Soufanieh: A flow of oil from an image of the Virgin Mary, and exudation of oil from the face and hands of Myrna Nazzour

On 22 November 1982, Myrna was praying with other members of her family while visiting her ailing sister-in-law, who had been ill for a month, when suddenly her hands began to ooze a lot of oil. Someone in the room with her suggested that she place her hands on the patient, who recovered, much to Myrna's surprise. The same thing happened a few days later: Myrna's mum, who was due to undergo surgery for a herniated disc, suddenly didn't need it any more after Myrna applied the oil dripping from her hands.

On 27 November, the families of Myrna and her husband, Nicolas, noticed that an icon in their home, depicting Our Lady of Kazan, was also continuously dripping with oil. Many people came to see the miracle.

Our Lady of Soufanieh / © Shutterstock / hramikona

Reasons to believe:

Initially, Myrna and Nicolas were not fervent, practising believers: they did not expect miracles of this kind and found it hard to understand what was happening. At first, Nicolas refused to believe that the oil in Myrna's hands had miraculous powers, but the events that follow left no room for doubt.

Scientific analysis of the oil using gas chromatography, carried out in several European laboratories, confirmed that the oil was unique, a 100% pure olive oil (a percentage that does not exist on the market).

Myrna's hands were observed by a doctor as she prayed and the oil dripped from them. He said: "This is God's work!"

The icon was carefully studied and taken apart to see what was inside and behind it. Oil gushed out, but no logical explanation could be found for this phenomenon.

The healings connected to the oil exuded from Myrna's hands and the Virgin's icon are indisputable.

The testimony of Myrna and her husband Nicolas shows many signs of reliability and credibility; it is corroborated by both their families (the Nazzours and the Al-Akhras).

Father Elias Zahlaoui, too, was so convinced by the facts that he wrote books on the subject, in order to make this miracle known, as the Virgin requested: "Open the doors. Do not deprive anyone of my sight."Similarly, Father Joseph Maalouli, a Lazarist priest, testified to all these events in writing and in his will.

Many witnesses were mentioned by name during those five days: bishops and priests (Mgr. Boulos Pandeli, Fathers Georges Gilo and Dimitri Athanasios), Patriarch Ignace Hazim, secret service agents (Messrs Mohsen Arnaout, Fariz Mouhanna and Akram Aboud), a doctor (Dr Saliba Abdel-Ahad), Orthodox, Catholic and Muslim believers (Viva Killizi, Mayada Kozali, Samir Zahr and Georges Maarraoui)...

Summary:

In Lebanon, war had been raging since 1975, and in Syria, the Muslim Brotherhood attempted to overthrow the Baath Party government of Hafez el-Assad. The uprising was crushed in the city of Hama after a 27-day siege. In November 1982, in a very troubled political and social context, an extraordinary event occurred in an old Arab house inhabited by the Nazzour family, in the heart of a modest Christian suburb of Damascus, located outside the city walls, near the gate known as "Thomas's Gate".

No one could have imagined at the time that the "phenomenon", which had just taken place in a private and strictly family circle, would expand and spread throughout the world, right up to the present day.

The first to be surprised and amazed were the two chosen ones, Myrna and Nicolas, a young couple who had been married for only six months, and whose lives were to change completely between 22 and 28 November 1982. Their conversion was the first miracle of this relationship with "my Mother the Virgin Mary ", as Myrna would say, and no one can describe it better than she can.

Here is her testimony:

"My name is Marie and I was born in Beirut (Lebanon) on 3 May 1964, into a Syrian-Lebanese family of five children, very close-knit and not very religious, even though we belong to the Melkite Greek-Catholic community. I grew up and studied in Damascus.

We are friends with the Nazzour family, Greek Orthodox, and their six children (four boys and two girls). My eldest sister married one of the sons, Khalil, and I met Nicolas on his brother's wedding day. He was much older than me, had travelled a lot and, despite opposition from both our families, we got married on 9 May 1982. The happiest days of our lives were spent on our honeymoon between Italy and Spain, where I visited many churches! Six months later, something happened that totally changed our lives.

