Dormition is one of the Twelve Great Feasts of the Christian faith. Of course, this is a great preaching opportunity, so we here at Preachers Institute, are offering an article on Dormition and a few things which we hope you will find valuable as you prepare this festal sermon.

1. Preach the Gospel

Don’t forget to preach the Gospel – tell your listeners the Good News! The only reason we are celebrating Dormition at all is because of the incarnation, suffering, death and resurrection of our Lord Jesus Christ. In fact, the feast of the Dormition is, indeed, a feast of resurrection! Be sure to make this connection to every listener with clarity. You may wish to treat this feast as a real opportunity to preach the Resurrection to those who may never get another chance to hear it!

This is a resurrectional feast!

2. About the Feast Itself

The word ‘Dormition’ simply means ‘falling asleep’ – the biblical idiom for a believer’s death.

The Dormition (Falling Asleep) of the Theotokos is one of the Great Feasts of the Orthodox Church, celebrated on August 15. This feast is called the Assumption in the western churches, and commemorates the death, resurrection and glorification of the Virgin Mary, Christ’s mother. It proclaims that Mary has been “assumed” by God into the heavenly kingdom of Christ in the fullness of her spiritual and bodily existence.

The Tradition of the Church is that Mary died as all people die, not “voluntarily” as her Son, but by the necessity of her mortal human nature which is indivisibly bound up with the corruption of this world.

The Orthodox Church teaches that Mary is without personal sins. In the Gospel of the feast, however, in the liturgical services and in the Dormition icon, the Church proclaims as well that Mary truly needed to be saved by Christ as all human persons are saved from the trials, sufferings and death of this world; and that having truly died, she was raised up by her Son as the Mother of Life and participates already in the eternal life of paradise which is prepared and promised to all who

“hear the word of God and keep it.” (Luke 11:27-28)

The services of the feast repeat the main theme, that the Mother of Life has

“passed over into the heavenly joy, into the divine gladness and unending delight” of the Kingdom of her Son. (Vesper verse)

The Old Testament readings, as well as the gospel readings for the Vigil and the Divine Liturgy, are exactly the same as those for the feast of the Virgin’s nativity and her entrance into the Temple. Thus, at the Vigil we again hear Mary say:

“My soul magnifies the Lord and my Spirit rejoices in God my Saviour.” (Luke 1:47)

At the Divine Liturgy we hear the letter to the Philippians where St. Paul speaks of the self-emptying of Christ who condescends to human servitude and ignoble death in order to be

“highly exalted” by God his Father. (Philippians 2:5-11)

And once again we hear in the Gospel that Mary’s blessedness belongs to all who

“hear the word of God and keep it.” (Luke 11:27-28)

Thus, the feast of the Dormition of the Theotokos is the celebration of the fact that all men are “highly exalted” in the blessedness of the victorious Christ, and that this high exaltation has already been accomplished in Mary the Theotokos. The feast of the Dormition is the sign, the guarantee, and the celebration that Mary’s fate is, the destiny of all those of “low estate” whose souls magnify the Lord, whose spirits rejoice in God the Saviour, whose lives are totally dedicated to hearing and keeping the Word of God which is given to men in Mary’s child, the Saviour and Redeemer of the world.

Finally it must be stressed that, in all of the feasts of the Virgin Mother of God in the Church, the Orthodox Christians celebrate facts of their own lives in Christ and the Holy Spirit.

What happens to Mary happens to all who imitate her holy life of humility, obedience, and love.

With her all people will be “blessed” to be “more honorable than the cherubim and beyond compare more glorious than the seraphim” if they follow her example. All will have Christ born in them by the Holy Spirit. All will become temples of the living God. All will share in the eternal life of His Kingdom who live the life that Mary lived.

In this sense everything that is praised and glorified in Mary is a sign of what is offered to all persons in the life of the Church. It is for this reason that Mary, with the divine child Jesus within her, is call in the Orthodox Tradition the Image of the Church. For the assembly of the saved is those in whom Christ dwells.

3. About The Dormition Fast

For the first fourteen days of August during each year, the Holy Orthodox Church enters into a strict fast period in honor of the Mother of God, the Virgin Mary.

Every Orthodox Christian is aware and generally knows the reason behind the fasts for Pascha and Christmas. But while they may know of the Dormition Fast, few follow it, and more than a few question why it is there, neither knowing its purpose.

First, given the pervasive misunderstanding of the purpose of fasting itself, a refresher on its purpose is always a good idea. There is a perception that we should fast when we want something, as though the act of fasting somehow appeases God, and seeing us “suffer” gets Him to grant our request. Nothing can be further from the truth. It is not our fasting that pleases God, it is the fruits of our fast (provided we fast in the proper mind set, and do not merely diet) that please Him.

We fast, not to get what we want, but to prepare ourselves to receive what God wants to give us. The purpose of fasting is to bring us more in line with another Mary, the sister of Lazarus, and away from their sister Martha, who in the famous passage was

“anxious and troubled about many things.”

Fasting is intended to bring us to the realization of

“the one thing needful.”

It is to help us put God first and our own desires second, if not last. As such it serves to prepare us to be instruments of God’s will, as with Moses in his flight from Egypt and on Mt. Sinai, as well as our Lord’s fast in the wilderness. Fasting turns us away from ourselves and toward God. In essence it helps us become like the Theotokos, an obedient servant of God, who heard His word and kept it better than anyone else has or could.

So why do we fast before Dormition?

In a close-knit family, word that its matriarch is on her deathbed brings normal life to a halt. Otherwise important things (parties, TV, luxuries, personal desires) become unimportant; life comes to revolve around the dying matriarch. It is the same with the Orthodox family; word that our matriarch is on her deathbed, could not (or at least should not) have any different effect than the one just mentioned.

The Church, through the Paraklesis Service, gives us the opportunity to come to that deathbed and eulogize and entreat the woman who bore God, the vessel of our salvation and our chief advocate at His divine throne. And as, in the earthly family, daily routines and the indulgence in personal wants should come to a halt. Fasting, in its full sense (abstaining from food and desires) accomplishes this. Less time in leisure or other pursuits leaves more time for prayer and reflection on she who gave us Christ, and became the first and greatest Christian.

In reflecting on her and her incomparable life, we see a model Christian life, embodying Christ’s retort to the woman who stated that Mary was blessed because she bore Him: blessed rather are those who hear His word and keep it. Mary did this better than anyone. She heard the word of God and kept it so well, that she of all women in history was chosen not only to hear His Word but give birth to it (Him). So while we fast in contemplation of her life, we are simultaneously preparing ourselves to live a life in imitation of her.

That is the purpose of the Dormition Fast. (source)

4. Why Is Dormition So Important?

The eminent Orthodox theologian, Fr. Sergei Bulgakov, beautifully expresses the high regard which the Orthodox Christians have for the Blessed Virgin Mary, the Mother of God, for her special role in the salvation of mankind, when he affirms,

“The warm veneration of the Theotokos is the soul of Orthodox Piety.”

St. John of Damascus, one of the great Orthodox fathers, pointed out that when the Blessed Virgin Mary became the Mother of God and gave birth to Christ, the Redeemer of Mankind, she became the mother of mankind. We call the Virgin Mary “Theotokos”, from the Greek, which means “The Birth-Giver or the Bearer of God.”

Why not refer to her simply as the Blessed Virgin Mary? Because, there are many holy Marys who were virgins, but there is only one Theotokos.

This is the highest title that can be bestowed upon any member of the human race.

The Theotokos, the Virgin Mary, was

“blessed amongst women,”

and she was chosen

“to bear the Savior of our souls.”

We, therefore, as Orthodox Christians, consider her to be the Queen of all the saints and the angels.

Knowing that she holds such a high place in the Kingdom of Heaven and that she is eternally present at the throne of God interceding for mankind, we, as good Orthodox Christians, must pray for her love, guidance, and protection. We must never forget to ask for her intercessions in times of sickness and danger, and we must constantly thank her for her care and her prayers in our behalf.

The word “paraclesis” has two different meanings: the first is “consolation,” from which the Holy Spirit is called the “Paraclete,” or “Consoler”; the second is “supplication” or “petition”. The Service of the Paraclesis to the Theotokos consists of hymns of supplication to obtain consolation and courage. It should be recited in times of temptation, discouragement or sickness. It is used more particularly during the two weeks before the Dormition, or Assumption, of the Theotokos, from August 1 to August 14.

The theme of these Paraclesis Services centers around the petition…

“Most Holy Theotokos, save us.”

Since these Paraclesis Services to the Theotokos are primarily petition for the welfare of the living, let the whole Church pray for you during the first fifteen days of August and especially on the Great Feast of the Dormition of the Theotokos on August 15th.

5. Special Blessings on Dormition

It is the custom in some churches to bless flowers and herbs on the feast of the Dormition.

It is the final Great Feast on the Christian Calendar. Thus, as a symbol of all believers, the liturgical year begins with the Nativity (birth) of the Theotokos, and ends with her Dormition (falling asleep).

© 2011, Fr. John A. Peck. All rights reserved.

Our father among the saints, the Venerable Bede of Jarrow,  (c. 672 – May 25, 735) was a monk at the Northumbrian monastery of Saint Peter at Wearmouth (today part of Sunderland), and of its daughter monastery, Saint Paul’s, in modern Jarrow. He is well known as an author and scholar, whose best-known work is Historia ecclesiastica gentis AnglorumThe Ecclesiastical History of the English People), which gained him the title ‘The Father of English History.’

