Public worship, or, as people say, church services, is the main thing for which our churches are intended. Every day the Orthodox Church holds evening, morning and afternoon services in churches. Each of these services consists in turn of three types of services, collectively combined into a daily cycle of services:

vespers - from the 9th hour, vespers and compline;

morning - from midnight office, matins and 1st hour;

daytime - from the 3rd hour, 6th hour and Divine Liturgy.

Thus, the entire daily circle consists of nine services.

In Orthodox worship, much is borrowed from the worship of Old Testament times. For example, the beginning of a new day is considered not midnight, but six o’clock in the evening. That is why the first service of the daily cycle is Vespers.

At Vespers, the Church remembers the main events of the sacred history of the Old Testament: the creation of the world by God, the fall of the first parents, the Mosaic legislation and the ministry of the prophets. Christians give thanks to the Lord for the day they have lived.

After Vespers, according to the Church Rules, Compline is supposed to be served. In a certain sense, these are public prayers for the sleep of the future, in which the descent of Christ into hell and the liberation of the righteous from the power of the devil are remembered.

At midnight, the third service of the daily cycle is supposed to be performed - the Midnight Office. This service was established to remind Christians of the Second Coming of the Savior and the Last Judgment.

Before sunrise, Matins is served - one of the longest services. It is dedicated to the events of the earthly life of the Savior and contains many prayers of both repentance and gratitude.

At about seven o'clock in the morning they perform the 1st hour. This is the name of the short service at which the Orthodox Church remembers the presence of Jesus Christ at the trial of the high priest Caiaphas.

The 3rd hour (nine o’clock in the morning) is served in remembrance of the events that took place in the Upper Room of Zion, where the Holy Spirit descended on the Apostles, and in Pilate’s Praetorium, where the Savior was sentenced to death.

The 6th hour (noon) is the time of the Lord’s crucifixion, and the 9th hour (three o’clock in the afternoon) is the time of His death on the cross. The above-mentioned services are dedicated to these events.

The main divine service of the Orthodox Church, a kind of center of the daily circle, is the Divine Liturgy. Unlike other services, the liturgy provides an opportunity not only to remember God and the entire earthly life of the Savior, but also to actually unite with Him in the sacrament of Communion, established by the Lord Himself during the Last Supper. According to the time, the liturgy should be performed between the 6th and 9th hour, before noon, in the pre-dinner time, which is why it is also called mass.

Modern liturgical practice has brought its own changes to the regulations of the Charter. Thus, in parish churches, Compline is celebrated only during Lent, and the Midnight Office is celebrated once a year, on the eve of Easter. The 9th hour is extremely rarely served. The remaining six services of the daily circle are combined into two groups of three services.

In the evening, Vespers, Matins and the 1st hour are performed in succession. On the eve of Sundays and holidays, these services are combined into one service called the all-night vigil. In ancient times, Christians actually often prayed until dawn, that is, they stayed awake throughout the night. Modern all-night vigils last two to four hours in parishes and three to six hours in monasteries.

In the morning, the 3rd hour, the 6th hour and the Divine Liturgy are served successively. In churches with large congregations, there are two liturgies on Sundays and holidays - early and late. Both are preceded by reading the hours.

On those days when there is no liturgy (for example, on Friday of Holy Week), a short sequence of figurative ones is performed. This service consists of some chants of the liturgy and, as it were, “depicts” it. But visual arts do not have the status of an independent service.

Divine services also include the performance of all sacraments, rituals, reading of akathists in church, community readings of morning and evening prayers, rules for Holy Communion.

Worship in general refers to worshiping God or pleasing God with good thoughts, words and deeds, that is, doing the will of God.

Worship began on earth from the time of the creation of the first people - in heaven. The worship of the first people in paradise consisted in the free glorification of God, His wisdom, goodness, omnipotence and other Divine perfections revealed in the creation of the world and in the providence for it.

After their fall, people had to pray to God even more, begging Him for their salvation. In the Divine services of people, after the Fall, in addition to prayers, the Lord established sacrifices. Sacrifice expresses the idea that everything we have is not ours, but God’s. The combination of prayers with sacrifices was supposed, at the same time, to remind people that God accepts their prayers for the sake of the sacrifice that was subsequently made for all people by the Son of God, the Savior of the world, who came to earth.

At first, Divine services were performed freely in open places. There were no holy temples or sacred persons. People made sacrifices to God wherever they wanted, and prayed with such words (prayers) as their own feelings and mood told them.

By command of God, during the time of the prophet Moses, it was established tabernacle(the first Old Testament temple to the One, True God), were chosen sacred persons(high priest, priests and Levites) were determined victims for different occasions and were installed holidays(Easter, Pentecost, New Year, day of atonement, etc.).

The Lord Jesus Christ, who came to earth, taught to worship the heavenly Father in every place, nevertheless often visited the Old Testament temple in Jerusalem, as a place of special, gracious, presence of God, took care of the order in the temple and preached in it. His holy apostles did the same until open persecution of Christians was initiated by the Jews.

In the time of the apostles, as can be seen from the book of the Acts of the Apostles, there were special places for gatherings of believers and for performing the sacrament Communions, called churches, where worship was performed by bishops, presbyters (priests) and deacons appointed through ordination (in the sacrament of the priesthood).

The final organization of Christian worship was carried out by the apostolic successors, under the guidance of the Holy Spirit and according to the commandment given to them by the apostles: " everything should be decent and orderly" (1 Cor. 14 , 40). This established order of worship is strictly preserved in our Holy Orthodox Church of Christ.

Orthodox church service is called service or service to God, consisting of reading and singing prayers, reading the Word of God and sacred rites (rites), performed according to a certain order, that is, order, led by a clergyman (bishop or priest).

Church services differ from home prayer in that they are performed clergy, legally established for this purpose through the sacrament of the priesthood by the Holy Orthodox Church, and is performed primarily in the temple.

Church Orthodox public worship has the goal of edifying believers in reading and chanting set forth the true teaching of Christ and dispose them to prayer and repentance, and in faces and actions depict the most important events from sacred history that took place for our salvation, both before the Nativity of Christ and after the Nativity of Christ. In this case, it is meant to arouse in those praying gratitude to God for all the blessings received, to strengthen the prayer for further mercies from Him to us, and to receive peace of mind for our souls.

Divine services, or, as people say, church services, are the main thing for which our churches are intended. Every day the Orthodox Church performs evening, morning and afternoon services in churches. Each of these services consists in turn of three types, collectively combined into a daily circle of services.

In Orthodox Divine services, much is borrowed from the Divine services of Old Testament times. For example, the beginning of a new day is considered not midnight, but six o’clock in the evening. That is why the first service of the daily cycle is Vespers. Before sunrise, Matins is served, one of the longest services. The main divine service of the Orthodox Church, a kind of center of the daily circle, is the Divine Liturgy. According to the time, the Liturgy should be celebrated from 12 to 3 o'clock in the afternoon, which is why it is called mass.

In modern Russian Orthodoxy, as in traditional, much attention is paid to the way of church life and rituals. For centuries, neither the layout of the temple, nor its orientation on the ground, nor the interior decoration has changed.

The structure of an Orthodox church goes back to ancient times and takes its architecture from the Orthodox church in Jerusalem. The temple consists of three parts: the altar, the middle temple (or simply the temple) and the vestibule (or refectory). There is nothing superfluous in the architecture and interior. Each item has its own meaning. The holy righteous John of Kronstadt wrote: “In the temple, in its location and parts, in the icons, the Divine service with the reading of the Holy Scriptures, singing, rituals, the entire Old Testament, New Testament and church history is inscribed, as on a map, in faces, in general terms.”

The Holy of Holies of the temple is an altar symbolizing the Kingdom of Heaven. Only clergy and church employees can enter it. That part of the room, which is called the temple itself, is separated from the altar by a wall of icons, called the iconostasis.

The iconostasis has three gates.

The central, largest ones are called the Royal Doors. Through them Jesus Christ comes to us invisibly. No one except the clergy is allowed to enter these doors during the service.

The side doors are called deacon doors. On the right are the southern doors, on the left are the northern ones. Deacons pass through them during services, and outside services - monks, ministers, as well as women - elderly pious parishioners working in the church.

The Royal Doors have a curtain that opens or closes at certain points during the Divine Service. The opening of the curtain symbolizes the revelation to people of the secret of their salvation, and the opening of the Royal Doors symbolizes the opening of the Kingdom of Heaven.

To the right of the Royal Doors in the iconostasis is an icon of the Savior, to the left is an image of the Most Holy Theotokos, behind them are icons of especially revered saints. To the right of the image of the Savior a temple icon is usually placed. This icon depicts the saint in whose honor the temple was consecrated. This row of icons in the iconostasis is called the bottom row.

Under the local row there may be a row of holiday icons depicting the twelve main events of the Gospel narrative.

In the third row of diesus (from the Greek word deesis - “prayer”), icons with images of the Mother of God, the Holy Apostles, Archangels and Saints are placed.

