"Ilyin-Chernigov" Icon
16/29 April
Until the revolution of 1917, there was in the Holy Trinity - Ilinsk [St Elias]
Monastery near Chernigov, on Boldino hill, a miraculous image of the Mother of God,
written in 1658 by the monk Gennady, and known as the Ilinsk-Chernigov image.
While Lazar Baranovich was Archbishop of Chernigov and Zosima was Abbot of the Ilinsk
monastery, tears poured forth from this icon from the 16th to the 24th
of April, 1662, as a sign of mercy. Almost all of the residents of Chernigov bore witness
to this miracle. Soon afterwards in that same year, the Tatars attacked Chernigov and
devastated all of the surrounding villages. However, the monks of the Ilinsk monastery
knew nothing of the imminent danger. In the night, they received the news. After rushing
to the church, and earnestly, tearfully, praying to their Heavenly Intercessor, they hid
in the Anthony cave. At midnight the Tatars broke into the monastery, looted the church,
and seized the church plate, but the miraculous icon with all of its precious decorations
remained untouched. An unseen power did not permit the barbarians to touch the Holy Icon.
That same unseen force kept them from entering the cave where the monks were hiding,
although the Tatars strove many times to do so, approaching with lighted torches and bared
swords. Suddenly, terrified by an incomprehensible vision, they fled.
St. Dimitry of Rostov, after describing 24 miracles wrought by the miraculous Ilinsk
Icon, concludes his book The Bedewed Fleece by saying, "The end of this book,
but not of the miracles of the Most-holy Theotokos, for who can enumerate them?"
icon from www.pravoslavie.ru