Posted on 02/12/2005 11:59:27 AM PST by NYer
Rome, Feb. 11, 2005 (CNA) - Forensic scientists in Italy are working on a different kind of investigation—one that dates back 2000 years.
In an astounding announcement, the scientists think they may have re-created an image of Jesus Christ when He was a 12-year old boy.
Using the Shroud of Turin, a centuries-old linen cloth, which many believe bears the face of the crucified Christ, the investigators first created a computer-modeled, composite picture of the Christ’s face.
Dr. Carlo Bui, one of the scientists said that, “the face of the man on the shroud is the face of a suffering man. He has a deeply ruined nose. It was certainly struck."
Then, using techniques usually reserved for investigating missing persons, they back dated the image to create the closest thing many will ever see to a photograph of the young Christ.
“Without a doubt, the eyes... That is, the deepness of the eyes, the central part of the face in its complexity”, said forensic scientist Andrea Amore, one of the chief investigators who made the discovery.
The shroud itself, a 14-foot long by 3.5-foot wide woven cloth believed by many to be the burial shroud of Jesus, is receiving renewed attention lately.
A Los Alamos, New Mexico scientist has recently cast grave doubt that the carbon dating originally used to date the shroud was valid. This would suggest that the shroud may in fact be 2000 years old after all, placing it precisely in the period of Christ’s crucifixion.
When death may be approaching, the priest will make sure that there has been opportunity for confession, and communion is brought to the bedside, as often as the person is able to receive it. The Holy Unction service is also performed at the bedside, and the parishioner is annointed with holy oil for healing of soul and body.
If death comes, then a pannikhida (memorial service for the departed) is chanted at the bedside immediately if possible. Traditionally, at this point, the body would be washed, dressed in burial clothes, and carried in procession directly to the Church, but in modern practice, mortuary services tend to intervene at this point. Burial is not delayed unecessarily, and the body is brought to the church the night before the funeral service -- the Trisagion "Holy God, Holy Mighty, Holy Immortal" is chanted as the body is brought into the church. A Pannikhida is served in the Church with the casket open, and immediately at the end of the service, parishioners begin reading the Psalter over the body. At our parish, this is taken in 1 hour shifts through the night without interruption until the funeral the next day. The following prayer is read in between each Kathisma of the Psalter (the Orthodox Psalter is divided up into 20 roughly equal sections called Kathismata):
Remember, O Lord our God, Thy servant our brother (sister) [Name], departed in the faith and hope of eternal life, and as One good and the Friend of man, Who forgivest sins and overlookest iniquities: remit, pardon, and forgive all his (her) transgressions, both voluntary and involuntary; deliver him (her) from eternal torment and the fire of Gehenna, and grant unto him (her) to partake of and enjoy Thine everlasting good things, prepared for them that love Thee. If he (she) hath sinned, yet he (she) hath not forsaken Thee, and hath believed firmly in Thee, God the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit glorified in Trinity; and he (she) hath in Orthodox manner confessed the Unity in Trinity and the Trinity in Unity even unto his (her) last breath. Therefore be merciful unto him (her) and receive his (her) faith in Thee in place of works; and as One compassionate grant him (her) rest with Thy Saints, for no man can live and not sin; but Thou alone art without sin, and Thy righteousness is unto the ages; for Thou alone art a God of mercies and compassion and love for man, and to Thee do we send up glory, to the Father, and to the Son, and to the Holy Spirit, now and ever, and unto the ages of ages. Amen.
The funeral service basically contains all of the hymns and prayers that have been sung at the previous two pannikhidas, plus quite a bit more. Of particular interest are the following prayers, which are in the pannikhida/memorial service and the funeral service in one form or another, and which are also read every single day at Midnight Office (the first service of the waking day) by those who pray the daily cycle of services:
Troparia/Apolytikia:
Remember, O Lord, for Thou art good, Thy servants and forgive them whatsoever sins they have committed in life; for none is sinless but Thee Who art able to give repose unto them that are departed.
