Rennovationist Liturgical Reform in Russia

[Alpha60]

On Kindle, I happened across an amazing book.  The first paragraph summarizes it:

The Divine Liturgy contained in this volume was compiled by Antonin (Granovsky) and published in 1923 in Zaikonospassky Monastery under the title < < Божественная литургия, рецензированная по чинам древних литургий > > (The Divine Liturgy, revised according to the old liturgical rites). It represents one of the first fruits of the twentieth century movement for liturgical reform in the Russian Orthodox Church. To the best of my knowledge, it has never previously been translated into English, and even in Russia, is poorly known. This is unquestionably because its author, Bishop Antonin, was a leading figure in the “Living Church” or Renovationist schism that followed the Russian Revolution of 1917, and was even before that associated with “liberal” ideas, never a good career move in the Russian Church. His association with the Living Church is so toxic that even such an avowed reformer as Fr George Kochetkov has felt it necessary to give a forceful denial that there was any link between his own liturgical reform agenda and that of Granovsky.

You can buy the book for $5 US on Kindle, here:  https://www.amazon.com/Divine-Liturgy-according-Metropolitan-Granovsky-ebook/dp/B07TY359G4/ref=sr_1_13?keywords=Orthodox+liturgy&qid=1563375323&rnid=2941120011&s=digital-text&sr=1-13

This is a steal, as English translations of obscure liturgical documents go.  I will, when I finish reading it, compare it with New Skete and other Orthodox liturgical reforms (and thus far, it looks like it will be greatly bolstering my love for New Skete’s Typikon, which looks at first glance much less disagreeable than this.

 

[Alpha60]

At first glance, Ho Monogenes is missing, inexplicably; a huge problem.  The anaphora itself is weird: attributed to St. Ambrose of Milan, it features some prayers from the Milanese Ambrosian liturgy, but other parts are taken from the Divine Liturgy of St. John Chrysostom, and the Syriac Orthodox recensions of the Liturgy of the Apostles and the Liturgy of St. Basils.  And the way they are spliced together makes no sense.  There are multiple epikleses, and “Thine own of thine own...” precedes them.  And then this is followed by a plethora of litanies.

The worst possible influence of this liturgy however may well be in it having prompted users of the Divine Liturgies of St. James, St. Mark, et cetera, to do three things which are contradictory to the surviving usages of those liturgies in the Coptic and Syriac rites, and in some cases what we know about the church in Antiquity: celebration in front of the iconostasis, which is just wrong, because we know from the curtain-removing incident of St. Epiphanius that the early church had sanctuary veiling, even if this did not take the form of the more elaborate templon, rood screen or iconostasis of more recent centuries; the use of simplified vestments, and the use of other non-standard practices like communion in the hand.  Especially in the case of the Liturgy of St. Mark, the Church of Alexandria did not expend great effort making sure the 1893 text featured a synaxis and congregational responses virtually the same as ByzBAS and CHR, just to have priests serve the liturgy in a weird manner, and given the emerging state of the art in liturgiology is that the Liturgy of St. James is quite possibly a variant of the UrText of St. Basil, celebrating JAS in a manner more different than necessary, given the non-standard synaxis, seems to be asking for trouble.

Anyone who thinks I ever wanted anything like the liturgical mess created by Metropolitan Granovsky and his “Church of the Renaissance” faction has been mistaken from the start.  The reforms of Metropolitan Granovsky represent everything I am opposed to liturgically.  In comparison, the mild reforms of New Skete would be broadly acceptable, but I don’t want to see that in parishes either, but in context of their monastery, I like their approach, provided it doesn’t “hop the fence.” But this reform of Metropolitan Granovsky is pure liturgical badness.

 

[IreneOlinyk]

Utterly fascinating.  Thank you for your comments on this unique liturgy.
Was it celebrated in modern vernacular Russian or still in Church Slavonic.

Is Edward Waters the translator?

 

[WPM]

If you learn Russian.

 

[WPM]

At first glance, Ho Monogenes is missing, inexplicably; a huge problem.  The anaphora itself is weird: attributed to St. Ambrose of Milan, it features some prayers from the Milanese Ambrosian liturgy, but other parts are taken from the Divine Liturgy of St. John Chrysostom, and the Syriac Orthodox recensions of the Liturgy of the Apostles and the Liturgy of St. Basils.  And the way they are spliced together makes no sense.  There are multiple epikleses, and “Thine own of thine own...” precedes them.  And then this is followed by a plethora of litanies.

