Miracle of the Holy Fire of Jerusalem
Every year for the last 1200 years, thousands of Orthodox Christians gather in pilgrimage to the Church of Holy Sepulcher in the Old City of Jerusalem waiting for days, bringing with them sleeping mats and chairs hoping to enter the church to witness the descent of the Holy Fire in the Great Saturday before Orthodox Easter Sunday.
The Recorded History of the Holy Fire
Eusebius
328 AD
Historian Eusebius writes about
an interesting miracle in Jerusalem during Easter in the year 162.
The church wardens noticed that there was no more oil left in the lamps. Bishop Narcissus of Jerusalem ordered the candles to be filled with water. In front of their eyes, every single lamp burned as if filled with pure oil. This miracle predates the construction of the Holy Sepulcher in the 4th century.
Fire occurs every year a day before Easter which is regarded as miraculous by the Christian Orthodox community.
Egeria: Travels of Egeria
Egeria is a noble woman from Spain who writes about earliest extant account of a Christian pilgrimage in 381 or 382-384.
The historical details it contains the journey in the early 380s, making it the earliest of its kind.
Around 385 AD, Egeria traveled to Palestine. In the account of her journey, she speaks of a ceremony by the Holy Sepulcher of Christ, where a light comes forth from the small chapel enclosing the tomb, by which the entire church is filled with an infinite light.
Bernard the Pilgrim
YEAR 867
The Holy Fire is believed to have been first recorded by the Christian pilgrim and Frankish monk, Bernard the Wise upon his travels to the Holy Land as commissioned by the pope.
Crusader Period-year 1101
Under Baldwin I, Latin clergy had taken over the Holy Sepulcher. During the Rite of the Holy Fire, the miraculous luminary did not descend to the Latin clergymen who sentinels the tomb thus causing a great riot.
Thus, the Greek clergy were restored "after the fiasco of the failure of the regular Easter miracle of the Holy Fire under Latin auspices in 1101. Holy Fire is supposed to descend from heaven to light the priests' candles in the Edicule of the Holy Sepulcher.
But the Holy Fire appeared in the holy grave on Sunday (Easter day), when the Latin archbishop Daimbert was NOT in Holy Sepulcher and processing was carried over by Greeks and other Orthodox Christians.
The holy grave was closed during this period by Daimbert.
(Christopher Tyerman)
Ottoman period
In 1834, in the presence of governor Ibrahim Pasha of Egypt, the frantic pilgrims in the smoke-filled and overcrowded church created a stampede, aggravated by the guards of the pasha, who cut their way out through the masses. Four hundred lost their lives.
(Robert Curzon)
The Miracle of the Holy Fire during Covid-19 and Now
During the Covid-19 lockdown of the entire nation of Israel including the Old City of Jerusalem, the Rite of Holy Fire continues at the same church of the Holy Sepulcher at the Mount Golgotha in Jerusalem.
Every year, Jesus Christ supernaturally ignites the lamp in his holy tomb in celebration of his resurrection from the dead.
This year on April 15, 2023 in the dark Church of the Holy Sepulcher and the Edicule, The Greek Orthodox Patriarch of Jerusalem, Theophillos III was inspected by the Israel authorities of matches or any devices with which could start a fire.
After inspection, to which the Patriarch is devoid of these fire starters, he brings 2 sets of 33 pieces of candles (signifying the age of Jesus Christ on earth).
He enters the narrow door opening of the Edicule. He recites the prayer which had been handed from long before Patriarchs.
The Exit from the Edicule
Then the miraculous appearance and hissing of a blue light emanates within Jesus Christ's tomb (usually rising from the marble slab covering the stone where Jesus' body was placed for burial), which eventually forms a column, which are then used to light his torches. The patriarch reopens the door, he emerges with lighted torch from the miraculous flame from the tomb shouting,
"Christos Anesti! Christ is risen!"
Darkness to Light
The flame is now shared to all the awaiting faithful inside the church and jubilation is usually manifested!
Delegations representing Eastern Orthodox countries carry the flame that same day to their home countries, where it is presented in cathedrals in time for the Easter service. It is also carried locally to cities in the West Bank, Israel with sizable Christian communities—such as Ramallah, Bethlehem and Nazareth—where crowds gather with fanfare in the city centers to receive the flame.
The Holy Fire is Sent to Other Orthodox Churches in the World
The Holy Fire is taken to Greece by special flight, similarly to other Orthodox countries or countries with major Orthodox churches, such as Syria, Georgia, Bulgaria, Lebanon, Romania, Egypt, Cyprus, North Macedonia, Serbia, Montenegro, Belarus, Ukriaine and Russia and being received by church and state leaders.
The Unrest and Fighting
Popular belief in the miraculous nature of the event stirred considerable controversy by the turn of the 11th century and may have been the reason al-Hakim bi-Amr Allah, the Fatimid caliph, ordered the destruction of the Church of the Holy Sepulcher in 1009.
It was said that the Holy Fire ONLY descend to Orthodox Patriarchs or other heterodoxy but never descend to Latin Patriarchs. In year 1100, months after the Crusaders arrived in Jerusalem and took control of the church, the Latin patriarch Daimbert led the ceremony but was unable to obtain the Holy Fire through miraculous means. This instance led to riots inside and outside the Holy Sepulcher church.
The Unbelief of the Latin Churches
The Holy Fire subsequently became a tool of division between Eastern Orthodox and Roman Catholic clergy, and in 1238 Pope Gregory IX who instituted the Papal Inquisition, also issued a papal bull denouncing the ritual as a fraud and forbidding the participation of Roman Catholic clergy in it.
Patriarch Diodoros of Jerusalem Describes the Miracle
Diodoros, a Jerusalem Patriarch describes what it’s like to receive the Holy Fire:
“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, I 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 color 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 sepulcher, 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. Hereafter I give the flame to all people present in the Church.”
(Post by Father Lawrence Farley)