On Monday 22 November 1982, my mother-in-law, who is very devout, asked me to go with her to see her youngest daughter, Leyla. She was worried about her because she had been ill for over a month and was now bedridden. When we arrived at the house, neighbours and relatives were there, including Marie-Rose, her older sister, who suggested that we pray together for her recovery. We got down on our knees, she opened the Gospel and, all of a sudden, I had a violent tremor and felt so bad that my neighbour Maya Khozali took me in her arms. I hear her shout: "Myrna, what's that on your hands?"

I opened them: they're slimy and, to my surprise, I saw an oily trickle escaping and dripping to the floor. There was a strong smell of oil. I was so frightened that I thought I was going to faint, amidst the cries of a shocked and bewildered audience: "O Virgin Mary, thanks be to God!" In the confusion, someone pleaded with me to quickly put my hands on Leyla, especially on the sore spots. Amid general silence, the sick young woman sat up, stretched, and asked to leave the bed. She walked normally, without fear and without support.

Then we heard a knock on the door: it was Nicolas, who caught us in the middle of our amazement and fright. We surrounded him to tell him what had just happened. When the shock wore off, he burst out laughing: "You must have eaten eggplant stuffed with oil, and you didn't wipe your hands!" His elder sister Marie-Rose, outraged, rebuked him: " Ah! There you are, always an unbeliever!" Offended, Nicolas ,offended, got angry and asked me to follow him. When I refused, he left in a huff, promising to come back for me.

Evening fell and Farid, Leyla's husband, came home. He saw his wife standing there laughing, and exclaimed: "Thank God, you look well!" We waited for Nicolas and sat down at the table without saying a word. At the end of the meal, we said a prayer of thanksgiving and, as I went to wash my hands, I heard Nicolas ask Maya Khozali, our young Muslim friend, to follow me to make sure I dried them properly. I returned to sit on Farid's left, where I could see an image of the Virgin Mary placed on the marble slab above the heater, and I suggested that we pray, under the astonished gaze of Nicolas, who couldn't take his eyes off me. Suddenly, my hands became shiny and oily. I lifted them up and placed them spontaneously on Farid's head:

"What are you doing? What's that on your hands?
- Smell that!," I told him.
- But it's oil ... where did it come from?
- It's this oil that healed me," Leyla replied, very moved.

She then told Farid what had happened... he immediately believed and gave thanks to God. That's how the first day of my story went. We went home, shaken by our inner thoughts. The event had upset Nicolas. Although he was a Christian, he used to think of God only when necessary. When I asked him for permission to go to church on Wednesdays with his mum, to the Marian group mass, he refused. That evening, to convince himself, he repeated in bad faith: "Tell me, Myrna, what difference does it make? What's the difference between our life before and our life now?" I preferred to not respond and quickly retreat to my room to pray. My whole being sensed that this was divine intervention. But my mind kept asking me the nagging question:"Why me, Lord? I'm ignorant and insignificant. What do you expect from me, I have nothing to offer you?" But I received no aswer!

Thursday 25 November 1982: Three days passed, and my parents learned what had happened. At the time, my mother was confined to bed on a board, waiting for an essential operation. Suffering from a herniated disc, she reproached me for not having thought of coming to relieve her immediately, as I had done for Leyla, who was completely healed. She wanted to see me, and Nicolas, his older brothers Awad and Khalil, and my sister Lina, decided to come with me.

I sat by my mother's bed, while the men sat round a table playing cards. My mother said to me: " Please, Myrna, pray for me and with me ", and she put a piece of dry cotton she had prepared into my hand. Immediately Nicholas's brothers stopped their game and surrounded me to pray. I immediately felt the oil gush out of my hands, soaking the cotton that my mother had asked me to rub on her back. Immediately, she was relieved and even completely healed - and is still well as I speak.

Friday 26 November 1982: that morning, Nicolas woke up and decided to fast for the first time in his life to thank the Lord for the incredible graces he had sent us. I liked the idea and we asked all the family members in the house (except Nicolas' mum, who was still staying with her daughter Leyla) to join us. All day long, we felt very happy, united in an intense communion.

Saturday 27 November 1982: I got up at eight o'clock and, as Nicolas was using the bathroom, I went up to the first floor of the house where Awad, my husband's elder brother, and his wife Hélène live, to chat with them, as I often do. Suddenly, there was a very strong smell of incense. "Did you burn incense, Hélène? "I asked. "Myrna," she laughed, "I think you're going to drive me crazy this week! You can go back downstairs and burn all the incense you want to purify the house."

