Miracle of the Holy Fire
Friday, April 13, 2001 8:16 PM
Copied here is an edited version of an article, written last year, by Niels Christian Hvidt.
„On Holy Saturday believers gather in great crowds in the Church of the Holy Sepulchre. For on this day fire comes down from Heaven and puts fire on the lamps in the Church.” Thus one reads in one of the many Easter itineraries to the Holy Land of the 12th Century.
„The Miracle of the Holy Fire” is known by Christians from the Orthodox Community as „the greatest of all Christian miracles”. It takes place every single year, at the same time, in the same manner, and on the same spot. No other miracle is known to occur so regularly and for such an extensive period of time.
There are sources about the miracle as old as from the eighth century AD. The miracle happens in the Church of the Holy Sepulchre in Jerusalem, to millions of believers the holiest place on earth.
One can trace the miracle throughout the centuries in the many itineraries to the Holy Land. The Russian abbot Daniel, in his itinerary written in the years 11067, in a very detailed manner presents the ‘Miracle of the Holy Light’ and the ceremonies that frame it. He recalls how the Patriarch goes into the Sepulchre-chapel (the Anastasis) with two closed candles. The Patriarch kneels in front of the stone on which Christ was laid after his death and says certain prayers, upon which the miracle occurs. Light proceeds from the core of the stone – a blue, indefinable light that after some time kindles closed oil lamps as well as the two candles of the Patriarch. This light is „The Holy Fire”, and it spreads to all people present in the Church.
The ceremony surrounding the ‘Miracle of the Holy Fire’ may be the oldest unbroken Christian ceremony in the world. From the fourth century AD all the way up to our own time, sources recall the awe awakening portent . >From these sources it becomes clear that the miracle has been celebrated on the same spot, on the same feast day, and in the same liturgical frames throughout all these centuries.
In order to investigate, I travelled to Jerusalem to be present at the ceremony. And I can testify that it not only happened in the ancient church and throughout the Middle Ages but also on Saturday 29 April 2000.
The Greek-Orthodox Patriarch of Jerusalem, Diodorus 1, is the man who every year enters the tomb to pray for and receive the Holy Flame. He has been the Patriarch of Jerusalem since 1982 and thereby is a key witness to the miracle. Prior to the ceremony this year the Patriarch received me in private audience. I was also, through his intervention, admitted to the balconies in the dome of the Holy Sepulchre Church, from where I had a fine view over the masses of people that had gathered around the tomb in anticipation of the ‘Great Miracle of the Holy Fire’.
But what exactly happens in the Holy Sepulchre Church on Easter Saturday? Why does it have such an impact on the Orthodox Tradition? Why does it seem as if nobody has heard anything about the miracle in the Protestant and Catholic countries?
The miracle occurs every year on the Orthodox Easter Saturday and is celebrated in union between all the Orthodox communities. There are many types of Orthodox Christians: Syrian, Armenian, Russian and Greek Orthodox as well as Copts. In the Holy Sepulchre Church alone there are seven different Christian denominations, and all, except the Catholics, take part in the ceremony.
Since the schism between East and West in 1054 the ‘Two Lungs of the Body of Christ’ as Pope John Paul II calls the Orthodox and Catholic communities have lived separated existences but in the first two hundred years after the schism, this was different in the Holy Sepulchre. The communal power of the ceremony was so great that it in spite of the schism gathered Catholics and Orthodox to celebrate it together. Only in 1246, when the Catholic Christians left Jerusalem with the defeated Crusaders, the Miracle of the Holy Fire became a purely Orthodox ceremony; the Orthodox remained in Jerusalem even after the Turkish occupation of Palestine.
Metropolitan Timothy, from the Greek-Orthodox Patriarchate of Jerusalem and the same Patriarchate’s representative to the recent ecumenical celebration of the opening of the Holy Doors of Saint Paul’s in Rome, said that the ecumenical and unifying power of the Holy Fire is quite exceptional. „Until the thirteenth century it was the entire Church that celebrated the ceremony of the Holy Fire,” he says.
„Even after the Catholics left Jerusalem it has remained a unifying ceremony for those of us that stayed here, that is for all the different branches of the Orthodox world. It is important to look at the spreading of the flame from a symbolic perspective. You can see the flame and the way it spreads as blood that is pumped by the heart into all the different members of a body. The flame first comes in a miraculous way from Christ to the Greek Orthodox Patriarch inside the Tomb. He gives it to the Armenian and Coptic metropolitans who again hand it on to the remaining communities who spread it to their people. After the ceremony is over, believers from all over Israel and the Palestinian territories carry it to the homes of their relatives. Pilgrims who came from further away make provisions of buying sufficient oil for special oil lamps with which they carry the flame to their countries.”
