Alexandermen (![[info]](http://p-stat.livejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif){kind=small} alexandermen) wrote,@ 2007-11-24 08:25:00 |
|
II-22 Divine Worship as a Synthesis of the Arts
This lecture was given in December of 1989. The
translation ,published in First Hour in 1997, is by
Steve Griffin
Divine Worship as a Synthesis of the Arts.
Fr Alexander Men
Divine worship is what you can see when you enter a church
in which a worship service is being conducted, and that with
which you inevitably, whether you are a believer or not come
into contact whether you are a believer or not as you watch this
peculiar religious rite. One person finds it lovely, mysterious and
enigmatic, while another finds it incomprehensible--rather like watching
a theatrical performance in a foreign language. To still another it all
appears very archaic and ancient like a fragment of hoary antiquity.
Perhaps each is right in his own way.
Divine service is what our Russian Orthodox Church has preserved
throughout her entire existence,even during the most difficult times. It
was performed in the first days of Christianity in Russia,throughout the
Tatar yoke, and in the twentieth century during Stalin's tyranny, when
church life was limited to it.
Divine service is the center,the pivot, if you will, the cultural foundation
of church life. It is an interesting fact that the earliest recorded witness
of divine service was by a non-Christian, Pliny the Younger whose
letters were published not long ago, was a wonderful ,cultured man who
had no idea of the new force which was coming out from underground,
as it were. In one of his letters he writes of Christians who appeared in
his province in Asia Minor, in present day Turkey, about 70-80 years
after Christ's crucifixion. There he describes divine service,whose
basis was the same principle we have even today, and which has been
present since Christianity's beginnings. And any cultured person who
would learn something of, and join even to a small degree with, the
cultural inheritance of his people and of the many of peoples of our
country(for Christian culture has cultivated the civilizations of the
Caucasus,the Baltic region, and Western Ukraine) should have some
sense of this.
You've probably noticed that scenes form divine service often appear in
contemporary films. Whether in the film versions of Russian classical
literature or in paintings of pre-revolutionary years, here and there the
events are given color by a wedding ceremony, a service for the dead,
divine service itself, or the singing of canticles. This singing can now be
heard on TV and radio. While I sometimes find it strange to hear the
Cherubic Hymn over the Moscow radio network, it is nevertheless
appropriate because it belongs to the greatest artistic,cultural and
spiritual tradition.
I don't pretend to be able to articulate the essence of divine service in
this short talk. I wish to speak of two things: first, why this
form of worship is called divine service, and second what takes part
in it.
The title of our discussion is taken from an article by the famous
scholar,theologian and philosopher Pavel Florensky who entitled his
article "Divine worship as a synthesis of the arts." Clearly, the arts
do not occupy the highest place in every individual church, nor can
their synthesis be practically achieved in any perfect way. But we're
concerned here about what is central and most important.
So we ask, why the term 'divine service'? Does man need to serve
God? One recalls the ancient pagan who believed that the deity was
in need of his sacrifices and offerings, and that in rendering to him a
part of what he had captured or harvested he was serving him. For 'to
serve' meant to serve a meal,as when it is said that a woman 'serves
at table' when feeding her guests. When pagans conducted their
ceremonial meal they believed that the deity was present,and that they
entertained him not merely to feed him, but to make him a brother,
someone dear, and so that he would take his place among them.
But if in ancient times this was natural and in order, for today's Christian
mind it seems quite strange. Even in pre-Christian times, several
centuries B.C.E. the Old Testament prophet said: "Do you really think
that God needs your lamps. He has lit all the Heavenly bodies. Do you
really think that God needs all your sacrificial rams? All the wild creatures
in the mountains and forests are his creation." These and other examples
show that people understood that God required something else. Thus
Hosea the prophet,who lived seven centuries before Christ, could say
on behalf of the Creator: "I desire mercy, not sacrifice." As it turns out
the greatest gift one can give to the Creator is mercy, humanness,
goodness. Nevertheless the principle of divine service has remained in
Christian culture. Why is this so?