St. Bede wrote on many other topics, from music and musical metrics to scripture commentaries.

Concerning the place of our Lord’s Ascension, the aforesaid author, St. Adamnan, writes thus.

“The Mount of Olives is equal in height to Mount Sion, but exceeds it in breadth and length; it bears few trees besides vines and olives, and is fruitful in wheat and barley, for the nature of that soil is not such as to yield thickets, but grass and flowers. On the very top of it, where our Lord ascended into heaven, is a large round church, having round about it three chapels with vaulted roofs. For the inner building could not be vaulted and roofed, by reason of the passage of our Lord’s Body; but it has an altar on the east side, sheltered by a narrow roof. In the midst of it are to be seen the last Footprints of our Lord, the place where He ascended being open to the sky; and though the earth is daily carried away by believers, yet still it remains, and retains the same appearance, being marked by the impression of the Feet. Round about these lies a brazen wheel, as high as a man’s neck, having an entrance from the west, with a great lamp hanging above it on a pulley and burning night and day. In the western part of the same church are eight windows; and as many lamps, hanging opposite to them by cords, shine through the glass as far as Jerusalem; and the light thereof is said to thrill the hearts of the beholders with a certain zeal and compunction. Every year, on the day of the Ascension of our Lord, when Liturgy is ended, a strong blast of wind is wont to come down, and to cast to the ground all that are in the church.”

Of the situation of Hebron, and the tombs of the fathers, he writes thus.

“Hebron, once a habitation and the chief city of David’s kingdom, now only showing by its ruins what it then was, has, one furlong to the east of it, a double cave in the valley, where the sepulchres of the patriarchs are encompassed with a wall foursquare, their heads lying to the north. Each of the tombs is covered with a single stone, hewn like the stones of a church, and of a white colour, for the three patriarchs. Adam’s is of meaner and poorer workmanship, and he lies not far from them at the farthest end of the northern part of that wall. There are also some poorer and smaller monuments of the three women. The hill Mamre is a mile from these tombs, and is covered with grass and flowers, having a level plain on the top. In the northern part of it, the trunk of Abraham’s oak, being twice as high as a man, is enclosed in a church.”

Thus much, gathered from the works of the aforesaid writer, according to the sense of his words, but more briefly and in fewer words, we have thought fit to insert in our History for the profit of readers. Whosoever desires to know more of the contents of that book, may seek it either in the book itself, or in that abridgement which we have lately made from it;

© 2011, Fr. John A. Peck. All rights reserved.

This is perhaps the greatest sermon ever written. It is read in every Orthodox Church in the world, every year at the Paschal Vigil, during the Matins of Pascha. St. John was the Archbishop of Constantinople during the fourth century. He was fearless when denouncing sin in high places, and was a prolific writer, and bold preacher, unafraid to hit the topical issues of the day squarely between the eyes with all the subtlety of a ball peen hammer.  His last words were “Glory to God for all things!”

If any man be devout and love God, let him enjoy this fair and radiant triumphal feast. If any man be a wise servant, let him rejoicing enter into the joy of his Lord. If any have labored long in fasting, let him now receive his recompense.

If any have wrought from the first hour, let him today receive his just reward. If any have come at the third hour, let him with thankfulness keep the feast.

If any have arrived at the sixth hour, let him have no misgivings; because he shall in nowise be deprived therefor.

If any have delayed until the ninth hour, let him draw near, fearing nothing.

If any have tarried even until the eleventh hour, let him, also, be not alarmed at his tardiness; for the Lord, who is jealous of his honor, will accept the last even as the first; he gives rest unto him who comes at the eleventh hour, even as unto him who has wrought from the first hour.

And he shows mercy upon the last, and cares for the first; and to the one he gives, and upon the other he bestows gifts. And he both accepts the deeds, and welcomes the intention, and honors the acts and praises the offering. Wherefore, enter you all into the joy of your Lord; and receive your reward, both the first, and likewise the second.

You rich and poor together, hold high festival.

You sober and you heedless, honor the day.

Rejoice today, both you who have fasted and you who have disregarded the fast. The table is full-laden; feast ye all sumptuously. The calf is fatted; let no one go hungry away. Enjoy ye all the feast of faith: Receive ye all the riches of loving-kindness.

Let no one bewail his poverty, for the universal kingdom has been revealed.

Let no one weep for his iniquities, for pardon has shown forth from the grave.

Let no one fear death, for the Savior’s death has set us free. He that was held prisoner of it has annihilated it. By descending into Hell, He made Hell captive.

He embittered it when it tasted of His flesh. And Isaiah, foretelling this, did cry:

Hell, said he, was embittered, when it encountered Thee in the lower regions.

It was embittered, for it was abolished.

It was embittered, for it was mocked.

It was embittered, for it was slain.

It was embittered, for it was overthrown.

It was embittered, for it was fettered in chains.

It took a body, and met God face to face. It took earth, and encountered Heaven. It took that which was seen, and fell upon the unseen.

O Death, where is your sting? O Hell, where is your victory?

Christ is risen, and you are overthrown.

Christ is risen, and the demons are fallen.

Christ is risen, and the angels rejoice.

Christ is risen, and life reigns.

Christ is risen, and not one dead remains in the grave.

For Christ, being risen from the dead, is become the first fruits of those who have fallen asleep. To Him be glory and dominion unto ages of ages. Amen.

© 2011, Fr. John A. Peck. All rights reserved.

by Niki Tsironis

From STUDIA PATRISTICA VOL. XXX, Leuven 1997.

In the present paper I will examine the models used by George of Nicomedia for the composition of his homily on Good Friday, the first homily which has come down to us that treats the subject from a mariological point of view. George of Nicomedia elaborates on the passage from the Gospel of St John (20:25): ‘Now there stood by the cross of Jesus his mother, and his mother’s sister, Mary the wife of Cleopas and Mary Magdalene’. The events of the Crucifixion are related through the eyes of the Virgin, who follows Christ from the court of Annas and Caiaphas to Calvary where He is crucified. The last part of the homily is devoted to the Deposition and Burial of the Lord. The homily of George of Nicomedia is characterised by a distinct dramatisation of the events related and by the extensive use of monologue and dialogue. These are the elements that I will try to trace back in the homiletic and hymnographic tradition of the Eastern Church until the 9th century. George wrote most of his homilies on the occasion of the feasts of the Mother of God. Although it can be attributed to an accident of the manuscript tradition the practice of focusing on an individual subject of interest was not unusual in the Byzantine homiletic tradition(1). The preoccupation of the author with the Mother of God implies a theological interest that is expressed in his mariology. However, here I will refrain from developing mariological points and I will only examine texts that could have been used by the homilist for the composition of his work.

To my knowledge there is no single homily that can be proposed as George’s sole, immediate source. The ‘invention’ of the theme of the lamentation of the Mother of God at the foot of the cross is found in the hymnographical tradition. The methodological problem that one faces when studying the hymns of the Orthodox Church is that, apart from a few hymns whose authorship is attested, the great majority of the liturgical texts are either unattributed and undated or —even worse— attributed incorrectly. Hymns, like icons, were important in themselves and the composers were not supposed to sign them, just like the artists who were not supposed to sign their icons. The problem is relevant to the subject because of the existence of a hymnographical text, the Lament of the Mother of God, which is read even today in the Eastern Church as part of the service of the Burial of the Lord. This text reproduces almost verbatim passages of the homily in question. Although its dating is uncertain, liturgiologists tend to consider it a composition that was incorporated in the service books towards the end of the middle Byzantine period, or even later. Let me now turn to the background of Marian devotion in order to trace the development of the theme.

Although very little is written about the Virgin either in the Gospel or in the Acts of the Apostles it is clear that at every single stage of the development of Orthodox theology in Byzantium, the Mother of God preoccupied the Fathers and was made a model of behaviour. At the same time the faithful saw in her the human, yet, God-bearer protectress and mediatrix. Basil the Great portrays the Mother of God as the protectress of virgins, of whom she becomes an archetype. Of the Cappadocian Fathers, Gregory of Nyssa worked most of all on the establishment of the typological references of the Mother of God. The importance of homiletics for the formulation of doctrine as the establishment of the living experience of the Church may be attested in the example of the homily delivered by Proclus, Patriarch of Constantinople, in the presence of his adversary Nestorius, in the great church of Haghia Sophia, in 428 or 429, in which the Virgin is referred to as the All-Holy and Ever-Virgin Theotokos, the Mother of God.

Let us now turn to the hymnography where the subject of the lament of the Virgin at the foot of the cross seems to appear for the first time. The celebrated hymnographer Ephrem the Syrian in a poem that was meant to be read during the Saturday vespers in Holy Week elaborates the theme. In this hymn the Virgin approaches the cross and speaks to the Lord without expecting a response. It is a silent lamentation, and one of the first attempts to reveal the human aspect of the salvific mystery. In the Syriac hymn of Jacob of Sarug on the Dormition of the Mother of God we read: ‘Many sorrows has your mother borne for your sake, and all afflictions surrounded her at your crucifixion. How many sorrowing weeping and tears of suffering did not her eyes shed at your funeral… How many terrors did not the mother of Mercy experience when you were buried and the guards of the sepulchre turned her away, so that she could not approach you!’ In the homily of George of Nicomedia we read: ‘But who will enumerate the arrows that penetrated her heart at that time? Who will recount in words her pains that are beyond words? He ineffable sorrow and pain of the Mother of God form the basic pattern upon which the events of Good Friday are recounted and each scene of the Passion of the Lord is introduced by a similar two-line exclamation.

