www.byzcath.org Forums Faith & Christian Life Faith & Theology "New Translation "of the Liturgy

Dear Administrator,

Forgive me, but what was so funny?

Alex

Slava Isusu Christu!
Glory to Jesus Christ!

Quick question and please forgive me in advance if this is stupid! I am new to the Byzantine Faith and love it!

I have the Byzantine Daily Worship published by Archbishop Raya. How different is the Divine Liturgy in the BDW from the 1941 Liturgy that is being referenced?

I realize this is written for our Melkite Bretheren but it also has what appears to me to be the Blessing/Approval of the EP.

Thank you.

In Christ,

Michael

Dear Michael,
Leaving aside questions which would only concern points of English translation, the Divine Liturgy as given in Byzantine Daily Worship differs from the 1941 Church-Slavonic edition published by Rome for use by the Ruthenians in two areas one might notice:

a) the petitions of the litany after the Gospel are a bit different (that often happens from one version to another), and

b) the text of the prayer before Holy Communion is longer in Byzantine Daily Worship.

Hope that's of some help.

Incognitus

Bless Fr. Incognitus,

Thank you for the information.

With deepest regards,

Michael

Dear John,

I agree with this completely. I have no objection to a priest, at an appropriate time taking some silent prayer aloud. But to mandate selected prayers be taken aloud, and to leave other ones optional, seems a matter of the committee's personal choice.

When I call the Liturgy of Saint John Chrysostom (the book I have on my shelf, not some mysterious historical reconstruction from antiquity) a 'work of art' that should not be revised or reorganized, I am not simply speaking about the choice of words in used translation, or some other text issue. I am talking about the whole balance, the ebb and flow of prayer between priest (bishop) deacon and faithful. There is a balance and a proportion, and a movement which is graceful.

The elimination of deacon's litanies and the shortening of the people's hymns, while at the same time expanding the audible parts of the priest (now mysteriously and erroneously renamed "celebrant" in the revised Liturgy (that is another matter of contention!), changes the balance and it upsets the 'flow' of prayer in the liturgy. The liturgy is an image of Church, faithful and ministers. I think, the revision of the liturgy is not about text or greek words, it is an issue of ecclesiology!

Nick

Great post.

With the latest exchange, I think we�ve pretty much said what needs to be said, so I�m going to take a break.

Just a few clarifications of things that have been unsaid. I probably antedate many of the members and certainly the Administrator. Please clarify: Most of our people remember the old �Slavonic High Mass,� complete with litanies (or at least those given in the Levkulic Pew Book).� - You can�t actually mean what you�re saying, since the litanies in the Levkulic Pew Book are fewer than those in the new translation. One must also remember that the liturgical attitude before Vatican II was predominantly legalistic. The priests did indeed say all the litanes - but inaudibly. That is why people sang �Hospodi pomiluj� between the antiphons, they responded to the litanies the priest was saying inaudibly. This quickened the pace of the Liturgy!
And in a legalistic mentality, the quicker you do the Liturgy that you �must� attend (even if its boring!), the better it is. Remember what our Lord said to one of his apostles at the Last Supper, �What you must do, do quickly.�

The sense of mystery in the Liturgy does not come from oscurantism. The Romans have lost a sense of mystery because of a lack of understanding of the mystery of the Incarnation - Jesus is just one more nice, everyday guy. The power of the Byzantine Liturgy comes from an understanding of the mystery of the Incarnation. The sense of mystery comes from a fact beyond our human control - that God is acting in the Liturgy - that it is a truly �Divine� Liturgy. This is more than just my opinion! We should seek understanding of the Liturgy - the more we understand the Liturgy, the more profound and beautiful the mystery becomes. This is yet another reason to hear the presbyteral prayers, which express the Paschal Mystery. One major error in many of the posts is the idea that the priest�s prayers �interrupt the flow� of the Liturgy. The prayers are the �flow� of the Liturgy, the people�s �Amen,� and hymns interrupt this flow - but in a good sense, in a sense of our joining in the prayer and becoming a part of the �divine� action.

The rubrics in the Slavonic Divine Liturgy come from a more ancient stratum. There is no direction to pray them �silently� (Greek, �mysticos,� Slavonic, �taino.�) The silent recitation is a superimposed practice.

