Truly it is worthy and just, right and profitable to salvation to praise Thee, o God, who art wondrous in thy Saints, and in them hast greatly been glorified. Though them adorning the sacred body of Thine only-begotten Son, by them Thou didst lay the foundations of Thy Church, which Thou didst found among the Patriarchs, prepare in the Prophets, and establish in the Apostles. From their number the blessed Peter, who was the first because of the confession of Thine only-begotten Son, and called to the office of an Apostle by the mouth of the Lord our God Himself, Thy very word, and his name being changed, was established as the foundation of Thy house, even him didst Thou make the protector and guardian of the gates of heaven, having granted to him the divine right, that what he should establish upon the earth, should be kept also in heaven. In his honor and glory today we keep this feast unto Thy majesty, and offer the sacrifice of thanks and praise, through Christ our Lord… (An ancient preface for the feast of St Peter’s Chair.)
St Peter, by the Sienese painter Simone Martini (1284 ca. - 1344), 1326.
VD: Te laudare mirabilem Deum in sanctis tuis, in quibus glorificatus es vehementer. Per ipsos Unigeniti tui sacrum corpus exornans, et in ipsis Ecclesiae tuae fundamenta constituisti, quam in Patriarchis fundasti, in Prophetis preparasti, in Apostolis condidisti. Ex quibus beatum Petrum, ob confessionem Unigeniti Filii tui principem, per os ipsius Domini Dei nostri Verbi tui vocatum in apostolatum, et immutato nomine, confirmatum in fundamentum domus tuae, caelestium claustrorum praesulem custodemque fecisti, divino ei jure concesso, ut quae statuisset in terris, servarentur in caelis. Cujus honore vel gloria hodie majestati tuae haec festa persolvimus, et gratiarum ac laudis hostiam immolamus. Per Christum...
This is the fourth and final part of Henri de Villiers’ examination of the various forms and traditions of the pre-Lenten period. Click the following links to read part 1, part 2 and part 3. The original French version was published in 2014 on the website of the Schola Sainte-Cécile.
Fore-Lent and Meditation on Human Frailty
Having demonstrated the antiquity and universality of Fore-Lent in the various rites, we conclude by highlighting some of the themes commonly used in this period in the liturgies of both East and West.
The reading of Genesis: meditation on the fall of Man and the need for Redemption
Adam was deprived of the delights of Paradise by the bitterness of the fruit; his gluttony made him reject the commandment of the Lord; he was condemned to work the earth from which he was formed; by the sweat of his brow was he obliged to earn the bread he ate. Let us look to temperance, lest we, like him, be made to weep before the gate of Paradise; but rather, let us struggle to enter therein. (Kathisma at Matins of Cheesefare Sunday, also known as the Sunday of the Expulsion from Paradise.)
A 16th century icon showing the Holy Trinity, the expulsion from Paradise, and monks contemplating the mortality of man as they preside over a burial.
The Byzantine hymns of the Sunday that immediately precedes the first day of Lent, which coincides with the Latin Quinquagesima, are dedicated to the Creation and the sin of Adam and Eve, and contrast the gluttony of our first father with Our Lord’s forty day fast in the desert. In fact, we frequently find readings from the book of Genesis at the beginning of Lent itself, or within the three-week period of Fore-Lent. In the Roman Rite, Genesis is begun at Matins of Septuagesima Sunday; both the Ambrosian and Byzantine Rites have a series of readings from Genesis and Proverbs at Vespers through most of the Lenten season.
The remembrance of death and the last things.
Meditation on the fall of Adam is naturally accompanied by further consideration of the frailty of man, his death, and the necessity of penance before Final Judgment. This is stated very eloquently in the Introit of the Roman Mass of Septuagesima.
Circumdederunt me * gémitus mortis, dolóres inférni circumdedérunt me: et in tribulatióne mea invocávi Dóminum, et exáudivit de templo sancto suo vocem meam.
The groans of death surrounded me: and pains of hell surrounded me; in my tribulation I called upon the Lord, and He heard my voice from his holy temple.
The Media vita is another text often sung during Septuagesima in the Roman Rite. This antiphon, which seems to date back to the 8th century, was later transformed into a responsory, and in many Uses integrated into the liturgy of Lent. In the Middle Ages, this dramatic text was often sung on the battle field to encourage the enthusiasm of the troops.
R. In the midst of life, we are in death; whom shall we seek to help us, but Thee, o Lord, who for our sins art justly wroth? * Holy God, holy mighty one, holy and merciful Savior, hand us not over to bitter death. V. Cast us not away in the time of our old age, when our strength shall fail, forsake us not, o Lord. Holy God, holy mighty one etc.
In a similar vein, the Byzantine Rite reads the Gospel of the Last Judgment (Matthew 25, 31-46) on the preceding Sunday, to call the faithful to think of the Last Things.
Prayer for the Dead
Just as the liturgy of Fore-Lent reminds us of our mortal condition fallen though sin, this period has also become in many liturgical traditions a privileged time to pray for the dead.
In the Armenian Rite, the Thursday of Quinquagesima (the last before the beginning of Lent) is dedicated to the commemoration of all the faithful departed. The same holds true for the Saturday before the Sunday of the Last Judgment in the Byzantine Rite; this is attested in the Typikon of the Great Church in the 9th or 10th century, the most important document describing the arrangement of services at Hagia Sophia. The Assyro-Chaldean rite has a similar observance on the Friday of the second week before Lent.