Yet, the dialogue between the Mother of God and Jesus at the crucifixion, to our knowledge, was first used by Romanos the Melodos, the great 6th century Syrian hymnographer. His well-known hymn on Mary at the Foot of the Cross is the only one to appear in the actual Triodion. The Mother of God pleads with him to address her a word of consolation: ‘.. Address me a word, Oh Word, do not pass in front of me in silence, you that preserved my purity, my son and my God’ In the relevant passage George of Nicomedia writes: ‘But you, say something as a farewell to your mother, … say a sweet and life-giving word’ and elsewhere: ‘They pierced the limbs of the one that has preserved my undefiled chastity, the one who has retained unblemished the seals of virginity and purity’

The response of the Lord to his mother is also similar in the two texts; Romanos writes: ‘Alleviate, mother, alleviate your grief: lamentations are not worthy of you who has been called the one full of grace(17′) where in the text of George, Jesus replies: ‘Calm the excess of the more severe pains mother; remit the heaviest despondency in your heart, by the grandeur of the benefit.. But the Virgin is not consoled, despite the fact that the words of the Lord remind her of the reason he was sent to the world. The comparison of the two texts shows that George knew Romanos’ hymn and that he uses the technique of dialogue in a similar way in order to achieve a similar end.

During the 8th and 9th centuries numerous hymns were composed for the Mother of God: Theotokia were written in the Eight Tones and although we cannot be sure of the exact date of their introduction in the services of the Church, their existence marks a distinct phase in the development of Marian devotion. Their authors were the distinguished iconophile preachers and hymnographers Germanos of Constantinople (d.733), Andrew of Crete (d.740), John of Damascus (d.c. 749) and Theodore the Stoudite (d.826), to name only the most important among them.

I have singled out the distinguished poet and patriarch of Constantinople, Germanos, for two reasons: the first is that George follows the style of his predecessor, both in the way of expression and in his treatment of the Mother of God. His admiration for the florid and elaborate style of Germanos lead him to the creation of his own embellished style of speech. The second is that in his homily On the Bodily Burial of the Lord on Holy Saturday, Germanos incorporates a lament of the Mother of God. After the eulogy of the feast that occupies the beginning of the sermon, Germanos dedicates the main part of his homily to the lament of the Mother of God, who voices her despair for the bereavement in short, rhythmical phrases. The prophecy of Symeon about the sword that would pierce her heart is interpreted not as doubt, but as the deplorable pain that ravages her heart. Her address to the Lord is reminiscent of the model of Ephrem the Syrian in that she expects no answer; but her lament is not ‘silent’. On the contrary it is similar to the laments of ancient Greek tragedy. The invitation to Nature and the world to participate in the wailing contrasts with the murmuring of sweet memories. An antithetical pattern is used in order to show the changing attitude of the Jews towards Jesus, who are addressed in a variety of terms that derive from the stock of the topoi of anti-Jewish polemic.

The treatment of the lament of the Mother of God by Germanos suggests that his work could have been used as a source by George of Nicomedia in the composition of his homily on Good Friday, although it has to be noted that neither dialogue nor dramatisation are fully explored by Germanos. However, he opened a way by introducing the subject of the lament, which as we have seen derives from the hymnographical tradition, to the domain of homiletics.

Finally I would like to refer briefly to the Theotokia written by Theodore, the abbot of the Stoudion monastery, which refer to the lament of the Mother of God at the Foot of the Cross. Very laconic, the Stavrotheotokia do not occupy more than a few lines. In the matins of the Friday in the first week of Lent the Stavrotheotokion reads: ‘Beholding Thee, ? Christ, stretched dead upon the Tree, Thy Virgin Mother cried aloud with bitter tears: “O my Son what is this fearful mystery ? How dost Thou who givest life eternal unto all, suffer willingly a shameful death upon the Cross; Although George does not use the imagery of the Tree for the cross, the Virgin laments her dead son in the same way and the idea of the willing death of the Lord who gives life to the whole creation occurs regularly in the homily. The lamentation of the Virgin also appears in the Stavrotheotokion of the Vespers of Friday: the Mother of God together with the whole of creation wonders at the strange and marvellous sight of the crucified Lord. Nature is evoked in the lament of the Virgin in the homily on Good Friday: ‘Set sun, seeing my and the world’s light setting bodily. Shudder sky, and in your grievous appearance share my lament; mourn as you perceive the slaughter of the universal Lord. George of Nicomedia offers an interesting example of a synthesis of the homiletic and the hymnographical tradition, combining his sources in order to achieve the dramatisation of the subject-matter which —we may well suppose— was the feature that enthralled his audience and earned him the title of ‘great rhetor’.

For example, Proclus in the 5th century and Germanos of Constantinople in the 8th century were known for their mariological homilies, whereas Leontius of Constantinople found particularly appealing the theme of Job. A characteristic example is his homily on Good Friday in which he links the subject to the story of Job. See Pauline Allen with Cornells Datema, Leontius, Presbyter of Constantinople, Fourteen Homilies (Brisbane, 1991) pp. 87-94.

I am grateful to Fr Michael Fortounatto and to Nicolas Ossorguine for their advice on the subject.

Fr John Breck, ‘Mary in the New Testament,’ Pro Ecclesia, 2/4 (1993) pp. 460-472.

Fr John Breck, ‘Mary: Mother of Believers, Mother of God,’ Pro Ecclesia, 4/1 (1995) pp. 105-111.

Basil the Great, ep. 135, PG 32, col. 372; see also Gregory of Nazianzus, PG 35, col. 1181 A.

Gregory of Nyssa, Vita Moses 2.21 (Jean Daniélou ed., SC 1, Paris, 1968, p. 118); Hilda Graef, Mary: A History of Doctrine and Devotion (New York, 1963) pp. 64-5. Also with reference to the typological references employed by Proclus of Constantinople see Nicholas P. Constas, ‘Weaving the Body of God: Proclus of Constantinople, the Theotokos and the Loom of the Flesh’, Journal of Early Christian Studies, 3:2 (1995) pp. 176-82.

For the historical background and the mariological aspects of the homiletic work of Proclus see Constas, op.cit., pp. 169-176.

D. Caillau, S. Patris nostri Ephraem Syri Opera, IV (Paris, 1844) pp. 440-444; also introduction to the hymn by Romanos, Marie a la Croix, by Grosdidier de Matons (SC 128; 1967), p. 144.

The hymn provides evidence for the introduction of the feast of the Dormition but most interestingly for the purpose of the present paper it introduces the lamentation of the Mother of God at the crucifixion and the burial of the Lord. Jacob of Sarug, Hymn on the Dormition of the Mother of God, in Baumstark (ed.) OC, 5 (1905) pp. 91-9; also quoted by H. Graef, op.cit., p. 122.

George of Nicomedia, Oratio in illud: ‘Stabant autem juxta crucem Jesu Mater ejus, et soror Matris ejus’ atque in sepulturam divini corporis Domini nostri Jesu Christi, sancta ac magna die Parasceves; , PG 100, cols. 1457A-1489D; citation in 1464C.

For the literary genre of the kontakion and its background, see E. Werner, The Sacred Bridge (London, 1959) pp. 226-231. For the feature of dialogue in hymnography see N.Tomadakis, vol. 2 (1993) pp. 109-115 and for a different use of dialogue Averil Cameron, ‘Disputations, Polemical Literature and the Formation of Opinion in the Early Byzantine Period’ in G.J. Reinink and H.L.J. Vastinphout (eds.), Dispute Poems and Dialogues in the Ancient and Medieval Near East (Leuven, 1991) p. 106-7.

Roman?s le Mélode, Hymnes, Tome IV, Grosdidier de Matons (ed.) (SC 128, Paris, 1967) pp. 160-187.

ibidem., introduction, p. 143; see also Triodion, Compline of Good Friday, Ikos of Tone Eight, Canticle 7 and elsewhere.

Romanos op.cit. stanza 1, 1. 8.

PG 100, col. 1473C-D. ;

PG 100, col. 1472B.

Romanos, op.cit., st. 5,1. 1-2.

PG 100, col. 1476C.

PG 98, In Dominici Corporis Sepulturam, cols. 244B-289B.

For the interpretation of the prophecy of Symeon by the Alexandrian exegetical school see H. Graef, op.cit., passim.

Gail Holst-Warhaft, Dangerous Voices, Women’s Laments and Greek Literature (London, New York, 1992), pp. 144-149; Margaret Alexiou, The Ritual Lament in Greek Tradition (Cambridge, 1974), passim.

Henry Maguire, Art and Eloquence in Byzantium (Princeton, 1981) pp. 91-108.

col. 273B-D.

Lenten Triodion, Eng. transl. by Archimandrite Kallistos Ware and Mother Mary (London, 1978) p. 268.

See PG 100, col. 1469A and 1476C.

Friday in the First Week of Lent, Stavrotheotokion in the Eighth Tone, op.cit., p. 272.

PG 100, col. 1472C.

© 2011, admin. All rights reserved.

