Today, September 18, the Church honors the memory of the parents of John the Baptist - Saints Zechariah and Elizabethtranslated

On September 18, the Orthodox Church remembers the prophet Zechariah and the righteous Elizabeth - the parents of Saint John the Baptist, the Baptist of the Lord.

The prophet Zechariah was a priest and came from the family of Aaron, brother of the prophet Moses. It was from the line of Aaron that, according to the word of God, priests were to be appointed to serve in the temple of Jerusalem. Righteous Elizabeth came from the family of King David. They lived south of Jerusalem, near the city of Hebron.

Saints Zechariah and Elizabeth did not have children for a long time and it seemed that they would never have them again, because in childlessness they had reached old age. However, as the holy evangelist Luke narrates (Luke 1), one day, when Zechariah was serving in the church, the Archangel Gabriel appeared to him and announced the imminent birth of a son.

Zechariah was confused by such a vision and the promise of the archangel, for which dumbness descended on him, and he could not speak until the birth of the child. In his promise, Archangel Gabriel also said that the baby should be named John.

After the allotted time, Elizabeth gave birth to a baby, who was named John. The future prophet was born six months earlier than the Lord Jesus Christ. On the maternal side (Elizabeth -...