Mountains of Gilboa, let neither dew nor rain come upon you, for on thee has the shield of the mighty been cast away, the shield of Saul, as if he had not been anointed with oil. How are the mighty fallen in battle! Jonathan hath been slain upon the high places; Saul and Jonathan were lovely and very comely in their lives, in their death also they have not been not divided. (The antiphon at the Magnificat for the Saturday before the 5th Sunday after Pentecost.)
Aña Montes Gélboë, nec ros nec pluvia veniant super vos: quia in te abjectus est clípeus fortium, clipeus Saul, quasi non esset unctus óleo. Quómodo cecidérunt fortes in bello? Jónathas in excelsis interfectus est: Saul et Jónathas, amábiles et decóri valde in vita sua, in morte quoque non sunt divísi.
The defeat of Saul and his sons by the Philistines on Mt Gilboa, depicted in a Bible made in Paris in the 1240s, now at the Morgan Library in New York City. (folio 34v, image cropped.)
The text of this unusually long antiphon is taken from the first chapter of the Second Book of Samuel (Second Kings in the Vulgate), which is read at Matins the following morning; David, not yet recognized as king in Israel, mourns for Saul and his son Jonathan after they had been killed by the Philistines in battle. The same passage (verses 17-27) was also made into a series of four motets which sticks much more closely to the original Biblical wording. These were formerly attributed to Josquin des Prez (1450/5-1521), but this is now considered very doubtful; nothing is known about the circumstances for which they were written.
R. Si quaeris miracula, Mors, error, calamitas, Daemon, lepra fugiunt, Aegri surgunt sani. * Cedunt mare, vincula:
Membra resque perditas Petunt et accipiunt Juvenes et cani. V. Pereunt pericula Cessat et necessitas:
Narrent hi, qui sentiunt, Dicant Paduani. Cedunt. Gloria Patri. Cedunt.
R. If you ask for miracles, Death, error, all calamities, Leprosy and demons fly And health succeeds infirmities. * The sea obeys, and fetters break, And lifeless limbs thou dost restore, While treasures lost are found again, When young and old thine aid implore. V. All dangers vanish at thy prayer, and direst need doth quickly flee,
Let those who know thy power proclaim, Let Paduans say, “These are of thee.” The sea obeys... Glory be.. The sea obeys...
V. Ora pro nobis, beate Antoni. R.Ut digni efficiamur promis- sionibus Christi.
V.Pray for us, blessed Anthony. R. That we may be made worthy of the promises of Christ.
Oremus. Ecclesiam tuam, Deus, beati Antonii Confessoris tui at- que Doctoris solemnitas votiva laetificet, ut spiritualibus semper muniatur auxiliis, et gaudiis per- frui mereatur aeternis. Per Chri- stum Dominum nostrum. R. Amen.
Let us pray. May Thy Church, o God, be gladdened by the solemnity of the blessed Anthony, Thy Confessor and Doctor: that she may be evermore de- fended by Thy spiritual assistance, and merit to possess everlasting joy. Through Christ our Lord. Amen.
Si quaeris miracula is the eighth and final responsory of the Franciscan Office of St. Anthony of Padua, whose feast is kept today, the anniversary of his death in the year 1231. It is traditionally known as the “miraculous” responsory, from the once-common custom of reciting it to ask for St. Anthony’s miraculous intervention. English-speaking Catholics today perhaps think of him principally as the Saint to call upon when something is lost, for which there is a well-known rhyme, “St. Anthony, St. Anthony, please come down: something is lost and cannot be found.” In his own lifetime, however, and for centuries after, Anthony was principally known for his extraordinary learning and his skill as a preacher; he was the first Franciscan to study at a university and teach.
St Anthony of Padua, ca. 1272, by an anonymous artist known as the Master of St Francis. In his hand he holds a book on which are written the words of Wisdom 7, 7 “I called upon (the Lord), and there came upon me the spirit of wisdom and understanding,” a verse often associated with the Doctors of the Church. (Image from Wikimedia Commons by Sailko, CC BY 3.0)
He was also known for a variety of highly spectacular miracles. The 39th chapter of The Little Flowers of Saint Francis tells the story of how he preached before the Pope and cardinals in consistory, and was understood by them all,
Greeks, Italians, French, Germans, Slavs and English, and other languages… as if he had spoken in their own languages … and it seemed that that ancient miracle of the Apostles at the time of Pentecost was renewed, when they spoke by the power of the Holy Spirit in every tongue. And they said to each other with admiration, “Is this man who preaches not a Spaniard? And how do we all hear our own language as he speaks?”
By an interesting coincidence, St. Anthony’s feast day is also the last day possible on which the feast of Pentecost can occur. He was canonized within a year of his death by the Pope in whose presence this miracle took place, Gregory IX (1227-1241), who also referred to him publicly as the “ark of the covenant, and the treasure-chest of the Divine Scriptures”; this is sometimes said to be the fastest canonization ever, but that honor actually belongs to the Dominican St. Peter Martyr. On the occasion of his canonization, Pope Gregory intoned in his honor the Magnificat Antiphon for Doctors of the Church, “O Doctor Optime”, a title which was formally confirmed in 1946 by Pope Pius XII.
The Franciscan Office of St. Anthony of Padua was composed by a German member of the order, Julian of Speyer, roughly ten years after the Saint’s death: one of the best known examples of a later type of Office known as a “rhymed office”.
Rhyme itself was not used by the ancients, and where it occurred it was considered a blemish on poetry. Verse was formed by the alternation of long and short syllables in regular patterns; the iambic pentameter used so much by Shakespeare is broadly similar. (His type of English poetry is however much freer than Latin verse.) An example of this type of poetry in the liturgy is an antiphon found in the Office of St. Peter in Chains on August 1st.
Solve, jubente Deo, terrarum, Petre, catenas,
Qui facis ut pateant caelestia regna beatis.
Release at God’s order, o Peter, the earthly chains
Who make the kingdom of heaven open to the blessed.
These two lines are written in dactylic hexameters, the same metrical form used in the epic poetry of Homer and Virgil; they were composed by Pope St. Leo I, (440-461) and inscribed on a wall of the ancient church of St. Peter.
As the Latin language evolved into the modern Romance languages, the vowel quantities on which ancient poetry was based came to be less and less perceptible, leading over the centuries to the emergence of rhyme as we understand it today. (The older forms, on the hand, never ceased to be used.) By the high Middle Ages, this new type of poetry had become extremely popular in the liturgy. Four of the five sequences in the Tridentine Missal (“Lauda Sion” on Corpus Christi, “Veni Sancte Spiritus” on Pentecost, “Stabat Mater” on the feast of the Seven Sorrows, and the “Dies irae” of the Requiem Mass) are in rhyme.
The responsory Si quaeris miracula in a 16th century Franciscan antiphonary. (Two pages cropped and joined.)
Likewise, whole Offices were routinely composed in which all of the proper musical parts, (antiphons, hymns and responsories), are rhymed. Julian of Speyer is considered one of the great masters of this type of liturgical composition, and the rhymed offices which he wrote for St. Anthony and St. Francis were widely imitated from his own time (he died in about 1250), until the Tridentine liturgical reform, when rhymed offices fell out of favor. Many continued to be used by the older religious orders, and churches which maintained their own proper Offices, but the newer orders, in the spirit of the Tridentine reform, preferred to base their proper Offices on Scriptural quotations. Thus, for example, the five antiphons used by the Oratorians at Lauds of St. Philip Neri are all quotations from the Bible, while the proper hymns are all written in thoroughly classical meter. (The Jesuits, unsurprisingly, do not even have a proper Office for St. Ignatius.)
