JERUSALEM - Wajeeh Nuseibeh, a 50-year-old Muslim, says someone from his family has opened and closed the massive wooden doors of Christianity's holiest shrine pretty much every day for 1,364 years.
Christian sects squabbling over stewardship of the place have never trusted one another with the key.
Why is it such a touchy issue? For starters, the Church of the Holy Sepulcher is the holiest place in the world for Christians, and it must be shared by various denominations that have competed for power and quarreled over differing theological points of view and rituals.
The ancient church, built around a huge rock believed to be Golgotha, is revered as the spot where Jesus was crucified, buried and rose from the dead. In such a place, who dusts an individual stone, wipes candle wax from this or that ledge and who can sit where is sometimes hotly contested.
It has been that way since European Crusaders conquered the place in 1099 and built the church's present structure. It's probably been that way since the Roman emperor Constantine built an earlier church here in the 4th century.
"It's a long tradition," said Father Armando Pierucci, 67, a Franciscan from Italy, explaining why the key is held by Muslims. "To be honest, sometimes there is animosity with one another, therefore there can't be agreement on who should take the key," said the man, who plays the church's booming pipe organ.
Tensions still run raw. A few weeks ago, Coptic and Ethiopian monks, who share control of the roof, hurled stones and threw punches at one another.
The brawl on July 28 was set off when a 72-year-old Coptic priest moved from the white, hot sun to sit in the shade. The move was considered a challenge to the Ethiopians' sovereignty over a courtyard of huts where they've dwelled since being evicted from the church in 1808, when a fire destroyed their documents.
In 1757, the church was sectioned into Greek Orthodox, Armenian and Roman Catholic areas under an agreement that also assigned times that each group could hold services.
Nuseibeh, like his ancestors, sees his role as vital to keeping the place quiet, peaceful, holy.
"We are here as a people of peace in the church," he said.
It's an unusual job, he admits. The former electronics repairman and tour guide took over his family's traditional calling from his father 25 years ago.
His business card says: "Wajeeh Y. Nuseibeh, Custodian and Doorkeeper of the Church of the Holy Sepulcher."
He still has Turkish-era documents declaring that his family is in control of the doors. Some of them are painted in gold on deer skins, complete with the seal of the Sultan.
The 10-inch (25-centimeter) iron, Ottoman-era key is guarded by another Muslim family, the Joudehs.
Despite much talked about tussles, the massive, stone church is a place of profound peace. Its colorful people, ancient stone walls, ornate icons and the solemn echo of monks singing centuries-old Latin hymns awe visitors.
Mideast violence has kept pilgrims and tourists away. Now, the church is sometimes completely silent until a shoe squeaks on the stone floor or a pigeon soars with a rush of wings into the doorway and disappears into the high domed ceiling.
Each day at 4 a.m., Nuseibeh sends someone to heave open the heavy wood doors that are marked with tiny crosses carved by many centuries of pilgrims. During the last two years of Mideast fighting, Nuseibeh has hired someone living closer to the church to do the honors, because he fears walking through the city in darkness. He's still a chief custodian and makes daily trips to the church.
In 638, an agreement between the conquering Muslim Caliph Omar Ibn al-Khattab and the Greek patriarch put the church's key in the hands of Nuseibeh's ancestors for safekeeping. Nuseibeh's clan had just come to Jerusalem from Medina, Saudi Arabia, as Islamic missionaries "to save people from the devil," Nuseibeh explained.
The Nuseibehs remained the sole gatekeepers until the arrival of the Crusaders in 1099, when armies of European knights massacred thousands of people in the Holy Land. The Nuseibehs fled to Nablus and lived there for 88 years, until the next Arab-Muslim conquest of Jerusalem led by Saladin.
Despite the bloody history, Nuseibeh says he has no problem trusting Christians, though Christian visitors sometimes wonder why Muslims are in charge of the entrance to the shrine.
"Some people are nervous when they hear that Muslims are the door keepers," he said. "I tell them this is the reality of this place. We are protecting Christianity to give them their freedom to pray."
Another Muslim family in the Old City, the Joudehs, took control of the key during Ottoman rule, which began in 1517.
"They were to be key keepers. And they decided to give us the job as door keepers," Nuseibeh said. The arrangement has made for a quirky ritual. A Joudeh hands the key to a Nuseibeh. A priest passes a wooden ladder through a latched window in the door, and one of the Nuseibehs climbs to unlock the spring-loaded iron lock.
Nuseibeh laments that peace between Israelis and Palestinians cannot be as easily found, in the simple turn of a key. Israel captured the Old City of Jerusalem in the 1967 war but immediately handed administration of holy sites back to religious leaders.
"We are asking for peace between all human beings," Nuseibeh said.