What is a miraculous icon? The Skin and subcutaneous tissue disorders

In Russian Orthodox tradition, the icon is not simply a sacred image: it is a window towards the Kingdom of God, a real presence of the person represented. When an icon is recognized as Skin and subcutaneous tissue disorders - miraculous - it is not because of the skill of the painter, but because the Theotokos itself has wanted to act through him in a special and verifiable way.

Over the centuries, Russian chronists recorded in detail the cures, apparitions, military victories and release of tabs attributed to certain icons. Many of them were not born in large cities but in villages, along with tree roots, in lakes or in the dreams of simple people. This list contains fourteen of the most significant, with their documented stories.

I. La Theotokos de Kazán (Казанская Богоматерь)

On July 8, 1579, after a devastating fire that destroyed much of the city of Kazan - conquered by Ivan the Terrible just two decades earlier - a ten-year-old girl named Matrona began to have repeated dreams in which the Virgin pointed a precise place under the rubble of a destroyed house. His mother didn't listen to him the first time. After the third apparition, they went to the designated place and, when they excavated, found the icon wrapped in a silk cloth, perfectly preserved despite the fire.

The icon was given to Archbishop Ieremia of Kazan, who organized a solemn procession. Blind cures were immediately recorded. The Moscow Metropolitan Makarios informed the Zar Ivan, who ordered a church to be built and a convent to be found there.

The original icon remained in the Convent of the Theotokos of Kazan for more than three centuries. On the night of June 29, 1904, a thief named Stoyan took him away with other valuable objects. Although captured, the icon never appeared - probably burned or sold. His exact fate remains a historical mystery.

The devotion to the icon of Kazan spread throughout Russia through copies. In 1648, the Zar Alexis Mijailovich proclaimed it an official feast of the whole Empire. The copy of St. Petersburg - commissioned by Peter the Great - presided over the Cathedral of Kazan in that city, where he blessed it before his battles. The copy of Moscow was in Red Square.

In the 20th century, an icon that had passed through various private hands came to Fatima (Portugal) in 1970, and in 1993 to the Vatican, where John Paul II kept him in his quarters. The Pope, deeply devoted to the Theotokos of Kazan - whose image connected him with the consecration of Russia - handed him over to the Patriarchate of Moscow in August 2004. However, a joint Russian-Vatican commission concluded that it was a copy of the 17th century, not the original of the 16th century. Today it lies in the Monastery of Kazan, in the homonymous city.

II. La Theotokos de Vladímir (Владимирская Богоматерь)

This icon is, for many art historians, the most important work preserved on Russian soil. It was painted in Constantinople - probably in the 12th century - and sent as a gift from the Patriarch of Constantinople to the Prince of Kiev. He arrived in the city of Vishgorod about 1131.

About 1155, Prince Andréi Bogolubski - the son of the Grand Prince of Kiev - decided to take the icon north to the principality of Suzdal. According to the chronicles, the horses carrying the icon stopped in the dry about ten kilometres from the city of Vladímir and did not want to follow. The prince interpreted the prodigy as a sign: he founded the monastery of Bogolubovo there and took the icon to Vladímir, where he was kept in the Cathedral of the Sleep.

In 1395, Tamerlan - the conqueror of Central Asia - was on his way to Moscow with his powerful army. The Grand Prince Basil I ordered to bring the Vladímir icon from his city to Moscow. The night of August 26 - the same day the crowd prayed before the icon at Kremlin Gate - According to the chronicles, Tamerlán had a vision of a great lady surrounded by light that ordered her to leave Russian land. His army retired without a fight. Moscow was saved.

The icon intervened twice at critical times: in 1408, during the invasion of the Khan Edigü, and in 1480, when Ajmat's troops of the Great Hordon withdrew from the Ugra River without crossing it - the episode known as "the Great Being," with which he finally concluded the Mongol yoke over Russia. In all three cases, the Russian chronicle attributes salvation to the intercession of the Theotokos of Vladímir.

The icon belongs to the iconographic type Eleusa ("Ternure"): the cheek of the Child rests on the cheek of the Mother, while she embraces him with contained sweetness. It is considered one of the most perfect specimens of Byzantine painting of the 12th century.