O Thou Who by the depth of Thy wisdom dost provide all things out of love for mankind, and grantest unto all that which is profitable, O only Creator: Grant rest, O Lord, to the souls of Thy servants; for in Thee have they placed their hope, O our Creator and Fashioner and God.
Kontakion:
With the saints give rest, O Christ, to the souls of Thy servants, where there is neither sickness, nor sorrow, nor sighing, but life everlasting.
And another prayer from the Midnight Office with an equivalent in the funeral/memorial services:
Remember, O Lord, our fathers and brethren who fell asleep in the hope of resurrection unto life eternal, and all those who ended this life in piety and faith, and pardon them every transgression which they have willingly or unwillingly, in word or deed or thought committed, and settle them in a place of light, a place of refreshment, a place of repose, wherefrom every sickness, sorrow and sighing are banished, and wherein from eternity the light of Thy countenance shineth and gladdeneth all Thy saints. Grant unto them and unto us Thy kingdom, and participation in Thine ineffable blessings, and the enjoyment of Thine endless and blessed life. For Thou art the life, and the resurrection, and the repose of Thy departed servants, O Christ our God, and to Thee we send up glory, with Thine unoriginate Father, and Thy most holy and good and life-creating Spirit, now and ever, and unto the ages of ages. Amen.
Toward the end of the funeral service, hymns are chanted for the soul of the departed while family and friends give a last kiss to the departed (usually on the hand or forehead, or sometimes kissing an icon held by the departed), the shroud is brought up over the face of the departed while the priest reads final prayers, and the casket is closed.
Again singing "Holy God..." the casket is carried to the cemetery or to the hearse, and this continues until all are assembled at the graveside, where there is a final short service and prayers, the casket is lowered, earth is cast onto the coffin by all in procession while psalms are sung, and finally, holy water and the ashes from the censer are scattered on the coffin.
At the close of each pannikhida, at the end of the funeral, and at the end of the graveside service, a very moving hymn is sung that consists only of two words repeated thrice (well, two words in English and Slavonic -- in Greek it is three words!) "Memory eternal, memory eternal, memory eternal!", which is itself repeated three times (we seem to do everything in threes in honor of the Trinity in the Orthodox Church...)
Anyway, no theological dissection here -- it's just what we do and how we pray, for those who are interested.
Next, to the extent that you dealt with the LXX in deriving Catholic canon, you have some glaring problems. Number one, there were multiple versions of the LXX. The Alexandrian version had multiple versions. And you didn't include all the books they included. Only 11 of 14 of the apocryphals in one of those versions was assented to as canon - initially excluding Maccabees.
To the extent that you wish to argue you gave assent to the authority of the Jews on canon, history shows you did not. In point of fact, Jamnia seems to be an excuse to foster foundation for doing whatever you pleased at that time. One version of the Alexandrian LXX included 1 & 2 Clement. For those two books alone I find it no wonder that there is bad blood on this issue between Rome and the Jews and on your lips and fingers here.
At our parish, this is taken in 1 hour shifts through the night without interruption until the funeral the next day. The following prayer is read in between each Kathisma of the Psalter (the Orthodox Psalter is divided up into 20 roughly equal sections called Kathismata):
This is such a testament of love by the Orthodox. I continue to fall in love with Orthodoxy, the more I am exposed to it.
Remember, O Lord our God, Thy servant our sister [Elida], departed in the faith and hope of eternal life, and as One good and the Friend of man, Who forgivest sins and overlookest iniquities: remit, pardon, and forgive all his (her) transgressions, both voluntary and involuntary; deliver him (her) from eternal torment and the fire of Gehenna, and grant unto him (her) to partake of and enjoy Thine everlasting good things, prepared for them that love Thee. If he (she) hath sinned, yet he (she) hath not forsaken Thee, and hath believed firmly in Thee, God the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit glorified in Trinity; and he (she) hath in Orthodox manner confessed the Unity in Trinity and the Trinity in Unity even unto his (her) last breath. Therefore be merciful unto him (her) and receive his (her) faith in Thee in place of works; and as One compassionate grant him (her) rest with Thy Saints, for no man can live and not sin; but Thou alone art without sin, and Thy righteousness is unto the ages; for Thou alone art a God of mercies and compassion and love for man, and to Thee do we send up glory, to the Father, and to the Son, and to the Holy Spirit, now and ever, and unto the ages of ages. Amen.