„Olympic Airways are helping to distribute the flame to many countries with Orthodox Christians, especially to Alexandria in Egypt and to Russia, but also to Georgia, Bulgaria, and USA. Each year we write letters of recommendation to the Israeli Ministry of Religious Affairs who in turn help pilgrims carry the lanterns with the Holy Fire, through customs and into their respective aircraft. This is how important the spreading of the flame is to us. It is holy and it keeps reminding us of how the One Holy Spirit is present in all the parts of the Body of Christ, just as the same blood flows in all the members of a human body.”
>From around 11am untill 1pm the Christian Arabs sing traditional songs with loud voices. These songs date back to the Turkish occupation of Jerusalem in the 13th century, a period in which the Christians were not allowed to sing their songs anywhere but in the churches. „We are the Christians, this we have been for centuries and this we shall be for ever and ever. Amen! ” they sing at the top of their voices accompanied by the sound of drums. The drum-players sit on the shoulders of others who ferociously dance around the Sepulchre Chapel.
At 1pm the songs fade out and there is silence, a tense and loaded silence electrified by the anticipation of the great manifestation of the Power of God that all are about to witness. At 1pm something else happens, a delegation of the local authorities elbows through the crowds. Even though these officials are not Christian, they are part of the ceremonies. In the times of the Turkish occupation of Palestine they were Moslem Turks; today they are Israelis.
For centuries the presence of these officials has been an integral part of the ceremony. Their function is to represent the Romans in the time of Jesus. The Gospels speak of Romans that went to seal the tomb of Jesus, so his disciples would not steal His Body and claim He had risen. In the same way the Israeli authorities on this Easter Saturday come and seal the tomb with wax. Before they seal the door it is customary that they enter the tomb to check for any hidden source of fire, which could produce the miracle through fraud. Just as the Romans were to guarantee that there was no manipulation after the death of Jesus, likewise the Israeli Local Authorities are to guarantee that there be no trickery in our times.
When the tomb has been checked and sealed, the whole church chants the Kyrie Eleison. At 1:45pm the Patriarch enters the scene. In the wake of a large procession he encircles the tomb three times, whereupon he is stripped of his royal liturgical vestments, carrying only his white alba, a sign of humility in front of the great portent of God, to which he is about to be the key witness.
All the oil-lamps have been blown out the preceding night, and now all that remains of artificial light are extinguished, so that most of the church is enveloped in darkness. With two big candles the Patriarch enters the Chapel of the Holy Sepulchre – first into the small room in front of the tomb and from there into the tomb itself.
It is not possible to see the events inside the tomb, so I asked the Patriarch of Jerusalem, Diodorus:
„Your Beatitude, what happens when you enter the Holy Sepulchre?”
„I enter the tomb and kneel in holy fear in front of the place where Christ lay after His death and where He rose again from the dead. Praying in the Holy Sepulchre is itself for me always a very holy moment in a very holy place. It is from here that He rose again in glory, and it is from there that He spread His Light to the world.
„I believe it to be no coincidence that the Holy Fire comes on exactly this spot. In Matthew 28:3, it says that when Christ rose from the dead, an angel came, dressed all in a fearful light. I believe that the striking light that enveloped the angel at the Lord’s Resurrection is the same light that appears miraculously every Easter Saturday. Christ wants to remind us that His Resurrection is a reality and not just a myth; He really came to the world in order to give the necessary sacrifice through His death and resurrection so that man could be re-united with his Creator.
„I find my way through the darkness towards the inner chamber in which I fall on my knees. Here I say certain prayers that have been handed down to us through the centuries and, having said them, 1 wait. Sometimes I may wait a few minutes, but normally the miracle happens immediately after I have said the prayers.
„From the core of the very stone on which Jesus lay, an indefinable light pours forth. It usually has a blue tint, but the colour may change and take many different hues. It cannot be described in human terms. The light rises out of the stone as mist may rise out of a lake – it almost looks as if the stone is covered by a moist cloud, but it is light.