This is a recording of our father, Archbishop Job of Chicago singing the 15th Antiphon at Matins for Great and Holy Friday 2009.

We include it for your own spiritual edification. Contemplate this worthy meditation on the Cross in anticipation of Holy Week.

May his memory be eternal!

If anyone has access to sheet music for this, please contact us here.

© 2011, Fr. John A. Peck. All rights reserved.

Against Heresies, Book 4, Chapters 7, 10, 11, 23

Therefore Abraham also, knowing the Father through the Word, who made heaven and earth, confessed Him to be God; and having learned, by an announcement [made to him], that the Son of God would be a man among men, by whose advent his seed should be as the stars of heaven, he desired to see that day, so that he might himself also embrace Christ; and, seeing it through the spirit of prophecy, he rejoiced [Genesis 17:17].

Wherefore Symeon also, one of his descendants, carried fully out the rejoicing of the patriarch, and said:

“Lord, now let Your servant depart in peace. For my eyes have seen Your salvation, which You have prepared before the face of all people: a light for the revelation of the Gentiles, and the glory of the people Israel” [Luke 2:29].

And the angels, in like manner, announced tidings of great joy to the shepherds who were keeping watch by night [Luke 2:8]. Moreover, Mary said,

“My soul does magnify the Lord, and my spirit has rejoiced in God my salvation” [Luke 1:46].

The rejoicing of Abraham descending upon those who sprang from him — those, namely, who were watching, and who beheld Christ, and believed in Him; while, on the other hand, there was a reciprocal rejoicing which passed backwards from the children to Abraham, who did also desire to see the day of Christ’s coming. Rightly, then, did our Lord bear witness to him, saying,

“Your father Abraham rejoiced to see my day; and he saw it, and was glad”.

For not alone upon Abraham’s account did He say these things, but also that He might point out how all who have known God from the beginning, and have foretold the advent of Christ, have received the revelation from the Son Himself; who also in the last times was made visible and passible, and spoke with the human race, that He might from the stones raise up children unto Abraham, and fulfil the promise which God had given him, and that He might make his seed

“as the stars of heaven” [Genesis 15:5],

as John the Baptist says:

“For God is able from these stones to raise up children unto Abraham” [Matthew 3:9].

Now, this Jesus did by drawing us off from the religion of stones, and bringing us over from hard and fruitless cogitations, and establishing in us a faith like unto Abraham. As Paul does also testify, saying that we are children of Abraham because of the similarity of our faith, and the promise of inheritance [Romans 4:12; Galatians 4:28].

He is therefore one and the same God, who called Abraham and gave him the promise. But He is the Creator, who does also through Christ prepare lights in the world, [namely] those who believe from among the Gentiles. And He says,

“You are the light of the world” [Matthew 5:14];

that is, as the stars of heaven. Him, therefore, I have rightly shown to be known by no man, unless by the Son, and to whomsoever the Son shall reveal Him. But the Son reveals the Father to all to whom He wills that He should be known; and neither without the goodwill of the Father nor without the agency of the Son, can any man know God. Wherefore did the Lord say to His disciples,

“I am the way, the truth, and the life and no man comes unto the Father but by Me. If you had known Me, you would have known My Father also: and from henceforth you have both known Him, and have seen Him” [John 14:6-7].

From these words it is evident, that He is known by the Son, that is, by the Word….

Wherefore also John does appropriately relate that the Lord said to the Jews:

“You search the Scriptures, in which you think you have eternal life; these are they which testify of me. And you are not willing to come unto Me, that you may have life” [John 5:39-40].

How therefore did the Scriptures testify of Him, unless they were from one and the same Father, instructing men beforehand as to the advent of His Son, and foretelling the salvation brought in by Him?

“For if you had believed Moses, you would also have believed Me; for he wrote of Me” [John 5:46];

[saying this,] no doubt, because the Son of God is implanted everywhere throughout his writings: at one time, indeed, speaking with Abraham, when about to eat with him; at another time with Noah, giving to him the dimensions [of the ark]; at another, inquiring after Adam; at another, bringing down judgment upon the Sodomites; and again, when He becomes visible, and directs Jacob on his journey, and speaks with Moses from the bush. And it would be endless to recount [the occasions] upon which the Son of God is shown forth by Moses. Of the day of His passion, too, he was not ignorant; but foretold Him, after a figurative manner, by the name given to the passover; and at that very festival, which had been proclaimed such a long time previously by Moses, did our Lord suffer, thus fulfilling the passover. And he did not describe the day only, but the place also, and the time of day at which the sufferings ceased, and the sign of the setting of the sun, saying:

“You may not sacrifice the passover within any other of your cities which the Lord God gives you; but in the place which the Lord your God shall choose that His name be called on there, you shall sacrifice the passover at even towards the setting of the sun” [Deuteronomy 16:5-6].

And already he had also declared His advent, saying,

“There shall not fail a chief in Judah, nor a leader from his loins, until He come for whom it is laid up, and He is the hope of the nations; binding His foal to the vine, and His ass’s colt to the creeping ivy. He shall wash His stole in wine, and His upper garment in the blood of the grape; His eyes shall be more joyous than wine, and His teeth whiter than milk.”

For, let those who have the reputation of investigating everything, inquire at what time a prince and leader failed out of Judah, and who is the hope of the nations, who also is the vine, what was the ass’s colt [referred to as] His, what the clothing, and what the eyes, what the teeth, and what the wine, and thus let them investigate every one of the points mentioned; and they shall find that there was none other announced than our Lord, Christ Jesus.

Wherefore Moses, when chiding the ingratitude of the people, said,

“You infatuated people, and unwise, do you thus requite the Lord?” [Deuteronomy 32:6].

And again, he indicates that He who from the beginning founded and created them, the Word, who also redeems and vivifies us in the last times, is shown as hanging on the tree, and they will not believe in Him. For he says,

“And your life shall be hanging before your eyes, and you will not believe your life.”

And again,

“Has not this same one your Father owned you, and made you, and created you?”…

But that it was not only the prophets and many righteous men, who, foreseeing through the Holy Spirit His advent, prayed that they might attain to that period in which they should see their Lord face to face, and hear His words, the Lord has made manifest, when He says to His disciples,

“Many prophets and righteous men have desired to see those things which you see, and have not seen them; and to hear those things which you hear, and have not heard them” [Matthew 13:17].

In what way, then, did they desire both to hear and to see, unless they had foreknowledge of His future advent? But how could they have foreknown it, unless they had previously received foreknowledge from Himself? And how do the Scriptures testify of Him, unless all things had ever been revealed and shown to believers by one and the same God through the Word; He at one time conferring with His creature, and at another propounding His law; at one time, again, reproving, at another exhorting, and then setting free His servant, and adopting him as a son (in filium); and, at the proper time, bestowing an incorruptible inheritance, for the purpose of bringing man to perfection? For He formed him for growth and increase, as the Scripture says:

“Increase and multiply” [Genesis 1:28].

And in this respect God differs from man, that God indeed makes, but man is made; and truly, He who makes is always the same; but that which is made must receive both beginning, and middle, and addition, and increase. And God does indeed create after a skillful manner, while, [as regards] man, he is created skilfully. God also is truly perfect in all things, Himself equal and similar to Himself, as He is all light, and all mind, and all substance, and the fount of all good; but man receives advancement and increase towards God. For as God is always the same, so also man, when found in God, shall always go on towards God. For neither does God at any time cease to confer benefits upon, or to enrich man; nor does man ever cease from receiving the benefits, and being enriched by God. For the receptacle of His goodness, and the instrument of His glorification, is the man who is grateful to Him that made him; and again, the receptacle of His just judgment is the ungrateful man, who both despises his Maker and is not subject to His Word; who has promised that He will give very much to those always bringing forth fruit, and more [and more] to those who have the Lord’s money.

“Well done,” He says, “good and faithful servant: because you have been faithful in little, I will appoint you over many things; enter into the joy of your Lord” [Matthew 25:21].

The Lord Himself thus promises very much.

As, therefore, He has promised to give very much to those who do now bring forth fruit, according to the gift of His grace, but not according to the changeableness of knowledge; for the Lord remains the same, and the same Father is revealed; thus, therefore, has the one and the same Lord granted, by means of His advent, a greater gift of grace to those of a later period, than what He had granted to those under the Old Testament dispensation. For they indeed used to hear, by means of [His] servants, that the King would come, and they rejoiced to a certain extent, inasmuch as they hoped for His coming; but those who have beheld Him actually present, and have obtained liberty, and been made partakers of His gifts, do possess a greater amount of grace, and a higher degree of exultation, rejoicing because of the King’s arrival: as also David says,

“My soul shall rejoice in the Lord; it shall be glad in His salvation”.

And for this cause, upon His entrance into Jerusalem, all those who were in the way recognised David their king in His sorrow of soul, and spread their garments for Him, and ornamented the way with green boughs, crying out with great joy and gladness,

“Hosanna to the Son of David; blessed is He that comes in the name of the Lord: hosanna in the highest” [Matthew 21:8].

But to the envious wicked stewards, who circumvented those under them, and ruled over those that had no great intelligence, and for this reason were unwilling that the king should come, and who said to Him,

“Do you hear what these say?”

did the Lord reply,

“Have you never read, Out of the mouths of babes and sucklings have You perfected praise?”

