THE TRISAGION

W hile the cantors are si-nging the troparia and kontakia proper to the day, the priest stands before the center of the holy table and

recites the Prayer of the Trisagion in a low voice :

0 Holy God who rest among the saints, whose praises are sung by the seraphim with the Trisagion Hymn and are glorified by the cherubim and adored by all the Powers of heaven : you brought all things into being out of nothingness and created man according to your image and likeness and adorned him with your every gift; you give to him that asks wisdom and understanding; you do not despise the sinner but offer him repentance for his salvation; you allowed us, your lowly and unworthy servants, to stand even at this moment before the glory of your holy altar and to offer the worship and honor due to you : accept, 0 selfsame Lord, even from the mouths of us sinners the hymn of the Trisa­gion, and in your goodness look down upon us. Forgive us every offense, whether voluntary or involuntary; sanctify our souls and bodies, and grant that we may serve you in holiness all the days of our life, through the prayers of the holy Mother of God and all the saints who have pleased you throughout the ages.

When the cantors begin chanting the final troparion, the deacon inclines his head toward the priest and, Jwlding the orar with three fingers, says to the priest :

Bless, master, the time of the thrice-holy hymn.

As he blesses the deacon, the priest sings the doxology of the Trisagion Prayer:

For you are holy, our God, and to you we give glory, to the Father, and to the Son, and to the Holy Spirit, now and always.

The deacon goes near the royal doors, turns toward the congregation

and, raising the orar with three fingers of his right hand, concludes the above doxology by singing its final words :

And for ever and ever.

People : Amen.

And immediately after, the people also sing the Trisagion:

Holy God, Holy Mighty One, Holy Immortal One, have mercy on us.

Holy God, Holy Mighty One, Holy Immortal One, have mercy on us.

Holy God, Holy Mighty One, Holy Immortal One, have mercy on us.

Glory be to the Father, and to the Son, and to the Holy Spirit, now and always and for ever and ever. Amen.

Holy Immortal One, have mercy on us. Holy God, Holy Mighty One, Holy Immortal One, have

:mercy on us. 1

An Eastern prayer always expresses the profound humility of the -sinner, but also hopeful trust in God's mercy. In his deep contem­plation, the Eastern Christian realizes his own utter sinfulness and misery, but he is even more vividly aware that God's justice is tempered with mercy, that in God's feelings for us sinners there is pity, tenderness, and love.

A Russian or Ukrainian peasant at prayer will fall on his knees,

1 The_ Greek forms ("AYL~ 6 6eoi;, &yiot; tax,upot;, &yt0i; a6iXvo:Tot;) are in the nominatiVe case (hence, the translation would read : " Holy is God, Holy the Mighty One, Holy the Immortal One ") but Greek grammatical usage has the nominative sometimes used in exclamations, and even in other expressions, where the vocative is more common (cf. W. Goodwin, A Greek Grammar [Boston, 1892], p. 223). The Slavonic translators, who were very much at home with the Greek, accordingly used the vocative case (i.e., Sviatej Bozhe, not Bah, etc.). Our translation follows the Slavonic.

On ChristmaS, Epiphany, the Vigil of Palm Sunday, Holy Saturday, Easter Sunday, and all the days of the Easter Octave and Pentecost, the Trisagion is replaced by : " For as many of you as have been baptized in Christ have put on Christ" (Gal. 3:27). Alleluia." This is repeated in the very same way in which the Trisagion is sung.

The Trisagion is also replaced on the Feast of the Exaltation of the Cross and -0n the third Sunday of Lent by : " Before your cross we bow in worship, 0 Master, and we glorify your holy resurrection." This is repeated in the same way.

press his forehead against the ground, and remain there, his brow in the dust, with a kind of life-giving humility, his face streaked with tears of sorrow. 2

Many kernels of dogmatic truth are embedded in the Trisagion Prayer, but two doctrines are emphasized : universal creation and the creation of man in God's image and likeness.

To create, according to the Scholastic concept, is to produce a thing which in no way previously existed, either in itself or in the potentiality of a subject (ex nihilo sui et suhjecti). Aside ~ the technical language, the Scholastics could not improve on the defi­nition of creation contained in this prayer : " 0 Holy God. . . You brought all things into being out of nothingness. " The phrase " all things " includes everything finite, both visible and invisible; the creative act is exclusively attributed to God, " who brought all things into being"; it excludes the use of any pre-existing matter, whereby true creation is denoted, not mere formation : " out of noth­ingness. " The Fathers, of course, from the very first centuries, have developed and defended the doctrine of universal creation, including primitive matter itself, against such adversaries as the Neoplatonists, the Gnostics, the Manicheans, etc. The concept of creation con­tained in the foregoing prayer is equally opposed to any theory of self-existent primitive matter from which all things either are made or are evolved (evolutionism, materialism, naturalism, etc.).