The disfavor into which rhymed offices fell is also a by-product of the increasingly common habit in the Tridentine period of reciting the Office in choir recto tono, i.e. singing everything on a single note, rather than with its longer, proper notation. This manner of saying the Office makes the sing-song quality of the medieval rhyme schemes far more obvious; most people would agree that the “Dies irae”, for example, sounds much better when sung then when read. This recording of the Miraculous Responsory shows very nicely how the proper musical notation transcends the rhyme scheme.
When Pope Urban IV promulgated the feast of Corpus Christi in 1264, he also offered a complete set of Mass and Office texts composed at his behest by St Thomas Aquinas. These are rightly recognized to be among the finest of the High Middle Ages, and have been treasured by Catholics as the official liturgical expression of Eucharistic devotion for many centuries. However, the feast had already been established almost two decades earlier in the city of Liège; in his bull Transiturus, Pope Urban refers to the visionary St Juliana of Mont-Cornillon, who had composed an office of Corpus Christi before St Thomas. Her assistant in this task and in the promotion of the feast was a canon of the church of St Martin in Liège, John of Lausanne; this church and several others continued to use the older Office or parts thereof well after Pope Urban’s time. In a 15th-century manuscript of St Juliana’s life, a note is added by a later hand that refers to this Office, saying that “(i)t begins with the words Animarum cibus, and is found in its entirety in the church of Tongres (about ten miles from Liège) and elsewhere; then Urban IV instituted the office which is now sung everywhere.” (As noted in “The Feast of Corpus Christi”, edited by Barbara R. Walters et al., Penn. State Univ. Press, 2006, p. 61.)
Despite the broad liturgical standardization after the council of Trent, Liège maintained its own proper medieval use, edited according to certain criteria of the Tridentine reform, until the French Revolution ended the independence of the city’s Prince-Bishopric. It would appear from the printed liturgical books of the era that the office of St Thomas was adopted throughout the diocese as part of this reform. At the church of St Martin, however, where the feast of Corpus Christi was first celebrated, several parts of the older office Animarum cibus were added to St Thomas’; among them, proper hymns are assigned to the minor hours of Prime, Terce, Sext and None. (This was done in some parts of the Low Countries on a very small number of feasts, where the use of Rome has the same hymns at these hours every day.) As was typical of the period, several lines are borrowed from other hymns already part of the general repertoire; for example, the first line of the hymn of Prime, “Summae Jesu clementiae” is borrowed from a much older hymn which begins with those same words.
At Prime
Summae Jesu clementiae,
Qui ob salutem mentium
Caelestis alimoniae
Nobis praestas remedium
Mores, vitam et opera
Rege momentis omnibus,
Et beatis accelera
Vitam dare cum civibus.
Praesta, Pater, per Filium,
Praesta per almum Spiritum,
Quibus das hoc edulium
Prosperum serves exitum. Amen.
Jesus, of greatest clemency, who for the salvation of our souls grant us the remedy of heavenly nourishment, in every moment guide our manners, life and works, and hasten also to grant us life with the blessed citizens (of heaven.)
(Each of these hymns is sung with the same doxology:)
Grant this, Father, through the Son, and through the Holy Spirit, and a properous end to those to whom you give this food.
At Terce
Sacro tecta velamine
Pietatis mysteria
Mentes pascunt dulcedine,
Qua satiant caelestia.
Sit ergo cum caelestibus
Nobis commune gaudium,
Illis quod se praesentavit,
Nobis quod se non abstulit.
The mysteries of devotion, covered by a sacred veil, feed our souls with the same sweetness that fills those in heaven. Let this then be the joy which we share with them, that He has made Himself present to them, and Has not (by so doing) removed Himself from us.
At Sext
Splendor superni luminis,
Laudisque sacrificium
Coenam tui da numinis
Tuae carnis post prandium.
Saturatus opprobriis
Ad hoc cruci configeris
Et irrisus ludibriis
Crudeli morte plecteris
Splendor of heavenly light, and sacrifice of praise, grant the banquet of your Divine presence after that of your flesh. For this were you weighed down with reproaches, this nailed to the Cross, derided and mocked, and punished with a cruel death.
Hujus cultu memoriae
Dirae mortis supplicio,
Nos de lacu miseriae
Educ qui clamas: Sitio.
Eternal glory of heaven, blessed light of believers, victim for our redemption, pasture of your sheep, by the worship of this memorial, by the punishment of this dreadful death, lead us forth from the pit of misery, you who cried out “I thirst.”
The Mass of St. Gregory the Great, by Robert Campin, 1440, or an assistant.
Each of these hymns contains a specific reference to the canonical hour at which it would be sung. The words “in every moment guide our manners, life and works” in the first hymn fit with one of the main ideas of the hour of Prime, to pray for the the sanctification of the day’s work; this is also expressed by the two invariable prayers of that Hour in the Roman Rite and most other uses. The references to receiving Communion in the hymn Sacro tecta velamine derive from the generally observed custom of the Middle Ages that the principle Mass of all major feast days was celebrated after the singing of Terce. The hymn for Sext refers to the Crucifixion which took place “at the sixth hour”, as St Matthew says, and that of None speaks of the death of Christ at the ninth hour, and His crying out “I thirst” just before, as told in the Gospel of St John.
One of the things that always impresses me in the study of the liturgy is the continuity which one can see over enormous distances in time, and here is a small but interesting example. The first set of pictures is taken from a Psalter made in the palace of Charles the Bald, a grandson of Charlemagne who ruled as King of the Western Franks from 840-77, and Holy Roman Emperor for the last 2 years of his life. An invocation is added to the Litany of the Saints, “that Thou may deign to preserve our spouse Ermentrude,” which dates the manuscript between her marriage to Charles in 842, and her death in 869. The name of the copyist and illuminator, Liuthard, is known from his signature at the end of the manuscript: “Hic calamus facto Liuthardi fine quievit. – Here the pen of Liuthard rested when the end was reached.”
The wooden covers are mounted with cabochons in metal frames, surrounding carved ivory plaques; the plaque on the front represents God protecting the soul of King David from various adversities. (Bibliothèque National de France, Département des Manuscrits, Latin 1152)
King David, with four of the other persons named by the titles of the Psalms as their authors, Asaph, Heman, Ethan and Idithun.
A portrait of Charles the Bald, with the hand of God reaching down to bless him. The inscription at top reads, “Since Charles sits crowned in great honor, he is like Josiah, and the equal of Theodosius.”
“The noble translator and priest Jerome, being nobly able, transcribed the laws of David.” The tradition of showing St Jerome as a cardinal has of course not yet arisen in the 9th century, and he is here shown as a Benedictine monk.
In the Roman Breviary, the feasts of the Apostles and Martyrs share a special proper Office which is used only in Eastertide, with different antiphons, responsories, chapters and versicles from those said during the rest of the year. This tradition is common to all Uses of the Roman Rite; many medieval breviaries (e.g. that of the Premonstratensians) develop it further, and extend at least some of these features to other categories of Saints. The Apostles, however, are the only ones whose Office also has proper hymns for Eastertide. This applies to the feasts of St Mark the Evangelist, whose First Vespers are celebrated this evening, of Ss Philip and James on May 1st, and the feast of St John at the Latin Gate on the 6th. It also applies to the feast of St Barnabas on June 11, but only in the extremely rare years when Easter falls on its latest possible date, April 25. (This has happened only 4 times since the Gregorian calendar was promulgated in 1582, and will happen only ten times in this millennium.)
