Category Archives: Theology

The Paraklesis Service

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Panagia Vlahernon Greek Orthodox Monastery

Panagia Vlahernon Greek Orthodox Monastery

The Paraklesis service is a service of supplication for the living. This service is in contrast to the Panikhída service, which is the service of supplication for the living. The Paraklesis is usually addressed to the Theotokos, but may be addressed to any saint. The Paraklesis service is similar to the Molobien, which is primarily a Slavic service.

The Paraklesis service is appointed to be served every evening of the Dormition fast (1-14 August), with the exception of Saturday evening, the eve of the feasts of Transfiguration (5 August) and of Dormition (15 August). During the Dormition fast, use, on alternate days, the Small Supplicatory Canon to the Most Holy Theotokos (composed by Theosterictus the Monk in the 9th Century) and the Great Supplicatory Canon to the Most Holy Theotokos (composed by Emperor Theodore I Ducas Lascaris in the 13th century).

The cycle of the Dormition parakleses is determined by two rules of thumb: (a) the cycle begins with the Small Supplicatory Canon whenever August 1 falls on a Monday through Friday; and (b) on Sunday evenings, the Great Supplicatory Canon is always appointed.

Outside the Dormition Fast, a paraklesis directed to the Theotokos is always chanted with the Small Supplicatory Canon.

The Odes of the Great Supplicatory Canon are as follows. (Note that there is no Ode 2. Historically this was a penitential canon, which was omitted during feasts. Eventually composers just stopped writing Ode 2, but kept to the traditional numbering.)

ODE ONE

The charioteer of Pharaoh was sunk in olden times by Moses’ rod, which worked a mighty wonder when, in the Cross’s form, it struck the sea, dividing it in two; and it led into safety sojourning Israel that fled by foot, chanting to the Lord God a song of praise.

Most Holy Theotokos save us.

My humble soul is troubled by the rising storms of afflictions and woes; and clouds of misfortunes overcome me, bringing darkness to my heart, O Bride of God. But since you are the Mother of the Divine and Eternal Light, shine your gladsome light and illumine me.

Most Holy Theotokos save us.

From countless trials and afflictions, grievous woes, and from misfortunes of life have I been delivered by your mighty strength, O spotless and pure Maid. I extol and I magnify your immeasurable sympathy, and the loving care that you have for me.

Glory to the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit.

Having my hope now in your mighty help, O Maid, I flee for refuge to you. Unto your shelter have I run wholeheartedly, O Lady, and I bow my knee; and I mourn and cry weeping: Do not disdain me, the wretched one, for you are the refuge of Christian folk.

Now and forever and to the ages of ages. Amen.

I shall not cease from making known most manifestly your great deeds, Maid of God; for if you were not present to intercede in my behalf and importune your Son and God, who would free and deliver me from such storms and turbulence, and surmount the perils that trouble me?

Preserve and save, O Theotokos, your servants from every danger; after God do all of us for refuge flee unto you; a firm rampart you are and you are our protection.

With good will, look on me, O all-hymned Theotokos; behold my body’s grievous infirmity, and heal the cause of my soul’s sorrow.

ODE THREE

The vault of the heavens is You, O Lord, Fashioner; and the Holy Church’s great founder; likewise establish me in unfeigned love for You, for You are the height of things sought for, the staff of the faithful and the only Friend of all.

Most Holy Theotokos save us.

At a loss and despairing, I cry with pain to you: Hasten, O fervent protection; grant your help to me, your lowly slave and wretched servant, O Maiden; for with heartfelt fervour I come seeking for your aid.

Most Holy Theotokos save us.

You, O Lady, have truly been shown to be wondrous now in your benefactions and mercies granted to me, O Maid; hence do I glorify and acclaim you, whilst praising your great loving care and your boundless solicitude.

Glory to the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit.

Mighty storms of misfortunes, O Lady, pass over me; and the swelling waves of afflictions plunge me into the depths. But be quick to come; lend me your helping hand, Maiden, for you are my fervent protectress and sure support.

Now and forever and to the ages of ages. Amen.

I profess you, O Lady, as the true Mother of God: you, who has both banished and triumphed over the might of death; for as the source of Life, you have freed me from Hades’ bonds, raising me to life, though to earth was I fallen down.

Preserve and save, O Theotokos, your servants from every danger; after God do all of us for refuge flee unto you; you are a firm rampart and our protection.

With good will, look on me, O all-hymned Theotokos; behold my body’s grievous infirmity, and heal the cause of my soul’s sorrow.

 ODE FOUR

You are my strength; You are my power and might, O Lord; You are my God; You Who is not absent from Thy Father’s arms, You, Lord, are my joy. You have deigned to visit our lowliness and our poverty. To You, therefore, I cry out with Habbakoum the Prophet: Glory be to Your power, O Friend of man.

Most Holy Theotokos save us.

Where else shall I find me another to be my help? To what refuge shall I hasten to be saved? Whose fervent aid shall I have in need? Alas, life’s affliction and turbulence shake me. In you alone, O Maiden, do I hope, trust, and glory; and I run to your shelter; save me.

Most Holy Theotokos save us.

I magnify and I proclaim, you all-pure one, the sweet river of your tender mercy and loving care; for with many gifts has it greatly refreshed my tormented and truly lowly soul, afire in a furnace of misfortunes and sorrows; and I run to you shelter; save me.

Glory to the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit.

You, O pure Maid, all-holy Virgin and spotless one, are my only steadfast shelter and retreat, and mighty wall that cannot be breached, my weapon of salvation. Do not disdain me, the prodigal, O hope of the despairing and ally of the ailing, you are the gladness and help of afflicted ones.

Now and forever and to the ages of ages. Amen.

How shall I praise you, how shall I worthily sing the praise of your boundless mercies and compassions which have ever cooled and refreshed my soul, aflame and tormented, O Lady, and wounded grievously? Indeed your benefactions and providence, Maiden, are bestowed upon me most abundantly.

Preserve and save, O Theotokos, your servants from every danger; after God do all of us for refuge flee to you; you are a firm rampart and our protection.

With good will, look on me, O all-hymned Theotokos; behold my body’s grievous infirmity, and heal the cause of my soul’s sorrow.

 ODE FIVE

You have deprived me, and cast me, the unfortunate one, far from Your countenance; and the outer darkness has enshrouded and casts its gloom over me. Yet, now I beseech You: convert and direct me to the light of Your precepts, O Lord my God.

Most Holy Theotokos save us.

As one grateful I cry out: Rejoice, O Virgin Mother; rejoice, O Bride of God; rejoice, O holy shelter; rejoice, O weapon and rampart invincible; rejoice, you are the protection and the assistance and salvation of all them that run to you, O Maid of God.

Most Holy Theotokos save us.

They that hate me without cause have made ready a dart and a sword and pit for me. My unfortunate body do they seek to destroy and to tear apart; and they seek to bring me into the depths of earth, O pure one; but be quick and come save me from them, O Maid.

Glory to the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit.

You deliver me from all need, affliction and from all disease and harm; and by your power, you preserve me unwounded in your shelter, Maid; and from every peril and foes that hate and war against me hasten to save me, O all-hymned one.

Now and forever and to the ages of ages. Amen.

What gift of thanksgiving shall I offer in gratefulness to you, O Maid, for your boundless goodness and the favours and gifts that I have from you? Hence, indeed I praise you, and glorify and magnify your inexpressible sympathy shown to me.

Preserve and save, O Theotokos, your servants from every danger; after God do all of us for refuge flee to you; you are a firm rampart and our protection.

With good will, look on me, O all-hymned Theotokos; behold my body’s grievous infirmity, and heal the cause of my soul’s sorrow.

 ODE SIX

My petition, I pour out to the Lord, and to Him do I proclaim all my sorrows, for many woes fill my heart to its limits, and unto Hades my whole life has now approached; like Jonas I pray to You: Raise me up from corruption, O Lord my God.

Most Holy Theotokos save us.

The storm clouds of grievous sorrows and distress shroud my unfortunate heart and soul in affliction, and with their gloom have they filled me, O Virgin. Yet, since you brought forth the Light Unapproachable, be quick to drive them far from me with the breeze of your holy entreaties, Maid.

Most Holy Theotokos save us.

A comfort you are to me in my distress, and I have you as a healer of all illness; you are the most perfect destruction of death; you are an unfailing fountain flowing with life, and speedy help and quick support of all them that are found in misfortunes, Maid.

Glory to the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit.

I shall not conceal the ever-flowing spring of the sympathy that you have for me, O Lady, nor the abyss of your infinite mercy, nor yet the fountain of your boundless miracles; but ceaselessly do I cry out and confess and declare and proclaim them, Maid.

Now and forever and to the ages of ages. Amen.

The turmoils of this life encircle me like unto bees about a honeycomb, O Virgin, and they have seized and now hold my heart captive, and I am pierced with the stings of afflictions, Maid; yet be, O all-holy one, my defender and helper and rescuer.

Preserve and save, O Theotokos, your servants from every danger; after God do all of us for refuge flee to you; you are a firm rampart and our protection.