A final point, to the administrator - I think you must be consistent. If the Liturgy is to be prayed in its 1941 form, than all services should be prayed in their 1941 form, and this includes the Presanctified Divine Liturgy (distinctly called a �Divine� Liturgy in the Slav texts). If they faithful can adapt to the 1941 Divine Liturgy, they can also adapt to the 1941 Presanctified. This also includes Vespers and Matins - though I will admit Matins is a problem if it must be served in its full form - I know of no one who does that.

Father David,

Of all of the posters here you and Father Loya seem to make the most sense, far more than I who know very little about the liturgy. What I do know I love and I'm not afraid of the minor changes as you describe them.

I'm more convinced than ever that the future of the Church, the future that is vibrant and moving toward union between East and West, the future that holds growth as well as devotion, will go to those who refuse to be sidetracked by every change that must be made but who will work with all of our might to grow this vision of a Church united.

We have Atheists and Muslims who would gladly destroy us all. But the real enemy is found in our midst, in our willingness to be sidetracked. I'm committed to work on a vision that fulfills our mission and to sing my heart out every time I go to Church. To sing my heart out even if we sing 3, 3 or 1 antiphon or sing "humans" instead of "mankind." To sing my heart out even if the RC's bore each other to tears and even if the Orthodox sneer at us or think we are traitors.

Count me FULLY in.

Dan L

I again thank Father David for participating in this discussion. I know that it is difficult to defend one�s position against those who disagree (especially in this type of �town hall� forum) and my respect for Father David has increased greatly with each of his posts. I hope he will find some recompense in the knowledge that the Forum has 5,000 regular readers. Many of these readers do not have access to the other venues in which he has spoken on liturgy. I have just realized that Father David is taking time away from his summer vacation from his job at the seminary. That is demonstrative of someone willing to go the extra mile and I thank him.

To clarify on the litanies, yes, the litanies I spoke of were those in the Levkulic Pew Book plus a few more. When I was growing up my pastor also prayed the litany after the Great Entrance at the �Slavonic High Mass� (but never everything in the 1941 Liturgicon). My point here is that there is a common memory of litanies among the people, and they have always been in the various prayer books pretty much in full. So the restoration of those from common memory and those that were missing will be seen as something that already belonged and not something new (there is no common memory of the priestly prayers of the doxologies being prayed aloud).

Father David is quite correct that nothing was actually omitted and that the priest prayed all these prayers silently. I remember at the �Low Mass� the people had to keep repeating the �Ize�, the �Jako da carja� and etc., to cover the gap while the priest was praying. I also remember our priest reading the epistle in the sacristy after the Divine Liturgy because it had not been out loud read at the Liturgy. He is quite right in his comments about the legalistic approach of that era.

I also agree with Father David that the sense of mystery in the Liturgy does not come from obscurantism. I suspect that I differ in opinion from Father David in that I don�t believe that the quiet taking of the priestly prayers equates to obscurantism. To accept Father David�s position here one would also have to believe that the rise of the icon screen is also from obscurantism.

Regarding consistency, yes, I agree that all services should be prayed in their 1941 form, including Vespers and Matins, and the Presanctified Divine Liturgy. Where these services are deemed too long for parochial usage they could be abbreviated according to the common custom throughout the rest of Orthodoxy. Others can comment to this more ably than I, but common abbreviations include not taking the �repeats� for the Hymns of Vespers and etc. Over the years I have prepared a small number of Vigil service books (Vespers and Matins combined) that were used in retreat settings. They omitted nothing (except for �repeats� and mistakes on my part) and they have always been very well received.

Again, I wish Father David a good summer break. And I hope he understands that I would prefer to have these discussions in an air conditioned pub with beer in hand, peanut shells on the floor, a steak on the plate before me, and maybe a baseball game on the television in the background.

Admin

Thank you, Father.

I do not tend to like "inclusive language" for its own sake, if by that you mean rather randomly replacing "brethren" with "brothers and sisters" and such just to make us women feel at home on Sunday. We women know we're welcome and included already - and somehow tweaking the words of the Liturgy for that purpose is a silly and, frankly, outdated thing to do. The women followed Jesus to His Crucifixion and went seeking after Him in the Tomb, while most of His disciples hid and had to be told about the Resurrection. If women need to be reminded of their home in the church, it is better to do so by reminding them of the brave and holy women of Scriptures than by tweaking wordings.