Properly speaking, the Vespers hymn Tristes erant Apostoli, (which is repeated at Matins), and the Lauds hymn Claro paschali gaudio are both parts of the hymn Aurora lucis rutilat, which is sung at Lauds of the Sundays and ferias of the Easter season. This hymn is undoubtedly very ancient, and was often attributed to St Ambrose, but this attribution is now regarded as incorrect, and it is not used at all in the Ambrosian Office. In the Mozarabic Rite, which has a strong tendency toward the prolix in its use of hymns, all twelve stanzas are sung daily at Prime in Eastertide. Here we see it in the edition published in 1775.
Pope Urban VIII’s classicizing revision of both parts is one of the least successful aspects of that reform, and fully justifies the famous bon mot often said against it, “Accessit latinitas, recessit pietas – Latinity came in, and piety went out.” Fortunately, the mighty Tomás Luis de Victoria composed this splendid version in alternating chant and polyphony before the reformed versions became standard. (The version in the post-Conciliar Liturgy of the Hours is much closer to the original. See the Latin original and an English translation by John Mason Neale at this link: https://www.preces-latinae.org/thesaurus/Hymni/AuroraLucis.html)
Another version, also in alternating chant and polyphony, by Victoria’s fellow Spaniard, priest and composer Francisco Guerrero (1528-99).
Thanks once again to our friend Mr Sean Pilcher, this time for sharing with us this a review of a resource newly reprinted by Church Latin Publications for those who want to learn to say the pre-55 Breviary, a book will be especially useful for those who have been used to the edition of 1960. Mr Pilcher is the director of Sacra: Relics of the Saints (sacrarelics.org), an apostolate that promotes education about relics, and works to repair, research, and document relics for religious houses and dioceses.
The transition from the breviary in force in 1962 to the more traditional breviary before 1955 can be disorienting, even for priests, religious, and interested layfolk who are familiar with the traditional Roman rite. The 1962 breviary is vastly simplified and pared down, so that is, in some ways easier to use. Setting aside the question of whether this outweighs the drastic reduction in patristic readings and hagiographies, as well as a neutered calendar, we can feel puzzled by the additional commemorations, lessons, and ranking of feasts when beginning to pray the older Office.
A very useful resource, especially for those looking for an intuitive transition from the reduced ’62 breviary, but really anyone interested in the Office, is Learning the Breviary by Fr Bernard A. Hausmann, S.J. The book, which was written in 1932, has been recently reprinted by Church Latin Publishing. The book begins with a touching exhortation to fidelity to the breviary written by His Excellency William Hayden, bishop of Wilcannia-Forbes, Australia, which he originally penned to his priests: “The priest who says his Office every day, digne, attente ac devote, is traveling on very safe lines. I do not mean to say that the reciting of the Office alone is all that is required of him. What I mean is, that the priest who is faithful to this duty will also be faithful to the many other obligations which are inseparably linked with the sacerdotal state.” The author also frankly acknowledges that the complex structure and the language can be real obstacles to appreciating the rich treasure of the Roman Breviary.
The text is directed toward those approaching Orders (and therefore obligation to the Divine Office) and those who have already spent much time reciting the breviary but with less profit than they wish. The introduction is especially stirring for clerics, but can be helpful for anyone who wishes to pray with the liturgy of the Church. He addresses the difficulty of the psalter: ‘Who could say when asked on the spot the meaning of words such as absistat et vecordia; or Virginis proles opifexque matris?’, and the value of the cursus of Scripture, saints’ lives, and patristic commentaries in the lessons of matins. The introduction also stresses the hidden beauty of the hymns, however altered, and ends by giving real paternal advice to priests in prioritizing the hours and staying faithful to them: “My dear Fathers, I know that many of you have to live in lonely places, without many home comforts and without the companionship of your fellow-priests. Hence I would advise you to make the Breviary your special friend and companion.” The bishop stresses that for him, not even a busy schedule, travel, or primitive accommodations should be real obstacles to faithful prayer of the breviary.
The Dictionary of Terms, or glossary, that follows is invaluable. The author defines all of the unique terms associated with the canonical hours (antiphon, versicle, ferial office) in clear, unambiguous language to assist beginners. Beyond this, however, he explains many terms which those coming from the ‘62 breviary may find puzzling, and which are in many texts taken for granted. Anyone who has ever had a second thought about ‘double,’ ‘semidouble’ or ‘duplex majus’ feasts will benefit. Finally, certain shorthands and rubrical notes (‘m.t.v.,’ ‘vesperae de sequenti’) used as technical terms are explained. ~ Besides its spiritual words of encouragement at the outset, the book is deeply practical. What follows is an individual treatment of each hour, an explanation of each of its parts and how they can vary, and an anticipation of many of the most common misunderstandings and errors in recitation of the office in question. The explanation even prints out many abbreviated texts in full, so that beginners can understand the sometimes confusing way the breviary prints the prayers for our ease and to economize space.
After the individual treatment of matins, lauds, prime, terce, sext, none, vespers, and compline individually on their own terms, the author dedicates a section to summarizing the structure of the Divine Office as a whole. Once the reader has a grasp of each of the hours, this helpful summary can solidify the general pattern of the Office as a unity throughout the year as seasons, feasts, and fasts come by. Two short sections follow explaining the Office of Our Lady on Saturdays, and the Office of the Dead, with special direction on how to pray the latter on particular days of commemoration (the day of death or burial, and on anniversaries), and how to pray them in conjunction with the regular offices for the day. The next section presents general changes throughout the seasons, such as on Sundays, during Lent and Holy Week, and for Paschaltide. There is also a small set of notes to aid beginners in reading an ordo.
Finally, the author presents sample offices and a series of charts to compare the various possible forms each one can take. The book ends with a very useful index of the explanations given.
Church Latin Publishing also reprints a similar resource for the 1962 Office, which could be of use to those learning the traditional breviary coming from no prior experience or from the Liturgy of the Hours.
The Roman tradition has always been very conservative about the use of hymns in the Divine Office. In most liturgical seasons, there are three proper hymns, one each for Matins, Lauds and Vespers, but many feasts, including some of the greatest solemnities (Christmas, Epiphany, Ascension etc.), have only two. In the Ordinal of Pope Innocent III (1198-1216), the ancestor text of the breviary of St Pius V, Lent is an exception, since it has four hymns, one each for Matins and Lauds, but two for Vespers. Audi, benigne Conditor is said from Monday to Saturday, but Sunday Vespers has its own hymn, Aures ad nostras, an anonymous work first attested in a 10th century manuscript from the abbey of St Benedict on Monte Cassino.
The hymn Aures ad nostras in a breviary according to the Use of Esztergom, the primatial see of Hungary, 1523-24. (Bibliothèque nationale de France, Département des Manuscrits, Latin 8879)
St Pius V’s reform of the Roman breviary made very few alterations to the established repertoire of musical propers for the Office in all their genres (antiphons, responsories etc.) This hymn was therefore left in its place, with a small correction of the awkwardly arranged opening words (“Ad preces nostras Deitatis aures”), but otherwise unchanged.
