Dormition of the Theotokos
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- Dormition of the Virgin redirects here. For the El Greco painting of the same name, see Dormition of the Virgin (El Greco). For the Western equivalent see Death of the Virgin
The Dormition of the Theotokos is a Great Feast of the Eastern Orthodox, Oriental Orthodox and Eastern Catholic Churches which commemorates the "falling asleep" or death of the Theotokos (Mary, the mother of Jesus). It is celebrated on August 15 (August 28, N.S. for those following the Julian Calendar) as the Feast of the Dormition of the Mother of God. The Armenian Apostolic Church celebrates the Dormition not on a fixed date, but on the third Sunday of August.
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[edit] Dormition Fast
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The Feast of the Dormition is preceded by a two-week fast, referred to as the Dormition Fast. From August 1 to August 14 (inclusive) Orthodox Christians fast from red meat, poultry, meat products, dairy products (eggs and milk products), fish, oil, and wine. The Dormition Fast is a stricter fast than either the Nativity Fast (Advent) or the Apostles' Fast, with only wine and oil (but no fish) allowed on weekends. As with the other Fasts of the Church year, there is a Great Feast that falls during the Fast; in this case, the Transfiguration (August 6), on which fish, wine and oil are allowed.
In some places, the services on weekdays during the Fast are similar to the services during Great Lent (with some variations). Many churches and monasteries in the Russian tradition will perform the Lenten services on at least the first day of the Dormition Fast. During the Fast, either the Great Paraklesis (Supplicatory Canon) or the Small Paraklesis are celebrated every evening except Saturday evening and the Eves of the Transfiguration and the Dormition.[1]
The first day of the Dormition Fast is a feast day called the Procession of the Cross (August 1), on which day it is customary to have a crucession and perform the Lesser Sanctification of Water.
[edit] Significance of the Feast
In Orthodoxy, as in the language of scripture, death is often called a "sleeping" or "falling asleep" (Greek κοίμησις; whence κοιμητήριον > coemetērium > cemetery, a place of sleeping). A prominent example of this is the name of this feast; another is the Dormition of Anna, Mary's mother. The Orthodox believe that Mary, having spent her life after Pentecost supporting and serving the nascent Church, became ill. She was living in the house of the Apostle John, in Jerusalem, when the Archangel Gabriel revealed to her that her repose would occur three days later. The apostles, scattered throughout the world, are said to have been miraculously transported to be at her side when she died. The sole exception was Thomas, who was characteristically late. He is said to have arrived three days after her death, and asked to see her grave so that he could bid her goodbye. Mary had been buried in Gethsemane, according to her request. When they arrived at the grave, her body was gone, leaving a sweet fragrance. An apparition is said to have confirmed that Christ had taken her body to heaven after her soul and reunited them, as a foretaste of the general resurrection to come. The Dormition of the Theotokos Mary is sometimes called the "Summer Pascha," or "Pascha of the Theotokos." This is because Mary's repose is linked with her passage to heaven in anticipation of the general resurrection and follows in the path created by Christ in his rising, and also because the Dormition fast that precedes the feast resembles that of Great Lent.
[edit] Dormition versus Assumption
The Dormition of the Theotokos is celebrated on August 15 (August 28, N.S. for those following the Julian Calendar), the same calendar day as the Roman Catholic Feast of the Assumption of Mary. The Dormition and the Assumption are different names for the same event, Mary's departure from the earth, although the beliefs are not entirely the same.
The Orthodox Church teaches that Mary died a natural death, like any human being; that her soul was received by Christ upon death; and that her body was resurrected on the third day after her repose, at which time she was taken up, soul and body, into heaven in anticipation of the general resurrection. Her tomb was found empty on the third day. As Bishop Kallistos (Ware) says:
...Orthodox tradition is clear and unwavering in regard to the central point [of the Dormition]: the Holy Virgin underwent, as did her Son, a physical death, but her body — like His — was afterwards raised from the dead and she was taken up into heaven, in her body as well as in her soul. She has passed beyond death and judgement, and lives wholly in the Age to Come. The Resurrection of the Body ... has in her case been anticipated and is already an accomplished fact. That does not mean, however, that she is dissociated from the rest of humanity and placed in a wholly different category: for we all hope to share one day in that same glory of the Resurrection of the Body which she enjoys even now.[2]
Roman Catholic teaching holds that Mary was "assumed" into heaven in bodily form. Some Catholics agree with the Orthodox that this happened after Mary's death while some hold that she did not experience death. Pope Pius XII, in his Apostolic constitution, Munificentissimus Deus (1950), which dogmatically defined the Assumption, leaves open the question of whether or not Mary actually underwent death, in connection with her departure.
