A brief theological commentary on the liturgy of St John ...



A Brief Theological Commentary on

the Divine Liturgy of St John Chrysostom

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“Your own of Your Own We Offer You,

On Behalf of All of For All …”

The Prothesis – Or Service of Preparation of the Holy Gifts

Then making three lowly reverences before the offertory-table each shall say within himself: “O God, cleanse thou me a sinner, and be merciful to me.” And the Priest shall say: Thou hast redeemed us by thy precious blood from the curse of the law: being nailed to the cross and pierced with the spear, thou art become for men the fount of immortal life: our Savior, glory be to thee.

Then shall the Deacon say: Master, give the blessing.

Office of Oblation

Priest: Blessed is our God always, now, and for ever: world without end. Amen.

Then shall the Priest take in his left hand a prosphora, and in his right hand the holy spear and therewith thrice making the sign of the cross over it shall say three times:

In remembrance of our Lord and God and Savior Jesus Christ. And immediately he shall thrust the spear into the right side of the seal, and the while he cuts it he shall say: “He was led as a sheep to the slaughter.” (Isa 53:7-8)

And the while he cuts the left side

And as a lamb without blemish before the shearer is dumb, so he opens not his mouth.

And cutting the upper part of the seal

In his humiliation his judgment was taken away. (Isa 53:7-8)

And into the lower part, saying

Who shall declare his generation?

And the Deacon reverently witnessing this mystery, at each incision shall say, holding his orarion in his hand

Let us pray unto the Lord.

Thereafter he shall say

Master, lift out.

And the Priest thrusting the sacred spear into the right side of the prosphoron shall lift out the holy bread, saying

For his life is taken away from the earth.’

And having laid it with the seal downwards on the paten, and the Deacon having said

Master, sacrifice,

The Priest shall cut it crosswise, saying the while

The Lamb of God, which taketh away the sin of the world is sacrificed for the life and salvation of the world.

And the Priest having turned the bread so that the emblem of the cross is now upward the Deacon shall say: Master, pierce.

And the Priest shall pierce the right side with the spear, saying: One of the soldiers with a spear pierced his side, and forthwith came there out blood and water. And he that saw it bares witness, and his witness is true.

Then the Deacon shall take of the wine and the water, and say to the Priest: Bless, Master, the holy blending.

And receiving the blessing upon them he shall pour into the chalice wine and water together

The Priest taking in his hand a second prosphora shall say: In honour and remembrance of our most blessed Lady, Mother of God and ever-Virgin Mary; at whose intercessions do thou, O Lord, accept this sacrifice unto thy heavenly altar. And taking out a particle he shall lay it on the right side of the holy bread near the centre thereof saying: The queen stood by on thy right hand, clothed in vesture wrought with gold, and arrayed in divers colours. (Ps 44:9 LXX)

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Then taking the third prosphora he shall say: Of the glorious prophet and forerunner John the Baptist.

And taking out a first particle he shall lay it on the left side of the holy bread, beginning with it the First rank …

… And then the rest of the Nine Ranks: Prophets, Apostles, Hierarchs/Teachers, Martyrs, Monastics, Unmercenary Saints, Saints of the Day, St John Chrysosotom or St Basil the Great

Fourth prosphora – Commemoration of the Metropolitan, Archbishop, Clergy, and the Living

Fifth prosphora – Commemorations of the Departed

Liturgy of the Catechumens

We are in the presence of the Holy and Divine Trinity because when we enter into the church building we sign ourselves with the Seal of our Baptism, “In the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit” thus bringing into our awareness the gift of adoption that allows us not only to be in the presence of the Holy Trinity but also to participate in the divine life.

The Call of the Holy Spirit

From Pentecost through Great and Holy Saturday:

Priest: O Heavenly King, the Comforter, the Spirit of Truth, You are everywhere and fulfil all things. Treasury of Blessings and Giver of Life, come and abide in us and cleanse us from every impurity and save our souls, O Good One

The Celebration of Our Eternal Life

From Holy Pascha until the Leave-taking of Pascha:

Priest: Christ is risen from the dead, trampling down death by death, and upon those in the tombs bestowing life.

The liturgical occasion is an opportunity to renew our participation in the life of the Trinity through Jesus our Lord and by the Holy Spirit.

The Announcement of the Good News (Gospel)

Priest: Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace, and among everyone, love and understanding. O Lord, open my lips, and my mouth shall show forth Your praise.

