Let all mortal flesh keep silence

  • The ser­vice tomor­row morn­ing is one of the few times we change the Cheru­bic Hymn. The lovely, lovely Chris Farha, choir direc­tor of St. George Cathe­dral in Wichita, KS, emailed out this per­spec­tive on the change. The more time you spend in the Church, the more you real­ize that there’s a lot of mean­ing in even the small­est aspects.

    There are only a few times in the litur­gi­cal year that we do not sing the Cheru­bic Hymn, but rather sub­sti­tute dif­fer­ent hymns in the place of the Cheru­bic Hymn.  This sub­sti­tu­tion occurs at the Pre­sanc­ti­fied Liturgy and two days of Holy Week; Holy Thurs­day and Holy Sat­ur­day.  I want to speak to the Holy Week sub­sti­tu­tions.   How­ever, in order to effec­tively accom­plish this task, we should first under­stand the Cheru­bic Hymn and its pur­pose in the liturgy.  The Cheru­bic Hymn is the sac­ri­fi­cial offer­ing to God, the offer­ing of Jesus Christ who offers him­self to God for the sins of the world.  The Cheru­bic Hymn is the only hymn of the liturgy that is not addressed to God, but it is addressed to one another.

    “We who mys­ti­cally rep­re­sent the Cheru­bim, and sing to the Life-giving Trin­ity, the thrice Holy Hymn, let us now lay aside all earthly care:  that we may receive the King of all, who comes invis­i­bly upborne by the Angelic Host.  Alleluia!”  We recall that the Angels of God are present in count­less num­bers before His throne in heaven – and on earth.  The Cheru­bic Hymn reminds us of the awe­some pres­ence of God, the accom­pa­ny­ing armies of angels who are wor­ship­ping here and now with us, and the tremen­dous Mys­tery that is unfold­ing in our midst – the sac­ri­fice of bread and wine changed into the very Body and Blood of Christ.  “Let us lay aside all earthly cares.”

    In other words, we are called now to our utmost con­cen­tra­tion and respect, ignor­ing all of our other con­cerns, think­ing only of our dear Lord who is com­ing into our midst, and soon to enter into our body and soul, in the Sacra­ment of the Eucharist.  It leaves us hum­bled, awestruck and exhilarated.

    Holy Thurs­day — “Receive me today”
    On Holy Thurs­day we sing “Receive me today, O Son of God, as a par­taker of thy sacra­men­tal Sup­per; for I shall not speak of thy mys­tery to thine ene­mies, nor give thee a kiss like Judas.  But like the thief, I shall con­fess thee.  Remem­ber me, O Lord, in thy king­dom.”  This is also the Koinon­ikon and the post com­mu­nion hymn, replac­ing, “We Have Seen the True Light”.

    The sig­nif­i­cance of this replace­ment is eas­ily under­stood, in light of what has just occurred in the liturgy – the Gospel of the Last Sup­per.  This is the day of the insti­tu­tion of the Sacra­ment of Holy Com­mu­nion, the Eucharist, and the betrayal by Judas.  The event of the Passover Meal was the entire mis­sion of Christ and indeed the very pur­pose of the cre­ation of the world in the first place, so that God’s cre­ation could be in the most inti­mate com­mu­nion with Him for eter­nity, sit­ting at table with Him, eat­ing and drink­ing in His unend­ing King­dom.  The cross, the tomb, the Res­ur­rec­tion on the third day and the Ascen­sion into Heaven came to pass pre­cisely so that men could be blessed by God to be in Holy Com­mu­nion with Him forever.

    Holy Sat­ur­day — “Let all mor­tal flesh keep silence”
    Holy Sat­ur­day is of great sig­nif­i­cance, link­ing Holy Fri­day and the death of the Lord on the Cross, and the Res­ur­rec­tion on the day of Pascha. Holy Sat­ur­day is the Great Sab­bath, the day of rest. God rested on the sev­enth day after accom­plish­ing Cre­ation. Christ said on the Cross, ‘it is fin­ished’, i.e. accom­plished, and like­wise rested in the tomb on the Sab­bath. The Great Entrance is com­monly iden­ti­fied with the Entry into Jerusalem and then with the bur­ial of Christ. But Holy Week is just pre­ceded by Palm Sun­day, and by Holy Sat­ur­day, the tomb, in the form of the epi­taphios, is set forth in the church. So, the cheru­bic hymn is inap­pro­pri­ate on Holy Saturday.