Among the Maronites, the three Sundays of Fore-Lent are dedicated to the commemoration of the dead, the first to deceased priests, the second to the “just and righteous”, the last to all the faithful departed. The arrangement of the season among the Syrian Jacobites is undoubtedly the more primitive: the fast of the Ninevites from Monday to Friday of Septuagesima week, the Sunday of prayer for deceased priests on Sexagesima, and for all the faithful departed on Quinquagesima.
Conclusions
The creators of the reformed Missal of Paul VI inexplicably suppressed the season of Septuagesima, an ancient element of the Roman Rite, without regard for its antiquity and its universality, and even though it is preserved in the Anglican Book of Common Prayer and in many Lutheran churches. These articles have sought to highlight and explain the following points:
1. In all liturgical traditions, Lent is preceded by a penitential period, originally the fast of the Ninevites in the third week before Lent, and the week immediately preceding it (Cheesefare / Quinquagesima / the fast of Heraclius). The most ancient witnesses to this period are from the fourth century: St Gregory the Illuminator, St Ephraem, Egeria’s pilgrimage to Jerusalem. The Copts of Egypt and Ethiopia have two fasts, the Mozarabic Rite has only Quinquagesima, the Assyro-Chaldeans have only the Rogations of the Ninivites. Starting at the beginning of the 6th century, Fore-Lent is developed and extended to a full three-week period before Lent in the Roman, Ambrosian, Byzantine, Armenian, Syro-Jacobite and Maronite rites.
2. This time is observed as a progressive entry into Lent, allowing for a gradual approach to, and spiritual preparation for, the ascetic exercises of that season. This aspect is explained by Protopresyter Alexander Schmemann in his description of the Sundays of Fore-Lent.
“Three weeks before Great Lent officially begins, we enter a period of preparation. It is a constant characteristic of our liturgical tradition that each major liturgical event – Christmas, Easter, Lent, etc., is announced and prepared for far in advance. Aware of our lack of concentration, the ‘materialist’ condition of our life, the Church draws our attention to the important aspects of the event that approaches, She invites us to meditate upon its various ‘dimensions’; therefore, before we can begin to keep the Great Lent, we are given the theological basis for it.” (The Liturgical Structure of Lent)
3. Meditation on the Fall of Man and the Last Things, and consequently, the common institution of prayers for the faithful departed, are an important recurring element in the various rites.
After bowing down to recite the In spiritu humilitatis, the priest stands up, lifts his hands in a circle, and raises his eyes to Heaven. As Gregory DiPippo notes, “This is the same gesture that he makes at the beginning of the Gloria, the Creed and the Canon, indicating the importance of the action.”
The priest then makes the sign of the cross over the bread and wine while he says:
Veni, Sanctificátor, omnípotens aeterne Deus: et bénedic hoc sacrificium, tuo sancto nómini praeparátum.
Which I translate as:
Come, O Sanctifier, almighty, eternal God, and bless this sacrifice prepared for Thy holy name.
After first appearing in the Irish Stowe Missal (early ninth century), the Veni Sanctificator found its way into various medieval Missals at different places during the Offertory, while in the Italian ordines it occupies the place that it still has in the 1570/1962 Roman Missal. [1]
From a linguistic point of view, there are two riddles to solve. The first is the invocation of God as Sanctifier. Abbé Claude Barthe does not think that it is the Holy Spirit which the prayer has in mind [2] while Rev. Nicholas Gihr insists that the referent “is beyond doubt.” [3] Later amplified versions of the prayer support Gihr’s confidence, such as this invocation from the Missal at Monte Cassino (eleventh and twelfth century):
Veni, Sanctificator omnium, Sancte Spiritus, et sanctifica hoc praesens sacrificium ab indignis manibus praeparatum et descende in hanc hostiam invisibiliter, sicut in patrum hostias visibiliter descendisti. [4]
Which I translate as:
Come, O Sanctifier of all, O Holy Spirit, and sanctify this present sacrifice prepared by unworthy hands, and descend upon this victim invisibly, as You descended visibly on the victims of the Fathers.
And if indeed the priest is praying to the Holy Spirit, a familiar pattern emerges: that of the Holy Spirit overshadowing something or someone in order to bless it or give it life. Examples include the Spirit moving over the face of the waters when God created Heaven and earth, and the Spirit breathing a soul into Adam when God created the first human being. But the most relevant biblical precedent is the Blessed Virgin Mary conceiving of the Holy Spirit when He overshadowed her. (Luke 1, 35-38) Just as the Word became flesh in the hidden womb of the Mother of God, the priest prays that the Word become flesh hidden under the appearance of bread and wine. As Gihr writes, there is an
analogy which the Consecration bears to the Incarnation. The great similarity and manifold relation between the accomplishment of the Eucharist on the altar and the mystery of the Incarnation of the Son of God in the bosom of the Immaculate Virgin Mary are often commented on by the Fathers, and are expressed also in the liturgy. The Incarnation is, in a manner, renewed and enlarged in the Eucharistic Consecration and that at all times as well as in numberless places. [5]
Because it is most likely the Holy Spirit who is being invoked, the Veni Sanctificator is sometimes portrayed as the Western Epiklesis. But we need not enter into this controversy in order to appreciate how the prayer reinforces the Trinitarian dimension of the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass, which is offered to the Father, through the Son, and with the Holy Spirit.