Icons are placed on all the walls of the temple. The temple also houses a kanun - a brass Crucifix on a brass box. On the eve, candles are lit for the repose of the deceased. Funeral services for the dead are also held here. In front of the holy icons there are candlesticks in which believers place lighted candles.

§ 79. In its special meaning, the word “Church” also means “a society established by God of believers in Christ, united by the Word of God, the hierarchy and the sacraments, under the invisible control of the Lord and the Spirit of God, for eternal life and salvation.”

§ 80. The Church is the soul of life. There is no soul - everything becomes a corpse. The family falls apart, morality disappears, and despair appears. Destroying a church is tantamount to destroying people. He who fights the Church does not love people. Therefore, in the Church everything is done to save people.

The temple, as already mentioned, is the house of God, and, just as when going on a visit, to the theater or to a celebration, we try to look decent, so when coming to church, we should remember Who we are going to. Clothing must be decent and neat. Women should not wear trousers or short skirts to church. It is advisable not to wear makeup on your face. Of course, if a woman has eyeliner and a light tone on her face, no one will take her out of the temple. And then, she shouldn’t wash herself before entering. However, lipstick on the lips is completely unacceptable. A woman's head must be covered with a headscarf, headscarf or scarf. Only little girls and unmarried young girls can remain bareheaded in the temple. Men are required to remove their hats before entering the temple.

Pious Christians, approaching the cathedral and looking at the holy crosses and domes, make the sign of the cross and bow. Having risen to the porch, you need to make the sign of the cross again. The same is done when entering the temple.

Due to the close connection between spirit and body, a person cannot help but express outwardly the movements of his spirit. Just as the body acts on the soul, communicating to it certain impressions through the external senses, so in the same way the spirit produces certain movements in the body. A person’s religious feeling, like all his other thoughts, feelings and experiences, cannot remain without external detection. The totality of all external forms and actions expressing the inner religious mood of the soul forms what is called “worship” or “cult.” Worship, or cult, in one form or another, is therefore an inevitable part of every religion: in it it is manifested and expressed, just as it reveals its life through the body. Thus, worship - it is the outward expression of religious faith in sacrifices and rituals.

Origin of worship

Worship, as an external expression of a person’s inner aspiration towards, dates back to the time when a person first learned about God. He learned about God when, after the creation of man, God appeared to him in paradise and gave him the first commandments about not eating from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil (Genesis 2:17), about observing rest on the seventh day (Genesis 2: 3) and blessed his marriage (Gen. 1:28).

This primitive worship of the first people in paradise did not consist of any specific church rites, as at present, but in the free outpouring of reverent feelings before God, as their Creator and Provider. At the same time, the commandment about the seventh day and about abstinence from the forbidden tree laid the foundation for certain liturgical institutions. They are the beginning of our and. In God's blessing of the marriage of Adam and Eve, we cannot help but see the establishment of a sacrament.

After the fall of the first people and their expulsion from paradise, primitive worship received its further development in the establishment of the ritual of sacrifice. These sacrifices were of two kinds: they were performed on all solemn and joyful occasions, as an expression of gratitude to God for the benefits received from Him, and then when it was necessary to ask God for help or beg for forgiveness for sins committed.

The sacrifice was supposed to constantly remind people of their guilt before God, of the original sin weighing on them, and of the fact that God could hear and accept their prayers only in the name of the sacrifice that the seed of the woman, promised by God in paradise, would subsequently bring to atone for their sins , that is, the Savior of the world, Messiah-Christ, who has to come into the world and accomplish the redemption of humanity. Thus, the divine service for the chosen people had a propitiatory power, not in itself, but because it was a prototype of the great sacrifice that the God-man, our Lord Jesus Christ, crucified on the cross for the sins of the whole world, once had to make. In the times of the patriarchs, from Adam to Moses, worship was performed in the families of these patriarchs by their heads, by the patriarchs themselves, in places and at times at their discretion. From the time of Moses, when the chosen people of God, the Old Testament Israel, who kept the true faith in the One God, increased in number, worship began to be performed on behalf of the entire people by specially appointed persons, who were called high priests, and Levites, as the book of EXODUS tells about this. and then the book of LEVIT. The order of Old Testament worship among the people of God was determined with all the details in the ritual law given through Moses. By command of God Himself, the prophet Moses established a certain place (the “tabernacle of the covenant”), and times (holidays, etc.) for the performance of worship, and sacred persons, and its very forms. Under King Solomon, instead of a portable temple-tabernacle, a permanent, majestic and beautiful Old Testament temple was erected in Jerusalem, which was the only place in the Old Testament where worship of the true God was performed.

Old Testament worship, determined by law, before the coming of the Savior, was divided into two types: temple worship and synagogue worship. The first took place in the temple and consisted of reading the Decalogue and some other selected passages of the Old Testament Holy Scripture, offerings and sacrifices, and, finally, hymns. But, in addition to the temple, from the time of Ezra, synagogues began to be built, in which the Jews felt a special need, deprived of participation in temple worship and did not want to be left without public religious edification. Jews gathered in synagogues on Saturdays to pray, sing, read the Holy Scriptures, as well as to translate and explain worship for those born in captivity and who did not know the sacred language well.

With the coming into the world of the Messiah, Christ the Savior, who sacrificed Himself for the sins of the whole world, the ritual Old Testament worship lost all meaning and it was replaced by the New Testament, which was based on the greatest Sacrament of the Body and Blood of Christ, established at the Last Supper by the Lord Jesus Christ Himself and bearing the name of the Holy Eucharist, or the Sacrament of Thanksgiving. This is the Bloodless Sacrifice, which replaced the Old Testament bloody sacrifices of calves and lambs, which only prefigured the One Great Sacrifice of the Lamb of God, who takes upon Himself the sins of the world. The Lord Jesus Christ Himself commanded His followers to perform the sacraments established by Him (Luke 22:19; Matt. 28:19), to pray private and public (Matt. 6:5-13; Matt. 18:19-20), to preach everywhere in world His Divine Gospel teaching (Matt. 28:19-20; Mark 16:15).

From this celebration of the sacraments, prayers and preaching of the Gospel, the New Testament Christian worship was formed. Its composition and character were more fully determined by St. Apostles. As can be seen from the book of the Acts of the Apostles, during their time special places for prayer meetings of believers began to appear, called in Greek ???????? - “churches,” because members of the Church gathered in them. So the Church, a collection of believers united into a single organism of the Body of Christ, gave its name to the place where these meetings took place. Just as in the Old Testament, starting from the time of Moses, divine services were performed by certain, appointed persons: the high priest, priests and Levites, so in the New Testament, divine services began to be performed by special clergy appointed through the laying on of hands of the Apostles: bishops, presbyters and deacons. In the book. In the Acts and Epistles of the Apostles we find clear indications that all these main three degrees of priesthood in the New Testament Church originate from the Apostles themselves.

After the Holy Apostles, worship continued to develop, replenished with more and more new prayers and sacred chants, deeply edifying in their content. The final establishment of a certain order and uniformity in Christian worship was accomplished by the apostolic successors according to the commandment given to them: “Let all things be done in order and in order” (1 Cor. 14:40).

Thus, at present, the worship of the Orthodox Church consists of all those prayers and sacred rites with which Orthodox Christians express to God their feelings of faith, hope and love, and through which they enter into mysterious communion with Him and receive from Him grace-filled powers for the holy and godly worthy of a true Christian life.

Development of Orthodox worship

The New Testament Christian religion, due to its close historical connection with the Old Testament, retained some forms and very much of the content of the Old Testament worship. The Old Testament Jerusalem temple, where Christ the Savior Himself and Sts. went to on all the major Old Testament holidays. Apostles, was originally a sacred place for the first Christians. The Old Testament sacred books were accepted into Christian public worship, and the first sacred hymns of the Christian Church were the same prayer psalms that were so widely used in Old Testament worship. Despite the ever-increasing purely Christian songwriting, these psalms have not lost their significance in Christian worship in all subsequent times, right up to the present day. The hours of prayer and feast days of the Old Testament remained sacred for Christians in the New Testament. But only everything accepted by Christians from the Old Testament Church received a new meaning and a special sign according to the spirit of the new Christian teaching in full, however, agreement with the words of Christ the Savior that He came “not to break the law, but to fulfill,” that is, “to replenish,” to put into all new, higher and deeper understanding (Matt. 5:17-19). Simultaneously with their visit to the Jerusalem temple, the Apostles themselves, and with them the first Christians, began to gather separately in their homes for the “breaking of bread,” that is, for a purely Christian service, in the center of which was the Eucharist. Historical circumstances, however, forced the first Christians relatively early to completely and completely separate from the Old Testament temple and synagogue. The temple was destroyed by the Romans in 70, and Old Testament worship with its sacrifices ceased altogether after that. The synagogues, which among the Jews were not places of worship, in the proper sense of the word (worship could be performed only in one place in the Jerusalem temple), but only places of prayer and teaching meetings, soon became so hostile to Christianity that even Jewish Christians stopped visiting them. And this is understandable. Christianity, as a new religion, purely spiritual and perfect, and at the same time universal in the sense of time and nationality, naturally had to develop new liturgical forms in accordance with its spirit; it could not limit itself to the Old Testament sacred books and psalms.

