Volume 1

A dictionary of Christian antiquities : being a continuation of the 'Dictionary of the Bible' / edited by William Smith and Samuel Cheetham ; illustrated by engravings on wood.

Date:
[between 1890 and 1899?]
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: A dictionary of Christian antiquities : being a continuation of the 'Dictionary of the Bible' / edited by William Smith and Samuel Cheetham ; illustrated by engravings on wood. Source: Wellcome Collection.

    1076/1096 (page 1056)
    The Sun'iays from this point are called Sundays of Mdtrhew or of Luke according as the gospels are taken from those Evangelists.? Second Sunday after Pentecost, or Second Sunday of Mattliew. Third Sunday after Pentecost, or Third Sunday of Matthew. and so on, up to the Exaltation of the Cross [Sept. 14], the Sunday before which festival is called:— The Sunday before the Exaltation; and that following is The Sunday after the Exaltation. After this the Sundays resume their reckon- ing from Pentecost, which varies with the years and are called Sundays of Luke, whose gospel is now read. First Sunday of Luke. Second „ „ Sunday before the Nativity. Sunday before the Lights [rrpb jiav </)wtwv, sc. Epi- phany]. Sunday after the Lights. The numeration from Pentecost, and of the Sundays of Luke is then resumed and continued till the Sunday of the Pharisee and the Pu’dican. (Martene, de Ant. Eccl. Lit. iv. (See also Allatius, de Dorn, et Heb. Graec.; Ducange in v. Dominica; Microhgus; and the Latin and Greek office books passim. [Compare Lectionary.] [H. J. H.] LORD’S PRAYER (the Liturgical use of the). 1. In nearly all ancient liturgies this was said between the consecration of the ele- ments and the communion. The earliest direct witness is Cyril of Jerusalem, A.D. 350; who, after explaining to his competentes, the Sanctus, prayer of consecration, and the intercessions, as they occur in the order of the service, proceeds, “ Then, after these things, we say that prayer which the Saviour delivered to His intimate dis- ciples, out of a pure conscience addressing God and saying. Our Father,” &c. {Catech. Myst. v. 8). Optatus in Africa (a.d. 368), charging the Donatist bishops, who “ gave remission of sins as if they had no sin themselves,” with a self-con- tradiction, says, “ For at that very time, when ye impose hands and remit offences, soon turning to the altar, ye are obliged to recite the Lord’s Prayer, and in fact say. Our Father, which art in heaven, forgive us our debts and sins” {de Schism. Don. ii. 20). Now we know from St. Cyprian {de Lapsis, p. 128; ed. 1690) that in Africa penitents were reconciled after the con- secration. St. Augustine, also in Africa (a.d. 397), puts the Lord’s Prayer there: “ When the hallowing (of the elements) has taken place, we say the Lord’s Prayer” {Serm. 227, ad Infantes, i.e. the newly baptized ; see before, vol. i. p. 836). Again, w'riting in 414, he says that by irpoa- fuxds in 1 Tim. ii. 1, he understands those Prayers which are said “ when that which i.s on the Loi'd’s table is blessed, and hallowed, and broken for distribution; which whole form of prayer nearly every church concludes with the Lord’s Prayer” {ad Paulin. Epist. 149, § 16). Again, to competentes: “ When ye are baptized, that prayer is to be said by you daily. For in p The Sundays of Matthew and Luke are sometimes also called by the headings of the sections read. the church that Lord’s Prayer is said daily at the altar of God, and the faithful hear it” {Serm. 58, c. X. § 12 ; see also de Serm. Dom. ii, vi. § 26 ; Serm. 17, § 5; 49, 8). St. Jerome must have thought the practice of saying it somewhere in the liturgy universal, for he says in a work written about 415, “ So He taught His apostles, that daily in the sacrifice of His body, believers should make bold to speak thus. Our Father,” &c. {Dial, contra Pehy. iii. 15.) Germanus of Paris is a witness to the use of France in the middle of the 6th century : “ But the Lord’s Prayer is put in that same place {i.e. after the consecration and contraction) for this reason, that every prayer of ours may be concluded with the Lord’s Prayer {Expos. Brev. in Martene de Ant. Eccl. Lit. i. iv. xii. ii.) In the treatise de Sacra- mentis, ascribed to St. Ambrose, but probably written in France, near the end of the 8th century (see Scudamore, Notitia Eucharistica, pp. 590, 622, 2nd ed.) we read, “ / said to you that before the words of Christ, that which is offered is called bread. When the words of Christ have been uttered, it is no longer called bread, but is named the Body. Wherefore then in the Lord’s Prayer which follows after that, does he say, ‘ our bread ’ (lib. v. c. iv. § 24) ? ” Leontius of Cyprus relates of his contemporary, John the Almoner, pope of Alexandria,who died in 616, that during the celebration he sent for and exchanged forgiveness with a clerk, who was not in charity, after which “ with great joy and gladness, he stood at the holy altar, able to say to God with a clear conscience, forgive us,” &c. {Vita Joan. c.l3 ; Rosweyd, p. 186). St. Augustine (as above) alleges the use of the Lord’s Prayer after the consecration in “ nearly every church,” We find it in that place in every ancient liturgy, except the Clementine {Constit. Apost. viii. 13), in which it does not appear at all, and the Abyssinian (Renaudot, Liturg. Orien. i. 521), in which it is said, as in the English, after the communion. In the Nestorian of Malabar it occurs both before and after the communion {Liturg. Mai. Raulin, 324, 327). When the Greek compiler of the liturgy called after St. Clement of Rome omitted the Lord’s Prayer, he was probably guided by the old Greek liturgy of Rome, which we may suppose to have been before him. We know from St. Gregory, writing in 598, that, until he inserted it, the Lord’s Prayer was, according to the plain meaning of his words, certainly not said between the consecration and reception, and therefore probably not said at all in the Eucharistic office of his church. He had been blamed for having (among other innovations) “ given an order that the Lord’s Prayer should be said soon (mox) after the canon” {Epist. viii. 64). His defence was, “ We say the Lord’s Prayer soon after the prayer (of consecration), because the apostles were wont to consecrate the ho.st of oblation to that very prayer only (ad ipsam solummodo orationem), and it seemed to me very unbecoming to say over the oblation a prayer which some scholastic had put together, and not to say the prayer (traditionem, lege fors. ora- tionem) which our Redeemer composed over His body and blood” {ind.). The Lord’s Prayer, then, had not been said over the elements either during or after the act of consecration, nor is , any place suggested at which it was said. From