Continuing where I left off in my first installation, What Exactly Are We Doing Wrong? A Liturgical Challenge to Calvinists, we will continue to look at the Liturgy of St. John Chrysostom.

After the prayers of the GREAT LITANY and the FIRST ANTIPHON, there follows a second antiphon, which is sometimes omitted in certain Eastern Churches. This is followed by the HYMN OF THE INCARNATION:

“Glory to the Father and to the Son and to the Holy Spirit, now and forever and to the ages of ages. Amen.

Only-begotten Son and Logos of God, being immortal, You condescended for our salvation to take flesh from the holy Theotokos and ever-virgin Mary and, without change, became man. Christ, our God, You were crucified and conquered death by death. Being one with the Holy Trinity, glorified with the Father and the Holy Spirit: Save us.”

The purpose of this hymn is to defend the deity of Christ against the many Arian heretics who were running around claiming Christ to be merely a created being rather than God Incarnate. I fail to see anything in this hymn to which Calvinists could object inasmuch as it defends the orthodox understanding of the Trinity.

A SMALL LITANY follows the HYMN OF THE INCARNATION. This, in turn, is followed by the chanting of the SMALL LITANY, which consists of four short prayers. The next prayer to be chanted is the THIRD ANTIPHON.  Again, we chant verses from the Psalms:

Come let us sing joyfully to the Lord, let us acclaim God our Savior. Psalm 95:1

Let us come before His face with praise, and acclaim Him in psalms. Psalm 95:2

For God is the great Lord and the great king over all the earth. Psalm 47:2

After each verse, the following refrain is chanted: “Son of God Matthew 14:33 risen from the dead Matthew 28:7  save us who sing to You, Alleluia.”

What a Calvinist should appreciate about the THIRD ANTIPHON is that while it is being chanted with refrains, the priest or deacon takes the Gospel book, and holding it above his head, proceeds out of the altar area to stand in front of iconostasis. He then chants “WISDOM! BE ATTENTIVE!” This is the LITTLE ENTRANCE.

The first time I saw this, as a Calvinist looking into the ancient and apostolic faith, I was a bit stunned. I had been told that Catholics (and by extension, the Orthodox) didn’t bother reading the Bible, nor did they care for it. I was told that they put “Holy Tradition” on a par with or even above the Bible. This did not sit well with me as a Calvinist. Imagine my surprise to see the Bible raised on high, paraded in front of the congregation, and then kissed by the deacon and priest before being placed back on the altar.

The THIRD ANTIPHON is followed by the chanting of the TROPARIA and KONTAKIA, short hymns sung after the small entrance at Divine Liturgy. For Sundays the subject is the Holy Resurrection; a different hymn for each of the Eight Tones. Every feast has its particular hymn describing the event or the virtues of the saint. Also there are hymns giving in an abbreviated form the substance of the day’s feast.  Originally, this was a hymn composed of many stanza (18-24) whose lengthy text required the use of a scroll. What remains today are short preliminary stanzas that give a concise meaning to the feast being celebrated. Here are the TROPARIA and KONTAKIA for tomorrow,  January 20, 2019.

TROPARIA:  “When You went down to death, O Life Immortal, You struck Hades dead with the blazing light of Your divinity. When You raised the dead from the nether world, all the powers of Heaven cried out: ‘O Giver of life, Christ our God, glory be to You!’ ”

KONTAKIA:  “You rose from the tomb, O almighty Savior, and Hades, seeing this wonder, was stricken with fear; and the dead arose. Creation saw and rejoices with You, and Adam exults. And the world, my Savior, sings Your praises forever.”

Notice the very biblical theme of these hymns:  Christ our God raised from the dead. The Resurrection, which is the reason we worship on Sunday instead of Saturday.  Our worship is the celebration of Christ’s glorious Resurrection, which brought life to all.

I would be remiss if I didn’t mention, much to the consternation of any Calvinist who might be reading this, that after the TROPARIA AND KONTAKIA,  there is a short hymn,  called a THEOTOKIA, which is sung in honor of the Mother of God.

