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However, even after guiding the faithful through the compunction and repentance of this woman who had fallen into many sins, Kassia leaves the question of her identity unresolved. The performance of the hymn blurs the distinctions between body and soul by meditating on the mystery of the Incarnation. At this moment in the hymn, the hymnographer invokes the scene in the book of Genesis where Eve fearfully flees the sound of God but reimagines the scriptural narrative in a profound way.
This textual synchronicity between the Old Testament and the Gospel weaves a fascinating dialogue between a prelapsarian world and the new creation inaugurated by the Incarnation. Sacred song interweaves biblical figures and events from the past and the future into the liturgical moment of performance. It is a tearing down of the fortifications that protected the faithful from experiencing the assault of divine passion.
The congregation could follow in the footsteps of, and identify with, the woman who had fallen into many sins as she journeyed toward repentance. In entering this sacred narrative, they did not remain in one point of time but followed the protagonist as she travelled with Christ to the exile of Adam and Eve from Eden and then to his crucifixion, death and resurrection.
His thesis explored Byzantine experiences of the emotion of compunction through the hymns of Romanos the Melodist c. Sinai Graecus —, fol. Princeton University Press, , p. You are commenting using your WordPress. You are commenting using your Twitter account. You are commenting using your Facebook account. The question " How many angels can dance on the head of a pin? The question has also been linked to the fall of Constantinople , with the imagery of scholars debating about minutiae while the Turks besieged the city. Aquinas's Summa Theologica , written c.
James Franklin has raised the scholarly issue, and mentions that there is a 17th-century reference in William Chillingworth 's Religion of Protestants , [7] where he accuses unnamed scholastics of debating "whether a Million of Angels may not fit upon a Needle's point?
The question of how many angels can dance on the point of a needle , or the head of a pin, is often attributed to 'late medieval writers' In point of fact, the question has never been found in this form…. Peter Harrison has suggested that the first reference to angels dancing on a needle's point occurs in an expository work by the English divine, William Sclater In An exposition with notes vpon the first Epistle to the Thessalonians , Sclater claimed that scholastic philosophers occupied themselves with such pointless questions as whether angels "did occupie a place; and so, whether many might be in one place at one time; and how many might sit on a Needles point; and six hundred such like needlesse points.
A letter written to The Times in [9] identified a close parallel in a 14th-century mystical text, the Swester Katrei:. Now rede me the meaning of this. Other possibilities are that it is a surviving parody or self-parody, or a training topic in debating. In Italian, [10] Spanish and Portuguese, the conundrum of useless scholarly debates is linked to a similar question of whether angels are sexless or have a sex. Sayers argued that the question was "simply a debating exercise" and that the answer "usually adjudged correct" was stated as, "Angels are pure intelligences, not material, but limited, so that they have location in space, but not extension.
To find such scenes — and notably of the Great Feasts — set out in the order of the calendar, one would have to look for them in manuscripts organised in this way, such as Lectionaries or Menologia. However, such a search is not immediately rewarding, and could finally lead only to negative results. Not only do lectionaries often contain, when they are illuminated, many other scenes, but, even when these scenes are limited to the Great Feasts, they are selective.
Weitzmann has suggested that, in such cases, the Feasts chosen for illustration were those celebrated with special solemnity according to the Typikon of the monastery to which the Lectionary was destined It is quite possible that a series of stereotypes was made for the iconography of the Great Feasts in the tenth century, but also for other Christological scenes.
In consequence, there is no evident reason for supposing that the emergence of a canonical series of Great Feasts. The explanation why a biographical cycle for Christ, from which the Twelve Feasts were selected, was introduced into the decorative scheme of Byzantine churches is best sought in their relationship to the text of the liturgy per se and its mystagogical interpretation.
As Spieser has recently pointed out, Gabriel Millet realised this long ago Unfortunately Demus's masterly synthesis of Middle Byzantine church programmes, incorporating a festival cycle, led subsequent art historians astray. Many passages of the liturgy contain an explicit mention of one or other of Christ's redemptive acts. Taken as a whole, the liturgy is a re-enactment of Christ's mission of salvation.