The second riddle is the meaning of “this sacrifice.” Critics of the traditional Offertory rite think that its sacrificial language falsely invents a second sacrifice, one that is different from that which takes place during the Canon. DiPippo is right to conclude that they are wrong. “The Offertory as it stands in the Missal of St. Pius V,” he writes, “….does not constitute a separate act of offering from the Canon of the Mass, much less an offering of something other than what the Canon itself offers.” On the other hand, the Offertory rite does seem to be more than a mere “Preparation of the Gifts” insofar as something sacrificial does seem to be taking place from the moment the chalice veil is lifted.
One clue into a possible tertia via is to revisit the biblical allusion in the amplified version of the Veni Sanctificator from the Monte Cassino Missal, when the priest prays for the Spirit to come invisibly just as He once descended visibly on the victims of the Fathers. The clearest instance of God visibly descending on a sacrificial victim is when Elijah challenges the false prophets of Baal to a contest of holocaust offerings to see which party is praying to the true God. After the false prophets fail to get Baal to ignite their sacrifice, Elijah drenches his offering in water three times and then asks God to light the fire.
Then the fire of the Lord fell, and consumed the holocaust, and the wood, and the stones, and the dust, and licked up the water that was in the trench. And when all the people saw this, they fell on their faces, and they said: ‘The Lord He is God, the Lord He is God.” (3 Kings [1 Kings] 18, 38-39)
Here, the sacrifice was consummated or completed when the fire of the Lord fell on the holocaust victim, but the sacrifice began when Elijah, after repairing the altar stones, ritually prepared the wood and the victim. Similarly, the sacrifice of the Mass begins when the priest begins the Offertory; he can thus refer to his actions as sacrificial even though he knows that the sacrifice will not reach its apex until the Words of Institution are uttered.
Notes
[1] Josef Jungmann, Mass of the Roman Rite, vol. 2, trans. Francis Brunner (Benziger Brothers, 1995), 68.
[2] Abbé Claude Barthe, A Forest of Symbols: The Traditional Mass and Its Meaning, trans. David J. Critchley (Angelico Press, 2023), 86.
[3] Gihr, The Holy Sacrifice of the Mass (Herder, 1902), 530.
Once again, we are very grateful to Mr Thomas Neal for sharing his work with us, some historical notes on motets which use the same words as one of the Offertory prayers which Dr Foley has been examining in his Lost in Translation series.
In spíritu humilitátis et in ánimo contríto suscipiámur a te, Dómine: et sic fiat sacrificium nostrum in conspectu tuo hodie, ut pláceat tibi, Dómine Deus.
In a spirit of humility, and in contrite heart, may we be received by Thee, O Lord; and may our sacrifice take place in Thy sight this day, that it may please Thee, O Lord God.
It is a particularly beautiful prayer which, along with the Suscipe, sancta Trinitas, occurs in the majority of medieval uses.
As Foley discussed in a follow-up post, one of the central subjects of this short prayer is the contrite heart, reflected in the priest’s posture: he recites the prayer in a low voice, as he prostrates himself before the altar. It is unsurprising, then, to find the text also used as the fourth psalm antiphon at Lauds on the First Sunday in Lent. It is set to a particularly beautiful chant in the second mode, found in both the Roman and Dominican Rites. The rising melisma on “fiat” underlines the speaker’s supplication, and is echoed on “tibi” in the penultimate quarter-measure.
This beautiful prayer was set to polyphony by the priest-composer Giovanni Croce (ca. 1557-1609). Born in the coastal town of Chioggia, on the southern side of the Venetian lagoon, in or around 1557, Croce studied with the great theorist Gioseffo Zarlino (1517-90) and sang in the choir of the Basilica di San Marco, Venice. He took holy orders in or before 1585 and spent the remainder of his life attached to the church of Santa Maria Formosa. By the early 1590s, Croce was vicemaestro at San Marco and taught singing at the seminary. In 1603 he succeeded Baldassare Donato (1525-1603) as maestro di cappella at the basilica, dying in post only six years later. While Croce is mostly remembered for his canzonette and madrigal comedies, he also composed a substantial body of liturgical music including masses (1596) and volumes of motets (1591, 1594, 1595) for double-choir or cori spezzati.
Croce’s polychoral setting of In spiritu humilitatis is not known to survive in any sources from his lifetime, but it was published posthumously, appended to Alessandro Grandi’s Motetti a cinque voci […] (Venice: Alessandro Vincenti, 1620). Is it too romantic to imagine Croce conceiving of a setting of this text one day while he celebrated Mass at Santa Maria Formosa? Here is the front cover from the Quintus partbook. A modern edition is available on the Polyphony Database.