With good will, look on me, O all-hymned Theotokos; behold my body’s grievous infirmity, and heal the cause of my soul’s sorrow.

 ODE SEVEN

The three Hebrew Children in the furnace trampled on the flames with courage and great boldness; they turned fire to dew, and cried out with a great voice: Blessed are You, O Lord our God, unto ages of ages.

Most Holy Theotokos save us.

Illumine my way, for I am darkened by the night of many sins, O Theotokos; for you brought forth the Light, and are in truth the blameless and undefiled vessel of light; hence with love do I praise you.

Most Holy Theotokos save us.

Be my shelter and protection and my help and boast, O Virgin Theotokos; of all manner of help have I now been stripped naked, O strength of those bereft of help, and you are the hope of those without hope.

Glory to the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit.

I praise you with my whole soul and understanding and with all my heart and with my lips, having truly enjoyed your many benefactions; yet boundless are your miracles, and your goodness is unending.

Now and forever and to the ages of ages. Amen.

Look upon me with graciousness, and dispel the evil plight that besets me; and from grievous distress, harm, temptations, and perils do rescue me by your infinite mercy.

Preserve and save, O Theotokos, your servants from every danger; after God do all of us flee to you for refuge; you are a firm rampart and our protection.

With good will, look on me, O all-hymned Theotokos; behold my body’s grievous infirmity, and heal the cause of my soul’s sorrow.

 ODE EIGHT

Let us ever applaud and praise the Lord God Who was seen of old on the holy mount in glory, Who by the fiery bush revealed the great mystery of the Ever-virgin and undefiled Maiden unto the Prophet Moses.

Most Holy Theotokos save us.

Be moved to compassion, O Virgin, and disdain me not, for life’s storms overwhelm me. But be quick, O modest one, and lend me your helping hand, O Maiden, for I perish drowning engulfed by life’s misfortunes.

Most Holy Theotokos save us.

Times of sorrows, necessity, and trouble, and misfortunes in life have found me, O pure Maiden; and from all sides temptations have encircled me; but be my ally, and protect me in your almighty shelter.

Glory to the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit.

In distress I have you, Maid, as my haven, and in sorrows and grief you are my joy and gladness; and in all illness, you have been my quick help, and rescuer in perils, and in all temptations my guardian and protectress.

Now and forever and to the ages of ages. Amen.

Rejoice, fiery throne of the Lord God; rejoice, the sacred vessel that is filled with manna; rejoice, the golden lampstand and unquenchable lamp; rejoice, O glory of virgins and the boast and adornment of mothers.

Preserve and save, O Theotokos, your servants from every danger; after God do all of us flee to you for refuge; you are a firm rampart and our protection.

With good will, look on me, O all-hymned Theotokos; behold my body’s grievous infirmity, and heal the cause of my soul’s sorrow.

 ODE NINE

The heavens were astonished and stood in awe, and the ends of the earth, Maid, were sore amazed, for God appeared bodily to mankind as very man. And behold, your womb has proved to be vaster and more spacious than heaven’s heights. For this, O Theotokos, the choirs and assemblies of men and angels magnify your name.

Most Holy Theotokos save us.

To whom else shall I flee, O Maid most pure, and to whom shall I run for help and be saved? Where shall I go, and where shall I find a safe retreat? Whose warm protection shall I have? Who shall be a helper in my distress? In you alone I hope, Maid; in you alone I glory; and trusting in you, I have fled to you.

Most Holy Theotokos save us.

To number your great deeds and your mighty acts is not possible for man, O Bride of God, nor yet can one tell of the unfathomable abyss of your unending miracles that surpass all knowledge, and which are granted to those that venerate and honour you, with longing, as the true Mother of our Lord and God.

Glory to the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit.

With anthems of thanksgiving I glorify and chant praise to your infinite mercy, and your boundless might I confess unceasingly unto all. With my soul and heart and mind and my lips I magnify and proclaim the many benefactions that you have poured upon me in your compassion, O Bride of God.

Now and forever and to the ages of ages. Amen.

Accept my appeal and my poor prayer, and disdain not my weeping and sighs, O Maid, nor my lament, but be quick to help me since you are good. Fulfil my every plea; you can do since you brought forth our mighty God and Master, if you but look upon me and bow down to mine utter lowliness.

Preserve and save, O Theotokos, your servants from every danger; after God, we flee to you for refuge; you are a firm rampart and our protection.

With good will, look on me, O all-hymned Theotokos; behold my body’s grievous infirmity, and heal the cause of my soul’s sorrow.

It is truly fitting to call you blessed, the Theotokos, the ever-blessed and all-pure Theotokos. More honourable than the Cherubim, and beyond compare more glorious than the Seraphim, you who without corruption gave birth to God the Word, the very Theotokos, you do we magnify.

This entry used information from Fr. John Cox, from orthodoxwiki.org, and from www.orthodoxchristian.info

Mariology and Prayer to the Saints

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Theotokos Praying for the People, Vladimir Church (Vologda)

Theotokos Praying for the People, Vladimir Church (Vologda)

Prayer to the saints is one of the areas where most Protestants  differ with the Catholic Church. Actually, this is not fully accurate; as it turns out, non-Protestant Christians — whether Roman Catholic, Eastern Rite Catholic, Eastern Orthodox, Oriental Orthodox, and Coptic Christians — all have no problem praying to the saints, of whom the blessed Virgin Mary is the paradigmatic example, being the greatest of all the saints.

Perhaps the most clear argument against prayer to Mary, to the saints, and to angels is found in the Smalcald Articles, part of the Lutheran’s Book of Concord. Here Martin Luther draws from and expands upon Philip Melanchthon’s arguments from the Augsburg Confession, and from the Apology to the Augsburg Confession.

The invocation of saints is also one of the abuses of Antichrist conflicting with the chief article, and destroys the knowledge of Christ. Neither is it commanded nor counseled, nor has it any example [or testimony] in Scripture, and even though it were a precious thing, as it is not [while, on the contrary, it is a most harmful thing], in Christ we have everything a thousandfold better [and surer, so that we are not in need of calling upon the saints]. And although the angels in heaven pray for us (as Christ Himself also does), as also do the saints on earth, and perhaps also in heaven, yet it does not follow thence that we should invoke and adore the angels and saints, and fast, hold festivals, celebrate Mass in their honor, make offerings, and establish churches, altars, divine worship, and in still other ways serve them, and regard them as helpers in need [as patrons and intercessors], and divide among them all kinds of help, and ascribe to each one a particular form of assistance, as the Papists teach and do. For this is idolatry, and such honor belongs alone to God. For as a Christian and saint upon earth you can pray for me, not only in one, but in many necessities. But for this reason I am not obliged to adore and invoke you, and celebrate festivals, fast, make oblations, hold masses for your honor [and worship], and put my faith in you for my salvation. I can in other ways indeed honor, love, and thank you in Christ. If now such idolatrous honor were withdrawn from angels and departed saints, the remaining honor would be without harm and would quickly be forgotten. For when advantage and assistance, both bodily and spiritual, are no more to be expected, the saints will not be troubled [the worship of the saints will soon vanish], neither in their graves nor in heaven. For without a reward or out of pure love no one will much remember, or esteem, or honor them [bestow on them divine honor]. (Dau and Bente 1921, SA II, 26-28)

In the passage, Martin Luther argues not from scripture. Instead, his argument is that prayer to the saints is against the chief article of faith — Justification, as defined by Lutheran dogma. This is a highly curious stance, as it can be argued that prayer to the saints and to angels is supported in scripture, even in the Protestant’s truncated canon.

The Scriptural Witness

The book of Zechariah is important for a number of reasons, but for our purposes we will focus on the importance of Zechariah for its development in the theology of angels. In particular, God communicates to Zechariah through angels, and Zechariah questions them as to the meaning of the visions he has been seeing. In the first chapter of Zechariah receives a series of visions, after which is recorded an extensive conversation with an angel, beginning as follows:

Then said I, O my lord, what are these? And the angel that talked with me said unto me, I will shew thee what these be. … And the LORD answered the angel that talked with me with good words and comfortable words.  So the angel that communed with me said unto me, Cry thou, saying, Thus saith the LORD of hosts; I am jealous for Jerusalem and for Zion with a great jealousy. … Then lifted I up mine eyes, and saw, and behold four horns. And I said unto the angel that talked with me, What be these? And he answered me, These are the horns which have scattered Judah, Israel, and Jerusalem (Zec 1:9, 13-14, 18-19).

The careful reader will notice that Zechariah inquired of the angel what these things meant; the angel asked the Lord, the Lord replied to the angel, and the angel told Zechariah. For our purposes, this demonstrates that prayer (which may be described as a conversation) may be made to angels. In Zechariah there seems to be little difference between asking an angel for an interpretation, and asking the Lord himself. Moreover, Zechariah treats the  answer from the angel as though it came directly from the Lord. This same back and forth between the Zechariah and the angel continues throughout the book. This idea is also found in the book of Daniel, where Daniel prays to God for the interpretation of his vision, and then discusses the interpretation with an angel. And of course Mary herself had a conversation with an angel, a non-corporeal, spiritual being, a conversation we know of as the Annunciation, and which is discussed more fully in Part V: Mariology in Sacred Scripture (from my book, “Why Mary Matters”). Not only did Mary converse with the angel, but treated the angel’s words as being those of God Himself.