" 0 Holy God. . . you. . . created man according to your image and likeness and adorned him with your every gift. " Creating man to his own image and likeness means that God endowed man with prerogatives which give man a resemblance, however imperfect, to God. This resemblance to God, in man, includes many things supernatural and natural : the natural endowments of the soul, i.e., its spirituality, freedom, and immortality; the absolutely supernatural endowment of sanctifying grace (re. first parents), including the

• Tears of repentance and of prayer were a much-appreciated charismata since the end of the fourth century, especially in Egypt and Syria. Byzantium and the Kievan Slavs inherited this idea from Syria and generalized it to the point where it was considered an element necessary to any sincere prayer. Pseudo-Gennadius even gives practical suggestions for acquiring this grace of tears : " If you have no tears, do not despair; sigh frequently and heavily from all the heart: for tears are the gift of God, and by and by, with sighs and prayers, you will obtain them from God ... " (50). "Having found tears, preserve them with all your strength" (51).

virtues of faith, hope, charity, justice, kindness, etc., infused into the soul with sanctifying grace; also, the relatively supernatural or preternatural gifts, such as infused, extraordinary knowledge, exemption from concupiscence and from suffering, and even immor­tality of the body. Though not enumerated, these endowments and gifts are implicit in the prayer, for they are what makes man most like God.

The text of the Trisagion Prayer can be traced back to the be­ginning of the eighth century in the Armenian version of Chrysos­tom's Liturgy; 3 hence, its origin probably goes back at least to the seventh century.

The liturgical Trisagion (tpl<; = thrice.. ocyLOI; = holy), to be distinguished. from the biblical Trisagion (the sanctus hymn) in the anaphora, is found in all the Offices of the Byzantine Church. In the other Oriental Rites, it is used frequently. In the Latin Rite, it is confined to the preces of Prime and the Adoratio crucis on Good Friday. ' The liturgical Trisagion was already common to the whole East, including the Monophysite and Nestorian Churches, before the end of the fifth century, but almost nothing is known about its origin. The earliest evidence of its use is found in a series of accla­mations at the Council of Chalcedon (A.D. 451). 5

Byzantine historians generally accept the tradition that the Tri­sagion was divinely inspired. The most common interpretation is that during a severe earthquake at Constantinople, while the patri­arch, St. Proclus (A.D. 434-446), was leading the people in prayer, a boy was ''lifted. up into the air" and heard the angels singing the Trisagion. This account is based. chiefly on two sources : the Letter to Peter the Fuller (Monophysite Patriarch of Antioch), ascribed to

•Cf. G. Aucher, La versione armena della liturgia di S. Giovanni Crisostomo, XPYCOCTOMIKA, pp. 378-379. In the eighth or ninth century Codex Barberini, gr. 336, however, this identical prayer appears in the Liturgy of St. Basil, while another, a different prayer, appears in the Liturgy of Chrysostom. Cf. Brightman, LEW, pp. 313-314.

• Since the famous amplification " Who was crucified for us " had not been added to the Trisagion in the Passion ceremonies of the Latin Church, it seems that the Trisagion was incorporated into these ceremonies at Rome prior to any of the lengthy controversies regarding the legitimacy of this amplification. Cf. A. Baumstark's article, " Der Orient und die Gesange der Adoratio Crucis, " in Jb. Lw., II (1922), 1-17.

• Cf. I. D. Mansi, Sacrorum conciliorum nova et amplissima collectio, 6, 936 C.

Acacius, Archbishop of Constantinople (A.O. 471-489); • and the testimony of St. John Damascene (A.O. 749), based on different historical sources, in his De fide orthodoxa. 7

The main trouble with this account is that there is no record of any earthquake at Constantinople between A.O. 434 and 446, under the patriarchate of Proclus. s

The account of the Trisagion's origin offered by Iesuiabus I, Katholikos of the Chaldeans (A.O. 581-5¢) is substantially the same as the Byzantine version although it differs in several details. 9 An angel is said to have appeared to a certain pious priest of Constan­tinople, while the city was being racked with great earthquakes because of its wickedness. The angel told the priest to go into the church to praise God with these words : " Holy God, Holy Mighty One, Holy Immortal One, have mercy on us. " The earthquakes ceased (temporarily at least), but no one believed the priest's vision. On the third night, angels appeared to him again, told him not to be afraid of entering the ravaged city, and instructed him to do whatever they did. With a few brave souls, he went back into the same church, where they saw the angels standing before the altar, praising God and saying, "Holy God, Holy Mighty One, Holy Immortal One, have mercy on us. " They all began singing the hymn, and when they had sung it three times, the earthquakes ceased com­pletely. The great city was spared further destruction.

