Protopresbyter Thomas Hopko
On the 21st of November/4th December, the Orthodox Church celebrates the festival of the Presentation or the Entry, the Eisodos, the Entrance, of the Mother of God, Mary, Christ’s Mother, in the Temple. In his book, The Meaning of Icons, Vladimir Lossky with Ouspensky, Leonid Ouspensky, Vladimir Lossky writes that this festival “does not belong to the most ancient feasts of the Church. None the less,” he writes, “it must be earlier than the end of the VIIth century, since St. Andrew of Crete [bears witness that it was known] at Jerusalem at [that time].”