While several commercial recordings of this motet have appeared in recent years, arguably none has matched that by the Choir of Westminster Cathedral under Martin Baker:
The Perugian composer Lorenzo Ratti (c.1589-1630), who made a career as a singer and composer in various churches and colleges at Rome and later at the Basilica della Santa Casa at Loreto, also composed a setting of In spiritu humilitatis. Ratti’s motet was published in the third part of his three-volume series Sacrae modulationes […] (Venice: Alessandro Vincenti, 1628), in which he sought to provide polyphonic settings (from two up to nine voices) of the Gradual and Offertory texts, as well as motets for the Elevation, for every Sunday of the liturgical year. Ratti’s setting is scored for two voices and continuo, and was intended as an Elevation motet for the First Sunday after Pentecost. To my knowledge, little of Ratti’s music has been transcribed into modern editions, let alone performed or recorded.
We continue with part 3 of Henri de Villiers’ examination of the various forms and traditions of the pre-Lenten period. Click the following links to read part 1 and part 2.
Synthesis of the fast of the Ninevites and Meatfare Week – the extension of Fore-Lent to three weeks.
We have seen that in the sixth century, the custom of preceding Lent by a week of abstinence from meat is well established in both East and West. The 24th canon of a council held at Orléans in 511 prescribes its observance, indicating that it was already spreading before that date in Merovingian France. Certain churches in the East added the fast of the Ninevites in the 3rd week before Lent. It was therefore natural to join these two periods together and extend Fore-Lent to three full weeks.
It is possible that in the East this liturgical “bridge” between Lent and the fast of Nineveh was first built in Armenia. The Armenian Fore-Lent is called Aratchavor, and comprises three weeks, the first of which, is called Barekendam, “the last day of fat.” The first week is quite strict, consecrated to the fasts of the Ninevites, instituted by St Gregory the Illuminator in the 4th century. The second and third week are less penitential, and the fast is kept only on the Wednesdays and Fridays.
The Cathedral of the Holy Cross, an Armenian church of the early 10th century built on Aghtamar island in Lake Van, now in the state of Turkey.
At Rome, Quinquagesima Sunday came to be preceded by two other Sundays, Sexagesima and Septuagesima, over the course of the 6th century. The old Gelasian Sacramentary (Vat. Reg. 316) and the Epistle book of Victor of Capua, dated to 546, attest the presence of Sexagesima in this period. The stations of the three Sundays were fixed by Popes Pelagius I (556-61) and John III (561-74) at the basilicas of St Lawrence Outside-the-Walls, St Paul and St Peter. We have homilies delivered by St Gregory the Great for all three of them. The oldest known Roman lectionary, known as the lectionary of Würzburg, was copied out in the first half of the 7th century for use in France, and largely corresponds to the arrangement of the old Gelasian Sacramentary; it also attests that the three Sundays were already established by that point.
St Gregory the Great, represented in the Sacramentary of Charles the Bald, (869-70). Bibliothèque nationale de France, Département des Manuscrits, Latin 1141
Fore-Lent also exists in the Ambrosian tradition, in which the three Sundays have the same names as in the Roman Rite. The Alleluia is not suppressed in this season, but rather, since the Borromean reform, on the First Sunday of Lent; before that, on the first Monday. The liturgical texts are quite different from those of the Roman Rite, which would likely not be the case if the season were not very ancient at Milan, rather than a mere Roman import. We may cite here the transitorium (the equivalent of the Roman Communio) of the Mass of Septuagesima, which proclaims the program of the season.
Convertímini * omnes simul ad Deum mundo corde, et ánimo, in oratióne, jejúniis et vigíliis multis: fúndite preces vestras cum lácrymis, ut deleátis chirógrapha peccatórum vestrórum, priusquam vobis repentínus superveniat intéritus, ántequam vos profundum mortis absórbeat, et cum Creátor noster advénerit, parátos nos inveniat.
Be ye all together converted to God, with pure heart and mind, in prayer, fasting and many vigils; pour forth your prayers with tears, that you may cancel the decree of your sins, before there come upon ye sudden destruction, before the depths of death swallow ye up; and so, when our Creator cometh, may He find us ready.
In this period, the Byzantine Rite reads a series of Gospels which prepare the people for the penance of Lent: the Publican and the Pharisee (Luke 19, 10-14), the Prodigal Son (Luke 15, 11-32), the Last Judgment (Matthew 25, 31-46), and Christ’s words on fasting from the Sermon on the Mount (Matthew 6, 14-21.) The organization of the three weeks is attested in the Typikon of the Great Church, of the 9th-10th century; the lack of liturgical documents older than this does not permit us to speak more precisely about the origins of the arrangement. It must be noted that in the first week, following the Sunday of the Publican and Pharisee, the Byzantines completely suppressed all fasting, even the regular weekly fast on Wednesday and Friday, as a result of certain controversies in the Middle Ages, to distinguish their own practice from that of the Armenians in the same week.
Only a few rites, those isolated from the rest of the Christian word by the advance of Islam, did not developed the three-week period of Fore-Lent. The Mozarabic Rite has remained in the primitive stage before the beginning of the 6th century with a single week of preparation for Lent. The Sunday of this week is called “ante carnes tollendas – before the meat is taken away”, indicating that meat was removed from the diet, but not milk products or other non-vegetarian foods. Egypt and Ethiopia have both the fast of Nineveh and the fast of Heraclius, but have never joined them into a single Fore-Lent. However, among the Ethiopians, the Sunday corresponding to the Latin Sexagesima, although counted with the liturgical season after Epiphany, is fixed in relationship to the following Sunday, called “the Sunday of the Bridegroom”, in which antiphons are taken from the Parable of the Wise and Foolish Virgins (Matthew 25, 1-13). This marks end the period in which marriages are permitted. The Assyro-Chaldeans have held to keeping the Rogations of the Ninevites, and do not have an equivalent to Quinquagesima.