Another Old Testament passage from 2nd Maccabees clearly indicates that prayer to the saints is not only heard, but answered.

And this was his vision: That Onias, who had been high priest, a virtuous and a good man, reverend in conversation, gentle in condition, well spoken also, and exercised from a child in all points of virtue, holding up his hands prayed for the whole body of the Jews. This done, in like manner there appeared a man with gray hairs, and exceeding glorious, who was of a wonderful and excellent majesty. Then Onias answered, saying, This is a lover of the brethren, who prayeth much for the people, and for the holy city, to wit, Jeremias the prophet of God. Whereupon Jeremias holding forth his right hand gave to Judas a sword of gold, and in giving it spake thus, Take this holy sword, a gift from God, with the which thou shalt wound the adversaries (2 Mac 15:12-15).

You may argue that 2 Maccabees is not in the Protestant canon of Scripture, and you would be correct. It is, however, in the scriptural canon used by every other Christian body (not just the Roman Catholics). Moreover, 2 Maccabees was in Martin Luther’s German translation of the Holy Bible, and in the original 1611 King James Bible (although in both were separated from those books that make up the current canon of the Hebrew Scriptures.) This is not the place to discuss canonical issues, other than to state that there are good and valid arguments to make for its being part of the Christian canon. But what we can say is that it is clear that the Jews of the diaspora 1) believed the saints were alive, 2) believed the saints were able to hear their prayers, and 3) believed the saints were able to respond. Therefore, it is not much of a stretch to understand how the early Christian church, being comprised mainly of Jews, did not have a problem with intercessory prayer to the saints.

Historical Witness

A belief in prayer to the Virgin Mary appears to be a quite early development. The John Rylands Papyrus 470 is a fragment dated to around 250 A.D., and containing the following prayer to the Theotokos:

Under your
mercy
we take refuge,
Mother of God! Our
prayers, do not despise
in necessities,
but from the danger
deliver us,
only pure,
only blessed. (Tribe and Villiers 2011)

Notice, if you will, the dating of this fragment — well before the time of the edict of Milan in 313 A.D.; this papyrus dates to the time of Emperor Decius, under whose reign there was a persecution of Christian laity across the empire. This prayer, dating from a time of great persecution, is still contained in the Greek Orthodox “Book of Hours”, where it is one of the concluding prayers of the evening services; also, the Orthodox sing this hymn as the last dismissal hymn of daily Vespers during Great Lent. (Orthodox Metropolitanate of Hong Kong and Southeast Asia 2011) The prayer is also used in the Roman Catholic Church, where it is known as the Sub tuum praesidium. (Mathewes-Green 2007, 85-86)

Shawn Tribe and Henri de Villiers provide us with the following theological analysis of this prayer.

Three fundamental theological truths are admirably synthesized:

  1. The special election of Mary by God (“only blessed”).
  2. The perpetual Virginity of Mary (“only pure”).
  3. The Divine Motherhood (“Mother of God”; “Mother” may be considered as a poor translation of Genitrix). (Tribe and Villiers 2011)

We should also add the idea that Mary hears our prayers and, in some sense, answers them. Thus prayer to the Theotokos, along with a belief in her remaining ever-virgin, is an expression of ante-Nicene Christianity, rather than (as some suggest) a syncretic grafting of paganism onto Christianity by a post-Constantine, apostate church.

Witness of the Fathers (and others)

St. John of Kronstadt waxes lyrical on this topic.

Pray, my brethren, to the Mother of God when the storm of enmity and malice bursts forth in your house. She, Who is all-merciful and all-powerful, can easily pacify the hearts of men. Peace and love proceed from the one God, as from their Source, and Our Lady–in God, as the Mother of Christ the Peace, is zealous, and prays for the peace of the whole world, and above all–of all Christians. She has the all-merciful power of driving away from us at Her sign the sub-celestial spirits of evil — those ever-vigilant and ardent sowers of enmity and malice amongst men, whilst to all who have recourse with faith and love to Her powerful protection, She soon speedily gives both peace and love. Be zealous yourselves also in preserving faith and love in your hearts; for if you do not care for this, then you will be unworthy of the intercession for you–of the Mother of God; be also most fervent and most reverent worshippers[i] of the Mother of the Almighty Lord; for it is truly meet to bless Her–the ever-blessed; the entirely spotless Mother of our God, the highest of all creatures, the Mediatrix for the whole race of mankind. Strive to train yourself in the spirit of humility, for She Herself was more humble than any mortal, and only looks lovingly upon the humble.” He hath regarded the low estate of His handmaiden” (said She to Elisabeth), of “God, Her Saviour.” (St John of Kronstadt 2010, Kindle Locations 3050-3059)

I must admit that this troubled me for some time. Even as I write this, after being chrismated into the Orthodox Church, I am still not entirely comfortable with prayer to the saints. Yet I consider this more a matter of my sloppy prayer habits rather than conviction, for I have become convinced that prayer to the saints is the most natural thing in the world.

One of the best places to start is with the words of Jesus: “God is not the God of the dead, but of the living” (Mat 22:32). The context of this passage has to do with the Sadducees and their disbelief in the resurrection from the dead. Jesus responded not with a defense of resurrection per se, but instead with the statement that the God of Abraham and Isaac and Jacob was the God of the living. In other words, the mortal bodies of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob may have died, but they were still very much alive. Jesus made much the same claim in his story of Lazarus and the rich man. This is likely not a parable, because Lazarus is named in the story; therefore he is a real person, despite his having suffered bodily death. Even after death, the rich man recognizes both Abraham and Lazarus, and actually converses with father Abraham (Luke 16:19-31).

St. John of Krondstat writes:

The saints of God live even after their death. Thus, I often hear in church the Mother of God singing her wonderful, heart-penetrating song which she said in the house of her cousin Elizabeth, after the Annunciation of the Archangel. At times, I hear the song of Moses; the song of Zacharias–the father of the Forerunner; that of Hannah, the mother of the prophet Samuel; that of the three children; and that of Miriam. And how many holy singers of the New Testament delight until now the ear of the whole Church of God! And the Divine service itself–the sacraments, the rites? Whose spirit is there, moving and touching our hearts? That of God and of His saints. Here is a proof for you of the immortality of men’s souls. How is it that all these men have died, and yet are governing our lives after their death–they are dead and they still speak, instruct and touch us? (St John of Kronstadt 2010, Location 63-68)

Thus the souls of those asleep in Jesus, while disembodied, are kept conscious and alive, awaiting the resurrection of their bodies (1 Thes 4:13-18). Jesus describes one conversation in particular, a conversation in which the rich man seems aware of the spiritual condition of his brothers. This would seem to allow for the possibility that those asleep in Jesus are aware of us. Moreover, at the Transfiguration, Jesus spoke with Moses and Elijah, both of whom seemed aware of Jesus’ upcoming death (Mat 17:1-9).

Peter Gillquist writes:

If Saint Paul instructs us as a holy priesthood to pray “always …for all the saints” (Ephesians 6:18), is it so outrageous to confess with the Church that holy Mary (along with all the saints who have passed from death to life and continually stand in the presence of Christ) intercedes before her Son on behalf of all men? For Mary is the prototype of what we are all called to be. (Gillquist 2009, 101)

It is with all this in mind that we read the roll call of faith in Hebrews chapter 11. Despite the Lutheran confessions arguing against intercessory prayer to the saints, Lutheran theologian Gustaf Aulén notes:

The koinonia of the church is not limited to the church as it exists now in the present. Death does not constitute a boundary. The fellowship of the church includes the witnesses to the faith in all ages. When the Letter to the Hebrews in the eleventh chapter has enumerated a long line of witnesses from the time of the old covenant, it continues in chapter twelve to stress the significance of the fact that “we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses,” and especially that we look “to Jesus the pioneer and perfecter of our faith” (Heb. 12:1-2). In these words the author of the letter has disclosed the true perspective of the relationship between the many and the one. Just as the old covenant has its heroes of faith, so the new has “so great a cloud of witnesses.” (Aulén 1960, 310)

Lutheran pastor Berthold Von Schenk writes in “The Presence” regarding the presence of our dear departed, worshiping with us around the altar:

As we seek and find our Risen Lord, we shall find our dear departed. They are with Him, and we find the reality of their continued life through Him. The saints are a part of the Church. We worship with them. They worship the Risen Christ face to face, while we worship the same Risen Christ under the veil of bread and wine at the Altar. At the Communion we are linked with heaven, with the Communion of Saints, with our loved ones. Here at the Altar, focused to a point, we find our communion with the dead; for the Altar is the closest meeting place between us and our Lord. That place must be the place of closest meeting with our dead who are in His keeping; The Altar is the trysting place where we meet our beloved Lord. It therefore, must also be the trysting place where we meet our loved ones, for they are with, the Lord. 