Today is the anniversary of the death of a young Italian woman who lived in the village I was born in.
Elida, 'Eliduccia', according to my Mom and Dad was a physically beautiful young woman. She fell in love and became intimate with a man who was conscripted into the Italian army, and died during WW II.
Right after the war, '45 or '46, she married someone else. On their wedding night, he discovered he wasn't the first, and demanded to know the name of her lover, and threatened to send her home to her mother the following morning, if she would not relent and tell him who he was.
She refused, but knew the shame and ostricization that lied ahead for her, in this small, provincial town. So, that night, in her dressing gown and slippers she took herself down to an Apennine gorge, braving the possiblity of wolves and bears, submerged herself in the icy, February waters and took her own life.
It is a sombre story, and of course, at that time she was afforded no Catholic burial.
The reason I'm relaying the story is that I think of her every year on the anniversary of her death, and I never knew her, but I've known desperation. And I pray that somehow she was forgiven for taking her own life, and is with the Lord today.
Well said.
Very interesting. Thanks for the pings.
While the closure of the canon at Jamnia is denied by the Jews and messianics, and probably by the Protestants, the missing or altered text that appears in the MT is burdened by a motive, just as Luthers alterations of the Bible were driven by his personal motives. While every reason existed, from the rabbinical position, to alter the text to minimize Christian competition, no such motive existed when the LXX was translated into Greek by Jewish scholars -- because LXX was intended to be used as Jewish Scripture for the Greek-speaking Jews of Egypt and Asia Minor! So, if anything, the LXX had every reason to be a true copy of the Hebrew original, having been written 200 years before Jesus was born.
Orthodoxy is a beautiful and artistic manner of worshiping God. But don't be taken by the artistry. Instead, read what the Fathers wrote about their experiences that eventually became customs of the Church, not all of which are equally shared by different nations that are Orthodox.
Do not think that the fast was regulated either or properly set from the start, or even equitably divided. A lot of anecdotal "experiences," dreams and visions are responsible for the customs -- and they are all man-made and not what Jesus taught. There is no sanctity in the man-made customs.
But one thing the Orthodox Church steadfastly maintains is the Merciful God. Our prayers are simply reduced to asking God for mercy for the living, for the dead and for ourselves -- no matter how elaborate and beautiful our customs, the common thread, truth and our ultimate hope is only His mercy.
This is where we find the True beauty and this is where we fall in love.
Thank you for the discussion.
Since you have offered the last word, naturally I will take it.
The Catholic Bible DID come from the Vulgate, but things have gotten more interesting in recent years.
The current Catholic study Bible in English is the New American Bible ("NAB"), and the NAB was a complete retranslation of the ancient manuscripts conducted post-Vatican II.
The NAB translators did not use only the Vulgate.
Rather, they used the Vulgate, and the various Septuagint Texts, the Massoretic Text and other translations and they did a comparison. Where there were differences, they made a selection and put the alternatives in footnotes. It's a very plain-English Bible, which lets you see the guts of the translation process and the choices made in many case. I like it.
The Douai-Rheims Bible was indeed a translation of the Vulgate, and the Vulgate continues to be an authoritative Bible source, because of its ancient provenance and the particular megawatt intellect of St. Jerome. He faced the same problems we do and made choices. We don't have to agree with his choices, but given that he was a Roman and a native speaker of Latin, living in that culture and milieu, and probably handling original texts which are lost to us or available to us only as monastic copies, his great work has a particular scholarly authority to it.