“The beginning and foundation of public Christian worship, as Archimandrite Gabriel points out well and in detail, was laid by Jesus Christ Himself, partly by His example, partly by His commandments. Carrying out His Divine ministry on earth, He establishes the New Testament Church (Matt. 16:18-19; 18:17-20; 28:20), chooses the Apostles for it, and in their person, successors to their ministry, shepherds and teachers (John. 15:16; 20:21; Eph. 4:11-14; Teaching believers to worship God in spirit and truth, accordingly, He Himself, first of all, represents an example of organized worship. He promises to be with believers where “two or three are gathered together in His name” (Matt. 18:20), “and to be with them always, even to the end of the age” (Matt. 28:20). He Himself prays, and sometimes the whole night (Luke 6:12; Matt. 14323), He prays with the help of external visible signs, such as: raising His eyes to heaven (John 17:1), kneeling (Luke 22 :41-45), and chapters (Matt. 26:39). He stimulates others to prayer, indicating in it a grace-filled means (Matt. 21:22; Luke 22:40; John 14:13; 15:7), divides it into public (Matt. 18:19-20) and home (Matt. 6:6), teaches His disciples prayer itself (Matt. 4:9-10), warns His followers against abuses in prayer and worship (John 4:23-24; 2 Cor. 3:17; Matt. .4:10). Next, He proclaims His new teaching of the Gospel through the living word, through preaching and commands His disciples to preach it “to all nations” (Matthew 28:19; Mark 16:15), teaches a blessing (Luke 24:51; Mark 8 :7), lays on hands (Matt. 19:13-15) and finally defends the holiness and dignity of the house of God (Matt. 21:13; Mark 11:15). And in order to communicate Divine grace to people who believe in Him, He establishes the sacraments, commanding them to baptize those who come to His church (Matthew 28:19); in the name of the authority given to them, he entrusts them with the right to bind and solve the sins of people (John 20:22-23); especially between the sacraments he commands to perform the sacrament of the Eucharist in His remembrance, as an image of the Calvary sacrifice on the cross (Luke 22:19). The apostles, having learned from their Divine Teacher the New Testament service, despite their primary focus on preaching the word of God (1 Cor. 1:27), quite clearly and in detail defined the very order of external worship. Thus, we find indications of some accessories of external worship in their writings (1 Cor. 11:23; 14:40); but the greatest part of it remained in the practice of the Church. The successors of the Apostles, pastors and teachers of the church, preserved the Apostolic decrees regarding worship and, on the basis of these, in times of calm after terrible persecutions, at Ecumenical and local councils, they determined in writing the entire, almost down to detail, constant and uniform order of worship, preserved by the church to this day "("Guide to Liturgics," Archimandrite. Gabriel, pp. 41-42, Tver, 1886).

According to the decree of the Apostolic Council in Jerusalem (chapter 15 of the book of Acts), the ritual Mosaic law in the New Testament is abolished: there can be no bloody sacrifices, because the Great Sacrifice has already been brought to atone for the sins of the whole world, there is no tribe of Levi for the priesthood, because in In the New Testament, all people redeemed by the Blood of Christ became equal to each other: the priesthood is equally available to everyone, there is not even one chosen people of God, for all peoples are equally called into the Kingdom of the Messiah, revealed by the sufferings of Christ. The place to serve God is not only in Jerusalem, but everywhere. The time of serving God is always and unceasingly. At the center of Christian worship becomes Christ the Redeemer and His entire earthly life, saving humanity. Therefore, everything borrowed from the Old Testament worship is imbued with a new, purely Christian spirit. These are all the prayers, chants, readings and rituals of Christian worship. The main idea is their salvation in Christ. Therefore, the central point of Christian worship has become the Eucharist, a sacrifice of praise and thanksgiving for the Sacrifice of Christ on the Cross.

Too little information has been preserved about exactly how Christian worship was performed in the first three centuries during the era of severe persecution by the pagans. There could be no permanent temples. To perform divine services, Christians gathered in private houses and in burial caves underground in the catacombs. It is known that the first Christians held prayer vigils in the catacombs throughout the night from evening until morning, especially on the eves of Sundays and great holidays, as well as on the days of remembrance of the martyrs who suffered for Christ, and these vigils usually took place at the tombs of the martyrs and ended Eucharist. Already in this ancient period, there were definitely liturgical rites. Eusebius and Jerome mention Justin's book of Psalms - "Singer," which contained church hymns. Hippolytus, Bishop Ostian, who died around 250, left behind a book in which he sets out the apostolic tradition regarding the order of ordaining a reader, subdeacon, deacon, presbyter, bishop, and regarding prayers or a short order of worship and commemoration of the dead. It is said about prayers that they must be performed in the morning, at the third, sixth, ninth hour, in the evening and at the announcement of the loop. If there cannot be a meeting, let everyone sing, read and pray at home. This, of course, presupposed the existence of corresponding liturgical books.

The meaning of Orthodox worship

This value is extremely high. Our Orthodox worship teaches the faithful, edifies them, and educates them spiritually, giving them the richest spiritual food, both for the mind and for the heart. The annual cycle of our worship sets out to us in living images and teachings almost the entire history, both the Old Testament and, especially, the New Testament, as well as the history of the Church, both universal and, in particular, Russian; here the dogmatic teaching of the Church is revealed, striking the soul with reverence for the greatness of the Creator, and moral lessons of truly Christian life are taught that purify and elevate the heart in the living images and examples of the saints. saints of God, whose memory is glorified by the Holy Church almost daily.
Both the entire internal appearance and structure of our Orthodox church, and the services performed in it, vividly remind those praying of that “heavenly world” to which all Christians are destined. Our worship is a genuine “school of piety,” completely taking the soul away from this sinful world and transferring it to the kingdom of the Spirit. “Truly the temple is earthly,” says the greatest shepherd of our time, Saint Fr. John of Kronstadt, “for where the throne of God is, where terrible sacraments are performed, where they serve with people, where the constant praise of the Almighty is, there truly is heaven and the heaven of heaven.” Whoever listens attentively to the divine service, who consciously participates in it with his mind and heart, cannot help but feel the full force of the powerful call of the Church to holiness, which is, according to the word of the Lord Himself, the ideal of Christian life. Through his worship, St. The Church is trying to tear us all away from all earthly attachments and passions and make us those “earthly angels” and “heavenly people” whom she glorifies in her troparions, kontakions, stichera and canons.

Worship has a great regenerating power, and this is its irreplaceable significance. Some types of worship, called “sacraments,” have an even more special, special meaning for the person receiving them, for they give him a special grace-filled power.

The most important service is the Divine Liturgy. The great Sacrament is performed on it - the transformation of bread and wine into the Body and Blood of the Lord and the Communion of the faithful. Liturgy translated from Greek means joint work. Believers gather in church in order to glorify God together “with one mouth and one heart” and partake of the Holy Mysteries of Christ. So they follow the example of the holy apostles and the Lord Himself, who, having gathered for the Last Supper on the eve of the betrayal and suffering of the Savior on the Cross, drank from the Cup and ate the Bread that He gave them, reverently listening to His words: “This is My Body...” and “This is My blood...”

Christ commanded His apostles to perform this Sacrament, and the apostles taught this to their successors - bishops and presbyters, priests. The original name of this Sacrament of Thanksgiving is Eucharist (Greek). The public service at which the Eucharist is celebrated is called liturgy (from the Greek litos - public and ergon - service, work). The Liturgy is sometimes called mass, since it is usually supposed to be celebrated from dawn to noon, that is, in the pre-dinner time.

The order of the liturgy is as follows: first, the objects for the Sacrament (Offered Gifts) are prepared, then the believers prepare for the Sacrament, and finally, the Sacrament itself and the Communion of the believers are performed. Thus, the liturgy is divided into three parts, which are called:

• Proskomedia
• Liturgy of the Catechumens
• Liturgy of the Faithful.

Proskomedia

The Greek word proskomedia means offering. This is the name of the first part of the liturgy in memory of the custom of the first Christians to bring bread, wine and everything necessary for the service. Therefore, the bread itself, used for the liturgy, is called prosphora, that is, an offering.

The prosphora should be round, and it consists of two parts, as an image of the two natures in Christ - Divine and human. Prosphora is baked from wheat leavened bread without any additions other than salt.

