The Life of the Blessed Virgin Mary by Blessed Anne Catherine Emmerich

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XIII.  THE FLIGHT INTO EGYPT AND ST. JOHN THE BAPTIST IN THE DESERT - THE MASSACRE OF THE INNOCENTS

Section IV

Towards the middle of Jesus’ second year the Blessed Virgin was told of Herod’s Massacre of the Innocents by an angel appearing to her in Heliopolis. She and Joseph were greatly distressed, and the Child Jesus wept that whole day. I saw what follows.

When the three kings did not return to Jerusalem, Herod’s anxiety decreased to some extent; he was at that time much occupied with family affairs. His anxiety revived again, however, when various reports reached him about Simeon’s and Anna’s prophecies in the Temple at the Presentation of the Infant Jesus. At this moment the Holy Family had been some time in Nazareth.

Under various pretexts he dispatched soldiers to different places round Jerusalem, such as Gilgal, Bethlehem, and Hebron, and ordered a census of the children to be made. The soldiers remained, I think, about nine months in these places. Herod was in the meantime in Rome,187 and it was not until soon after his return that the children were massacred. John the Baptist was two years old when it happened, and had again been for some time at home with his parents in secret. Before Herod issued the order that all mothers were to bring before the authorities their male children up to two years old, Elisabeth had been warned by the appearance of an angel and had once more fled into the wilderness with her little son.

Jesus was nearly eighteen months old and could already run about.188 The children were massacred in seven different places. The mothers had been promised rewards for their fruitfulness. They came from their homes in the surrounding country to the government offices in the various towns, bringing with them their little boys in holiday dress. The husbands were turned back, and the mothers were separated from their children. These were stabbed by the soldiers behind the walls of lonely courtyards; their bodies were heaped together and then buried in trenches.

[Catherine Emmerich communicated her vision of the Massacre of the Innocents on March 8th, 1821, i.e. a year after her account of the Flight into Egypt, so that it may be presumed that the massacre took place a year later than the Flight.]

This afternoon I saw the mothers with their little sons up to two years of age come to Jerusalem from Hebron, Bethlehem, and a third place. Herod had sent soldiers there, and had later communicated his orders through the authorities of these towns. The women came to the city in separate groups. Some had two children with them and rode on donkeys. They came to the city in joyful expectation, for they thought they were to receive a reward for their fruitfulness. They were all taken into a large building, and the men accompanying them were sent home. This building was somewhat isolated; it was not far from the house where later Pilate lived. It was so enclosed that it was difficult to see from outside what was happening within it. It must once have been a place of execution, for I saw in its courtyard stone pillars and blocks with chains fastened to them, as well as trees which were tied together and then allowed to spring apart so as to tear in pieces the men fastened to them. It was a dark, strong building, and its courtyard was quite as big as the graveyard on one side of Dülmen parish church. A gate led through two walls into this courtyard, which was enclosed by buildings on three sides. To the right and left these were one storey high; the centre one had two storeys and looked like an ancient deserted synagogue. There were gates opening into the courtyard from all three buildings.

The mothers were led through the courtyard into the two side-buildings and there imprisoned. At first I had the impression of their being in a kind of hospice or inn. They became alarmed when they saw themselves deprived of liberty and began to weep and moan, continuing their laments throughout the whole night.

[On the next day, March 9th, she said:] This afternoon I saw a terrible picture. I saw the Massacre of the Innocents taking place in that house of execution. The big building at the back of the court was two storeys high: the lower storey consisted of a great deserted hall like a prison or a guard-room; above it was a large room with windows looking down into the courtyard. I saw a number of officials assembled there as if in a court of justice; before them was a table on which lay scrolls. I think Herod was there, too, for I saw a man in a red cloak lined with white fur with little black tails on it. He was wearing a crown. I saw him, surrounded by others, looking out of the window of the room.

