A prominent Muslim family holds the key to Christ Jesus' tomb site in Jerusalem, and the patriarch of the said Muslim family has now taken the honor of keeping it.
Adeeb Joudeh and his family have been reported to be holding the iron key to the Church of the Holy Sepulchre, which stands in the site where Christians believed Jesus to have been crucified and executed. The Joudeh is one of the most dominant and popular clans of the Muslim, which is why the key has been entrusted to them. They have reportedly been keeping the key for nearly a millennium now.
Joudeh has claimed that the arrangement for them to be the keyholders of Jesus' tomb site dates back to when Christian-controlled Jerusalem was sacked and conquered by the Muslim Saracen leader Saladin back in 1187. The task of gatekeeping the tomb site was entrusted to two prominent families, the other being the Nusseibehs, who had the duty of opening and closing the church doors, which they still do today.
Historians, however, were not convinced and had a different take on why Saladin might have bestowed to the two families. Apparently, Saladin wanted to assert Muslim dominance over Christianity in the city, hence the granting of the church to the two dominant Muslim families. Some researchers also claimed that the tax people had to pay to enter the tomb site church could also have played a part in Saladin's decisions.
Whichever is the reason, it may be buried in history, as the earliest records of the Church of the Holy Sepulchre date back to only the 1500s. This means that there is not much to go on apart from the words of the two Muslim families, historical researchers, and archaeologists.
Still, Joudeh considers the key a prestige, not only for his family but for all Muslims, stating, "Honestly, it's a great honor for a Muslim to hold the key to the Church of the Holy Sepulchre, which is the most important church in Christendom." The key that Joudeh uses, a 30 centimeter (cm) bar of iron, is also claimed to be 800 years old and has had several copies, a lot of which had broken due to wear and tear.
Despite Muslims holding to the most important Christian church, some Christian scholars believe that this is a way to keep the peace between the two religions, making a church a prime example of co-existence between people of different beliefs.