A cross is imprinted on the top of the prosphora, and in its corners are the initial letters of the Savior’s name: “IC XC” and the Greek word “NI KA,” which together means: Jesus Christ conquers. To perform the Sacrament, red grape wine is used, pure, without any additives. Wine is mixed with water in memory of the fact that blood and water poured out from the Savior’s wound on the Cross. For proskomedia, five prosphoras are used in remembrance that Christ fed five thousand people with five loaves, but the prosphora that is prepared for Communion is one of these five, because there is one Christ, Savior and God. After the priest and deacon have performed the entrance prayers in front of the closed Royal Doors and put on sacred vestments in the altar, they approach the altar. The priest takes the first (lamb) prosphora and makes a copy of the image of the cross on it three times, saying: “In remembrance of the Lord and God and our Savior Jesus Christ.” From this prosphora the priest cuts out the middle in the shape of a cube. This cubic part of the prosphora is called the Lamb. It is placed on the paten. Then the priest makes a cross on the bottom side of the Lamb and pierces its right side with a spear.

After this, wine mixed with water is poured into the bowl.

The second prosphora is called the Mother of God; a particle is taken out of it in honor of the Mother of God. The third is called nine-order, because nine particles are taken out of it in honor of John the Baptist, the prophets, apostles, saints, martyrs, saints, unmercenaries, Joachim and Anna - the parents of the Mother of God and the saints of the temple, the day saints, and also in honor of the saint whose name Liturgy is celebrated.

From the fourth and fifth prosphoras, particles are taken out for the living and the dead.

At the proskomedia, particles are also taken out from the prosphoras, which are served by believers for the repose and health of their relatives and friends.

All these particles are laid out in a special order on the paten next to the Lamb. Having completed all the preparations for the celebration of the liturgy, the priest places a star on the paten, covering it and the chalice with two small covers, and then covers everything together with a large cover, which is called air, and censes the Offered Gifts, asking the Lord to bless them, remember those who brought these Gifts and those for whom they were brought. During the proskomedia, the 3rd and 6th hours are read in the church.

Liturgy of the Catechumens

The second part of the liturgy is called the liturgy of the “catechumens,” because during its celebration not only the baptized can be present, but also those preparing to receive this sacrament, that is, the “catechumens.”

The deacon, having received a blessing from the priest, comes out of the altar to the pulpit and loudly proclaims: “Bless, Master,” that is, bless the assembled believers to begin the service and participate in the liturgy.

The priest in his first exclamation glorifies the Holy Trinity: “Blessed is the Kingdom of the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit, now and ever, and unto ages of ages.” The choristers sing “Amen” and the deacon pronounces the Great Litany.

The choir sings antiphons, that is, psalms, which are supposed to be sung alternately by the right and left choirs.

Blessed are you, Lord
Bless, my soul, the Lord and all that is within me, His Holy Name. Bless the Lord, my soul
and do not forget all His rewards: He who cleanses all your iniquities, He who heals all your illnesses,
who delivers your belly from decay, who crowns you with mercy and bounty, who fulfills your good desires: your youth will be renewed like an eagle. Generous and merciful, Lord. Long-suffering and abundantly merciful. Bless, my soul, the Lord and all my inner being, His Holy Name. Blessed be you Lord

And “Praise, my soul, the Lord...”
Praise the Lord, my soul. I will praise the Lord in my belly, I will sing to my God as long as I am.
Do not trust in princes, in the sons of men, for there is no salvation in them. His spirit shall depart and return to his land: and on that day all his thoughts shall perish. Blessed is he who has the God of Jacob as his helper; his trust is in the Lord his God, who made heaven and earth, the sea and all that is in them; keeping the truth forever, bringing justice to the offended, giving food to the hungry. The Lord will decide the chained; The Lord makes the blind wise; The Lord raises up the downtrodden; The Lord loves the righteous;
The Lord protects strangers, accepts the orphan and the widow, and destroys the path of sinners.

At the end of the second antiphon, the song “Only Begotten Son...” is sung. This song sets forth the entire teaching of the Church about Jesus Christ.

Only Begotten Son and the Word of God, He is immortal, and He willed our salvation for the sake of incarnation
from the holy Theotokos and Ever-Virgin Mary, immutably made man, crucified for us, Christ our God, trampled upon by death, the One of the Holy Trinity, glorified to the Father and the Holy Spirit,
save us.

In Russian it sounds like this: “Save us, Only Begotten Son and Word of God, Immortal One, who deigned to be incarnated for the sake of our salvation from the Holy Theotokos and Ever-Virgin Mary, who became man and did not change, crucified and trampled death by death, Christ God, one of the Holy Persons Trinity, glorified together with the Father and the Holy Spirit.” After the small litany, the choir sings the third antiphon - the Gospel “beatitudes”. The Royal Doors open to the Small Entrance.

In Your Kingdom, remember us, O Lord, when You come to Your Kingdom.
Blessed are the poor in spirit, for to them is the Kingdom of Heaven.
Blessed are those who cry, for they will be comforted.
Blessed are the meek, for they will inherit the earth.
Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they will be satisfied.
Blesseds of mercy, for there will be mercy.
Blessed are those who are pure in heart, for they will see God.
Blessed are the peacemakers, for these shall be called sons of God.
Blessed is the expulsion of truth for the sake of them, for those are the Kingdom of Heaven.
Blessed are you when they revile you, and mistreat you, and say all sorts of evil things against you, who lie to Me for my sake.
Rejoice and be glad, for your reward is abundant in heaven.

At the end of the singing, the priest and the deacon, who carries the altar Gospel, go out to the pulpit. Having received a blessing from the priest, the deacon stops at the Royal Doors and, holding up the Gospel, proclaims: “Wisdom, forgive,” that is, he reminds the believers that they will soon hear the Gospel reading, therefore they must stand straight and with attention (forgive means straight).

The entrance of the clergy into the altar with the Gospel is called the Small Entrance, in contrast to the Great Entrance, which takes place later at the Liturgy of the Faithful. The Small Entrance reminds believers of the first appearance of the preaching of Jesus Christ. The choir sings “Come, let us worship and fall before Christ.” Save us, Son of God, risen from the dead, singing to Ti: Alleluia.” After this, the troparion (Sunday, holiday or holy) and other hymns are sung. Then the Trisagion is sung: Holy God, Holy Mighty, Holy Immortal, have mercy on us (three times).

The Apostle and the Gospel are read. When reading the Gospel, believers stand with their heads bowed, listening with reverence to the holy gospel. After the reading of the Gospel, at the special litany and the litany for the dead, the relatives and friends of the believers praying in the church are remembered through notes.

They are followed by the litany of the catechumens. The liturgy of the catechumens ends with the words “Catechumen, come forth.”

Liturgy of the Faithful

This is the name of the third part of the liturgy. Only the faithful can attend, that is, those who have been baptized and have no prohibitions from a priest or bishop. At the Liturgy of the Faithful:

1) the Gifts are transferred from the altar to the throne;
2) believers prepare for the consecration of the Gifts;
3) the Gifts are consecrated;
4) believers prepare for Communion and receive communion;
5) then thanksgiving is performed for Communion and dismissal.

After the recitation of two short litanies, the Cherubic Hymn is sung. “Even though the cherubim secretly form and sing the Trisagion hymn to the Life-giving Trinity, let us now put aside all worldly cares. As if we will raise up the King of all, the angels invisibly bestow ranks. Alleluia, alleluia, alleluia". In Russian it reads like this: “We, mysteriously depicting the Cherubim and singing the trisagion of the Trinity, which gives life, will now leave concern for all everyday things, so that we can glorify the King of all, Whom the invisibly angelic ranks solemnly glorify. Hallelujah.”

Before the Cherubic Hymn, the Royal Doors open and the deacon censes. The priest at this time secretly prays that the Lord will cleanse his soul and heart and deign to perform the Sacrament. Then the priest, raising his hands up, pronounces the first part of the Cherubic Song three times in an undertone, and the deacon also finishes it in an undertone. Both of them go to the altar to transfer the prepared Gifts to the throne. The deacon has air on his left shoulder, he carries the paten with both hands, placing it on his head. The priest carries the Holy Cup in front of him. They leave the altar through the northern side doors, stop at the pulpit and, turning their faces to the believers, say a prayer for the Patriarch, bishops, and all Orthodox Christians.

Deacon: Our Great Lord and Father Alexy, His Holiness the Patriarch of Moscow and All Rus', and our Most Reverend Lord (name of the diocesan bishop) Metropolitan (or: Archbishop, or: Bishop) (title of the diocesan bishop), may the Lord God always remember in His Kingdom , now and ever, and unto ages of ages.

Priest: May the Lord God remember all of you, Orthodox Christians, in His Kingdom always, now and ever, and forever and ever.

Then the priest and deacon enter the altar through the Royal Doors. This is how the Great Entrance takes place.

The brought Gifts are placed on the throne and covered with air (a large cover), the Royal Doors are closed and the curtain is drawn. The singers finish the Cherubic Hymn. During the transfer of the Gifts from the altar to the throne, believers remember how the Lord voluntarily went to suffer on the cross and die. They stand with their heads bowed and pray to the Savior for themselves and their loved ones.

After the Great Entrance, the deacon pronounces the Litany of Petition, the priest blesses those present with the words: “Peace to all.” Then it is proclaimed: “Let us love one another, that we may confess with one mind” and the choir continues: “Father, and Son, and Holy Spirit, Trinity, Consubstantial and Indivisible.”