Age-old Christian tradition and the Bible assure us that divine service is
the greatest gift we can offer to the One who gave us life and who created
the world and humanity. And the greatest gift to the Creator is our
response of worship and love. Divine service is man's dialogue,if you will,
with the universe,with the invisible one, with the Cosmos, with the
Divine. It is for this reason that we return to something ancient. Man calls
upon the Supreme Being so that he might draw near to him. This is a great
and marvelous mystery, and the reason why Christian churches throughout
the ages have never been schools, or places where people merely read,
received and learned information,and went home. Instead they have been
places where people are united by something,strong powerful and spiritual:
a faith which is never handed on only in words.
Of course you all know that the word is a great and powerful force. But
there are other things that are equally capable of expressing our states
and experiences, such as music, sculpture, painting, or the fine arts.
And over the centuries it has happened that the Christian Church has
indeed ,at her best, become the synthesis of the arts. This is seen for
instance in the way in which the church's architectural lines(as Florensky
stressed)give even the censer's smoke a certain plasticity, so that a
certain movement is created as the incense flows under the arches. So too
the church walls speak,as it were, as they interact with the words and
music of the canticles.
It must be said that throughout the two thousand years of Christian history,
and the millennium of our Russian Orthodox Church the architectural structure
of churches has changed,as have some rites and melodies. These have changed
because life, with its traditions and culture,has developed. While much has
changed, however,what has always remained is the tendency to pass on the
ineffable: to bring people together to unite their hearts as well as their
minds. Here we do not find an artificially invented theater or script, but
something that arose naturally and organically.
The churches of old Russia and Byzantium were distinctive models of the
universe. Every level of the universe participates in them:animals,
plants,constellations, human and sacred history, the creation of the
world the end of human history,and images of saints. In ancient churches
all these were selected according to a strictly determined artistic and
semantic structure. Everything,including the paintings of sacred history
on the walls and the images on the ikonostasis, was directed towards a
great whole: everything united the altar with the entire church.
Here we then ask, what is an altar? When you enter a church the first
thing you see in front and in center are closed gates. These are called
the Royal Doors. When these are opened one sees a cubic table called an
altar. The cube is an ancient symbol which represents the whole universe.
n every church you will find behind this cube seven candles,or,as is the
custom in our churches,seven lamps:and Old Testament symbol which stood
for the starry heavens. At the same time the number seven,whose
symbolism is complex and deep, represented the whole church, throughout
ger history,according to the Revelation of St John. The altar, on which
the Chalice stands during the central divine service in Christianity, is
the focus of everything.
It's a great shame that in our lack of culture(here I am thinking of
believers as well as unbelievers)we often behave irreverently in church.
Tour guides have spoken to me of the difficulty that they had in
getting people to remove their hats even in the Kremlin's cathedrals.
We act as barbarians in these buildings which are hallowed by centuries,
prayers,traditions and history. Even if we forgive such behavior in
conquering soldiers(as when Napoleon's grenadiers built stables in the
Kremlin cathedrals),how are we to understand it in the descendants of
those who with such reverence and great craftsmanship created these
buildings?
So I stress once again, for believer and atheist, that when one enters
a church one must above all feel respect and reverence, for it is a
house of prayer. Centuries are here present. The walls depict thousands
of years of people from all tribes and nations. The priests' vestments,
canticles, and the ornamental pattern surrounding the icons all came to
us from Judea, Syria,Egypt,Byzantium, and Ancient Rome. They developed in
Old Russia, and were then transformed in Russia. So much is combined here
that it is truly living history. I stress the word "living" because it is
not a museum, but living history.
Many art specialists have noted that even the great icons like the Vladimir
Mother of God or Rublev's Trinity lose their effect when hanging on a bare
museum wall, and not in a church. Of course it is wonderful that these
icons have been saved, restored and displayed. But in any event an icon is
an organic part of this synthesis of arts.
We refer to our main service of divine worship the Eucharist ,or thanksgiving.
Thanksgiving--as any person with a thankful heart senses--is a holy word. A
certain French writer, an atheist, not long before his death said:"I've
lived a wonderful life. I don't know whom to thank, but I give thanks with
all my heart." In the verses and songs which you all know, such as
"I love your,life," there is the unconscious sense of gratitude on the part
of man for all that happens.
For us Christians this is thanksgiving to God. It is the most noble, most
sublime prayer when a person is full of high feelings and understands just
how undeservedly he has received the amazing gift of life, love, friendship
beauty,labor,reason,everything that makes life rich and splendid. One is
grateful even for life's trials and difficulties because these fortify
the strong and true soul. You recall Pushkin's words: "So the heavy
hammer, while it shatters glass, forges the sword."(Poltava. Canto 1)
So we give thanks for everything, but above all because that which is
eternal,unfathomable,and boundless has come into our life.