Taken in detail, one or other of the events in Christ's life could be referred to a specific moment of the liturgy. Grabar showed how this method was applied by the erudite illuminator of the liturgical roll Stavrou Spieser has shown that Grabar's analysis of this unique manuscript can be carried even further Kitzinger has written that "a precise definition of what constitutes a festival cycle is not possible" This is certainly true, because a festival cycle never existed, only a biographical cycle for Christ. However, the Twelve Feasts of the Lord certainly existed, but not in church decorative programmes.
Aquinas's Summa Theologica , written c. Les constitutions apostoliques CPG , edited M. The special case of the Cappadocian sanctuary barriers has been assiduously studied in recent years They provided the laity with a subject for meditation while the liturgy was being celebrated on the other side of the sanctuary barrier. For this word, see B. A documentary film on the life of Pulitzer Prize-winning author N. Two events were of fundamental importance to the development of a unique, Byzantine art.
It is necessary to distinguish in Byzantine tradition between monumental and devotional art. The same subjects recur in both, but their organisation is different. Kitzinger, in fact, provides much of the necessary material for tracing the origins of the Twelve Feasts as a devotional subject back to Early Christian objects like the ampullae brought back as souvenirs from the Holy Land They were decorated with some of the scenes which occur in the canonical series of Great Feasts.
Other objects, notably icons, ivories and steatites, were decorated with a selection of scenes from Christ's life, not necessarily the canonical Feasts. Millet noted some examples like the mosaic icon at Vatopedi, Mount Athos, on which the Crucifixion is surrounded by twelve scenes88, the metal.
Weitzmann has called attention to one such icon at Sinai92 and Kitzinger to another It is not necessary to give an extensive list of these objects. There is a sure terminus ante quern for the representation of the Twelve Feasts on the epistyle, since such icons are mentioned by Pakourianos in his Typikon of Evidence that they were introduced earlier is virtually non-existent. Assuredly Weitzmann has suggested that the well-known tenth-century icon of the Footwashing at Sinai was originally destined for an epistyle, and some scholars have accepted his suggestion However, there are reasons for being sceptical.
One is that the Footwashing hardly ever appears elsewhere among the Feasts.
Another is that the icon is unique in its genre; consequently there is no strong argument for connecting it with an epistyle. On the other hand, there is a reference in the Typikon of the Pantocrator to an icon of the Footwashing in the left apse, before which a lamp was to be kept permanently alight They provided the laity with a subject for meditation while the liturgy was being celebrated on the other side of the sanctuary barrier.
The parallel with the practice of Roman Catholic lay people reciting the rosary during the celebration of the Mass is close. Fifteen mysteries were proposed for their meditation, seven of which correspond to the Byzantine Feasts. The eleventh century would seem appropriate for the introduction of the Feasts on the epistyle, because it was at this time that Eucharistie scenes became the focal point of apse decoration The contemplation of these scenes was reserved to the clergy, since, like the liturgy itself, they were not visible to the laity.
As I have noted earlier, there was sometimes contamination of the decoration of the sanctuary screen, whether from the overall decorative programme of the church as at Staro Nagoricino or from the liturgy itself as at Karan. An analogous contamination may sometimes be observed on the epistyle beam, when the Last Supper" or the Communion of the Apostles accompanied the Twelve Feasts In conclusion it may be affirmed that the area in the immediate vicinity of the altar was certainly significant programmatically in the Byzantine church, but in a special way, because the sanctuary screen and the adjacent area were the focal point of lay piety.
Lay people could approach the screen to pray and to venerate the icons placed there or nearby. These iconographical themes recalled the necessity of the intercession of the saints and the major events of Christ's redemptive mission which were being re-enacted behind the screen. It might be asked whether the same interpretation should be given to the scene of the Annunciation painted on the Holy Doors The Mother of God was the "door" through which salvation entered the world, while the Holy Doors gave the clergy access to the sanctuary in order to re-enact the mysteries of salvation.
Later, notably in Russia, officiating bishops might be represented on the Holy Doors, an evidently clerical subject However, this was part of an enterprise which does not concern us here, the exploitation of the space provided by a sanctuary barrier, high and fully enclosed, to set out in detail all the stages of the divine providential plan PG , a CPG Les commentaires byzantins de la divine liturgie, Paris , p. Sodini, Paris , nos Apparently similar objects are found in many other places.
Numerous sensitive studies of this subject have been published recently, notably J.