In early 1588, Pope Sixtus V established the Sacred Congregation for Rites, and appointed as its first prefect Alfonso Gesualdo, archbishop of Conza in southern Campania, and uncle of the famous composer Carlo Gesualdo. As part of the preparatory work for new editions of the breviary and missal of St Pius, the cardinal wrote to various nuncios in Europe, asking them to canvas the learned men of their respective nations for suggestions as to what might be due for revision. The reports of two different nuncios (Prague and Madrid) contained the suggestion that Aures ad nostras be removed from the Office completely; another (Venice) suggested it be corrected, since its numerous metrical flaws made the Catholic Church look foolish to the Protestant heretics. [1]
This information comes from an article by a chant scholar and canon of the cathedral of Chartres, Fr Yves Delaporte, published in 1907. In the second part, he gives the following information from the notes of the commission that prepared the revised breviary which Pope Clement VIII promulgated in 1602. “The hymn Ad preces nostras... has been removed; it seemed inept in both its choice of words and phrasing, was put together with no account of (metrical) feet or syllables, and further, was superfluous, since in all offices, the same hymn is said at both Vespers, and no other solemn observance... has more then three hymns.” [2]
In the post-Conciliar Rite, however, it has been restored to use, but not in Lent. The first three stanzas serve as the hymn for the Office of Readings on Tuesday of weeks 2 and 4 of the Psalter, and the fifth, sixth and eighth on Wednesday; on both days, it concludes with the same, original doxology. In accordance with the usual censorship of any negative thoughts that might disturb the complacency of Modern Man™ in his splendor, the fourth stanza, which says that “we are submerged beneath the wave of sin” is suppressed, as is the seventh, which refers to the newly unfashionable practice of fasting, and the “thousand vices of the flesh.” Both of these stanzas also contain significant blemishes in their Latinity. Surprisingly, the reference to Satan in the eighth stanza remains in place, and only a few other alterations were made.
This first recording, from the always wonderful Schola Hungarica, begins with the antiphon Media vita, which was commonly sung with the Nunc dimittis at Compline in Lent. The first stanza of the hymn begins at 2:20, in a Gregorian melody, followed by a polyphonic version of the second, and only these two are sung.
The first stanza of the hymn in a musical collection of the 15th century. (Bibliothèque nationale de France, département Musique, RES-1750)
This English translation is from the collection Pange Lingua by Alan G. McDougall (Burns and Oates, London, 1916.) [3]
Ad preces nostras Deitátis aures, [4] Deus, inclína pietáte sola: Súpplicum vota súscipe, precámur Fámuli tui.
God, of thy pity, unto us thy children Bend down thine ear in thine own loving kindness, And all thy people’s prayers and vows ascending Hear, we beseech thee.
Réspice clemens solio de sancto, Vultu seréno lámpades illustra: Lúmine tuo ténebras depelle Péctore nostro.
Look down in mercy from thy seat of glory. Pour on our souls the radiance of thy presence, Drive from our weary hearts the shades of darkness, Lightening our footsteps.
Free us from sin by might of thy great loving, Cleanse thou the sordid, loose the fettered spirit, Spare every sinner, raise with thine own right hand All who have fallen.
Te sine tetro mérgimur profundo: Lábimur alta scéleris sub unda: Brachio tuo tráhimur ad clara Sídera caeli.
Reft of thy guiding we are lost in darkness, Drowned in the great wide sea of sin we perish, But we are led by thy strong hand to climb the Ascents of Heaven
Christe, lux vera, bónitas et vita, Gaudium mundi, píetas immensa, Qui nos a morte róseo salvasti Sánguine tuo:
Christ, very light and goodness, life of all things, Joy of the whole world, infinite in kindness, Who by the crimson flowing of thy life-blood From death hast saved us,
Plant, sweetest Jesu, at our supplication Deep in our hearts thy charity: upon us Faith’s everlasting light be poured, and increase Grant us of loving.
Tu nobis dona fontem lacrimárum, Jejuniórum fortia ministra; Vitia carnis millia retunde Frámea tua.
Grant to our souls a holy fount of weeping, Grant to us strength to aid us in our fasting, And all the thousand hosts of evil banish Far from thy people.
Procul a nobis pérfidus absistat Satan, a tuis víribus confractus: Sanctus assistat Spíritus, a tua Sede demissus
Bruised by thine heel may Satan and his legions Far from our minds be driven, that are guided By the indwelling of the Holy Spirit Sent from Heaven
Gloria Deo sit aeterno Patri: Sit tibi semper, Genitóris Nate, Cum quo aequális Spíritus per cuncta, Sáecula regnat. Amen.
Glory to God the Father everlasting, Glory for ever to the Sole-begotten, With whom the Holy Spirit through the ages Reigneth coequal.
This splendid polyphonic version by the Flemish composer Adrian Willaert (1490 ca. - 1562) has only the odd-numbered stanzas, since it was written to be sung in alternation with the Gregorian melody. (Willaert spent the last 35 years of his life as the Master of the Chapel at the basilica of St Mark in Venice, and is regarded as the founder of the Venetian school of polyphony, which makes great use of multiple choirs.)
[1] Of the hymn’s thirty-six lines, twenty-eight contain mistakes according to the rules of classical Latin prosody.
[2]Les Hymnes du Bréviaire Romain de Pie V à Urbain VIII, 1568-1632; Rassegna Gregoriana, Nov.-Dec. 1907, col. 495-512; cited by Dom Anselmo Lentini OSB in Te decet hymnus, p. 49, with incorrect citation of the first column number (489 instead of 495). Second part, May-June 1908, col. 231-250. (My thanks to Fr Brian Austin, FSSP, for providing me with a copy of the second part.)
[3] This meter is known as the Sapphic stanza, after its inventor, the Greek poetess Sappho (ca. 630-570 B.C.) Each stanza has three lines that run as follows, ⎼⏑│⎼⏒│⎼⏑⏑│⎼⏑│⎼⏒, and then one shorter line, ⎼⏑⏑│⎼⏒, with the primary accents on the long syllables (⎼) at the beginning of each foot. English, however, lends itself more naturally to meters that place the primary accent at the end of a foot, such as the iambic pentameter (⏑⎼ x5); this accounts for the awkwardness of McDougall’s translation in many places, since he retained the meter of the Latin version.
[4] The original wording, “Aures ad nostras Deitatis preces, / Deus, inclina”, abuses the flexibility of Latin word order, and sounds at first blush like it means “O God, incline the prayers of the Divinity to our ears”; hence, the correction to the much clearer (and theologically sounder) “Ad preces nostras Deitatis aures, / Deus, inclina. – O God, incline the ears of the Divinity to our prayers.”
Discover the beauty of the sung Divine Office at this enriching online conference!
The Church Music Association of America is proud to serve as a co-host with the Catholic Institute of Sacred Music for an upcoming conference on the sung Divine Office, which will be held online on February 6-7.
Beginning with the ancient invocation “Deus in adjutorium meum intende ~ O God, come to my assistance”), this event explores how the Divine Office, the Church’s official daily prayer, is sung and lived across diverse spiritual traditions and charisms, from Benedictine monasteries, Dominican friaries, and Norbertine abbeys to diocesan rectories, cathedrals, and in the lives of the laity.