How pathetic it is to see ‘men and women going out to the cemetery, kneeling at the mound, placing little sprays’ of flowers and wiping their tears from their eyes, and knowing nothing else. How hopeless they look! Oh, that we could take them by the hand, away from the grave, out through the cemetery gate, in through the door of the church, and up the nave to the very Altar itself; and there put them in touch, not with the dead body of their loved one, but with the living soul who is with Christ at the Altar!

Oh, God the King of Saints, we praise and magnify Thy holy Name for all Thy servants, who have finished their course in Thy faith and fear, for the Blessed Virgin Mary, for the Holy Patriarchs, Prophets, Apostles, and Martyrs, for all Thy other righteous servants; and we beseech Thee that, encouraged by their example and strengthened by their fellowship, we may attain to everlasting life, through the merits of Thy Son Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen. (Von Schenk 1945)

The saints are living, are aware of us (as seen in the conversations between Moses, Elijah, and the transfigured Christ), fellowship with us, worship with us at the heavenly altar (of which the earthly altar is but a shadow), and are able to speak with Jesus. The author of Hebrews charges us to keep in mind the saints in heaven, the great cloud of witnesses (Heb 12:1) — of whom constant mindfulness in some way helps us avoid sin and keep us on the path towards salvation.

Many Protestant churches are aware of the saint’s perpetual involvement in the life of the church, even if they do not fully comprehend it. Why is it that many Protestant churches have graveyards on the church grounds? If you ask some of them, the more theologically sophisticated will say that the departed are still members of the church. Some sacramental Protestants (such as Lutherans) will go so far as to say that every time they celebrate the Lord’s Supper, the departed dead are celebrating it with them in heaven.[ii] If this is true, then why would we not ask the saints to intercede for us, just as we might ask the pastor or a trusted friend?

Bibliography

Aulén, Gustaf. The Faith of the Christian Church. Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1960.

Dau, William H. T., and Gerhard F. Bente, . Triglot Concordia: The Symbolical Books of the Ev. Lutheran Church. St. Louis: Concordia Publishing House, 1921.

Gillquist, Peter. Becoming Orthodox: A Journy to the Ancient Christian Faith. Third. Ben Lomond: Conciliar Press, 2009.

Mathewes-Green, Frederica. The Lost Gospel of Mary: The Theotokos in Three Ancient Texts. Brewster: Paraclete Press, 2007.

Orthodox Metropolitanate of Hong Kong and Southeast Asia. “The Oldest Hymn to the Theotokos.” OMHKSEA. August 10, 2011. http://www.omhksea.org/2011/08/the-oldest-hymn-to-the-theotokos/ (accessed February 12, 2012).

St John of Kronstadt. My Life in Christ, or Moments of Spiritual Serenity and Contemplation, of Reverent Feeling, of Earnest SelfAmendment, and of Peace in God. Edited by John Iliytch Sergieff. Translated by E. E. Goulaeff. Grand Rapids: Christian Classics Ethereal Library, 2010.

Tribe, Shawn, and Henri de Villiers. “The Sub Tuum Praesidium.” New Liturgical Movement. February 3, 2011. http://www.newliturgicalmovement.org/2011/02/sub-tuum-praesidium.html (accessed February 12, 2012).

Von Schenk, Berthold. The Presence: An Approach to the Holy Communion. New York: E. Kaufmann, Incorporated, 1945.


[i] This is an excerpt from the diary of St. John of Kronstadt. As such it lacks the theological precision one might otherwise expect. Theologically, we honor or venerate Mary and the saints, but reserve worship for God alone.

[ii] Scandinavian Lutheran churches often have a semi-circular altar rail; the other half of the circle is in heaven, and reserved for the departed saints who celebrate their heavenly liturgy with us.

Clothed with the Glory of God

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Painting of a man, hands raised , all aflame.

Clothed with the Glory of God

Abba Lot went to see Abba Joseph and said to him, ‘Abba as far as I can I say my little office, I fast a little, I pray and meditate, I live in peace and as far as I can, I purify my thoughts. What else can I do?’ then the old man stood up and stretched his hands towards heaven. His fingers became like ten lamps of fire and he said to him, ‘If you will, you can become all flame.’

In the communion of persons, first evidenced in the persons of Adam and Eve, we are presented with a sign[i] and symbol of the communion the trinity has with itself. This helps us to understand what the scriptures mean when they speak of Adam and Even being naked, and not ashamed (Ge 2:25). (John Paul II 2006, 163) By nature the man and the woman were in full communion with each other, and full communion with God (Ge 2:8). The fathers of the church believed Adam and Eve were thereby clothed with the glory of God.

The obvious question is whether the idea of the original and prototypical humanity being clothed with the glory of God has any scriptural foundation. In the introduction to Robert Alter’s translation of Psalms, he notes the way the language of Psalms presents the idea of light’s being a mythological property of deity, of God wearing light as a garment, and of God stretching out the heavens as a garment.

God, as we noted in a verse quoted from Psalm 27[ii], is associated with light — in that instance, because light, archetypically, means safety and rescue to those plunged in fearful darkness, but also because radiance is a mythological property of deities and monarchs. Psalm 104 is a magnificent celebration of God as king of the vast panorama of creation. It begins by imagining God in the act of putting on royal raiment: “Grandeur and glory you don” (hod wehadar lavashta). The psalmist then goes on: “Wrapped in light like a cloak, / stretching out the heavens like a tentcloth” (verse 2). What makes the familiar figure of light for the divinity so effective is its fusion with the metaphor of clothing. The poet, having represented God donning regalia, envisages Him wrapping Himself in a garment of pure light (the Hebrew verb used here is actually in the active mode, “wrapping”). Then, associatively continuing the metaphor of fabrics, he has God “stretching out the heavens like a tent-cloth,” the bright sky above becoming an extension of the radiance that envelopes God. (Alter 2007, xxviii)

The association of God with light is the source for the phrase describing Jesus Christ as “light from light” in the Nicene Creed. Since Sacred Scripture speaks of God being clothed in light, and of spreading out the heavens like a tentcloth, it is only natural to extend that idea to original and prototypical humanity. Ephrem the Syrian writes: “God clothed Adam in glory”; and again: “It was because of the glory with which they were clothed that they were not ashamed. It was when this glory was stripped from them after they had transgressed the commandment that they were ashamed because they were naked” (St Ephrem the Syrian n.d., 99, 106) In like manner, Chrysostom writes: “[W]hile sin and disobedience had not yet come on the scene, they were clad in that glory from above which caused them no shame. But after the breaking of the law, then entered the scene both shame and awareness of their nakedness.” (Louth, Conti and Oden, Ancient Christian Commentary on Scripture: Old Testament I, Genesis 1-11 2001, 72)

The 17th century mystic Jacom Böhme remarks:

Man should have walked naked upon the earth, for the heavenly [part] penetrated the outward, and was his clothing. He stood in great beauty, glory, joy and delight, in a child­like mind; he should have eaten and drunk in a magical manner; not into the body, as now, but in the mouth there was the separation; for so likewise was the fruit of Paradise. (Böhme 2009)

Such was the state of humanity in Paradise. Yet once Adam had sinned and the glory of God had departed from him, it was immediately clear to him that he no longer belonged in Paradise. St. Ephrem the Syrian, explains this in the seventh verse of his second Hymn on Paradise,:

At its boundary I saw
figs, growing in a sheltered place,
from which crowns were made that adorned
the brows of the guilty pair,
while there leaves blushed, as it were,
for him who was stripped naked:
there leaves were required for those two
who had lost their garments;
although they covered Adam,
still they made him blush with shame and repent,
because, in a place of such splendor,
a man who is naked is filled with shame. (St Ephrem the Syrian 1989, 87)

There are striking parallels between this hymn and the account of the Philistines capturing the ark — how the pregnant wife of Phineas, upon hearing this, gave birth. “And she named the child Ichabod, saying, The glory is departed from Israel” (I Sam 4:21). It is only after the fall, after the glory has departed, and after full communion of persons has been lost, that the man and the woman objectified each other as individuals rather than persons partaking of the same nature; in their fallen state they saw themselves as naked before each other and before God. (Lossky, The Creation 1989, 77)

The reader will no doubt be reminded of how the ark of the covenant was shrouded in the “thick darkness” of the Holy of Holies (I Kings 8:12); and of how in Ezekiel chapters 8-10, the prophet is given a vision of the glory of God, the defilement of the temple, and how the glory of God departed from the temple as a consequence for Israel’s sin. In this manner we come to the understanding that the glory with which Adam and Eve were clothed, or overshadowed, is natural to mankind in the state of original righteousness, a state of communion with God. We also understand that the glory of God, with which they were clothed, would quite rightly depart as a consequence of Adam’s sin. In this context, we note that after the Babylonian captivity and the rebuilding of the temple, Ezra makes no mention of the glory of God returning, filling the temple, and overshadowing the ark. Instead, the return of the Shekinah glory came at the Annunciation, when the angel Gabriel informed the blessed virgin that the Holy Ghost would come upon her and the power of the highest would overshadow her. What we see at the annunciation (and in Revelation 12), is the blessed virgin clothed with the glory of God, as was Eve in the garden — which points to the incarnation as the inauguration of God’s plan for reconciliation and recreation, for the reestablishment of that perfect communion between God and man, and between each human person.

