forget to put away your ladder. ~B
Tolbert