Sessions include:
Theological reflections on biblical texts and the hymns of the Office
Practical workshops on chanting psalmody and employing the organ at the Divine Office
Insights into adapting the Divine Office in parish settings, religious communities, and private prayer
Presentations on historical and contemporary approaches to sung prayer in various rites and orders
Whether you are a cleric, religious, choir director, or lay faithful seeking to deepen your prayer life through sacred music, this conference will inspire you to make the Church’s universal prayer a vibrant part of your daily rhythm. Register now and join Catholics from around the world in praising God through the timeless treasure of the Divine Office!
The Spirituality of the Divine Office – Fr. Mark Bachmann, OSB, Choirmaster of Our Lady of Clear Creek Abbey
The Spirituality and Place of the Divine Office in the Lives of the Laity – Dr. Anthony Lilles, St. Patrick’s Seminary, Avila Institute
The Spirituality of the Sung Office for the Diocesan Priest – Fr. Robert Pasley, Church Music Association of America (CMAA)
Accompaniment & Accentuation: The Role of the Organ in the Divine Office – Prof. Christopher Berry, CMAA and Catholic Institute of Sacred Music
The Hymns of the Divine Office – Sr. Maria Kiely, OSB, Dominican House of Studies, ICEL
Vocal Technique for Singing the Office – Dr. Jennifer Donelson-Nowicka, CMAA and Catholic Institute of Sacred Music
Officium Divinum: The Role of Latin in the Celebration of the Divine Office – Gregory DiPippo, Editor of New Liturgical Movement
Progressive Solemnity in the Dominican Office – Fr. Innocent Smith, OP, University of Notre Dame
The Old Testament Canticles of Lauds: Songs of the New Creation – Dr. Nina Heereman, St. Patrick’s Seminary
Nihil operi Dei præponatur: The Centrality of the Divine Office in Monastic Life – Abbot Marc Crilly, OSB, St. Benedict’s Abbey
The Divine Office for the Canons Regular of Prémontré: A Changing Expression of a Perennial Vocation – Fr. Chrysostom Baer, O.Praem., St. Michael’s Abbey, Silverado, California
Challenges in Preparing Editions for and Singing the Liturgy of the Hours in Parish Life – Dr. Richard Skirpan, St. Patrick’s Cathedral, Harrisburg, Pennsylvania
Psalmody Workshop: Pointing, Pacing, and Developing a Community Sound – Dr. Jennifer Donelson-Nowicka, CMAA and Catholic Institute of Sacred Music
In its habitual conservatism, the Roman Breviary has fully proper offices for only two of the Apostles, Ss Andrew and Paul. Most of the others take all the chant propers from the common, and even St Peter himself has proper responsories at Matins, but no proper antiphons. The same is true of St John the Evangelist, whose feast we keep today, even though he is one of the titular saints of the cathedral of Rome.
The upper part of the façade of St John in the Lateran; in the middle are statues of Christ and the two Saints John, the Baptist and the Evangelist. (Image from Wikimedia Commons by NikonZ7II, CC BY-SA 4.0, cropped.)
Of course, many proper offices were created for the Apostles, some of which were more widely adopted than others. One of the most common is a set of very beautiful antiphons for Matins of St John, which are attested in most of the oldest sources for the cathedral office, although it seems they were less widely diffused among the monks. Unlike those of St Andrew, which are drawn from his hagiography, or those of St Paul, many of which are Scriptural, these antiphons are mostly drawn from the writings of the Fathers, although some of them do refer to specific events in the traditional legend of St John.
The text of the first three is taken directly from St Isidore of Seville’s book “On the birth and death of the Fathers”, chapter 72.
Aña 1 Joannes Apostolus et Evangelista, virgo est electus a Domino, atque inter ceteros magis dilectus. ~ John the Apostle and Evangelist, was chosen as a virgin by the Lord, and more beloved among the others. (This also refers to an argument made by St Jerome in his treatise Against Jovinian (I. 26), who had spoken against the superiority of virginity over marriage.)
Aña 2 Supra pectus Domini Jesu Christi recumbens, Evangelii fluenta de ipso sacro Dominici pectoris fonte potavit. ~ Resting upon the breast of the Lord Jesus Christ, he drank the streams of the Gospel from the sacred font of the Lord’s breast.
The Last Supper, 1324, by Ugolino di Nerio (1280-1330)
Aña 3 Quasi unus de paradisi fluminibus, Evangelista Joannes verbi Dei gratiam in toto terrarum orbe diffudit. ~ Like one of the rivers of Paradise, the Evangelist John poured out the grace of the Word of God in all the earth.
The next two are taken in their specific wording from a homily of St Bede for St John’s feast. (VIII in die natali S Joannis) The fourth antiphon refers to a very ancient story, already known to Tertullian (de Praescript. 36, ca. 200 A.D.), that St John came to Rome after the deaths of Ss Peter and Paul, and in the reign of the emperor Domitian, was put into a vessel of boiling oil, but he came out cleaner and healthier than he went in. This is also cited by St Jerome in his treatise Against Jovinian.
Aña 4 In ferventis olei dolium missus Joannes Apostolus, divina se protegente gratia, illæsus exivit. ~ The Apostle John, put into the vat of boiling oil, came out unharmed by the protection of God’s grace.
The traditional story goes on that after this failed attempt to kill him, John was sent into exile on the island of Patmos, where he received the visions recorded in the book of the Apocalypse.
Aña 5 Propter insuperabilem evangelizandi constantiam exsilio relegatus, divinæ visionis et allocutionis meruit crebra consolatione relevari. ~ Because of his invincible constancy in preaching the Gospel, being sent into exile, he merited to be conforted by the frequent consolation of divine vision and address.
After the death of Domitian, he is released from his exile, and returns to Asia Minor to visit the churches. This antiphon seems not be traceable to a specific literary source.
Aña 6 Occurrit beato Joanni, ab exsilio revertenti, omnis populus virorum ac mulierum, clamantium et dicentium: Benedictus qui venit in nomine Domini. ~ As the blessed John returned from exile, all the people, men and women, came to meet him, crying out and saying, “Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord.”
The text of the next antiphon comes partly from a sermon on the Lord’s Supper, subtitled “To the brothers dwelling in the desert”, and falsely attributed to St Augustine. (All three of these are quoted in Jacopo da Voragine’s Golden Legend.) When St John is very old, and has long outlived all the other Apostles:
Aña 7 Apparuit caro suo Joanni Dominus Jesus Christus cum discipulis suis, et ait illi: Veni, dilecte mi, ad me: quia tempus est ut epuleris in convivio meo cum fratribus tuis. ~ The Lord Jesus Christ appeared to his dear John with his disciples, and said to him, “Come to me, my beloved friend; since it is time for you to dine in my banquet with your brothers.”
Aña 8 Expandens manus suas ad Dominum, dixit: Invitatus ad convivium tuum, venio, gratias agens, quia me dignatus es, Domine Jesu Christe, ad tuas epulas invitare, sciens quod ex toto corde meo desiderabam te. ~ Stretching out his hands to the Lord, He said, “Invited to your feast, I come, giving thanks that you have deigned to invite me to your banquet, o Lord Jesus Christ, knowing that I longed for you with all my heart.”
The Ascension of St John, painted by Giotto ca. 1315 in the Peruzzi Chapel in the Franciscan basilica of the Holy Cross in Florence.