Sometimes, of course, as you well know, dedicated scholars uncover more about the vernacular of Scriptural times and use that knowledge to better translate holy texts in historical context. When that is an honest pursuit with an eye toward better understanding higher things, it is a good pursuit, because it helps us to better understand our collective faith.

I appreciate that you refer to "counterfeit" changes that were wrongly associated with Vatican II. The Vatican II consular documents say a lot of wonderful, wonderful things that never were absorbed by the people. The important message got lost and muddied. Instead, you had people using Vatican II as an excuse to try to change this or that "pet" peeve - looking for any excuse to re-open unrelated issues of all types - not just Liturgical issues, but moral and social as well. There is an important lesson to learn that we cannot ignore - what went wrong after Vatican II could as easily happen to any church as it did to Romans. When one treads into turbulent waters of change, one had better be ready to watch for the undertow and keep an eye to the shore as well.

For myself, I will wait to hear what the changes are before I decide my own opinion. But, Father, saying a Liturgical change is "not as bad as it could be" does not seem a ringing endorsement from you...? Were you only referring to the inclusive language itself, though? (I hope?)

Dear Administrator,

As you know I am curious and like to ask questions, even when slightly off topic. So, here I ask: truly "everything" for Vigil? If so I would like to know how long it took and I would even like to see the book. I find that basically no one takes truly everything outside of monasteries.

For instance even when Matins was celebrated at seminary in Pittsburgh we did not take all six of the Hexapsalmos. We also did not take the kathismata generally. Please, tell me about this "everything Vigil" and how it was received and how long it took with prostopinije settings and if the psalms were done in the common (among Ruthenians here at least) antiphonal way.

Tony

Dear Tony,
A "complete" Vigil service is not an entirely unambiguous term, believe it or not, and it's possible to stimulate disagreements even among experts on this or that aspect of the matter. That said, though, an approximately complete Vigil as done on a feast-day (the night before, obviously) in a smallish parish using mostly simple chant can be expected to last between three and four hours - and yes, that does include all the assigned Psalms. The Polyeleos can be done magnificently even if led by two chanters, provided that the chanters are up to it in both knowledge and proficiency and that the rest of the singers will follow their leading.
Some pieces do not lend themselves to simple chant, and a more elaborate chant will require rehearsal. But it can be done.
In a monastery on a feast - at Jordanville, say - the complete Vigil is apt to take longer, for several reasons not directly involved with the text.
In Greece an All-Night Vigil means precisely that, but not only is everything sung (sometimes by different choirs in shifts), but in order to make the night itself complete, so to speak, other elements are added to the basic Vigil - an Akathistos, probably some enkomia, one or even two Divine Liturgies . . . the options are numerous.
And so it goes.

Incognitus

Aargh!!! I thought thought this was just something unique to the Basilians. The Six Psalms are a single unit, they are meant to be taken together. Is it really that much trouble to read all of them, every time? If one is chanting them antiphonally (which shouldn't be happening) I can see the aversion to taking all of them. If they are all chanted by a Reader it should take somewhere between 5 and 10 minutes (I've never timed it, but I'll try to do so).

Are clergy taught to do this in other places? Some of the gems found in the Basilian "Breviary", in addition to breaking up the Hexapsalmos, include breaking up:
* the 'Prayers of Light' at Vespers (one per week, according to the tone)
* the Psalms at Compline
* the Psalms at the Midnight Office
* as mentioned by above, the Hexapsalmos. Though the 'rubrics' don't mention breaking up the priest's silent prayers during the Hexapsalmos, I can't see how one could get through all 11 in the space of one Psalm.
* the Psalms at each of the Hours. Yes, the three psalms at each hour are spread out over the week.

I can understand some of the above if one is doing the Divine Office as a private prayer rule. But at a Seminary? That explains a few things.

Σώσον, Κύριε, καί διαφύλαξον η�άς από τών Βασιλιάνικων τάξεων!

