www.byzcath.org Forums Mysteries: The Life of Worship Vespers, Matins & the Divine Liturgy Platform in the nave of old Rusyn churches?

Vasyl Rudejko devotes a page and a half of his recent book on Orthros in the Byzantine tradition and especially in the Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church to the central bema found in a number of ancient Syrian churches, including the altar-like table called “Golgotha” that stood in the middle of the bema and held a Cross and the book of the Gospels. At the end of this brief survey, he remarks:

Until the seventeenth century the ambo was found the Byzantine churches of western Ukraine, in the form of a circular or sometimes semicircular platform. As still today in the old churches of the Bačka Ruthenians; and the above-mentioned altar [viz. the “Golgotha”], on which the Cross and the book of the Gospels are laid, and which is called the Tetrapodion (four-foot), stands also until the present day over against the sanctuary, moved more toward the middle of the nave.

(Bis ins 17. Jahrhundert fand man in den byzantinischen Kirchen der Westukraine den Ambo in Form einer halbrunden oder auch runden Plattform. Wie heute noch in den alten Kirchen der Ruthenen in der Batschka in der Mitte der Kirche und der oben beschrieben Altar, auf den man der Kreuz und das Evangelienbuch niederlegt und der Tetrapodion [Vierfuß] gennant wird, steht er auch bis heute gegenüber dem Altarraum, mehr zur Mitte des Kirchenschiffs gerückt.)

Vasyl Rudejko, Studien zur Geschichte der byzantinischen Orthros: Historische Vergewisserung für eine heutige Praxis der Gemeindeliturgy; Schriften zur Praktischen Theologie, Bd 12 (Hamburg: Verlag Dr. Kovač, 2010), p. 74.

The tetrapodion is of course a normal part of the furniture of an Orthodox or Byzantine-rite Catholic church. In my GOArch parish it is a small, unadorned table that stands unobtrusively in a corner until there is occasion for the priest to bless something during a service—bread at an artoklasia, water at Theophany, grapes at Transfiguration, and the like. Then it is brought out to the center line of the solea, and the blessing is performed. Few of our parish would be able to make much sense of Rudejko’s convoluted two sentences quoted above, but having lived long in Pennsylvania and claiming the Carpatho-Rusyn tradition as my home base in Orthodoxy, I am quite familiar with the practice of placing the tetrapodion, a heavier and more ornate object than our modest Greek table, on the center line of the church, in the nave just before the solea, or sometimes, if pews do not obstruct it, more toward the center of the nave; and placing on it a Cross, candles, the icon of the day (here rather than on an analogion as in most Orthodox churches, maybe a Gospel book, and anything for which a blessing is requested. I know that this is done in some Romanian churches also.

What is of particular interest in Rudejko’s discussion is the assertion that a permanent platform stood in the middle of the nave of churches of western Ukraine until the 17th century. Although his book is generally well provided with footnotes, no references are given. Can anyone supply further information?

The article confuses me. The Ambon (semi-circle) the tetrapod and the bema are three different physical things.

The location of the "Ambon Prayer" varies in actual practice; some priests pray it from the Ambon just in front of the Royal Doors, but other priests go out beyond the tetrapod, near the middle of the nave.

I'm not very familiar with the term "bema" but an internet search indicates that it is the Altar, that area behind the iconostas that we commonly call the sanctuary.

In antiquity, the center of the nave had much more liturgical importance than is practiced now. Maybe this is what Rudyeko was referring to.

Perhaps our forum priests could give more insight here.

What we call the ambon is the bema. The platform the bishop uses in the nave in a Hierarchal Divine Liturgy is the remnant of the great ambo of Hagia Sophia:
http://sketchup.google.com/3dwarehouse/details?mid=ec1426d7cfc01cc49a063cd1580b7bb2

In the linked picture it is backward, the long end led to the iconostasis.

Fr Robert Taft has an article in The Oxford Dictionary of Byzantium p75. It includes a short bibliography. The bema is the sanctuary area.

Since the Rusyns of Vojvojdina didn't move there until the time of Empress Maria Theresa, my hunch is that the circular-style ambon found in some of their churches is a borrowing from their Serbian Orthodox neighbors.

Fr. David

Let me try to clarify the terminology.

Bema. Nowadays in the Byz. rite we use the word to refer to the raised area in the eastern end of a church where the holy table stands; in Western terminology, the sanctuary, just as Deacon David notes. However, in a traditional synagogue the bema (or bimah, from the Hebrew spelling) is a raised platform in the middle of the hall--the middle of the nave in church terms--from which much of the worship service is conducted. ("Modern" synagogues usually lack the central bimah.) At the place where we would put the altar, what you would find in a synagogue is the ark, a chest containing the scrolls of the Torah.

From the 4th to the 9th centuries, some (not all) Syrian churches had a similar bema in the middle of the nave. The Syrian bema had seats for the clergy (as Deacon Lance points out, in East-Slavic usage in a hierarchical Liturgy the bishop's throne is on a platform in the middle of the nave, a similar practice) and a table with a cross on it. This bema originated before the Christological schisms of the 5th century, and remained in use for several centuries after the schisms in both the West Syrian and the East Syrian churches (not, as far as I know, among the Maronites), and is found in ruins of churches along the Silk Road, and also in churches in India. Rudejko briefly discusses this Syrian bema, and asserts that old Rusyn churches had something similar. So bema in this context is *not* the sanctuary in the east end of the church but rather a platform in the middle of the nave.

