Yuri Kuchinsky

What's the matter, Vork? Are you getting tired of conspiracy hunting???

Yuri.

Yuri Kuchinsky

Well, Peter, I'm certainly not going there on the account of Carlson and his conspiracies... Might as well stay home and watch X-Files reruns on TV...

Best,

Yuri.

S.C.Carlson

It's too bad, I guess, that a lot of us missed our chance to meet you at SBL Toronto.

andrewcriddle

Lazarus Saturday in the Eastern Orthodox church does not seem to have been an occasion for Baptism.

It is not surprising IMO that, with the increased emphasis on Holy Week as a reenaction of the events of the last week of Jesus's life, that the Saturday before Palm Sunday becomes related to the resurrection of Lazarus.

This idea is probably due to Cyril of Jerusalem.

Andrew Criddle

Yuri Kuchinsky

Really, Andrew?

http://www.stmarysuoc.org/baptism.html

"As evidenced by the Liturgy of the Orthodox Church, the following days are traditional baptismal days: Lazarus Saturday, Holy Saturday, Pascha, the Nativity of Christ and Holy Theophany."

Hmm... Lazarus Saturday comes first in this list!

Yours,

Yuri.

andrewcriddle

I should have said that Lazarus Saturday does not seem to have been an occasion for baptism in the early period of the Eastern Orthodox church eg the description of Lazarus Saturday in Egeria's Travels (c 383 CE) section 29 (which is our earliest record) has no hint that Baptism occurs on that day. The baptism is clearly supposed to occur at Easter itself (Egeria's Travels sections 38 and 45-47)

Andrew Criddle

Yuri Kuchinsky

Well, that of course begs the question of when the Lazarus Saturday baptismal tradition was introduced, and where...

Perhaps we have a _triple_ coincidence here?

(i.e. the Egyptian fathers point to baptism within this time frame; Lazarus Saturday tradition points to baptism within this time frame; and SecMk also points to baptism within this same time frame?)

Best regards,

Yuri.

andrewcriddle

The number of days suitable for Baptism in the Eastern Oerthodox church rose with time.

IIUC the earliest evidence for baptism on Lazarus Saturday comes in a manuscript written after 800.

The practice is obviously older but I see no reason to date it before the elaboration of ritual under Justinian and his successors.

Andrew Criddle

Yuri Kuchinsky

Well, Talley does supply such a reason in his book. He cites Chrysostom's Homily on Psalm 145, that "was preached on the Saturday of Lazarus and refers both to that day and to the celebration of Jesus' entry into Jerusalem on the day following." (Talley , ORIGINS OF THE LITURGICAL YEAR, 1991, p. 186)

So it looks like Justinian is quite irrelevant in this case...

Also, in your earlier post, you were talking about Egeria's Travels showing "no hint that Baptism occurs on that day [Lazarus Saturday]". But, according to Talley, the fact, itself, that she is writing about the 'Lazarus Saturday', and describing some ceremonies on this day (i.e. the Saturday before the Palm Sunday) at the 'Lazarium' in Bethany, is already quite significant. (Talley takes this as a reflection of the contemporary liturgy in Constantinople.)

Regards,

Yuri.

Yuri Kuchinsky

I've been re-reading the relevant passages in Talley, ORIGINS OF THE LITURGICAL YEAR, 1991, and wanted to comment on some important points he's making in regard to the 'Lazarus Saturday' custom, and its connection to the Palm Sunday.

In the traditional Christian liturgy, we're used to Palm Sunday as an important feast that celebrates Jesus' entry into Jerusalem, and that always comes before the Easter Sunday. But was it always this way?

Well, according to Talley, in fact, Palm Sunday was not one of the early holidays for the Catholic Church... It seems to have become a big day for Catholics only in the 4th century.

Talley argues that Palm Sunday was originally not directly connected with the Easter and the Holy Week, but rather with a special six-weeks fast, that started at the beginning of the year (i.e. after the Epiphany). So, it seems like Palm Sunday originally marked the end of this Egyptian fast of six weeks (which eventually became the Lenten fast).

And, just before Easter, there was a separate one week of fasting.

One needs to keep in mind in all this that Easter has always been a movable feast; it moves every year, depending on the moon. But the early Egyptian-style fast was not movable, as it was always fixed to the beginning of the year. Thus, there should always have been a variable period of time between the end of their six-week fast, and the beginning of Easter celebrations.

So it seems like the Egyptian Church (now Coptic) celebrated the Palm Sunday traditionally as a non-movable feast and, accordingly, 'the Lazarus Saturday', as well, since it precedes the Palm Sunday. In other words, originally, both feasts were chronologically independent from Easter.

So this is when the baptism of the initiates was probably administered in the Egyptian Church, rather than during Easter.

At this time, the Coptic Church still refers to the Sunday prior to Palm Sunday as "the Sunday of Baptism".

======quote======

http://www.coptic.net/lessons/LentLectionary.txt

The last Sunday in Lent is the Sunday of Baptism...

======unquote======

In his book, Talley supplies some evidence indicating that the Egyptian Church didn't begin to administer paschal baptisms until 385 AD (p. 195ff.).

So it seems like the special status of the Palm Sunday was originally an Egyptian tradition.

Best regards,

Yuri.