The mothers were summoned one by one with their children from the side-buildings into the great hall below the building at the back of the courtyard. As they came in, their children were removed from them by soldiers and taken through the gate into the courtyard, where some twenty soldiers were at the murderous work of thrusting swords and spears into their throats and hearts. Some were children still at the breast, wrapped in swaddling-bands; others were tiny boys wearing long embroidered dresses. They did not trouble to take off their clothes, they ran their swords through their throats and hearts, and then seized their bodies by an arm or leg and flung them on to a heap. It was a ghastly sight. The mothers were thrust back one by one by the soldiers into the great hall. When they saw what was done to their children, they raised a terrible outcry, clinging to each other and tearing their hair. They were so closely packed at the end that they could hardly move. I think the massacre went on until towards evening.

The children’s bodies were afterwards buried in a pit in the same courtyard. Their number was shown to me, but I have no clear recollection of it. I think it was 700, and another number with 7 or 17 in it. The number was explained to me by an expression in which I remember a sound like ‘Ducen’: I think I had to reckon two c’s together several times.189

I was absolutely horrified by what I had seen, and did not know where it had happened: I thought it was here. It was only when I woke up that I was able gradually to recollect myself. The next night I saw the mothers being taken back by the soldiers to their homes, bound, and in separate groups. The place of the Massacre of the Innocents in Jerusalem was used later as a court of justice; it was not far from Pilate’s judgment seat, but by his time it had been a good deal altered. At Christ’s death I saw the grave of the massacred children fall in and saw their souls appear and depart from thence.

I was shown how Elisabeth, warned by the angel, once more fled into the desert with the little John to escape the Massacre of the Innocents. Elisabeth searched for a long time till she found a cave which seemed to her sufficiently hidden, and then stayed there with the boy for about forty days. When she went home, an Essene from the community on Mount Horeb came to the boy in the wilderness, brought him food, and gave him all the help he needed. This Essene (whose name I keep forgetting) was a relation of Anna of the Temple. He came at first every eight days, then every fourteen; but in a short time John no longer needed help, for he was soon more at home in the wilderness than among men. It was ordained by God that he should grow up in the wilderness without contact with mankind and innocent of their sins. Like Jesus, he never went to school; the Holy Ghost taught him in the wilderness. I often saw at his side a light, or shining figures like angels. The desert here was not waste and barren; many plants and bushes grew in it, bearing many kinds of berries, and among the rocks were strawberries, which John picked and ate as he passed. He was uncommonly familiar with the beasts, and especially with the birds: they flew to him and perched on his shoulders, he spoke to them and they seemed to understand him and to act as his messengers. He wandered along the banks of the streams, and was just as familiar with the fishes. They swam near to him when he called them, and followed him in the water as he went along the bank.

I saw now that he moved far away from his home, perhaps because of the danger which threatened him. He was so friendly with the beasts that they helped him and warned him. They led him to their nests and lairs, and he fled with them into their hiding-holes if men came near. He lived upon fruit, berries, roots, and herbs. He had no need to search long for them; he either knew himself where they grew, or the beasts showed him. He always had his sheepskin and his little staff, and from time to time went still deeper into the wilderness.

Sometimes he would go nearer his home. Several times he rejoined his parents, who were always longing for him. I think they must have known about each other by revelation, for whenever Elisabeth and Zacharias wanted to see him, he always came from a long way off to meet them.

After staying in Heliopolis for a year and a half, until Jesus was about two years old, the Holy Family left the city because of lack of work and various persecutions. They moved south-wards in the direction of Memphis. When they passed through a small town not far from Heliopolis and sat down to rest in the open porch of a heathen temple, the idol fell down and broke in pieces. (It had the head of an ox with three horns, and there were holes in its body in which sacrifices were placed to be burnt.) This caused an uproar amongst the heathen priests, who seized and threatened the Holy Family. As the priests were consulting together, one of them said that for his part he thought it wise to commend themselves to the God of these people, reminding them of the plagues that had befallen their ancestors when they persecuted the Israelites, and how in the night before their exodus the first-born had died in every Egyptian house. They followed his advice and dismissed the Holy Family unmolested.

They made their way to Troja, a place on the east bank of the Nile, opposite Memphis. It was a big town, but filthy. They thought of staying here, but were not taken in; indeed, they could not even obtain the drink of water or the few dates for which they asked. Memphis was on the west bank of the Nile, which was here very broad, with islands. Part of the city was on the east bank, and here in the time of Pharaoh was a great palace with gardens and a high tower, to the top of which Pharaoh’s daughter used often to ascend to survey the country round. I saw the place where the child Moses was found among the tall rushes.