However, the Catholic Church has, in a sense, "rediscovered" the Septuagint, especially in light of the first and century manuscripts that have been literally dug up out of the ground in the Middle East in the 20th Century at Nag Hammadi, the Dead Sea Scrolls, and the rediscovery of fragments in ancient libraries in the East that were all but forgotten.
Example: The Didache. An incredibly important document, since it is effectively the catechism of the age of the 12 Apostles. Eusebius writes of it and other Church Fathers refer, invariably with great respect and reverence, to the Didache. But we had NO copy of it until an ancient manuscript was found in a monastic library in Asia Minor in the late 1800s, and translated.
Modern archaelogy is unearthing interesting things which bear on the Bible, and the Catholic Church has greater confidence in the Septuagint Texts that we have, and now uses them as one of the several sources for its newest translations.
So, the Catholic Bible I use, at any rate, is no longer simply a translation of the Vulgate. It is the result of a painstaking comparison of Vulgate, Septuagint, Massoretic Text and every other fragment or text available to the translators.
The more we know of the history, the more important the Greek texts become, because it is so clear that Jesus and the Apostles were influenced by it. Indeed, Jesus' citation to the language found in the Septuagint as opposed to the competing Massoretic Text raises the interesting question as to whether he spoke Greek. Of course, the Targumim many have been translated from the same source documents.
Certainly from Qumran of the Essenes we have discovered Hebrew versions of the Scripture that match the wording of the Septuagint where it differs from the Massoretic Text.
Anyway, all of this is fascinating stuff, and it's all to say that Catholicism is not lashed to the mast of the Vulgate. Catholics like me are interested in the Truth, wherever it lies. That is why I am so determined that the Shroud of Turin be scientifically studied. We cannot start waving the Bible at it and saying it is an evil graven image if we have not established that it was not "graven" any more than we can start waving the Book of Genesis at Darwin and Paleontologists and saying that the dinosaurs either didn't exist, or co-existed with man because the Earth is only 8000 years old or whatever.
We have to understand our texts and respect them.
But we have to allow the discoveries of modern science to give us new insight into the meaning of our texts. The discoveries of paleontologists and anthropolists have taught us that the world is very old, and allowed us to see Genesis as a sacred poem on creation, describing its roots in God, but not a scientific text on anthropology.
Ok, now I have to get to answering Havoc.
Unfortunately, that will take more time, which I do not have this morning.
Perhaps over the weekend.
1 and 2 Clement are Christian writings, attributed to the third Bishop of Rome. Many Christians considered them canonical for centuries before the Canon was settled upon.
"Well, according to the history, the canon was set by 150 bc."
This is where the argument fails.
According to "the history".
WHAT history?
WHOSE history?
Based on what specific ancient source?
You are postulating that a canon existed, and everyone knew what it was.
Cite to an ancient list during or before Jesus' life and times.
You can't. One doesn't exist.
The first lists start appearing long after Jesus died.
And in them, you have Christians citing to some books, Alexandrian Jews using Septuagint Greek texts, and Palestinian Jews like Josephus writing a different text.
Saying "The history says" doesn't work.
The "history" only "says" that if there is a piece of paper dating from the period that says it. If there isn't, then a history book that goes further is not writing "the history". It is engaging in conjecture.
You keep returning the idea that I need to prove that the Septuagint was a canon, and that the books Jesus and the Apostles cited to, which are not in the Hebrew Canon, were considered canonical.
But you're missing something crucial: I am not the Sola Scripturalist. YOU are. YOU are asserting that there is one canon, and that everything we need to know about God is right there, that the Church does not have special authority to interpret that, and that the Church has added to the Canon, etc.
The very proof that you demand of me, that I establish that books were in the Canon, is really incumbent on YOU. Because I and people like me think that the authority reposes in the CHURCH to interpret these things, and that Scripture Alone, without the guidance of the Church, will lead a man straight into error and contradiction.
