Question: Can you tell us about the history of the
sign of the cross since the early Christian times? As far as I know, neither
Jesus nor his apostles made the sign of the cross. When did this tradition
appear?
The Rev Athanasios Gumerov from Sretensky
Monastery: We do
not have any worship texts written by the Christians of the Apostolic age.
Therefore, we cannot resolve the issue of whether the sign of the cross was
used in the primitive Church unequivocally. Absence of definitive knowledge
does not mean that we must deny the possibility for the sign of the cross to appear
in the earliest Christian communities. Some researchers unambiguously state
that “The custom of making the sign of the cross begins in the Apostolic times”
(The Comprehensive Orthodox
Theological Encyclopedia. Saint Petersburg, published by P.P. Soykin,
year n/a, p. 1485). As early as Tertullian’s time, the sign of the cross has
already become an established tradition among Christians. Tertullian writes in
his treatise De Corona
(ca. 211) that we guard our forehead with the sign of the cross in all circumstances
of our daily lives: when we enter a house or leave it, when we put on our
clothes, when we kindle lights, when we go to bed or begin to do something.
The sign of the cross isn’t just a part of
a religious ritual. First of all, it’s a mighty weapon. There are many examples
in the collections of sayings by the Holy Fathers and the lives of the saints
of the real spiritual power that the image of the Cross possesses. Didn’t the
God-enlightened Apostles know it? We find an interesting testimony in The Spiritual Meadow by John
Moschos. When a priest named Conon from the monastery of Pentucla left the
monastery, he met St John the Baptist who meekly implored him to return to the
monastery, promising to make the monk free from temptations. Abba Conon refused.
St John made him sit on a hill, opened his garment and made the sign of the
cross three times. (See Chapter 3). The great John the Forerunner descended from
Heaven. Could he have learned to make the sign of the cross from people?
This story indirectly points at the fact
that the sign of the cross was used since the beginning of Christianity. Here
is another argument in favour of this assertion. Saint John of Damascus writes,
referring to the cross, “It is given unto us as a sign, similar to the circumcision
of the Israel.” (An Exact
Exposition of the Orthodox Faith, Book 4, Chapter XI). Who gave it
unto us? God. He bequeathed to us the circumcision through Abraham (Genesis
17:10) and apparently the sign of the cross through the apostles.
Translated by The Catalog of Good Deeds
CONVERSATION