Memphis was composed as it were of three different towns, one on each side of the Nile, and another called Babylon which seemed to belong to it. This was farther down-stream on the east bank. Indeed, in Pharaoh’s time the whole region round the Nile between Heliopolis, Babylon, and Memphis was so covered with canals, buildings, and stone embankments that it all seemed to form one uninterrupted city. Now, at the time of the Holy Family’s visit, it had all become separated with great waste spaces between. From Troja they went northwards down-stream towards Babylon, which was ill-built, dirty, and desolate. They skirted this city between it and the Nile, and retraced their steps for some distance. They went down-stream, following an embankment along which Jesus travelled later, when He journeyed through Arabia to Egypt after the raising of Lazarus before meeting His disciples again at Jacob’s Well at Sichar. They travelled down-stream for some two hours; there were ruined buildings at intervals all along their path. They had to cross a small arm of the river or canal, and came to a place whose name as it was at that time I cannot remember; afterwards it was called Matarea, and was near Heliopolis.190 This place, which lay on a promontory surrounded by water on two sides, was very desolate. Its scattered buildings were mostly very badly made of palm wood and thick mud, roofed with reeds. Joseph found much work here in strengthening the houses with wattles and building galleries on to them.

In this town the Holy Family lived in a dark vaulted room in a lonely quarter at the landward side of the town, not far from the gate by which they had entered. As before, Joseph built a room in front of the vaulted one. Here, too, when they arrived, an idol fell down in a small temple, and afterwards all the idols fell. Here, too, a priest pacified the people by reminding them of the plagues of Egypt. Later, when a little congregation of Jews and converted heathen had gathered round the Holy Family, the priests handed over to
them the little temple where the idol had fallen, and Joseph arranged it as a synagogue. He became, as it were, the father of the congregation, and introduced the proper singing of the psalms, for their previous services had been very disorderly. There were only a few very poor Jews living here in wretched holes and ditches, though in the Jewish town between On and the Nile there were many Jews and they had a regular temple there. They had, however, fallen into dreadful idolatry; they had a golden calf, a figure with an ox’s head surrounded by little figures of animals like pole-cats or ferrets with little canopies over them.

These were animals which protected people against crocodiles. They also had an imitation Ark of the Covenant, with horrible things in it. They carried on a revolting idolatrous worship, which consisted of immoral practices performed in a subterranean passage and supposed to bring about the coming of the Messias. They were very obstinate and refused to amend their lives. Afterwards many of them left this place and came to where the Holy Family lived, not more than two hours’ journey away. Owing to the many dykes and canals, they could not travel direct but had to make a detour round On. The Jews in the land of Gessen had already become acquainted with the Holy Family in the city of On, and Mary had done much work for them-knitting, weaving, and sewing. She would never work at things which were superfluous or mere luxuries, only at what was necessary and at praying garments. I saw women bringing her work to do which they wanted, from vanity, to be made in a fashionable style; and I saw Mary giving back the work, however much she needed the money. I saw, too, that the women insulted her vilely.

To begin with, they had a very hard time in Matarea. There was great shortage of good water and wood. The inhabitants cooked with dry grass or reeds. The Holy Family generally had cold food to eat. Joseph was given a great deal of work in improving the huts, but the people there treated him just like a slave, giving him only what they liked; sometimes he brought home some money for his work, sometimes none. The inhabitants were very clumsy at building their huts. Wood was lacking, and though I saw trunks of trees lying about here and there, I noticed that there were no tools for dealing with them. Most of the people had nothing but stone and bone knives like turf-cutters. Joseph had brought his necessary tools with him. The Holy Family soon arranged their dwelling a little. Joseph divided the room very conveniently by light wicker screens; he prepared a proper fireplace and made stools and little low tables. The people here all ate off the ground.

They lived here for several years, and I have seen many scenes from Our Lord’s childhood. I saw where Jesus slept. In the thickness of the wall of Mary’s sleeping-room I saw a niche hollowed out by Joseph in which was Jesus’ couch. Mary slept beside it, and I have often seen her during the night kneeling before Jesus’ couch and praying to God. Joseph slept in another room.