Both churches agree that she was taken up into heaven bodily. The Orthodox belief regarding Mary's falling asleep are expressed in the liturgical texts used of the feast of the Dormition (August 15) which is one of the Twelve Great Feasts of the Orthodox Church, and is held by all pious Orthodox Christians; however, this belief has never been formally defined as dogma by the Orthodox Church nor made a precondition of baptism.
The Eastern Catholic observance of the feast corresponds to that of their Orthodox counterparts, whether Eastern Orthodox or Oriental Orthodox.
[edit] Liturgical Practices
It is customary in many places to bless fragrant herbage on the Feast of the Dormition.
In some places, the Rite of the "Burial of the Theotokos" is celebrated at the Dormition, during the All-Night Vigil. The order of the service is based on the service of the Burial of Christ on Great Saturday. An Epitaphios of the Theotokos, a richly embroidered cloth icon portraying her lying in state is used, together with specially composed hymns of lamentation which are sung with Psalm 118. The Epitaphios is placed on a bier, and carried in procession in the same way as the Epitaphios of Christ is during Holy Week.
This practice began in Jerusalem, and from there it was carried to Russia, where it was followed in various Dormition Cathedrals, in particular that of Moscow. The practice slowly spread among the Russian Orthodox, though it is not by any means a standard service in all parishes, or even most cathedrals or monasteries. In Jerusalem, the service is chanted during the Vigil of the Dormition. In some Russian churhes and monasteries, it is served on the third day after Dormition.
The Feast of the Dormition has a one-day Forefeast and 8 days of Afterfeast. The feast is framed and accentuated three feasts in honour of Jesus Christ, known as the "Three Feasts of the Saviour in August". These are: the Procession of the Cross (August 1), the Transfiguration (August 6), and the Icon of Christ "Not Made by Hand" (August 16).
[edit] Development of the Dormition tradition
The Dormition tradition is associated with various places, most notably with Jerusalem, which contains Mary's Tomb and the Basilica of the Dormition, and Ephesus, which contains the House of the Virgin Mary, and also with Constantinople[citation needed].
The first four Christian centuries are silent regarding the end of the Virgin Mary's life, though it is asserted without documentation that the feast of the Dormition was being observed in Jerusalem shortly after the Council of Ephesus.[3]
At the point in the later fifth century when the earliest Dormition traditions surface in texts, Stephen Shoemaker has detected[4] the sudden appearance of three distinct narrative traditions describing the end of Mary's life: he has characterised them as the "Palm of the Tree of Life" narratives, the Bethlehem narratives, and the Coptic narratives — aside from a handful of atypical narratives.
[edit] Notes
- ^ Outside the Dormition Fast it is always the Small Supplicatory Canon (Paraklesis) which is chanted. During the Dormition Fast, however, the Typikon prescribes that the Small and Great Supplicatory Canons be chanted on alternate evenings: If August 1st falls on a Monday through Friday, the cycle begins with the Small Supplicatory Canon; if August 1st falls on a Saturday or Sunday, the cycle begins with the Great Supplicatory Canon.
- ^ Bishop Kallistos (Ware) of Diokleia, in: Festal Menaion (London: Faber and Faber, 1969), p. 64.
- ^ A fairly representative example of mainstream Orthodox teaching is offered by Sophia Fotopoulou: "We have no historical data to indicate how long the Mother of God remained on earth after the ascension of Christ into heaven, nor when, where, or how she died, for the Gospels say nothing of this. The foundation for the feast of the Dormition is to be found in a sacred tradition of the Church dating from apostolic times, apocryphal writings, the constant faith of the People of God, and the unanimous opinion of the holy Fathers and Doctors of the Church of the first thousand years of Christianity." "The Dormition of the Theotokos".
- ^ Stephen J. Shoemaker, 2003. Ancient Traditions of the Virgin Mary's Dormition and Assumption (Oxford University Press).
[edit] See also
- Assumption Cathedral - a number of Russian churches are dedicated to this feast
[edit] Further reading
- Shoemaker , Stephen J. 2003. Ancient Traditions of the Virgin Mary's Dormition and Assumption (Oxford University Press).