Ambo. This word nowadays means an analogion standing on ghe solea, from which lections are read; and the solea is the raised extension of the sanctuary to the west of the iconostasion. In ancient Byzantine churches, notably in Justinian's Hagia Sophia, the ambo was a large raised platform in the nave, and the solea was the raised walkway connecting the sanctuary to the ambo. This ambo was similar to the Syrian bema but lacked seating for the clergy and (at least as far as I know) the table with the cross. This ambo was used by readers and singers rather than by priests and bishops.

So in my question both "bema" and "ambo" have a meaning different from our customary usage; both refer to some sort of platform in the middle of the nave, or at least well out in the nave away from the sanctuary. My question is about Rudejko's assertion that Rusyn churches once had such a platform. I don't follow Rudejko's discussion exactly about the Vojvodina churches, but he is also contending that there were such platforms in Western Ukraine (just where he does not say; I suppose he means Galicia and Carpathian Rus', maybe also Bukovyna Volynia, and other provinces), and that they are still found in the Vojvodina churches. If they were *only* in Vojvodina, we would have to investigate whether they were a borrowing from the Serbs, as Fr David suggests; but then we would need evidence of the existence of such platforms among the Serbs, and I would like to hear of any such evidence also.

Tetrapod. The tetrapod in Greek and Russian churches is used for special occasion where some object or objects are to be blessed. The icon of the day or season is displayed on an analogion. In Rusyn and some other churches, the same tetrapod is placed along the center line of the church where the solea meets the nave, and holds the icon of the day on a low stand and usu. a cross and perhaps candles, so it is in daily use. According to Rudejko, it also holds or held the book of the Gospels, and stood on the platform in the middle of the nave that he describes. This is what I am trying to trace. The present use of the tetrapod is well know, and the Rusyn custom perseveres even in thoroughly Russified Orthodox parishes; what I am looking for is any evidence that it formerly stood on a platform in the middle of the nave, as asserted by Rudejko.

So I am now asking if anyone has information about such raised platforms in the nave of old Rusyn churches.

The article seems to be incoherent. Vojvodina is in Serbia. There was a migration of Serbs to Subcarpathia around the 15-16th centuries (perhaps my "Rusin" ancestors were among them as Bobovic' is a Serbian surname, but my grandfather was from Spis.)
As I understand it, the peasants would migrate every few years so they woundn't be attached to the lord or pay taxes.

To name those in Vojvodina as Rusyns is a stretch.

I wouldn't put a whole lot of faith into this article.

Vojvodina has a significant Rusyn population. They migrated there in the 1700s. The village of Ruski Krstur is almost completely Rusyn and it is the seat of the Greek Catholic Exarchate in Serbia.

Yes, Andrejko is referring to the population Deacon Lance describes, the "Bačka Ruthenians," as they are called. The Rusyns have established a literary standard and legal recognition for their language, which is linguistically and eastern Slovak dialect and is written in modern Ukrainian orthography. Apparently what Andrejko is saying is at the time they migrated, the central platform was still found in the churches of the Carpathians, and stands to this day in old churches of these Rusyns, an example of marginal survival. I agree that he is not as clear as one might wish.

This is a video of a wedding in a Vojvodina Rusyn church, performed by the bishop. At minute 3:18 ff. you can see the tetrapod well out into the nave, with candles, flowers, the Gospel book . . . . Whether it stands on a permanent platform, which is what I am trying to find, is impossible to determine. There appears to be a backup table with flowers abutting the tetrapod to the east.

This is a video of a wedding in a Vojvodina Rusyn church, performed by the bishop. At minute 3:18 ff. you can see the tetrapod well out into the nave, with candles, flowers, the Gospel book . . . . Whether it stands on a permanent platform, which is what I am trying to find, is impossible to determine. There appears to be a backup table with flowers abutting the tetrapod to the east.

How about that; you learn something new every day.

Do you know what the reason was for the migration? Was this a forced migration to populate newly gained territory for the Empire?

An Orthodox church in Vojvojdina:
http://www.panoramio.com/photo/48218606

Enthronement of Patriarch Irinej:
http://www.manastir-lepavina.org/vijest_cir.php?id=4520
(The video shows the platform being used both as a cathedra for the Patriarch, and an ambon for the deacons.)

Lepavina Monastery:
http://spc.rs/sr/manastir_lepavina_dobio_novi_ikonostas

Also, the photos between pages 48 and 49 of Attwater's "The Christian Church of the East" includes an old photo of the Greek Catholic Cathedral in Oradea Mare, Romania. It also includes a circular platform.

Fr. David

One source of evidence would be if there were signs of such a platform in the old temples. Most of the photos i have seen, however, have a carpet going along the axis of the nave, or the floor is not visible. Because there are no such platforms today in Carpathian temples does not immediately preclude their existence. It is an interesting relic, to say the least. I've seen a picture or photo of an ambo from one of the smaller churches in Thessalonika(?) that was only three steps. It is not a far stretch to reduce it to two steps in even smaller, rural temples, and dispense with the raised walkway connecting the ambo to the solea.

As an aside, when I was taught to read, I was instructed to read from in the middle someplace-it had to be the aisle in the midst of everyone-our cantor at the time recommended under one of the chandeliers as there was a structural support there, and if i did a bad job, and the floor opened up, it would be the least likely spot for that to happen without taking everyone out with me. Anyway, at the time I wondered why we did it that way, and everywhere else i had been, the reader was off to the side or the choir loft or up front facing the people (NO NO!).

from Adam


I like that as an explanation - the one I was given was that the centre of the church is frequently where there is a 'sweet spot' so the Reader will be heard more easily by all present without extra strain on him . Not having a centre Aisle I can't do that - but I do stay in my place which is about half way down the Church - and I've never been conscious of anyone having problems hearing me.

Up front facing the people - agree - please no.