The Jewish cemetery on the Mount of Olives, overlooking the Old City
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In the Book of Zechariah the Mount of Olives is identified as the place from which God will begin to redeem the dead at the end of days.

Jerusalem From the Mount Of Olives
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For this reason, Jews have always sought to be buried on the mountain, and from Biblical times to the present day the mountain has been used as a cemetery for the Jews of Jerusalem.

Major damage was suffered when the Mount was occupied by Jordan during the 1948 Arab-Israeli War, with Jordanians using the gravestones from the cemetery for construction of roads and toilets, including gravestones from millennia-old graves.

View of Mount of Olives and churches (Church of All Nations, Russian Orthodox Church of Maria Magdalene). Photo by Gila Brand. This is my own work.
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The Mount of Olives is first mentioned in connection with David's flight from Jerusalem through the rebellion of Absalom (2 Samuel 15:30), and is only once again mentioned in the Old Testament, in Zechariah 14:4.

It is, however, frequently alluded to (I Kings 11:7; II Kings 23:13; Nehemiah 8:15; Ezekiel 11:23).

It is frequently mentioned in the New Testament (Matthew 21:1; 26:30, etc.). The road from Jerusalem to Bethany runs over the mount as it did in Biblical times. According to the Bible, it was on this mount that Jesus stood when he wept over Jerusalem and the location of the Olivet discourse.

There are an estimated 150,000 graves on the Mount, including those of many famous figures. Just a few of these include the tomb of Zechariah (who prophesized there), Yad Avshalom, and a host of great rabbis from the 15th to the 20th centuries including Abraham Isaac Kook, the first Ashkenazi Chief Rabbi of Israel.

The Triumphal Entry

¹ Now when they drew near to Jerusalem and came to Bethphage, to the Mount of Olives, then Jesus sent two disciples, ² saying to them, "Go into the village in front of you, and immediately you will find a donkey tied, and a colt with her. Untie them and bring them to me. ³ If anyone says anything to you, you shall say, 'The Lord needs them,' and he will send them at once." ⁴ This took place to fulfill what was spoken by the prophet, saying,

⁵ "Say to the daughter of Zion,'Behold, your king is coming to you,
humble, and mounted on a donkey,
and on a colt, the foal of a beast of burden.'" (Matthew 21:1-5 ESV)

Called Mount of Corruption

¹³ And the king defiled the high places that were east of Jerusalem, to the south of the mount of corruption, which Solomon the king of Israel had built for Ashtoreth the abomination of the Sidonians, and for Chemosh the abomination of Moab, and for Milcom the abomination of the Ammonites.
(2 Kings 23:13 ESV)

Cultural references

• Yad Avshalom
• Tomb of Zechariah
• Church of all Nations
• Church of Maria Magdalene
• Dominus Flevit Church
• Gethsemane
• Mary's Tomb
• Seven Arches Hotel

Notable people buried on the mount

• Abraham Isaac Kook (1864-1935); Ashkenazi chief rabbi of the British Mandate of Palestine; founder of Yeshivat Merkaz HaRav. Ahron Soloveichik (1917-2001); Rosh yeshiva of Yeshivas Brisk, Chicago.

   

• Aryeh Kaplan (1934-1983); Rabbi, noted author of The Living Torah and other works. Avigdor Miller (1908-2001); Profound American thinker and lecturer of Orthodox Judaism; communal rabbi and Mashgiach ruchani.

   

• Ben Ish Chai (1832-1909); Leading hakham, posek and kabbalist.

   

• Chaim ibn Attar (1696-1743); Prominent talmudist, kabbalist and author.

   

• Eliezer Ben-Yehuda (1858-1922); Linguist.

   

• Eliyahu Asheri (1988-2006); Israeli student kidnapped and murdered by Palestinians.

   

• Gabriel A. Shrem (1916-1986); Chief cantor of the Sephardic Syrian Jewish Community in New York.

   

• Immanuel Jakobovits (1921-1999); Chief rabbi of Great Britain and the Commonwealth.

   

• Meir ben Judah Leib Poppers (1624-1662); Bohemian rabbi and kabbalist.

   

• Meir Feinstein (1927-1947); Irgun activist.

   

• Menahem Begin (1913-1992); Prime minister of Israel.

• Ephraim Urbach, Talmud scholar (buried near Begin)

   

• Moshe Biderman (1776-1851); Hassidic rabbi.