Christianity's uniqueness lies in the fact that,while it acknowledges
an eternal supreme being who is indescribable in human terms, at the same
time it knows that this being has a great and intimate relationship with
us and that we as persons in one way or another have a deep relationship
with eternity. Each one of us,feeble infirm vertebrates with a short life
span, at the same time carries a star, an unending spark of eternity. And
above all this is linked with the coming of Christ, who revealed to us
the image of eternity, and who became for us the human face of the Divine.
It is very important,after all, for us to see a human face because we
are people, and not trees or flowers--although we can perceive the
boundless beauty of eternity in them. Recall the epilogue of Turgenev's
famous novel "Fathers and Sons", in which the flowers on the grave were
there as if to speak of reconciliation and life eternal. Nevertheless
a flower cannot say to us what a person can. And that's why the
appearance of the divine in human form in Jesus Christ becomes
the center of our thoughts,life, and faith.
On the night when Jesus was betrayed, by his closest disciple, knowing
already that enemies had taken up arms against him and were preparing for
him an unlawful punishment and a shameful death, he gathered together his
disciples, anticipating the ancient Passover. The feast was celebrated
in memory of the Israelites--the Old-Covenant Church's--deliverance from
slavery.
The religion of the Bible begins with a proclamation of freedom, for God is
one who sets people free. Recalling this deliverance,then,people for
nearly thirteen centuries gathered at the holy table with belief and
hope that the inscrutable God was also present at the table as a guest.
And God became a member of this community, this brotherhood of the
Old-Covenant Church. Christ acknowledged this ancient thirteen-century-
old tradition and transformed it into a new one:now the Paschal rite was
being preformed as bread and wine, symbolizing our food, human life, and
human labor, stood on the table before the disciples.
At this table with people whom he loved but who still understood him so
poorly, He said to them:"One of you shall betray me." And they grieved
and began to nudge one another asking in confusion: "who could it be?"
And each asked himself: "Is it I?" But he said nothing in response. Only
to one of them he whispered: "The one to whom I give this piece of
bread."
According to the ancient Paschal tradition, to give a piece of
consecrated bread to someone meant to express one's love,one's
respect, one's earned affection. And here Jesus reaches out,takes
the consecrated bread, and gives it to a man called Judas, Judas
Iscariot. Judas then takes the bread--a sign of friendship and
love--and at that moment in him all flares up. As St.John writes,
Satan entered him, and he got up and left.
When you are in Leningrad, in the Russian Museum, have a look at
Nikolai Nikolaevich Ge's painting "The Last Supper." This moment
is captured very dramatically in that work. Christ, lost in
thought, no longer has his eyes on Judas. The disciples are looking
at one another in confusion, while Judas is throwing on his cloak
as he makes his way outside. As Judas leaves he hears the Master's
words: :"Go and do what you have intended to do." The rest assume
that he has sent him to purchase something for the feast, for on the
following day they would celebrate Passover, and all the shops
would be closed. When Judas is gone, eleven men remain in
a dark room,amidst lamps, bread and wine.
When in ancient times the people of God made a Sacred Covenant
with Heaver, they brought a lamb as a sacrifice, sprinkling its
blood over all the people as a sign that all were blood brothers
and that God himself was a participant in this festival. The blood
was the holy blood of a sacrificial animal.
The Old Testament, the ancient Covenant, was about Mount Sinai,
lightning,thunder ,the people in terror, and Moses's stern words:
"I am the Lord your God. You shall have no other gods before me.
Your shall not make for yourself an idol. Remember the Sabbath by
keeping it holy.Honor your father and your mother. You shall not
murder. You shall not commit adultery. You shall not bear false
witness. You shall not covet." These words became fixed on the
consciousness of people two and a half thousand years ago. That
was the Old Covenant.
But Christ establishes a New Covenant. He does this with just a
few individuals, but for the benefit of a vast number of people--
indeed not just for one nation, but for all of humanity. And he
says: "Here there is no sacrificial animal's blood," then breaks
the bread saying: "This is my body." He then pours the wine, and
gives the cup to his disciples saying: "This is my blood." His
blood united his disciples. His body would be pierced within
hours. His death was that which would unite Him with them and
them together. Thus he remains with them forever. "Do this in
remembrance of me," He says to them.
