The Dormition of the Theotokos

(august 15.)

(This Feast is preceded by a Fast of two weeks' duration.)

At Vespers.

The Stanza (Stikhira) for: Lord, I have cried: In Tone I. O marvel wonderful! The Source of life is laid in the grave, and the tomb becometh the ladder unto heaven. Rejoice, O Gethsemane, thou holy abode of the Birth-giver of God! In that we have Gabriel for our chieftain, let us cry aloud, ye faithful: Hail, thou that art full of grace! The Lord is with thee, through thee granting unto the world great mercy. (Twice.)

Glory to the Father, and to the Son, and to the Holy Spirit, now, and ever, and unto ages of ages. Amen.

At the sovereign command of God were the God-bearing apostles caught up on high in the clouds from every place; and when they were come to thine all-holy and life-originating body, they kissed the same with love. The heavenly powers most high also, when they were come with their Master, were seized with dread as they escorted the body all-pure and well-pleasing unto God, which had received God; with stately mien, also, they went before, and invisibly cried aloud unto the Powers most high: Lo, the Queen over all, and the Maiden of God cometh. Be ye lifted up, O gates, and lift ye up Her who in more than earthly wise is the Mother of the Everlasting Light. For through her was salvation universal brought to pass for men: and we cannot gaze upon her, and it is not possible to render unto her the honour that is meet: for her surpassing merit exceedeth all understanding. Wherefore, O Birth-giver of God most pure, who abidest ever with the life-bearing King, who also is thy Son, entreat thou him that he will ever preserve thy new people, and save them from every hostile assault; for we have acquired thine intercession, forever blessing thee who art revealed in light.

The Gradual (Prokimen) for the Day.

The Parables (Paremii), the same as for the Nativity of the Birth-giver of God.

The Stanza at the Litiyd, in Tone V Sing, O ye people, sing the Mother of our God; for to-day she doth yield up her all-radiant soul into the hands most pure of Him who, without seed, was incarnate of her: Whom, also, she doth unceasingly entreat that he will give unto the world peace and great mercy.

The Hymn for the Day (Tropdr), in Tone I. In Birth-giving thou didst

preserve thy virginity; in thy Falling-asleep thou hast not forsaken the world, O Birth-giver of God. Thou hast passed over into life, thou who art the Mother of Life, and through thine intercessions dost deliver our souls from death. (Konddk.) Collect-Hymn. (Page 265.)

The Exaltation (Velitchdnie). We magnify thee, O Mother all-undefiled of Christ our God, and we glorify thine all-glorious Falling-asleep.

The Gradual (Prokimen), in the Fourth Tone. I will call to mind thy name from generation to generation.

Verse (Stikh): Hearken, O daughter, and behold, and incline thine ear.

The Gospel. Luke i. 39-49, 56.

The First Canon. Tone I. (St. Cosmas of Maium.)

Theme-Songs (Irmosi). I. Adorned with glory divine thy holy and illustrious memory, O Virgin, hath gathered together all the faithful unto joy; that after the manner of Miriam, with choirs and cymbals, they may sing thine Only-born: For gloriously hath he been glorified.

III. O Christ, the Wisdom and the Power of God, who createth and maintaineth all things, establish thou the Church steadfast and immovable. For thou only art holy who restest in the Saints.

IV. The predictions and dark sayings of the Prophets proclaimed beforehand thine incarnation of a Virgin, O Christ: The splendour of thy shining forth (said they) shall come for the enlightenment of the nations; and the deep with joy shall cry unto thee: Glory to thy might, O thou who lovest mankind.

V The beauty divine and ineffable of thy perfection will I declare, O Christ; for thou who didst shine forth from the Glory eternal, as an effulgence coeternal and one in Essence, when thou didst become incarnate of a Virgin's womb, didst shine as the sun upon those who sat in darkness and the shadow.

VI. The fire (of pain) within the whale of the sea, the denizen of the deep, in which the Prophet Jonah was found, was the prototype of thy three days' burial; for remaining unscathed, as before the swallowing, he cried aloud: With the voice of praise will I sacrifice unto thee, O Lord.

VII. Love divine, resisting the wrath audacious and the fire, did sprinkle the fire with dew, but laughed to scorn the wrath, proclaiming above the instruments of music upon the God-inspired, supersensual and triple-stringed lyre of the Righteous Ones amid the flame: Blessed art thou, O God of our fathers, and our God, exceeding glorious!

VIII. As dew-dropping for the Godly Ones, but as consuming to the impious, did the all-powerful Angel of God manifest forth the flame to the Children. And the Birth-giver of God did he make a life-originating Fountain, pouring forth destruction to Death and life to those who sing:

The only Creator do we, who have been delivered, praise in song and magnify unto all the ages.

In place of: My soul doth magnify the Lord: The Refrain: We, even all the nations, do bless thee, the only Birth-giver of God. Or: When the all-holy Angels beheld thine Assumption they marvelled how a Virgin should ascend from earth into heaven.

IX. The laws of Nature were conquered in thee, O Virgin pure; for in birth-giving was virginity preserved, and with death is life conjoined. Thou who, after birth-giving, a Virgin didst remain, though dead, art yet alive, O Birth-giver of God, and savest always thine inheritance.

At the Liturgy.

The Collect-Hymn (Konddk). The tomb and death have not been able to hold the Birth-giver of God, who is constant in supplications, in intercession an unfailing hope: for the Mother of the Life is come into the presence of the Life, who took up his abode in her ever-Virgin womb.

The Gradual (Prokimen), in the Third Tone. My soul doth magnify the Lord, and my spirit hath rejoiced in God my Saviour.

Verse: For he hath regarded the lowliness of his handmaiden; for behold, from henceforth all generations shall call me blessed.

The Epistle. Phil. ii. 5-1 1.

Alleluia. (Tone II.) Arise, O Lord, in thy rest, thou, and the tabernacle of thy holiness.

Verse: The Lord sware truth unto David, and he shall not abjure it.

The Gospel. Luke x. 38-42, xi. 27, 28.

The Hymn in place of: Meet is it: The Ninth Theme-Song of the Canon: The laws of Nature were conquered in thee,.. (See above.)

The Communion Hymn. I will take the cup of salvation, and call upon the Name of the Lord.