I also saw a praying-place which Joseph had arranged in their dwelling. It was in a separate passage. Joseph and the Blessed Virgin had their own special places, and the Child Jesus also had His own little corner, where He prayed sitting, standing, or kneeling. The Blessed Virgin had a kind of little altar before which she prayed. A little table, covered with red and white, was let down like a flap before a cupboard in the wall, of which it generally formed the door. In the thickness of the wall were preserved sacred relics. I saw little bushy plants in pots shaped like chalices. I saw the end of St. Joseph’s staff with its blossom, whereby the lot had fallen upon him in the Temple to become Mary’s spouse. It was fixed in a box an inch and a half in thickness. Besides this, I saw another precious relic, but can no longer explain what it really was. In a transparent box I saw five little white sticks of the thickness of big straws. They stood crossed and as if tied in the middle; at the top they were curly and broader, like a little sheaf. [She crossed her fingers to explain and spoke also of bread.]

During the sojourn of the Holy Family in Egypt the child John must have again stayed in secret with his parents at Jutta, for I saw him at the age of four or five being once more taken into the wilderness by Elisabeth. When they left the house, Zacharias was not there; I think he had gone away beforehand so as not to see the departure, for he loved John beyond measure. He had, however, given him his blessing, for each time he went away he used to bless Elisabeth and John.

Little John had a sheepskin hanging over his left shoulder round his breast and back, fastened together under his right arm. Afterwards in the desert I saw him wearing this sheepskin sometimes over both shoulders, sometimes across his breast, sometimes round his waist—just as it suited him. This sheepskin was all that the boy wore. He had brownish hair darker than Jesus’, and he still carried in his hand the little white staff which he had brought from home before. I always saw him with it in the wilderness.

I now saw him hurrying along hand in hand with his mother Elisabeth, a tall woman with a small face and delicate features. She was much wrapped up and walked quickly. The child often ran on ahead; he was quite natural and childlike, but not thoughtless. At first their way led them northwards for some time, and they had water on their right hand; then I saw them crossing a little stream. There was no bridge, and they crossed on logs lying in the water, which Elisabeth, who was a very resolute woman, ferried across with a branch. After crossing the stream they turned more eastwards and entered a rocky ravine, the upper part of which was waste and stony, though the lower slopes were thick with bushes and fruits, among them many strawberries, of which the boy ate one here and there.

After they had gone some way into this ravine, Elisabeth said good-bye to the boy. She blessed him, pressed him to her heart, kissed him on his forehead and on both cheeks, and started on her journey home. She turned round several times on her way, and wept as she looked back towards John. The boy himself was quite  untroubled and wandered on farther into the ravine with sure steps.

As during these visions I was very ill, God granted me the favour of feeling as if I were myself a child in presence of all that happened. It seemed to me that I was a child of John’s own age, accompanying him on his way; and I was afraid that he would go too far from his mother and would never find his way home again. Soon, however, I was reassured by a voice which said: ‘Do not be troubled, the boy well knows what he is about.’

Then I thought that I went quite alone with him into the wilderness as if he had been a familiar childhood’s playmate of mine, and I saw many of the things that happened to him. Yes, while we were together, John himself told me much about his life in the wilderness; for example, how he practised self-denial in every way and mortified his senses, how his vision grew ever brighter and clearer, and how he had been taught, in an indescribable way, by everything round him.

All this did not astonish me, for long ago as a child, when I was all by myself watching our cows, I used to live in familiar fellowship with John in the wilderness. I often longed to see him, and used then to call into the bushes in my country dialect: ‘Little John with his little stick and his sheepskin on his shoulder is to come to me’: and often little John with his little stick and his sheepskin on his shoulder did come to me, and we two children played together, and he told me and taught me all kinds of good things. And it never seemed to me strange that in the wilderness he learnt so much from plants and beasts, for when I was a child, whether in the woods, on the moors, in the fields, with the cows, or plucking ears of corn, pulling grass, gathering herbs, I used to look at every little leaf and every flower as at a book; every bird, every beast that ran past me, everything round me, taught me something.