We are in the kingdom of the Holy Trinity

Priest: Blessed is the Kingdom of the Father, and of the Son, and of the

Holy Spirit, now and ever, and unto the ages of ages!

We are here in the kingdom but we are not alone, and so we begin by The Great Litany in peace that is of Christ, which is established reconciliation of heaven and earth and with all humans.

Deacon: In peace let us pray to the Lord.

People: LORD, HAVE MERCY

➢ For the peace from above, and the salvation of our souls, let us pray to the Lord.

➢ For the peace of the whole world, the good estate of the holy churches of God, and the union of all, let us pray to the Lord.

➢ For this holy temple, and for them that with faith, reverence, and the fear of God enter herein, let us pray to the Lord.

➢ For our Metropolitan Jonah; for Archbishop JOB; for the honorable Priesthood, the Deacons in Christ, for all the clergy and people, let us pray to the Lord.

➢ For our deliverance from all affliction, wrath, danger, and necessity, let us pray to the Lord.

➢ Help us, save us, have mercy on us, and keep us, O God, by Your grace.

Why do we say Lord Have Mercy? According to Nicholas Cabasilas: “Why is this the sole cry they send forth to God?

In the first place, as we have already said, it is because this prayer implies both gratitude and confession. Secondly, to beg God’s mercy is to ask for his kingdom, that kingdom which Christ promised to give to those who seek for it, assuring them that all things else of which they have need will be added unto them.’ Because of this, this prayer is sufficient for the faithful, since its application is general.

How do we know that the kingdom of God is signified by his mercy? In this way: Christ, speaking of the reward of the merciful, and of the recompense of kindness which they will receive from him, in one place says that they shall obtain mercy, and in another that they shall inherit the kingdom; thus proving that God’s mercy and the inheritance of the kingdom are one and the same thing. “Blessed are the merciful, for they shall obtain mercy,” (Matt 6:33)’ he says. And elsewhere, as if to explain himself and to show what it means to obtain mercy, he declares: “Then shall the King say unto them on his right hand (by whom he means the merciful): Come, ye blessed of my Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world.”(Matt 25:34). Moreover, if, among the actions of merciful men, one wishes to contemplate the aim of the divine mercy, he will find that it corresponds exactly to the kingdom itself. For what is the character of the merciful man? “I was an hungered, and you gave me meat; I was thirsty and ye gave me drink.” (Matt 25:35) Therefore those to whom Christ shows mercy he will admit to a share at his own table. And what table is this? “That you may eat and drink at my table in my kingdom.”(Lk 22:30) And that you may know the splendour of that table, and may realize that it is a table not of servants but of kings, know that he who waits upon it is Lord of all. “He shall gird himself, and make them to sit down to meat, and will come forth and serve them.” (Lk 12;37)

Likewise, if I may recall that other saying: “I was naked and you clothed me”,’ the Lord will clothe him to whom he shows mercy. And will he not give him a royal garment? He will clothe him in his own garments; and nothing of his is base, for he is a king—just as nothing of ours is royal, since we are slaves. This garment is the wedding-robe which will ensure for those who wear it admission to the kingdom; the King will find in its wearers no fault for which they can be cast forth from the marriage-chamber.

What more? He will open his doors to them and lead them into his house to rest. “I was a stranger, and you took me in.”(Matt 25:35) Those who have been counted worthy of such favour are servants no longer, but sons of God. “The servant abides not in the house forever: but the Son abides forever.” Now the sons are heirs not only of the kingdom but of him who is the heart of the kingdom. “Heirs of God, co-heirs with Christ”,(Rom 8:17) says St Paul. That is why, in asking Christ for mercy, we are asking that we may obtain the kingdom. (On the Divine Liturgy pp 47- 48)

➢ As we pray for all, we have to keep into our heart the most precious part of our prayer, the sharing of the glory of the saints and the mother of all the saints the Theotokos. With this in our hearts we commit ourselves and each other, and all our life unto Christ our God, according to this call.

➢ Calling to mind our most holy, most pure, most blessed and glorious Lady, the Theotokos and Ever-Virgin Mary, with all the saints, let us commit ourselves and each other, and all our life unto Christ our God.

This act of commitment is followed by a confession of the congregation:

People: TO YOU, O LORD!

This is our God to whom we commit everything:

Priest: O Lord our God, Your power is incomparable. Your glory is incomprehensible. Your mercy is immeasurable. Your love for man is inexpressible.