The place I started was the Canon itself, because if I am to play at Sola Scriptura, I want to at least make sure that we are using the complete Scripture.
But YOU assert, "the history says", without providing any ancient source that backs YOUR limited canon, which YOU say contains everything anyone needs to know about religion.
When I read the Bible, even if I limit it to your abridged canon, I do not see any words in there that remotely approach "Sola Scriptura". I see "all Scripture is God-breathed", which is true enough. But that is saying "Scrpture is Good", not "ONLY Scripture has authority." Indeed, I don't see Jesus leaving ANY Scripture, but leaving a Church and insisting that the Spirit will be with the Church, also imbuing the men of the CHURCH with "the power of the keys", to forgive sins, etc. I see Paul referring to how to make new clergy. What I don't see any of them doing is focusing on the Bible and saying "This is IT! THIS is the most important thing, not the Church, not us."
You say that the Bible IS the nec plus ultra.
The Bible doesn't say that, as far as I can see.
Really it doesn't say anything like that.
And what's worse, even if we allow it for the sake of argument, you are not able to produce any credible evidence of why we should pick YOUR limited canon of the Bible as the true one.
Jesus, Paul, Peter, John, James: THEY all cited to books you say are not the Bible.
You say "the history says", but you won't provide any history that actually says that.
(Hint: the closest you will get is Josephus' "Against Apion", written at the end of the 1st Century, in which he says there are 22 books in the Hebrew Canon. But, of course, Josephus is a Palestinian Jew of priestly origin who is a player in the Jewish world that results in the Hebrew Canon, and is writing at that time. His 22 books do not quite match the Hebrew canon as we usually see it, but with inferences one can make it jibe. WE make those inferences. What that proves is that circa 90 AD an educated former Jewish priest had a strong opinion about what the Jewish Scriptures were, and that the Jews who produced the Massoretic Text agree with him. This tells us nothing of Judaism circa 30 AD, two generations prior, before the massive upheavals of the Jewish world.)
If you are going to stipulate to Bible Alone, YOU are the one who has to prove what the Bible IS in the first place, and YOU have to prove that it says Bible Alone.
The second thing is easy: the Bible doesn't say Bible Alone.
The first part is hard, because the Bible doesn't say what's in the Bible.
For that, we have to turn to history.
There is no list of canon before about 90 AD.
Therefore, we have to go on inference for 30 AD.
Circa 30 AD we have Jesus and his Apostles quoting from Septuagint scripture. THEY evidently thought this was Scripture.
I think it is extraordinary to assert, as you did, that "Maybe they were wrong."
Umm, no. By definition Jesus can NEVER be wrong about ANY aspect of religion, including Scripture, because he was GOD. If HE cites something as a precept, that precent is Holy, again by definition. Clearly nobody has the authority to overrule Jesus' choice of Scripture. One can quibble with the Apostles. Jude refers to 1 Enoch, which only the Ethopian Church considers Scripture. But if you are arguing with Jesus, you've lost the forest for the trees.
Since you are not, by your own definition, Protestant, then what is the big deal anyway. Jesus and the Apostles clearly used the Deuterocanonical works: they use passages from them all the time. Presumably you want to get it right with Jesus. Why not, then, use the same books that HE did? Why are you even arguing that those books are not in the canon, if you're not a Protestant?
The LXX owes it's existence to the fact that the average Jew in the middle east spoke Greek and not Hebrew. So, while the temple maintained it's usage of Hebrew, the Synagogues used the Greek, the business language of the day (it's no accident that the NT was written in Greek). It is the Greek text that the Jews heard from every week; it is the Greek text that they would be most familiar with. With all this in mind, what I find compelling is that Jesus read a portion of Isaiah in the Synogogue. Obviously, the ability to read and speak Greek would have been a prerequisite.
Indeed, just a few years ago they dug up the ruins of a whole Greek trading center, replete with gymnasium, about a mile from the site of ancient Nazareth.
Jesus the tradesman worked in an economy that was Hellenistic Greek, not the narrow and zealous air of desert Judah, far to the South.