I went back down to the ground floor where, in the patio, we have a large wooden icon of the Virgin, dating from the 13th century, placed on a pedestal table, next to which Nicholas has placed a small image of the Virgin in a plastic frame. During one of his trips to Sofia, Bulgaria, in 1980, he had visited the Saint Alexander Nevsky Cathedral and bought eleven small reproductions of the Virgin of Kazan to give to his family as souvenirs.

This morning, like all the others, my eyes were drawn to the unusual, shiny appearance of this little icon that, because it's always there, nobody really looks at. The little icon was shining so brightly that I picked it up and started shouting! Without my knowing where it came from, oil began to drip profusely and, as Nicolas was getting dressed in our bedroom, I ran towards him with the little icon in my hands. He turned round, livid, began to tremble and, taking a small brown wooden saucer from among our knick-knacks, he placed the icon on it. The oil immediately overflowed. He then hurried into the kitchen and brought out a silver tray, which he placed under the saucer. We fell to our knees in front of it, and I said to him without thinking:

" Nicolas, I want to burn incense!
-Incense! Where do you want me to find incense?"
Then I heard myself answer:
"There's some here, in the chalice. Please burn some.
- Which chalice, and where?"

He looked around at all the familiar knick-knacks, and discovered one he didn't know - a bowl with black incense spotted with white. Who had put it there, without his knowledge? Nicolas stared at it stupidly, feeling overwhelmed, said to me: "I'm going to call my mother, my brothers, my sisters, please stay here." I stayed alone in this room, in a frightening silence. I prayed like a crying automaton, without tears, but inside, a voice said: "What's happening to me? Am I dreaming? Is this reality? Am I in reality?" And suddenly I heard a woman's voice, without knowing or understanding where it was coming from - a voice like the echo in a shell that you hear when you put it to your ear: "My daughter Marie, don't be afraid. I am with you. Open the doors. Don't deprive anyone of the sight of me. Light a candle for me."

Without thinking, I ran to the kitchen to fetch a candle, so panicked that I returned to the image without the candle. I knelt down and was suddenly plunged into darkness. It was the usual power cut, but in Damascus it can last for two or three hours. I couldn't see anything, I was trembling with fear, I was all alone. I groped my way down to the basement, lit by a window well, where Khalil, Nicolas' brother, was putting his things away, and I found a tiny candle. I went back up to the bedroom. "O Virgin Mary, didn't you say not to deprive anyone of your sight? I'll light the candle for you, but please restore the electricity." I spoke a little mechanically - a monologue to pass the time and dispel my fear. Just as I finally managed to light the candle, the electricity came back on and I was very surprised by it. I lost track of time: Nicolas had come back with his mum and his two sisters, Leyla and Marie-Rose. He took care to alert my parents and a friend who is a member of the Damascus Choir of Joy, directed by Father Elias Zahlaoui. Nicolas was terrified that the rumour would spread, and he called us all together to forbid anyone to talk about the events that took place in our house. I reacted sharply: "No, Nicolas, I heard a woman's voice telling me that we must open the doors of our house and not deprive anyone of their view!" I didn't dare speak of the Virgin, especially not in her name; it was only much later that we realised it was our mother Mary.

It was then that, as events disrupted our daily lives, the older members of our families made some decisions. We informed the Orthodox Patriarchate, who immediately sent Mgr Boulos Pandeli, accompanied by two priests. I was on my knees, praying in front of the icon. They took off their shoes and knelt down to pray with me. The oil immediately dripped from my hands and I bent down to kiss the bishop's hand. He refused and said to me: "I came into your house asking the Lord to give me a sign that his Blessed Mother was here, so we are the ones who should ask for your blessing!" I burst into tears, aware of my insignificance. From that moment on, word spread like wildfire and the house never stopped filling up.

On Sunday 28 November 1982, I was already in prayer when Father Dimitri Athanasios from the Melkite Greek Catholic community came in. He took a dry cotton pad to wipe the image of the icon, and held it in his hand. Suddenly, the cotton pad filled up with yellow oil, with which, deeply moved, Father blessed without a word all those who were already filling the patio. I escorted him to the door and, breaking through the crowd, I heard someone I'd never seen before say to me: "Madame Myrna, you should pray the rosary!" I nodded mechanically, not knowing what the word "rosary" meant, where to find it or how to pray it. Returning to the foot of the image, I was ashamed of my ignorance and began to invoke: "O Virgin, I beg you, inspire me to know where I should get this rosary and what I should do to pray it!"