THEOTOKIA:  “The tomb and death could not hold the Mother of God, unceasing in her intercession and unfailing hope of patronage, for as the Mother of Life she was transferred to life by Him Who had dwelt in her ever-virgin womb.”

However, unlike the many false accusations which are hurled at Orthodox (and Catholic) worship, you will not find in any of these honorarium hymns a description of Mary as God, part of the Godhead, or having attributes which can only be ascribed to God. Yes, as an X-Calvinist, it did take a while for me to understand this. Marian honor can be a very hard thing for Protestants of any stripe to understand. Only as I understood the covenant relationship of God to mankind, and of Mary as the New Eve, did I begin to understand what makes our honoring of Her to be proper.

The next action of the Liturgy is the chanting of the PROKEIMENON:

“A prokeimenon (Greek Προκείμενον, plural prokeimena; sometimes prokimenon / prokimena; lit. “that which precedes”) is a psalm or canticle refrain sung responsorially at certain specified points of the Divine Liturgy or the Divine Office, usually to introduce a scripture reading.”

The example given is the Sunday prokeimenon in Tone 8, assuming no additional feast. The verses are taken from Psalm 75 (Septuagint numbering).

Reader: “The prokeimenon is in the eighth tone: Pray and make your vows before the Lord our God!”

Choir:”Pray and make your vows before the Lord our God!”

Reader: “In Judah, God is known; His name is great in Israel!”

Choir:”Pray and make your vows before the Lord our God!”

Reader: “Pray and make your vows!”

Choir:”Before the Lord our God!”

So here is yet another reading from the Bible. In fact, the Divine Liturgy is rather full of biblical references. The reading of the Epistle of the Day is followed by the chanting of the TRISAGION HYMN.

The Trisagion (Greek: Τρισάγιον “Thrice Holy”), sometimes called by its opening line Agios O Theos, is a standard hymn of the Divine Liturgy in most of the Eastern Orthodox, Oriental Orthodox and Eastern Catholic churches.

In churches which use the Byzantine Rite, the Trisagion is chanted immediately before the Prokeimenon and the Epistle reading. It is also included in a set of prayers named for it, called the Trisagion Prayers, which forms part of numerous services (the Hours, Vespers, Matins, and as part of the opening prayers for most services).

When the Trisagion is sung during the Divine Liturgy of the Byzantine Rite, before the Prokeimenon of the Gospel that precedes the Epistle reading, it is normally sung three times to one of many melodies composed for it. This is followed by singing Glory… Now…, the second half of the Trisagion once, and finally the whole Trisagion a fourth time:

“Holy God, Holy [and] Mighty, Holy [and] Immortal, have mercy on us.

Holy God, Holy [and] Mighty, Holy [and] Immortal, Have mercy on us.

Holy God, Holy [and] Mighty, Holy [and] Immortal, Have mercy on us.

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

Holy and Immortal, have mercy on us.

Holy God, Holy and Mighty, Holy and Immortal, Have mercy on us.”

The reading of the Gospel passage of the day follows, preceded by the three-fold singing of Alleluia.  Before and after the Gospel reading, the chant “Glory be to you our God, glory be to you.” is sung. A homily (hopefully short – I was taught in seminary that a homily shouldn’t go over eight minutes) follows.  And thus ends the first half of the Divine Liturgy – the Liturgy of the Word.

Forgive me for being perhaps a tad smarmy here, but so far, I see no calling upon the names of pagan gods, nothing which directly violates Scripture, and other than the prayers to the Theotokos and the Hymn to the Theotokos, nothing that should even be controversial. But then again, having been in the Eastern Church for 18 years now, I am a bit prejudiced and may have lost my perspective.

SO…

if you feel that I have missed something and that there is a serious violation of the Regulative Principles of Worship (or whatever other Protestant form you follow) please make note in the comments section below so we can discuss this. As I said before, my desire is not to try to scald Calvinists, but to show that the Orthodox faith does have a very biblical basis.  I hope that I might be in some small measure accomplishing this.

Part Three – The Eucharist