Great monday

After that, Jesus came to the Temple of Jerusalem , where he told parables about two sons and evil winegrowers .

Orthodox Church

Matins

On Great Monday, the Typical reading of the entire Psalter begins (except for the 17th Kathisma ), which continues for the first three days of Holy Week. Matins are performed according to the order of Lenten, that is, after the sixth psalm, Hallelujah is sung with verses. Then the special troparion of the first three days of Holy Week “ Behold the Bride is Coming at Midnight ” is performed three times:

Behold the Bridegroom is coming at midnight, and the slave is blessed, the watchful one will show him: he is not worthy of the pack, but the one who is discouraged will see him. Take your heart and soul to me, you shall not be burdened with sleep, and you shall not be put to death, and the kingdom will be shut up outside, but perceive those who call: Holy, Holy, Holy God, have mercy on the Virgin Mary ^[2] .

Transfer

Now, the Bridegroom ( that is, Christ ) comes at midnight. Blessed is the slave whom He finds awake, and unworthy the one He finds sleeping. Be careful, my soul, so as not to be weighed down by sleep, to be put to death, and to remain outside the closed doors of the Kingdom. But rise, calling out: Holy, holy, holy, God bless us, by the prayers of the Virgin have mercy on us.

This troparion, being a reminiscence of the parable of the ten virgins , reminds believers of the Last Judgment and calls them to spiritual wakefulness. During the singing of the troparion, the censorship of the temple and worshipers is performed according to the custom (absent from the Typicon ).

After reading the ordinary kathisma from the Psalter, the gospel story about the curse of the barren fig tree and two parables (about two brothers and evil winegrowers) is offered to the prayers (conception 84: Matthew 21: 18-43 ). The canon of Matins of Great Monday is a trippite (that is, it contains only three songs out of nine possible: the first, eighth and ninth) of Cosmas Mayumsky . After the ninth song of the canon, the expostillarium (luminaries) of the first four days of Holy Week is sung three times: “ Your hall, I see my Savior ” (reminiscence of the parable of the marriage feast ).

Thy Hall Your Savior, my dear, is adorned, and there is no imam, but I will go within it: enlighten the garment of my soul to the Sovereign, and save me.

Transfer

I see Your decorated ( marriage ) chamber, the Savior, but I do not have ( worthy ) clothing to enter it. Enlighten the clothes of my soul, Giving light, and save me.

The palace mentioned in the exapostillarium is, according to the interpreters, the chamber of the Last Supper , and the prayers are invited, therefore, to think about how worthy they are to be witnesses and participants in the events of Holy Week. The charter stipulates that this important exostalion should be performed by the canonarch in the middle of the church with a candle in his hands, and worshipers will bow down.

In the Greek Churches the Matins of Great Mondays, Tuesdays and Wednesdays are called the “Matins of the Bridegroom”; on Monday itself, the icon “The Bridegroom of the Church” depicting Christ in a crown of thorns is solemnly taken out and laid in the middle of the church ^[3] .

Clock

On Great Monday and the next two days, the clock is modeled after the Lenten - with bows on the troparia of each hour and at the prayer of Ephraim the Syrian . The features of these three days are:

• Reading the gospel every hour. The typicon proposes to read the four Gospels in full during these three days (with the exception of the account of the Passion of Christ ). In modern parish practice, reading the Gospel on a watch begins much earlier - on the second week of Lent, so on Great Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday the Gospel of John is already being read.
• At the sixth hour, it is not the Book of Isaiah (as on the weekdays of the six previous weeks) that is read, but the first chapters of the prophet Ezekiel . On Great Monday, a passage from Ezek is read . 1: 1-20 - visions of the glory of God resting on mysterious cherubs ( animals with four faces and six wings ).

Liturgy

The liturgy of the blessed gifts is celebrated . The verses on “ Lord Calls ” return the worshipers to the circumstances preceding the entrance to Jerusalem : the prophecy of Christ about His coming death and resurrection, the request of Salome and her sons about privileged places in the future Kingdom, and the conversation with the apostles about the primacy through the service of neighbors. These stichera also indicate future events: crucifixion , burial and resurrection . A typical example is the first of these stichera (it is also performed “in praise” at matins):

The Lord is coming to a free passion, an apostle with a verb on the way: behold we ascend to Jerusalem, and the Son of Man will surrender, as is written about Him. Come slaughter, and we, refined meanings, will sow to Him, and will be crucified, and put to death for His sweetness of life, and we will live with Him, and hear Him crying out: not to some in Jerusalem on earth for a hedgehog of suffering, but I will ascend to My Father and your Father, and to my God and your God, and I will bring you to high Jerusalem, the kingdom of heaven.