In our latest episode, we tackle the development of the Kyriale, that section of the Liber Usualis and the Graduale Romanum, which includes the chants of the Mass Ordinary: Kyrie, Gloria, Credo, Sanctus, Agnus Dei, etc. We give some specifics, as well as the cultural and ecclesiastical trends that made the groupings we now know (18 Masses, Credos, ad libitum section) possible, and touch on the impact this organization of the liturgy had on the development of the polyphonic mass.
A reader who recently acquired from an antiquities dealer a handwritten letter from Pope St Pius X has kindly shared with us the image of the letter, a translation, and a look into the soul of Giuseppe Sarto, who so loved Gregorian chant that he quoted (relatively obscure) chants as authorities in making his argument.
The Letter
Note the elegance of penmanship. People like to say Pius X was a man of the people, a peasant, etc., and it’s true that he had holes in his shoes from walking back and forth to school. But, like any literate person before education tanked after the 1960s, he was taught excellent penmanship, grammar, and style. He was neither a country bumpkin nor a 21st-century public-school illiterate.
If you look closely on both the left and right sides, you can see fingerprints in what look to be the same color as the ink. My assumption is that these belong to Pope Pius as the ink would have been dry by the time the recipient received the letter. One might be reminded of an anecdote about Pius X:
Noted for his humility and simplicity, he declared that he had not changed personally save for his white cassock. Aides consistently needed to remind him not to wipe his pen on the white cassock, as he had previously done on his black cassock which hid stains.
While it cannot be seen from the digital image, when the letter is help up the light, the paper stock on which it was written contains a large and detailed watermark of the Pope’s face. In the lower right, there’s a watermark of the company that made the paper. The owner of this letter had it framed with double-sided glass so that the watermark can be observed while it's in the frame.
The document came with the original envelope in which it was mailed in 1908. That envelope is now quite stained and decayed, with some of the staining bleeding through to the letter.
The Transcription
The Translation
“Dearest Monsignor and Venerable Brother,
Please inform the canons of the cathedral of Chiavari that I have read with the greatest pleasure the story of the miraculous image of the Crucified, which is venerated in that city. - I congratulate them and the good people of Chiavari on this source of grace that Providence has reserved for them – and I pray that it might ever increase devotion for the good of souls. However, I believe it would not only disfigure the miraculous image with a gold crown, but would also contradict the very will of our Holy Redeemer, which allowed human malice, certainly for the highest purposes, to crown Him with thorns.
No image speaks so powerfully to the love of the true faithful as that of the Holy Crucified, and no crown, however precious, can replace the one that encircles the most holy head, of which the Church sings: The crown reddened with the blood of Christ, thorns changed to roses, and overcoming the wreath with its rewards, becomes more fitting for triumphal processions. [1] Hail, Crown of glory, More beautiful than gems and gold, knowing the sorrows of Christ you will surpass the crowns of the stars. [2]
I am certain that, as in the hymn, Venerable Brother, so shall the dearest canons enter into this sublime and holy concept, and with all best wishes, I impart the Apostolic Blessing.
Given at the Vatican on the 26th of November, 1908
Pius PP. X
To Msgr. Fortunato Vinelli Bishop of Chiavari
Notes
[1] The first hymn is “Exite Sion Filiæ,” from Lauds of the feast of the Receiving of the Crown of Thorns. It was also used for Vespers and Matins on the Friday after Quinquagesima Sunday, dedicated to the Most Holy Crown of Thorns of Our Lord Jesus Christ, in the Office of the Instruments of the Passion, or the Passion Offices.
[2] This line is from the hymn “Legis Figuris Pingitur” which comes from Lauds on the Friday after Quinquagesima Sunday, dedicated to the Most Holy Crown of Thorns of Our Lord Jesus Christ.
We continue with part 2 of Henri de Villiers’ examination of the various forms and traditions of the pre-Lenten period. Click here to read part 1.
Quinquagesima Week, the fast of Heraclius, Cheesefare Week
In both East and West, the week immediately before Lent took on a penitential character very early, beginning at first with abstinence from meat. We must remember that the early Church followed a strictly vegetarian diet for all of Lent. For the week immediately preceding Lent (the Latin Quinquagesima, Tyrophagia in the Byzantine Rite), although meat is removed from the diet, milk products, eggs and other animal products may still be consumed.
To better understand the origins of this week, we must also consider that Lent lasts for seven weeks in the East, and for six in the West. In the East, where there is no fast on either Saturday (except for Holy Saturday) or Sunday, this makes for a Lent of 36 fast-days. In the West, where the fast is kept also on Saturday, but never on Sunday, this gave the same number of days, following the Roman custom before the time of St Gregory the Great. To compensate for the missing days and to make the symbolic number of 40, the number of days of Christ’s fast in the desert, the Christians chose to anticipate the official beginning of Lent by a week. This was also done in consideration of the possible occurrence of feasts that displace the fast, principally the Annunciation.
