LITX7RG7
307
LZTUBGT
in or Greek for any Sastem rite. Their word, corres-
ponding exactly to our "Masa, is Liturgy. The Byzantine
liturgy is the service that corresponds to our Roman
SCass; to call it the Byzantine (or, worse still, the
Greek) Mass is as wrong as naming any other of their
services after ours, as calling their Hesperinos Vespers,
or their Orthraa Lauds. When people go even as far as
calling their books and vestments after ours, saying
Missai when they mean Euchologion, alb when they
mean sticharion, the confusion becomes hopeless.
II. Thb Origin op the Liturgy. — At the outset of this discussion we are confronted by three of the most difficult questions of Christian archaeology, namely: From what date was there a fixed and regulated serv- ice such as we can describe as a formal Liturgy? How Car was this service uniform in various Churches? How far are we able to reconstruct its forms and arrangement?
With regard to the first question it must be said that an Apostolic Liturgy in the sense of an arrange- ment of prayers and ceremonies, like our present ritual of the Mass, did not exist. For some time the Eucha- ristic Service was in many details fluid and variable. It was not all written down and read from fixed forms, but in part composed by the officiating bishop. As for ceremonies, at first they were not elaborated as now. All ceremonial evolves gradually out of certain obvious actions done at first with no idea of ritual, but simply because they had to be done for convenience. The bread and wine were brought to the altar when they were wanted, the lessons were read from a place where they could best be heard, Ixands were washed because they were soiled. Out of these obvious ac- tions ceremony developed, iust as our vestments de- veloped out of the dress of the first Christians. It follows then of course that, when there was no fixed Liturgy at all, there could be no question of absolute uniformity among the different Churches.
And yet the whole scries of actions and prayers did not depend solelv on the improvisation of the celebrat- ing bishop. Wnereas at one time scholars were in- clined to conceive the services of the first Ciiristians as vague and undefined, recent research shows us a very Btnking uniformity in certain salient elements of the aervioe at a very early date. The tendency among students now is to admit something very like a regu- lated Liturgy, apparently to a great extent uniform in the chief cities, hack even to the first or early second oentuiy. In the first place the fundamental outline of ihe rite of the Holy Eucharist was given by the account of the Last Supper. What our Lord had done then, that same thing He told His followers to do in memory of Him. It would not have been a Eucharist at all if the celebrant had not at least done as our Lord did the night before He died. So we have everywhere from the very beginning at least this uniform nucleus <rf a liturgy: bread and wine are brought to the cele- brant in vessels (a plate and a cup); he puts them on a table — ^the altar; standing before it m the natural attitude of prayer he takes them in his hands, gives thsuniks, as our Lord had done, says again the words of institution, breaks the Bread and gives the consecrated Bread and Wine to the people in communion. The absence of the words of institution in the Xestorian Rite is no argument against the universality of this order. It is a rite that developed quite late; the parent liturgy has the words.
But we find much more than this essential nucleus in use in every Church from the first centurv. The Eucharist was always celebrated at the end oi a serv- ice of lessons, psalms, prayers, and preacliing, which was itself merely a continuation of the service of the eyiULgogae, So we have everywhere this double function; first a synagogue service Christianized, in which the holy books were read, psalms were sung, prayers said by the bishop in the name of all (t)ie people answering "Amen in Hebrew, as had tlicir
Jewish forefathers), and homilies, explanations of what
had been read, were made by the oishop or priests,
just as they had been made in the synagogues by the
learned men and elders (e. g., Luke, iv, 16-27). This
is what was known afterwanls as the Litur^ of the
Catechumens. Then followed the Eucharist, at which
only the baptized were present. Two other elements
of the service in the earhcst time soon disappeared.
One was the Love-feast (agape) that came just before"*
the Eucharist; the other was the sviritual exercises , in
which people were moved by the Holy Ghost to
prophesy, speak in divers tongues, heal the sick by
prayer, and so on . This function — to which I Cor., xi v,
1-14, and the Didache, x, 7, etc., refer — obviously
opened the way to disorders; from the second century
it gradually disappears. The Eucharistic Agape
seems to have disappeared at about the same time.
The other two functions remained joined, and still
exist in the liturgies of all rites. In them the service
crystallized into more or less set forms from the be-
ginning. In the first half the alternation of lessons,
psalms, collects, and homilies leaves little room for
variety. For obvious reasons a lesson from a Gospel
was read last, in the place of honour as the fulfilment
of all the others; it was preceded by other readings
whose number, order, and arrangement varied con-
siderably (see Lessons in the Liturgy). A chant
of some kind would very soon accompany the entrance
of the clerg3' and the beginning of the service. We also
hear very soon of litanies of intercession said by one
person to each clause of which the people answer with
some snort formula (see Antiochene Liturgy; Alex-
andrine Liturgy; Kyrie Eleison). The place and
number of the homilies would also vary for a long time.
It is in the second part of the service, the Eucharist it-
self, that we find a very striking crystallization of the
forms, and a uniformity even in the first or second cen-
tury that goes far beyond the mere nucleus described
above.
Already in the New Testament — apart from the account of the Last Supper — ^there are some indexes that point to liturgical forms. There were already read- ings from the Sacred Books (I Tim., iv, 13; I Thess., V, 27; Col., iv, 16), there were sermons (Act., xx, 7), psalms and hymns (I Cor., xiv, 26; Col., iii, 16; Eph., v, 19). I Tim., ii, 1-3, implies public liturgical prayers for all classes of people. People lifted up their hands at prayers (I Tim., li, 8), men with uncovered heads (I Cor., xi, 4), women covered (ibid., 5). There was a loss of peace (I Cor., xvi, 20; II Cor., xiii, 12; I Thess., V 26). There was an offertory of goods for the poor (Kom., XV, 26; II Cor., ix, 13) called by the special name " communion" {Koiwvia). The people answered "Amen" after prayers (I Cor., xiv, 16). The word Eucharist has already a technical meaning (ibid.). The famous passage, I Cor., xi, 2Q-9, gives us the out- line of the breaking of bread and thanksgiving (Eucha- rist) that followed the earlier part of the service. Heb., xiii, 10 (cf. I Cor., x, 16-21), shows that to the first Christians the table of the Eucnarist was an altar. After the consecration prayers followed (Acts, ii, 42). St. Paul "breaks bread" (= the consecration), then communicates, then preaches (Acts, xx, 1 1). Acts, ii, 42, gives us an idea of the liturgical Synaxis in order: They "persevere in the teaching of the Apostles" (this implies the readings and homilies), "communi- cate in the breaking of bread" (consecration and com- munion) and " in praj'ers". So we have already in the New Testament all the essential elements that we find later in the organized liturgies: lessons, psalms, hvmns, sermons, prayers, consecration, communion. (For all this see F. Probst: "Liturgie der drei ersten christl. Jahrhunderte", Tubingen, 1870, c. i; and the texts collected in Cabrol and Ixjclereq; "Monumenta ecclcsia; liturgica", I, Paris, 1900, pp. 1-51.) It has Nh'ii fhouj^ht that there are arc in the New Testament even actual fornuila> useil in the liturgy. The Ativww
