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I have heard, that dividing after ten knots is Russian tradition, after 25 Greek. But some komvoskinis are divided after 33 knots.

andreios
Byzantine Catholics in Slovakia [grkat.nfo.sk]

Dear Andreios,

The division of the prayer rope into 25 knots before the divider bead is the tradition established by St Basil the Great himself for his monks.

The Russians in the 17th century developed the leather "ladder" or "lestovka" that keeps Basil's 100 knotches with three dividers, but organizes them this way:

After the beginning three large knotches, there are 12 "babotchki" or steps signifying the 12 Apostles.

After that is a larger, divider knotch or step, followed by 38 steps signifying the 36 weeks and two days in which Christ dwelt in the Womb of His Most Holy Mother.

Then follow 33 steps signifying the years Christ lived on earth.

Then follow 17 steps signifying the 16 Prophets who foretold Christ's coming and St John the Baptist.

There are nine larger steps all together (six at the bottom above the four "flaps") that signify the nine choirs of Angels.

We may use this counter to do the 12 Lord Have Mercy's or the 40 Lord have mercy's (begin at the large step before the group of 38 and end on the large step at the end).

Or else it is used in Lent for the Prayer of St Ephrem the Syrian (group of 17).

While there are 16 bows and prostrations, the Old Believers begin this prayer with "By the prayers of our Holy Fathers, Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God, have mercy on us!" followed by a bow - which comes to 17.

The Lestovka is worn on the elbow rather than on the wrist and all Old Rite Christians have their Lestovka which they bring to Church.

The Old Believers also have a "Theotokos Lestovka" which has 150 smaller steps divided every ten with a larger step - 150 Hail Mary's and 15 Our Father's - a witness to the ancient practice of what the West calls the "rosary" in the East.

Orthodox monasteries today will produce prayer ropes with 50, 100 or 150 decades divided with larger divider knots.

These are used for the recitation of Our Father's and Hail Mary's with prostrations with a prostration every ten prayers.

In addition, this is used for the recitation of the Jesus Prayer with metanias or waste-bows ten times with a prostration to the ground every ten.

The practice of having 33 knots goes back to the veneration of the years our Lord lived on earth and is most predominant in the Middle East.

The Russian Lestovka has a 33-step set honouring Christ's years and small 33-knot prayer ropes are a favourite for Orthodox Christians to carry about with them.

(Also, this is similar to the RC practice of honouring the years in which the Most Holy Virgin Mary lived on earth - the Brigittine Rosary has 63 Hail Mary's for her 63 years and the Franciscan Rosary has 72 for their tradition that she lived for 72 years).

In fact, Muslims who, as I think the evidence will bear out, adopted the Christian prayer beads for themselves, have them in 33 and 99 bead sets.

(There are, today, some Muslim sects (e.g. in Pakistan and Africa) that use their fingers to pray the 99 Names of Allah with - they emphatically state that prayer beads are a Christian invention and therefore should not be used by Muslims!)

Am I good or what?

Alex

Dear Thea Logica,

Actually, the constant teaching of the great practitioners of the Rosary is that one should indeed break it up into three groups said at three different times of the day (St Louis de Montfort).

And it takes time to get used to this Rule - the Russian elders said that one should say 50 Hail Mary's a day at first.

But I've found that if you add some words to each decade of Hail Mary's reflecting the mystery - there is no problem.

This method is heaven-sent.

Last year, my wife and I went on a cruise, but spent the day before at a shopping mall.

Those times are when I use my cord rosary or decade "tenner" to pray and meditate on the Mysteries of the Life of Christ and Mary.

I did more than 50 decades that day in fact, so wonderful a shopping day my wife had . . .

I couldn't believe how simple it was to keep one's attention focused with the "phrase method."

The next day we boarded our ship and at the end of the cruise, everyone was informed that a plot by terrorists was foiled at the docks - five "security agents" were arrested as they were about to board the ship with well-packed bags . . .

I believe the Mother of God protected us all that day!!!

The RC West used to use the 15 decades of the Rosary as a form of the Divine Office with three decades for Matins and two decades for each of the other six Hours.

Those who had the blessing to use the Rosary in place of the Little Office (for purposes of the Sabbatine Privilege and the Scapular) had to say the Rosary in this way, or at least strive to.

There were also Russian Elders who would use the Hail Mary in place of the Jesus Prayer. One Elder who did this was nicknamed the "Elder of the Theotokos."

The Hail Mary is a mystic prayer of the New Testament and the Incarnation.

It praises BOTH Christ and Mary - and, what has always inspired me about it, it praises MARY FIRST and then the "Fruit of Your Womb."

Alex

I do pray the Jesus prayer (chokti), the Franciscan crown, or the "traditional" rosary. I carry an old rosary around with me that my father carried with him in WW2 - he had to parachute with it once or twice and it is a little beaten up. I do say the rosary on it, in memory of him, because he had a strong devotion to the Blessed Mother and said the rosary daily.