— thus pointing out that what had been declared by David concerning the Son of God, was accomplished in His own person; and indicating that they were indeed ignorant of the meaning of the Scripture and the dispensation of God; but declaring that it was Himself who was announced by the prophets as Christ, whose name is praised in all the earth, and who perfects praise to His Father from the mouth of babes and sucklings; wherefore also His glory has been raised above the heavens.

If, therefore, the self-same person is present who was announced by the prophets, our Lord Jesus Christ, and if His advent has brought in a fuller [measure of] grace and greater gifts to those who have received Him, it is plain that the Father also is Himself the same who was proclaimed by the prophets, and that the Son, on His coming, did not spread the knowledge of another Father, but of the same who was preached from the beginning; from whom also He has brought down liberty to those who, in a lawful manner, and with a willing mind, and with all the heart, do Him service; whereas to scoffers, and to those not subject to God, but who follow outward purifications for the praise of men (which observances had been given as a type of future things — the law typifying, as it were, certain things in a shadow, and delineating eternal things by temporal, celestial by terrestrial), and to those who pretend that they do themselves observe more than what has been prescribed, as if preferring their own zeal to God Himself, while within they are full of hypocrisy, and covetousness, and all wickedness—[to such] has He assigned everlasting perdition by cutting them off from life….

For which reason the Lord declared to the disciples:

“Behold, I say unto you, Lift up your eyes, and look upon the districts (regiones), for they are white [already] to harvest. For the harvest-man receives wages, and gathers fruit unto life eternal, that both he that sows and he that reaps may rejoice together. For in this is the saying true, that one sows and another reaps. For I have sent you forward to reap that whereon you bestowed no labour; other men have laboured, and you have entered into their labours” [John 4:35].

Who, then, are they that have laboured, and have helped forward the dispensations of God? It is clear that they are the patriarchs and prophets, who even prefigured our faith, and disseminated through the earth the advent of the Son of God, who and what He should be: so that posterity, possessing the fear of God, might easily accept the advent of Christ, having been instructed by the prophets. And for this reason it was, that when Joseph became aware that Mary was with child, and was minded to put her away privately, the angel said to him in sleep:

“Fear not to take to you Mary your wife; for that which is conceived in her is of the Holy Spirit. For she shall bring forth a son, and you shall call His name Jesus; for He shall save His people from their sins” [Matthew 1:20].

And exhorting him [to this], he added:

“Now all this has been done, that it might be fulfilled which was spoken from the Lord by the prophet, saying, ‘Behold, a virgin shall be with child, and shall bring forth a son, and His name shall be called Emmanuel’”;

thus influencing him by the words of the prophet, and warding off blame from Mary, pointing out that it was she who was the virgin mentioned by Isaiah beforehand, who should give birth to Emmanuel. Wherefore, when Joseph was convinced beyond all doubt, he both did take Mary, and joyfully yielded obedience in regard to all the rest of the education of Christ, undertaking a journey into Egypt and back again, and then a removal to Nazareth. [For this reason,] those who knew not the Scriptures nor the promise of God, nor the dispensation of Christ, at last called him the father of the child. For this reason, too, did the Lord Himself read at Capernaum the prophecies of Isaiah:

“The Spirit of the Lord is upon Me, because He has anointed Me; to preach the Gospel to the poor has He sent Me, to heal the broken-hearted, to preach deliverance to the captives, and sight to the blind” [Isaiah 61:1; Luke 4:18].

At the same time, showing that it was He Himself who had been foretold by Isaiah the prophet, He said to them: “This day is this Scripture fulfilled in your ears.”

For this reason, also, Philip, when he had discovered the eunuch of the Ethiopians’ queen reading these words which had been written:

“He was led as a sheep to the slaughter; and as a lamb is dumb before the shearer, so He opened not His mouth: in His humiliation His judgment was taken away” [Acts 8:27, Isaiah 53:7];

and all the rest which the prophet proceeded to relate in regard to His passion and His coming in the flesh, and how He was dishonoured by those who did not believe Him; easily persuaded him to believe in Him, that He was Christ Jesus, who was crucified under Pontius Pilate, and suffered whatsoever the prophet had predicted, and that He was the Son of God, who gives eternal life to men. And immediately when [Philip] had baptized him, he departed from him.

For nothing else [but baptism] was wanting to him who had been already instructed by the prophets: he was not ignorant of God the Father, nor of the rules as to the [proper] manner of life, but was merely ignorant of the advent of the Son of God, which, when he had become acquainted with, in a short space of time, he went on his way rejoicing, to be the herald in Ethiopia of Christ’s advent. Therefore Philip had no great labour to go through with regard to this man, because he was already prepared in the fear of God by the prophets.

For this reason, too, did the apostles, collecting the sheep which had perished of the house of Israel, and discoursing to them from the Scriptures, prove that this crucified Jesus was the Christ, the Son of the living God; and they persuaded a great multitude, who, however, [already] possessed the fear of God. And there were, in one day, baptized three, and four, and five thousand men [Acts 2:41, Acts 4:4].

© 2010, Fr. John A. Peck. All rights reserved.

Our father among the saints Gregory Palamas (1296-1359), Archbishop of Thessalonica, was a monk of Mount Athos in Greece (at Vatopedi  and Esphigmenou Monasteries), and later became Archbishop of Thessalonica. His feast days in the Church are Nov. 14 and the 2nd Sunday of Great Lent.

David indicates that our Lord Jesus Christ has no genealogy with regard to His divinity (Ps. 110:4), Isaiah says the same (Isa. 53:8), and later so does the apostle (Heb. 7:3). How can the descent be traced of Him

“who is in the beginning, and is with God, and is God, and is the Word and Son of God” (cf. Jn. 1:1-2, 18)?

He does not have a Father who was before Him, and shares with His Father

“a name which is above every name” and all speech (Phil. 2:9).

For the most part, genealogies are traced back through different surnames; but there is no surname for God (cf. Gen. 32:29), and whatever may be said of Father, Son and Holy Spirit, they are one and do not differ in any respect.

Impossible to recount is Christ’s descent according to His divinity, but His ancestry according to His human nature can be traced, since He who deigned to become Son of Man in order to save mankind was the offspring of men. And it is this genealogy of His that two of the evangelists, Matthew and Luke, recorded. But although Matthew, in the passage from his Gospel read today, begins with those born first, he makes no mention of anyone born before Abraham He traces the line down from Abraham until he reaches Joseph to whom, by divine dispensation, the Virgin Mother of God was betrothed (Matt. 1:1-16), being of the same tribe and homeland as him, that her own stock may be shown from this to be in no way inferior.

Luke, by contrast, begins not with the earliest forebears but the most recent, and working his way back from Joseph the Betrothed, does not stop at Abraham, nor, having included Abraham’s predecessors, does he end with Adam, but lists God among Christ’s human forebears (Lk. 3:23-38); wishing to show, in my opinion, that from the beginning man was not just a creation of God, but also a son in the Spirit, which was given to him at the same time as his soul, through God’s quickening breath (Gen. 2:7). It was granted to him as a pledge that, if, waiting patiently for it, he kept the commandment, he would be able to share through the same Spirit in a more perfect union with God, by which he would live forever with Him and obtain immortality.

By heeding the evil counsel of the pernicious angel, man transgressed the divine commandments, was shown to be unworthy, forfeited the pledge, and interrupted God’s plan. God’s grace, however, is unalterable and His purpose cannot prove false, so some of man’s offspring were chosen, that, from among many, a suitable receptacle for this divine adoption and grace might be found, who would serve God’s will perfectly, and would be revealed as a vessel worthy to unite divine and human nature in one person, not just exalting our nature, but restoring the human race.

The holy Maid and Virgin Mother of God was this vessel, so she was proclaimed by the Archangel Gabriel as full of grace (Lk. 1:28), being the chosen one among the chosen, blameless, undefiled and worthy to contain the person of the God-Man and to collaborate with Him. Therefore God pre-ordained her before all ages, chose her from among all that had ever lived, and deemed her worthy of more grace than anyone else, making her the holiest of saints, even before her mysterious childbearing. For that reason, He graciously willed that she should make her home in the Holy of Holies, and accepted her as His companion to share His dwelling from her childhood. He did not simply choose her from the masses, but from the elect of all time, who were admired and renowned for their piety and wisdom, and for their character, words and deeds, which pleased God and brought benefit to all.

Note where this choice began. The excellent Seth was chosen from among Adam’s children, because by his well-ordered conduct, his control over his senses and his glorious virtues he showed himself to be a living heaven and so came to be one of the elect, from whom the Virgin would spring forth, that truly heavenly and divinely appropriate chariot of the supercelestial God, and through whom He would call men back to eternal sonship. Therefore all Seth’s stock were called

“sons of God” (Gen 6:2),

because it was from the race that the Son of God was to become the Son of Man. That is why the name Seth can be interpreted to mean “resurrection“, or rather “a raising up from“, which really refers to the Lord, who promises and gives eternal life to those who believe in Him.

And how worthy a type of Christ is Seth?