The Liber Heraclidis (A.O. 451-539) gives yet another and com-

• Ep. ad Petrum Fu/lonem (Mansi, op. cit., 7, 1121 D). 7 St. John Damascene, De fide orthodoxa, I, III, chap. IO (PG 94, 1021 AB).

Substantially the same account about the origin of this hymn is given in the spurious letters of Pope Felix III (A.D. 483-492), Ad Petrum Fullonem, supposedly written at the Synod of Rome, A.D. 485, and Ad Zenonem (Mansi, op. cit., 7, 1037-1054).

• Of the three earthquakes during the reign of Emperor Honorius II, the first occurred in A.D. 422, according to the Chronicon Paschale (PG 92, 797 A) and Philostorgius (fifth century), Hist. eccl., XII, 8-9 lPG 65, 617 A-C). The second, in A.D. 447, is recorded by Marcellinus Comes, Chronicon (PL 51, 927), and in Chronicon Paschale (PG 92, 8o5-808 [cf. also Evagrius, Hist. eccl., I, 17; PG 86, 2467-2470]). According to the Chronicon Paschale (PG 92, 809 C-812 A), the third happened in A.D. 450.

• Iesuiabus I, Commentarius de trisagio (edit. G. Furlani, " II trattato di Y eso'yabh d'Arzon sul Trisagion," Reflista degli studi orientali, VII [1916-1918], pp. 691-693).

pletely different version. 10 The only common point is its attribution to divine revelation (at least indirectly) and its date, some time before A.D. 448-449. According to this narrative, the hymn originated as a refutation of the Monophysite doctrine : that in Christ there is only one nature, the divine, and therefore that God himself suffered and died in the Passion of Christ. The Monophysites directly opposed any formula of praise in which God was extolled as " mighty" (tcrxupoi; = incapable of suffering?) and " immortal " (&6&.voc't'oi;) even in Christ's Passion and death. 11

The original meaning of the Trisagion definitely insists on God's " immortality, " an attribute not found in Sacred Scripture, nor in any of the ancient formulae of prayer. The fact that the Council of Chalcedon used the very same words confirms the idea of a refu­tation of Monophysitism. It seems, then, that the Trisagion was originally a purely Christological hymn, which explains its use in the Latin Church to honor Christ's Passion and death. In later controversies, the Byzantines addressed it to the Blessed Trinity, in order to avert any suspicion of heresy. 19

Whatever its origin and the reasons for its use, the Trisagion appears to have been incorporated into the Byzantine Liturgy at

10 Cf. F. Nau, Nestorius, Le livre d'Heraclide de Damas, pp. 318-323. 11 There is nothing contradictory to the above account in the explanation of the

Trisagion's origin and meaning by a certain Jewish convert to Christianity, given in lobius Monachus, De Verba incamato commentarius, 1, VI, chap. 25 (contained in Nestorius, Bibliotheca cod. 222 [PG 103, 772]); a similar explanation, but without reference to supernatural revelation, is given of the hymn by the great Byzantine liturgist of the fourteenth century, Nicolas Cabasilas, Liturgiae expositio, chap. 20 (PG 150, 412-414).

11 The Byzantine Church has managed to preserve the Trisagion in its original form without the interpolation " Immortal One, Who was crucified for us" by the Monophysite Patriarch of Antioch, Peter the Fuller (A.D. 468-470), who thus succeeded in making it a proclamation of Monophysite doctrine. The Syrian and Coptic Monophysites adopted the interpolation in their Liturgy. The Emperor Anastasius I (A.D. 491-518) tried to incorporate it into the hymn at Constantinople, and seditions resulted. See Marcellinus Comes (fl. c. A.D. 550), Chronicum for the year 512 (PL 51, 937 C-938 B); also Evagrius Scholasticus (sixth century), Hist. eccl., l, III, chap. 44 (PG 86, 2697 B). The Trisagion with the said insertion, if addressed to the Blessed Trinity, would mean that not only God the Son but also the Father (heresy of Patripassianism) and the Holy Spirit suffered death on the cross; or it would deny the distinction between the three Persons in the Trinity (heresy of Sabellianism). If, however, the hymn with the insertion were directed only to the Incarnate Word, it would be dogmatically acceptable. Cf. M. Jugie, Monophysisme, IV, Le theopaschitisme, DTC, X, 2237-2241.

Constantinople some time between A.D. 430 and 450. Th!-s we have on the contemporary testimony of a predecessor of Patriarch Pro­clus, the banished and heretical Nestorius. 18 Its use in the Byzantine Eucharistic Liturgy was without doubt already an established custom during the time of Marcellinus Comes (fl. A.D. 550). 14 Its position in the Liturgy was certainly fixed by the eighth century. 15