Condescension of the Holy Fire. The secret of the Holy Fire has been revealed: we light it at home

This miracle occurs every year on the eve of Orthodox Easter in the Jerusalem Church of the Resurrection, which covers with its huge roof both Golgotha, the cave in which the Lord was laid down from the cross, and the garden where Mary Magdalene was the first of the people to meet His resurrection. The temple was erected by Emperor Constantine and his mother Queen Helena in the 4th century, and evidence of the miracle dates back to this time.

That's how it goes these days. At approximately noon, a procession headed by the Patriarch. The procession enters the Church of the Resurrection, heads to the chapel erected over the Holy Sepulcher, and, having walked around it three times, stops in front of its gates. All the lights in the temple have been extinguished. Tens of thousands of people: Arabs, Greeks, Russians, Romanians, Jews, Germans, British - pilgrims from all over the world - watch the Patriarch in tense silence. The Patriarch is unmasked, the police carefully search him and the Holy Sepulcher itself, looking for at least something that can produce fire (during Turkish rule over Jerusalem, Turkish gendarmes did this), and wearing one long flowing tunic, the Primate of the Church enters. Kneeling in front of the Tomb, he prays to God to send down the Holy Fire. Sometimes his prayer lasts a long time... And suddenly, on the marble slab of the coffin, fiery dew appears in the form of bluish balls. His Holiness touches them with cotton wool, and it ignites. With this cool fire, the Patriarch lights the lamp and candles, which he then takes into the temple and hands over to the Armenian Patriarch, and then to the people. At the same moment, tens and hundreds of bluish lights flash in the air under the dome of the temple.

It’s hard to imagine the jubilation that filled the crowd of thousands. People shout, sing, the fire is transferred from one bunch of candles to another, and a minute later the whole temple is on fire.

At first it has special properties- it does not burn, although everyone has a bunch of 33 candles burning in their hand (according to the number of years of the Savior). It is amazing to watch how people wash themselves with this flame and run it through their beards and hair. Some more time passes, and the fire becomes natural properties. Numerous police force people to put out the candles, but the rejoicing continues.

Holy fire descends into the Church of the Holy Sepulcher only on Holy Saturday - the eve of Orthodox Easter, although Easter is celebrated every year on different days according to the old Julian calendar. And one more feature - the Holy Fire descends only through the prayers of the Orthodox Patriarch.

Once another community living in Jerusalem - the Armenians, also Christians, but who had apostatized from holy Orthodoxy back in the 4th century - bribed the Turkish authorities so that the latter would allow them, and not the Orthodox Patriarch, into the cave on Holy Saturday - the Holy Sepulcher .

The Armenian high priests prayed for a long time and unsuccessfully, and the Orthodox Patriarch of Jerusalem, together with his flock, cried on the street near the locked doors of the temple. And suddenly, as if lightning struck the marble column, it split, and a pillar of fire came out of it, which lit the candles of the Orthodox.

Since then, none of the representatives of numerous Christian denominations has dared to challenge the Orthodox right to pray on this day in the Holy Sepulcher.

In May 1992, for the first time after a 79-year break, the Holy Fire was again delivered to Russian soil. A group of pilgrims - clergy and laity - with a blessing His Holiness Patriarch carried the Holy Fire from the Holy Sepulcher in Jerusalem through Constantinople and all Slavic countries to Moscow. Since then, this unquenchable fire has been burning on Slavyanskaya Square at the foot of the monument to the holy Slovenian teachers Cyril and Methodius.
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For nearly two thousand years, Orthodox Christians have met their greatest holiday- The Resurrection of Christ (Easter) in the Church of the Holy Sepulcher in Jerusalem.

Every time, everyone who is inside and nearby the Temple witnesses the descent of the Holy Fire on Easter.