“Seth was born to Eve”, as she herself says, “instead of Abel” (Gen. 4:25),

whom Cain envied and murdered, whereas the Virgin’s son, Christ, was born to the human race instead of Adam, whom the prince and father of evil killed out of envy. Seth, however, did not raise up Abel, as he was merely a prefiguration of the resurrection, whereas our Lord Jesus Christ resurrected Adam, for He is the true life and resurrection of mankind (cf. Jn. 11:25), through whom Seth’s descendants were deemed worthy, in hope, of divine adoption, being called sons of God. That they were referred to as God’s sons on account of this hope, is demonstrated by the first person to be so called and to inherit God’s election. This was Seth’s son Enos who, as Moses wrote,

“was the first to hope to be called by the Lord’s name” (Gen. 4:26 LXX).

Do you see clearly that it was through hope that he came to be called? If the Seventy [translators of the Septuagint] say,

“He was the first to hope to be called by the Lord’s name”,

they are not at all in disagreement with the others; because Enos lived in a way that pleased God more than anyone else in his day, and was the first to receive this hope from God. He called upon this hope and was called after it. Seth was chosen from God from among Adam’s sons, and so Luke, in preparing his genealogy, traces back to him the whole race from which Christ was born according to the flesh. Then Enos was chosen in preference to Seth’s other children, as we have said. From his descendants Enoch was chosen, who proved through what happened to him that virtue does not go unrewarded, and that this fleeting world is not worthy of those who are well-pleasing to God, for he was translated because he pleased God (Gen. 5:24; Heb. 11:5).

Lamech was chosen and preferred to Enoch’s other descendants, and after him his son, Noah, attained to God’s election and became the only father of everyone in the world after the flood. Only he and his entire family were found to live chastely at that time when the sons of God took wives from among the daughters of men, as Moses tells us (Gen. 6:1-2). This means that among the offspring of Seth, the forefather of the Mother of God, those who were rejected as unworthy were swept out of the Virgin Mother’s family and completely deprived of the divine Spirit. Later this Spirit came upon the Virgin, according to the angel’s words to her:

“The Holy Spirit shall come upon you, and the power of the Highest shall overshadow you” (Lk. 1:35).

The Spirit also arranged beforehand for the Virgin to come into being, choosing from the beginning, and cleansing, the line of her descent, accepting those who were worthy, or were to become fathers of eminent men, but utterly casting out the unworthy.

This is why the Lord God said on that occasion of those rejected ones,

“My Spirit shall not abide with these men, for they are flesh” (Gen. 6:3 LXX).

Although the Virgin, of whom Christ was born according to the flesh, came from Adam’s flesh and seed, yet, because this flesh had been cleansed in many different ways by the Holy Spirit from the start, she was descended from those who had been chosen from every generation for their excellence. Noah, too, “a just man and perfect in his generation”, as the Scriptures say of him (Gen. 6:9), was found worthy of this election.

Observe also that the Holy Spirit makes it clear to such as have understanding that the whole of divinely inspired Scripture was written because of the Virgin Mother of God. It relates in detail the entire line of her ancestry, which begins with Adam, then passes through Seth, Noah and Abraham, as well as David and Zerubbabel, those in between them and their successors, and goes up to the time of the Virgin Mother of God. By contrast, Scripture does not touch upon some races at all, and in the case of others, it makes a start at tracing their descent, then soon abandons them, leaving them in the depths of oblivion. Above all, it commemorates those of the Mother of God’s forebears who, in their own lives and the deeds wrought by them, prefigured Christ, who was to be born of the Virgin.

See how Noah clearly foreshadows Him who was later to be born of the Virgin, for whose sake the election was made. For Noah was shown to be the savior, not of all the race of men in general, but of his own household, all of whom were saved through him. In the same way Christ, too, is the Savior of the race of men, not of all men in general, but of all His own household, that is of His Church; not, however, of the disobedient. Furthermore, the name Noah can be translated to mean “rest” (Gen. 5:29). But who is true “rest” except the Virgin’s Son, who says,

“Come unto me through repentance, all you that labor and are heavy laden with sin, and I will give you rest” (Matt. 11:28),

bestowing freedom, ease and eternal life upon you.

Lamech, who gave Noah this name, because he saw in him Christ, who was later to come from their stock, and would be the comfort of all God-fearing people down through the ages, clearly prophesied through this name concerning Christ.

“He called his name Noah”,

says the Scripture,

“saying, ‘This name shall bring us rest from our works, and from the toils of our hands, and from the earth, which the Lord our God has cursed’” (Gen. 5:29 LXX).

These words are not about the flood which came to pass, for Lamech’s death preceded the flood, yet he says that Noah will “bring us rest”, including himself as a partaker in the comfort he foretold. In those days it had not yet come about that in each man

“every imagination of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually” (Gen. 6:5)

throughout his life, which was why universal destruction of everyone on earth came upon the earth from God. So to whom do his words refer when he says, “He will bring us rest”? He also says,

“He shall bring us rest from the earth except Him who opened heaven, raised our nature thither and taught us, through words and deeds, the way up to heaven, calling us towards it? But if the flood too prefigured this rest, it did so by cutting off sins and laying them to rest, not by bringing comfort and ease to sinners.

In this way and for these reasons, Noah attained to God’s election. Of his children, Shem was accepted among those chosen to be the blessed family of the Mother of God. That is why, although Japheth also appears to have been well-pleasing to his father, only Shem heard from his father,

“Blessed be the Lord God of Shem” (Gen. 9:26),

as his progeny was to be divine. For it was from him that Abraham was descended, who was preferred according to God’s election above all Shem’s offspring and was called to be part of the lineage of the Virgin Mother. He was given a new name by God, and received that great promise that all the families of the earth would be blessed in his seed (Gen. 17:5; 12:3). According to Paul, Christ our God, who was born of the Virgin, is his seed according to the flesh (Gal. 3:16).

And who could describe the divine visions that Abraham experienced, or the signs and promises from God which foreshadowed and prophesied concerning the ever-virgin Mother of God and her ineffable childbearing? Let us, however, quickly pass over what happened next, as time does not permit us to speak at length. From among Abraham’s children Isaac was chosen, then Jacob from among his sons, and the tribe of Judah from Jacob’s offspring. From this tribe the root of Jesse was selected, and for those who sprang from this root, David the psalmist and prophet and king, of whom God says,

“Thy seed shall endure forever, and His throne as the sun before Me; and as the moon that is established forever, and the witness in heaven is faithful” (Ps. 89:36-37 LXX).

Who is this witness? Obviously He who sits upon the heavenly throne, of whom it says elsewhere:

“His name shall be continued as long as the sun: and all the families of the earth shall be blessed in Him” (Ps. 72:17 LXX).

From this the lineage of the Mother of God and Joseph, to whom she was betrothed, seems somehow double, for both were of the same tribe and descent according to the law. Thus the family’s ancestral line is twofold, made up both of natural children and children according to the law, often converging into one, but sometimes divided into two, so that the same child, strange as it may seem, might be the son of two fathers who are brothers, of the one from a legal point of view, as not having been begotten of him physically, and of the other, according to nature, as having been raised up as seed for his brother (Matt. 22:24; Deut. 25:5; Gen. 38:8); inasmuch as the child traces his ancestry back to David through both his fathers. It is possible to see the dual nature of this lineage in another respect, because the royal line was united on many occasions and in numerous ways with the priestly one.

Thus in the holy ancestral line of the Mother of God, Zerubbabel traces his lineage back to David through the descendants of Nathan, who was counted among the priests, as well as through those of Solomon, who inherited the kingdom. For this reason the Lord’s genealogy according to the flesh is drawn up differently by the evangelists Luke and Matthew, because one takes into account natural fathers, the other, fathers according to the law, and one mentions only those of royal descent, whereas Luke brings in those of the Levitical race and those of the royal house, who were bound together by priesthood or marriage.

As for Zerubbabel, because he was also favored among the Mother of God’s forbears, he too prefigured Christ and was honored with great titles and authority. Born in captivity, he was admired by Cyrus, king of the Medes and Persians, for his virtue and misunderstanding. He taught both Hebrews and foreigners the power of the truth, set his race free from servitude, and restored God’s Temple (1 Esd. 4:33-63; Ezra 3:1-13).

Later Christ did something similar, not renewing the inanimate Temple, but that living, rational temple, our nature, and redeeming it, not from perceptible and temporary, but spiritual and primeval captivity. Nor did He move His followers from one country to another, but transferred them from earth to heaven. Zerubbabel was the forefather of both the Virgin and Joseph to whom she was betrothed, but whereas she was the Virgin’s forbear by nature alone, he was Joseph’s according to nature and the law. For Joseph had two fathers, Heli according to Luke (Lk. 3:23), and Jacob according to Matthew (Matt. 1:16). Heli and Jacob were brothers descended from Zerubbabel, and when Heli died without children, Jacob fathered a child, Joseph, by his brother’s wife, who according to the law belongs to Heli.

Now these things are examples and types of greater mysteries, since it was necessary that the royal line be united in many ways, with the priestly race, which would bring forth the family of Christ according to the flesh; because in many ways Christ is truly the eternal King and High Priest. And the fact that adopted sons are counted as sons, that the law approves of adoptive fathers no less and sometimes more than natural fathers, and that the same, appropriately, applies to other kinds of kinship, was a clear example and type of our adoption by Christ, our kinship with Him and our calling according to the Spirit and the law of grace. For the Lord Himself says in the Gospels,

“Whosoever shall do the will of My Father which is in heaven, the same is My brother, and sister, and mother” (Matt. 12:50).