Every shape and colour that I saw, every little veined leaf, filled my mind with many deep thoughts. But if I spoke of these, people either listened with surprise or else, more often, laughed at me, so that at last I accustomed myself to keeping silence about such things. I used to think (and sometimes think still) that it must be so with everyone, and that nowhere could one learn better, because here God Himself had written our alphabet for us.

So now, when again in my visions I followed the boy John into the wilderness, I saw as before all that he was about. I saw him playing with flowers and beasts. The birds especially were at home with him. They flew on to his head as he walked or as he knelt in prayer. I often saw him lay his staff across the branches; then at his call flocks of bright-coloured birds came flying to perch on it in a row. He gazed at them and spoke familiarly with them as if they were his schoolchildren. I saw him, too, following wild animals into their lairs, feeding them and watching them attentively.

When John was about six years old, Elisabeth took the opportunity of Zacharias’ absence on a journey to the Temple with herds for sacrifice to pay a visit to her son in the wilderness. Zacharias, I think, never went to see him there, so that he might truthfully say, if asked by Herod where his son was, that he did not know. In order, however, to satisfy his intense longing to see John, the latter came several times from the wilderness to his parents’ house in great secrecy and by night, and stayed there a short time. Probably his guardian angel led him there at the right moment when there was no danger. I saw him always guided and protected by higher Powers, and sometimes accompanied by shining figures like angels.

John was destined to live in the wilderness, separated from the world and from ordinary human food, and to be taught and trained by the Spirit of God. Providence so ordained matters that outer circumstances made him take refuge in the desert to which his natural instincts drew him with irresistible force; from his earliest childhood I always saw him thoughtful and solitary. Just as the Child Jesus fled to Egypt as the result of a divine warning, so did John, His precursor, fly to a hiding-place in the wilderness. Suspicion was directed to him, too, for there had been much talk in the land about John ever since his early days. It was well known that wonders had attended his birth, and that he was often seen surrounded by light, for which reasons Herod was particularly suspicious of him. He had caused Zacharias to be questioned several times as to the whereabouts of John, but had never yet laid hands on the old man. This time, however, as he was on his way to the Temple, he was attacked by Herod’s soldiers in a sunken road outside the Bethlehem Gate of Jerusalem, from which the city was not yet visible. These soldiers, who had been lying in wait for him, dragged him brutally to a prison on the slope of the Hill of Sion, where later I used often to see Jesus’ disciples making their way up to the Temple. The old man was here subjected to ill-treatment and even torture, in order to force from him a confession of his son’s whereabouts. When this had no effect, he was, by Herod’s soldiers, stabbed to death.191

His friends buried his body not far from the Temple. This was not the Zacharias who was murdered between the Temple and the altar. When the dead came out of their graves at the death of Christ, I saw the grave of that Zacharias falling out of the Temple walls near the praying-room of the aged Simeon, and himself coming forth from it. At that moment several other secret graves in the Temple burst open. On the occasion when that Zacharias was murdered between the Temple and the altar, there were many disputes going on about the descent of the Messias, and about certain rights and privileges in the Temple of various families. For instance, not all families were allowed to have their children brought up in the Temple. (This reminds me that I once saw in the care of Anna in the Temple a boy whose name I have forgotten; I think he was a king’s son.) Zacharias was the only one among the disputants who was murdered. His father was called Barachias.192 I saw that later the bones of that Zacharias were found again, but have forgotten the details. Elisabeth came home from the desert expecting to find Zacharias returned from Jerusalem. John accompanied her for some of the way; when they parted, she blessed him and kissed him on the forehead, and he hastened back, untroubled, to the wilderness. On reaching home Elisabeth heard the terrible news of the murder of Zacharias. She grieved and lamented so sorely that she could find no peace or rest at home, and so left Jutta forever and hastened to join John in the wilderness. She died there not long after, before the return of the Holy Family from Egypt. She was buried in the wilderness by the Essene from Mount Horeb who had always helped little John. 

