HOLY FIRE

The Miracle of Holy Saturday at the Tomb of Christ

Forty-five Historical Accounts (9th – 16th c.)

 

The descent of the Holy Fire at the Tomb of Christ every Holy Saturday is the only miraculous event in human history which has taken place each year on the same day for more than one thousand years. Covering a period of eight centuries, from the 9th to the 16th century, this book assembles historical accounts of the celebrated event.

Forty-five authors – ten French, five Muslim Arabs, five Byzantine Greeks, five Germans, four Englishmen, three Russians, three Muslim Persians, three Icelanders, two Armenians, one Syrian, one Moldavian, one Swiss and one Italian – describe this great miracle of the Christian world: the Holy Fire which, like lightning, descends from the heavens on Holy Saturday at the Tomb of Christ, a few hours before the celebration of His
Resurrection.

Furthermore, the scientific measurements that were taken in the tomb of Christ on Holy Saturday in 2008 by the Russian physicist Dr. Antrey Volkov, confirm the descent of the Holy Fire and reveal three phenomena, which he himself characterizes as "incredible and entirely inexplicable."

 

Cover image: The sharing of the Holy Fire in
the Orthodox Church of the Resurrection

 

 

The coming of the Holy Fire at noon of Holy Saturday 1877 (detail of the illustration). Pilgrims rush to
light their tapers from the flames of the Holy Fire coming out of the vents in the Holy Sepulchre.
Newspaper TheGraphic, London, 21March 1878. British Library, TheGraphic, vol. 18, pp. 292–93.