Today Macedonia celebrates Ilinden – the Day of the Republic, one of the largest state holidays in the Republic of Macedonia and a religious holiday celebrated in honor of St. Elijah. The Day of the Republic marks two large events that took place on this date when the foundations of the Macedonian statehood were established: the Ilinden Uprising of 1903, organized by the Internal Macedonian Revolutionary Organization against the Ottoman Empire, when the Krushevo Republic was formed, and the first session of the Anti-fascist Assembly of the People’s Liberation of Macedonia (ASNOM) in 1944, when the foundations of modern Republic of Macedonia were established.

Ilinden was proclaimed a state holiday even at the first ASNOM session.

Large popular gatherings are organized in all Macedonian monasteries. There is also a traditional cavalry march from Skopje to Krushevo, a small town in southwest Macedonia where the rebellion leaders proclaimed the Krushevo Republic in 1903. The main celebration is on the Mechkin Kamen, the place where in August 1903 a company of rebels led by Voyvoda Pitu Guli held the Ottoman army until the majority of rebel forces managed to retreat. They all died a heroic death.

Macedonians celebrate this day as a religious holiday for millennia. The tradition originates from the times when the Slavs who occupied this territory accepted Christianity and switched their main god Perun with the Christian saint St. Elijah.