The removal of meat from the diet in the week before Lent is attested early in the West. Quinquagesima Sunday is called in the ancient Latin books “Dominica ad carnes tollendas” or “levandas” (whence the term Carnival), indicating that one began to take away meat right after the Sunday, passing to the strict vegetarian diet only in the following week. The first week of Lent is then called “in capite jejunii – at the beginning of the fast.” Before the time of St Gregory, the Roman Lent began on the Monday after the First Sunday, the custom still followed by the Ambrosian and Mozarabic Rites. St Gregory set the fast to begin on the Wednesday of Quinquagesima, to make a complete period of 40 days. (To this very day, the Roman Rite retains the Office of Quinquagesima week even after Ash Wednesday, and the proper rubrics of Lent begin only with First Vespers of the First Sunday.)
The institution of Quinquagesima week is attributed by the Liber Pontificalis to the eighth Pope St Telesphorus (125 to 136–138). This attribution may be purely legendary, but since the notice of Telesphorus was written under Pope St Hormisdas (514-523), we can infer that this custom was already of immemorial use at the time, if it could plausibly be attributed to such an early predecessor. The so-called Leonine Sacramentary contains a Mass for Quinquagesima, the text of which seems to have been written in the reign of Pope Vigilius, ca. 538 A.D.
In the East, we can follow the same early indications of the establishment of Cheesefare Week (Tyrophagia). The pilgrim Egeria (Itinerarium 27, 1) reports that an eighth week of penance was kept at Jerusalem in the 4th century. Between the 5th and 6th centuries, the Georgian lectionaries, which are based on the Jerusalem liturgy of this period, bear witness to the existence of special readings for the two weeks before Lent.
In the 6th century, St Dorotheus of Gaza attests that the institution of a penitential week before Lent was already considered ancient in his time: “These are the Fathers who later agreed to add another week, both to train in advance and to urge on those who will give themselves over to the work of fasting, and to honor these fasts with the number of the Holy Forty Days which Our Lord Himself passed in fasting.” (Spiritual Works, 15, 159)
The custom of a week of ascetic practice before Lent, already attested before the 6th century (St Severus of Antioch counts it in his description of Lent), was sanctioned by official decision in the 7th century, in the reign of the Emperor Heraclius (610-41). The origin of his fast is uncertain. Most authors connect it with the events of the war which took place between the Byzantine Empire and the Persian Sassanid Empire from 602 to 628, during which the Jewish population of Palestine rebelled against the Christians and the power of Constantinople, and allied with the Persian troops. This led to the fall of Jerusalem to the Persians, the loss of the relics of the True Cross, and the massacre of 90,000 Christians. By the time Jerusalem was reconquered by the Byzantine armies, and Heraclius entered the city in triumph in 629, all the Christian churches, including the Holy Sepulcher, were in ruins. The Emperor ordered a massacre of the rebel Jewish forces, despite a previous promise of amnesty. In penance for this act of perjury, the Patriarch of Jerusalem instituted a week of fasting before the beginning of Great Lent.
This arrangement was at first supposed to last for only 70 years, but endures to this day with this name among the Copts of Egypt and Ethiopia. Alongside this more common explanation, another is generally neglected, namely, that Heraclius prescribed to his troops a week of abstinence from meat, and the reduction in the use of milk products, during the sixth year of his wars against the Persian, to implore God for victory. It is also possible that both explanations are true, and more than probable that they merely ratified a custom already widespread. In the following century, St John Damascene attests that Lent is preceded by a preparatory week. (cf. On the Holy Fast, 5).
The institution of a week of mitigated fasting before Great Lent, which was done very early in both East and West, has two virtues, one symbolic and the other practical. On the one hand, this week of semi-fasting was perceived as a way of fulfilling the sum of forty days; on the other, the transition to the strictly vegetarian diet was made easier by a gradual progression.
Our long-time contributor Fr Lawrence Lew, O.P., has another interesting project going on, in addition to his new book, which Peter wrote about last week. This is a series on British EWTN called “Through My Lens”, in which Father Lew shares his traveling experiences, and shows many of the wonderful photographs he takes of the places he visits. The first episode is about the Italian town of Orvieto, a place which is especially important for Dominicans. From 1261-4, St Thomas Aquinas lived and lectured in the Dominican house there, while Pope Urban IV and his court were sojourning in the city. This was the period when Thomas completed the Summa contra gentiles, and wrote the Catena Aurea, the Office and Mass of Corpus Christi, and the Contra errores graecorum.
In 1447, another famous Dominican, the painter Fra Angelico (1395 ca. - 1455), was commissioned to decorate a large chapel attached to the cathedral of Orvieto, along with his assistant Benozzo Gozzoli. This commission was interrupted when the artists were called away to Rome by Pope Nicholas V, and the project was not finished until about 50 years later, but Angelico and Gozzoli did leave behind two completed sections of the ceiling vault. Here is one of them, of Christ in Majesty at the Last Judgment, photographed by Fr Lew. Fra Angelico was beatified by Pope St John Paul II in 1982; today is the anniversary of his death in 1455, and his feast day.