    “Let all mor­tal flesh keep silence and with fear and trem­bling stand, pon­der­ing noth­ing earthly minded.  For the King of Kings and the Lord of Lords comes to be slain, to give him­self as food to the faith­ful.  Before him go the ranks of angels:  all the prin­ci­pal­i­ties and pow­ers, the many eyed cheru­bim and the six-winged seraphim, cov­er­ing their faces, singing the hymn:  Alleluia!  Alleluia!    Alleluia!” 

    ‘Let all mor­tal flesh keep silence’ comes from Habakkuk 2:20, and it is pre­scribed to main­tain silence as far as pos­si­ble dur­ing Holy Sat­ur­day, at least in monas­ter­ies. We ‘stand with fear and trem­bling’ in antic­i­pa­tion of the mys­tery of the Lord’s res­ur­rec­tion. We ‘take no thought for any earthly thing’ because noth­ing com­pares with the sav­ing pas­sion and res­ur­rec­tion of the Lord, who has died for us and gives us His Body and Blood for our heal­ing and sal­va­tion which we pre-eminently think upon at Pascha.

    Habakkuk 2:20  “But the Lord is in his holy tem­ple; let all the earth keep silence before him”.  The Ortho­dox Study Bible com­men­tary foot­note reads: “The mys­tery of God is best hon­ored with silence.  When God revealed Him­self out of the whirl­wind, Job too was found speech­less. (Job 40:5; 42:3).

    Great and Holy Sat­ur­day, our Lord’s mor­tal body is lying silent in the tomb while He breaks the bronze gates of hades and over­throws death.

    The mys­ti­cal Sab­bath, the sev­enth day, the mor­tal body of God rests in silence. The Mes­siah is in the tomb and the Res­ur­rec­tion is not yet expe­ri­enced, the events in hades are unknown. The cry of Holy, Holy, Holy and majes­tic praise seems strange and inap­pro­pri­ate in this time of quiet sad­ness. What else is there for mor­tal flesh to do but keep silent? What could be more appro­pri­ate? We wept at the Cross. We wept dur­ing His bur­ial. We are wept out. We rest in silent antic­i­pa­tion on the Sab­bath Day, await­ing the time of ulti­mate joy of Pascha, when the Thrice Holy Hymn will sound in dou­ble vol­ume as we break the silence of sad­ness with joy­ful noise!


    Related posts:

    1. The silence of Zacharias
    2. On silence (again)
    3. “Lord, have mercy”, cont.
    4. Happy Thanks­giv­ing — in two tries

    April 2nd, 2010 | Grace | 3 Comments |

3 Responses and Counting...

  • Mimi 04.02.2010

    Christ is Risen!
    Beau­ti­ful thoughts on Holy Sat­ur­day. This was the first year that I really con­tem­plated that the Sab­bath that was insti­tuted by God for Moses is con­nected to Christ’s rest in the tomb. Ba-wow. Thank you to our priest who pointed it out

  • Grace

    Wow. I hadn’t con­nected that. That is just incredible.

    I’m really get­ting a lot out of the Ortho­dox Study Bible’s foot­notes in the OT. I’m espe­cially amazed at how con­stantly the psalms fore­shadow and fore­tell Christ’s coming.

  • Mimi

    Isn’t it? I’m still sit­ting here think­ing “wow, how did I miss this before?“
    I agree, it is incred­i­ble how the Old Tes­ta­ment, espe­cially the Psalms, fore­shad­owed Christ. And, how our hymnogro­phy draws that out, but often I miss it, because it is Ves­pers and Matins, and I’m not there, through my own sin­ful self.

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