Following this, usually by the entire temple, the Creed is sung. On behalf of the Church, it briefly expresses the whole essence of our faith, and therefore should be pronounced in joint love and like-mindedness.

Creed

I believe in One God, the Father Almighty, Creator of heaven and earth, visible to all and invisible. And in the One Lord Jesus Christ, the Son of God, the Only Begotten, who was born of the Father before all ages. Light from light, true God from true God, born uncreated, consubstantial with the Father, to Whom all things were. For our sake, man, and for our salvation, who came down from heaven, and became incarnate from the Holy Spirit and the Virgin Mary, and became human. Crucified for us under Pontius Pilate, and suffered and was buried. And he rose again on the third day according to the scriptures. And ascended into heaven, and sits at the right hand of the Father. And again the coming one will be judged with glory by the living and the dead, His Kingdom will have no end. And in the Holy Spirit, the Life-Giving Lord, who proceeds from the Father, who with the Father and the Son is glorified, who spoke the prophets. Into one Holy Catholic and Apostolic Church. I confess one baptism for the remission of sins. I hope for the resurrection of the dead and the life of the next century. Amen.

After singing the Creed, the time comes to offer the “Holy Offering” with the fear of God and certainly “in peace,” without having any malice or enmity towards anyone.

“Let us become kind, let us become fearful, let us bring holy offerings to the world.” In response to this, the choir sings: “Mercy of peace, sacrifice of praise.”

The gifts of peace will be a thanksgiving and praise offering to God for all His benefits. The priest blesses the believers with the words: “The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ and the love (love) of God and the Father, and the communion (communion) of the Holy Spirit be with you all.” And then he calls: “Woe is the heart we have,” that is, we will have hearts directed upward to God. To this the singers on behalf of the believers respond: “Imams to the Lord,” that is, we already have hearts directed toward the Lord.

The most important part of the liturgy begins with the words of the priest “We thank the Lord.” We thank the Lord for all His mercies and bow to the ground, and the singers sing: “It is worthy and righteous to worship the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit, the Consubstantial and Indivisible Trinity.”

At this time, the priest, in a prayer called Eucharistic (that is, thanksgiving), glorifies the Lord and His perfection, thanks Him for the creation and redemption of man, and for all His mercies, known to us and even unknown. He thanks the Lord for accepting this bloodless Sacrifice, although He is surrounded by higher spiritual beings - archangels, angels, cherubim, seraphim, “singing a victory song, crying out, calling out and speaking.” The priest speaks these last words of the secret prayer loudly out loud. The singers add to them the angelic song: “Holy, holy, holy, Lord of hosts, the heavens and the earth are filled with Your glory.” This song, which is called “Seraphim,” is supplemented by the words with which the people greeted the Lord’s entry into Jerusalem: “Hosanna in the highest (that is, he who lives in heaven) Blessed is he who comes (that is, he who walks) in the name of the Lord. Hosanna in the highest!”

The priest pronounces the exclamation: “Singing the song of victory, crying, crying and speaking.” These words are taken from the visions of the prophet Ezekiel and the apostle John the Theologian, who saw in revelation the Throne of God, surrounded by angels having different images: one was in the form of an eagle (the word “singing” refers to it), the other in the form of a calf (“crying”) , the third in the form of a lion (“calling”) and, finally, the fourth in the form of a man (“verbally”). These four angels continually cried out, “Holy, holy, holy, Lord of hosts.” While singing these words, the priest secretly continues the prayer of thanksgiving; he glorifies the good that God sends to people, His endless love for His creation, which manifested itself in the coming to earth of the Son of God.

Remembering the Last Supper, at which the Lord established the Sacrament of Holy Communion, the priest loudly pronounces the words spoken by the Savior at it: “Take, eat, this is My Body, which was broken for you for the remission of sins.” And also: “Drink of it, all of you, this is My Blood of the New Testament, which is shed for you and for many for the remission of sins.” Finally, the priest, remembering in secret prayer the Savior’s commandment to perform Communion, glorifying His life, suffering and death, resurrection, ascension into heaven and second coming in glory, loudly pronounces: “Thine from Thine, what is offered to Thee for all and for all.” These words mean: “We bring Your gifts from Your servants to You, O Lord, because of everything we have said.”

The singers sing: “We sing to You, we bless You, we thank You, Lord. And we pray, our God.”

The priest, in secret prayer, asks the Lord to send His Holy Spirit on the people standing in the church and on the Offered Gifts, so that He would sanctify them. Then the priest reads the troparion three times in a low voice: “Lord, who sent down Thy Most Holy Spirit at the third hour by Thy Apostle, do not take Him away from us, who is good, but renew us who pray.” The deacon pronounces the twelfth and thirteenth verses of the 50th Psalm: “Create a pure heart in me, O God...” and “Do not cast me away from Thy presence...”. Then the priest blesses the Holy Lamb lying on the paten and says: “And make this bread the honorable Body of Thy Christ.”

Then he blesses the cup, saying: “And in this cup is the precious Blood of Thy Christ.” And finally, he blesses the gifts along with the words: “Translating by Your Holy Spirit.” In these great and holy moments, the Gifts become the true Body and Blood of the Savior, although they remain the same in appearance as before.

The priest with the deacon and the believers bow to the ground before the Holy Gifts, as if they were bowing to the King and God himself. After the consecration of the Gifts, the priest in secret prayer asks the Lord that those receiving communion be strengthened in every good thing, that their sins be forgiven, that they partake of the Holy Spirit and reach the Kingdom of Heaven, that the Lord allows them to turn to Himself with their needs and does not condemn them for unworthy communion. The priest remembers the saints and especially the Blessed Virgin Mary and loudly proclaims: “Extremely (that is, especially) about the most holy, most pure, most blessed, most glorious Our Lady Theotokos and Ever-Virgin Mary,” and the choir responds with a song of praise:
It is worthy to eat, as you are truly blessed, the Mother of God, the Ever-Blessed and Most Immaculate and the Mother of our God. We magnify Thee, the most honorable Cherub and the most glorious without comparison, the Seraphim, who gave birth to God the Word without corruption.

The priest continues to secretly pray for the dead and, moving on to prayer for the living, loudly remembers “first” His Holiness the Patriarch, the ruling diocesan bishop, the choir answers: “And everyone and everything,” that is, asks the Lord to remember all the believers. The prayer for the living ends with the exclamation of the priest: “And grant us with one mouth and one heart (that is, with one accord) to glorify and glorify Your most honorable and magnificent name, the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit, now and ever, and unto the ages of ages.”

Finally, the priest blesses everyone present: “And may the mercies of the great God and our Savior Jesus Christ be with you all.”
The litany of petition begins: “Having remembered all the saints, let us pray again and again in peace to the Lord.” That is, having remembered all the saints, let us again pray to the Lord. After the litany, the priest proclaims: “And grant us, O Master, with boldness (boldly, as children ask their father) to dare (dare) to call upon Thee Heavenly God the Father and speak.”

The prayer “Our Father...” is usually sung after this by the entire church.

With the words “Peace to all,” the priest once again blesses the believers.

The deacon, standing at this time on the ambo, is girdled crosswise with an orarion, so that, firstly, it would be more convenient for him to serve the priest during Communion, and secondly, to express his reverence for the Holy Gifts, in imitation of the seraphim.

When the deacon exclaims: “Let us attend,” the curtain of the Royal Doors closes as a reminder of the stone that was rolled to the Holy Sepulcher. The priest, raising the Holy Lamb over the paten, loudly proclaims: “Holy to holy.” In other words, the Holy Gifts can only be given to saints, that is, believers who have sanctified themselves through prayer, fasting, and the Sacrament of Repentance. And, realizing their unworthiness, believers answer: “There is only one holy, one Lord, Jesus Christ, to the glory of God the Father.”

First, the clergy receive communion at the altar. The priest breaks the Lamb into four parts just as it was cut at the proskomedia. The part with the inscription “IC” is lowered into the bowl, and warmth, that is, hot water, is also poured into it, as a reminder that believers, under the guise of wine, accept the true Blood of Christ.

The other part of the Lamb with the inscription “ХС” is intended for the communion of the clergy, and the parts with the inscriptions “NI” and “KA” are for the communion of the laity. These two parts are cut by a copy according to the number of those receiving communion into small pieces, which are lowered into the Chalice.

While the clergy are receiving communion, the choir sings a special verse, which is called “sacramental,” as well as some chant suitable for the occasion. Russian church composers wrote many sacred works that are not included in the canon of worship, but are performed by the choir at this particular time. Usually the sermon is preached at this time.

Finally, the Royal Doors open for the communion of the laity, and the deacon with the Holy Cup in his hands says: “Come with the fear of God and faith.”