„This light each year behaves differently. Sometimes it covers just the stone, while other times it gives light to the whole Sepulchre, so that people who stand outside the tomb and look into it will see it filled with light. The light does not burn – I have never had my beard burnt in all the sixteen years I have been Patriarch in Jerusalem and have received the Holy Fire. The light is of a different consistency than normal fire that burns in an oil-lamp.
„At a certain point the light rises and forms a column in which the fire is of a different nature, so that I am able to light my candles from it. When I thus have received the flame on my candles, I go out and give the fire first to the Armenian Patriarch and then to the Coptic. Thereafter I give the flame to all people present in the church.”
While the Patriarch is inside the chapel kneeling in front of the stone, there is darkness but far from silence outside. One hears a rather loud mumbling, and the atmosphere is very tense. When the Patriarch comes out with the two candles lit and shining brightly in the darkness, a roar of jubilee resounds in the church, comparable only to a goal at a soccer match.
The miracle is not confined to what actually happens inside the little tomb, where the Patriarch prays. What may be even more significant, is that the blue light is reported to appear and be active outside the tomb. Every year many believers claim that this miraculous light ignites candles, which they hold in their hands, of its own accord. All in the church wait with candles in the hope that they may ignite spontaneously.
Often closed oil-lamps take fire by themselves before the eyes of the pilgrims. The blue flame is seen to move in different places in the church. A number of signed testimonies by pilgrims, whose candles lit spontaneously, attest to the validity of these ignitions. The person who experiences the miracle from a close distance by having the fire on the candle or seeing the blue light usually leaves Jerusalem changed.
One can ask the question why the Miracle of the Holy Fire is hardly known in Western Europe. In the Protestant areas it may to a certain extent be explained by the fact that there is no real tradition for miracles; people don’t really know in which box to place the miracles, and they don’t take up much space in newspapers. But in the Catholic tradition there is vast interest in miracles.
Thus, why is it not more known? For this only one explanation suffices: Church politics. Only the Orthodox Churches attend the ceremony framing the miracle. It only occurs on the Orthodox Easter date and without the presence of any Catholic authorities. To certain Orthodox this evidence proves the notion that the Orthodox Church is the only legitimate Church of Christ in the world, and this assertion obviously may cause certain apprehensions in Catholic circles.
As with any other miracle there are people who believe it is fraud and nothing but a masterpiece of Orthodox propaganda. They believe the Patriarch has a lighter inside of the tomb. These critics, however, are confronted with a ijumber of problems. Matches and other means of ignition are recent inventions. Only a few hundred years ago lighting a fire was an undertaking that lasted much longer than the few minutes during which the Patriarch is inside the tomb. One then could perhaps say he had an oil-lamp burning inside, from which he kindled the candles, but the local authorities confirm to have checked the tomb and found no light inside it.
The biggest arguments against a fraud, however, are not the testimonies of the shifting patriarchs. The biggest challenges confronting the critics are the thousands of independent testimonies by pilgrims whose candles were lit spontaneously in front of their eyes without any possible explanation.
According to our investigations, it has never been possible to film any of the candles or oil-lamps igniting by themselves. However, I am in the possession of a video filmed by a young engineer from Bethlehem, Suhail Thalgich. Mr Thalgieh has been present at the ceremony of the Holy Fire since his early childhood. In 1996 he was asked to film the ceremony from the balcony of the dome of the church. Present with him on the balcony were a nun and four other believers. The nun stood at the right hand of Mr Thalgich.
On the video one can see how he zooms down on the crowds. At a certain point all lights are turned off – it is time for the Patriarch to enter the tomb and take the Holy Fire. While he is still inside the tomb one suddenly bears a scream of surprise and wonder originating from the nun standing next to Mr Thalgich. The camera begins to shake, as one hears the excited voices of the other people present on the balcony. The camera now turns to the right, whereby it is possible to contemplate the cause of the emotion. A big candle, held in the hand of the Russian nun, takes fire in front of all people present before fhe Patriarch comes out of the tomb. With shaking hands she holds the candle while over and over making the sign of the Cross in awe of the portent she has witnessed.
The miracle is, as most miracles are, surrounded by unexplainable factors. As Archbishop Alexios of Tibenas said when I met him in Jerusalem:
„The miracle has never been filmed and most probably never will be. Miracles cannot be proved. Faith is required for a miracle to bear fruit in the life of a person and without this act of faith there is no miracle in the strict sense. The true miracle in the Christian tradition has only one purpose: to extend the Grace of God in creation, and God cannot extend His Grace without the faith on behalf of His creatures.”