I tend to say traditional morning and/or evening introductory prayers and some prayers from matins and/or vespers from an old Slovak prayer book. That's a more common way of praying for me that saying the chokti or various rosaries or chaplets, but I think they all have their place, and I say them, too. For me, I like to read from a prayer book and think about the words s-l-o-w-l-y and try to do something along the lines of the Jesuit's Examen, esp. at the end of the day.

If I can get to one of the local monasteries, I'll pray some version of vespers there. I either go to a Franciscan, Benedictine, or Ukrainian monastery - all slightly different. I like to pray in community, but, like most of us, I have to go to work and don't usually get out in time to go to vespers.

I'm a distance runner. I particularly like to say a decade of the rosary when running ten milers. I pray during longer runs than that, too, but it tends to be more free form. A priest whom I found helpful when I was younger, told us that we should "pray on the run," and I guess I took that literally. I get a lot of my praying done when I'm putting in the miles.

A dear friend of mine is a follower of Orthodox Judiasm and is in the habit of saying prayers of thanksgiving for every day things - I find myself doing the same thing in my daily activities and travels. It's a different way to pray, I suppose, but I like it. For example, my friend prays before and after a meal - in thanks for food, in thanks for food that satisfies, in thanks for the joy of the company of friends while he eats, in thanks for the people who do the work that gets the food to his table, etc. One time I asked him how he gets anything done at all, saying all these prayers of thanksgiving for every little thing. He told me that people never miss their bread until they are hungry, so they should be thankful when they have it and express their thanks - and that that also helps us to be conscious of those who don't have what we have and we might actually do as the Lord wants and help them out. Wow, but he has a point. He has traditional morning and evening prayers - but I noticed that these little, personal, daily expressions of joy and wonder are the real center of his prayer life.

Oh, and I do like Stations of the Cross. There is a little Italian church that I sometimes go to during the Great Fast in order to attend Stations. I have some Orthodox friends who like the devotion, too. (They wouldn't like it if their church did it, but they like to go to Catholic churches that have that tradition!)

Dear Annie,

The old Rosary Confraternities of Europe used to do the Stations of the Cross as a Rosary.

They would do one decade for each Station.

The Stations of the Cross are actually practiced in many Orthodox parishes in Eastern Europe and the form that I use is one published by an Orthodox parish that my in-laws brought back for me.

St Tikhon of Zadonsk had no icons in his cell, but only a life-size representation of a series of "Stations" of Christ on His way to Calvary.

St Dmitri of Rostov also translated a number of Western "Passion" devotions into Slavonic for use by the Orthodox. The Orthodox "Passia" from the time of St Peter Mohyla was a kind of adaptation of the wildly popular Stations of the Cross - as was the Akathist to the Passion of Christ that, in its original form by St Innocent of Odessa, has an Orthodox translation of the Western devotion to the Five Wounds of Christ!

One could also do the Seven Words of Christ on the Cross with decades.

They also did nine decades for the nine choirs of Angels, 12 decades for the Apostles and so on.

I think it is important for all Eastern Christians, Catholic and Orthodox, to understand that this form of prayer is common to them both as well as to their saints.

If anything else occurs to me to add here, I'll come back and do so with your permission and that of the Administrator!

Alex

OK, so, is it OK to do a sort of hybrid? 'Cause I've got this rosary I'm really fond of (I made it myself, it came out all twisted, kind of like me), and it feels kind of wierd skipping over the "Our Father" beads.

If I use the Byzantine Hail Mary, and the mysteries from the Orthodox rule-it's grown on me this past week- but pray it in the same fashion as a regular rosary, is that OK?

Also, I've tried to pray the rosary while walking, and it didn't work out. I have a hard time keeping my mind on the mysteries and at the same time, keeping an eye open for obstacles on the sidewalk, avoiding getting hit by cars that don't seem to grok the concept that that red octagonal sign means they're supposed to stop, things of that nature.

Dear Thea Logica,

Well, you don't have to skip over the Our Father beads . . .

The Eastern Church monastics say the Rule of the Mother of God in a number of ways.

One may simply say 150 Hail Mary's (monastics also often do prostrations at the end of each Hail Mary).

St Seraphim of Sarov organized this Rule into decades, but with no Our Father's (he recited 150 Our Father's as a separate Rule). Each decade of St Seraphim's rule ended with the prayer "Open to us the doors of Thy Mercy, O Blessed Mother of God, so that having placed our hope in Thee we should not perish, but obtain release, by Thee, from peril - for You are the salvation of the Christian race!"

The New Hieromartyr St Seraphim Zvezdinsky added the Our Father to the above together with 15 mysteries.

The Serbian Orthodox and others recite the Troparion in honour of the feast of the Mystery being considered at the beginning of the decade.

So definitely do include the Our Father!

Alex