Bibliography

Alter, Robert. The Book of Psalms: A Translation with Commentary. New York: W. W. Norton & Company, Inc., 2007.

Böhme, Jacom. “Mysterium Magnum (part one).” Gnosis research. October 9, 2009. http://meuser.awardspace.com/Boehme/Jacob-Boehme-Mysterium-Magnum-part-one-free-electronic-text.pdf (accessed November 15, 2010).

John Paul II. Man and Woman He Created Them: A Theology of the Body. Boston: Pauline Books & Media, 2006.

Lossky, Vladimir. “The Creation.” In Orthodox Theology: An Introduction, by Vladimir Lossky, edited by Ian Kesarcodi-Watson, & Ihita Kesarcodi-Watson, 51-78. Crestwood: St. Vladimir’s Seminary Press, 1989.

Louth, Andrew, Marco Conti, and Thomas C. Oden. Ancient Christian Commentary on Scripture: Old Testament I, Genesis 1-11. Vol. 1. 28 vols. Westmont: InterVarsity Press, 2001.

St Ephrem the Syrian. “Commentary on Genesis.” Scribd.com. n.d. http://www.scribd.com/doc/56174298/St-Ephraim-the-Syrian-Commentary-on-Genesis (accessed June 9, 2013).

—. Hymns on Paradise. Translated by Sebastion Brock. Crestwood: St Vladimir’s Seminary Press, 1989.

 

[i] On the nature of the sign and the thing signified, Karl Barth notes: “Sign and thing signified, the outward and the inward, are, as a rule, strictly distinguished in the Bible, and certainly in other connexions we cannot lay sufficient stress upon the distinction. But they are never separated in such a (“liberal”) way that according to preference the one may be easily retained without the other.” (Barth 1956, 179) In other words, the sign always points to the thing signified. However, if we believe in the thing signified, we have to accept the sign as well—as, for example, with the virgin birth being the sign of the incarnation (Isa 7:14).

[ii] The Lord is my light and my rescue.

Whom should I fear?

The Lord is my life’s stronghold.

Of whom should I be afraid?

Ps 27:1, Robert Alter’s translation (Alter 2007, xxv-xxvi; 91)

Catechesis and the Virgin Mary

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One Protestant objection is that we do not see a well-developed Mariology in Sacred Scripture or in the writings of the earliest church fathers. To answer this objection, we need to examine the concept of catechesis — of instruction in the faith. For a number of reasons, catechesis in the early church was primarily oral.

  • First, because there was no New Testament canon in the ante-Nicene church. For nearly thirty years there were no epistles; for nearly forty years there were no gospels; for many years different bishops promulgated different canons, and the canon as we know it today wasn’t standardized until the late 4th century.
  • Second, there were no books as we know them today, only scrolls; different churches had different collections of scrolls.[i]
  • Third, scrolls were hand-copied, and therefore expensive.
  • Fourth, literacy was not widespread, especially among the lower classes that formed the bulk of the Christian Church.[ii]
  • Fifth, because scrolls were hand-copied and errors were frequent, the written word was not considered to be as trustworthy as the oral word passed on from teacher to student.
  • And finally, because the Christian Church was an underground movement. As Christianity was technically an illegal religion in the Roman Empire, and also so as not to cast pearls before swine, the mysteries of the faith were kept hidden from non-believers. It is perhaps for these reasons that we do not see well-defined theology on a great many subjects within the writings of the earliest church fathers.
Fresco of Virgin and Child, Catacomb of Priscilla

Fresco of Virgin and Child, Catacomb of Priscilla

As evidence, let us examine some of the works preserving the church order of the early church. The Didache (a.k.a. the Teachings of the Apostles), is a very early work, perhaps written as early as 50 AD (but certainly before 70 AD), which was accepted as scripture by many church fathers and within several jurisdictions, and was not officially excluded from the canon until the 4th century. (O’Loughlin 2010, 26) [iii] The Didache contains very little doctrine, but is mostly concerned with matters of church order, church practices, and holy living. (P. Schaff, ANF07. Fathers of the Third and Fourth Centuries: Lactantius, Venantius, Asterius, Victorinus, Dionysius, Apostolic Teaching and Constitutions, Homily, and Liturgies 2004) In the third century, Hippolytus (c. 170-c. 236) wrote his Apostolic Traditions, preserving the church order and practices in use in Alexandria, but containing none of what we today would call doctrine. (Hippolytus 1997) The  Didascalia Apostolorum, probably from the early third century, preserves the early church order and practices in use in Syria, likely close to Antioch. The so-called Constitutions of the Holy Apostles appears to be a second or third century work (with fourth or fifth century interpolations), which preserves the church order and practices of the churches in Asia Minor, and appears to be “a revised and enlarged edition of the Didascalia.” (Chapman 1913) This work consists of eight books, most of which are solely concerned with church order and holy living. Only the sixth book, “Against Heresies”, contains any doctrine — and apart from a creedal portion in Section III entitled An Exposition of the Preaching of the Apostles, most of the work consists of a description of various errors or of the prescriptions of the apostles. What we would term the doctrinal portion of this work is surprisingly brief. (P. Schaff, ANF07. Fathers of the Third and Fourth Centuries: Lactantius, Venantius, Asterius, Victorinus, Dionysius, Apostolic Teaching and Constitutions, Homily, and Liturgies 2004)

Fresco of the Adoration of the Magi in the catacomb of Marcellinus and Peter

Fresco of the Adoration of the Magi, Catacomb of Marcellinus and Peter

Given this, it is likely that Marian doctrine was considered to be a mystery, preserved orally and passed on to catechumens only after their baptism. It is also possible that Marian doctrine, along with Christology, was not especially well developed in the primitive church; but when heretics such as Arius began to attack the nature of Christ, Christology became increasingly important and well-defined. In this view, Marian doctrine developed as an outgrowth of and in support of Christology. In any case, it seems the primitive church had no need of a written dogmatic tradition, being content with the apostolic witness passed on orally to the catechumens. And if some hold that Mariology was a creation of the later Ecumenical Councils, what are they to make of the 2nd century fresco entitled “Virgin and Child with Balaam the Prophet”, preserved in the Catacomb of St Priscilla? (Fletcher n.d., Beckett 2009, 30-31) What are they to make of the early 4th century Fresco of the Adoration of the Magi in the catacomb of Marcellinus and Peter? (Beckett 2009, 31-32) What are they to make of the 4th century marble sarcophagus with its image of the Adoration of the Magi? (Beckett 2009, 31-33) Or of another similar mid-4th century sarcophagus with its image of the Adoration of the Magi, including one of the figures carrying a gold wreath which was a gift “offered only to the emperor”? (Beckett 2009, 33-34)

4th century marble sarcophagus with its image of the Adoration of the Magi

Adoration of the Magi, 4th century marble sarcophagus

Mid-4th century sarcophagus with its image of the Adoration of the Magi, including one of the figures carrying a gold wreath which was a gift "offered only to the emperor

Adoration of the Magi, mid-4th century marble sarcophagus

Bibliography

Beckett, Wendy. Encounters With God: In Quest of the Ancient Icons of Mary. Maryknoll: Orbis Books, 2009.

Fletcher, Elizabeth. Bible Archaeology:Tombs and Catacombs:tomb where Jesus called Lazarus back from the dead,catacombs of St.Priscilla,St.Callixtus for the early Christians. n.d. http://www.bible-archaeology.info/tombs_catacombs.htm (accessed May 25, 2009).

Hippolytus. “The Apostolic Tradition of Hippolytus of Rome.” Kevin P. Edgecomb. July 8, 1997. http://www.bombaxo.com/hippolytus.html (accessed May 25, 2009).

O’Loughlin, Thomas. The Didache: A Window on the Earliest Christians. Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2010.

Schaff, Philip. ANF07. Fathers of the Third and Fourth Centuries: Lactantius, Venantius, Asterius, Victorinus, Dionysius, Apostolic Teaching and Constitutions, Homily, and Liturgies. Edited by Philip Schaff. Vol. 7. Grand Rapids: Christian Classics Ethereal Library, 2004.

 

[i] It was Christians who first began cutting scrolls into pages, sewing the four gospels together to form a Codex, the predecessor of our modern books. Even so, the Bible was still known as a collection of scrolls and codices—a library, and not a single book.

