“It is Time for the Lord to Act”: the Significance of Assembling
According
to the official OCA service book, the Divine Liturgy begins when the deacon
“bows his head to the priest and says, ‘It is time to begin the service to the
Lord. Bless, Master’”. (The words translated thus are rendered in the venerable
Hapgood version as “time to sacrifice unto the Lord”) The Greek original is
καιροζ του ποιησαι τω κυριω/ kairos tou poiesai to kurio. In the Septuagint of
Psalm 118/ 119 verse 26, these words are translated as “It is time for the Lord
to act”. Ideas of doing service or sacrificing are therefore interpretive
renderings. The words do not so much inform us about what we should do (e.g.
offer service or sacrifice) as about what God is about to do. In these words
the deacon tells the priest that the Lord is about to act, and because of this
they should do something.
One may
ask why it is the deacon who tells this to the priest. Why doesn’t the priest
say this to the deacon? Or why doesn’t the reader say this to the priest? Or
the choir director? After all, the service can’t properly get going until the
choir director is ready to roll. Why is the deacon the one who says this?
The
answer takes us out of the present and back to a time when the deacon, who was
supported by subdeacons and door-keepers, was in effective charge of the
assembled crowds. “If anyone misbehaves,” Chrysostom advised in his day, “call
the deacon” (from his homilies on the Acts of the Apostles). In that day, when
the people had assembled, the deacon would be informed, and he then would tell
the priest that everyone had assembled. That is what he meant by saying “It is
time for the Lord to act”—it was because everyone had now assembled that Christ
was about to act and manifest His presence. The Lord had promised that “when
two are three are gathered in My name, there am I in the midst of them”
(Matthew 18:20), and now that the people had gathered in His name, He was about
appear in their midst. “The Church” is not so much an organization to which one
belongs as it is an event that takes place when Christians gather together in
liturgical assembly. The term “church” in part refers to the experience of
Christ manifesting Himself in the midst of His people when they assemble in His
name. In the words cited at the beginning, the deacon is telling the priest
that this assembling or gathering had taken place and that Christ was ready to
manifest Himself. They had better therefore begin to do their part.
We see
the same significance of the assembly in the original opening of the Liturgy as
served in Constantinople in Chrystostom’s day, though that opening is now
buried further into the service. In Chrysostom’s day the celebrants would enter
the church in silence and ascend into the altar area. The main celebrant (the
bishop) would then takes his episcopal seat or throne in the high place and
greet the assembly saying, “Peace be unto all!” to which they would respond
“And with your spirit!” This was not just a way of the presider saying, “Hello everybody,
nice to see you”. The exchange was his formal acknowledgment of the assembled
Christians as those who have assembled in Christ’s name and who now had Christ
in their midst. The mutual blessing set the liturgical seal on the assembly.
This is
obscured somewhat in our present Liturgy, where this mutual greeting which once
opened the service now takes place many minutes into the service itself,
preceded by the opening doxology, the Great Litany, three Antiphons and their
accompanying prayers/ litanies, a series of troparia, the Trisagion Prayer and
the singing of the Trisagion Hymn. One would never guess that this liturgical
exchange was once the effective beginning of the service, and as it now is, it
serves little point. It once sealed the opening assembly. Now it looks like a
quick exchange introducing the prokeimenon and the epistle.
That is
probably why in the service book the response is given to the celebrant’s
blessing of “Peace be unto all!” not by the assembled people whom he was
addressing, but by the Reader. Why the reader? He was not addressing the Reader
in particular, but rather peace was offered to “all”. The Reader however now
responds because the blessing now serves to introduce to the readings, not to
seal the assembly. Given this diminution of meaning it is not surprising that
in some versions of the Liturgy (such as in the Antiochian Liturgikon) it is
simply omitted or appended as a footnote documenting the odd practice of “some
traditions”. It has been effectively emptied of meaning.
This
unfortunate change of meaning is not simply of historical or archaeological
significance, but witnesses to a more profound change in our whole
understanding of Liturgy. Before the assembling of the people was of crucial
importance—it was the sign that Christ was about to act and manifest His
presence in their midst. That is, the diaconal signal and the presider’s
greeting witnessed to the fact that
Liturgy
was something priest and people did together, and it was in this cooperative
action that the gift of divine presence was given. The assembling of the people
is now no longer viewed in the same way. In Chrysostom’s day, the deacon would
be told that everyone had gathered and that therefore something was about to
occur. The fact of assembly was the precondition for doing everything else, for
Liturgy was a corporate action. Now the Liturgy can begin at a set time (e.g.
10.00 a.m.) regardless of whether or not the people have gathered. The deacon
now no longer says, “It is the time for the Lord to act” because the subdeacons
or door-keepers have told him that everyone had gathered. He now says “It is
time for the Lord to act” because his watch tells him it is 10.00 a.m.
regardless of who has gathered. (Perhaps this is why the rendering “It is time
to begin the service to the Lord” is now used, for this rendering expresses not
the thought of God’s imminent action, but of our obligation. It’s 10.00
a.m.—time to start.) The people can come in anytime they like, and drift in
throughout the service. Their gathering is now longer crucial or the sine qua
non of liturgical functioning. As long as the priest and cantor or choir
director are present, things can proceed. We Orthodox may say we do not believe
in “private Masses” as in the historical western practice, but this offers a
close enough approximation. Like the private Mass, the assembly of the people
is no longer crucial. The canonical requirement of two or three people present
in the nave (who may or may not eventually communicate) is a poor substitute
for the earlier expectation that the people would assembly in their fullness.
We
observe that in this mentality the performance of the Liturgy has become
clericalized—it is now no longer something the clergy do as a part of the
assembly and for which the gathered assembly was a crucial requirement. It is
now something the clergy do for the people—a product to be consumed by
consumers, regardless of the number of them present. The people feel free to
come late for the Liturgy in the same way as they feel themselves free to come
into a theatre late for a movie, and for the same reason—the movie will begin
whether or not they are late, and their lateness will not effect the quality of
the movie. The clergy do not feel free to come late to the Liturgy because
their presence is crucial to its performance. We need to recover a sense of the
significance of the assembly, and of the sanctity of the laity. They must come
for the Liturgy on time for the same reason that the priest must come on time—
because their presence also is crucial to its performance. That does not mean
that Christ legalistically withholds His presence until a certain number have
gathered. The Lord is gracious and condescending, and bestows the gift of His
presence even when many are tardy and drift into the service after the Gospel.
But His kindness must not be received as divine permission to be late or
misconstrued that their presence if superfluous. As Paul said, God’s kindness
leads us to repentance (Romans 2:4).
Every
baptized Orthodox is called to do his or her share and should assemble on time
to make their contribution to the Liturgy. Their presence is not superfluous.
It is essential. It is so important that Christ pledged His presence to those
who would gather in His name. Our service books tell the deacon to be on the
lookout for the fullness of their presence and to announce this fullness to the
priest: the Church of the living God has assembled! It is now time for the Lord
to act.
By Fr. Lawrence Farley
Source: https://blogs.ancientfaith.com/nootherfoundation/time-lord-act-significance-assembling/
