REVIEW OF EUGENE HYNES' KNOCK THE VIRGIN'S APPARITION IN NINETEENTH CENTURY IRELAND

This book does an excellent job of showing how the Knock visions were conditioned by the times and circumstances.

On the night of the 21st of August 1879 the Virgin Mary flanked by St Joseph and a bishop thought to be St John the Evangelist and an altar with a lamb and cross on it allegedly appeared on the gable wall of the Parish Church of Knock for a few hours. Fifteen people witnessed the vision including a child of five. Witness statements were published in a highly altered and edited form that differed hugely from the real ones the witnesses made. That witnesses didn't do the slightest thing about the lies speaks strongly against them as honest people.

The first witness was Mary McLoughlin. The Nun of Kenmare categorically stated in THREE VISITS TO KNOCK that Mary Mc Loughlin only saw a light at first despite saying in her deposition that she saw figures like Mary and Joseph and a bishop. And wrote that her very close friend Mary Beirne was the first to see the figures not Mc Loughlin.

THE APPARITIONS AND MIRACLES AT KNOCK ALSO, The Official Depositions of the Eye-Witnesses, PREPARED AND EDITED BY JOHN McPHILPIN says,

As some persons were hurriedly going along the road which leads to the chapel, at about half-past seven P. M., they perceived the wall beautifully illuminated by a soft, white, flickering light, through which could be perceived brilliant stars twinkling as on a fine frosty night. The first person who saw it passed on".

Children were indoctrinated as to who Mary and Joseph were and pictures of them were rife. Yet Catherine Murray 8 said she saw "the likeness of the Blessed Virgin Mary and that of St Joseph and St John, as I learned from those that were around about." If the images were as plain as some of the testimonies say, what did she of all people need to be told who they were of? She was attending school which was saturated in religion and sacred images for goodness sake! It is a blunder how Joseph would have been seen as an old man but scholarship today says that is unlikely.

Patrick Hill spoke of how clear and distinct the vision was and said he went up close. In 1879 he declared, "There was a line or dark mearing between the figure of the Blessed Virgin and that of St. Joseph, so that one could know St. Joseph, and the place where his figure appeared distinctly from that of the Blessed Virgin and the spot where she stood." That shows it wasn’t really that clear. Something had to be done to stop Mary and Joseph blending.

John Curry 6 years of age, "He could state no more that he saw the fine images and the light, ... nice things and the lights.” John Curry told the newspaper New York Tribunal in 1937, that Brigid Trench touched the picture. The images were then flat on the wall. He says the images appeared to be alive. But this contradicts his claim that Mary had a face like a statue. He said the Lamb may have been under Joseph's arm and not on the altar like the others said. All this indicates that the vision was not as clear as crystal.

Even a child could notice the images were only things not people. What is astounding is that the lad said they were images several weeks after the event. He prefers the nice things and the lights to the images. That could be significant.

Mary's crown according to Mary Beirne was only a little yellower than her robes which were supposed to be white. Are we to believe God struggled with the colours?

Beirne said that the Virgin, "Wore a beautiful crown; it looked like gold; and the face appeared to be a yellower white than the body of the cloak". The yellowness is what you would expect from a magic lantern or a trick. It was hard to produce pure white images in those days. All that suggests a projector was being used. We can't accuse God of producing poor images!

Mary Beirne later described the Virgin's crown as white (page 49, The Apparition at Knock, Walsh). Catholics say that small errors like that do not discredit the story. But who would think of saying a crown was white unless it was? We tend to think of crowns as gold. A white crown would suggest that the vision was a hoax.

In 1932, she testified that St Joseph was the most lifelike of the images.

Patrick Beirne made the following declaration before a priestly board of investigators of the apparition in 1932.

"I saw three figures on the gable surrounded by wonderful light. They appeared to be something like shadows or reflections cast on a wall on a moon-lit night."

This contradicts the usual line that the vision was impressive. The more banal the sight the more likely a natural explanation is.