[ii] A study by William Harris indicates “literacy rates were rarely higher than 10-15 percent of the population.” (Ehrman 2005, 37)

[iii] Clement of Alexandria, writing in the 2nd century, quotes directly from the Didache as though it were scripture. In the Stromata, or Miscellanies, Book 1, chapter 20, he says: “he who appropriates what belongs to the barbarians, and vaunts it is his own, does wrong, increasing his own glory, and falsifying the truth. It is such an one that is by Scripture called a ‘thief.’ It is therefore said, ‘Son, be not a liar; for falsehood leads to theft.’ (P. Schaff, ANF02. Fathers of the Second Century: Hermas, Tatian, Athenagoras, Theophilus, and Clement of Alexandria (Entire) 2004, 529) This is a direct quote from the Didache 3:5, also known as The Teaching of the Twelve Apostles: “My child, be not a liar, since a lie leadeth the way to theft”. (P. Schaff, ANF07. Fathers of the Third and Fourth Centuries: Lactantius, Venantius, Asterius, Victorinus, Dionysius, Apostolic Teaching and Constitutions, Homily, and Liturgies 2004, 561) Irenaeus, also writing in the 2nd century, may mention the Didache in fragment 37, as discussed by Henry Wace: “In one of the fragments, published by Pfaff, as from Irenaeus, we read: ‘Those who have followed the Second Ordinances of the Apostles (οι ταις δευτεραις των αποστολων διαταξεσι παρηκολουθηκοτες) know that our Lord instituted a new offering in the New Covenant according to the saying of Malachi the prophet, ‘From the rising of the sun to the going down, my name has been glorified in the Gentiles; and in every place incense is offered to my name and a pure offering.” This passage is quoted in the Didaché with reference to the Eucharist [Didache XIV:3-4]; not, however, textually, as in the fragment, but very loosely. We can only say then that it is possible the Didaché may be the Second Ordinances of the Apostles referred to here.” (Wace 2001)

Mariology as a Defense Against Heresy

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 The following text is from my book “Why Mary Matters”.

 

Definition of Chalcedon, opposed by Nestorianism, Docetism, Arianism, and Monophysitism

Definition of Chalcedon

The earliest Gnostic heresy was Docetism, which taught that Jesus had only appeared to be a man, but did not take on a real human body. The first mention of Mary by a father of the Church appears in the works of Ignatius of Antioch, and is a defense of the full humanity of Christ by means of His birth of the Virgin Mary. In Chapter VII or his Epistle to the Ephesians, titled “Beware of False Teachers”, Ignatius provides the following formulation of the Christ, being both true God and true man.

For some are in the habit of carrying about the name [of Jesus Christ] in wicked guile, while yet they practise things unworthy of God, whom ye must flee as ye would wild beasts. For they are ravening dogs, who bite secretly, against whom ye must be on your guard, inasmuch as they are men who can scarcely be cured. There is one Physician who is possessed both of flesh and spirit; both made and not made; God existing in flesh; true life in death; both of Mary and of God; first passible and then impassible, even Jesus Christ our Lord. (P. Schaff, ANF01. The Apostolic Fathers with Justin Martyr and Irenaeus 1884, 86)

From there we begin to see references to the Virgin Mary pop up in early Gnostic writings. These writings provide us with evidence of what the Church was trying to avoid — the syncretic identification of the Mother Goddess with the Virgin Mary. Hilda Graef mentions two works — the Ascension of Isaiah and Odes to Solomon — both of which describe the birth of Jesus as something other than a true birth. In fact, these are the earliest literary sources (if perhaps not the theological sources) for the doctrine that Mary maintained her virginity in partu, in the birth, and that this was something other than an ordinary vaginal delivery. (Graef 2009, 27-28)

I note in passing the relative impossibility of keeping secrets. The “disciplina arcani: the secret, inner life of the Church” was bound to slip out. Witness for example the description of Christianity by Pliny the Younger in his letter to the Emperor Trajan where he seeks council on how to deal with Christians (Epistulae X.96). This letter, written early in the second century, provides the earliest literary description of the Eucharist, something that was hidden from the catechumenate, and which the Church forbade discussion of to those outside the Church. Even today we pray (in the pre-Communion prayer of St. John Chrysostom): “Of thy Mystical Supper, O Son of God, accept me today as a communicant; for I will not speak of thy Mystery to thine enemies, neither like Judas will I give thee a kiss; but like the thief will I confess thee: Remember me, O Lord, in thy Kingdom.”

Having discussed the existence of the Virgin Mary as part of the secret, inner life of the Church, we must also state that the veneration of the Blessed Virgin is indeed to be found in Sacred Scripture.  We will follow the example of Archimandrite[i] Lev Gillett in using only the Gospels and the book of Acts for this; the more symbolic witness of the Old Testament and the book of Revelation cannot be understood without a proper evaluation of the more straightforward evidence. (Gillett 1949, 76) Lev Gillett writes:

The Gospel itself ascribes to Mary a privileged place among the creatures. The angel Gabriel said to her: ‘Hail, thou that are highly favoured, the Lord is with thee’ (Luke i:28). The place occupied by Mary in the divine scheme of our salvation is not only privileged, but unique. Therefore, Elisabeth said to Mary: ‘Blessed art thou among women, and blessed is the fruit of thy womb’ (Luke i. 42). The Gospel observes that Elisabeth, when she saluted Mary in this manner, was ‘filled with the Holy Ghost’ (Luke i. 41). Every ‘evangelical’ (in the Protestant sense) Christian will acknowledge as true and inspired these words of the angel Gabriel and Elisabeth. The same words form the greatest part of the text of the Latin Ave Maria, which many ‘evangelical’ Christians mistrust, and the whole text of the corresponding Byzantine prayer. Could ‘evangelicals’ object to our addressing the glorified Virgin Mary in the same words with which she, on earth, was greeted by an angel and by a woman filled with the Holy Ghost? Could they object to our repeating such words, as recorded in the Gospel? If they did, would they still be ‘evangelical’? (Gillett 1949, 76)

A standard evangelical argument against the veneration of Mary is that Jesus himself did not honor her. The argument is that when a woman tried to honor Mary for having given birth, Jesus instead rejected her. This argument is faulty, as Lev Gillet explains.

Jesus himself explained in what is the blessing of God which rests on Mary. When a certain woman out of the multitude lifted up her voice and said to our Lord: ‘Blessed is the womb that bare thee, and the paps which thou hast sucked’, he answered: ‘Yea rather, blessed are they that hear the word of God, and keep it’ (Luke xi. 27-38). These words are part of the lesson from the Gospel which the Orthodox Church reads at the liturgy on every feast of the Virgin; this shows that the Orthodox Church considers them as the most perfect expression of her own mind concerning Mary’s holiness. The words of Jesus must certainly not be interpreted as a disavowal of the praising of his mother by the woman or as an underestimation of Mary’s excellence; but they emphasize the real point and show where lies the merit of Mary. (Gillett 1949, 77)

St. Nikolai Velimirovich, in his Prayer number XXII, explores this idea. “O my Majestic Lord! You dance on Your Mother’s lap, quickened by the All-Holy Spirit … You fill the whole soul of Your Mother, all Her virgin breast; and there is nothing in Your Mother’s soul except You. You are Her radiance and Her voice, truly Her eye and Her song.” (Velimirovich 2010, 40) Herein we see the connection between the witness of the Sacred Scriptures and that of the inner life of the Church. The meaning of Jesus’ words regarding His mother are unclear, and could be interpreted any number of ways. Historically, Christianity has interpreted these words of Christ as expressing the true measure of Mary’s greatness, and the reason why she is to be specially honored today. This is in line with the Lukan account of how “Mary kept all these things, and pondered them in her heart” (Luke 2:19; see also 2:51).


[i] The term “Archimandrite” can refer to a superior abbot who is given authority over several ordinary abbots and monasteries. However, it is more commonly used as an honorific, bestowed upon certain clergy out of respect, often out of gratitude for a special service to the church. This term is applied only to celibate clergy; married clergy receive the honorific of “archpriest”.

The Trisagion Hymn

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The Trisagion Prayers are a set of ancient prayers that begin each service of the Daily Cycle of divine services. They are also commonly used to begin one’s private prayers.

The Trisagion Thrice Holy by Angelboy

The-Trisagion-Τρισάγιον-Thrice-Holy-by-Angelboy

+ In the Name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit.  Amen.

Glory be to Thee, our God; glory be to Thee.

O Heavenly King, the Comforter, the Spirit of Truth, Who art everywhere present and fillest all things; Treasury of blessings, and Giver of life:  Come and abide in us, and cleanse us of every impurity, and save our souls, O Good One.

+ Holy God, Holy and Mighty, Holy Immortal One, have mercy upon us.  (with bow)
+ Holy God, Holy and Mighty, Holy Immortal One, have mercy upon us.  (with bow)
+ Holy God, Holy and Mighty, Holy Immortal One, have mercy upon us.  (with bow)

+ Glory be to the Father, and to the Son, and to the Holy Ghost, both now and ever, and unto the ages of ages.  Amen.

Most-holy Trinity, have mercy on us:  Lord, cleanse us of our sins; Master, pardon our transgressions; Holy One, visit and heal our infirmities, for Thy Name’s sake.

Lord, have mercy.  Lord, have mercy.  Lord, have mercy.

+ Glory be to the Father, and to the Son, and to the Holy Spirit, both now and ever, and unto the ages of ages.  Amen.