The Holy Fire has been appearing in the temple for more than a millennium. The earliest mentions of the descent of the Holy Fire on the eve of the Resurrection of Christ are found in Gregory of Nyssa, Eusebius and Silvia of Aquitaine and date back to the 4th century. They also contain descriptions of earlier convergences. According to the testimony of the Apostles and Holy Fathers, uncreated Light illuminated the Holy Sepulcher shortly after the Resurrection of Christ, which one of the apostles saw: “Peter came to the Sepulcher and was in vain horrified by the light in the tomb,” writes St. John of Damascus. Eusebius Pamphilus narrates in his " Church history"that when one day there was not enough lamp oil, Patriarch Narcissus (2nd century) gave his blessing to pour water from the Pool of Siloam into the lamps, and the fire that came down from heaven lit the lamps, which then burned throughout the entire Easter service.

The litany (church ceremony) of the Holy Fire begins approximately one day before the start of Orthodox Easter. Pilgrims begin to gather in the Church of the Holy Sepulcher, wanting to see with their own eyes the descent of the Holy Fire. Among those present there are always many heterodox Christians, Muslims, and atheists; the ceremony is monitored by the Jewish police. The temple itself can accommodate up to 10 thousand people, the entire area in front of it and the enfilade of surrounding buildings are also filled with people - the number of people willing is much greater. more possibilities temple, so it can be difficult for pilgrims.

A lamp filled with oil, but without fire, is placed in the middle of the bed of the Life-Giving Sepulcher. Pieces of cotton wool are laid out throughout the bed, and tape is laid along the edges. Thus prepared, after inspection by the Turkish guards, and now by the Jewish police, the Edicule (Chapel of the Holy Sepulcher) is closed and sealed by the local Muslim key keeper.

Before the descent, the temple begins to be illuminated by bright flashes of the Holy Light, small lightning flashes here and there. In slow motion you can clearly see that they are coming from different places temple - from the icon hanging over the Edicule, from the dome of the Temple, from the windows and from other places, and flood everything around bright light. In addition, here and there, between the columns and walls of the temple, quite visible lightning flashes, which often pass through standing people without any harm.

A moment later, the entire temple turns out to be surrounded by lightning and glare, which snake down its walls and columns, as if flowing down to the foot of the temple and spreading across the square among the pilgrims. At the same time, the candles of those standing in the temple and in the square are lit, and the lamps located on the sides of the Edicule are lit (with the exception of 13 Catholic ones). The temple or its individual places are filled with an unparalleled radiance, which is believed to have first appeared during the Resurrection of Christ. At the same time, the doors of the Tomb open and the Orthodox Patriarch emerges, blessing those gathered and distributing the Holy Fire.

"...The most vivid description dates back to 1892, where a wonderful picture of the ignition of the Holy Fire is given from the words of the Patriarch. He said that sometimes, entering the Edicule, and not having time to read the prayer, he already saw how the marble coffin slab was covered with small multi-colored beads, like small pearls. And the stove itself began to emit an even light. The Patriarch swept away these pearls with a piece of cotton wool, which merged like drops of oil. He felt the warmth in the cotton wool, and with it the wick flared up, like gunpowder. The slab is first covered with cotton wool. According to eyewitnesses, this is sometimes done by non-believers to eliminate doubts on this matter.

There is also other evidence. The Metropolitan of Trans-Jordan, who received the Holy Fire more than once, said that when he entered the Edicule, the lamp standing on the Tomb was burning. And sometimes - no, then he fell and with tears began to ask for mercy from God, and when he rose, the lamp was already burning. From it he lit two bunches of candles, carried them out and gave the fire to the people waiting for him. But he himself never saw the fire light up.

After the Patriarch leaves the Edicule, or rather he is taken to the Altar, the people rush inside the Tomb to venerate. The whole slab is wet, as if it had been wet by rain." Excerpt taken from the book: Holy Fire over the Holy Sepulcher, 1991.