There is evidence that Patrick Beirne was telling the truth about the vision being like moonlight images. The best evidence comes from the star witness, Mary Beirne his sister. She said the vision was out from the wall. He says it was on it. In 1936, she stated that the vision looked like a painting when close enough, "When we went near the wall, the figures seemed to go back to the wall, as if painted on it. Then when we came back from the wall, they seemed to stand out and come forward".

In 1935, Liam Na Cadhain interviewed Mary Beirne then Mary O Connell and she declared, "The light about the figures was not like any light I ever saw but more like the soft silvery light of the moon" (page 50, The Apparition at Knock). She said in her authentic July 1880 deposition, "I saw 3 figures on the west side of the gable." The on is of utmost importance.

The accounts agree in the biggest things but there is evidence that what they saw was not totally clear. There are some contradictions among some of the witnesses about the cross on the altar. It is best to take all that as evidence that the visionaries did not see a vision as clear as you see your friends in the coffee shop. The vagueness of the vision led to some misperceptions.

Why did Mary Mc Loughlin and the others stand so far away from the vision? Was it because it looked clearer at a distance and close up was blurry and indistinct? McLoughlin, "I was outside the ditch and to the south-west of the schoolhouse near the road, about thirty yards or so from the church ; I leaned across the wall in order to see, as well as I could, the whole scene."

The testimony of Brigid Trench is a fabrication. This is her real testimony, "

LIVES IN THIS PLACE. ON THE EVE OF 21 AUGUST A PERSON SICK SENT FOR HER THAT SHE MIGHT SEE HER. SHE CAME THAT EVENING TO THE CHURCH [SOMETHING ERASED]. SHE WAS IN THE HOUSE OF THE SICK WOMAN. SHE CAME BY THE ROAD AND SAW GREAT LIGHT. SHE ENTERED AT HER RIGHT HAND. SHE LEFT HER HAND ON THEM. SHE SAW ST JOSEPH AND THE BVM AND ST JOHN AND THE ALTAR AND THE LAMB. THEY WERE NOT STANDING ON THE GROUND BUT PROBABLY TWO FEET ABOVE THE GROUND.

The fabricated testimony speaks of an apparition which was detailed and clear. It says she reached to touch the Virgin's feet and despite the images being so lifelike and clear her hands passed through the feet.

The need to fake a testimony designed to refute the indistinctiveness of the apparition is telling.

Nobody else tried to touch the images. Given that the Irish are fond of touching holy surfaces that is strange. Today, thousands of people every year touch a panel of stones from the original gable at Knock Shrine. Even if the people who saw the alleged vision thought it couldn't be touched they surely would have wanted to touch the gable anyway? They would have wanted to take the magic away with them for a blessing.

Witness Patrick Walsh gave an interesting testimony,

My name is Patrick Walsh; I live at Ballinderrig, an English mile from the chapel of Knock. I remember well the 21st of August, 1879. It was a very dark night. It was raining heavily. About nine o'clock on that night I was going on some business through my land, and standing a distance of about half a mile from the chapel, I saw a very bright light on the southern gable-end of the chapel ; it appeared to be a large globe of golden light ; I never saw, I thought, so brilliant a light before; it appeared high up in the air above and around the chapel gable, and it was circular in its appearance ; it was quite stationary, and it seemed to retain the same brilliancy all through. The following day I made inquiries in order to learn if there were any lights seen in place that night; it was only then I heard of the Vision or Apparition that the people had seen.

Ballinderrig is a townland in the vicinity of Knock in the Ballyhaunis direction. You would get no good or direct view of the gable from it at all. If he saw a light then it was not on the gable but higher up.

His statement that the globe of light was high up makes liars of those who said the images were just two feet above the ground. This would be Patrick Hill, Mary Beirne and Bridget Trench. Judith Campbell said that she went within a foot of the images: "I went within a foot of them."

The alleged HEAVY rain is hard to verify. The witnesses say little about it. Too little. Patrick Beirne said there was no rain only drizzle. The rain against the gable is a myth propagated to make out that the images would have been washed away if they were painted.

This line was interpolated into the testimony by Dominic Beirne Sen, “ and yet there was not one drop of rain near the images.” That was useful for making the sight seem paranormal.

Mary Beirne told the paper that she was going from the house to the chapel at 8 to lock it up (page 46, The Apparition at Knock). This was a lie as the chapel had been locked at 7.30 by her sister Margaret who lived in the same house. Why did she lie? If she went to lock the chapel, what was she doing going in the direction of the southern gable when the door to be locked was in the

There is a story from the Duchas collection from Claremorris which is not far from Knock. It shows how apparitions that nobody said were Mary were taken to be of fairy women. The story only guesses that this "big lady dressed in white" is a fairy woman. Visions were not uncommon.

Judith Campbell was an apparition witness. In her testimony, she declared that Mary Beirne called at her house at 8 and asked her to go and see the apparition (page 31, The Apparition at Knock). She did not say how long she stayed. She did not mention abandoning her dying mother and leaving her on her own. Her mother was dying and Judith left her in her sickbed to look at the vision. Manipulator!

Bridget Trench 75 was in Campbell's house. She left at 7.30 upon hearing of the apparition which she prayed at for an hour (page 30, The Apparition at Knock). That means she could have gone back to keep an eye on dying Mrs Campbell when Judith appeared at 8 but didn't.

The visionaries left the vision because Mrs Campbell had been found unconscious at her door and needed help. Judith had thought she was dead when she discovered her (page 82, The Apparition at Knock). The old lady heard about the vision and wanted to see and got out of her bed and made it to the door where she fell.

Why does the Church say that if the witnesses hadn't run off and abandoned the vision to help dying Mrs Campbell, it would be a sign that the apparition was false? (page 83, The Apparition at Knock). Surely a vision taking a daughter away from her mother is false then with that logic? And the apparition did that! Keeping the daughter away from the dying mother is more serious than keeping people at a gable when an old and abandoned woman is dying. Judith left her mother's sickbed unattended. Because of the apparition, nobody was with the old woman. Why did the vision not vanish the very moment the alarm was raised about Mrs Campbell? It lingered on as if disapproving of them going away. God will not send a vision unless he wants people to see it. Yet in Knock we have an apparition that was around before the first witness saw it. She ignored it for a while and it was still there when she and friends went to see it. It was still there when they all left the apparition site. However, they helped Mrs Campbell and when they returned to the gable the vision was gone. It vanished during their ten or fifteen minute absence. It is strange that Judith didn't have her mother carried out to see the vision in the hope of a miracle.

Why is the apparition nearly killing a dying woman not a disproof of its authenticity?

Why did all the visionaries have to leave? They behaved strangely. Even more so when they stayed fifteen to twenty minutes away.

There is no way that people in a rural community in Ireland would have let it happen that an old woman would be left alone to possibly die.

Whatever the truth about Knock is, the lies and gullibility and extremism that followed it shows it is not from a benevolent supernatural source.

FINALLY

The apparition was a hoax even if we can only guess what trickery was used!

The summary of the case for a hoax.

The images were not alive.

There were errors such as Mary being yellow in the face and the crown being too pale in its yellow colour.

The images were not seen coming or going.

The witnesses did not tell everything - for example not all mentioned a cross. What else did they not tell? They did not say how they thought the images came to be there. All they had to do was say they saw the show.

Beirne who said the bishop was St John had too much influence over the others who said the same thing. Oddly it was not thought to be St Patrick. She lied that a statue of John in Lecanvey which had no mitre unlike this bishop made her say it was John. There was no statue.

The images showed no signs of life. Most of the testimonies state that the images were statues. All of the witnesses said the figures showed no sign of life. There was an exception. Unreliable Mary McLoughlin said they moved but movement is a very easy thing to imagine. But she never put that into her deposition so it is mere gossip. None of the official depositions speak of the images being alive. Patrick Hill said the images moved but he was not referring to them moving as if they were alive. The tableau as a whole appeared to or seemed moved in and out a bit.

The images looked flat against the wall.

They looked unclear with Joseph reportedly being the most lifelike.

If the publishers believed the story why did they have to exaggerate the testimonies of the witnesses to make them seem more credible? They could not go to the witnesses to get a more miraculous story so they just fabricated.

The book provides a framework for more exploration along these lines. I highly recommend it.