The common structure of O Gladsome Light and the Cherubic Hymn
It will look familiar to my readers
For the holidays I will keep things simple this week, looking at the common fivefold chiastic structure of two ancient church hymns still sung by the Orthodox today. This post could serve as an addendum to either my Trisagion prayers article (which also mentions the prayer ‘Vouchsafe’) or my ‘Cosmic Chiasmus’ article.
O Gladsome Light
This vesperal hymn is among the most ancient to originate in the Church. In the 4th century St. Basil the Great cited it as evidence of the early Church’s worship of the Holy Spirit as God, describing it as old and of unknown authorship, but sung in the churches during the lighting of the lamps at evening.1 This remains how the hymn is used in Orthodox Churches to this day.
It’s all centered (χ.) on worship of the Trinity, the three persons of which are named and identified as God. It begins (α.) as an address to Jesus Christ, hailing Him as the light of the glory of the immortal Father. This paternal relationship is in the end (ω.) recapitulated by the Son of God as giver of life to all the world, which world then serves as the glory of Him who is the glory of the Father.
The Father may be immortal, as noted in the first verse, but in the second verse (β.), we learn the quite different condition of those singing the hymn. Their perspective is of those on earth who are trapped in the fleetingness of time. They live in a world where the sun sets and light departs. Yet once they have worshiped the Trinity, in the fourth verse (ο.) there blossoms in them a new perspective, whereby they recognize the fittingness of hymning God not just now but always. Those singing Vespers play a humble role in this multiplication of praise, and in their humility, even in the face of dying light, they are lifted up to a chorus of ‘all times’ — the conglomeration of which can only be considered from a vantage point outside of time.
Thus, heaven and earth are differentiated in the movement from the first line to the second. Then they are reunited in the fourth, to the point where the loving relationship between the Son of God and creation depicted in the fifth line reflects the Trinitarian love between the Father and Son in the first. All these magisterial words of worship flow from the central third line: “We praise Father, Son, and Holy Spirit God.”
The Cherubic Hymn
The Cherubic Hymn is similarly set in a specific liturgical context, only here it’s even more important. The faithful sing it at the Great Entrance during the Divine Liturgy, when the clergy bear the gifts in procession from the table of preparation, through the nave, and into the sanctuary, being placed on the altar where they are to be offered. In its current form this particular entrance hymn dates to the sixth century, when it was adopted to accommodate developments in church architecture. St. Germanus of Constantinople (8th c.), in his commentary on the Divine Liturgy, describes the Great Entrance, writing,
By means of the procession of the deacons and the representation of the fans, which are in the likeness of the seraphim, the Cherubic Hymn signifies the entrance of all the saints and righteous ahead of the cherubic powers and the angelic hosts, who run invisibly in advance of the great king, Christ, who is proceeding to the mystical sacrifice, borne aloft by material hands. Together with them comes the Holy Spirit in the unbloody and reasonable sacrifice. The Spirit is seen spiritually in the fire, incense, smoke, and fragrant air: for the fire points to His divinity, and the fragrant smoke to His coming invisibly and filling us with good fragrance through the mystical, living, and unbloody service and sacrifice of burnt-offering. In addition, the spiritual powers and the choirs of angels, who have seen His dispensation fulfilled through the cross and death of Christ, the victory over death which has taken place, the descent into hell and the resurrection on the third day, with us exclaim the alleluia.
It is also in imitation of the burial of Christ, when Joseph took down the body from the cross, wrapped it in clean linen, anointed it with spices and ointment, carried it with Nicodemus, and placed it in a new tomb hewn out of a rock. The altar is an image of the holy tomb, and the divine table is the sepulcher in which, of course, the undefiled and all-holy body was placed.2
So that’s what’s going on in the Liturgy when the Cherubic Hymn is sung. Here is the text of the song:
We are receiving the King of all; the King of all is being placed in a tomb. We are the tomb in which the King of all is being placed. This tomb, by means of the Lord’s presence, mystically becomes a heaven filled with the highest ranks of angels. I will not be able to do this hymn justice in this post, but let me go through the bullet points.
Firstly (α.), we become images of the cherubim, providing bodies of expression for their noetic activity. Secondly (β.), we hymn the life-creating Trinity, distinguishing ourselves from God — before fourthly (ο.), we receive the God of all, who unites us with Himself as a people and their king. The crucial turning point necessary for this transformation occurs third (χ.), when we put aside all earthly cares.
This word here for ‘earthly’ is tricky to translate efficiently. In Greek it’s biōtikēn, from the noun bios, the word for ‘life’ that isn’t zōē or psychē. When Christ in the Gospels calls Himself “the bread of life” (John 6:35), or “the way, the truth, and the life” (John 14:6), He’s using the word zōē. When He says, “Whosoever will save his life shall lose it, and whosoever will lose his life for my sake shall find it” (Matt. 16:25), He’s using the word psychē. When He describes the seed that fell among thorns as they which “are choked with the cares and riches and pleasures of life” (Luke 8:14), He’s using the word bios. Bios refers not to an animating force but to life in how it is manifested, or the condition of being alive. The adjective biōtikos refers to those material conditions that contribute to the sustenance of life. Biōtikēn cares would be practical concerns for living, like “what ye shall eat” and “what ye shall put on” (Matt. 6:25). “Earthly cares” is a good way of putting it, but the Greek is less referencing the earth than it is one’s practical livelihood.
Now, the faithful who chant the Liturgy call upon themselves to put aside all bodily cares and be icons of the cherubim. Disdain for the body, though, is not a motivation here. Remember the context. Through liturgical action, this song occurs only in the bodily expression of God’s embodiment. The center of the Cherubic Hymn reflects this motion with the idea of humans becoming spiritual. God empties Himself into a body, and we empty our bodies in loving response. This mutual embrace is expressed by means of the body and not without it, because we are worshiping an incarnate God. We lose our bodies so as to find them in the God who becomes a body. Thus — while being resolutely in the body, thus confirming its reality by what we are doing — we put aside all cares for the body and attend only to spiritual things. It’s a bit paradoxical, but we’re talking about the Incarnation of God and the deification of man; that’s to be expected. This paradoxical quality, then, merits the line’s central position in the hymn.
That’s the central third line, and I’ve already mentioned the fourth line about receiving the King of all. By this point the Orthodox Christians of today have pressed pause on the choir so the clergy can make commemorations before entering the altar. The Slavs do this after the third line, and the Greeks after the fourth. There were no such commemorations made originally, however, as the clergy made their procession without speaking. The hymn’s original form was without interruption.
So that brings us to the final line (ω.), which chiastically reflects the first. Just as we bear the angels by providing material images for them, so the angels bear the King of all, even if the act is not visible to material eyes. We are materially bearing those who are invisibly bearing God. It’s a hierarchical chain of bodies hosting higher principalities, a hierarchy that mediates the concrete existence of all creation spiritual and material, while at the same time collapsing it upwards in deification.
At the center stands the Christian paradox of those bearing the body of God calling upon themselves to put away all material cares, creation’s submissive response to the Creator’s loving embrace. The Son of the Father, who together with the Father and the Spirit is worshiped as the life-creating Trinity, is in the body placed on the altar as in a tomb. The Liturgy proceeds, the offering is made, and the bread of life is given to all. Alleluia.
St. Basil the Great, On the Holy Spirit 29.73.
St. Germanus of Constantinople, On the Divine Liturgy 37, td. by Paul Meyendorff (Crestwood, N.Y.: St Vladimir’s Seminary Press, 1984), p. 87.