According to eyewitnesses, the fire does not burn for the first minutes after the descent. Here's what they write:

“Yes, and I, a sinful slave from the Metropolitan’s hands, lit 20 candles in one place and burned my candles with all those candles, and not a single hair curled or burned; and having extinguished all the candles and then lit them from other people, I warmed those candles, so and on the third day I too lit those candles, and then without touching anything, not a single hair was scorched or writhed, and I am damned, not believing that the heavenly fire and the message of God, and so I lit my candles three times and extinguished, and before Metropolitan and before all the Greeks, he said goodbye to the fact that he blasphemed God’s power and called heavenly fire, that the Greeks are doing sorcery, and not God’s creation; and the Metropolitan blessed me in all his simplicity and blessings.” The life and journey to Jerusalem and Egypt of Kazan resident Vasily Yakovlevich Gagara (1634-1637).

"Father Georgy films everything with a video camera, takes photographs. I also take a few pictures. We have ten packs of candles prepared with us. I extend my hand with candles to the burning bundles in people’s hands, I light them. I scoop up this flame with my palm, it is large, warm, light - light yellow, I hold my hand on fire - it doesn’t burn! I bring it to my face, the flame licks my beard, nose, eyes, I feel only warmth and a gentle touch - it doesn’t burn!!!" Priest from Novosibirsk.

“It’s amazing... At first, the Fire doesn’t burn, it’s just warm. They wash themselves with it, rub it over the face, apply it to the chest - and nothing. There was a case, one nun’s apostle’s pennant caught fire, and there was no trace left. Another burned through her cassock. She carried it home with a hole, but when I came, there was no hole.” Archimandrite Bartholomew (Kalugin), monk of the Trinity-Sergius Lavra, 1983.

“I try to take Fire in my palm and find that it is material. You can touch it, in your palm it feels like a material substance, it is soft, neither hot nor cold.” Parishioner of the Church of St. Nicholas in Biryulyovo Natalia.

The people who are in the temple at this time are overwhelmed with an indescribable and incomparable in its depth feeling of joy and spiritual peace. According to those who visited the square and the temple itself when the fire descended, the depth of feelings overwhelming the people at that moment was fantastic - eyewitnesses left the temple as if born again, as they themselves say, spiritually cleansed and cleared of sight.

Many non-Orthodox people, when they first hear about the Holy Fire, try to reproach the Orthodox: how do you know that it was given specifically to you? What if he was received by a representative of another Christian denomination? However, attempts to forcefully challenge the right to receive the Holy Fire from representatives of other faiths have happened more than once.

The most significant incident occurred in 1579. The owners of the Temple of the Lord are simultaneously representatives of several Christian Churches. To the priests Armenian Church, contrary to tradition, they managed to bribe Sultan Murat the Truthful and the local mayor to allow them to individually celebrate Easter and receive the Holy Fire. At the call of the Armenian clergy, many of their co-religionists came to Jerusalem from all over the Middle East to celebrate Easter alone. The Orthodox, together with Patriarch Sophrony IV, were removed not only from the edicule, but also from the Temple in general. There, at the entrance to the shrine, they remained to pray for the descent of the Fire, grieving over their separation from Grace. The Armenian Patriarch prayed for about a day, however, despite his prayer efforts, no miracle followed. At one moment, a ray struck from the sky, as usually happens during the descent of Fire, and hit the column at the entrance, next to which the Orthodox Patriarch was located. Splashes of fire splashed out from it in all directions and a candle was lit by the Orthodox Patriarch, who passed on the Holy Fire to his co-religionists. This was the only case in history when the descent took place outside the Temple, actually through the prayers of the Orthodox, and not the Armenian high priest. “Everyone rejoiced, and the Orthodox Arabs began to jump for joy and shout: “You are our one God, Jesus Christ, our one true faith is the faith of Orthodox Christians,” writes monk Parthenius. At the same time, in the enfilades of buildings adjacent to the temple square there were Turkish soldiers. One of them, named Omir (Anvar), seeing what was happening, exclaimed: “One Orthodox faith, I am a Christian” and jumped down onto the stone slabs from a height of about 10 meters. However, the young man did not crash - the slabs melted under his feet. wax, capturing his traces. For the adoption of Christianity, Muslims executed the brave Anwar and tried to scrape off the traces that so clearly testified to the triumph of Orthodoxy, but they failed, and those who come to the Temple can still see them, as well as the dissected column at the door of the temple. The body of the martyr was burned, but the Greeks collected the remains, which until late XIX centuries were in convent Great Panagia, exuding fragrance.