Do you see that the family and kin of Christ are not engendered according to nature, but according to grace and the law that comes from grace? This law is so far superior to the law given through Moses that, whereas those called sons according to the law of Moses are neither born of God nor do they transcend human nature, those styled sons by the law of grace are born of God, brought to perfection above nature and made sons of Abraham through Christ, more closely associated with Him than sons according to blood. All who have been baptized into Christ have put on Christ, according to Paul (Gal. 3:27), and although they are other people’s children according to nature, they are born supernaturally of Christ, who in this way conquers nature. For as He became incarnate without seed of the Holy Spirit and the ever-virgin Mary, so He grants potential and power to those that believe in His name to become children of God. For “as many as received Him”, says the evangelist,

“to them gave He power to become the sons of God, even to them that believe on His name: which were born, not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God” (Jn. 1:12-13).

Why, when he says, “which were born of God”, does he not say “and became sons of God”, but “received power to become” sons? Because he was looking towards the end and universal restoration, the perfection of the age to come. The same evangelist says in his Epistles,

“It does not yet appear what we shall be: but when He shall appear, we shall be like Him” (1Jn. 3:2).

Then we shall be children of God, seeing and experiencing God’s radiance, with the rays of Christ’s glory shining around us and shining ourselves, as Moses and Elijah proved to us when they appeared with Him in glory on Mount Tabor (Matt. 17:3; Lk. 9:30).

” The righteous”, it says, “shall shine forth as the sun in the kingdom of their Father” (Matt. 13:43).

We receive power for this purpose now through the grace of divine baptism. Just as a newborn infant has received potential from his parents to become a man and heir to their house and fortune, but does not yet possess that inheritance because he is a minor, nor will he receive it if he dies coming of age, so a person born again in the Spirit through Christian baptism has received power to become a son and heir of God, a joint-heir with Christ (Rom. 8:17), and in the age to come he will, with all certainty, receive the divine and immortal adoption as a son, which will not be taken from him, unless he has forfeited this by spiritual death. Sin is spiritual death, and whereas physical death is annulled when the future age arrives, spiritual death is confirmed for those who bring it with them from here.

Everyone who has been baptized, if he is to obtain the eternal blessedness and salvation for which he hopes, should live free from all sin. Peter and Paul, the leaders of the highest company of the holy apostles made this clear. Paul said of Christ,

“In that he died, he died unto sin once: but in that he lives, he lives unto God”, (Rom. 6:10-11),

whereas Peter wrote,

“Forasmuch as Christ has died for us in the flesh, arm yourselves likewise with the same mind: that you no longer should live the rest of your time by the lusts of men, but by the will of God” (1 Pet. 4:1-2).

If it was for our sake that the Lord lived His time on earth, to leave us an example, and He passed His life without sin, we too must live without sin, in imitation of Him. Since He said even to Abraham’s descendants according to the flesh,

“If you were Abraham’s children, you would do the works of Abraham” (Jn. 8:39),

how much more will He say to us who have no physical kinship with Him, “If you were My children, you would do My works”? It is therefore consistent and just that anyone who, after divine baptism, after the covenants he made then to God and the grace he received from it, does not follow Christ’s way of life step by step, but transgresses and offends against the benefactor, should be utterly deprived of divine adoption and the eternal inheritance.

But, O Christ our King, who can worthily extol the greatness of Your love for mankind? What was unnecessary for Him and what He did not do, namely, repentance (for He never needed to repent, being sinless, cf. Heb. 4:15), He granted to us a mediator for when we sin even after receiving grace. Repentance means returning once again to Him and to a life according to His will out of remorse. Even if someone commits a deadly sin, if he turns away from it with all his soul, abstains from it and turns back to the Lord in deed and truth, he should take courage and be of good hope, for he shall not lose eternal life and salvation. When a child according to the flesh meets his death, he is not brought back to life by his father, but someone born of Christ, even though he fall into deadly sins, if he turns again and runs to the Father who raises the dead, is made alive once more, obtains divine adoption, and is not cast out from the company of the just.

May we all attain to this, to the glory of Christ and of His Father without beginning and of the life-giving Spirit, now and forever, and unto the ages of ages. Amen.

© 2010, Fr. John A. Peck. All rights reserved.

by Fr. John A. Peck

Well, friends, it is that time in our exercise. There’s no shame in it. Blogging has become difficult. We’re hitting ‘the wall’ in this marathon.

Runners know what ‘the wall’ is. It’s that wonderful experience you just have to push through. It’s tough. It’s all will power. Now for those of you who took up the challenge of the 30 (40) Days of Blogging, first let me congratulate you for takinng the challenge.

Second, for those blogging only the first 30 days, we are only a day away from the finish line, so blog on anything, but just blog.

For those of you going all the way to 40 Days of Blogging, it is a unique crucible, and one that has required some real effort.

I’d also like to say that it is precisely your willingness to – at this very busy season in the priesthood – put aside time for this exercise that will benefit you.

Remember, the purpose of this exercise is not simply to see “if you could do it.” Of that, I have no doubt whatsoever. The real prize to this exercise is what benefit it will provide you in your preaching.

As preachers, especially at Christmas, we have a real chance to preach the Gospel in a heightened way, using a more solemn and exalted tone or voice. This is a special event in the Church, to be sure, but it is prominent in our culture, too. People do expect something else, something different, something exalted.

This is a good expectation for us to try and meet, nay, exceed.  The prize of our hearer’s repentance, reconciliation with God and their fellows, and a return to some kind of healing normalcy; these are the dashed hopes of many of our hearers. They come expecting Sunday fare, or worse, a trip to a theological McDonalds. Give them a taste  of the Marriage Feast of the Lamb.

Slogging through these final days of blogging is a bit time consuming, but take a moment and recall why we are doing it. Look through some of the early articles on Blogging here at Preachers Institute. Reignite the purpose of blogging as a tool for better preaching.

After all, blogging is a kind of preaching, isn’t it? And the Lord Jesus Christ has called, chosen, and ordained us to preach “in season and out.”

We started strong. We can finish strong, for if no other reason than the Lord Himself is strong.

© 2010, Fr. John A. Peck. All rights reserved.

In this, one of my favorite articles, William Tighe explodes the notion we were all taught in public school about the ‘Christianization’ of a pagan festival for the date of Christmas. He uses historical fact to prove his point, and has thereby offered all Christians that most precious of all jewels – the truth, regarding the Church’s celebration on Dec. 25th.

Enjoy!

Many Christians think that Christians celebrate Christ’s birth on December 25th because the church fathers appropriated the date of a pagan festival. Almost no one minds, except for a few groups on the fringes of American Evangelicalism, who seem to think that this makes Christmas itself a pagan festival. But it is perhaps interesting to know that the choice of December 25th is the result of attempts among the earliest Christians to figure out the date of Jesus’ birth based on calendrical calculations that had nothing to do with pagan festivals.

Rather, the pagan festival of the “Birth of the Unconquered Sun” instituted by the Roman Emperor Aurelian on 25 December 274, was almost certainly an attempt to create a pagan alternative to a date that was already of some significance to Roman Christians. Thus the “pagan origins of Christmas” is a myth without historical substance.

A Mistake

The idea that the date was taken from the pagans goes back to two scholars from the late seventeenth and early eighteenth centuries. Paul Ernst Jablonski, a German Protestant, wished to show that the celebration of Christ’s birth on December 25th was one of the many “paganizations” of Christianity that the Church of the fourth century embraced, as one of many “degenerations” that transformed pure apostolic Christianity into Catholicism. Dom Jean Hardouin, a Benedictine monk, tried to show that the Catholic Church adopted pagan festivals for Christian purposes without paganizing the gospel.

In the Julian calendar, created in 45 B.C. under Julius Caesar, the winter solstice fell on December 25th, and it therefore seemed obvious to Jablonski and Hardouin that the day must have had a pagan significance before it had a Christian one. But in fact, the date had no religious significance in the Roman pagan festal calendar before Aurelian’s time, nor did the cult of the sun play a prominent role in Rome before him.

There were two temples of the sun in Rome, one of which (maintained by the clan into which Aurelian was born or adopted) celebrated its dedication festival on August 9th, the other of which celebrated its dedication festival on August 28th. But both of these cults fell into neglect in the second century, when eastern cults of the sun, such as Mithraism, began to win a following in Rome. And in any case, none of these cults, old or new, had festivals associated with solstices or equinoxes.

As things actually happened, Aurelian, who ruled from 270 until his assassination in 275, was hostile to Christianity and appears to have promoted the establishment of the festival of the “Birth of the Unconquered Sun” as a device to unify the various pagan cults of the Roman Empire around a commemoration of the annual “rebirth” of the sun. He led an empire that appeared to be collapsing in the face of internal unrest, rebellions in the provinces, economic decay, and repeated attacks from German tribes to the north and the Persian Empire to the east.

In creating the new feast, he intended the beginning of the lengthening of the daylight, and the arresting of the lengthening of darkness, on December 25th to be a symbol of the hoped-for “rebirth,” or perpetual rejuvenation, of the Roman Empire, resulting from the maintenance of the worship of the gods whose tutelage (the Romans thought) had brought Rome to greatness and world-rule. If it co-opted the Christian celebration, so much the better.