Aña 9 Domine, suscipe me, ut cum fratribus meis sim, cum quibus veniens invitasti me: aperi mihi januam vitæ, et perduc me ad convivium epularum tuarum: tu es enim Christus, Filius Dei vivi, qui præcepto Patris mundum salvasti: tibi gratias referimus per infinita sæculorum sæcula. ~ Lord, receive me, that I may be with my brothers, with whom you have come to invite me; open to me the door of life, and lead me to the feast of your banquet; for you are Christ, the son of the living God, who at the command of the father saved the world; we give you thanks through the endless ages of ages.
In the liturgical books of the Tridentine reform, the feast of the Immaculate Conception has no proper Office or Mass; the texts were those of the Nativity of the Virgin Mary, with the word “Nativity” changed to “Conception” wherever it occurs. Apart from that, the only difference is the proper readings of the first and second nocturns of Matins, from the book of Ecclesiasticus (24, 5-31) and St. Ambrose’s treatise “On the Virgins.” The proper Office and Mass of the feast currently used in the Roman Rite were promulgated by Bl. Pius IX in 1863, nine years after he made the official dogmatic definition of the Immaculate Conception on the feast day in 1854.
The Immaculate Conception, by José Antolínez, 1650
However, the Franciscans kept a proper Office for the feast well before the decree of 1863, even though in most respects they had from the very beginning followed the liturgical use of the Roman Curia, and hence also the Missal and Breviary of St. Pius V. The Order, and famously among them, the Blessed Duns Scotus, had been the great champions of the dogma of the Immaculate Conception, and kept the feast as that of the “Principal Patron and Protectress of the Order.”
The Office in question was originally composed by Leonardo Nogarolo, a notary in the court of Pope Sixtus IV, who formally approved it in the year 1480. Sixtus IV had been the Minister General of the Franciscans until two years before his election in 1471; and as Pope, he issued two important decrees on the subject of the Immaculate Conception. The first of these, Cum praeexcelsa of 1477, gave formal permission and encouragement to celebrate the feast, which was still not kept in many places. The second, Grave nimis, was issued in 1483, condemning the “preachers of certain orders” who had dared to assert that belief in the Immaculate Conception, and the celebration of the feast, was heresy, while likewise imposing silence on those who asserted the contrary, that denial of the dogma was heresy. “Preachers” refers quite obviously to the Dominicans, who were at the time largely opposed to the idea of the Immaculate Conception as taught by the Franciscans, and particularly Duns Scotus’ explanation of it. In their liturgical books of the later 15th century, the feast on December 8 is usually called the “Sanctification of the Virgin Mary”, reflecting a theory that the Virgin was sanctified in the womb like John the Baptist.
The calendar page for December of a Dominican Missal printed in 1484 (the last year of Sixtus IV’s reign), showing the feast as the “Sanctification of the Virgin Mary”.
Pope Sixtus is of course known especially as the man who commissioned the most famous chapel in the world, the Sistine Chapel, which is nicknamed for him. He also constructed a second chapel within the old basilica of St Peter next door, dedicated to the Immaculate Conception, and the Office mentioned above was written by Nogarolo specifically for use therein as the proper Office of the titular feast. (Following the normal custom, I will refer to this Office as “Sicut lilium”, the first words of its first antiphon.) For this reason, the first two antiphons at Lauds are borrowed from Lauds of the Dedication of a Church, and do not refer to the Virgin Mary.
The text of most of the other antiphons and responsories is taken from the Bible, and predominantly from the Books of Proverbs, Ecclesiasticus and the Song of Songs. At Second Vespers, however, a rather unique set of antiphons was composed for the Psalms, consisting of quotations from the Church Fathers; some of the texts cited are also read at in the lessons of Matins in Nogarolo’s original version of the Office. In the pre-Tridentine liturgical books, the name of each Father is printed before the antiphon.
Jerome Nihil est candoris, nihil est splendoris, nihil est numinis quod non resplendeat in Virgine gloriosa. – There is no part of brightness, no part of glory, no part of the godhead, such that it does not shine forth in the glorious Virgin. (In the post-Tridentine use, “godhead” was evidently felt to be a bit of an exaggeration, and changed to “virtutis – virtue.”) Origen Quæ neque serpentis persuasione decepta, nec ejus venenosis afflatibus infecta est. – Who was not deceived by the coaxing of the serpent, nor infected by his poisonous breath. Augustine (speaking in the person of Christ.) Hanc, quam tu despicis, Manichaee, mater mea est, et de manu mea fabricata. – This woman whom you despise, Manichean, is my mother, made by my own hand. (The text from which this is taken is not an authentic work of Augustine.) Anselm Decuit Virginem ea puritate nitere, qua major sub Deo nequit intelligi. – It was becoming that the Virgin shine with that purity, than which no greater can be understood beneath God. Ambrose Hæc est virga, in qua nec nodus originalis nec cortex actualis culpæ fuit. – This is the rod, on which there was no knot of original guilt, nor the bark of any actual guilt. (referring to the rod of Jesse in Isaiah 11, 1)
A similar custom is still observed by the Premonstratensians, who sing the following antiphon for the Nunc dimittis on the Immaculate Conception, with the annotation at the end, “the words of our father Saint Norbert.” (St Norbert and the Premonstratensian Order were, of course, champions of the dogma even before the Franciscans, and in the Middle Ages had an entirely different proper Office of their own for the feast.)
Ant. Ave Virgo, quæ Spiritu sancto præservante, de tanto primi parentis peccato triumphasti innoxia. – Hail, o Virgin, who by the preservation of the Holy Spirit, didst triumph unhurt over the sin so great of our first father.
If I remember correctly, I once read somewhere that “Sicut lilium” was also musically very beautiful, and back in the days when attendance at solemn Vespers was the norm on major feasts, people would flock to Franciscan churches to hear it. If any of our readers can confirm or deny this, I would be interested to hear from you in the combox.
The decree that promulgated the new Office and Mass in 1863 required all religious orders to accept them, and those who preserved their own proper Uses to adapt it to their own particular customs, subject to the approval of the Sacred Congregation for Rites. Since the Franciscans (unlike the Dominicans or Premonstratensians) had always used the Roman Breviary, “Sicut lilium” then ceased to be used; a few parts of it were taken into the new Office, most notably the prayer, which reflects Duns Scotus’ insight on how the Immaculate Conception is possible.
O God, Who by the Immaculate Conception of the Virgin, prepared a worthy dwelling place for thy Son; we beseech thee, that, as by the foreseen death of Thy same Son, Thou preserved Her from every stain, so Thou may grant us also, through Her intercession, to come to thee with pure hearts.
One of the most notable features of the 1863 Office is the readings at Matins for the feast and its octave. In the third nocturn, the readings (with one exception, a passage from St Bernard on Dec. 10) are taken from Eastern Saints whose writings had never, to the best of my knowledge, appeared in any form of the Breviary hitherto. These are two patriarchs of Constantinople, Ss Germanus (715-30) and Tarasius (784-806); St Sophronius, the Patriarch of Jerusalem (634-38) and great enemy of the Monothelite heresy, and St Epiphanius of Salamis (died 403), a great enemy of heresies generally. (This last is incorrectly attributed.) These passages are unusually long, and rhetorically effusive in the manner of their age, but were clearly chosen to witness the belief of the Universal Church in the Immaculate Conception. The reading of St. Germanus on the feast itself begins thus: “Hail Mary, full of grace, holier than the Saints, more exalted than the heavens, more glorious than the Cherubim, more honorable than the Seraphim, and venerable above every creature.” This is a clear reference to the hymn Axion esti, which is sung in the Liturgy of Saint John Chrysostom.