The Turkish authorities were very angry with the arrogant Armenians, and at first they even wanted to execute the hierarch, but later they had mercy and decided to edify him about what happened at the Easter ceremony to always follow the Orthodox Patriarch and henceforth not take direct part in receiving the Holy Fire. Although the government has long since changed, the custom continues to this day.

The Holy Fire is the greatest miracle of God for all people. For believers - indescribable bliss and joy in Christ, for non-believers - the opportunity to see and believe!

In 2001, the Locum Tenens of the Patriarchal Throne of the Church of Jerusalem, Metropolitan Cornelius of Petra, in an interview with the program “GCRIZES ZONES” on the Greek TV channel “MEGA”, recalled that “every creation of God is good, because it is sanctified by the word of God and prayer” (1 Tim. 4:4- 5). According to him, in the case of the Holy Fire, or as it is called in Greek – the Holy Light, “ we're talking about about natural, natural light, but the prayers that are read by the Patriarch or another bishop replacing him sanctify this natural light, and as a result it has the grace of the Holy Light. This is natural light, which is lit from the Unquenchable Lamp, kept in the sacristy of the Church of the Resurrection. But prayers have the power to sanctify natural light, and it becomes supernatural light. The miracle is in the epiclesis, in the prayer of the bishop; this light is sanctified by it"

Of course, I am in awe of this event. And, of course, I really don’t like hysteria, no matter what authoritative mouth it comes from. I also want to say that we at the Russian Spiritual Mission began to study the text of the Rite of the Holy Light. In this rite we are talking about the fact that “Christ is the True Light”, that “the Light of Christ enlightens everyone.” When the Resurrection of Christ occurred, a glow was visible. It is clear that the Light of Christ or the Light of Tabor is not actually a flame, it is precisely the Divine Light. But we, people, are always trying to replace the living God with His image, His icon - it is more convenient for us to pray this way, otherwise we cannot accommodate Him in our limited consciousness. We have the Body and Blood of Christ under the guise of bread and wine, therefore the Divine Light is presented in the form of Fire, which we can actually see, which we can even kindle ourselves."

Easter will come on April 24th. The culmination of the main Christian holiday there will be a descent of the Holy Fire in the Church of the Holy Sepulcher. Disputes will arise again about what the miraculous fire is, how to explain its occurrence? Atheists are convinced that this is just a hoax. Believers, on the contrary, think that this is a real miracle. Who is right?

Strange discharge

Quite recently, a report appeared in the press that a Russian physicist, an employee of the Russian Research Center “Kurchatov Institute” Andrei Volkov last year attended the ceremony of the descent of the Holy Fire and secretly made some measurements.

According to Volkov, a few minutes before the removal of the Holy Fire from the Edicule (the chapel where the miraculous fire lights up), a device recording the spectrum electromagnetic radiation, detected a strange long-wave pulse in the temple, which no longer manifested itself. That is, an electrical discharge occurred.

The physicist came to Jerusalem as an assistant to one of the film crews who received permission to work inside the temple. According to him, it is difficult to judge anything reliably from one measurement, since a series of experiments is required. But still, “it could also turn out that we have detected the reason preceding the appearance of the genuine divine Holy Fire”...

Today, closer to midnight, a plane with the Holy Fire landed at Vnukovo airport. According to tradition, the sacred fire from the Church of the Holy Sepulcher in Jerusalem was taken to the Cathedral of Christ the Savior, and particles of Fire were delivered to various churches throughout the country.

But what is the Holy Fire - a trick for believers or the True Light - a Russian physicist managed to find out. Scientist from the Institute atomic energy with the help of high-precision instruments, he was able to prove that the Holy Fire is actually of divine origin.