+ Our Father, Who art in Heaven, hallowed be Thy Name.  Thy Kingdom come; Thy will be done, on earth as it is in Heaven.  Give us this day our daily bread; and forgive us our debts, as we forgive our debtors.  And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from the evil one.

For Thine is the Kingdom, and the power, and the glory, + of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost, both now and ever, and unto the ages of ages.  Amen.

Meet it is in truth to bless thee, O Theotokos,
ever-blessèd and all-pure, and the Mother of our God.

More honourable than the Cherubim,
and more glorious incomparably than the Seraphim,
thou who without corruption gavest birth to God the Word,
the very Theotokos:  we thee magnify.

+ Glory be to the Father, and to the Son, and to the Holy Spirit, both now and ever, and unto the ages of ages.  Amen.

Lord, have mercy.  Lord, have mercy.  Lord, have mercy.

Through the prayers of our holy Fathers, + O Lord Jesus Christ our God, have mercy upon us.  Amen.

From John Damascene’s book “An Exposition of the Orthodox Faith”

Depiction of the Cherubim

The Cherubim

For we hold the words “Holy God” to refer to the Father, without limiting the title of divinity to Him alone, but acknowledging also as God the Son and the Holy Spirit: and the words “Holy and Mighty” we ascribe to the Son, without stripping the Father and the Holy Spirit of might: and the words “Holy and Immortal” we attribute to the Holy Spirit, without depriving the Father and the Son of immortality. For, indeed, we apply all the divine names simply and unconditionally to each of the subsistences in imitation of the divine Apostle’s words. “But to us there is but one God, the Father, of Whom are all things, and we in Him: and one Lord Jesus Christ by Whom are all things, and we by Him.” And, nevertheless, we follow Gregory the Theologian when he says, “But to us there is but one God, the Father, of Whom are all things, and one Lord Jesus Christ, through Whom are all things, and one Holy Spirit, in Whom are all things:” for the words “of Whom” and “through Whom” and “in Whom” do not divide the natures (for neither the prepositions nor the order of the names could ever be changed), but they characterize the properties of one unconfused nature. And this becomes clear from the fact that they are once more gathered into one, if only one reads with care these words of the same Apostle, Of Him and through Him and in Him are all things: to Him be the glory for ever and ever. Amen(4). For that the “Trisagium” refers not to the Son alone, but to the Holy Trinity, the divine and saintly Athanasius and Basil and Gregory, and all the band of the divinely-inspired Fathers bear witness: because, as a matter of fact, by the threefold holiness the Holy Seraphim suggest to us the three subsistences of the superessential Godhead.

Depiction of the Seraphim

The Seraphim

But by the one Lordship they denote the one essence and dominion of the supremely-divine Trinity. Gregory the Theologian of a truth says, “Thus, then, the Holy of Holies, which is completely veiled by the Seraphim, and is glorified with three consecrations, meet together in one lordship and one divinity.” This was the most beautiful and sublime philosophy of still another of our predecessors.

Ecclesiastical historians, then, say that once when the people of Constantinople were offering prayers to God to avert a threatened calamity, during Proclus’ tenure of the office of Archbishop, it happened that a boy was snatched up from among the people, and was taught by angelic teachers the “Thrice Holy” Hymn, “Thou Holy God, Holy and Mighty One, Holy and Immortal One, have mercy upon us:” and when once more he was restored to earth, he told what he had learned, and all the people sang the Hymn, and so the threatened calamity was averted. And in the fourth holy and great Ecumenical Council (I mean the one at Chalcedon), we are told that it was in this form that the Hymn was sung; for the minutes of this holy assembly so record it.

Damascene, St. John (2010-08-08). An Exact Exposition of the Orthodox Faith (Kindle Locations 1955-1981).  Kindle Edition.

For more information, See John Sanidopoulos’s blog: The Miracle of the Trisagion (“Thrice-Holy Hymn”)

The Secret Inner Life of the Church

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The following is slightly modified from my book “Why Mary Matters”.

 

Icon of Christ Pantocrator St. Catherine's Monastery, Sinai

Icon of Christ Pantocrator
St. Catherine’s Monastery, Sinai

A proper and catholic[i] Mariology is inextricably bound to Christology, and is therefore a necessary component of the true faith. St. Ignatius of Antioch, disciple of the apostle John, calls the virginity of Mary a mystery hidden from the prince of this world, a mystery wrought in silence by God: “Now the virginity of Mary was hidden from the prince of this world, as was also her offspring, and the death of the Lord; three mysteries of renown, which were wrought in silence by God.” (P. Schaff, ANF01. The Apostolic Fathers with Justin Martyr and Irenaeus 1884, 87, 95-96) Now as we know, the term mystery is also the source of the term sacrament; sacrament and mystery have the same scriptural meaning. Protestants, including Lutherans, jettisoned much of the spiritual heritage bequeathed them from the church catholic — specifically that church whose bishop resides in Rome.[ii] Of course they would not consider this as an abandonment, but rather a recovery of a primitive Christianity uncorrupted by nearly fifteen centuries of hierarchal and heretical development within the Roman Catholic church. However, the loss of one of the Ignatius’ “three mysteries of renown” raises the question of whether Protestantism has recovered primitive Christianity, or rather whether in jettisoning Roman Catholicism they also jettisoned something essential to Christianity.

Peter Gillquist writes:

The highly charged emotional atmosphere which surrounds this subject serves to blunt our objectivity in facing up to Mary. Many of us were brought up to question or reject honor paid to Mary in Christian worship and art. Therefore, we often have our minds made up in advance. We have allowed our preconceptions to color our understanding even of the Scripture passages concerning her. We have not let the facts speak for themselves. (Gillquist 2009, 97)

To be fair, whether one sees the veneration of the Virgin Mary in Sacred Scripture depends in part upon one’s theological background and interpretive framework. Scot McKnight, the Karl A. Olsson Professor in Religious Studies at North Park University and author of the book “The Real Mary”, states: “[T]he story about the real Mary has never been told. The Mary of the Bible has been hijacked by theological controversies whereby she has become a Rorschach inkblot in which theologians find whatever they wish to find.” (McKnight 2007, 3) So far, so good. However, McKnight then attempts to find a version of Mary palatable to Evangelicals, ignoring the witness of history and the church, and creates version of Mary befitting his thesis. McKnight’s great mistake is his hubris — his dismissal of what historic Christianity believed, taught, proclaimed, and even died regarding the theology surrounding Christ and the Virgin Mary.

To be fair to those from a “Scripture Alone” background, we must admit that the overt scriptural evidence for the veneration of Mary seems rather sparse. Orthodox theologian Vladimir Lossky notes: “If we desired to consider biblical evidence apart from the Church’s devotion to the Mother of God, we should be obliged to limit ourselves to the few New Testament passages relating to Mary and the one Old Testament passage cited in the New Testament with reference to her (the prophecy of the Virgin-Birth of the Messiah in Isaiah).” (Lossky, Panagia 1949, 25) Therefore, the starting place for an understanding of the veneration of Mary must begin with a proper understanding of Christology, and of its dogmatic development as a defense against Christological heresy. Vladimir Lossky notes that even here, the evidence for a Mariological connection is sparse.

If we were to limit ourselves to the dogmatic data, in the strict sense of the word, and were dealing only with dogmas affirmed by the Councils, we should find nothing except the name Theotokos, whereby the Church has solemnly confirmed the divine maternity of the Holy Virgin. The dogmatic subject of the Theotokos, as the name was affirmed against the Nestorians, is Christological before it is anything else; that which is thereby defended against the gainsayers of the divine maternity is the hypostatic unity of the Son of God, when he had become the Son of Man. It is Christology which is directly envisaged here; it is indirectly that at the same time there is a dogmatic confirmation of the Church’s devotion to her who bore God according to the flesh. It is said that all those who rise up against the appellation Theotokos, all who refuse to admit that Mary has this quality given to her, are not truly Christians, for they oppose the true doctrine of the Incarnation of the word. This should demonstrate the close connection between dogma and devotion, which are inseparable in the Church. (Lossky, Panagia 1949, 24)

John Breck notes: “The mystery of the Holy Virgin Mary belongs, as much as any other in Christian experience, to the disciplina arcani: the secret, inner life of the Church.”[iii] Thus we cannot truly understand the place of the Holy Virgin Mary in the economy of salvation apart from the church — for, as Breck notes: “[T]he person of Mary and her place within God’s work of salvation is in the broadest sense ecclesial, and not merely scriptural.” (Breck, Scripture in Tradition: The Bible and Its Interpretation in the Orthodox Church 2001, 143) While the biblical evidence for Mariology exists, the interpretation of the evidence is informed by the church’s dogma and devotion (which, as we have shown, is Christological in its orientation).

Still, the question deserves an answer: If the veneration of Mary is truly part of Christianity, why is it not more widely and clearly proclaimed in Sacred Scripture? Hilda Graef provides the following information.

