If you stand at Manger Square outside the Church of the Nativity today, you are in the midst of a throbbing city. Yet in ancient times, this site celebrating the birth of Jesus which has been a Christian pilgrimage destination for centuries, was at the very edge of a much smaller town, graced by the stark brown landscape of the Judean mountains and desert. A plan of the Church of the Nativity and its surrounding buildings.
Entrance is from the left.
The still-intact church, originally built in the fourth century by the Emperor Constantine, and rebuilt again in the sixth century, is entered through a low narrow door. After the Moslem conquest in the sixth century, security and safety of Christians in Arab lands deteriorated. The entrances of the past were bricked up and the doors installed. Once through the door, the visitor enters the Narthex of the church, one of the sections that was added in the sixth century to the original fourth century plan of the structure. Indeed, the eastern wall of the Narthex was an outside wall of the church in its earlier incarnation and hints at its beauties in that period.