The head of the laboratory of ion systems at the Kurchatov Institute, Andrei Volkov, succeeded in doing something that no other scientist in the world had ever succeeded in: he conducted a scientific experiment in the Church of the Holy Sepulcher in Jerusalem.

At the moment of the descent of the Holy Fire, instruments recorded a sharp surge of electromagnetic radiation.

52-year-old candidate of physical and mathematical sciences Andrei Volkov has always been interested in the phenomenon of unusual spontaneous combustion in the Church of the Holy Sepulcher, which happens on the eve of Orthodox Easter. This fire appears by itself, in the first seconds it does not burn; believers wash their faces and hands with it, as if with water. Volkov suggested that this flame was a plasma discharge. And the scientist came up with the idea of ​​a bold experiment - to measure electromagnetic radiation in the temple itself during the descent of the Holy Fire.

I understood that it would not be easy to do this - in Holy place with the equipment they might not let us in,” Andrei Volkov told Your Day. - And yet I decided to take a risk, since all the devices fit in a regular case. In general, I hoped for luck. And I was lucky.

Radiation

The scientist set up the instruments: if during the descent of the Holy Fire there is a jump in electromagnetic fields, the computer will record it. If the flame is a trick that is arranged for believers (this explanation of the phenomenon is still in use among atheists), then no leap will occur.

Volkov watched as the Patriarch of Jerusalem, having taken off his vestments, wearing only a shirt, entered the Edicule (chapel in the Temple) with a bunch of candles. People froze, waiting for a miracle. After all, according to legend, if the Holy Fire does not descend on people on Easter Eve, it will be a sign of the approaching end of the world. Andrei Volkov found out that the miracle had happened before anyone else who was in the temple - his instruments detected a sharp jump!

During six hours of observation electromagnetic background in the temple, it was at the moment of the descent of the Holy Fire that the device recorded a doubling of the radiation intensity, the physicist testifies. - Now it is clear that the Holy Fire was not created by people. This is not a deception, not a hoax: its material “traces” can be measured!

In fact, this inexplicable burst of energy can be called a message from God?

Many believers think so. This is the materialization of the Divine, a miracle. You can't find another word. God's plan cannot be squeezed into mathematical formulas. But the Lord, by this miracle every year, gives us a sign that Orthodox faith- true!

"Fire like a cobra"

An argument in favor of the fact that the Holy Fire is of “natural” and not divine origin is the fact that similar phenomena do occur. Of course, in no case should they be placed on a par with the fire in the Temple of the Lord. However, there are some common features.

Let's start with such a sign as suddenness, absence apparent reason. The same property is characteristic of such a phenomenon as spontaneous combustion, which is not so rare. For example, “Buff Garden” last month wrote about an abnormal fire on Bolshaya Podgornaya Street that occurred last spring. This is far from an isolated case. And not only for Tomsk. For example, causeless fires are not uncommon in Moscow. The most surprising thing is that this happens especially often on the Garden Ring. Moreover, not only apartments and offices are burning, but even car interiors.

Let's take another sign of the Holy Fire - the property of not burning, at least for the first time. This already looks like the so-called cold plasma, a low-temperature ionized substance. It seems that such plasma exists not only in physics laboratories.

Here is a quote from the newspaper “Shakhtarsky Krai”, Novokuznetsk. A case is described when a firefighter went to a call and saw something completely unusual before his eyes. “I somehow broke into a room in the middle of which hovered an orange-blue selective column of flame. The fire stood in like a cobra vertical position as if he was preparing to jump. I took a step towards the flame, and it was immediately sucked into a hole in the floor with a whistle... And when we extinguished the barracks on Vera Solomina Street, the fire seemed to be hiding from us, spreading from one wall to another...” Notice that the flame wriggled, “hidden,” but did not cause a fire.