The worst possible influence of this liturgy however may well be in it having prompted users of the Divine Liturgies of St. James, St. Mark, et cetera, to do three things which are contradictory to the surviving usages of those liturgies in the Coptic and Syriac rites, and in some cases what we know about the church in Antiquity: celebration in front of the iconostasis, which is just wrong, because we know from the curtain-removing incident of St. Epiphanius that the early church had sanctuary veiling, even if this did not take the form of the more elaborate templon, rood screen or iconostasis of more recent centuries; the use of simplified vestments, and the use of other non-standard practices like communion in the hand.  Especially in the case of the Liturgy of St. Mark, the Church of Alexandria did not expend great effort making sure the 1893 text featured a synaxis and congregational responses virtually the same as ByzBAS and CHR, just to have priests serve the liturgy in a weird manner, and given the emerging state of the art in liturgiology is that the Liturgy of St. James is quite possibly a variant of the UrText of St. Basil, celebrating JAS in a manner more different than necessary, given the non-standard synaxis, seems to be asking for trouble.

Anyone who thinks I ever wanted anything like the liturgical mess created by Metropolitan Granovsky and his “Church of the Renaissance” faction has been mistaken from the start.  The reforms of Metropolitan Granovsky represent everything I am opposed to liturgically.  In comparison, the mild reforms of New Skete would be broadly acceptable, but I don’t want to see that in parishes either, but in context of their monastery, I like their approach, provided it doesn’t “hop the fence.” But this reform of Metropolitan Granovsky is pure liturgical badness.

Why don't you just pick the one liturgy you want? . . .

 

[Deacon Lance]

“Thine own of thy own” precedes the Epiclesis in Byzantine Liturgies.

 

[Alpha60]

“Thine own of thy own” precedes the Epiclesis in Byzantine Liturgies.

Indeed so, but only once, for example, although there are two epikleses in the Divine Liturgy of St. Mark, only one of them has “Thine own of thine own...” (which represents the apex of Byzantine liturgy poetry, by the way).

This unpleasant Soviet-era liturgy on the other hand has two, for reasons that only the Rennovationist(s) who arbitrarily composed it backed by state power could tell us I reckon.  Really it is quite bad.  I would be the first person to say otherwise were that the case.

 

[rakovsky]

I read a claim that the Renovationists put the altar in the middle of the Church because they got the idea from Freemasonry.
But I also read that the reason was because it was meant to be more democratic that way.

 

[hecma925]

In a Lodge, the altar is in the east.

 

[Alpha60]

In a Lodge, the altar is in the east.

Actually in the English tradition it is in the center; the Worshipful Master or his equivalent in the dependent bodies (the Worthy Matron in Eastern Star, for example, and the Master Councillor in deMolay, of which I was a member) sits in the East.  But the altar, on which there must be a book of sacred scripture (usually the Bible in the US) is in the middle.  The liturgical ritual is stupid and wrong, but a Low Church Protestant Methodist with no knowledge even of Anglican praxis could not be expected to perceive that, because the majority of members are Christians and there are inevitably chaplains, who are clergy from Protestant churches.

But I doubt Rakovsky’s theory very much, especially since the Soviets purged the Freemasons with great precision, and the practice predated the Rennovationists.  The Greeks who started doing this with the Divine Liturgy of St. James, that could be another story, but it does not make a difference; it is wrong to erect a second  Holy Table in the Nave, outside of the consecrated Altar and outside of the Iconostasis, or to celebrate versus populum.

 

[rakovsky]

the practice predated the Rennovationists.  The Greeks who started doing this with the Divine Liturgy of St. James, that could be another story, but it does not make a difference; it is wrong to erect a second  Holy Table in the Nave, outside of the consecrated Altar and outside of the Iconostasis, or to celebrate versus populum.

I am curious about the Greeks doing this before the 20th century.
I know that Benedictines often have the altar in the middle.

 

[Dominika]

The Greeks who started doing this with the Divine Liturgy of St. James, that could be another story, but it does not make a difference; it is wrong to erect a second  Holy Table in the Nave, outside of the consecrated Altar and outside of the Iconostasis, or to celebrate versus populum.

It's the same altar just put out to the middle of the churhc at this Liturgy. It's practices by Poles and Bulgars too at this Liturgy.
BTW in some parishes (some Greek and Macedonian) on Great Saturday Liturgy is served on the epitaphios.

 

[rakovsky]

Was the early practice to have the altar in the middle for this liturgy?
In synagogues, the Torah is near the wall. But I guess if your altar is for the Last Supper, maybe you could treat it like a table and put it in the middle.

 

[WPM]

I like Outdoors Worship.