The paganism of the Byzantine world round the shores of the Mediterranean was no longer the comparatively sober affair of the Greco-Roman Olympus, of Jupiter and Juno, of Minerva and Mars. It had become a syncretistic religion with very disturbing elements of ecstatic frenzy and sexual promiscuity, and one of its most prominent figures was the Mother Goddess, worshipped under many names, as the Magna Mater, the Phrygian Kybele, the Palestinian Ash-taroth, the Egyptian Isis and the Diana of the Ephesians whose devotees so violently opposed St. Paul (Acts 19). …When Christianity began to spread, not only among the Jewish communities of the Roman Empire but, under the leadership of St. Paul, also among the pagan population, its teachers had to make it clear that there was only one God, incarnate in Jesus Christ, who could tolerate no rivals, whether male or female, and who was both the creator and the redeemer of the world. A strong [public] emphasis on his virgin mother would have led to unfortunate comparisons and, possibly, identifications. (Graef 2009, 25-26)

And so we see why the veneration of the Virgin Mary might be part of the “disciplina arcani: the secret, inner life of the Church”. Whereas Alexander Hislop presumes that the veneration of Mary is evidence of the early apostasy of the church, I propose an alternate point of view: the early church knew that the open veneration of the Blessed Virgin would invite ill-informed comparisons to the mystery religions of the Mediterranean region, and so kept her veiled from view, hidden in plain sight.


[i] The word “catholic” with a little “c” is a reference to that which has been believed everywhere, in every place, and by all, or what is sometimes called the church catholic. With a capital “C”, Catholic is a shorthand reference to the Roman Catholic church.

[ii] Lutherans retained a semblance of sacramental theology, but redefine them and limit them in a manner unacceptable to non-Protestant Christians. With the Catholics, they number the sacraments; unlike the Catholics, they only accept two sacraments—baptism and the Lord’s Supper.

[iii] St. Basil the Great writes: “Of the dogmas and proclamations [kerygma] that are guarded in the Church, we hold some from the teaching of the Scriptures, and others we have received in mystery as the teachings of the tradition of the apostles.” (St Basil the Great 2011, Kindle Location 1657) Metropolitan Hilarion Alfeyev notes that St. Basil the Great is speaking “chiefly of traditions of a liturgical or ceremonial character, passed down by word of mouth and thereby entering into church practice.” (Alfeyev, Orthodox Christianity: Doctrine and Teaching of the Orthodox Church 2012, 16)

Worship, Veneration, and the Axion Estin (It is Truly Meet)

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The following is slightly modified from my book “Why Mary Matters”.

 

Icon of the Theotokos, "All of Creation Rejoices in Thee."

Icon of the Theotokos, “All of Creation Rejoices in Thee.”

The theotokian (or hymn to Mary) known as Axion Estin (or It is Truly Meet), is sung in the Orthodox liturgy, and is part of the daily prayers in most Orthodox prayer books. It reads as follows:

It is truly meet to bless you, O Theotokos,
Ever blessed and most pure and the Mother of our God!
More honorable than the cherubim,
and more glorious beyond compare than the seraphim.
Without corruption you gave birth to God the Word.
True Theotokos, we magnify you!

Protestants would likely be uncomfortable with this hymn; I know I was. Yet as Robert Arakaki demonstrates, the expressions of this hymn are entirely biblical.

 

Blessed — “Blessed are you among women, and blessed is the child you will bear!” (Luke 1:42)

Theotokos (God-bearer) — “And whence is this to me, that the mother of my Lord should come to me?” (Luke 1:43; see also Isaiah 7:14, Matthew 1:21-25, Luke 2:6-7, Revelation 12:5)

Ever-blessed — “From now on all generations will call me blessed….” (Luke 1:48)

All-holy — “But just as he who called you is holy, so be holy in all you do; for it is written: ‘Be holy, because I am holy.’” (I Peter 1:15-16)

Utterly pure — “Blessed are the pure in heart for they will see God.” (Matthew 5:8).  “Everyone who has this hope in him purifies himself, just as he is pure.” (I John 3:3)

Mother of God — “The virgin will be with child and will give birth to a son, and will call him Immanuel– which means, ‘God with us.’” (Matthew 1:23, cf. Isaiah 7:14)

More honorable than — “You made him a little lower than the heavenly beings the Cherubim  and crowned him with glory and honor.” (Psalm 8:5)  “And God raised us up with Christ and seated us with him in the heavenly realms in Christ.” (Ephesians 2:6) (Arakaki, Why Evangelicals Need Mary 2012)

If we can accept that the various phrases of the Axion estin hymn are biblical, what then is the problem? Why would a Protestant find this hymn so troubling? Robert Arakaki provides us with an  answer.

Many Protestants are afraid that venerating Mary will eventually lead to worshiping her. Protestants’ confusion when Orthodoxy claims that it venerates Mary but does not worship her arises from differences in their understanding of worship. Where the sermon is central to Protestant worship, the center of Orthodox worship is the Eucharist. (Arakaki, Why Evangelicals Need Mary 2012)

The evangelical converts to Catholicism, Scott and Kimberly Hahn, describe their difficulties with these different definitions of worship.

I could not figure out why it was that it seemed to be that Catholics worshiped Mary, even though I knew worship of Mary was clearly condemned by the Church.  Then I got an insight: Protestants defined worship as songs, prayers and a sermon.  So when Catholics sang songs to Mary, petitioned Mary in prayer and preached about her, Protestants concluded she was being worshiped.  But Catholics defined worship as the sacrifice of the body and Blood of Jesus, and Catholics would never have offered a sacrifice of Mary nor to Mary on the altar. (Hahn and Hahn, Rome Sweet Home: Our Journey to Catholicism. 1993, 145)

We can all agree that worship is due to God alone. Yet we honor the hero and the celebrity; why then would we not honor the heroes of the faith? Why not show the Blessed Virgin greater honor than that which we offer a singer, a soldier, or a sports hero?

The Great Panagia

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The following is from “The Scent of Holiness”
by Constantina R. Palmer

 

The Great Panagia

The Great Panagia

The love and admiration the saints have for the Most Holy Theotokos is one of the main common characteristics of their holiness. Countless are the stories in which you read of the saints’ devotion to the All-holy Lady. St. Mary of Egypt went to live out her days in the desert after her encounter with an icon of the Mother of God. St. Nektarios wrote hymns to her in Ancient Greek to demonstrate his love and devotion to her. And Elder Joseph the Hesychast could barely say her name without tears streaming down his face.

Elder Isidoros the blind was also like that. One evening, sitting down with a group of people, he bowed his head and crossed himself while tears rolled down his cheeks. Wiping them away, he said, “Excuse me, but at this time of night the love of the Mother of God pulls me.”

“That’s why,” the nuns told me, “he won’t speak about Panagia in front of too many people. He’ll start to cry.”

One afternoon I sat with the elder in the reception room. Since we were alone, I thought I’d take the opportunity to start up the conversation about the Mother of God he had said we would have.

“Papouli, why don’t you talk to me about Panagia now?”

“Okay, what you would like to know?”

“Why don’t you just tell me about her?” I asked him.

“She is . . . she is . . .” he said, raising his hand in the air and waving it in a circular motion— a gesture Greeks do when they are either pleased or annoyed about something.

“She is . . . she is . . . she’s like . . .”   he said, rubbing his hands together and ever so slightly smiling.

“I can’t describe her. She’s indescribable!” he finally said.

He then started singing the Supplicatory Canon to her: “Now to God’s Mother let us humble sinners run in haste and in repentance let us fall down before her feet, crying aloud with fervor from the depths of our souls, ‘Sovereign Lady, help us now, have compassion upon us, hasten for we perish from our many offenses. Let not your servants go empty away; we have you as our only hope.’” “Do you have the Paraclesis * here?” the elder asked.

“Yes, Papouli, but it’s in English,” I told him.

“Ah, never mind,” he said. He leaned his head back and rested it against the wall.

“How can we become like her?” I asked.

“You know she lived in the Temple from the age of three on,” he said.

“Yes, I know. She was the first hesychast.”

“That’s right! That’s right!” he said. “She was the most pure person that ever lived. She was pure because she never once accepted a bad thought. Not once. She kept her mind, her soul, and her body perfectly pure.”

I understood this to be his answer to my question. We can become like her if we also control our thoughts and struggle to attain purity of heart and mind.

He sang some different hymns to her and then he told me, “The more we cry out to her, the more she will harken to our prayers.”

I knew he spoke from experience. For, although he was blind since birth, when he went to the Holy Mountain to become a monk, his sight was gradually restored. For ten days he could see, but he told the Mother of God, “Panagia, take my sight back so I don’t lose Paradise.”

And she did.

But he wasn’t truly blind. He simply couldn’t use his bodily eyes. He’s been known to describe things in detail, things he couldn’t possibly know if he were truly blind. “And Jesus said, ‘For judgment I have come into this world, that those who do not see may see, and that those who see may be made blind’” (John 9: 39).

 Palmer, Constantina (2012-10-05). The Scent of Holiness: Lessons from a Women’s Monastery (Kindle Locations 3069-3099). Conciliar Press. Kindle Edition.

Elder Isidoros the Blind

Elder Isidoros the Blind