Hi Tony,

Yes, it�s off topic but still a good question. My yardstick of �everything� is more-or-less the full Vigil that they do at the local ROCOR parish on Saturday evenings and the eves of feast days. As Incognitus notes, the term �complete� is rather elastic.

I can only find one of the books on my shelf (the others have probably migrated to a box in the closet) but this was the general outline of the Saturday Night Vigil (fill in the introductions, etc.):

-Psalm 103
-Great Synapte
-First Kathisma (�Blessed is the man� as taken in parishes)
-Litany
-Psalm 140
-Stichera (but with no repeats and no saints of the day)
-Entrance and �O Joyful Light�
-Prokimenon
-Litany
-�Count us worthy, O Lord�
-Litany
-Apostica
-Simeon and Trisagion Prayers
-Bohorodice
-Psalm 33
-The Six Psalms of Matins (chanted by a reader)
-Great Synapte
-God the Lord & Troparia
-First Kathisma (only the first psalm � Ps 9)
-Small Litany
-First Sessional Hymn
-Second Kathisma (only the first psalm � Ps 17)
-Small Litany
-Second Sessional Hymn
-Third Kathisma (only the first psalm � Ps 118)
-Hosts of Angels
-Small Litany
-Hypakoe
-Gradual Hymns (3 Antiphons in full)
-Prokimenon
-Gospel
-�Having beheld the resurrection�
-Psalm 50
-Litany �Save your people�
-Canon Odes 1 & 3 (1 was for the Resurrection and 3 was for the Prophet Elias)
-Small Litany
-Canon Odes 4, 5 & 6
-Small Litany
-Kontakion
-Ikos
-Canon Odes 7 & 8
-The Magnificat
-Canon Ode 9
-�It is truly proper�
-Small Litany
-Holy is the Lord
-Hymn of Light
-Psalm 148, 149 and 150 (in full)
-Five Sticheri (which is not all of them)
-The Great Doxology (and etc.)
-Litany
-Litany
-Dismissal

The book itself was 129 pages but also contained Friday Vespers, Saturday morning Akathist to the Theotokos, and the text and music for the Sunday Divine Liturgy.

Yes, not everything but certainly equivalent to the Vigil at any ROCOR parish (the OCA cathedral near me abbreviate horribly! ).

The above was for a weekend retreat in Niagara Falls, Ontario. We did not take everything according to Ruthenian prostopinije. I have some of the canon written out but I don�t like singing by myself (and only about half those making the retreat were Ruthenians). We sang the Canon to Tone 5 (think of the melody for �Blessed are You, O Lord, guide me by your precepts� and �The choir of saints has found the fountain of life�� as given in the funeral book). It is a very simply melody and the people picked up on it immediately. There were several priests, two very good deacons, and the acoustics in the church were very good. I don�t remember exactly how long the entire Vigil took but it was probably 2 � hours. The service was very well received. It was one of those services that was so powerful and spirit-filled that, when it was over, no one got up to leave and no one was tired.

On another occasion I prepared (at the request of the retreatmaster) a Vigil service that was similar to the above but, at the Friday Vespers we sang all of the Kathisma psalms. That Friday Vespers was probably about 75 minutes. In this case I assigned psalms to readers instead of the people chanting them (which is actually according to the rubrics).

Hmmm� now I wonder if people are going to accuse of me of being �Low Church� because we didn�t sing all the possible sticheri or add a few extra canons!

For parochial use I would love to see all of our parishes celebrating either Vespers on the eves of Sundays and feasts and Matins and Divine Liturgy in the morning or the Vigil in the evening and the DL in the morning. Yes, it can be long, but with the usual abbreviations and good music a good Vigil service can be served in about 90 minutes. [One can take a fuller service at a retreat than might be pastorally advisable for a regular parish setting.]

And, to get in my usual slogan, we don�t need to revise the services we have. We need to pray them so that they can form us!

Admin

Incognitus,

If you look at Administrator's post and my response, he did not say complete but rather that nothing was omitted. To that I asked about everything (everything being the opposite of nothing). If he were to have said "complete" or full or regular I would have asked "according to whom." The same could have been done for the nothing/everything phrasing but as I prefer for someone to answer for himself I gave him the opportunity to speak for himself.

Is that so offensive to you?

Tony