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Strange Hymn
I was wandering if anyone knew what hymn Cantor Zaher is singing at 1:04:00 in the following video:
God Bless
Comments
εν ονοματι κυριου Ωσαννα εν τοις υψιστοις
I truly think that hymnology and poetry can be some of the most amazing transmitters of theology. May our Church also invest in the rich Orthodox hymnographic traditions for the life of the world.
Let's look at this carefully
Language: The Greek in Nahdet Al-Kana'es, as well as the posted recording is not wrong grammatically or even theologically. It translates well into "Hosanna in the highest. Blessed is He who came and is coming in the name of the Lord. Hosanna in the highest". Perhaps it is referring to Christ's first coming, His incarnation - He who came - and His awaited second coming - He who is coming. Notice that the second clause is actually in the present, not the simple future, communicating perhaps the same sense of immediacy felt by the children of Jerusalem at the entrance of the Lord.
Theologically: The Lord indeed comes in various forms and means. As I said in a previous post, His coming and presence is revealed in Scripture at the liturgy of the Word....it is revealed later, more mystically in the Eucharist itself...it is also revealed in the fullness of His body, the Church, "Where two or three are gathered in my name....", and it is our duty as children of God, and heirs by grace, to reveal Him to the world in countless ways. That being said, at that specific moment in the Divine Liturgy, the idea is that as we praise God's creating of "heaven, and earth, and all that is therein," including the various ranks of angels, we are joined to them at the climactic singing of the Sanctus, or the Triumphant Hymn as it is called in the Liturgy of St. John Chrysostom and St. Gregory. It is in this sense most especially that we can speak of Christ's coming at this moment in the present, experiencing this presence, glory, and majesty that fills heaven and earth before His throne. The Triumphant Hymn (in its familiar short text, without the addition) is therefore integral to the Alexandrian liturgical ethos, which prefers to interpret the liturgy as a journey upwards in the eschaton, where the rituals, ranks, and hymns are meant to be expressions here on earth of the heavenly liturgy that is constantly ongoing. In fact, many scholars have hypothesized that the Triumphant Hymn was first used in the liturgy in Egypt, and spread from there to other regions.
Liturgically: All of the above does not quite address the purpose of including a reference to the Lord's Entry to Jerusalem in an otherwise a familiar heavenly praise from Isaiah and Revelation. In fact, I dont' think this addition is original or traditional to the Alexandrian liturgy at all. It does not appear in the received text of the Liturgies of Basil or Mark (or Sarapion to my knowledge), but only appears in the Liturgy of St. Gregory, thought to be of much later date. I have to check some manuscripts and early euchologion editions to come up with an idea of when this addition was added. However, I do know that in studies of early liturgy (until the 5th century), the "Sanctus without Benedictus" is one of the signature features of the Alexandrian tradition, whereas the "Sanctus with Benedictus" is a distinctly Antiochene tradition, which later became part of the Byzantine rite, since the rite of Constantinople depends in one of its archaic layers on the rite of Antioch. Notice however that this addition is not identical in the Byzantine rite, where the text is:
ὡσαννὰ ἐν τοῖς ὑψίστοις. Εὐλογημένος ὁ ἐρχόμενος ἐν ὀνόματι Κυρίου. Ὡσαννὰ ὁ ἐν τοῖς ὑψίστοις.
Hosanna in the highest. Blessed is He who comes in the name of the Lord. Hosanna in the highest.
Clearly we can see that the Byzantine text is more faithful to the Biblical quote, which probably means it is older than our own similar addition. Theologically, if I recall, I have read a meditation on this by Hieromonk Gregorios of Mt. Athos (of blessed memory), that at this juncture in the liturgy, as we proclaim saying "heaven and earth are full of Your glory," we likewise join the praise of heaven "Holy Holy Holy..." to that of earth, "Hosanna in the highest," revealing by our own praise that heaven and earth are indeed joined together at this moment in praising the Lord of Hosts.
Even experts, of whom I am not one, make mistakes....so always ask :)
I had to double check to make sure I am not forgetting my Ancient Greek, but ελθών is an aorist participle of έρχομαι (to come). Participles in Greek can be used circumstantially (Walking down the street, a tree fell), or as attributive adjectives, (Blessed is the one who came and who comes).
In Greek also, some verbs have different stems or principal parts in the different tenses. So the present stem έρχo becomes έλθ- in the past and ελευ- in the future. That's how we can distinguish the two participles here elthon and erkhomenos as past and present respectively.
The participle ανελθών familiar to us from Asomen and Agios is a compound verb of ανά (up) and the past stem έλθ.....meaning to ascend.
Did that clarify? I may still be missing something important and have a light bulb moment later :)