Those who are blessed with access to Holy Week in the Tridentine Rite, that is, the rite celebrated for a thousand years and more prior to Pius XII’s changes in the mid-1950s, may find helpful a resource published by Os Justi Press, The Masses of Holy Week & Tenebrae, which contains the liturgy (in Latin with English translation) for Palm Sunday, the Triduum Masses, and the Office of Tenebrae, including the complete Gregorian chants. Summary rubrics are indicated. No page turning is required. The book features many medieval illustrations as well.
Ideal for scholas, for personal study, or as a congregational worship aid, the book is handsomely printed with readable type and weighs in at nearly 500 pages. The cost is $19.95. Bulk discounts are available (and for multiple countries, not just the USA) by contacting the publisher. The book is also available through Amazon, including all of its international sites.
The cover is shown above. Below are some sample pages; more may be found here.
N.B.: The paperback’s illustrations are printed in grayscale, not in color. The hardcover is in color. Please be aware that these volumes are printed “on demand” rather than offset-printed, and, as a result, the binding is not sewn but glued.
This article by Henri de Villiers was originally published in French on the website of the Schola Sainte-Cécile in 2014. It will be reproduced here in my English translation in four parts, since it is fairly long, and definitely worth a careful read. In it, Henri examines the universal Christian tradition of the preparatory period before Lent in the various forms in which it is practiced by the Eastern and Western churches.
In all ancient Christian liturgies, one finds a period of preparation for the great fast of Lent, during which the faithful are informed of the arrival of this major season of the liturgical year, so that they can slowly begin the ascetical exercises that will accompany them until Easter. This preparatory period before Lent generally lasts for three weeks. In the Roman Rite, these three Sundays are called Septuagesima, Sexagesima and Quinquagesima, names which derive from a system used in antiquity, counting the periods of ten days within which each of these Sundays falls. They precede the first Sunday of Lent, which is called Quadragesima in Latin.
The churches of the Syriac and Coptic tradition have preserved an older state of things, comprising two shorter periods of fasting, the fast of the Ninevites, and the fast of Heraclius, which are probably the starting point for the presence of Fore-Lent in the other rites.
The reminder of human fragility, meditation on the last things, and consequently, prayer for the dead, are recurrent elements of this liturgical season.
Inexplicably, the modern rite of Paul VI suppressed Fore-Lent from its liturgical year, notwithstanding its antiquity and universality.
The Origins of Fore-Lent: The Fast of the Ninevites
“And the word of the Lord came to Jonah the second time, saying: ‘Arise, and go to Nineveh the great city: and preach in it the preaching that I bid thee. And Jonah arose, and went to Nineveh, according to the word of the Lord: now Nineveh was a great city of three days’ journey. And Jonah began to enter into the city one day’s journey: and he cried, and said, ‘Yet forty days, and Nineveh shall be destroyed. And the men of Nineveh believed in God: and they proclaimed a fast, and put on sackcloth from the greatest to the least. And the word came to the king of Nineveh; and he rose up out of his throne, and cast away his robe from him, and was clothed with sackcloth, and sat in ashes. And he caused it to be proclaimed and published in Nineveh from the mouth of the king and of his princes, saying, ‘Let neither men nor beasts, oxen nor sheep, taste any thing: let them not feed, nor drink water. And let men and beasts be covered with sackcloth, and cry to the Lord with all their strength, and let them turn every one from his evil way, and from the iniquity that is in their hands. Who can tell if God will turn, and forgive: and will turn away from his fierce anger, and we shall not perish?’ And God saw their works, that they were turned from their evil way: and God had mercy with regard to the evil which he had said that he would do to them, and he did it not.” (Jonah 3)
To commemorate the fast of the Ninevites, the churches of Syria instituted a fast which runs from Monday of the third week before the beginning of Lent (the Monday after the Roman Septuagesima). These days are called “Baʻūṯá d-Ninwáyé” in Syriac, which can be translated as the Rogation (or Supplication) of the Ninevites. It seems that this fast initially lasted the whole week, more precisely, from Monday to Friday, since fasting on Saturday and Sunday are unknown to the Orient. (However, abstinence without fast may continue through these days.) The fast of Nineveh was eventually reduced to three days: Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday, while Thursday became a “day of thanksgiving of the Ninevites” in the Assyro-Chaldean rite. Traditionally, the number of these three days of fasting is explained by the three days passed by Jonah in the whale. This fast of Nineveh, which is very strict, is still kept by the various Syriac churches of both the Eastern tradition (the Chaldean, Assyrian and Syro-Malabar churches) and of the Western (Syriac churches). Among the Assyro-Chaldeans, the book of Jonah is read at the Divine Liturgy of the third day. This fast remains very popular; some of the faithful drink and eat nothing at all for the three days. Alone among the churches of the Syriac tradition, the Maronite Church no longer has the fast of the Ninevites properly so-called, but has adopted the arrangement which we will discuss later on of the three weeks of preparation for Great Lent.
The Egyptian Coptic Church, and likewise the Ethiopian, received from the Syrian churches this custom of the Supplication of the Ninevites. In the Coptic liturgy, these three days of rogation in memory of the Fast of Nineveh, also called “the fast of Jonah”, strictly follow the liturgical uses of Lent: the Eucharistic liturgy is celebrated after Vespers, the hymns are sung in the Lenten tone, without cymbals, and the readings are taken from the lectionary of Lent. The fast of Nineveh was adopted by the Coptic Church under the 62nd Patriarch of Alexandria, Abraham (or Ephrem, 975-78), who was of Syrian origin. It is possible that it was adopted more anciently in Ethiopia; the first bishop of Axum, St Frumentius, was of Syrian origin, and the Church of Ethiopia was reorganized in the 6th century by a group of nine Syrian Saints, who contributed enormously to the evangelization of the Ethiopian countryside. The fast of Nineveh (Soma Nanawe) is very strict for them, and no one is dispensed from it.