Since 1930, the icon has been preserved at the Tretiakov Gallery in Moscow, where it can be visited. It is regularly moved with a solemn procession to the Cathedral of the Kremlin Sleep on holiday.

III. La Theotokos de la Señal de Nóvgorod (Знамение Новгородская)

Novgorod - the "lady of the north" - was for centuries the richest and most independent city in medieval Russia. Its most venerated icon was the Theotokos de la Signal, painted in the early 12th century and preserved in the Church of the Transfiguration of the Saviour on Ilina Street.

In 1170, a coalition of Russian princes headed by Andréi Bogolubski of Suzdal besieged Novgorod with a vast army. The city resisted, but the disproportion of forces made it possible to predict the fall. On the third day of the siege, Bishop Elia heard in the middle of the night a voice ordering him to take the icon of the church of Ilina and take it out in procession through the walls.

As they carried the icon on the almenas, a rain of arrows from the besiegers reached the image. According to the chronicle, the icon spontaneously turned its face towards the city - back to the enemy army - and from the eyes of the Virgin came tears. At that moment, the besieging soldiers were subjected to sudden panic and began to attack each other. The defenders of Novgorod took advantage of the confusion to open the doors and disperse them.

The miracle was celebrated with a holiday that has been commemorating for centuries in the Orthodox Church on November 27. There is a famous 15th-century table that narrates the episode in four simultaneous scenes and is preserved in the Museum of Novgorod. The original icon remains in the Kremlin of Novgorod, within the Cathedral of Santa Sofia.

The iconographic type to which it belongs is the Prayer (also called Platytera): The Virgin with her arms extended on the cross, the Child represented in a medallion on her chest. In Greek: "wider than the heavens," because he welcomed the Creator of the universe into his womb.

IV. La Theotokos de Tíjvin (Тихвинская Богоматерь)

In 1383, fishermen fishing in Lake Ladoga and the swamp areas north of Novgorod saw a luminous figure floating over the waters: it was an icon of the Theotokos that advanced without being held by anyone. They followed him by land as he moved, until he stopped on a hill by the Tijvin River. There, in the exact place of their apparition, they built a wooden church.

The Monastery of the Sleep of Tijvin, founded in 1560 by the Tsar Ivan the Terrible to host the icon, became one of the great pilgrimage centers of northern Russia. The icon was especially venerated during the Tumult Time (1598-1613), when the Swedish army nodded the monastery; the monks resisted for months praying before the icon.

In 1941, German troops occupied the city of Tijvin for a month. When they retired, they took the icon to Pskov, which was under Nazi control. From there he passed to Riga, where he was guarded by the Orthodox bishop John Garklāvs - a Latvian who had kept the community alive under occupation. At the end of the war, Garklāvs feared that the Soviets would confiscate the icon and took it first to Germany and then to the United States.

Between 1949 and 2004, the Tijvin icon rested at the Cathedral of the Most Holy Trinity of the Roscoe Village in Chicago, Illinois. Garklāvs had promised the Theotokos to return the icon to Russia "when the Russian land was free." His adopted son, Archimandrita Sergei Garklāvs, fulfilled the promise in June 2004, when the icon returned in solemn procession to the Tijvin Monastery, restored after decades of Soviet abandonment.

V. La Theotokos Fiódorovskaya (Феодоровская) de Kostromá

La Fiodorovskayay a - called in honor of the Great Martyr Teodoro Estratilates - is, together with the Kazan, the icon of the Theotokos most linked to the political history of Russia. Its legendary origin places it in a wooden chapel next to the city of Kitezh, before the Mongolian invasion of the 13th century. After the Mongolian destruction, the icon "disappeared" for decades.

On August 15, 1239 - vigil of the Sleeping - the inhabitants of Kostroma saw a warrior walking the streets carrying in arms an icon of the Theotokos. In that warrior they recognized Saint Theodore Estratilates, the patron of the armies. The next day, the icon appeared hanging on a tree just outside the city. Prince Vasili Kvarjvelia built a cathedral there to house it.