In this God, we participate in his mercy and compassion

Look down on us and on this holy house with pity, O Master, and impart the riches of Your mercy and Your compassion to us and to those who are praying with us. For unto You is due all glory, honour and worship; to the Father, and to the Son, and to the Holy Spirit, now and ever, and unto the ages of ages.

The Three basic components of the Liturgy:

❖ What is revealed by God and is declared in the liturgy

❖ What is given as gift in the Son, through the Holy Spirit

❖ What is celebrated now in time, and is the reason for coming to the liturgy

We can see the three above components clearly in this hymn:

PEOPLE: O ONLY BEGOTTEN SON, AND DEATHLESS WORD OF GOD; FOR OUR SALVATION YOU TOOK FLESH OF THE HOLY THEOTOKOS, AND EVER-VIRGIN MARY, WITHOUT CHANGE YOU BECAME MAN. YOU WERE CRUCIFIED OUR O CHRIST, OUR GOD! YOU CONQUERED DEATH BY DEATH! YOU ARE ONE OF THE HOLY TRINITY, GLORIFIED WITH THE FATHER AND THE HOLY SPIRIT! O SAVE US!

Again look at the underlined words:

O You who have given us the grace to make our common supplications to You with one accord, and who promised that when two or three are gathered together in Your Name You would grant their requests: Fulfil now, O Lord, the petitions of Your servants as may be expedient for them: granting us in this world the knowledge of Your Truth, and in the world to come life everlasting.

For You are a good God and You love mankind, and unto You we ascribe glory: to the Father, and to the Son, and to the Holy Spirit, now and ever and unto ages of ages.

People: AMEN!

The next song is that of the Beatitudes; it is the song of those who seek the kingdom

Prayer of the Little Entrance

Priest (in a low voice): Master, Lord our God, you have set orders and armies of Angels and Archangels in heaven to minister to your glory; grant that, with our entrance, holy Angels may enter, concelebrating with us, and with us glorifying your goodness. For to you belong all glory, honour and worship, to the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit, now and for ever, and to the ages of ages. Amen.

When the prayer is finished, the Deacon, in a low voice, says to the

Priest: Master, bless the holy Entrance.

And the Priest, blessing the entrance, says, in a low voice: Blessed is the entrance to your holy place, now and for ever, and to the ages of ages. Amen.

The Priest kisses the Gospel. The Deacon , standing in the middle of the Church in front of the Priest and raising the sacred Gospel, says aloud:

Wisdom. Stand upright.

Then the Deacon, followed by the Priest, enters the Sanctuary through the Holy Doors and places the Gospel on the Holy Table.

People (sing the Entrance Chant): Come, let us worship and fall down before Christ. Son of God, who rose from the dead, O Son of God, save us who sing to you: Alleluia

Two things are indicated by the prayers:

1. We join the heavenly beings in this service

2. The Gospels are the guarantee of our entrance into the Sanctuary; the Book rests on the Altar - the “throne of the Holy Trinity” - it is later from this throne that we hear the word of God in the Gospel

Because we are in the presence of the Holy Trinity and in his Sanctuary, the Trisagion is sung. But read this prayer carefully and notice how and why we join the Cherubim and the Seraphim. There is something that these two great Ranks in heaven do; they watch us as we sing; this is included in the words of the Trisagion, (holy immortal because of our salvation God the Trinity vanquished death and had mercy on us)

The Prayer of the Trisagion Hymn

Priest: O Holy God: Who rests in the Saints; who is hymned by the Seraphim with the thrice-holy cry, and glorified by the Cherubim, and worshipped by every heavenly power; Who out of nothing has brought all things into being; Who created man after Your own image and likeness, and has adorned him with Your every gift; Who gives to him who asks wisdom and understanding; Who does not despise the sinner, but has instead appointed repentance unto salvation; Who has vouchsafed to us, Your humble and unworthy servants, even in this hour to stand before the glory of Your Holy Altar, and to offer the worship and praise which are due unto You. You, O Master, accept even from the mouths of us sinners the Thrice-holy Hymn, and visit us in Your goodness. Forgive us every transgression, both voluntary and involuntary. Sanctify our souls and bodies and enable us to serve You in holiness all the days of our life. Through the intercessions of the holy Theotokos and of all the saints who from the beginning of the world have been well pleasing to You.

