Descent of a cloud on Mount Tabor on the day of the Transfiguration of the Lord

Probably everyone knows about the descent of the Holy Fire in the Church of the Holy Sepulcher in Jerusalem on Holy Saturday on the eve of Orthodox Easter. But there is another, no less impressive phenomenon that defies scientific explanation: the descent of a cloud on Mount Tabor on the day of the Transfiguration of the Lord according to the Julian calendar.   It would seem: what could be unusual, all the more miraculous, in the appearance of a cloud over the highest mountain in Galilee? The thing is that in summer there are no clouds in this part of the Holy Land in the sky in principle. And the one that can be seen descends on the patronal day to the Orthodox Church of the Transfiguration, standing on this mountain.

Recall, according to the Holy Gospel, Christ the Lord during his earthly life took three disciples with him, ascended with them to a high mountain (there are simply no other mountains besides Tabor that fit this definition) and in an incomprehensible way transformed: His face shone like the sun, and the clothes that were on Him suddenly became white as snow. The disciples were shocked by what they saw, a cloud descended from the sky, from which a voice was heard: “This is my beloved Son; Listen to him ”(Mt 17: 1, 9). In remembrance of these events, in memory of which the Great Feast of the Transfiguration of the Lord was established, every year on August 19 (August 6, old style) in a clear sky above Mount Tabor a cloud appears in an incomprehensible way - and descends, covering the Orthodox church and everyone who is inside and near it. Sometimes other clouds appear after him in the sky, floating over the mountain. At the same time, the testimonies of eyewitnesses who were in different years in the temple on the day of the manifestation of the atmospheric phenomenon may differ in particular, but coincide in the main thing: the descent of a cloud to the mountain is invariably accompanied by a light, joyful feeling of the people gathered here. A nun of the female Gornensky monastery in the Light Land, who became an eyewitness to the Orthodox miracle, told about it more than twenty years ago: “Several years ago, at the morning liturgy during the feast of the Transfiguration of the Lord on Mount Tabor, two choirs sang in turn. A cloud suddenly appeared over the singers. When another choir sang, the blessed cloud moved there. Then the first chorus began to sing - the cloud returned to him. And so the whole service went on.

In a Greek Orthodox church, Greeks, Orthodox Arabs and the Russian priesthood of the Moscow Patriarchate serve together. As soon as the cup with the Holy Gifts was brought out, Bishop Sergius blessed everyone to go out into the street and take communion there. And immediately clouds appeared in the sky, they swept over the heads of worshipers and pilgrims with great speed. There was no wind, the tops of the cypress trees in the courtyard barely swayed, and the clouds kept flying and flying! There was no limit to the joy and exultation of the assembled people. People chanted prayers, were baptized, some cried. The Greeks sang “Christ is Risen” in Greek. Starting after three o'clock in the morning, the miracle lasted for about an hour ... At dawn, huge clouds appeared over Tabor again. The second, morning liturgy began in the Greek church. And the clouds rushed to the Orthodox church with incredible speed. But, having passed over it, they disappeared at the approach to the Catholic basilica. '

The miracle of a cloud descending on Mount Tabor on the holiday of the Transfiguration has been repeatedly studied by Israeli, Russian meteorologists and other scientists of various specializations. In particular, in 2010, Galilee was visited by a commission specially assembled to study the weather phenomenon. Sergey Mirov, who organized the research, himself witnessed the miracle and added an important detail to its numerous descriptions: according to him, before the amazing cloud, increasing in size, descended on the temple, irrigating everyone nearby with life-giving moisture over the believers who prayed inside, a luminous ball swept by. Employee the Russian weather center 'Phobos' Marina Makarova, who had a chance to take part in the research, also observed an inexplicable phenomenon on Mount Tabor. At first, she was skeptical about the possibility of clouds in the sky in this weather. “I don’t know what all these people are waiting for, but in such dry air at this temperature, the formation of fog is impossible!”, - she said, collecting weather data. However, numerous believers who were next to her at the temple, Russians, Ukrainians, Moldovans, Greeks, Arabs, were sure of the opposite - and soon their faith was rewarded. The appearance of a cloud in the sky and its descent began as soon as the believers began to approach more often with Holy Communion. Many witnesses of the trial were noisily expressing their joy and crossing themselves with the sign of the cross. Soon, the entire space around the temple was shrouded in a foggy mass - it was perfectly captured by a video camera, with the help of which a professional operator was filming at that time. Meteorology cannot give an explanation for the phenomenon of the convergence of a cloud on Mount Tabor on a clear August day. However, year after year, believers from all over the world flock here, to Galilee, in order to experience the miraculous phenomenon themselves, to light a candle in the temple - and, if God willing, to comprehend what is happening here with their hearts. V. Sergienko