Nisibis & Istanbul

Christ from the Deeisis, Hagia Sophia, Istanbul

I finished my time in Eastern Turkey with a trip to the border city of Nusaybin (ancient Nisibis), to visit the Church of St. Jacob, which is named for their important 5th century leader Jacob Bardaeus (lit. “Jacob the rag-wearer”), an ascetic and theologian, who is buried there. The Syrian Orthodox Christians are sometimes called “Jacobites” because of his influence. Only the sanctuary and a shallow nave survive of what was once a much larger complex, as the surviving ruins suggest.

I went on to Dara, a Byzantine city that was built up as a major garrison town in the 6th century, after Nisibis was taken by the Persians (only to see it destroyed when the Persians later advanced). Most of what survives is a very large necropolis, the complex of cave tombs cut into the soft stone, sometimes with reliefs and elegant architectural features. There are also two immense cisterns, designed to hold rain water in case of siege, and some elements of the forum and fortifications.

I flew to Istanbul, where I had most of Sunday free before flying to Egypt to cover the Global South Fellowship of Anglicans Assembly for TLC (my real purpose in making the trip to this part of the world in the first place). I went to Mass at Christ Church, Istanbul, where there was a young and engaged congregation, many of them recent Turkish converts. I was sorry not to see the chaplain, who I enjoyed interviewing for a TLC cover story last year, but a retired Lutheran pastor resident there handled things well.

I was also able to spend a good amount of time in the gallery of the Hagia Sophia, which had been closed to visitors on my previous trips to Istanbul. There are a number of stunning mosaics, including the famous Deeisis image of Christ with the Blessed Virgin and John the Baptist, as well as some smaller mosaics that can’t be viewed clearly from below.

I was even more delighted with the Chora Church, which is finally reopened after several years of renovation. The mosaics and frescoes there are widely considered to be the very best of the late Byzantine period, and for me, the assembly ranks with Giotto and Michelangelo’s masterworks as a complete artistic cycle of the Christian story. I was able to spend about two hours in the church, studying every scene in turn, and answering a fair number of questions from Turks about the scenes (unsurprisingly, the government provides no interpretive materials in Turkish).

I was surprised and moved by a number of homely touches in the storytelling, especially in the mosaic cycle on the early life of the Blessed Virgin Mary. The mosaicist shows Mary being cradled by her parents and taking her first steps. Children play dice in the foreground of the multiplication of the loaves and fishes, and there are two beautiful peacocks framing one of the scenes.

The 14th century was a bleak time in the Byzantine empire, with devastating outbreaks of the Black Death and continued loss of territory and financial stability. But in this little church, the artists hoped to bring joy and hope. The resurrection scenes in the funerary chapel are also stunning, and justly famous, and are especially poignant against such a background of chaos and turmoil.