The Priest and the Deacon also say the Trisagion, making three bows before the Holy Table. Then the Deacon says to the Priest: Master, command. And they go to the Throne (that is the Altar). As they go the Priest says: Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord.

Deacon: Master, bless the Throne on high.

Priest: Blessed are you on the throne of glory of your Kingdom, who are seated upon the Cherubim, always, now and for ever, and to the ages of ages. Amen.

The Epistle Reading

DEACON: Let us attend.

PRIEST: + Peace be unto all.

PEOPLE: AND TO YOUR SPIRIT!

DEACON: Wisdom!

Reader: The Prokeimenon (the name comes from Greek and means an introductory that introduce the reading and it is sung by the people

The Gospel Reading

While the Alleluia is being sung the Deacon taking the censer with incense, approaches the Priest, and having received a blessing for the incense he censes the book of the Gospel, the Holy Table all round, the whole Sanctuary, the Priest and, coming out a little from the Holy Door the principal icons and the People.

According to Patriarch Germanus of Constantinople: “The censer demonstrates the humanity of Christ, and the fire, His divinity. The sweet-smelling smoke reveals the fragrance of the Holy Spirit which precedes. For the censer denotes sweet joy.

Again the interior of the censer is understood as the [womb of the virgin Theotokos] who bore the divine coal, Christ, in whom “the whole fullness of deity dwells bodily” (Col 2:9). All together, therefore, give forth the sweet-smelling fragrance. Or again, the interior of the censer points to the font of holy baptism, taking into itself the coal of divine fire, the sweetness of the operation of the Holy Spirit, which is the adoption of divine grace through faith, and exuding a good odor.” (On the divine Liturgy pp79-81)

Prayer for the illumination by the divine light before reading the Gospel

Alleluia ……ALLELUIA!

Priest: Illumine our hearts, O Master who loves mankind, with the pure light of Your divine knowledge. Open the eyes of our minds to the understanding of Your gospel teachings. Implant in us also the fear of Your blessed commandments, that trampling down all carnal desires, we may enter upon a spiritual manner of living, both thinking and doing such things as are well pleasing to You. For You are the illumination of our souls and bodies, O Christ, our God, and unto You we ascribe glory, together with Your Father, who is from everlasting, and Your All-holy, Good, and Life-creating Spirit, now and ever and unto ages of ages.

Please note the three parts of the old faith and life of the ancient church:

1. Christ himself is the light, and so light is not other than the second Person of the Trinity.

2. Victorious Christian life depends on the illuminated mind and heart, and a new understanding

3. This illumination is for both soul and body

The Homily and the great Litany follow; this ends with the litany for the catechumens

Do This In Remembrance of Me – The Liturgy of the Faithful

The Divine Presence in History

1. If we forget that Jesus is God Incarnate, then we have to deal with past history as just past, and that it is only in our memory. But if Jesus is truly divine and human, then his human presence in history is also divine. The old heretics had their views of Jesus and in fact had their views also of history. For the Gnostics, Jesus is “spirit” who has lost his communion with flesh, blood, time and history. For the Monophysites, there is no place for the humanity of Jesus; he is all divine, and thus he has to communicate with us at the mental level. For the two extremes, Arianism and Nestorianism, the created god of the Arians has excluded the True God form being with us and thus history moves on as mere human existence without a true divine revelation. For the Nestorians who never accepted a full union of the divine and the human in Jesus, history of humanity is closed to God.

2. The fact that Jesus, and later on the apostolic Church, have met to break the bread and drink the cup is a continuing testimony to the truth of Jesus’ life, death and resurrection. Jesus is ratifying a new covenant between God and man. The Eucharistic action is: “as often as ye eat this bread and drink the cup, ye proclaim the Lord’s death till he come’ (I Cor. 11:26). This means, of course, “proclaim the Lord‘s saving death” which is meaningless without the resurrection, for the Eucharistic action implies not interpretation of the fact of Christ’s death, because this is Gnostic, but the Divine Presence of the Savior. We must not make the mistake of the older NT critics who thought that what was to be interpreted was a number of ancient documents, which could be more objectively judged if they were isolated from the paradosis (handing over) to the Church. Actually the documents are themselves primarily witnesses to the existence of the paradosis and cults of the earliest Christian communities and are misjudged if they are not seen in the light of the Church’s faith and worship. The Eucharist, every time it is offered, bears witness not only to history, but also to an interpretation of history. It is the proclamation of the saving death of Christ. Every Eucharist proclaims the beginning of the time of God’s salvation.(Alan Richardson, An Interdiction to the Theology of the NT, 1985,pp 364ff).