   

• Moshe Halberstam (1932-2006); Rosh yeshivah of the Tschakava yeshivah and prominent Dayan of the Edah HaChareidis.

   

• Moshe ben Nahman Gerondi - also known as 'Ramban'/'Nahmanides' (1194-1270); Catalan rabbi, philosopher, physician, Kabbalist, and biblical commentator.

   

• Pesach Stein (1918-2002); Rosh yeshiva of Telz yeshiva.

   

• Princess Alice of Battenberg (1885-1969); Mother of Prince Philip, Duke of Edinburgh.

   

• Robert Maxwell (1923-1991); British media proprietor.

   

• Shaul Yedidya Elazar Taub (1886-1947); Second Modzitzer Rebbe; composer. (He was the last person to buried on the Mount of Olives until it was liberated in 1967). His son, Rebbe Shmuel Eliyahu, the third Modzitzer Rebbe, was buried there in 1984; and his grandson, Rebbe Yisrael Dan, the fourth Modzitzer Rebbe, was buried there in 2006; both graves are in close proximity to his.

   

• Shlomo Goren (1917-1994); Ashkenazi chief rabbi of Israel and author.

• Shmuel Yosef Agnon (1888-1970) ;the first Hebrew writer to win the Nobel Prize in literature.

   

• Shmuel Salant (1816-1909); Ashkenazi chief rabbi of Jerusalem and a renowned talmudist.

   

• Uri Zvi Greenberg (1896-1981); Poet.

   

• Yechezkel Sarna (1890-1969); Rosh yeshiva of Slabodka yeshiva.

   

• Yechiel Yehoshua Rabinowicz (1900-1981); Grand Rabbi of the Biala hasidic dynasty.

   

• Yisrael Eldad (1910-1996); Activist, philosopher.

   

• Yitzchok Yaakov Weiss (1902-1989); Prominent talmudic scholar, Posek and chief Rabbi of the Edah HaChareidis.

   

• Yosef Chaim Sonnenfeld (1849-1932); Co-founder of the Edah HaChareidis in Jerusalem and its first chief rabbi.

   

• Zundel Salant (1786-1866); Prominent rabbi.

   

• Zvi Yehuda Kook (1891-1982); Leader of the Mizrachi movement in Israel and Rosh yeshiva of Yeshivat Merkaz HaRav.

   

• RABBI HAIM MOUSSA DOUEK LAST CHIEF RABBI OF EGYPT (1905-1974).

   

• RABBANITE JUSTINE DOUEK (NEE ANTEBI (FASKHA)(1905-1971).

   

• Jerusalem,
• History of Ancient Israel,
• The Holy Land

References

• This is Jerusalem Menashe Har-El, Canaan Publishing House, Jerusalem, 1977, p.117
• Hull, Edward (1885). Mount Seir, Sinai and Western Palestine. Richad Bently and Son, London, p 152.
• Har-el, Menashe (1977). This is Jerusalem. Jerusalem: Canaan, 120-123.
• Har-el, Menashe (1977). This is Jerusalem. Jerusalem: Canaan, 120-123.
• Nom de Deu, J. (1987). Relatos de Viajes y Epistolas de Peregrinos Jud.os a Jerusalén, 82.
• The good jailer - Haaretz - Israel News
• "Israel 1948-1967: Holy Sites Desecrated". palestinefacts.org. Retrieved on 2007-06-27.
• "Fact Sheets #8 - Jerusalem". Jewish Virtual Library (May 19, 2005). Retrieved on 2007-06-27.
• Alon, Amos (1995). Jerusalem: Battlegrounds of Memory. New York: Kodansha Int'l, 75. ISBN 1568360991. “In 1967, it was discovered that during the Jordanian occupation of East Jerusalem, tombstones had been removed from the ancient Jewish cemetery on Olivet to pave the latrines of a nearby Jordanian army barrack.”
• Alon, Amos (1995). Jerusalem: Battlegrounds of Memory. New York: Kodansha Int'l, 170. ISBN ISBN 1568360991.
• "Mt. of Olives National Authority to be Formed". Israelnationalnews (2007-08-23). Retrieved on 2007-08-26.
• Rabbi Haim Moussa Douek
• 2 Kings 23:13 (English Standard Version)
• This article incorporates text from the public domain Easton's Bible Dictionary, originally published in 1897.