It is also telling that in 2/3rds of the cases in the New Testament where Jesus or the Apostles uses a passage from Scripture that reads slightly differently in the Septuagint Greek Scripture and Hebrew Massoretic Text, they used the Septuagint Greek.
Within the overall context of our discussion of "What WAS the Canon when Jesus lived", this is important.
If there was an explicit, written, closed canon in Jesus' day, there is not one ancient document that says so.
But we do have Jesus using texts that Christians have always considered sacred Scripture...well, until the 16th Century anyway...but that Jews do not.
This is the most compelling argument I can imagine that GOD inspired the texts that GOD referred to.
Really, I don't see how anyone can apply logic and come to a different conclusion.
I think that the debate over the Deuterocanonica is an artifact of two specific periods in history, first during the great First- and early-Second Century polemics between the Christians and the Jews, and second in the 16th Century with the Lutheran Reformation.
And given that Jesus left two commandments, seven sacraments and a Church, not a Bible dispensary, it wouldn't matter whether or not the Deuterocanonica are in the Bible or not...but for the claim of Sola Scriptura.
For if we are going to truly go by Scripture Alone, and disregard Christian Tradition, in addition to having to return to the Saturday Sabbath, we have to settle definitively what PRECISELY "Scripture" is.
It certainly doesn't tell us.
And neither does any other piece of paper from the before 90 AD or so.
We can only infer.
And Jesus' reliance on the Septuagint wording of so many passages, as well as his and the Apostles frequent use of sayings and examples from the Deuterocanonica, sets up - one would THINK - a very strong inference in FAVOR OF their canonicity.
Others differ.
Of course, actually there is a bit of difference between the Catholic and Orthodox Canons of the Old Testament. The Orthodox have a few more books, such as 3 and 4 Maccabbees.
So, why is not THIS divergence one of the big, burning tops of flaming dissent between the Orthodox and Catholics?
Because neither are Sola Scripturalists, of course.
Jesus left Two Commandments, Seven Sacraments and a Church.
Both wings of the Catholic Church, Roman and Eastern, agree on the Roman Bible. The East has a few more books that sometimes some folks cite to. Our religion does not hang on this difference, because our religion is a Church, not a Bible Dispensary.
"Tone I
Where is the pleasure in life which is unmixed with sorrow? Where the glory which on earth has stood firm and unchanged? All things are weaker than shadow, all more illusive than dreams; comes one fell stroke, and Death in turn, prevails over all these vanities. Wherefore in the Light, O Christ, of Your countenance, the sweetness of Your beauty, to him (her) whom You have chosen grant repose, for You are the Friend of Mankind.
Tone 2
Like a blossom that wastes away, and like a dream that passes and is gone, so is every mortal into dust resolved; but again, when the trumpet sounds its call, as though at a quaking of the earth, all the dead shall arise and go forth to meet You, O Christ our God: on that day, O Lord, for him (her) whom You have withdrawn from among us appoint a place in the tentings of Your Saints;yea, for the spirit of Your servant, O Christ.
Another in Tone 2
Alas! What an agony the soul endures when from the body it is parting; how many are her tears for weeping, but there is none that will show compassion: unto the angels she turns with downcast eyes; useless are her supplications; and unto men she extends her imploring hands, but finds none to bring her rescue. Thus, my beloved brethren, let us all ponder well how brief is the span of our life; and peaceful rest for him (her) that now is gone, let us ask of Christ, and also His abundant mercy for our souls.
Tone 3
Vanity are all the works and quests of man, and they have no being after death has come; our wealth is with us no longer. How can our glory go with us? For when death has come all these things are vanished clean away. Wherefore to Christ the Immortal King let us cry, "To him (her) that has departed grant repose where a home is prepared for all those whose hearts You have filled with gladness."