It is truly right to bless thee, O Theotokos, ever most blessed, and wholly pure, and the Mother of our God. More honorable than the Cherubim, and incomparably more glorious than the Seraphim, without corruption thou gavest birth to God the Word, the true Theotokos, we magnify thee.
Likewise, the litanies of the Divine Liturgy refer repeatedly to the Virgin Mary as “immaculate” at the conclusion, “Having made memory of our all-holy, immaculate, (“ ἄχραντος ”) blessed above all and glorious Lady, the Mother of God and ever Virgin Mary, with all the Saints, let us commend ourselves and one another and all our life to Christ our God.”
The original version of “Sicut lilium” makes only one brief mention of the Virgin Mary’s mother St Anne, in whose womb the Immaculate Conception took place. In the Byzantine Rite, on the other hand, the feast is called “the Conception (in the active sense, ‘σύλληψις’) of Saint Anne, Mother of the Mother of God”. In the icon below, the upper left shows St Joachim in the desert, where he has gone to mourn his and Anne’s barrenness, for the sake of which his offering in the temple had been refused. An angel has come to tell him to return to Anne, and that God will grant them a child who will become the Mother of the Redeemer. In the upper right, the same message is delivered to Anne herself.
The legend on which this image is based goes on to say that Joachim and Anne then went to find each other, meeting at the gate of Jerusalem called “the Golden Gate.” The depiction of their embrace and kiss is often used not only to decently represent the act of Anne’s conceiving, but to distinguish the Immaculate Conception of the Virgin from that of the Virginal Conception of Christ. This legend is referred to in a prayer found in some pre-Tridentine missals and breviaries, such as that of Herford in England; it also commonly depicted in Western art, as seen below in Giotto’s frescoes in the Scrovegni Chapel in Padua.
O God, who by an angelic prophecy foretold the Conception of the Virgin Mary to her parents; grant to this Thy family gathered here, to be protected by Her assistance, whose Conception we happily venerate in this great solemnity.
The Meeting at the Golden Gate by Giotto, 1304. The mysterious female figure in black standing in the middle of the gate may represent the devil, whom Christ begins to defeat in the Conception of His Holy Mother. This figure seems also to have been the inspiration for one of the most sinister representations of the devil in modern art, in the movie The Passion of the Christ by Mel Gibson.
An icon of St Nicholas with episodes of his life, by the Cretan painter Theodore Poulakis (1622-92). Clockwise from upper left: his episcopal ordination; his imprisonment in the time of persecution; he is released by order of Constantine; destroying a pagan temple; participating in the Council of Nicaea; brings food to a merchant in Myra; saving from execution three officers who had been falsely accused; appearing in a dream to Constantine; rescuing sailors in danger of shipwreck; his death.
Many of the proper Offices commonly used in the Middle Ages make an addition to the last responsory of Matins called a Prose (“Prosa” in Latin, sometimes also “Prosula”), an interpolation which often begins and ends with the same words as the repeating part of the responsory. It is similar to the Sequence of the Mass, and in fact, “Prosa” or “Prosula” was often used in medieval Missals instead of “Sequentia.” Some of them were inordinately long; I have heard one for the Office of Christmas which extends the responsory to about 15 minutes. They effectively disappeared at the time of the Tridentine reform, with a single exception, “Inviolata,” which is found in many editions of the Liber Usualis and other chant collections; this was kept by the Dominicans on the Purification, and by the Premonstratensians in their Little Office of the Virgin. In the commonly used medieval Office of St Nicholas, the ninth responsory includes a fairly short prose, as heard in the following recording. Below is a longer version, in which part of the responsory is repeated several times, extending it to over 13 minutes.
R. Ex ejus tumba marmorea sacrum resudat oleum; quo liniti, sanantur caeci, * surdis auditus redditur, et debilis quisque sospes regreditur. V. Catervatim ruunt populi, cernere cupientes quae per eum fiunt mirabilia. Surdis auditus redditur, et debilis quisque sospes regreditur. Prosa
Sospitati reddit aegros olei perfusio.
Nicolaus naufragantum affuit praesidio.
Revelavit a defunctis defunctum in bivio.
Baptizatur auri viso Judaeus indicio.
O quam probat sanctum Dei farris augmentatio!
Vas in mare mersum, patri redditur cum filio.
Ergo laudes Nicolao concinat haec concio.
Nam qui corde poscit illum, expulsato vitio,
Sospes regreditur. Gloria Patri et Filio, et Spiritui Sancto. Et debilis quisque sospes regreditur.
R. From his marble tomb comes forth a sacred oil; and when they are anointed with it, the blind are healed, * hearing is given back to the deaf, and every lame man walks away healthy. V. In crowds the people rush, wishing to see the wonders that take place through him. Hearing is given back to the deaf, and every lame man walks away healthy. Prose
The pouring of the oil brings the sick back to health.
Nicholas was present as help to sailors risking shipwreck.
At a crossroad, he raised a dead man from the dead.
A Jew is baptized when he sees the miracle of the gold.
Oh how the multiplication of grain proves God’s Saint.
A vessel sunk into the sea is given back to a father with his son.
Therefore, let this assembly sing praises to Nicholas,
For he that seeks him in his heart, vice being driven away,
walks away healthy. Glory be to the Father, and to the Son, and to the Holy Spirit. And every lame man walks away healthy.
The reference to the baptism of a Jew “when he sees the miracle of the gold” is one of the less known posthumous miracles of St Nicholas. The story is told in the Golden Legend of Bl Jacopo de Vorgine that a man who had borrowed a sum of money from a Jew tried to cheat him by claiming falsely that he had already repaid it. Going to court, he filled his hollowed out walking-staff with small pieces of gold, to a value greater than what he owed, and then handed the staff to the Jew to hold for him, while he solemnly (and in a certain sense, truthfully) swore his oath that he had given him what he owed and more. While returning from court, however, the cheat was run over by a chariot at a crossroads and killed, and his staff broken, revealing the fraud. When it was suggested to the Jew that he reclaim his money, he refused “unless the dead man should return to life by the merits of the blessed Nicholas,” which did indeed happen, leading to his conversion and baptism.
In addition to Great Lent, the Byzantine tradition has three other fasts connected with major feasts. The liturgical year begins on September 1st, so the first of these is the fast of the Lord’s Nativity, which is often called “St Philip’s fast”, since it begins on November 15th, the day after the feast of the Apostle St Philip. This is very similar to the custom of the Ambrosian and Mozarabic Rites, which begin Advent on the Sunday after the feast of St Martin. Another fast is kept from the Monday after the feast of All Saints (which is celebrated on the Sunday after Pentecost, the Western day for the feast of the Holy Trinity) to the feast of Ss Peter and Paul; because of the variable date of Pentecost, this can run as long as 42 days, or as short as 8. The fast of the Dormition is kept from August 1-14, and is the strictest of the three.