The priest reads a prayer before Holy Communion, and the believers repeat it to themselves: “I believe, Lord, and confess that You are truly the Christ, the Son of the Living God, who came into the world to save sinners, from whom I am the first.” I also believe that This is Your Most Pure Body and This is Your Most Honest Blood. I pray to You: have mercy on me and forgive me my sins, voluntary and involuntary, in word, in deed, in knowledge and ignorance, and grant me the ability to partake of Your Most Pure Mysteries without condemnation, for the remission of sins and eternal life. Amen. Thy secret supper this day, O Son of God, receive me as a partaker, for I will not tell the secret to Thy enemies, neither will I give Thee a kiss like Judas, but like a thief I will confess Thee: remember me, O Lord, in Thy Kingdom. May the communion of Your Holy Mysteries be not for judgment or condemnation for me, Lord, but for the healing of soul and body.”

After communion, they kiss the lower edge of the Holy Chalice and go to the table, where they drink it with warmth (church wine mixed with hot water) and receive a piece of prosphora. This is done so that not a single smallest particle of the Holy Gifts remains in the mouth and so that one does not immediately begin to eat ordinary everyday food. After everyone has received communion, the priest brings the chalice to the altar and lowers into it particles taken from the service and brought prosphoras with a prayer that the Lord, with His Blood, would wash away the sins of all who were commemorated at the liturgy.

Then he blesses the believers who sing: “We have seen the true light, we have received the heavenly Spirit, we have found the true faith, we worship the inseparable Trinity: for she who saved us is.”

The deacon carries the paten to the altar, and the priest, taking the Holy Cup in his hands, blesses those praying with it. This last appearance of the Holy Gifts before being transferred to the altar reminds us of the Ascension of the Lord to heaven after His Resurrection. Having bowed to the Holy Gifts for the last time, as to the Lord Himself, the believers thank Him for Communion, and the choir sings a song of gratitude: “May our lips be filled with Thy praise, O Lord, for we sing Thy glory, for Thou hast made us worthy to partake of Thy Divine, immortal and life-giving Mysteries; keep us in Thy holiness, and teach us Thy righteousness all day long. Alleluia, alleluia, alleluia.”

The deacon pronounces a short litany in which he thanks the Lord for Communion. The priest, standing at the Holy See, folds the antimension on which the cup and paten stood, and places the altar Gospel on it.

By loudly proclaiming “We will go out in peace,” he shows that the liturgy is ending, and soon the believers can go home quietly and in peace.

Then the priest reads the prayer behind the pulpit (because it is read behind the pulpit) “Bless those who bless Thee, O Lord, and sanctify those who trust in Thee, save Thy people and bless Thy heritage, preserve the fulfillment of Thy Church, sanctify those who love the splendor of Thy house, Thou glorify them with Thy Divine by strength and do not forsake us who trust in Thee. Grant Thy peace, to Thy Churches, to the priests and to all Thy people. For every good gift and every perfect gift is from above, coming down from You, the Father of lights. And to You we send glory, and thanksgiving, and worship, to the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit, now and ever, and unto ages of ages.”

The choir sings: “Blessed be the name of the Lord from now on and forever.”

The priest blesses the worshipers for the last time and says dismissal with a cross in his hand, facing the temple. Then everyone approaches the cross to, by kissing it, confirm their fidelity to Christ, in whose memory the Divine Liturgy was performed.

Daily worship

In ancient times, the divine service of the Orthodox Church was performed throughout the day nine times, that’s why there were all nine church services: ninth hour, vespers, compline, midnight office, matins, first hour, third and sixth hours, and mass. Currently, for the convenience of Orthodox Christians, who do not have the opportunity to visit the temples of God so often due to homework, these nine services are combined into three church services: Vespers, Matins and Mass. Each individual service includes three church services: at vespers the ninth hour, vespers and compline entered; Matins consists of Midnight Office, Matins and the first hour; mass begins at the third and sixth hours and then the liturgy itself is celebrated. For hours These are short prayers, during which psalms and other prayers appropriate for these times of the day are read for mercy on us sinners.

Evening service

The liturgical day begins in the evening on the basis that at the creation of the world there was first evening, and then morning. After vespers Usually the service in the church is dedicated to a holiday or saint, whose remembrance is performed on the next day according to the arrangement in the calendar. On every day of the year, either some event from the earthly life of the Savior and the Mother of God or one of the saints is remembered. saints of God. In addition, each day of the week is dedicated to a special memory. On Sunday a service is held in honor of the risen Savior; on Monday we pray to St. angels, on Tuesday is remembered in the prayers of St. John, the Forerunner of the Lord, on Wednesday and Friday a service is held in honor of the life-giving cross of the Lord, on Thursday - in honor of St. Apostles and St. Nicholas, on Saturday - in honor of all saints and in memory of all departed Orthodox Christians.

The evening service is held to thank God for the past day and to ask for God's blessing for the coming night. Vespers consists of three services. Read first ninth hour in memory of the death of Jesus Christ, which the Lord accepted according to our reckoning of time at 3 o’clock in the afternoon, and according to the Jewish reckoning of time at 9 o’clock in the afternoon. Then the most evening service, and is accompanied by Compline, or a series of prayers that Christians read after the evening, at nightfall.

Matins

Matins begins midnight office which took place in ancient times at midnight. Ancient Christians came to the temple at midnight to pray, expressing their faith in the second coming of the Son of God, who, according to the belief of the Church, would come at night. After the Midnight Office, Matins itself is immediately performed, or a service during which Christians thank God for the gift of sleep to calm the body and ask the Lord to bless the affairs of every person and help people spend the coming day without sin. Joins Matins first hour. This service is so called because it departs after the morning, at the beginning of the day; behind it, Christians ask God to direct our lives towards the fulfillment of God’s commandments.

Mass

Mass begins with reading the 3rd and 6th hours. Service three o'clock reminds us how the Lord, at the third hour of the day, according to the Jewish account of time, and according to our account at the ninth hour of the morning, was led to trial before Pontius Pilate, and how the Holy Spirit at this time of the day, by His descent in the form of tongues of fire, enlightened the apostles and strengthened them for the feat of preaching about Christ. Service of the sixth The hour is so called because it reminds us of the crucifixion of the Lord Jesus Christ on Golgotha, which according to the Jewish reckoning was at 6 o’clock in the afternoon, and according to our reckoning at 12 o’clock in the afternoon. After hours, mass is celebrated, or liturgy.

In this order, divine services are performed on weekdays; but on some days of the year this order changes, for example: on the days of the Nativity of Christ, Epiphany, on Maundy Thursday, on Good Friday and Great Saturday and on Trinity Day. On Christmas and Epiphany Eve watch(1st, 3rd and 9th) are performed separately from mass and are called royal in memory of the fact that our pious kings are in the habit of coming to this service. On the eve of the holidays of the Nativity of Christ, the Epiphany of the Lord, on Maundy Thursday and on Holy Saturday, mass begins with Vespers and therefore is celebrated from 12 noon. Matins on the feasts of Christmas and Epiphany are preceded by Great Compline. This is evidence that the ancient Christians continued their prayers and singing throughout the night on these great holidays. On Trinity Day, after mass, Vespers is immediately celebrated, during which the priest reads touching prayers to the Holy Spirit, the third Person of the Holy Trinity. And on Good Friday, according to the charter of the Orthodox Church, to strengthen the fast, there is no mass, but after hours, performed separately, at 2 o’clock in the afternoon, vespers is served, after which the funeral service is carried out from the altar to the middle of the church shroud Christ, in remembrance of the taking down of the body of the Lord from the cross by the righteous Joseph and Nicodemus.

During Lent, on all days except Saturday and Sunday, the location of church services is different than on weekdays throughout the year. Departs in the evening Great Compline, on which in the first four days of the first week the touching canon of St. Andrei Kritsky (mephimons). Served in the morning Matins, according to its rules, similar to ordinary, everyday matins; in the middle of the day the 3rd, 6th and 9th are read watch, and joins them vespers. This service is usually called for hours.

Details about the service at “Pravmir”:

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Orthodox Divine Service

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Conversations with the priest. How to understand Orthodox worship

Through worship, Orthodox Christians enter into mysterious communion with God, through the performance of the sacraments, and precisely the most important of them, the sacrament of the union of man with God, and receive from God grace-filled strength for a righteous life.

The purpose of the service is also to edify believers in the teachings of Christ and to dispose them to prayer, repentance and thanksgiving to God.

Orthodox worship is very symbolic, not a single action takes place “for beauty”, everything contains a deep meaning that is incomprehensible to casual visitors. As we study the composition and structure of the service, an understanding of the depth, meaning and greatness contained in the liturgical actions comes.

All church services are divided into: daily, weekly and annual.

The liturgical church year begins on September 1st according to the old style, and the entire annual cycle of worship is built in relation to the holiday.

About Orthodox worship

Worship is the external side of religion, or, in other words, worship is an external activity in which the relationship of God to man and man to God is revealed and realized. Consequently, worship has two sides: the mystical, supernatural, expressing the relationship of the Divine to man, and the moral-aesthetic, expressing the relationship of man to the Divine. Christian worship is a set of sacred actions and rituals, or generally external activity, in which and through which the salvation of man is achieved and carried out on the part of God - the sanctification of man and the assimilation by him of the feat of Redemption accomplished by the Son of God and its gracious fruits, and on the part of man, already redeemed , blessed, faith in the Atonement and true worship of God based on it.