Tone 4
Terror truly past compare is by the mystery of death inspired; now the soul and the body part, disjoined by resistless might, and their concord is broken; and the bond of nature which made them live and grow as one, now by the edict of God is rest in twain. Wherefore now we implore Your aid grant that Your servant now gone to rest where the just that are Yours abide, Life-bestower and Friend of Mankind.
Tone 4
Where is now our affection for earthly things? Where is now the alluring pomp of transient questing? Where is now our gold, and our silver? Where is now the surging crowd of domestics, and their busy cries? All is dust, all is ashes, all is shadow. Wherefore draw near that we may cry to our immortal King, "Lord, Your everlasting blessings vouchsafe unto him (her) that now has gone away. bringing him (her) to repose in that blessedness which never grows old."
Tone 5
I Called to mind the Prophet who shouted, "I am but earth and ash." And once again I looked with attention on the tombs, and I saw the bones therein which of flesh were naked; and I said, "Which indeed is he that is king? Or which is soldier? Which is the wealthy, which the needy? Which the righteous, or which the sinner?" But to Your servant, O Lord, grant that with the righteous he (she) may repose.
Tone 6
My beginning and foundation was the form;bestowing Word of Your commandment; for it pleased You to make me by compounding visible and invisible nature into a living thing. out of earth was my body formed and made, but a soul You gave me by the Divine and Life-creating In; breathing. Wherefore, O Christ, to Your servant in the land of the living, in the courts of the righteous, do You grant repose.
Tone 7
Bring to his (her) rest, O our Savior, You giver of life, our brother (sister) whom You have withdrawn from this transient world, for he (she) lifts up his (her) voice to cry: "Glory to You."
Another in Tone 7
When in Your own image and likeness You in the beginning did create and fashion man, You gave him a home in Paradise, and made him the chief of your creation. But by the devil's envy, alas, beguiled to eat the fruit forbidden, transgressor then of Your commandments he became; wherefore back to earth, from which he first was taken, You did sentence him to return again, O Lord, and to pray You to give him rest.
Weep, and with tears lament when with understanding I think on death, and see how in the graves there sleeps the beauty which once for us was fashioned in the image of God, but now is shapeless, ignoble, and bare of all the graces. O how strange a thing; what is this mystery which concerns us humans? Why were we given up to decay? And why to death united in wedlock? Truly, as it is written, these things come to pass by ordinance of God, Who to him (her) now gone gives rest
Glory to the Father and to the Son and to the Holy Spirit.
The death which You have endured, O Lord, is become the harbinger of deathlessness; if You had not been laid in Your tomb, then would not the gates of Paradise have been opened;wherefore to him (her) now gone from us give rest, for You are the Friend of Mankind.
Both now and ever and to the ages of ages. Amen.
Virgin chaste and holy, Gateway of the Word, Mother of our God, make supplication that his (her) soul find mercy."
Is that supposed to be a color picture, or a picture that has been "antiqued"?
Because if it's color, I think he looks a bit jaundice.
Yes, irresistably so, but we must never, ever allow ourselves to fall in love with customs and confsue them with Him. Unfortunately, I think some people do.
Megawatt intellect or not, what Jerome did and what others have done, including the NAB, and what you are doing here in mnay words -- is called rationalization, which goes hand in hand with religious rationalism of the West.
Do you not think it presumptuous and arrogant of +Jerome to think he knew better than the Apostles, or -- for that matter -- for the Latin Church to assume the Gospels are using an "inferior" source? Is it not an in-your-face statement that somehow we know better? Did the Apostles put other versions in their marginal notes?
Until proven that the Gospels and the Epistles are subject to corruption and doubt, the only scripture we can quote of the Old Covenant is Septuagint, which is why the Orthodox Church uses only that "version." Anything else is expressing lack of faith in what the Apostles wrote.
What could I possibly add? One Tone is more beautiful than the next. It must be hard to keep from weeping when these are chanted or read.
Thanks, Kolo.
The love I was referring to has little to do with custom, and everything to do with what enlivens it. To wit: the sacrifice and love of the vigil keepers.
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