The Shepherd, April 2008
Then they began Matins. They chanted the canon “The waves of the sea” completely, verse by verse, antiphonally, with the heirmos and fourteen troparia. They chanted two hours. At that time they lit the candles and oil lamps around the whole church; in the domes themselves more than a thousand lamps were lit. We monastics all stood in the altar. Then the Patriarch and the metropolitans, archbishops, bishops, archimandrites, abbots, priests and deacons and all the church clergy, having put on all their sacred vestments, took twelve banners. The banners were richly adorned; they had been presented by ancient Greek and Georgian kings. They were sewn with gold and pearls. They bring them out only on Pascha. Behind the Patriarch they carried a banner which took three men to hold; it was sewn only with gold, and was an image of the Resurrection of Christ of Russian workmanship offered by Muscovite merchants. Then they gave everyone large candles of white wax. They also lit candles and oil lamps around the whole church.
The Sepulchre seemed as though it were one fiery lamp. From the large candles in the hands of each person the whole church became as though on fire and the domes of the church shone like the sun. Those that were in the procession of the Cross took the Gospels, icons, crosses, and the candles and went from the altar of the Church of the Resurrection through the royal gates directly to Christ’s Sepulchre, chanting, “Angels in the Heavens, O Christ our Saviour, praise Thy Resurrection with hymns; deem us also who are on earth worthy to glorify Thee with a pure heart.” When they had gone in procession around the Sepulchre three times, the whole concourse of clergy stopped opposite the doors of the Sepulchre. Then the Patriarch himself read the Gospel of the Resurrection from Matthew which is read in the evening on Saturday in the Liturgy. Then he took the censer inside, and censed the Grave of Christ. When he came out he censed around the whole shrine and all the brethren. Then with all the bishops he went into the Sepulchre of Christ, and there, having censed, he exclaimed, “Glory to holy and consubstantial and indivisible Trinity, always, now and ever, and unto the ages of ages.” The bishops exclaimed, “Amen.” Then the Patriarch himself with all the bishops, from within the Sepulchre itself, chanted, “Christ is risen from the dead, trampling down death by death, and on those in the graves hath He bestowed life.” And they chanted this three times. They did not chant in Russian, but only in Greek, that is, “Christos anesti ek nekron, thanato thanaton patisas, kai tis en tis mnemasi zoen charisamenos.” Then the chanters chanted and all those standing around the Sepulchre of Christ chanted it many times.
O what joy there was then, and who would not weep for joy, beholding the Grave of their Saviour Jesus Christ before their own eyes, standing empty, for He has risen from the dead! Who could not thank their Creator Who had deemed them worthy to celebrate Holy Pascha, His glorious Resurrection from the dead, in the Holy City of Jerusalem, around His very Grave and on that very spot where the mystery of our salvation was accomplished? What pen can describe our joy? Or who could explain it in words? Which tongue could tell of it? Only he can understand it who tastes of this joy in the purity of his heart. How is it possible not to rejoice or to be happy? We had gathered from the four corners of the earth, Christians of different tongues, all gathered in one church. We all stood around the Grave of our Saviour and were glorifying His glorious Resurrection from the dead. In truth, all things were now filled with light; then the canon of Pascha became for us real and clear. For that which we were chanting, we were seeing with our own eyes. And with what feelings did we exclaim to Sion on which we were standing: “Lift up thine eyes about thee, O Sion, and see, for behold, from the west, from the north, and from the sea and from the south as to a light by God illumined, have thy children come to thee, blessing Christ forevermore” (8th Ode, 2nd trop.). Truly for us, holy and worthy of all solemn triumph is this redeeming and radiantly effulgent night, the harbinger of the bright-beaming Day of the Resurrection on which Light eternal shone forth in the flesh from the grave for all.
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