Traditional Site
Church of the Pater Noster
PAH-ter NOSS-ter · Modern Mount of Olives, East Jerusalem · 31.7780° N, 35.2449° E
Part of a Carmelite convent on the Mount of Olives, this church stands over a grotto where, by patristic-era tradition rather than direct Gospel narrative, Jesus taught his disciples the Lord's Prayer (compare Luke 11:1-4 and Matthew 6:9-13). Its cloister and church walls are covered with ceramic plaques bearing the prayer in more than 140 languages, making it one of the most visually striking sites on the Mount. The site was originally known as Eleona ("of the olives") and, in early tradition recorded by pilgrims like Egeria, was also associated with Jesus's private teaching to the disciples, including the Olivet Discourse (Matthew 24-25; Mark 13).
Archaeology
The original Eleona basilica was commissioned in the early 4th century, traditionally under the patronage of Constantine's mother Helena, and measured roughly 35 by 19 meters; it was destroyed by the Sasanian Persian invasion in 614 CE. Crusaders built an oratory on the ruins in 1106 and a fuller church in 1152. The Byzantine basilica's foundations were rediscovered in 1910 by French archaeologists, partially underlying the present 19th-century Carmelite cloister; a full reconstruction begun in 1915 was never completed. The identification of the specific grotto with the Lord's Prayer teaching is a medieval devotional overlay on an earlier, broader tradition about the site — it is not attested in the New Testament text itself.
On a modern map
Further reading
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