There was a man in the crowd whom I didn't know at all. He came up to me and introduced himself: "I'm Hanoun Chéhadé from Seidnaya [[a village near Damascus, where a monastery of Orthodox nuns guards the precious icon of the Virgin, painted by Saint Luke, known as the Chaghoura, “the Famous”]. I want you to know, Madame Myrna, that I had a strange dream last night: the Virgin asked me to come and bring a rosary to her daughter Marie and teach her how to pray it."He handed me the rosary and I fell to my knees, sobbing. I had been heard, once again, and my prayed was immediately answered!

Later, a man from the secret services, named Akram Abbou, turned up and asked for permission to take photos of the icon. He did so very quickly, then left and returned with a doctor, Dr Saliba Abdel-Ahad, and another government official, Mr Fariz Mouhana. They asked me to pray in front of them. I obeyed, and the oil immediately dripped from my hands, which the doctor took in his own to examine where this exudation was coming from. The two policemen asked him: "What do you think?"

Without saying a word, the doctor raised his index finger, then sighed: "That's God's work!" But Mr Mouhana politely insisted: "Can we take the frame apart and see what's inside and out?"We let him to this, and, despite his caution, he broke off a corner in the top right-hand corner of the frame. Immediately, from this fracture, oil gushed out. He hurriedly put everything back in place and got down on his knees. A little later, the visitors left silently.

It was six o'clock and we were still there when a priest arrived, well known in Damascus and Syria. He came as a curious visitor, mainly to please three young members of his choir (Choir of Joy of Damascus), three of my close friends who had been with us the day before. They were very disturbed and absolutely had to have the opinion of this priest from the Melkite Greek-Catholic community. They knew him to be firm in his views and teaching, and for being a strong leader in his parish of Our Lady of Damascus (in the Koussour district). We had no idea that he would become an ardent protector and defender of the Virgin Mary in Soufanieh, and a spiritual director to accompany me on the path that the Blessed Virgin Mary and Christ were opening up for my family and for me. He was very discreet and left without saying a word.

Evening came and there were still so many people in the patio. An officer from the secret services, Mr. Arnaout, accompanied by Mr Chaoui, asked to speak to my husband, Nicolas: "Brother Nicolas, today this phenomenon is reaching the neighbourhood, tomorrow the whole of Syria, and after that the whole world. Are you in a position to agree to leave your door open?" "It wasn't me who opened the door. The One who wanted it open is the only one who will close it!"

From then on, for days and months on end, Nicolas and I slept in the living room, offering our bedroom to visitors and the sick who came to visit. The oil never stopped flowing, and I can testify that, through this grace, God gave us uncommon spiritual, moral and physical strength to accept that his will be done.

Jean-Claude and Geneviève Antakli, writers and biologists, interviewed Myrna Nazzour personally on several occasions.

Beyond reasons to believe:

Let us consider the symbolism of oil for a moment. The significance of oil and perfume are important in the East, where the olive tree grows:

Oil nourishes and warms; it softens and heals.
It is used in all the sacraments: perfumed, it is the sign of the Holy Spirit (baptism, confirmation, ordination, extreme unction).
It is a sign of election and blessing. The word "Messiah" means "the anointed one". Kings are anointed, and this anointing makes each of us a king, a prophet and a priest.
It is also a sign of joy (" Your God has anointed you with the oil of gladness" Heb 1:9) and of healing ("They anointed many sick people with oil and healed them" Mk 6:13).
It is an essential food in the Bible: "I gave you a land you did not till and cities you did not build; you ate of vineyards and olive groves you did not plant" (Jos 24:13).
It is the symbol of God's love for his people: "Your love is better than wine, better than the fragrance of your perfumes. Your name is oil flowing out" (Song of Songs 1:3).
The olive tree is the symbol of peace.

Going further:

Memoir of Our Lady of Soufanieh Syrian Arab Republic (Messages From Jesus & Mary) and Other Phenomena by Antoine Mansour & Claire Mansour, 101 Foundation (January 1, 2003)