After this John moved farther into the wilderness. He left the rocky ravine for more open country, and I saw him arrive at a small lake in the desert. The shore was flat and covered with white sand, and I saw him go far out into the water and all the fishes swimming fearlessly up to him. He was quite at home with them. He lived here for some time, and I saw that he had made himself in the bushes a sleeping-hut of branches. It was quite low, and only just big enough for him to lie down in. Here and later I saw him accompanied very often by shining figures or angels, with whom he associated humbly and devoutly, but unafraid and in childlike confidence. They seemed to teach him and to make him notice all kinds of things. I saw that his staff had a little cross-piece, so that it formed a cross; fastened to it was a broad band of bark which he waved about in play like a little flag.

A daughter of Elisabeth’s sister now lived in John’s family house at Jutta near Hebron. It was well supplied with everything. When John was grown up he came there once in secret, and then went still farther into the wilderness, remaining there until he appeared among mankind. Of this I shall tell later.



187. This was recounted while Catherine Emmerich was seriously ill; she mentioned several journeys and other matters connected with Herod’s family, but very obscurely. The statement that Herod had been in Rome in the meantime was the only clear one. Some fifteen years after this communication, the writer reread the history of Herod the Great given by the Jewish historian Josephus, but found no mention of any journey of Herod’s to Rome at this time. (CB)

188. It has already been observed that Matt. 2.13, according to AC, involves the passing of over seven months. Here we are told that Jesus was nearly eighteen months old, so that Matt. 2.16, ‘Then Herod perceiving that he was deluded... sending killed...’, shows the passage of a further nine months to the murder of the Innocents. The Gospel has no details beyond the fact of the massacre. (SB)

189. Perhaps this refers to the Roman numeral DCC = 700 (AC always saw Roman numerals). She mentions (supra) that the massacres took place in seven different places, and the Gospel (Matt. 2.16) indicates a whole district: ‘Bethlehem and all the borders thereof.’ (SB)

190. Troja and Babylon near Memphis, and Matarea near Heliopolis or On, are all readily identifiable in the region of the modern Cairo. At Matarea it is said that the ‘Tree of Our Lady’ is still shown. The tree is also mentioned in the Arabic Gospel of the Infancy, 24. (SB)

191. The murder of Zacharias, the father of John the Baptist, is recounted in Protev. 23, with subsequent portents added. (SB)

192. The earlier Zacharias killed near the altar is in II Par. 24.20-21. There is a well-known difficulty in Matt. 23.35, where this Zacharias is called ‘son of Barachias’, when II Par. gives his father’s name as Joiada. It is generally agreed that the verse in Matt. includes a scribal error, arising from the fact that the much betterknown Prophet Zacharias’ father was called Barachias (Zach. 1.1), and that the two names were thus linked in the scribe’s memory. This supposition is borne out by the omission of a father’s name in Matt. in Codex Sinaiticus. The parallel in Luke 11.51 has no father’s name. Yet all texts of Matt. before the discovery of Sinaiticus in 1859 include the name, and it is hardly surprising that AC should do so too. (SB)
The two names given for Zacharias’ father can be explained in another way. It may well be that the father of Zacharias was called both Barachias and Joiada. The name “Barachias” means ‘son of Achias,’ so that Joiada refers to Zacharias’ father and Achias to Zacharias’grandfather. The Jews in ancient times often referred to the son by the father’s name; for example the Caiaphas of the Gospels was actually Joseph, son of Caiaphas. The father of Zacharias could easily have been called both Joiada, his given name, and Barachias, referring to his father: Joiada Barachias means Joiada, son of Achias.  As an example of this, we have “Joseph called Barsabbas, who was surnamed Justus.” (Acts 1:23). The name Barsabbas may refer to his father, meaning ‘son of Sabbas.’ The name Justus is called a surname, that is, a last name or family name. For the Jews of that time, the surname often referred to the father. Thus, both the name Barsabbas and the name Justus may refer to Joseph’s father’s names. Alternately, the name Barsabbas may refer to Joseph himself. Sabbas may be a derivative of Sabbath, so that Joseph, a devout keeper of the Sabbath, may have been referred to metaphorically as Barsabbas, ‘son of the Sabbath.’ In either case, it is an example of one man being referred to with two different names. Similarly, Zecharias is referred to as Barachias (‘son of Achias’) and Joiada. AC tells us that the Virgin Mary’s father was called both Joachim and Heli. (RC)