How to build Jerusalem? In search of the evolution of ways to privatize the sacred and the secular

The author suggests that since Jerusalem has become one of the model cities for European consciousness (along with Rome and partly Athens), its legacy manifests itself in the invariable correlation of the systems created by politicians and their cultural protégés with those described in the Old and New Testaments. The model archetypal state was compared not only with Caesar’s Rome and the power of Alexander the Great, but primarily with the Israel of David and Solomon, despite its fragility. This comparison provided a very reliable and longterm perspective for the future. The rulers themselves were forced to focus on these two exemplary monarchs. At the same time, there were no attempts to correlate their state with post-Hasmonean Israel, since Dostoevsky’s question about the relationship of spiritual and secular power was already too acute for many medieval states.

Jerusalem, Etchmiadzin, Grebenshchikov, New Jerusalem, Andrey Bogolyubsky, Belgrade