Spieser, Liturgie et programmes iconographiques, TM 11, , p. Besides the bibliographical references given by Spieser, see N. Schulz, The Byzantine Liturgy. Dupont, Le dynamisme de l'action liturgique. I would sum up Early Christian apse iconography as an adaptation of imperial imagery combined with Old Testament typological scenes. The Middle Byzantine Sanctuary Barrier: Templon or Icono- stasis?. Journal of the British Archaeological Association , , p. Artemios at Constantinople, Zograf 10, , p.
For the date of the Miracula, see J.
Gros- didier de Matons, Les Miracula sancti Artemii. Saffrey, Geneva , p. A new edition has been proposed by V. For the term templon, see my word list cited above. The word occurs in the Life of Philip of Argyrion, which the latest editor, C. Pasini, Vita di S. Filippo d'Agira attribuita al monaco Eusebio, Rome , attributes to the ninth or tenth century, p.
It is further inscribed on an architrave in the Byzantine Museum, Athens: Internationalen Byzantinisten-Kongress, Munich , p. De Boor, Leipzig , II, p. The text differs slightly in Muralt's edition, PG , a. I thank Joseph Munitiz for helping me to establish the translation. For this word, see B. The word is first attested as meaning the space between the nave and the sanctuary in Theophanes, Chronographia, edited C.
De Boor, Leipzig , p. See my word list cited above. The practice of calling the jutting entrance to the sanctuary of Early Christian churches a solea, e. Harrison, A Temple for Byzantium.
God Where We Are: Reflections from the Byzantine Liturgical life that we may receive the King of all, escorted invisibly by ranks of angels. Search for courses, skills, and videos . To speak of “Byzantine Art” is a bit problematic, since the Byzantine empire This interest in representing the body with some naturalism is reflective of a Jacob wrestling the angel, Vienna Genesis.
There are no clues as to the original emplacement of these reliefs. I am now inclined to look on this mosaic as a pre-Iconoclast artefact, Ch. Cormack, The Church of Saint Demetrius: Chatzidakis, Iconostas, , gives a list of Byzantine sanctuary barriers in more or less good state of conservation. Miljkovjc-Pepek, Veljusa, Skopje , p. Georgiev, Manastirskata c'rkva pri s. Ravna, Probdijsko, Izvestija na narodnija musej, Varna 21 36 , , p. I thank Mme Drossoyanni, director of the ephoria for the Byzantine monuments of the Cyclades, for obtaining permission for me from the Ministry of Culture to study and photograph this sanctuary barrier.
Wallace has kindly allowed me to consult her doctoral dissertation, Byzantine Cappadocia, the Planning and Function of Its Ecclesiastical Structures, Canberra Rodley's suggestion for dating, p. Cutler does not mention that the archangel Michael was the psychopomp par excellence. I refrain from further comment, since I agree with Cutler, p. Weitzmann, Diptih slonovoj kosti iz Ermitaza otnosjashchijsja k krugu imperatora Romana, VV 32, , p. As I wrote in my review, BEB 39, , p.
The Virgin Episkepsis is painted beside the sanctuary on the north wall. The author proposes for these paintings of high quality a date about Icons are also painted on the sanctuary barrier of Saint George in the citadel of Geraki, Chatzidakis, ibidem, pi. This suggestion does not seem to have been taken up by Babic, nor by V.
Her translation is not exact. Even Gautier, by a slip of the pen, translates as Resurrection, not Crucifixion! The Eustratius beam has long been known, G. Weitzmann, The Icon, London , p.
Manafis, Athens , p. For Saint Nicolas, Weitzmann, art. For Saint John the Baptist, P. Mouriki, Athens , n" 31, p. Lazarev, Storia delta pitlura bizantina, Turin , p. La Palo d'oro di San Marco, Milan , fig. The Twelve Feasts were also represented in silver on the doors of the Ghalkoprateia. Alexius I Gomnenus had them melted down to mint coinage. Bardy, Pans , II xvii 21, p. Les constitutions apostoliques CPG , edited M. Metzger, II, Paris , p. Isermeyer, Beschneidung Christi, Lexikon der christlichen Ikonographie 5, He refers to another version of the poem by Xanthopoulos, transcribed by E.
Because it is relatively inaccessible, I transcribe it: