The Holy Oil is Ready For King Charles's Coronation
Preparations for King Charles’s coronation, and the three days of celebrations surrounding it, are now well underway. And a particularly symbolic ritual took place in Jerusalem today as the holy oil that will be used to anoint the new monarch and his queen consort was consecrated.
“The Chrism oil which will be used to anoint His Majesty The King on 6th May 2023 has been consecrated in Jerusalem today, Friday 3rd March 2023,” Buckingham Palace said in a statement today. The ceremony took place at 10 a.m. local time in The Church of the Holy Sepulchre in Jerusalem, with the oil consecrated by the Patriarch of Jerusalem, His Beatitude Patriarch Theophilos III, and the Anglican Archbishop in Jerusalem, The Most Reverend Hosam Naoum. The oil was created using olives from two groves on the Mount of Olives, one at the Monastery of Mary Magdalene which is the burial place of Prince Philip’s mother, Princess Alice of Greece. It has been perfumed with essential oils including sesame, rose, jasmine, cinnamon, and orange blossom.
The holy oil is at the center of the most sacred part of the Coronation ceremony—the anointing—which happens before the investiture and crowning. The Royal Collection Trust describes how the Archbishop of Canterbury pours the oil onto the Coronation Spoon and anoints the sovereign on the hands, breast and head. “The tradition goes back to the Old Testament where the anointing of Solomon by Zadok the Priest and Nathan the Prophet is described,” the RCT explains. “Anointing was one of the medieval holy sacraments and it emphasised the spiritual status of the sovereign. Until the seventeenth century the sovereign was considered to be appointed directly by God and this was confirmed by the ceremony of anointing. Although the monarch is no longer considered divine in the same way, the ceremony of Coronation also confirms the monarch as the Head of the Church of England.”
The anointing was the one moment of Queen Elizabeth’s 1953 Coronation that was not shown on television, with a canopy held over the new Queen instead. Plans for exactly how King Charles's Coronation will be seen publicly have yet to be announced though it is expected to be televised in the same way his mother's was.
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