"In remembrance of me," not simply as a memorial of something that
happened long ago, but because "i am with you always until the end
of the age." His presence here is the most important thing in the
sacrament of thanksgiving. Whether on Golgotha, at His death ,during
the disciples flight, or throughout the astonishing Passover events
which dispelled their fear and caused Christianity to spread
throughout the world, Christ's presence among his disciples has
always been sustained by the one sole act of gathering together to
break bread and share the Cup of wine.
This ,dear friends,is the basis of the sacrament of the Eucharist--
the presence of Christ among us--which was to be found in the catacombs
of ancient Rome,in immense Byzantine churches, in tall Gothic, and
magnificent Baroque cathedrals, in stern 19th century churches, and
even today in the churches of our city,and throughout the world and
always.
For this reason we use ancient garments and sing ancient canticles. Old and
new are here united:the present with antiquity. Eternity knows no age: she
looks upon everything from the same vantage point high above. She remains with
us. And I am convinced that in this very thing is found the power, essence, and
only basis of Christianity. For Christ says of himself: "I am the Alpha and
the Omega,the Beginning and the End." And no matter how terrible the altar
on which the Chalice and paten with the consecrated bread stand, no matter
what form the Chalice takes(one finds authentic jewelers art),no matter
the language of the text--whether Greek or Old Church Slavonic--it is
always ,in essence, the same thing.
And no matter the religious processions,services of prayer,or requiems;
no matter the ceremony,whether wedding ,infant baptism, or numerous
traditions and rites, our entire life is carried out within Church
tradition. But the Eucharist remains the pivot and most firm foundation
for divine service in the Church.
Art arises from spirit, for it is spirit that gives birth. Great art cannot
be bred by soul-less beings. Thus the art which adorns the sacrament of
the Eucharist, born throughout the two-thousand year old Christian
tradition, is born of spirit. So before entering a church, whether you
are a believer, an atheist, a doubter or a skeptic,try to bear these
things in mind. Remember that for these people gathered something very
important is taking place: here present is the One who began all this, and
who is invisibly present here and always.
This lecture was given in December of 1989. The
translation ,published in First Hour in 1997, is by
Steve Griffin
Divine Worship as a Synthesis of the Arts.
Fr Alexander Men
Divine worship is what you can see when you enter a church
in which a worship service is being conducted, and that with
which you inevitably, whether you are a believer or not come
into contact whether you are a believer or not as you watch this
peculiar religious rite. One person finds it lovely, mysterious and
enigmatic, while another finds it incomprehensible--rather like watching
a theatrical performance in a foreign language. To still another it all
appears very archaic and ancient like a fragment of hoary antiquity.
Perhaps each is right in his own way.
Divine service is what our Russian Orthodox Church has preserved
throughout her entire existence,even during the most difficult times. It
was performed in the first days of Christianity in Russia,throughout the
Tatar yoke, and in the twentieth century during Stalin's tyranny, when
church life was limited to it.
Divine service is the center,the pivot, if you will, the cultural foundation
of church life. It is an interesting fact that the earliest recorded witness
of divine service was by a non-Christian, Pliny the Younger whose
letters were published not long ago, was a wonderful ,cultured man who
had no idea of the new force which was coming out from underground,
as it were. In one of his letters he writes of Christians who appeared in
his province in Asia Minor, in present day Turkey, about 70-80 years
after Christ's crucifixion. There he describes divine service,whose
basis was the same principle we have even today, and which has been
present since Christianity's beginnings. And any cultured person who
would learn something of, and join even to a small degree with, the
cultural inheritance of his people and of the many of peoples of our
country(for Christian culture has cultivated the civilizations of the
Caucasus,the Baltic region, and Western Ukraine) should have some
sense of this.
You've probably noticed that scenes form divine service often appear in
contemporary films. Whether in the film versions of Russian classical
literature or in paintings of pre-revolutionary years, here and there the
events are given color by a wedding ceremony, a service for the dead,
divine service itself, or the singing of canticles. This singing can now be
heard on TV and radio. While I sometimes find it strange to hear the
Cherubic Hymn over the Moscow radio network, it is nevertheless
appropriate because it belongs to the greatest artistic,cultural and
spiritual tradition.