To what period does the fast of the Ninevites belong among the Syrians? Certain things indicate that it was probably practiced very anciently. Saint Ephrem, deacon of Edessa, composed hymns for the fast of the Ninevites; it seems that it lasted a week in that period, and not three days as it does today. The Armenian church has a fast of Nineveh that lasts for five days, beginning on the same Monday as the Syrians, and ends on the following Friday, on which the appeal of Jonah to the Ninevites is mentioned. This is also a full week of fasting, since the Armenians also do not fast on Saturday or Sunday, a constant in the East. These days have a fast and strict abstinence like that of Lent, and Armenian writers claim that it was established by St Gregory the Illuminator at the time of the general conversion of the Armenians in 301. It is likely that St Gregory simply continued a custom already in use among the neighboring Syrian Christians. The institution of this fast, which seems to be ancient among the Assyro-Chaldeans, may then have passed (or been re-established) in the 6th century among their Syrian Jacobite cousins at the behest of St Maruthua, the Jacobite Catholicos of Tagrit, during a plague in the region of Nineveh. It is possible that its reduction to a fast of three days instead of a week also dates to this period.
The children of Israel served the king of Babylon for seventy years, and afterwards, were set free and returned to Jerusalem. Likewise, we ourselves must serve all of this life, either for our faults and their punishment, or at least in hardship. For this reason, the Church, being set, as it were, in the captivity of Babylon, that is, in this world, and wishing penance to be done, so that She may someday be set free and come to the heavenly Jerusalem, keeps Septagesima (i.e. the “70th”). Therefore, She begins to read the five books of Moses, since the usefulness of penance is set out in them step by step as follows.
The first book, namely Genesis, instructs us in the first stages of penance, namely, in faith and fear, which are the essence of penance, since penance is conceived through them. It instructs us in the Faith in the same way as the Creed does, for what is said there, “of things visible and invisible”, is also said here: “In the beginning God created heaven and earth,” which is to say, the empyreal heaven, and the things which are in it, which are invisible, and the earth, that is, all these visible things. Just as in the Creed the persons of the Father and the Son are mentioned, so also in Genesis “In the beginning” (that is, in the Son,) God (that is, the Father,) created heaven and earth. Afterwards, the person of the Holy Spirit is named, when it says “And the spirit of the Lord was borne over the waters”, that is, the Holy Spirit, who created and rules over all things.
The Genesis Dome of the Basilica of St Mark in Venice; mosaic by unknown artist, 1215-35.
It also instructs us in the faith of the Incarnation and Passion, so that we might believe that Christ suffered in so far as he is a man, and not in so far as he is God; this is expressed through Isaac, who was not sacrificed, but rather a ram (took his place). Again it instructs us to believe that Christ was given by grace, and not for the sake of our merits, as Isaac (was given to Abraham by grace.) It also instructs us in the faith of the Resurrection and the Ascension and the sending of the Holy Spirit through the figure of Joseph, who after being sold was exalted in Egypt, distributing wheat through all of that land, just as Christ, after being sold, was exalted unto the world, and distributes the wheat of the word of God throughout the world through his preachers. …
Also, in the figure of Adam, it instills fear, lest through the vice of gluttony or through inobedience we be cast out of the spiritual Paradise, as he was cast out of the earthly Paradise. In the figure of Cain, it instructs us to guard against murder; in the cities which were completely destroyed, to stay away from the vice of Sodom; and in the flood, to abstain from every vice; and again, in the figure of Esau, to abstain from the vice of gluttony, since he was rejected he ate the red beans (i.e., the food which Jacob sold him for his birthrights). Furthermore, because in Septagesima we remember the misery which we incur because of the sins of our parents, we read the book of Genesis, which treats of the expulsion of the first parents from Paradise, … To signify how great our wretchedness is, first we read and sing (in the responsories) about the dignity of man, namely, that he was made in the image and likeness of God, that he was set in Paradise, that a companion was made for him, and that he could not die, nor suffer any other penalty, except that it came from his own fault.
The Expulsion from the Garden of Eden, by Thomas Cole, 1828
Now the introit of the Mass is “The groans of death have surrounded me” in which the Church confesses that it is in suffering and afflictions because of Sin … But, lest this mourning beget sloth or sadness within us, which lead to (spiritual) death, in the verse it speaks of consolation: “I will love Thee, o Lord, my strength.” … And notice that these words (of the Introit) are also the voice of the Church of the early days, weeping enable the first martyr, whose blood cries out to the Lord from the earth, which opened up its mouth and received it from the hand of Cain, his brother. For this reason, the station is at (the tomb of) St Lawrence, whose precious death by a new and unheard-of kind of suffering cried out to heaven, and was heard in all the world; wherefore also the authority of the Roman church was declared above all others in the martyrs. (William Durandus, Rationale Divinorum Officiorum, 6, 25, 1-4)