Science and myths

There are cases when a mysterious flame or glow, taken for miracles, was eventually found scientific explanation. According to old beliefs, the lights flickering in the swamps are candles used to illuminate the path of lost souls. It is now reliably known that will-o'-the-wisps are nothing more than flammable swamp gas released from rotting plants. The bluish glow on the masts and frames of ships - the so-called "St. Elmo's lights", observed since the Middle Ages - is caused by lightning discharges at sea. And what about the northern lights, which in Scandinavian myths is the reflection of the golden shields of the Valkyries? Scientists explain this phenomenon by the interaction of streams of charged particles passing through the upper layers of the atmosphere, through magnetic field Earth.

However, some cases still remain a mystery. In 1905, Welsh preacher Mary Jones was visited by mysterious lights. Their appearance varied from small balls of fire, columns of light a meter wide, to a faint glow reminiscent of fireworks disintegrating in the sky. Moreover, some researchers explained the appearance of mysterious lights by the mental stress that Jones experienced during sermons.

We should not guess, but explore

Let us return to where we started, to the wonderful Holy Fire in Jerusalem. It turns out that Moscow physicist Andrei Volkov was almost ahead of Tomsk residents. The year before last I was planning to go to Jerusalem research group, among whom were the director of the Biolon center Viktor Fefelov and the famous photojournalist Vladimir Kazantsev.

— We wanted to study the Holy Fire with the help physical devices, says Viktor Fefelov. - With the help of Tomsk scientists scientific center assembled equipment: an automatic spectrophotometer, other various instruments for studying electromagnetic waves of the widest range... Outwardly, everything would look like filming with a regular video camera, in fact, a thorough analysis would be carried out from X-ray and gamma radiation to low-frequency. We completely unbiasedly hoped to find the answer - either this is a miracle, or a natural phenomenon, or deception.

Unfortunately, due to problems with visas, the trip was canceled. Although many Tomsk residents provided one form of support or another: corresponding member of the Russian Academy of Sciences Vladimir Zuev, deputy Nikolai Vyatkin, director of the television studio Elena Ulyanova and others. The researchers also received approval in church circles. Perhaps it will be possible next year.

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Perhaps the answer lies in geophysics? That is, it’s all about the release of a clot of tectonic, underground energy to the surface in the form of low-frequency electromagnetic radiation, which Volkov was able to detect?

“The Earth is a very large, extremely complex electromagnetic object,” says Viktor Fefelov, “and extremely little studied. It is likely that there is a tectonic contribution to this phenomenon. There is no need to guess, we need to explore.

Indeed, perhaps the Holy Fire is due to many reasons? Edicule is in a unique place in terms of plate tectonic dynamics. Perhaps the believers gathered at the Temple of the Lord also generate energy, which, thanks to a large number emotionally excited people increases many times over? Let us recall the aforementioned case of the preacher Mary Jones.

There may be other factors that we don't yet know about.

JERUSALEM, April 7 – RIA Novosti, Anton Skripunov. After several hours of tense waiting at the chapel of the Holy Sepulcher, tens of thousands of people witnessed what they believed was a miracle. A RIA Novosti correspondent was present at the ceremony and saw everything with his own eyes.

Rogues

Getting to church on Holy Saturday is not easy. Usually members of official delegations from different countries peace. Even at the entrance to the old part of the city, Israeli police give them name badges - every year different designs in order to avoid fakes.

At the Jaffa and Zion gates stand those who came on their own. In addition to the miracle of the Holy Fire, they hope for one more thing - to get inside the temple. Chernivtsi native Larisa has been able to do this for six years now.

“Every year I get there in different ways. I usually ask some official delegation to take me with them. Sometimes I go through an unreal crush - with people like me,” she opens up.

Screams in the temple

Father Fyodor Konyukhov is wearing a shirt and vest today, not a cassock. This is his first time at the ceremony of the descent of the Holy Fire. This famous traveler, who has faced danger more than once, is clearly worried.

“The land itself is awe-inspiring. When you walk on it, you feel awe,” he admits.

Together with other members of the delegation of the St. Andrew the First-Called Foundation, he quickly walks along the narrow streets of the Armenian Quarter towards the Church of the Holy Sepulchre. More than a hundred Russians came to Jerusalem for the Holy Fire. Members of the delegation will take the shrine to different cities and countries, including Abkhazia, Italy and Great Britain.