I don't pretend to be able to articulate the essence of divine service in
this short talk. I wish to speak of two things: first, why this
form of worship is called divine service, and second what takes part
in it.
The title of our discussion is taken from an article by the famous
scholar,theologian and philosopher Pavel Florensky who entitled his
article "Divine worship as a synthesis of the arts." Clearly, the arts
do not occupy the highest place in every individual church, nor can
their synthesis be practically achieved in any perfect way. But we're
concerned here about what is central and most important.
So we ask, why the term 'divine service'? Does man need to serve
God? One recalls the ancient pagan who believed that the deity was
in need of his sacrifices and offerings, and that in rendering to him a
part of what he had captured or harvested he was serving him. For 'to
serve' meant to serve a meal,as when it is said that a woman 'serves
at table' when feeding her guests. When pagans conducted their
ceremonial meal they believed that the deity was present,and that they
entertained him not merely to feed him, but to make him a brother,
someone dear, and so that he would take his place among them.
But if in ancient times this was natural and in order, for today's Christian
mind it seems quite strange. Even in pre-Christian times, several
centuries B.C.E. the Old Testament prophet said: "Do you really think
that God needs your lamps. He has lit all the Heavenly bodies. Do you
really think that God needs all your sacrificial rams? All the wild creatures
in the mountains and forests are his creation." These and other examples
show that people understood that God required something else. Thus
Hosea the prophet,who lived seven centuries before Christ, could say
on behalf of the Creator: "I desire mercy, not sacrifice." As it turns out
the greatest gift one can give to the Creator is mercy, humanness,
goodness. Nevertheless the principle of divine service has remained in
Christian culture. Why is this so?
Age-old Christian tradition and the Bible assure us that divine service is
the greatest gift we can offer to the One who gave us life and who created
the world and humanity. And the greatest gift to the Creator is our
response of worship and love. Divine service is man's dialogue,if you will,
with the universe,with the invisible one, with the Cosmos, with the
Divine. It is for this reason that we return to something ancient. Man calls
upon the Supreme Being so that he might draw near to him. This is a great
and marvelous mystery, and the reason why Christian churches throughout
the ages have never been schools, or places where people merely read,
received and learned information,and went home. Instead they have been
places where people are united by something,strong powerful and spiritual:
a faith which is never handed on only in words.
Of course you all know that the word is a great and powerful force. But
there are other things that are equally capable of expressing our states
and experiences, such as music, sculpture, painting, or the fine arts.
And over the centuries it has happened that the Christian Church has
indeed ,at her best, become the synthesis of the arts. This is seen for
instance in the way in which the church's architectural lines(as Florensky
stressed)give even the censer's smoke a certain plasticity, so that a
certain movement is created as the incense flows under the arches. So too
the church walls speak,as it were, as they interact with the words and
music of the canticles.
It must be said that throughout the two thousand years of Christian history,
and the millennium of our Russian Orthodox Church the architectural structure
of churches has changed,as have some rites and melodies. These have changed
because life, with its traditions and culture,has developed. While much has
changed, however,what has always remained is the tendency to pass on the
ineffable: to bring people together to unite their hearts as well as their
minds. Here we do not find an artificially invented theater or script, but
something that arose naturally and organically.
The churches of old Russia and Byzantium were distinctive models of the
universe. Every level of the universe participates in them:animals,
plants,constellations, human and sacred history, the creation of the
world the end of human history,and images of saints. In ancient churches
all these were selected according to a strictly determined artistic and
semantic structure. Everything,including the paintings of sacred history
on the walls and the images on the ikonostasis, was directed towards a
great whole: everything united the altar with the entire church.
Here we then ask, what is an altar? When you enter a church the first
thing you see in front and in center are closed gates. These are called
the Royal Doors. When these are opened one sees a cubic table called an
altar. The cube is an ancient symbol which represents the whole universe.
n every church you will find behind this cube seven candles,or,as is the
custom in our churches,seven lamps:and Old Testament symbol which stood
for the starry heavens. At the same time the number seven,whose
symbolism is complex and deep, represented the whole church, throughout
ger history,according to the Revelation of St John. The altar, on which
the Chalice stands during the central divine service in Christianity, is
the focus of everything.
