More Thoughts on the Time of the Holy Saturday Liturgy

source: FSSP Roma

What is the right rite time for Mass on Holy Saturday? The failure to answer this question with a proper foundation in liturgy has spelled trouble for those who discuss the significance of the Pian Holy Week and its child, the Pauline liturgy. What follows is hardly scholarship, just conjecture which I hope is well grounded in the facts and which might incite more significant discussion on a topic at the core of how we understand and value the Roman rite.

One hears in some quarters words such as "Well, Pius XII restored the right times for Holy Week, but he went too far in changing the ceremonies. Still, it's better to celebrate a vigil at night than at 8AM." I counter this common statement in saying that Pius XII got the times, particularly on Holy Saturday, far more wrong in reforming them than they were when he inherited the rites from his predecessors. Why?

Let us briefly recapitulate that in liturgical time, tomorrow begins tonight, hence the concept of first Vespers for Double feasts and just one Vespers, the evening before, for Simple feasts. The major hours—Vespers, Mattins, and Lauds—were originally one long vigil prayed outside the holy places of Jerusalem and Rome in ancient time which would conclude with the offering of the Eucharist within those holy places. This vigil eventually broke up, separating the parts into the major hours and the Mass proper. The original Office was a series of readings separated by psalms. The Office began with a lamp-lighting service called the Lucernarium. With the growth of monastic presence in Rome the more singable psalms took precedence over readings and the Office evolved into the psalter which existed from the fifth century or so until the radical redistribution of 1911.

All of this is essential to understanding my [entirely willy nilly] theory. Here is how I believe the vigil, understood in the ancient sense of the word outlined above, may have looked in the middle of the first millennium for Pascha:

Lucernarium

Vespers

Reception of Neophytes with litanies procession into the church

Mattins

Lauds

Mass of the Resurrection

Now we can see that the Lucernarium survived as the blessing of the fire with three collects and the bringing of the holy fire into the church in the pre-Pius XII Holy Saturday rite. Lauds, until 1911, always meant the singing of psalms 148, 149, and 150 (and still does in every other rite). Mattins is a series of "nocturns" (psalms followed by three readings). Given that Lauds ends the all night vigil by welcoming the daylight, the reception of the neophytes appears to be more of a break in the normal action of the vigil or an interpolation than its own stand alone rite. Vespers and Mattins likely had the same character: readings interspersed with psalms. 

As the Roman Church began to separate the major hours into Vespers, Mattins & Lauds, and the Mass, devout locals seeking to pray constantly and monks concurrently created the little hours which fall between the major hours, cementing the differentiation of the majors.

Now, instead of the above table, which was one vigil beginning with the Lucernarium and ending with Mass, the time from Vespers to the Mass of the Resurrection would have looked like this:

Lucernarium

Vespers with reception of Neophytes with litanies procession into the church

Compline

Mattins & Lauds

Prime

Terce

Mass of the Ressurection

Vespers with the blessing of fire and reception of the Neophytes became its own separate rite, now practiced in the late afternoon during the late daylight after the hour of None, around four o'clock. That means Vespers began with the remnant of the Lucernarium once practiced at every Vespers. The ancient Vespers of readings interspersed with psalms remained and ended with the blessing of the font, Baptism of converts, and their entrance into the church proper with the litanies of saints, which according to Cuthbert Atchley's critical edition of the Ordo Romanus Primus was used as an entrance chant in ancient times when ending the vigil and moving into the church for the Eucharist. Perhaps a more modern reading would judge that the litany was used generally in processions. Still, ending a rite with a litany and procession would be quite odd so a simple Mass which anticipates and does not celebrate the Resurrection was added as a glue to bind these ceremonies together, hence the absence of an Offertory or Communion chant and the use of the litanies as an Introit. Psalm 116 and the Magnificat constituting a mini-Vespers was added later perhaps.

If I am right about this, and I may not be, the consequences are startling. It would mean the pre-Pius XII Holy Saturday was the most ancient extant rite in the Roman Church. It would mean that the ancient Lucernarium was preserved, in contrast to the Byzantines who moved the Lucernarium to Paschal Mattins; yes, Rome's Paschal rites were older than Byzantium's. It would mean a complete ancient form of Vespers was preserved (the twelve prophecies and tracts were the Vespers). It would also mean that the Mass itself was not terribly important and was not the "first Mass of Easter" as so many believe. It would mean that, legally, the proper time to begin this rite was when the sun was setting, not late at night (either the 9PM norm in the Pauline rite or the near-midnight norm in the Pian rite). It would also mean that the "vigil Mass" exists precisely because the Vespers service became celebrated more and more during daylight.

It would also mean that while the ancient rites were preserved, the character of the Holy Saturday liturgy changed when the little hours came into being and the short Vespers became part of the Mass. Whereas the old Vespers, now the reading of prophecies, began the celebration of the Resurrection, now it is strictly part of the day of Holy Saturday. A new liturgical day begins with Vespers, which is why any pre-Pius XII vigil Mass was sung after None and prior to Vespers, anticipating the feast and not celebrating it. The Holy Saturday rites—Lucernarium, readings, and receptions—became a part of Holy Saturday prior to the introduction of a Mass and not because of it. The Mass was never at night!

On another note, should I be right the destruction and discarding of the old Holy Saturday was a catastrophe and disgrace of monumental proportions....

But let us work towards restoration rather than wallow in bitterness. Christ is risen! He is truly risen!