Oct 18, 2005

Anaphora of Bishop Serapion of Thmuis


1. “It is meet and just to praise thee, to sing and glorify thee, the uncreated Father of thine only-begotten Son, Jesus Christ. 2. We praise thee, O uncreated God, inscrutable, unspeakable, incomprehensible to all created nature. 3. We praise thee, thou ‘who art known by thine only begotten son,’ and who hast been made manifest, explained and revealed by Him to all created nature. 4. We praise thee, ‘who dost know the son’ and dost manifest His glory to the saints, thee, who art known and contemplated by the Word generated by thee, and who art revealed to the saints. 5. We praise thee, indivisible Father, author of immortality; thou art the fountain of life, the source of light, the font of all grace and truth, thou lover of mankind and the poor, who hast pity on all and dost ‘draw’ them to thee by the advent of thy beloved Son.

6. “We pray thee, make us living men; give us the spirit of light, that we may ‘know thee the true [God], and Him whom thou hast sent, Jesus Christ;’ give us the Holy Spirit, that we may be able to preach and explain thine ineffable mysteries. 7. Let the Lord Jesus and the Holy Spirit speak in us, and He shall glorify thee through us.

8. “For thou art ‘above all principality and power and virtue and dominion, and every name that is named, not only in this world but also in that which is to come.’ 9. ‘Thousands of thousands and ten thousand times ten thousand stand before thee,’ angels, archangels, ‘thrones, powers, dominations, principalities, and virtues;’ before thee stand the two most glorious seraphim, ‘with six wings, covering their face with two, and their feet with two; flying with two and proclaiming thee holy.’ 10. With them accept also our adoration, for we say: ‘Holy, holy, holy, is the Lord God of hosts, heaven and earth are full of thy glory.’

11.”Heaven is full, the earth is also full of thy sublime glory, O Lord of hosts. Extend thy power upon this sacrifice, and grant thy aid to its fulfillment; for it is to thee that we have offered this living victim, the unbloody sacrifice. 12. To thee have we offered this bread, the likeness of the body of thine only Son. This bread is the image of His holy body; for ‘the Lord Jesus on the night in which He was betrayed, took bread, broke it, and gave it to His disciples and said: Take and eat, this is my body, which shall be broken for you,’ for the remission of sins. 13. Therefore have we, by repeating the figure of His death, offered the bread and pray: By this sacrifice reconcile thyself with us all and have mercy upon us, O God of truth. And as this bread was scattered upon the hills and brought together into one, so do thou unite thy holy Church from every people and every land and every city and every village and house, and build up one living Catholic Church. 14. We have also offered the chalice, the symbol of the blood; for the Lord Jesus, ‘after He had supped, took the cup and said to His disciples: Take, drink, this is the new covenant, which is my blood, which shall be shed for the remission of sins.’ Therefore have we also offered the chalice, because we have consummated the symbol of the blood.

15. “Let thy holy Word (Logos), O God of truth, come down upon this bread, so that the bread may become the body of the Word, and on this chalice, so that the chalice may become the blood of Truth. And grant that all who partake of them, may receive the medicine of life, as a cure for all sickness and as an increase and progress in virtue, not, however, as judgment, O God of truth, nor as punishment and disgrace.

16. “For we have besought thee, O uncreated God, through they only-begotten [Son] in the Holy Spirit: Have mercy on this nation, make it worthy of increase, send forth angels to assist the people in overcoming evil and to strengthen the community. 17. We also pray for those who are asleep, of whom we also make commemoration. 18. (After the mention of their names.) Sanctify these souls, for thou knowest them all. Sanctify those who have died in the Lord, number them among thy holy principalities and grant them a place and a dwelling in thy kingdom!

19. “Likewise accept the thanks of thy people, and bless those who have offered gifts and prayers of thanks to thee, and give health and strength, joy and prosperity to the soul and the bodies of this whole people, through Jesus Christ, thine only Son, in the Holy Ghost, as it was, and is, and shall be from generation to generation for all eternity. Amen.”

Source: Rauschen, Gerhard, Ph.D., S.T.D., Eucharist and Penance: In the First Six Centuries of the Church, B Herder, St. Louis, 1913
N.B. St. Serapion of Thmuis is also called St. Serapion the Scholastic. Thmuis is a titular see and suffragan of the Metropolitan See of Pelusium. It is independent of the See of Alexandria and therefore does not follow the unique Alexandrian liturgical structure in it's anaphora but instead is of the Antiochene family.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

Absolutely beautiful!
Thank you.