The Elevation of the Holy Cross – Day of the Cross

On this day, two events related to the Holy Cross of Christ are celebrated: first, the discovery of the Holy Cross on Golgotha, and second, the return of the Holy Cross from Persia back to Jerusalem. Visiting the Holy Land of St. Empress Jelena decided to seek the Holy Cross of Christ. An old Jew, named Judas, was the only one who knew the place where the Cross was located, so he was forced by the empress to declare that the Cross was buried under the temple of Venus, which was built by Emperor Hadrian on Golgotha.

By order of the empress, they destroyed that idol temple, and digging in the place where it was in the depths, they found three crosses. While the empress was in doubt as to how they knew the Cross of Christ, a procession with a corpse passed by that place. Patriarch Makarie then said that they would place the body of the deceased on each of the crosses. When the body of the deceased was placed on the first and second crosses, nothing happened. And when the deceased was placed on the third cross, he came to life. That is how he knew that it was the honorable and life-giving Cross of Christ.

Afterwards, they put a sick woman on the Holy Cross of the Lord and she was immediately healed. Then the patriarch raised the cross so that all the people could see it, and the people sang with tears: Lord have mercy! Empress Jelena made a silver coffin and placed the Holy Cross in it. Later, when King Khozro conquered Jerusalem, he took many people into slavery and took the Cross of the Lord to Persia.

The Cross was in Persia for 14 years. And in the year 628, the Greek emperor Heraclius defeated Khozro and returned the Cross to Jerusalem with glory. Arriving in the city of Jerusalem, King Heraclius carried the Cross on his back. But suddenly the emperor stopped and could not take a step forward.

Patriarch Zacharias sees an angel, who stops the emperor to go and wear the Cross in a luxurious royal suit, in the same way that the Lord, humiliated and barefoot, walked. What the patriarch saw, he told the emperor. The emperor took off his royal shirts and in miserable clothes and barefoot took the Cross, took it to Golgotha, and laid it in the temple of the Resurrection.