It's a great shame that in our lack of culture(here I am thinking of
believers as well as unbelievers)we often behave irreverently in church.
Tour guides have spoken to me of the difficulty that they had in
getting people to remove their hats even in the Kremlin's cathedrals.
We act as barbarians in these buildings which are hallowed by centuries,
prayers,traditions and history. Even if we forgive such behavior in
conquering soldiers(as when Napoleon's grenadiers built stables in the
Kremlin cathedrals),how are we to understand it in the descendants of
those who with such reverence and great craftsmanship created these
buildings?
So I stress once again, for believer and atheist, that when one enters
a church one must above all feel respect and reverence, for it is a
house of prayer. Centuries are here present. The walls depict thousands
of years of people from all tribes and nations. The priests' vestments,
canticles, and the ornamental pattern surrounding the icons all came to
us from Judea, Syria,Egypt,Byzantium, and Ancient Rome. They developed in
Old Russia, and were then transformed in Russia. So much is combined here
that it is truly living history. I stress the word "living" because it is
not a museum, but living history.
Many art specialists have noted that even the great icons like the Vladimir
Mother of God or Rublev's Trinity lose their effect when hanging on a bare
museum wall, and not in a church. Of course it is wonderful that these
icons have been saved, restored and displayed. But in any event an icon is
an organic part of this synthesis of arts.
We refer to our main service of divine worship the Eucharist ,or thanksgiving.
Thanksgiving--as any person with a thankful heart senses--is a holy word. A
certain French writer, an atheist, not long before his death said:"I've
lived a wonderful life. I don't know whom to thank, but I give thanks with
all my heart." In the verses and songs which you all know, such as
"I love your,life," there is the unconscious sense of gratitude on the part
of man for all that happens.
For us Christians this is thanksgiving to God. It is the most noble, most
sublime prayer when a person is full of high feelings and understands just
how undeservedly he has received the amazing gift of life, love, friendship
beauty,labor,reason,everything that makes life rich and splendid. One is
grateful even for life's trials and difficulties because these fortify
the strong and true soul. You recall Pushkin's words: "So the heavy
hammer, while it shatters glass, forges the sword."(Poltava. Canto 1)
So we give thanks for everything, but above all because that which is
eternal,unfathomable,and boundless has come into our life.
Christianity's uniqueness lies in the fact that,while it acknowledges
an eternal supreme being who is indescribable in human terms, at the same
time it knows that this being has a great and intimate relationship with
us and that we as persons in one way or another have a deep relationship
with eternity. Each one of us,feeble infirm vertebrates with a short life
span, at the same time carries a star, an unending spark of eternity. And
above all this is linked with the coming of Christ, who revealed to us
the image of eternity, and who became for us the human face of the Divine.
It is very important,after all, for us to see a human face because we
are people, and not trees or flowers--although we can perceive the
boundless beauty of eternity in them. Recall the epilogue of Turgenev's
famous novel "Fathers and Sons", in which the flowers on the grave were
there as if to speak of reconciliation and life eternal. Nevertheless
a flower cannot say to us what a person can. And that's why the
appearance of the divine in human form in Jesus Christ becomes
the center of our thoughts,life, and faith.
On the night when Jesus was betrayed, by his closest disciple, knowing
already that enemies had taken up arms against him and were preparing for
him an unlawful punishment and a shameful death, he gathered together his
disciples, anticipating the ancient Passover. The feast was celebrated
in memory of the Israelites--the Old-Covenant Church's--deliverance from
slavery.
The religion of the Bible begins with a proclamation of freedom, for God is
one who sets people free. Recalling this deliverance,then,people for
nearly thirteen centuries gathered at the holy table with belief and
hope that the inscrutable God was also present at the table as a guest.
And God became a member of this community, this brotherhood of the
Old-Covenant Church. Christ acknowledged this ancient thirteen-century-
old tradition and transformed it into a new one:now the Paschal rite was
being preformed as bread and wine, symbolizing our food, human life, and
human labor, stood on the table before the disciples.
At this table with people whom he loved but who still understood him so
poorly, He said to them:"One of you shall betray me." And they grieved
and began to nudge one another asking in confusion: "who could it be?"
And each asked himself: "Is it I?" But he said nothing in response. Only
to one of them he whispered: "The one to whom I give this piece of
bread."
