The Russian Orthodox Church commemorates the Placing of the Honorable Robe of the Lord at Moscow on July 10 (July 25 N.S.). A portion of the Robe was also preserved at the Cathedral of the Dormition in Moscow, and small portions at Kyiv’s Sophia Cathedral, at the Ipatiev monastery near Kostroma and at certain other old temples. Later, two portions of the robe were taken to Saint Petersburg: one in the cathedral at the Winter Palace, and the other in Sts. Reports also circulated at that time of miraculous signs being worked through the relic. The authenticity of the robe was attested by Nectarius, Archbishop of Vologda, by Patriarch Theophanes of Jerusalem and by Joannicius the Greek. At the insistence of the Russian ambassador and Tsar Michael Feodorovich, the Shah sent the robe as a gift to Patriarch Philaret (1619–1633) and Tsar Michael in 1625. Then the Persian Shah Abbas I, when he invaded Georgia, carried off the robe. Eastern traditions Ĭoat of arms of Kingdom of Georgia depicting Holy Tunic, 1711Ī portion of the himation was also brought to Georgia, but it was placed in the treasury of the Svetitskhoveli Cathedral, where it remained until the seventeenth century.
Advocates of the theory that the Argenteuil cloth is the seamless robe claim that the Trier robe is actually Jesus's mantle. A long-running dispute claims that the Argenteuil cloth is actually not the seamless robe worn by Jesus during the crucifixion, but the garments woven for him by the Virgin Mary and worn his entire life. He described it, however, as the garment of the child Jesus. The earliest document referring to the robe at Argenteuil dates from 1156, written by Archbishop Hugh of Rouen. They were moved to the present church of Argenteuil in 1895. In 1793, the parish priest, fearing that the robe would be desecrated in the French Revolution, cut the robe into pieces and hid them in separate places. Charlemagne gave it to his daughter Theocrate, abbess of Argenteuil, where it was preserved in the church of the Benedictines. Since then, the Bishopric of Trier has conducted an annual ten-day religious festival called the "Heilig-Rock-Tage".Īccording to the Argenteuil tradition, the Empress Irene made a gift of the seamless robe to Charlemagne in about the year 800. The 1996 exhibition of the tunic was seen by over one million pilgrims and visitors. The 1844 exhibition of the relic, on the instructions of Wilhelm Arnoldi, Bishop of Trier, led to the formation of the German Catholics ( Deutschkatholiken), a schismatic sect formed in December of that year under the leadership of Johannes Ronge. The people of Trier heard about that and demanded to see the Holy Robe. Archbishop Richard von Greiffenklau arranged the opening of the altar that had enshrined the tunic since the building of the Dome and exhibited it. In 1512, during an Imperial Diet, Emperor Maximilian I demanded to see the Holy Robe which was kept in the Cathedral. The relic is normally kept folded in a reliquary and cannot be directly viewed by the faithful. The stigmatist Therese Neumann of Konnersreuth declared that the Trier robe was authentic. The few remaining original sections are not suitable for carbon dating. Sections of taffeta and silk have been added to the robe, and it was dipped in a rubber solution in the 19th century in an attempt to preserve it. Although biographies of Johann I state that this was not the first time the robe was displayed, there are no historical dates or events presented which predate 1196. The history of the Trier robe is certain only from the 12th century, when Archbishop Johann I of Trier consecrated an altar which contained the seamless robe in early 1196. Thus the saying in Scripture was fulfilled: they divided My raiment ( ta imatia) among them, and upon My vesture ( epi ton himatismon) did they cast lots. Therefore, they said among themselves, let us not tear it, but cast lots for it, whose it will become. Now the coat was without seam, woven whole from the top down. Then the soldiers, when they had crucified Jesus, took his garments ( ta himatia) and divided them into four parts, to every soldier a part, and the coat ( kai ton chitona). Himatia (literally “over-garments”) and the seamless robe, which is chiton, (literally "tunic" or "coat"). A distinction is made in the New Testament Greek between the According to the Gospel of John, the soldiers who crucified Jesus did not divide his tunic after crucifying him, but cast lots to determine who would keep it because it was woven in one piece, without seam.