The Immovable Ladder and The Status Quo

Since the early 18th century, a small wooden ladder has rested against a window at the Church of the Holy Sepulchre in Jerusalem. In this episode, we learn about “The Immovable Ladder” and why no one has bothered to move it after hundreds of years. Then we play the quiz with America’s Got Talent star, Jonathan Burns!

In Glasgow Scotland, there’s a statue of the Duke of Wellington on a horse. It depicts Arthur Wellesley, the first Duke of Wellington outside of the Gallery of Modern Art. And if you look up a picture of the statue, chances are you won’t be able to see the Duke’s face. That’s because the statue almost always has a traffic cone on its head. Even though the statue was erected in 1844, the traffic cone tradition only started in the 1980s. It began as a bit of vandalism. Just some locals having fun. But the image was so funny to the public, that once it was removed by the city, another cone went on. City Council hated it. They put the statue on a higher pedestal. It didn’t matter. The cone kept appearing. And soon, the image of the statue with the cone carried more cultural relevance to the people of Glasgow than the Duke of Wellington himself. It was a way for them to express the city’s sense of humor. The city removes the cone 100 times a year and it doesn’t matter. By all accounts, it seems like the traffic cone is now a permanent object. That’s because the people want it there. 

On the Eastern coast of Scotland, there’s a stone called the Stone of Destiny – also called the Stone of Scone that is considered a permanent, immovable object. It was supposedly used to coronate Scottish Monarchs dating back to the first century. It has a long and storied history of being taken and used by different groups, political and religious, but was most recently seen in 2023 during the coronation of King Charles. 

A lot of these immovable or permanent objects are that way because of a deep meaning – usually religious. And while today’s story is about religion, it’s not about an object that has any deep religious meaning. 

If you visit the Church of the Holy Sepulchre in Jerusalem, there’s a ledge on the wall of the Armenia Apostolic Church. Above that ledge, there’s a window and leading up to the window, a small, 5-rung wooden ladder. And that ladder has been there since at least the early 1700s. 

So – just to go into a brief background of the Church of the Holy Sepulchre – this is the site that’s largely agreed upon as the place where Jesus of Nazareth was supposedly crucified and resurrected. And because of that, it’s one of the most revered places in the world for believers. But it’s also a place that’s incredibly fragile. Throughout history, many different groups have laid claim to the site. Since the 4th century, people have been claiming control and dominance over the Church of the Holy Sepulchre. Think about all of the different sects of Christianity – they all have slightly different thoughts on tradition and history and all want to control the site slightly differently. And then you’ve got the Muslim groups in the area as well and the whole thing becomes incredibly complicated. It’s actually been destroyed and rebuilt several times. With religious sites being commonly destroyed throughout history, it’s amazing that this place exists today.

Control of the Church has been taken through blackmail, bribery and outright fights throughout history and currently, it’s resting on a delicate balance of an insanely complicated set of rules. We’re talking like American income tax policy level of complications. The Church of the Holy Sepulchre is currently cared for by the Greek Orthodox, Armenian Apostolic, and Roman Catholic Church, along with Coptic, Ethiopian, and Syriac Orthodox churches. Each group has different duties and areas of care and the entire thing is incredibly fragile and complicated. Not all of it has been completely agreed upon. There are some areas of the holy site that cause arguments even today.

In 2008, Armenian Monks and Greek Monks got into a huge fight over a chair. Apparently there’s a place where a chair is placed for a Coptic Monk to sit on the roof. It was a hot day and he moved the chair something like 8 inches to the right so he could be in the shade. This was seen as a huge affront and caused a literal fistfight. And since it was in the 2000s, there were videos of it that got spread around the world. Something like eleven people were hospitalized. 

So imagine now that this building has something that needs to be repaired. How do they decide who is responsible? Since it’s so complicated, it’s a huge task to do the tiniest amounts of work. They must maintain the centuries old agreements which are referred to as the “status quo.”

We see everyday on the news the precarious situation in the Middle East. In Jerusalem, you’ve got a very small piece of earth that many many different religious groups lay claim to. It’s not just Jewish people and Muslims. So as a result, there are 9 different religious sites in Jerusalem that are subject to an agreement called the “Status Quo,” which dates back to the Firman of Ottoman sultan Osman in 1757. It basically splits up the responsibilities of ownership and care of these sites between 6 different religious communities and says that no one can make any changes to these places without consensus among all the groups. The Status Quo is old and has gone through a bunch of iterations, but it was most recently formalized in the 1949 UN Conciliation Commission which was a response to the 1947-1949 Palestine War. 

The most famous symbol of the Status Quo is a single ladder. It’s a small 5-rung wooden ladder in the Church of the Holy Sepulchre, one of the 6 Status Quo sites. And this ladder rests against a window of the Armenia Apostolic Church. The ladder has been there since at least 1728, which is the first time we see a reference to it in print, but it’s likely been there long before that. It’s known as “The Immovable Ladder,” but some refer to it as “Jacob’s Ladder,” which is a Biblical reference that has nothing to do with this particular ladder. 

The ladder was originally used for who knows what. There are a ton of theories as to what the ladder was used for and there’s really no way to know which is the truth. It could have been a ladder to help monks get a breath of fresh air. It could have been a ladder used by a mason to work on the stones of the building. We just don’t know. 

The use of the ladder isn’t important. The reason the ladder is significant is because of what it represents symbolically. It’s a symbol of the agreement for all of these different people, with different beliefs – strong beliefs – to come together and respect each other’s use of this space. 

It was removed once by Pope Paul the Sixth in 1964. He didn’t like that the ladder reminded people of the divisions within the church. So he had someone pull it in through the window and hide it. A week later, it was returned and this time, a steel grate was installed in the window so it couldn’t be pulled in again. I guess we’re just lucky this one didn’t result in a huge fist fight like the battle over the chair.

The immovable ladder is now seen as an important piece of the history of that region – it represents the Status Quo and the agreement between a lot of people who don’t always agree. So next time there’s a mess in your house and you can’t decide whose job it is to clean it up, maybe just think of it as a symbol of agreement (or lack thereof) and leave it….and tell them The Internet Says it’s True.

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