3. Thus the Eucharist proclaims the truth of the New Life that was given to us by the Son of God Incarnate to change our history from death to life. All Docetic and Gnostic tendencies crash with Jesus Christ who was come in the flesh (I John 4:2; 2John 7). The Holy Spirit testifies in baptism and in the Eucharist that Jesus Christ has come in human history, not in pagan theophany or in docetic play-acting, but in real human life; the three witnesses, the Spirit, the water (of baptism) and the blood (of the Eucharist), testify to the historicity of the Gospel (I John 5.6-8). ‘Be ye careful to observe one Eucharist’, writes St Ignatius, ‘for there is one flesh of our Lord Jesus Christ and one cup unto union in his blood; there is one altar, as there is one bishop. . .‘ (Philad., 4); he goes on to speak of ‘taking refuge in the Gospel as the flesh of Jesus’ (ibid., 5). Elsewhere he says that those who hold strange doctrine abstain from Eucharist and prayer, ‘because they allow not that the Eucharist is the flesh of our Saviour Jesus Christ, which suffered for our sins and which the Father of his goodness raised up’ (Smyrn., 6). That is to say, Docetists, who do not believe that Christ is come in the flesh, do not understand the Eucharist, because in it testimony is given to the fact that the Logos became flesh and dwelt in us (John 1.14) and that the Gospel of the Incarnation concerns real historical happening. (Alan Richardson, An Interdiction to the Theology of the NT, 1985, pp 365).

4. The Eucharist is “remembrance” of Christ, of the Actions of God Incarnate, his life and the days in Galilee, the Lakeside meals when Jesus broke the bread for the hungry multitudes on those memorable ‘guest-nights,’ when he spoke about the bread from heaven. Like the fish which appear in the frescoes representing the Eucharist in the catacombs in Rome, the breaking of the bread is a reminder of Galilee and of the original fellowship of the fishermen- disciples. The Eucharist is rooted in time and place; it is recognizable as the Lord’s Supper because the same Jesus is one who calls the Church, “take and eat.. take and drink” so that Jesus may be known “in the breaking of the bread” (Luke 24.35). It is therefore for ever a witness—a memorial or in another sense—that Jesus Christ is come in the flesh to be in us, with us as the Head of his New Creation that is now his Body.

5. But if the Eucharist is a memorial of the passion of our Lord, it is also the abiding witness of his resurrection: only a Church which possessed a living experience of the Presence of the Risen Christ in her midst could have celebrated week by week the memory of how on that dreadful night on which he was betrayed the Lord Jesus took bread and made Eucharist. Jesus was betrayed, but at the same time Jesus gave his life “freely” for the “life of the world”. In the Bible the past is not just the past, it is the time of the Revelation of the Divine Salvation that is always present with the Savoir. In Acts 10:4 the angel says to Cornelius, ‘your prayers and your alms are gone up for a memorial before God’ (compare Ps. 141:2). When Jesus in Mark 14:9 says that the ‘good work’ of the unnamed woman who anointed his body for burial would be spoken of on memory of her wherever the Gospel is preached, he means that the continual remembrance of her by the Church would avail like a memorial-sacrifice and be effective for her in the day of judgment. God’s remembrance of someone is always active for mercy or for judgment; it is never a neutral memory, like a mere idea in the mind. To remember someone, in biblical language, means to be gracious unto him (cf. Luke 23:42), ‘Jesus, remember me when you come in your Kingdom’; (Ps. 74.:2; etc.), unless it is his misdeeds which are remembered, in which case the consequences are dire (e.g. Ps. 25:7; 79:8, etc.). Indeed, we must not forget that the Body gathered together to remember its Head meant entering into the same action that Jesus established for the Eucharist - primarily a divine and not a human action that we remember as mere human.

Of the Fraction of the Holy Bread

Know, O priest, when thou dost divide the Holy Lamb, to lay the parts on the holy paten with the sign of the cross downward and the incision upward, as before when it was slain. Lay then IC at the top of the holy paten, which is toward the east, and XC at the bottom, which is toward the west; and NI on the north side, and KA on the south side, as is here figured.

