The Shepherd, July 2005

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§ 115. Teaching on Passion Week. The Particular Characteristics of the Services of Passion Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday. Passion Week, which follows after the Holy Forty Days (Great Lent), is wholly consecrated to commemorating the last days of the earthly life of the Saviour, His Suffering, death and burial. On account of the importance of these commemorations all the days of the week in Passion Week are referred to as Great. The last three days have particularly touching commemorations, prayers and chants.

During the first three days, just as in Great Lent itself, the services each day consist of Great Compline, Mattins, the Hours and the Liturgy of the Presanctified Gifts, although the services are much longer. During these three days, the whole Psalter is read (with the exception of Psalm 118 which is read later in the week). There are Gospel readings at Mattins and at the Liturgy, and during the Hours all four Gospels (from Matthew 1:1 to John 13:32) are read. This intensified reading of the Gospels is not simply to set forth the teachings and miracles of Jesus Christ, but also to bear witness that He is the True Son of God and to remind us that, in the last days of His earthly life, Jesus Christ taught the people in Jerusalem extensively and for prolonged periods. On the Hours, the Gospel is read in the centre of the church, and on Mattins instead of “God is the Lord,” we chant the Alleluia. Then follows the hymn:

“Behold, the Bridegroom cometh in the middle of the night, and blessed is that servant whom He shall find watching; and again unworthy is he who He shall find heedless. Beware, therefore, O my soul, lest thou be borne down with sleep, lest thou be given up to death, and be shut out from the Kingdom. But rather rouse thyself and cry: Holy, Holy, Holy art Thou, O our God; by the intercession of the Bodiless Hosts, have mercy on us.”

This is how it is chanted on Monday. On Tuesday the last line is: “by the intercession of the Forerunner, have mercy on us.” And on Wednesday: “by the power of Thy Cross, have mercy on us.” Thus it is chanted twice and then, on every day, it is chanted a third time, with the last line thus: “through the Theotokos, have mercy on us.”

After the canon we chant the exapostolarion:

“I see Thy bridal chamber all adorned, O my Saviour, and I have no wedding garment that I may enter therein. Make the robe of my soul to shine, O Giver of Light, and save me.”

In addition to the general commemorations of the last days of Jesus Christ’s earthly life, the Church adds other commemorations on each day of the week. Thus, on Great Monday, in the prayers we remember the innocent sufferings of Joseph the All-Comely (the son of the Old Testament Patriarch Jacob), which were a prefiguring of of those of Jesus Christ. The Gospel on Mattins and that in the Liturgy are taken from the events and teaching of Jesus Christ in His last days, and they manifest the salvation which is achieved through Jesus Christ and the fate of the Jewish peoples and the pagans. For this reason, on Great Monday at Mattins we read the Gospel concerning the fruitless figtree and the evil keeper of the vineyard (Matt. 21:18-43). The fruitless figtree, which was subjected to the Lord’s curse, depicts the Jewish people who had an outward piety but did not possess any true works of piety; the evil keeper of the vineyard represents their leaders and the pharisees. At the Liturgy the Gospel is read concerning the calamitous fate of the Jewish people and the end of the world (Matt. 21:3-35).

On Great Tuesday, the Mattins Gospel contains the answers which Jesus Christ gave to the provocative questions put to Him by the Pharisees and Saducees concerning the resurrection of the dead and also His unmasking of the Pharisees (Matt. 22:15-23:39). In the Liturgy the Gospel speaks of the Second Coming, and contains the Parable of the Ten Virgins and that of the Talents, and it speaks of the the Dread Judgment over the whole race of man (Matt. 24:36-26:2).

On Great Wednesday, the Mattins Gospel consists of a foretelling of the redeeming death of Jesus Christ, and of the founding of the Church among the nations (John 12:17-50). At the Liturgy, the Gospel tells the history of the anointing by the woman of Jesus Christ’s feet with the very precious ointment as a preparation for His burial, which was done at the house of Simon the Leper, and of His betrayal unto death by Judas. A particular feature of the Great Wednesday services is that in place of the usual dismissal after the Hours, we have the prayer usually read at Compline, and during the Liturgy, before the dismissal, for the last time we have the Prayer of St Ephraim, “O Lord and Master of my life, ….”

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