On Thursday, the Church offers spiritual sacrifices, through which it may obtain joy, but because mercy is only obtained by confessing justice, therefore She says in the introit, as a way of confessing God’s justice towards us, “All that Thou hast done to us, o Lord, thou hast done in true judgment.” Which is to say, if Thou hast sent tribulations, it is well done, because we have sinned against Thee. And afterwards, she asks for mercy: “Give glory to Thy name, and deal with us according to the multitude of Thy mercy.” …
Introitus Omnia, quae fecisti nobis, Dómine, in vero judicio fecisti: quia peccávimus tibi, et mandátis tuis non oboedívimus: sed da gloriam nómini tuo, et fac nobiscum secundum multitúdinem misericordiae tuae. ~ All that Thou hast done to us, o Lord, thou hast done in true judgment; because we have sinned against Thee, and have not obeyed Thy commandments: but give glory to Thy name, and deal with us according to the multitude of Thy mercy.The same is said in the epistle, which is taken from the book of Daniel (3, 25; 34-45), “Daniel prayed, ‘Lord God, despise us not, etc., because we have sinned, and there is no sacrifice.” Thus did the children of Israel say when they were in Babylon; and so also we can say when we are in sin, “There is no sacrifice, sed with a humble spirit and contrite heart, let us be received by Thee, o Lord.” (The post-Tridentine Roman Missal changes the incipit of this reading to conform it to the Biblical text, “Azarias prayerd...”)
The gradual, “Bring up sacrifices, and come into his courts,” urges us to offer spiritual sacrifices. The verse is, “He will uncover the thick woods,” for one cannot make such a spiritual sacrifice unless God remove darkness from the heart. It is sung in the fifth tone, to indicate that one must make such a sacrifice with the five senses.
Graduale, Ps. 95, 8-9 Tóllite hostias, et introíte in atria ejus: adoráte Dóminum in aula sancta ejus. V. Ps. 28, 9 Revelávit Dóminus condensa: et in templo ejus omnes dicent gloriam. (Bring up sacrifices and and enter into His courts; adore ye the Lord in His holy court. V. The Lord uncovers (or ‘lays bare’) the forests, and in His temple all sspeak of His glory.)
There follows the Gospel (Luke 7, 36-50), which tells of how Mary Magdalene obtained forgiveness by her tears, because she sacrificed everything that she formerly had in delight, and thus offered herself as a spiritual sacrifice to God in her body.
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| The Feast in the House of Simon the Pharisee, 1570, by Paolo Veronese; originally painted for the refectory of the Servite church in Venice, gifted by the Venetian Republic to King Louis XIV of France in 1664, and since then, kept in the Chateau of Versailles. (Public domain image from Wikimedia Commons; click to enlarge.) |
The offertory shows how one ought to weep and mourn. There are two things that bring us to this: the memory of past sin, and the remembrance of the heavenly Jerusalem. For when a man compares his miseries with the purity of the angels, he weeps over the rivers of Babylon. (Babylon here means the sinful world in general.) This is sung in the first tone, because this must be first in the memory, the end for the sake of which we exist. The verse “On the willows in the midst thereof we hung up our instruments” is said, because after this day, no Gospel is read which tells of the Lord preaching publicly to the Jews. (This refers to one of the added verses of the offertory which is included in the ancient chant books, but not in the missal. ~ Excerpts from William Durandus’ Rationale Divinorum Officiorum, VI, 64)
“Super flúmina Babylónis illic sédimus et flévimus, dum recordarémur tui, Sion.
By the rivers of Babylon, there we sat and wept when we remembered thee, o Zion.”
A very nice polyphonic setting by Palestrina.
