Great Lent Traditions
Approaching Great Lent
The first 3 Sundays before Great Lent
I have asked by some of you in the prison to tell about "Orthodox Traditions". This is a little like answering the question "Say something in French"! There are a lot of traditions. I will try to arrange my answer in manageable pieces, after I get on my soapbox a bit.
TWO KINDS OF TRADITIONS
There are two kinds of "Traditions" in the church, in my mind. Only the first really matters to me. The second has nice things, but is not primary.
The first and most important traditions are regarding our worship and our living a Christian life throughout the church year. These traditions give the year a "rhythm" and help keep us grounded. Our traditions in worship and prayer and how we live and what we focus on throughout the church year was a major factor in my becoming Orthodox.
The other traditions are things like food we eat at various seasons, specific foods that are blessed at various times of the year, the Pascha basket - stuff like that. I will try to talk about both kinds of traditions, but I am "wired'; to be excited about the first category.
Please permit a little side bar. As a kid, I HATED the Christmas season. I did not believe in Santa Claus from the time I was three years old (but was sworn to secrecy, to not ruin things for those who believed in this little bit of supposed Christmas "magic"). There was no preparation for the feast, except for shopping, and decorating and parties. It made no sense to me. It still does not. For most people in America, the so-called "Christmas Spirit" is all this stuff. Christmas would arrive, and we would all be under the tree to see what "Santa" brought us. We had conveniently gone to church the night before so Christmas would be a family day. I hated the day.
When I learned of Orthodoxy, I saw that we do not just go shopping before Christmas. We have a long fast, and gradually start singing more about the feast. Just before the actual day of Christmas, we have long services which have many readings from the Old and New Testaments and teach about it. These are the traditions that matter to me! When we add to these traditions other local customs, such as special foods eaten on Christmas, caroling, etc., it is a truly meaningful celebration.
APPROACHING GREAT LENT
We are approaching Great Lent, so I will begin describing the period approaching Great Lent. I am not trying to be comprehensive, but am just writing as my heart tells me. This is because: 1. I love this stuff, and writing about it comes easily, and 2. I hate research and am lazy. I suppose I will do a little research along the way.
The Great Fast is unlike any other time of the year. It is my favorite time of the year. Because it is a preparation for the most important of all feasts - PASCHA (when we celebrate the Resurrection of our Lord Jesus Christ), we must have a preparatory period before the preparatory period!
We can consider the 5 weeks before Great Lent begins to be the preparatory period for Great Lent. I suppose liturgical scholars would actually consider this to be 4 weeks, but for me, it has always been 5 because of the Gospel we read 5 Sundays before Great Lent begins.
ZACCHAEUS SUNDAY - 5 Sundays before Lent begins.
Our tradition is to read the Gospel about Zacchaeus, the publican, who Christ saw in a tree, and commanded to come down, and then proceeded to eat a meal in his house. We appropriately call this day "Zacchaeus Sunday". The next Sunday, we start using the major liturgical book of Great Lent and Holy week, the Lenten Triodion, but on this day we read and talk about a publican who came to his senses and followed Christ. This day is linked with the next Sunday, which we call "Sunday of the Publican and Pharisee". These two Sundays together teach us much about repentance. Two sinners -- 2 publicans, teach us.
The major task of Great Lent is to prepare ourselves to be fully edified by Pascha. This is not the mere celebration of a historical event. God sends forth His grace on this day (and every day), but we are not always able to feel Him and retain the grace He gives us. Great Lent is the preparation of our ground, our soul, so that we can retain the grace of God which falls like rain, and be enlightened. Some saints lived in the light of Pascha every day, such at my patron, St Seraphim of Sarov, but we poor ones need to change our habits at least during this period of the year, to be more enlightened.
On the Sunday of Zacchaeus, we begin to turn our minds in earnest towards the goal of preparation for Pascha. This little man achieved what we are longing for - to be enlightened. One can say it another way (it will be said this way in two more Sundays) - we want to "come to ourselves"- to stop believing delusional things about life and to live in a spiritual way. This can be done! Zacchaeus (who later become a missionary apostle) proves it.
SUNDAY OF THE PUBLICAN AND PHARISEE - 4 Sundays before Lent
The next weekend, we read about the "Publican and the Pharisee" (Luke 18:10-14), and begin using the Lenten Triodion. We SHOULD feel a shift in the season. This is an exciting time. It is a time of "getting ready", and expectation and hope.
There are several important traditions associated with this day.
1. We read about the Publican and Pharisee. It is always read 4 Sundays before Lent begins.
2. We start using the Triodion. This is the book with all the hymns sung during Great Lent and Holy week. It is so-called because weekday services have many "canons" in it (a form of liturgical poetry that is very common, and which usually has 8 sections or "Odes") which have only 3 Odes in them. You can see this in the name, which means "Three Odes".
3. The following week is completely fast free.
We sing the Kontakion about this event in Matins and at liturgy. It highlights the major teaching about the story - how pride kills the soul. We cannot know God if we are proud.
Kontakion for the Publican and the Pharisee, Tone 4: "Let us flee the bragging of the Pharisee, and learn the humility of the Publican, while crying out unto the Savior with groanings: Be gracious unto us, O Thou Who alone dost readily forgive".
We also sing sober hymns from the Triodion that introduce to us the subject of repentance. Throughout the entire Lenten period, the Triodion will make references to the "Publican and the Pharisee", and the "Prodigal Son" (which we read about next week).
What is the Purpose of Lent?