And now part of the delegation, led by the Chairman of the Foundation’s Board of Trustees, Vladimir Yakunin, is standing right next to the Edicule - the chapel over the Holy Sepulcher. And the other part of it waits nearby, in the Greek part of the temple.

The temple, with a capacity of over ten thousand people, is crowded from 10 o’clock, although the ceremony itself does not begin until two. “I remember a few years ago I saw a pilgrim who stood on a stone bench against the wall on one leg for six hours. Six hours! He, poor thing, kept shifting from foot to foot, but survived,” says Vadim Zelenev, a member of the Russian delegation. It's also very stuffy. And water doesn’t help much. Unlike faith - in the resurrection of the Lord.

"Cheyshmariat ahthga!" - Georgians echo them.

"Christos anestis!" - the Cypriots pick up.

"Adevarat a inviat!" - the Romanians respond.

Arab ringleaders

After a couple of hours, the Easter roll call fades away. There is silence in the temple. Suddenly there is the ringing of tambourines and a rolling ringing crack - like something out of a movie about African tribes. Gradually the sounds intensify and drums join them. Two guys in white T-shirts burst into the temple, one sits on the shoulders of the other and shouts, waving a scarf: “Hey! Hey! Salaam!”

One day, Orthodox Arabs, living mainly in the Palestinian Authority, were not allowed to attend the ceremony. And the Holy Fire... did not appear. “And when they were finally allowed inside the temple and they began to shout, praising the Lord, the fire came down,” says nun Seraphima, a resident of the Gornensky Monastery in Jerusalem.

The Arabs bang drums, shout and wave their arms like rock stars or football fans do to get the crowd going. The legs forget about fatigue and begin to stomp to the beat. And they, without stopping for a minute, first walk around the perimeter of the entire temple, and then around the Edicule.

"We all die!"

The main participant in the ceremony is the Patriarch of Jerusalem. He enters the temple to the sound of sticks held in the hands of Kavas Turks, symbolic guards of the Church of the Holy Sepulcher. By the way, an Arab holds the key to the doors to the shrine.

A long procession slowly enters the temple through its Greek part and circles the Edicule three times with prayers and chants. After this, all liturgical clothes are removed from the Patriarch of Jerusalem, leaving him only in a cassock. Then he and the Armenian priest go inside. The priest remains in the Angel's chapel - the room preceding the Holy Sepulcher - only the head of the Jerusalem Orthodox Church can be in front of the stone where the body of Christ lay.

All the lights in the temple go out. A frightening silence sets in, even the Arabs became silent. “I get very scared at such moments. I’m afraid that the fire won’t go away. Do you know what will happen in that case?” — I remember the words of Larisa from Chernivtsi.

According to legend, if the fire does not go down, then everyone present in the temple will die instantly. Believers, knowing this, pray intensely.

Five minutes pass, ten. There is still no fire. The tension is rising. Someone, as if trying to summon him, constantly shouts: “Christ is risen!” And now - a cry of jubilation. The multifaceted crowd of ten thousand shouts with joy and relief: “He has come down! He has come down! Christ has risen!”

After twenty minutes, people begin to put out the candles and disperse from the lamps lit from them. The whole church is in smoke. Pilgrims are organizing a crowd again - they need to have time to bring the fire to their homeland before the start of the Easter service.

Father Fyodor Konyukhov looks tired, but very, very blissful.

“At first it was exciting. And then joyful. This means that the Lord still does not forget about us,” he tells RIA Novosti.

Ben Gurion Airport is ahead. Now the Holy Fire will be delivered to the patriarchal service in the Cathedral of Christ the Savior in Moscow and in churches in the capital and Moscow region, St. Petersburg, Tula, Yekaterinburg, Tver, Vladimir and others Russian cities. And tens of thousands of Orthodox believers will be able to see this symbolic confirmation that Christ has risen. And testify: “Truly he is risen!”