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Take then the part IC and fill the holy chalice. But XC divide for the priests and the deacons. The two other portions, namely, the NI and the KA, thou shalt divide into small pieces, as many as are sufficient for the communicants, accordingly to thy discretion. And from the portion which representeth the Holy Mother of God, or from the particles representing the nine ranks of the saints, or others that lie on the holy paten none shall communicate: but only from the two of the Holy Lamb which remain shall the Priest give communion. And here be it known to thee also concerning this, that when thou dost dilute the divine blood of the Lord with the holy zeon, then thou pourest with all the care so much as is necessary for all to communicate. After the same manner also of the wine and the water, when thou piercest the Holy Lamb, then pour in so much as is sufficient for all. But afterward in no wise pour in anything but only once at The holy things unto the Holy. And so communicate all with these.

The Orthodox Liturgy, Oxford University Press, 1985, pages 23-25 and 86

The Two Celebrants of the Liturgy

“May the Holy Spirit himself minister with us all the days of our life”, these are the words of the Liturgy of St. John Chrysostom.

In the liturgy of St. Basil, we have a rich Trinitarian theology. It appears as part of the theology of revelation of the Father who does all in the Son and through the Holy Spirit.

In his book On the Holy Spirit, St. Basil wrote on the various roles to the Holy Spirit as the source of sanctification and life for all spiritual creatures who works through the Son, “the Holy Spirit was revealed, the spirit of truth, the grace of sonship, the pledge of the inheritance to come, the first fruits of eternal good things, life-giving power, and the fountain of sanctification” (2:24) In the Liturgy itself, Jesus "…cleansed us with water and sanctified us by the Holy Spirit." It is the Holy Spirit who sanctifies us at baptism and the fruit of that sanctification is our sharing in the sonship of the Divine Son” We enter into the Liturgy as baptized and Anointed so that the same Spirit may at the “Epiclesis Invocation” “reveal” to us the body and the blood of Christ, “may come upon us and upon these gifts set forth, and bless them and sanctify them and show (anadeixai) this bread to be the precious body of our Lord and God and Savior Jesus Christ. And this cup to be the precious blood of our Lord and God and Savior Jesus Christ...."

The Father sends the Holy Spirit to reveal the Son to the Church so that the Church may partake of the Son. In the liturgy of St. John Chrysostom, the Father is asked to send the Holy Spirit. “on us and on these gifts set forth; and make this bread the precious body of your Christ, and that which is in this cup the precious blood of your Christ, changing (metabalōn) them by your Holy Spirit.”

The change (metabalōn) belongs to the set of words used for the New Creation which is expressed in the Great Prayer of Thanksgiving: “It is meet and right to hymn …. You brought us from nonexistence into being, and when we had fallen away, You raised us up again, and did not cease to do all things until You brought us up to heaven, and bestowed upon us Your kingdom which is to come. For all these things we give thanks to You, and to Your Only- begotten Son, and to Your Holy Spirit; for all things of which we know of and of which we know not, whether manifest or unseen; and we thank You for this Liturgy……”

Once again, it is important to remember that the Church is the Body of Christ. It is an organic living entity made alive by the indwelling of the Holy Spirit in the individual members that come together to make up the Church. With this in mind, one can look at the Holy Spirit as the Co-Celebrate who hands over to us the New Life in Christ and transfigures not only those in the Church, but also the bread and wine offered by the Church.

Christ the Priest of the Liturgy

In one elegant prayer we can see this clearly: “We give thanks unto You, O King invisible, ……Through the grace and compassion and love of mankind of Your Only-begotten Son, with whom You are blessed, together with Your all-holy, and good and life-creating Spirit, now and ever, and unto ages of ages. Attend, O Lord Jesus Christ our God, out of Your holy dwelling place, from the throne of glory of Your kingdom; and come to sanctify us, O You who sit on high with the Father, and are here invisibly present with us; and by Your mighty hand impart to us Your most pure Body and precious Blood, and through us, to all the people.”

It is the same Table: St John Chrysostom: “But how says he (St Paul), that he “received this from the Lord?’ since certainly he was not present then, but was one of the persecutors. That you may know that the first table had no advantage above that which comes after it. For even to-day also it is he who does all and delivers It even as then.”

Homily 27:5 on I Cor 11

“Since Christ for his part gave Himself equally to all, saying, ‘Take, eat.’ He gave His Body equally…….Yea, It was indeed broken for all alike, and became the Body equally for all.” (Ibid)

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