So, in the liturgical actions of any religion and rituals, its entire content is expressed and visually presented. But is it possible to speak of some kind of “service” in relation to that transcendental Beginning, which with its mysterious power embraces the entire universe? Will this not be an illusion of self-delusion of the human mind, which is so often inclined to exaggerate its place in the Universe? Why is worship necessary, what are its religious and psychological roots?

Due to the close, almost inextricable connection between spirit and body, a person cannot help but express his thoughts and feelings through one or another external action. Just as the body acts on the soul, communicating to it through the senses impressions of the external world, so the soul influences the state of the body and its organs. The religious area of ​​the soul, or the human spirit, also requires an external manifestation of the phenomena occurring in this area. The inevitability of the external detection of religious feeling is caused by its intensity and tension, surpassing all other feelings. No less a guarantee of the external manifestation of religious feeling also lies in its constancy, which strongly presupposes constant, regular forms of its manifestation. Therefore, worship is an obligatory component of religion: in it it is manifested and expressed in the same way as the soul reveals its life through the body. Worship determines the existence of religion, its being. Without it, religion would freeze in man and could never develop into a complex and living process. Without expression in the language of cult, it could not be recognized by a person as the highest manifestation of his soul, and would not exist for him as a real communication with God. And since religion has always and everywhere been understood as a person’s desire for reconciliation and unity with God, then worship, its external side, is a manifestation of the same need. A similar feature is characteristic of worship of all times and peoples.

In the religion of the most ancient stage, worship, as a rule, was understood in the image and likeness of human relationships. There was self-interest, claims, references to one’s merits, and flattery. But one should not think that the entire ancient liturgical cult was reduced to this. Even the religion of primitive people contained some spiritual core. Man was vaguely instinctively aware that he was cut off from the Divine life, that he had violated the commands of God. The meaning of ancient sacrifices was that a person confessed his devotion, repentance, love for God and willingness to follow His path. However, around this pure base an ugly bark of magic grew. They began to look at the sacrifice as a mechanical way to earn the favor of mysterious forces, to force them to serve oneself; it was believed that certain rituals naturally entailed the fulfillment of what was desired. “I gave to You, You give to me” - this is the general formula of the pagan cult. Homer argued that sacrifices and the aroma of incense are pleasing to the gods and they are favorable to diligent donors. This was a universal belief, common to all peoples.

The first major shift in this area occurred many centuries before the birth of Christ. During this era, in all countries of the then civilized world, prophets, philosophers and sages appeared who proclaimed the meaninglessness of the magical approach to worship. They taught that serving God should consist, first of all, not in a sacrifice brought to the altar, but in purifying the heart and following the Will of God. Visible worship in churches should be an expression of spiritual worship. The best expression of this exact meaning of pre-Christian sacrifice are the words from the book of Leviticus: “The soul of the body is in the blood; and I have appointed it (the blood) for you on the altar to atone for your souls, for this blood makes atonement for the soul” (17:11). Thus, already in the patriarchal period, in accordance with the promise, which was later expressed in the Law of Moses, a reconciliatory sacrifice was established by God Himself. As a result of this, God's chosen people formed a religious community, the Old Testament, to which worship was given, and at its center was sacrifice. The peculiarity of the Old Testament sacrifice, in its difference from the primitive sacrifice, is that in the first the place of sinful and destroyed human life is taken by the life of an innocent being, who, however, must suffer punishment for human sins. This life of an innocent creature (animal), ordained from above to cover the guilt of man, was supposed to serve as an external means of communication between God and man and showed that this communication is an act of God’s ineffable mercy. Making such a sacrifice reminded a person of his own sinfulness, supporting the consciousness that the death of the victim was in fact a well-deserved punishment for himself. But based only on the promise of redemption and precisely defined in the Law, which only prepared for the coming of the Redeemer, and not on the Redemption itself, the Old Testament sacrifice could not and did not have redemptive significance.

By the time of the coming of the Savior, a dual worship service had formed in the Old Testament Church: temple and synagogue. The first was performed in the Jerusalem Temple and consisted of the reading of the Decalogue and some other selected verses of Scripture, several specific prayers, the blessing of the people by the priests, offerings and sacrifices, and finally hymns. Since the time of Ezra, in addition to the temple, synagogues have appeared, which arose during the Babylonian captivity, where the Jews, who did not have the opportunity to participate in temple worship, received religious edification, listened to the Word of God and its interpretation in a language accessible to those born in captivity and who did not know the sacred language. Initially, synagogues spread among the Jews of the Diaspora, and at the time of the Savior they appeared in Palestine. This was caused by the decline in religious culture that occurred as a result of the cessation of prophecy, the subsequent formation of the canon of Holy Scripture, the emergence, along with the priesthood, of a strong corporation of scribes and, finally, the replacement of the Hebrew language among the people by Aramaic and, as a result, the need to translate and interpret Scripture to the people. In synagogues, sacrifices could not be made, and therefore there was no need for a priesthood, and all worship was performed by special people - rabbis.

According to the definition of priest Pavel Florensky, worship, cult is “the totality of shrines, Sacra, that is, sacred things, such actions and words - including relics, rituals, sacraments, and so on - in general, everything that serves to establish our connection with other worlds – with the spiritual worlds.”

The syncretism of the spiritual and natural, historical and typological, biblically revealed and universally religious appears in the cult, and, in particular, in the liturgical annual circle: every moment of this circle not only in itself and for the sake of man, but also extends into the cosmic region, perceiving it in himself, and, having received, sanctifies. Already in the main division of the church year into four large fasts, pauses in life associated with four typical great holidays, or, more precisely, groups of holidays, the cosmic significance of the annual circle is clearly reflected: both fasts and the corresponding holidays are in clear correspondence with the four times of the astronomical year and the four corresponding to these last elements of cosmology. “Before, out of laziness, we constantly fast and do not want to be freed from the evil ones, since the apostles and divine fathers gave this harvest to souls... and we must preserve it most dangerously. But then there are three others: the holy apostle, the Mother of God and the Nativity of Christ; at four o’clock in the summer, the Divine Apostles published the Pentecost” – in these words the synaxar of Cheese Week notes the connection between the four main fasts and the four seasons.

So, the Gospel teaching finally established that external worship in churches should be only a symbol of spiritual worship. Christ proclaims that the only worthy service to God is service “in spirit and truth.” He repeats the words of the prophet: “I want mercy, not sacrifice.” He denounces the Jewish clergy and lawyers for raising rituals and ceremonies to the level of the highest religious duty. Denouncing the superstitious and legalistic attitude towards the Sabbath, Christ says: “The Sabbath is for man, and not man for the Sabbath.” His harshest words were directed against the Pharisaic adherence to traditional ritual forms.

Although the first Christians observed the prescriptions of the Old Testament Law for some time, the Apostle Paul already turned his preaching against the useless burden of old rituals that had lost their inner meaning. His victory in the fight against the defenders of the Law marked the victory of the Church over the spirit of magical, ritual religiosity. However, Christianity did not completely abandon the ritual. It only opposed its undivided dominance in religious life and its misunderstanding: after all, the prophets did not reject temple worship, but protested only against the ugly exaggeration of a ritual that supposedly has self-sufficient value.

It may be objected: Christianity is the religion of the “spirit of truth.” Does it need external forms? And in general, with the Christian understanding of God, is any kind of “service” to Him possible? Could God really “need” him? And yet the Christian cult exists. First of all, we must agree that the All-Perfect and Almighty cannot “need” anything. But is the emergence of created being in general connected with “need,” with necessity? Did need, and not Love, create the Universe? – From the darkness of non-existence, the highest primordial Love and the highest primordial Reason brought the diverse created world into existence. But he was created on the basis of freedom, in the image and likeness of eternal Divine Freedom: he was not created complete; and only from the highest transcendental dimension can one see him as “very good,” as it is said in the 1st chapter of the book of Genesis. The realization and real completion of this world is only the finale: the Universe is in continuous development. The world, driven by free spiritual beings, must develop and improve freely. And freedom presupposes the possibility of choosing between good and evil. This is how imperfections, deviations and falls appear in the world process.

Therefore, the implementation of the Divine Economy requires the efforts of intelligent beings, in particular man, as a complex being standing at the border of the spiritual and psychophysical world. “The Kingdom of Heaven,” says Jesus Christ, “is taken by force, and those who use force take it away” (). From here it is obvious that our every deviation from the divine destiny slows down the development of the world and, on the contrary, our efforts to follow the Heavenly Will are “necessary” for history leading to the Kingdom of God. By serving this Kingdom, by creating it, we serve God, for we are implementing His Eternal Plan. Every fight against evil, every service to good and the cause of enlightenment of humanity is worship. In it we realize our love for Divine Eternity, our thirst for heavenly perfection.