One of the liturgical customs associated with these fasts is the celebration of the “Inter-Hours”, as they are called (in Greek Μεσώριον sing., -ια plur., in Church Slavonic Междочасїе sing., -їѧ plur.), a second Prime, Terce, Sext and None, which are said after the main Prime etc. Most Greek liturgical books appoint them to be said during the Nativity and Apostle fasts; some sources say that they are also done during that of the Dormition. They are not said during Great Lent, since the Hours from Prime to None are lengthened by various other additions in that season. In point of fact, the Inter-Hours are now something of an archaism, in that they are associated with the practice of keeping some weekdays within the fasting periods as “aliturgical” days, i.e., days on which the Eucharist is not celebrated. This practice is still strictly observed for all the weekdays of Lent, but has apparently mostly fallen out of use for the other three fasts. Some sources indicate that the Inter-Hours are in practice celebrated in monasteries only on the first weekday of each minor fast (this year, that would be today), so effectively, twice or three times a year. (See this article on Academia for more details.)
The beginning of Psalm 45, the first Psalm of the Inter-Hour of Prime, in a Byzantine Psalter of the mid-10th century known as the Paris Psalter. (Bibliothèque nationale de France, Département des manuscrits, Grec 139; folio 119v, image cropped.)
Their structure is similar to that of the main Hours to which they correspond, but not identical. They begin with the same series of prayers said at the beginning of the other Hours, conveniently known as “The Usual Beginning.” However, when an Hour is said immediately after another, it starts with the very last part of the Usual Beginning, “Come let us worship…” Three invariable Psalms are then said: at Prime, 45, 91 and 92 (according to the numbering of the Septuagint); at Terce, 29, 31 and 60; at Sext, 55, 56 and 69; at None, 112, 137 and 139. A group of prayers called the Trisagion prayers are then said, which are repeated from the Usual Beginning (omitting the first two parts and the last part), and then a series of three chants called tropars, with the two parts of the doxology between them. These do not vary according to the day or season, as they do at the corresponding main Hour; the final tropar in any such group is almost always dedicated to the Virgin Mary.
At Prime:
Have mercy upon us, o Lord, have mercy upon us; for lacking all apology, we sinners bring to Thee this supplication, as to our Master: have mercy on us. Glory be…
Lord, have mercy us, for in Thee we have placed our trust, be not exceedingly wroth with us, and remember not our iniquities, but look (upon us) even now, as one merciful, and ransom us from our enemies; for Thou art our God, and we are Thy people, all of us the works of Thy hands, and we have all called upon Thy name. Both now and forever…
Open to us the gate of mercy, blessed Mother of God; as we hope in Thee, let us not err; may we be delivered through Thy urgent prayers, for Thou art the salvation of the nation of Christians.
At Terce:
God of our fathers, who dealest with us ever according to Thy goodness, put not Thy mercy away from us, but by their prayers, govern our life in peace. Glory be…
Thy Martyrs, o Lord, in their contests bore away the crowns of incorruption from Thee, our God; for having gained Thy strength, they threw down tyrants, and shattered the weak insolence of demons; by their prayers, o Christ our God, save our souls! Both now and forever…
Virgin Mother of God, Thou art the unconquerable fortress of Christians; for as we flee to Thee, we remain unwounded, and when we sin again, we cry out to Thee, “Hail, that art full of grace; the Lord is with Thee!”
At Sext:
Save, o Lord, Thy people, and bless Thine inheritance, granting victory to (our) kings over the barbarians, and preserving Thy citizenry (i.e., the members of the Church) through Thy Cross. Glory be… (This is also the tropar of the Exaltation of the Cross, and of the commemoration of the Cross celebrated on the Third Sunday of Lent; the traditional music of the Church Slavonic version is particularly nice.)
Be Thou prevailed upon, o Lord, by the pains of the Saints which they suffered for Thee, and heal all our ailments, we beseech Thee, that lovest mankind. Both now and forever…
By the prayer of all the Saints, o Lord, and of the Mother of God, give us Thy peace, and have mercy on us, as the only merciful one.
At None:
Thou who didst enlighten the things of the world through Thy Cross, and call sinners unto repentance, separate me not from Thy flock, o Good Shepherd, but seek me, Master of those who wander, and number me together with Thy holy flock, who alone art good and love mankind. Glory be…
Like the thief, I confess and cry out to Thee, o Good one: remember me o Lord, in Thy kingdom, and number me within it, who didst willingly accept sufferings for our sake. Both now and forever…
Come, let us all sing hymns to Him who was crucified for us, for Mary beheld Him upon the Cross and said, “Although Thou abidest the Cross, Thou are My Son and God.
There follows a series of elements also said at the other Hours except for Vespers and Orthros: Kyrie, eleison 40 times, the Prayer of the Hours, Kyrie, eleison 3 times, Glory be, a brief prayer to the Virgin (“Higher than the Cherubim…”) a conclusion said by the priestly celebrant, and then a very well-known prayer of St Ephraim the Syrian, accompanied by three prostrations. (In Lent this is added to all of the Hours.)
At the end of Prime, two longer prayers are said by the reader, at the others, just one. The prayers of the Inter-Hours of Prime and Terce are proper to them, but those of Sext and None are taken from the main Hour that precedes them. (When the Inter-Hours are said, the prayer of the main Terce, which is quite short, is repeated at the main Sext and None.) Like almost all prayers of the Byzantine Rite, these are not changed from one day or season to another. They are traditionally attributed to St Basil the Great. These office conclude with the same brief dismissal as at the other day Hours.
Eternal God, light without beginning and everlasting, maker of all creation, fount of mercy, sea of goodness, unsearchable abyss of love for mankind, shine the light of Thy countenance upon us, o Lord. Shine in our hearts, o spiritual Sun of justice, and fill our souls with Thy rejoicing, and teach us ever to take thought of Thy matters, and speak forth judgments, and confess Thee without ceasing, our Master and benefactor. Guide the works of our hands towards Thy will, and help us on the way to do what is pleasing and welcome to Thee, that even through us, Thy unworthy servants, Thy all-holy name may be glorified, Father, Son and Holy Spirit, of one divinity and kingdom to which beseem all glory, honor and worship, unto the ages. Amen.
Thou who sendest forth the light, and it goeth, who makest the sun to rise upon the just and the unjust, the wicked and the good, who makest the morn, and enlighten all the world; enlighten also our hearts, Master of all. Grant us to please Thee in the present day, preserving us from every sin and from every wicked deed, delivering us from every arrow that flieth in the day, and every opposing power, by the prayers of our all-immaculate Lady, the Mother of God, of Thy immaterial ministering heavenly powers, and all the Saints that have been pleasing to Thee from the beginning of the world. For it is Thine to have mercy on us and save us, our God, and to Thee do we give glory, the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit, now and every, and unto the ages of ages. Amen.
At Terce:
O Lord our God, who hath given Thy peace to men, and sent the gift of Thy All-holy Spirit to Thy Disciples and Apostles, and by Thy power opened their lips with tongues of fire, open Thou also the lips of us sinners, and teach us how we must pray and for what things. Govern our life, calm haven of those tossed by storms, and make known to us the way in which we shall go. Renew a righteous spirit within us, and by (Thy) governing Spirit, give support to what is liable to err in our thoughts, so that each day, being led on the way by Thy good spirit to that which is beneficial, we may be deemed worthy to obey Thy commandments and ever to remember Thy return in glory, that shall search through the deeds of men, and not be deceived by the corruptible delights of this world, but strengthen us to reach out for the enjoyment of the treasures that are to come, for Thou art blessed and praiseworthy in all Thy Saints, unto the ages of ages. Amen.
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