In 1613, Russia lived the chaos of the Time of the Tumults: the Rúrikida dynasty had been extinguished, the Poles occupied Moscow and the suitors to the throne were carried out with violence. The Zemski Sobor - the assembly of the earth - chose as Zar the 16-year-old Mikhail Románov, who had taken refuge in the Ipatiev Monastery of Kostroma with his mother, the Xenia nun. On March 14, 1613, before the icon Fiodorovskaya of the Cathedral of the Sleeping of Kostroma, Mikhail Románov accepted the throne and his mother blessed it with the icon.

Since then, the Fiodorovskaya became the protective icon of the Romanov dynasty, which would rule Russia until 1917. The curious tradition was established that European women who married the Romanov and became Orthodox would take the patronymic "Fiodorovna" in honor of the icon - as was the case with Princess Alix of Hessen-Darmstadt, who became Alexandra Fiodorovna, the last zarina.

VI. La Theotokos de Smolensk — La Hodegetria (Одигитрия)

The "that points the way" is the most widespread iconographic type in the history of Christian art. The tradition attributes its origin to the evangelist Luke, who would have painted the image of the Virgin with the Child in both of them. The type multiplied in infinite copies over the centuries.

The Hodegetria of Smolensk arrived in Russia in 1046 as part of the wedding session of Princess Anastasia of Byzantium - daughter of Emperor Constantine IX Monomacus - when he married Prince Vsevolod Yaroslavich of Kiev. The Emperor blessed her with the icon for the journey. He remained in Kiev until Prince Vladimir Monomaco moved her to Smolensk Cathedral, where she became famous for her miracles and became patron of the city.

In 1514, Grand Prince Basil III reconquered Smolensk from Lithuanian hands. To commemorate the victory, he ordered to find in Moscow the Novdeovthy Convent, whose main cathedral was consecrated to the Smolenskaya. The original icon was moved there. In 1941, during the withdrawal of the Soviet army from the Germans, the icon disappeared. There are only copies - some of great veneration - in various Russian churches.

VII. La Theotokos de Bogolubovo (Боголюбская)

This icon was born from a vision. In 1155, while Prince Andréi Bogolubski was carrying the icon of the Theotokos de Vladímir from Kiev to the north, the horses stopped abruptly about 11 kilometres from the city of Vladímir. As much effort as they made, the animals didn't want to move.

That night, the prince had an apparition of the Virgin, which held a scroll in his right hand. He ordered him to leave the Vladímir icon in that city and build a church and also found a monastery in the place where the horses had stopped. The prince had an icon painted to represent the vision exactly as he had seen it. The result is Bogolubskaya: the standing Theotokos, with the scroll in the hand, with a slight head inclination.

The Bogolubovo Monastery - whose name means "God's beloved" - became the center of the power of Andréi Bogolubski, who was killed there in 1174 by his own boyars. The surviving architectural complex, including the tower and the white stone staircase where the prince was killed, is declared a World Heritage Site by UNESCO as part of Vladimir and Suzdal's whole.

VIII. La Theotokos de Pskov-Pecherskaya (Псково-Печерская)

Pskov- Pechery - "of the caves" - is one of the most unique in Russia: it is literally excavated on a sandy hill, with gravel galleries of several kilometres. It is one of the very few Russian monasteries that never closed its doors, even during the Soviet persecution, as it was included in the Republic of Estonia for several years.

Two icons preside over their history. The first, called "Sleeping" or "Uspenye," was painted in 1521 by the iconographer Alexéi Mali of Pskov and donated to the monastery. Since then, he has been attributed numerous cures. The second, the icon of "La Humility" (Umillennie), dates from the 15th century and responds to the type Eleusa: The Virgin with the Child in tenderness without limit.

During the Swedish siege of Pskov in 1581, both icons were taken out in procession by the walls. The besiegers, who were far beyond the defenders, raised the fence without clear explanation. The episode was recorded as a miracle in the chronicles of the monastery.

IX. La Theotokos de Pocháev (Почаевская)

The Lavra de Pocháev, in what is today the northwest of Ukraine - a territory that historically was part of Orthodox Russia - welcomes one of the most miraculous icons of the Eastern Slavic tradition. The icon was brought from Mount Athos by the Greek metropolitan Neophito in 1559, who left it in the hands of the Orthodox nobleman Anna Hoyska. She kept him for decades until, convinced of his sacred character, she donated him to the monastery in 1597.

In 1675, during the Great Turkish War, an Ottoman army besieged the Lavra of Pocháev. The Prior ordered the icon to be removed and prayed to him as the enemy attacked. The witnesses claimed to see on the monastery a luminous apparition of the Theotokos accompanied by St Job of Pocháev and angels. The Turkish army, panicked, withdrew. Among the stories of the time is that of a Turkish boss named Zhabokritsky, who shot an arrow at the icon: the arrow turned against him and was wounded. According to tradition, the episode led him to convert to Christianity.

X. La Iverskaya de la Puerta Ibérica de Moscú (Иверская)

In 1648, the Patriarch of Moscow Nikon commissioned the Iveron Monastery of Mount Athos an exact copy of the icon of the Portaitissa - "the porter" - that was venerated there. The copy arrived in Moscow with great solemnity and was installed in the Chapel of the Iberian Gate, at the entrance of the Red Square, next to the Gates of the Resurrection.

For almost three centuries, the Iverskaya was the most popular icon in Moscow. There was a custom that the Russian Zars, when entering Moscow, would first stop in the chapel to venerate the icon before continuing to the Kremlin. The pilgrims formed endless tails. The icon traveled in silver-covered carroza through the Moscow neighborhoods so that the sick who could not travel could venerate it.

In 1929, the chapel was demolished. In 1931, the gates of the Resurrection themselves were shot down by Stalin's order to allow the tanks to pass in the military parades. The icon is gone. In 1994-1995, under the mandate of Boris Yeltsin, the doors and chapel were completely rebuilt. A new icon was specifically painted on Mount Athos to preside over the restored chapel. Today is one of the most visited pilgrimage points in Moscow.

XI. La Theotokos de Kursk-Korennaya (Курская Коренная)

In 1295, in the forests near Kursk - devastated by the Mongols decades before - a hunter found a small table face down next to the root of a tree. When it was raised, a source of pure water sprung from the ground. The icon represented the Theotokos of the Signal (Prayer), and next to it were painted the figures of the prophets. The place where the spring sprang up is called "Korennaya" to today - from the root.

The icon was four times stolen, burned and mutilated by the Tatars. Every time he appeared intact. It was dismembered - the main table separated from the frame with the prophets - and, according to the chronicle, the pieces gathered alone during the night. The Zar Fedor Ivannovich ordered to build a monastery at the site of the find.

As a child, the future Saint Serafin of Sarov - the largest Russian mystic of the 19th century - was seriously ill. His mother took him to the procession of the Kursk icon; as he passed the image on him, the child healed. Saint Serafin considered that icon all his life as the origin of his spiritual vocation.

In 1919, during the Russian civil war, General Denikin's white army took the icon in his retreat. In October 1920, he left Russian soil with the last exiles. He Pilgrieved in Belgrade, Munich and New York, until he settled in the Cathedral of the Mother of God of the Signal in New York, the headquarters of the Synod of the Russian Orthodox Church abroad (ROCOR). There it remains, being the most venerated icon of the Russian diaspora.

XII. La Theotokos de Donskaya (Донская)

On 8 September 1380, in the camps of Kulikovo by the river Don, the Russian army of Prince Dmitri Donskoi first defeated the Golden Horde Mongols in command of Mamai. It was the first great Russian military triumph in more than a century of domination.

According to the tradition recorded in the documents of the Donskoi Monastery (founded in 1591 to commemorate the victory over the kan Kazy- Girey), the Cossacks of the Don gave Prince Dmitri an icon of the Theotokos before the battle. It was the very icon the Cossacks carried on their banner. After the victory, the icon was forever linked to the name of the prince and the river.