Why do Christians need external forms of worship, why do they need a cult? Isn’t it enough to carry God in your heart and strive for Him with all your deeds and your whole life? – This would really be enough if modern man were at a higher stage of development. We know that the great ascetics of Christianity who lived in the deserts often did not attend church services for decades. But who has the courage to compare modern man with them in terms of the level of spiritual perfection? Those who oppose external forms of worship of God forget that man is not only a spiritual being, that he tends to clothe all his feelings, experiences and thoughts in certain external forms. Our whole life in its most diverse manifestations is clothed in rituals. The word “rite” comes from “to rite”, “to clothe”. Joy and grief, everyday greetings, approval, admiration, and indignation - all this takes external forms in human life. And even though in those moments when human feelings become particularly acute, this form becomes, as it were, superfluous in ordinary life, it still invariably accompanies a person. Moreover, we cannot deprive our feelings towards God of this form. The words of prayers, hymns of thanksgiving and repentance, which poured out from the depths of the hearts of the great seers of God, the great spiritual poets and hymns, elevate our soul, directing it to the Heavenly Father. Deepening into them, co-dissolving in their spiritual impulse is the school of the soul of an Orthodox Christian, educating him for true service to the Lord. B. leads to enlightenment, elevation of a person, it enlightens and ennobles his soul. Therefore, the Orthodox Church, serving God in spirit and truth, carefully preserves rituals and cult.

In Christian worship, of course, it is necessary to distinguish form from content. Its essence lies in the self-disclosure of a person before the Heavenly Father, who, although he knows the need of every soul, awaits filial trust, love and readiness to serve. The thirst for God, which has tormented humanity since ancient times, has never remained in vain. But she achieved true satisfaction only when the Incomprehensible One was revealed in the face of the God-Man Jesus Christ. Incarnate, Crucified and Resurrected, He was not only the Light of the world during His earthly life. He continues to shine for all who seek His light. He accepts a person through Baptism, sanctifies his soul and body, his entire life in the Sacrament of Confirmation, blesses conjugal love and the continuation of the human race in the Sacrament of Marriage, leads His Church through those chosen by Him, through the Sacrament of the Priesthood, cleanses and heals the soul of His faithful children in the Sacraments Repentance and Blessing of Anointing and, finally, leads into ineffable Divine communion through the Eucharist. In prayers and the Sacraments is the essence of B. Its form was constantly changing: one thing disappeared, and in accordance with the needs of a particular time, another appeared, but the main thing always remained unchanged.

Christian worship in a broad sense is called Liturgy, that is, “common work,” common, congregational prayer. Christ taught about the superiority of turning to God in silence, but at the same time He said: “Where two or three are gathered in My Name, there I am in the midst of them” (). The spirit of unity, the spirit of empathy is the spirit of true churchliness. The evil of the world is division and enmity. The stone of the Church is faith, which cannot exist without love. When many people are inspired by common prayer, a mysterious spiritual atmosphere is created around them, which captures and softens the hardest hearts.

Human life is poisoned by vanity and constant worries. It is no coincidence that Christ pointed out this as the main obstacle to achieving the Kingdom of God. That is why the temple, in which a person can at least briefly renounce everyday life, from the hustle and bustle of life, is the place where our spiritual growth takes place, our meeting with the Father. We are talking specifically about a temple, since, for example, a Baptist meeting house is not a temple, but only a room for a community meeting. Here almost everything is addressed to human reason; Here, mainly, the service of the “word”, the sermon, is carried out. And it is not surprising that the most serious and profound people among the Protestant sectarians, after a difficult struggle, introduced music and other elements of external ritual into their meetings.

The priest called the service a “synthesis of arts.” And, indeed, not just one side of the human personality should be ennobled and sanctified in the temple, but his entire being, all his five senses should be included in communion with God. Therefore, everything in the temple is important and significant: the grandeur of the architecture, and the aroma of incense, which covers the sense of smell of all those praying and ascends to the Throne of God, and the beauty of the icons, and the singing of the choir, and the sermon, and the sacred rites that make up the temple mystery, in which the entire created cosmos is involved. . Everything here serves to reveal the proclaimed Truth, everything testifies to It, everything encourages a person to rise above the everyday world of vanity and languor of the spirit.

The divine services of the Orthodox Church are performed according to the Charter (Typikon). This means according to certain rules, according to some order or order established once and for all. Our Church does not know non-statutory divine services; Moreover, the concept of the Rule applies equally to liturgical life as a whole, and to each of its individual cycles, and, finally, to every service. Even with a superficial acquaintance with the Charter, it is not difficult to be convinced that it is based on a combination of two main elements: the Eucharist (with which all other Sacraments are in one way or another connected) and that divine service, which is associated, first of all, with three circles of time: daily, weekly, annual, which in turn breaks down into Easter and fixed; these liturgical cycles are otherwise called the liturgical services of time.

Both of these elements constitute two integral and obligatory parts of the modern Charter. The centrality of the Eucharist in the liturgical life of the Church is self-evident. The weekly and annual cycles are also beyond doubt. And finally, with regard to the daily cycle, which has practically fallen out of use in parish life, neglecting it obviously does not correspond to the letter and spirit of the Charter, according to which it is the irrevocable and obligatory framework of the entire liturgical life of the Church. According to the Rule, there are days when the Liturgy is not supposed to be served, or when one “memory” or “holiday” replaces others, but there is no day when Vespers and Matins are not supposed to be served. And all holidays and memories are always combined with constant, unchangeable liturgical texts of the daily cycle. But it is equally obvious that the Eucharist and the worship of time are different from each other, being two elements of liturgical tradition.

The time of worship is distributed by hours, days, weeks and months. It is based on a daily circle, consisting of the following services: Vespers, Compline, Midnight Office, Matins, 1st hour, 3rd hour, 6th hour, 9th hour (with the so-called inter-hours). The charter of these services is set out in the Typikon: Ch. 1 (rite of Little Vespers); Ch. 2 (Great Vespers combined with Matins, that is, the so-called all-night vigil); Ch. 7 (Great Vespers, Midnight Office and Sunday Matins); Ch. 9 (everyday Vespers and Matins) and in the Book of Hours. The constant, that is, repeated every day, prayers of these services are found in the Followed Psalter or in its abbreviation - the Book of Hours. These texts are taken almost exclusively from Holy Scripture; these are psalms, biblical songs and individual verses from the Old Testament and New Testament books (for example, prokemeny, etc.). It should also be noted that, according to the Rules, the church day begins in the evening, and the first service of the daily cycle is Vespers.

The daily circle, replenishing it, is followed by the seven-day circle. It does not have its own separate services, but its liturgical texts are inserted at certain places in the daily services depending on the day of the week. These are troparia, kontakia, stichera and canons of the day of the week, which are read (or sung) at Vespers of this day, that is, according to the civil reckoning of the day, the evening before. These troparia and kontakia are read at the end of evening prayers only on weekdays, that is, not on Sunday, when Sunday troparia in the appropriate voice are supposed to be sung, and not on holidays, which have their own special troparia and kontakia. Monday is dedicated to the Incorporeal Heavenly Powers, Tuesday to the Baptist and Forerunner John, Wednesday and Friday to the Holy Life-Giving Cross of the Lord, Thursday to the holy apostles and St. Nicholas of Myra, Saturday to all saints and the memory of deceased members of the Church. All these chants are divided into eight main melodies, or voices, and are printed in the book of Octoechos. Each week has its own voice, and thus the entire Octoechos is divided into eight parts - according to voices, and each voice - into seven days. The weekly service is a cycle of eight weeks, repeated throughout the year, starting with the first Sunday after Pentecost.

Finally, the third circle of worship is the annual circle, the most complex in its structure. It includes:

• B. Months of the Word, that is, motionless ones associated with a certain date of holidays, fasts, and commemorations of saints. The corresponding liturgical texts are found in the twelve books of Menaion of Menstruation and are distributed by date, starting from September 1.
• The Lenten cycle embraces three preparatory weeks for fasting, six weeks of fasting and Holy Week. His liturgical materials are found in the book of the Lenten Triodion.
• B. the Easter cycle, consisting of the services of Easter, Easter Week and the entire period between Easter and Pentecost. The liturgical book of this cycle is the Colored Triodion (or Penticostarion).

The divine service of the annual circle includes both biblical and hymnographic material, and this material also does not have independent services, but is included in the structure of the daily circle. Divine services are also divided into public and private, which, generally speaking, contradicts the understanding of any divine service in the Ancient Church as a conciliar act in which the entire community of the faithful participates. In modern times, such meaning is acquired only by the Liturgy and worship of the time. The sacraments (with the exception of the Eucharist), prayer chants, and funeral services are classified as private services, or the services of the Trebnik.

The Holy Equal-to-the-Apostles Prince Vladimir heard the following description of Orthodox worship from the lips of his ambassadors: “When we stood in the temple, we forgot where we were, for nowhere else on earth is there such a place - truly God lives there among people; and we will never forget the beauty we saw there. No one who has tasted sweetness will want to taste bitterness anymore; and we can no longer remain in paganism.”