Page:Catholic Encyclopedia, volume 6.djvu/861

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775

GREEK

by a natural process of imitation churches around began to copy the order observed in the great town. Tlie greater the influence of the city where the rite arose, the more widely the rite spread. It was not a question of inherent advantages. No one thought of choosing the rite that seemed most edifying or beauti- ful or suitable. People simply copied their chief. The rites were formed at first in the patriarchal cities: Rome, Alexandria, Antioch, Constantinople. Jeru- salem had already given hers to Antioch. The bi.sh- ops of each patriarcliate naturally thought that they could not do better than celebrate the holy mysteries in the same way as their patriarch. We know in the West how, long before there were any laws on the sub- ject, every one began to copy what was done at Rome. It seemed safest to follow Rome in the matter. The Frankish Chiu'ch in the eighth century gave up the Gallican Rite, and adopted that of the patriarchal see. The " Liber sacramentorum Roraana> Ecclesiae" spread throughout Western Europe till it had dis- placed all other uses, e.xcept in one or two remote districts. We see the same tendency at work still — uniformity in accordance with Roman customs, even in such details as the shape of vestments and the pro- nunciation of Latin. So it was in the East with regard to their patriarchal sees. Local customs are gradually suppressed in favour of the patriarch's way of doing things. Schisms and heresies accentuate this uni- formity among Catholics. It was a sign of adherence to the Catholic centre — .\le.xandria, Constantinople, or whichever it might be — to agree entirely with it in rite. Lastly come laws determining this tendency; and so we have the principle that (with exceptions) obtains still throughout Christendom, namely: "Rite follows Patriarchate". The Roman Rite is used throughout the Roman patriarchate, by the clergy subject to the pope as their patriarch, and only by them; the Alexandrine Rite belongs to E^ypt — where the patriarch of Alexandria has juri-sdietion; that of Antioch to Syria; that of Constantinople to the By- zantine territory. The National Nestorian (East- Syrian) and Armenian patriarchates have their own rites. Such was the principle for many centuries everywhere. Except for the two remnants of other Western rites at Milan and Toledo, it may still be taken as a fairly safe one in the Catholic Church; and among all Eastern sects, except the Orthodo.x. Since the thirteenth century, however, the Orthodox, re- gardless of the older tradition, use the Byzantine Rite everywhere, even in their Alexandrine, Antiochene, and Jerusalem patriarchates. In their case, then, the principle cannot be applied. But the exception is rather apparent than real. This spread of the use of the Rite of Con.stantmople meant an assertion of that patriarch's jurisdiction throughout the Orthodox Church. In this case, too, rite really followed patri- archate; the disappearance of the Liturgies of Alexan- dria and Antioch among the Orthodox meant, as was intended, the practical disappearance of any real authority in those places save that of the prelate who nearly succeeded in justifying his pompous title of (Ecumenical Patriarch. Now that his attempt has failed, and the other patriarchs are becoming more and more conscious of their independence of him, there are signs of a near restoration of their own liturgies, to be used, as before, where their jurisdiction extends.

But a rite in spreading out from the patriarchal city where it was composed does not itself change. Since the invention of printing, especially, and the- later tendency to stereotype every tietail of the sacred func- tions, each rite, wherever used, is made to conform rigidly with its standard form as u.setl in the central church. The Liturgj' of Jerusalem-Antioch contains, as the first member of its Great Intercession, a prayer for "the holy and glorious Sion, mother of all Churches", plainly a local touch intended originally for use in Jerusalem, where the rite was written

(Brightman, "Eastern Liturgies", .54,90). The Alex- andrine Rite, even if u.sed in far countries, makes the priest pr.ay that God may "draw up the waters of the river to their proper measure" (op. cit., 127, 167) — a local allusion to the flood of the Nile on which fertility in Egypt depends. And the Roman Rite, too, used in every continent, still contains unmistakable evidence that it was composed for use in that one city. The lists of saints ("Communicantes" and "Nobis quo- que") contain the Apostles and then local Roman saints, or those, like St. Cyprian, specially honoured at Rome; the Calendar with its Rogation and ember- days supposes the Italian climate; the special heroes of Rome, as St. Laurence, are those that have the old- est great feasts. Of course Rome, like all Churches, honours the Ble.ssed Virgin, the Apostles, the Baptist, St. Stephen, the oecumenical saints of Christendom. After them she naturally honours first her own saints, whose relics hallow her basilicas. The stations at the Roman basilicas affect her year throughout; and on the fea.st of the Princes of the Apostles she remembers specially " happy Rome purple with their glorious blood". From all this, then, it is clear that the real dis- tinction of rites is not by language nor b}' the religion of those who may use them, but according to the places where they were composed. The correct and scientific way of describing any rite, therefore, is always by the name of a place. Thus we have the Roman and Gallican Rites in the West; in the East the Rites of Alexandria, Antioch, Constantinople, etc. This is the really essential note of any rite, that it keeps even when translated into other languages.

(.3) TI7irt( is a Greek Rite? — An obvious corollarv^of what has been said is that w-e had much betternever speak of a "Greek Rite" at all. Like the cognateex- pression "Greek Church" it is a confused and unscien- tific term, the use of which argues that the speaker has a mistaken conception of the subject. What is called a Greek Rite will alwa^-s be the rite of some city — Alexandria or Constantinople, and so on. If one wishes to emphasize the fact that the Greek language is used for it, that statement may be adiled. At Athens and Constantinople the\' u.se the Byzantine Liturgy; it may be worth while to add that they use it in Greek, since at St. Petersburg and Sofia they follow exactly the same rite in Old Slavonic, ^\■hen people further distinguish "pure Greek" and "Gra-co-Ara- bie ", " Grxco-Slavonic ' ' Rites, the confusion is greater than ever. By these last terms they mean rites trans- lated into Arabic and Slavonic out of the Greek. Now, the evidence on the whole tends to show that every ancient rite in Christendom was first u.sed in the Greek language; those of the Copts, Sj-rians, and Romans certainly were. So that if one calls the Russian ser- vice "Gra?co-Slavonic'', one may just as well describe the pope's Mass as " Gra-co-Latin ". It would then be enormously to the advantage of clear ideas if people would stop using this expression and would describe each rite by the name of its place of origin. The name Greek Rites, however, still too commonly used, applies to the three classical Eastern uses whose original forms in (ireek are still extant. These are the parent rites of Alexandria and Antioch and the widely spread By- z.antine Rite. The Alexandrine Liturgy, ascribed to St. Mark, is no longer said in Greek anywhere. It is the source of the Coptic and Aby.ssinian Rites. The Greek text, which was used by the Orthodo.x of Egypt down to the thirteenth century, will be foimd in Brightman's "Eastern Liturgies", ILJ-l^.S; an En- glish translation of the Coptic form follows, 1-14-188; the Abyssinian Liturgy, 194-244. For a further ac- count see Alex.\ndrine Liturgy. The other parent rite of Antioch stands at the head of a very great family of liturgies. In the original Greek it is represented ia two obviously cognate forms, that of the eighth book of the ".Apostolic Constitutions" (Brightman. op. cit., 3-27; compare the fragments of the liturgy in the