Lent is a time of concentrated repentance. Too many people think that repentance is only feeling bad about yourself, and some perhaps understand it a little more by also knowing that repentance involves the desire to change. It is much more than this. We are trying to see life as it really is. This includes us. We are benighted by ignorance because of our sins. I have a saying: "Sin makes you stupid". Sin gets in our way, and debilitates us. during all of Great Lent, we will be begging God to enlighten us and see things as they really are, and to have the strength to change as we learn what is right and what is wrong.
Why have a fast-free week?
Normally, on Wednesdays and Fridays throughout the year, we fast from animal products (meat, dairy products, eggs) and usually also wine and olive oil. The week following this Sunday is totally fast free (we can eat any foods on any day), in order to show us the deep purpose of fasting, and what it can and cannot do. The Pharisee bragged about fasting, like it was some sort of accomplishment. This made his fasting not only ineffectual, but actually a sin before God. We should fast only because we are sinners and are trying to improve. The church knows by experience that fasting helps us spiritually. This should be all the reason you need to at least try to fast. Fasting does not save us, but God saves us. In order for us to remember this important lesson, the church actually commands us to not fast for a week.
A little side note. It is very beneficial to NOT fast, but only if you normally follow the fasts! To those who do not observe the fasts, a non-fasting week is just like any other week. I am acutely aware of God on non-fasting days that are normally fasting days. I give thanks to God, take a little rest, and get ready for an enhanced struggle. Anyone who fasts, even if poorly, will benefit spiritually from the fast-free week.
SUNDAY OF THE Prodigal Son - 3 Sundays before Lent
There are several important traditions associated with this day.
1. We read the Parable of the Prodigal son (Luke 15:11-32). As mentioned above, this parable, along with that of the Publican and Pharisee, will be mentioned in many services throughout the whole of Great Lent.
2. We add the "By the Waters of Babylon" to the Polyeleos during matins. It will be sung for the next three weeks, the only time it is sung during the year.
3. We begin using Katavasia from the Triodion in the matins canon.
The parable of the Prodigal Son is so sublime that no amount of commentary can do it justice. It is a story of sin and repentance and mercy. The Kontakion from the Triodion describes it in this way:
Foolishly have I run away from Thy glory, O Father, / wasting in sin the wealth that Thou gavest me. / Therefore with the words of the Prodigal I cry unto Thee: / I have sinned before Thee, compassionate Father. // Accept me in repentance and make me as one of Thy hired servants. (Kontakion from the Triodion, Tone 3)
The Stichera for Vespers summarize the story very well. Observe in the following Stichera an "outline of repentance" of sorts:
1. God made us in His image and gave us all that we need for perfection.
2. We have wasted His gifts because of our sins.
3. We must "come to ourselves" and recognize our sin, and slothfulness and the bitter fruits of our actions.
4. We do not have the strength to overcome our sins, but our loving Father does, and He will accomplish in us our perfection if we turn to Him.
5. Our knowledge of our sins and that God will receive our repentance, not matter how weak we are, and will restore us, should motivate us. We have no excuse to languish in our sins, and do nothing, since even a weak effort will be rewarded.
[ I was entrusted with a sinless and living land (1)], / [but I sowed the ground with sin / and reaped with a sickle the ears of slothfulness; / in thick sheaves I garnered my actions, / but winnowed them not on the threshing floor of repentance. (2)] / [ But I beg Thee, my God, the preeternal husbandman, / with the wind of Thy loving-kindness winnow the chaff of my works, / and grant to my soul the corn of forgiveness; // shut me in Thy heavenly storehouse and save me. (3)]
[ Brethren, let us learn the meaning of this mystery. / For when the Prodigal Son ran back from sin to his Father's house, / his loving Father came out to meet him and kissed him. / He restored to the Prodigal the tokens of his proper glory, / and mystically He made glad on high, / sacrificing the fatted calf. (4) ] / [ Let our lives, then, be worthy of the loving Father / Who has offered sacrifice, // and of the glorious Victim Who is the Savior of our souls. (5)]
The Psalm "By the Waters of Baptism" is a highlight of the Matins service (a service chanted in the morning, or in Russian usage, often chanted Saturday evening after Vespers. On Sundays, it is a long and intricate service, with the basic theme of the resurrection, and many hymns and chanting from the Psalter, and the reading of one of the Resurrection accounts form the Gospels. The church has divided these accounts, 1 from Matthew, 2 from Mark, 4 from Luke, and 5 from John) into 11 sections, which are read sequentially throughout the year on Sundays.).
This Psalm is the entire text of Psalm 136 (Septuagint numbering, in Western bibles, it is Psalm137), sung in a plaintive melody. It will be sung the next two Sundays also. It appears after the Polyeleos, which is a very joyful psalm, sung in a very "upbeat" melody, as part of the sequence before the Gospel is read. If you will permit me a "pop culture" reference, the transition from joy to sober repentance is startling, much like the transition in the "Sound of Music" movie from joyful singing after the wedding of Maria and Captain von Trapp to the somber tolling of a bell, which signified the invasion of the Nazis into Austria.
It is appropriate that we being singing this Psalm on the day we read the Parable of the Prodigal Son, because there are strong similarities between the two. I do not want to take the time to "reinvent the wheel", so I include below something I wrote about this Psalm and the parable. I know it is long, but it is worth the read.
How shall we sing the Lord's song in a strange land?
Parable of The Prodigal Son compared to By the Waters of Babylon