NAZARETH. - City of Galilee, where Jesus led the hidden life with Mary Most Holy and St. Joseph. The name is written and interpreted in various ways. Ναζαρεθ or Ναζαρετ, which corresponds to the Syriac Nāsrat and the Hebrew Nāsreth, seems to mean "watchtower, guard." St. Jerome, from nēser, interprets it as "flower, shoot." The form Ναζαρα (Lk. 4:15; Mt. 4:13) seems to be a Hellenization, like Ναζωραῖος, a name given to Christians, not without contempt. The city in the time of Our Lord was of no importance (Jn. 1:46), but it acquired importance afterward because of the events of Jesus' life (Mt. 4:13; Lk. 1:26; 2:4, 39, 51; 4:16) and because of the title "prophet of N." given to him (Mt. 21:11; Acts 10:38). In the 2nd century A.D. the city was inhabited by Jews, among whom Count Joseph of Tiberias built a church for the Christians. The Jews remained at least until the 6th century, despite the Christianization.
In 634 N. was occupied by the Arabs, who a century later made life very difficult for the Christians. In the 12th century the Crusaders raised N. to the rank of episcopal see, transferring it from Bejsān, but the city, having fallen back into Muslim hands, suffered greatly, especially under the ferocious Bejbars in 1263. In 1291 the translation of the Holy House of Loreto (v.) from N. is placed. In 1390 the Franciscans were able to open a convent there, but it was short-lived because of the harassment of the Arabs; they gained a foothold in N. again and definitively in 1620. In modern times many other religious communities have gone to settle in N., forming an active center of Christian life. In 1948 it was occupied by the Jewish forces, which hold it even today. The inhabitants, because of the war, number about 19 thousand between residents and refugees, the majority of whom are Christian.
The position of ancient N. must be placed, contrary to the opinion of Kopp, on the hill where the sanctuaries of the Annunciation and of St. Joseph stand built, together with the Franciscan convent, which even today forms the center of N., both because in the flanks of the rocky hills all around there are many tombs from Roman times, among them a fine one with a circular stone at the entrance on the property of the Ladies of N., and because of the remains of silos, cisterns and other antiquities found there, and finally because of the tradition resulting from the literary sources.
The principal monuments of N. are: 1) the sanctuary of the Annunciation (Lk. 1:26-38), of which the anonymous pilgrim of Piacenza (v.) in 570 says that "domus s. Mariae basilica est." Excavations carried out in 1899 and 1909 have brought to light a Byzantine pavement near the sacred grotto, held by tradition to be the house of Mary; furthermore, remains of a large three-aisled church erected by the Crusaders, in which the grotto remains in the north aisle. Above them the present church was rebuilt in 1730, in such a way that the grotto remained beneath the high altar. 2) The sanctuary of the Nutrition or house of St. Joseph, rebuilt in 1914 on the Crusader plan. It has in its interior the remains of an oil press with a mosaic pavement and a grotto with two levels. It is believed that it must be identified with the church "super duos fundata cancros" of which Arculf (v.) speaks in 670. 3) The church of St. Gabriel, rebuilt in the 17th century on what seems to be a Crusader foundation; it is connected with the account of the apparition at the fountain narrated by the Protoevangelium of James (11:1). 4) Later the fountain was made to flow further south and is today in a rudimentary building near the road leading to Tiberias. 5) The Precipice (Lk. 4:30), indicated by the Commemoratorium de casti Dei of 808 as a mile distant from N. and precisely at today's Gebel el-Qafzeh, where remains of an apse are visible. 6) The Tremor, a sanctuary connected with the preceding one and dedicated to the Virgin, whose existence Poggibonsi attests in 1347. 7) The synagogue, now the church of the Melkites, built, it seems, on the site of the ancient one of which the apocrypha speak.
Bibliography8 works
Bellarmino Bagatti
EDICT (RESCRIPT) of N. - Greek inscription with the title Διάταγμα Καίσαρος, carved on stone (0.60 × 0.375), sent from N. to Paris in 1878, kept since 1925 in the Froener collection at the Musée des Médailles, interpreted and published in 1930 by F. Cumont.
The imperial Edict concerns the violatio sepulchri and prescribes that all tombs remain intact and that no one dare tamper with, exhume or remove "by evil deceit" bodies or inscriptions. It concludes: "let no one, absolutely, be permitted to make translations, otherwise I wish that he be condemned to capital punishment."
F. Cumont suggested the hypothesis that the Edict was the response to the report sent by Pilate on the trial of Jesus and on the disappearance of the body, which, according to the calumny spread by the members of the Sanhedrin, had been stolen by the disciples (Mt. 28:11-15). The procurator of Judea, having received the order, would have had it transcribed into Greek and displayed in N., the birthplace of Jesus. Against Cumont's explanation the following observations have been presented: there is no positive proof of an official report by Pilate to Tiberius on the trial of Jesus; the name of "Caesar" in the inscription may refer to Augustus, to Tiberius or to Gaius (Caligula); the occasion of the decree may have been, more than a concrete and specific case, the general practice of the profanation of tombs; the provenance from N. does not assure its original destination; the Greek language presupposes a Hellenistic city.
Although, because of the form of the carved letters, the inscription may date back to the 1st century, it offers in itself no positive elements for a sure dating.
Bibliography6 works
Donato Baldi