Jubail Church ( syc, ܥܕܬܐ ܕܡܕܢܚܐ ܕܐܬܘܖ̈ܝܐ, ʿĒḏtā ḏ-Maḏnḥā ḏ-ʾĀṯūrāyē, ar, كنيسة الجبيل) is a 4th-century church building near
Jubail
Jubail ( ar, الجبيل, ''Al Jubayl'') is a city in the Eastern province on the Persian Gulf coast of Saudi Arabia, with a total population of 684,531 as of 2021. It is home to the largest industrial city in the world. It is also home to th ...
, a city in the
Eastern province on the
Gulf
A gulf is a large inlet from the ocean into the landmass, typically with a narrower opening than a bay, but that is not observable in all geographic areas so named. The term gulf was traditionally used for large highly-indented navigable bodies ...
coast of
Saudi Arabia
Saudi Arabia, officially the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia (KSA), is a country in Western Asia. It covers the bulk of the Arabian Peninsula, and has a land area of about , making it the fifth-largest country in Asia, the second-largest in the A ...
. It is one of the oldest churches in the world. It contains 2 still visible crosses that have been carved into the wall on either side of the middle inner doorway leading from the nave towards the sanctuary.
History
Discovered in 1986, it originally belonged to the
Church of the East, a branch of
Eastern Christianity in the
West Asia
Western Asia, West Asia, or Southwest Asia, is the westernmost subregion of the larger geographical region of Asia, as defined by some academics, UN bodies and other institutions. It is almost entirely a part of the Middle East, and includes Ana ...
. The majority of its adherents are ethnic
Assyrians.
Recently, the government has put a fence around the church to prevent potential tourists from seeing it. However, the fences have not stopped locals from coming in to vandalise and damage the building.
[''Crossing the Line'' L Castoro – 2002 – The lost churches of the Arabian Gulf: recent discoveries on the islands of Sir Bani Yas and Marawah, Abu Dhabi emirate, United Arab Emirates J Elders – Proceedings of the Seminar for Arabian Studies, 2001 "There are two known sites along the Gulf coast of Saudi Arabia, at Jubail (Langfeldt 1994)
and slightly inland at Jebel Berri (Potts 1994). There are unconfirmed but persistent reports of at least one, more probably two church sites on Qatar."]
See also
*
List of the oldest churches in the world
*
Christianity in Saudi Arabia
Notes
External links
Ancient Churches in Saudi Arabia(Crossroads Arabia blog site)
Assyrian International News Agency 2010 (with pictures)
{{Authority control
4th-century churches
Churches in Saudi Arabia
Assyrian Church of the East churches
Archaeological sites in Saudi Arabia
1986 archaeological discoveries