According to the ancient Paschal tradition, to give a piece of
consecrated bread to someone meant to express one's love,one's
respect, one's earned affection. And here Jesus reaches out,takes
the consecrated bread, and gives it to a man called Judas, Judas
Iscariot. Judas then takes the bread--a sign of friendship and
love--and at that moment in him all flares up. As St.John writes,
Satan entered him, and he got up and left.
When you are in Leningrad, in the Russian Museum, have a look at
Nikolai Nikolaevich Ge's painting "The Last Supper." This moment
is captured very dramatically in that work. Christ, lost in
thought, no longer has his eyes on Judas. The disciples are looking
at one another in confusion, while Judas is throwing on his cloak
as he makes his way outside. As Judas leaves he hears the Master's
words: :"Go and do what you have intended to do." The rest assume
that he has sent him to purchase something for the feast, for on the
following day they would celebrate Passover, and all the shops
would be closed. When Judas is gone, eleven men remain in
a dark room,amidst lamps, bread and wine.
When in ancient times the people of God made a Sacred Covenant
with Heaver, they brought a lamb as a sacrifice, sprinkling its
blood over all the people as a sign that all were blood brothers
and that God himself was a participant in this festival. The blood
was the holy blood of a sacrificial animal.
The Old Testament, the ancient Covenant, was about Mount Sinai,
lightning,thunder ,the people in terror, and Moses's stern words:
"I am the Lord your God. You shall have no other gods before me.
Your shall not make for yourself an idol. Remember the Sabbath by
keeping it holy.Honor your father and your mother. You shall not
murder. You shall not commit adultery. You shall not bear false
witness. You shall not covet." These words became fixed on the
consciousness of people two and a half thousand years ago. That
was the Old Covenant.
But Christ establishes a New Covenant. He does this with just a
few individuals, but for the benefit of a vast number of people--
indeed not just for one nation, but for all of humanity. And he
says: "Here there is no sacrificial animal's blood," then breaks
the bread saying: "This is my body." He then pours the wine, and
gives the cup to his disciples saying: "This is my blood." His
blood united his disciples. His body would be pierced within
hours. His death was that which would unite Him with them and
them together. Thus he remains with them forever. "Do this in
remembrance of me," He says to them.
"In remembrance of me," not simply as a memorial of something that
happened long ago, but because "i am with you always until the end
of the age." His presence here is the most important thing in the
sacrament of thanksgiving. Whether on Golgotha, at His death ,during
the disciples flight, or throughout the astonishing Passover events
which dispelled their fear and caused Christianity to spread
throughout the world, Christ's presence among his disciples has
always been sustained by the one sole act of gathering together to
break bread and share the Cup of wine.
This ,dear friends,is the basis of the sacrament of the Eucharist--
the presence of Christ among us--which was to be found in the catacombs
of ancient Rome,in immense Byzantine churches, in tall Gothic, and
magnificent Baroque cathedrals, in stern 19th century churches, and
even today in the churches of our city,and throughout the world and
always.
For this reason we use ancient garments and sing ancient canticles. Old and
new are here united:the present with antiquity. Eternity knows no age: she
looks upon everything from the same vantage point high above. She remains with
us. And I am convinced that in this very thing is found the power, essence, and
only basis of Christianity. For Christ says of himself: "I am the Alpha and
the Omega,the Beginning and the End." And no matter how terrible the altar
on which the Chalice and paten with the consecrated bread stand, no matter
what form the Chalice takes(one finds authentic jewelers art),no matter
the language of the text--whether Greek or Old Church Slavonic--it is
always ,in essence, the same thing.
And no matter the religious processions,services of prayer,or requiems;
no matter the ceremony,whether wedding ,infant baptism, or numerous
traditions and rites, our entire life is carried out within Church
tradition. But the Eucharist remains the pivot and most firm foundation
for divine service in the Church.
Art arises from spirit, for it is spirit that gives birth. Great art cannot
be bred by soul-less beings. Thus the art which adorns the sacrament of
the Eucharist, born throughout the two-thousand year old Christian
tradition, is born of spirit. So before entering a church, whether you
are a believer, an atheist, a doubter or a skeptic,try to bear these
things in mind. Remember that for these people gathered something very
important is taking place: here present is the One who began all this, and
who is invisibly present here and always.