A By-Product

It is true that the first evidence of Christians celebrating December 25th as the date of the Lord’s nativity comes from Rome some years after Aurelian, in A.D. 336, but there is evidence from both the Greek East and the Latin West that Christians attempted to figure out the date of Christ’s birth long before they began to celebrate it liturgically, even in the second and third centuries. The evidence indicates, in fact, that the attribution of the date of December 25th was a by-product of attempts to determine when to celebrate his death and resurrection.

How did this happen? There is a seeming contradiction between the date of the Lord’s death as given in the synoptic Gospels and in John’s Gospel. The synoptics would appear to place it on Passover Day (after the Lord had celebrated the Passover Meal on the preceding evening), and John on the Eve of Passover, just when the Passover lambs were being slaughtered in the Jerusalem Temple for the feast that was to ensue after sunset on that day.

Solving this problem involves answering the question of whether the Lord’s Last Supper was a Passover Meal, or a meal celebrated a day earlier, which we cannot enter into here. Suffice it to say that the early Church followed John rather than the synoptics, and thus believed that Christ’s death would have taken place on 14 Nisan, according to the Jewish lunar calendar. (Modern scholars agree, by the way, that the death of Christ could have taken place only in A.D. 30 or 33, as those two are the only years of that time when the eve of Passover could have fallen on a Friday, the possibilities being either 7 April 30 or 3 April 33.)

However, as the early Church was forcibly separated from Judaism, it entered into a world with different calendars, and had to devise its own time to celebrate the Lord’s Passion, not least so as to be independent of the rabbinic calculations of the date of Passover. Also, since the Jewish calendar was a lunar calendar consisting of twelve months of thirty days each, every few years a thirteenth month had to be added by a decree of the Sanhedrin to keep the calendar in synchronization with the equinoxes and solstices, as well as to prevent the seasons from “straying” into inappropriate months.

Apart from the difficulty Christians would have had in following—or perhaps even being accurately informed about—the dating of Passover in any given year, to follow a lunar calendar of their own devising would have set them at odds with both Jews and pagans, and very likely embroiled them in endless disputes among themselves. (The second century saw severe disputes about whether Pascha had always to fall on a Sunday or on whatever weekday followed two days after 14 Artemision/Nisan, but to have followed a lunar calendar would have made such problems much worse.)

These difficulties played out in different ways among the Greek Christians in the eastern part of the empire and the Latin Christians in the western part of it. Greek Christians seem to have wanted to find a date equivalent to 14 Nisan in their own solar calendar, and since Nisan was the month in which the spring equinox occurred, they chose the 14th day of Artemision, the month in which the spring equinox invariably fell in their own calendar. Around A.D. 300, the Greek calendar was superseded by the Roman calendar, and since the dates of the beginnings and endings of the months in these two systems did not coincide, 14 Artemision became April 6th.

In contrast, second-century Latin Christians in Rome and North Africa appear to have desired to establish the historical date on which the Lord Jesus died. By the time of Tertullian they had concluded that he died on Friday, 25 March 29. (As an aside, I will note that this is impossible: 25 March 29 was not a Friday, and Passover Eve in A.D. 29 did not fall on a Friday and was not on March 25th, or in March at all.)

Integral Age

So in the East we have April 6th, in the West, March 25th. At this point, we have to introduce a belief that seems to have been widespread in Judaism at the time of Christ, but which, as it is nowhere taught in the Bible, has completely fallen from the awareness of Christians. The idea is that of the “integral age” of the great Jewish prophets: the idea that the prophets of Israel died on the same dates as their birth or conception.

This notion is a key factor in understanding how some early Christians came to believe that December 25th is the date of Christ’s birth. The early Christians applied this idea to Jesus, so that March 25th and April 6th were not only the supposed dates of Christ’s death, but of his conception or birth as well. There is some fleeting evidence that at least some first- and second-century Christians thought of March 25th or April 6th as the date of Christ’s birth, but rather quickly the assignment of March 25th as the date of Christ’s conception prevailed.

It is to this day, commemorated almost universally among Christians as the Feast of the Annunciation, when the Archangel Gabriel brought the good tidings of a savior to the Virgin Mary, upon whose acquiescence the Eternal Word of God (“Light of Light, True God of True God, begotten of the Father before all ages”) forthwith became incarnate in her womb. What is the length of pregnancy? Nine months. Add nine months to March 25th and you get December 25th; add it to April 6th and you get January 6th. December 25th is Christmas, and January 6th is Epiphany.

Christmas (December 25th) is a feast of Western Christian origin. In Constantinople it appears to have been introduced in 379 or 380. From a sermon of St. John Chrysostom, at the time a renowned ascetic and preacher in his native Antioch, it appears that the feast was first celebrated there on 25 December 386. From these centers it spread throughout the Christian East, being adopted in Alexandria around 432 and in Jerusalem a century or more later. The Armenians, alone among ancient Christian churches, have never adopted it, and to this day celebrate Christ’s birth, manifestation to the magi, and baptism on January 6th.

Western churches, in turn, gradually adopted the January 6th Epiphany feast from the East, Rome doing so sometime between 366 and 394. But in the West, the feast was generally presented as the commemoration of the visit of the magi to the infant Christ, and as such, it was an important feast, but not one of the most important ones—a striking contrast to its position in the East, where it remains the second most important festival of the church year, second only to Pascha (Easter).

In the East, Epiphany far outstrips Christmas. The reason is that the feast celebrates Christ’s baptism in the Jordan and the occasion on which the Voice of the Father and the Descent of the Spirit both manifested for the first time to mortal men the divinity of the Incarnate Christ and the Trinity of the Persons in the One Godhead.

A Christian Feast

Thus, December 25th as the date of the Christ’s birth appears to owe nothing whatsoever to pagan influences upon the practice of the Church during or after Constantine’s time. It is wholly unlikely to have been the actual date of Christ’s birth, but it arose entirely from the efforts of early Latin Christians to determine the historical date of Christ’s death.

And the pagan feast which the Emperor Aurelian instituted on that date in the year 274 was not only an effort to use the winter solstice to make a political statement, but also almost certainly an attempt to give a pagan significance to a date already of importance to Roman Christians. The Christians, in turn, could at a later date re-appropriate the pagan “Birth of the Unconquered Sun” to refer, on the occasion of the birth of Christ, to the rising of the “Sun of Salvation” or the “Sun of Justice.”

Copyright © 2003 the Fellowship of St. James. All rights reserved. This article appeared in Touchstone Magazine, and was reprinted by Orthodoxytoday.org. We have reprinted it with permission.

The author refers interested readers to Thomas J. Talley’s The Origins of the Liturgical Year (The Liturgical Press). A draft of this article appeared on the listserve Virtuosity.

William J. Tighe is Associate Professor of History at Muhlenberg College in Allentown, Pennsylvania, and a faculty advisor to the Catholic Campus Ministry. He is a Member of St. Josaphat Ukrainian Catholic Church in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania. He is a contributing editor for Touchstone Magazine.

© 2010, Fr. John A. Peck. All rights reserved.

It’s really not all that challenging, but for someone who has never read the entire New Testament before, it is an excellent time for just such an exercise.

• If you begin on Nov. 15th, you will do the 40 day schedule.
• If you begin on Dec. 1, you will do the 25 day schedule.
• Both schedules complete their readings on Christmas day.

This makes the entire Nativity Fast a time of real devoted ascetic effort and spiritual growth. It is especially appropriate (in my opinion) as the term Advent, basically implies a preparation and anticipation of the Second Coming of Christ. Notice, on Christmas Day, one is finishing Revelation!

Now, you may say “Who is honestly going to read half – or the entire – book of Revelation on Christmas?” Well, that’s what the 12 Days of Christmas are for!

I recommend that all preachers and clergy offer this to your parishioners during the Nativity Fast. It is a great time to do it, and this is a wonderful thing to promote RIGHT NOW!

In any event, if you want some activity for parishioners to do together to count down the days of the Nativity Fast, some spiritual exercise for them to stay accountable to, and some endeavor for you to present alongside their efforts, the New Testament Challenge is my offering to you.

You can download the form in PDF format by clicking the image above.

The New Testament Challenge Schedule

This is a great exercise, and I find that often it gets folks who have desired for many years to read the New Testament on target to doing so for the first time. It’s a great fellowship builder also, as I try to get those who are reading together during our Fellowship Hour on Sunday, so they know they aren’t alone, and to provide a little impetus to keep on schedule.

It doesn’t matter to me if they finish – though that is the goal. The truth is, I want them to start.

You may have heard the old Irish saying,

“Well begun is half done.”

and this is no more true in blogging than it is in reading Scripture.

You can actually blog about the entire experience yourself.

You’ll get a more attentive audience, I can guarantee you, if they know you are reading along with them, noting (ahead of time, of course, so you can blog about it) impressions and spiritual dimensions of the readings they will be with you every step of the way. Beginning such an enterprise takes commitment and devotion, but if you really aren’t sure what to blog about, and you just can’t figure out what to do – the New Testament Challenge is an excellent blogging exercise for you, and your fellow NT readers.

Be sure to announce in your weekly bulletin AND from the pulpit that you will be doing this, so that your people will know what you are doing, and so they can join you on this journey. Be sure to pass out copies at Church.

And join you they will.

There is an Old Testament Challenge also, but that’s for another time, and is far more intense.

Fr. John A. Peck is the priest of the St. George Church in Prescott, AZ, and is the Director of the Preachers Institute.

© 2010, Fr. John A. Peck. All rights reserved.