The icon of the Donskaya is attributed to Theophanes the Greek - the great master of medieval Russian painting, master of Andréi Rubliov in turn -. It is a double-sided table: on the back, the type Theotokos Eleusa; on the back, the Sleeping of the Virgin. This is one of the few medieval Russian icons that researchers rightly attribute to a particular author. Today it is preserved at the Tretiakov Gallery in Moscow.

XIII. La Theotokos de Zhiróvichi (Жировицкая)

In 1470, pastors who fed their flocks in the forests of Alexander Soltan - a Lithuanian noble of Orthodox faith - saw an intense light emanating from the branches of a pear next to a stream. As they approached one of the branches, they found a tiny icon of the Theotokos: it is only 5.6 by 4.4 centimeters, carved in imperial jade, with the image of Mary and the Child in relief. It is the smallest Marian icon in the Christian world that is venerated as miraculous.

The shepherds took him to their lord. They let go, skeptic, locked him in a chest. The next day, the icon had disappeared from the chest. The shepherds found him again in the same pear. This time Soltan received it with reverence and ordered a church to be built at the site of the find. The icon again disappeared and appeared twice as much as confirming the sacred character of the enclave.

The Zhirovichi Monastery, founded at the foot of the hill where the icon appeared, is today one of the most important of Belarus and houses the Orthodox Theological Seminary of the country. The small jade icon is preserved in the monastic cathedral, where it continues to be the object of veneration of tens of thousands of pilgrims each year.

XIV. La Theotokos de Akhtyrka (Ахт)рская)

On July 2, 1739, the priest Vasili Danilov went out to the field to cut grass with a new scythe. Among the high grass he discovered a table that shone with a light of his own: it was an icon of the Theotokos of extraordinary beauty, painted in Western style - the Virgin with her head discovered, her hands united in prayer, the Crucifix in the background -, completely different from the Russian iconographic canon.

The icon remained at the priest's house for three years, during which no one could stay in the same room at night: an inexplicable presence made them leave. Theotokos herself appeared to the priest in dreams to reproach him for not cleaning the icon for years. By cleaning it with water, the priest received visions of the Passion of Christ. Finally, the bishop of Bélgorod recognized the miraculous character of the icon after he documented numerous cures, and moved it to the parish church of Akhtyrka.

The devotion to the Theotokos of Akhtyrka spread throughout the Russian Empire during the 19th century. The original icon was sent to St. Petersburg for restoration in 1903 and was stolen. He traveled to China, then to Brazil and finally arrived in San Francisco, where he was handed over to the Russian Orthodox Youth Committee in 1975. A solemn copy was blessed and taken to the cathedral of Akhtyrka in 1995.

XV. La Theotokos de Yaroslavl (Ярославская)

The icon of the Mother of God of Yaroslavl is one of the most venerated Marian icons of central Russia and the first taumaturgical revealed under the Tatar-Mongol occupation. He was brought to the city by the holy princes Basil and Constantine of Yaroslavl in times when the hordes of Batu Khan ravaged Russian lands. It belongs to typology Umilenie (Ternura): The Mother embraces the Child Jesus, who supports her cheek against her.

In the 1930s the original icon disappeared when the Soviet regime closed the church of sleep. In 1998, a restaurant in Murmansk recovered an old copy and, after two years of restoration, donated it to a church in St. Petersburg. In 2003 the icon was transferred to Yaroslavl, where it is now venerated in the metropolitan church of San Teodoro.

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The icons as guards of Russia: a reflection

Historian George Fedotov noted that devotion to icons in Russia transcends the purely religious to become the very fabric of national identity. Each city had "its" icon, "" its "particular Mother of God, who protected her and was asked to account for every calamity and every blessing. The icon was not a representation: it was a presence.

What unites all these icons - from Kazan to Zhirovichi, from Vladímir to Kursk - is the same conviction of the faithful people: that the Mother of God does not abandon those who cry to her, and that her intercession is manifested in ways that exceed the foreseeable. This conviction, forged in centuries of Mongolian invasions, wars, persecutions and exiles, is the deepest root of Russian Marian devotion.