Transfer

Going to voluntary suffering, the Lord said on the way to the apostles: behold, we ascend to Jerusalem, and the Son of Man, as it is written about Him, will be betrayed. Having cleansed our thoughts, we will come and follow with Him, and crucify, and in His name we will put to death our worldly sweets in order to come to life with Him and hear His words: I ascend into Jerusalem on earth not only to suffer, but I ascend to my Father and your Father, to my God and your God. And with Me, I will lead you up to Jerusalem, to the Kingdom of Heaven.

As paremias are offered:

• 1 chapter of the book of Exodus ( Exodus 1: 1-20 ), recalling the suffering of the Jews in Egypt and the anger of the pharaoh , who wanted the death of newborn Jewish boys;
• the beginning of the book of Job ( Job 1: 1-12 ), where Job's righteousness is contrasted with the malice of the devil who wants to tempt the righteous.

Then the Gospel of the second coming is read (conception 98: Matthew 24: 3-35 ). The apostle is not read at the liturgy. At the end of the service, a special leave is read: “The Coming Lord for our free passion for the sake of salvation, Christ, our true God, through the prayers of our Most Holy Most Holy Mater, the holy glorious and universal apostle, the holy righteous God-Father Joachim and Anna and all the saints ... ”.

Joseph's Theme

The service of Great Monday is permeated with memories of the Old Testament Joseph . In his sufferings from his brothers who hated him, his chaste abstinence and undeserved imprisonment, the Church sees a prototype of the sufferings of Christ . In the final triumph of Joseph and his exaltation in Egypt, the resurrection of Christ and His victory over the world are prefigured. Like Joseph, who forgave the brothers and nourishes them with earthly goods, Christ reconciles fallen humanity with Him and nourishes the faithful with His Body and Blood . The story of Joseph and Potiphar's wife is symbolically opposed to the fall of the ancestors : Potiphar's wife, like Eve , became the vessel of the crafty serpent, but Joseph, unlike Adam and like the coming Savior, was able to resist the temptation and remain pure from sin; the sinner Adam was ashamed of his nakedness before God, and the chaste Joseph chose to remain naked in order to maintain his moral purity. The tradition of seeing in Joseph's story a prototype of gospel events can be traced back to the apostolic times and can be found in Acts ( Acts 7: 9-16 ).

A typical example of Joseph’s theme is the Monday of the Great Monday:

We shall apply sobbing now, and we will pour out tears with Jacob, weeping Joseph for ever more memorable and chaste, enslaved by his body, but he is not enslaved to his soul, and by reigning to all of Egypt: God will give imperishable crown to His servant.

Transfer

We add sobbing to sobbing and pour out tears together with Jacob, mourning the chaste and ever-memorable Joseph. He ( Joseph ) was enslaved by the body, but retained a free soul, and reigned in Egypt. Thus, God will bestow on His servants a crown incorruptible.

Catholic Church

The liturgy is performed in the usual manner. The first reading of the Liturgy of the word is the prophecy about the Messiah from the book of Isaiah ( Isa. 42: 1-7 ), the gospel reading of this day ( John 12: 1-11 ) tells how Mary 's sister Lazarus anointed the feet of the world . According to the Gospel of John, this happened the day before the Lord’s Entrance into Jerusalem , but this text is read on Great Monday, because on Saturday a fragment of the Gospel is read, telling about the resurrection of Lazarus.

The sacrament chant of Great Monday is taken from Psalm 101 - “Do not hide Your face from me; on the day of my sorrow, bow thy ear to me; on the day I call upon you, hear me soon ”( Psalm 101: 3 ).

In the Ambrosian rite, before the liturgical reform of Paul VI, an excerpt of Lk was read at Mass . 21: 34-38 (warning of Jesus about the imminent Last Judgment), after the reforms - John. 12: 27-36 (last public sermon of Christ in Jerusalem ) ^[3] .

Ancient Eastern Churches

In West Syrian, East Syrian , Coptic , Armenian rites, the service of Great Monday, as well as the subsequent Great Tuesday and Wednesday, is characterized by an abundance of biblical readings. So in the East Syrian rite on Great Monday read Gen. 37: 1-23 (envious brothers intend to kill Joseph ), Nav. 22: 21-30 ( Joshua releases the tribe of Reuben and Gad in their inheritance for the Jordan ), on the same day I recall the resurrection of Lazarus .

In the service of the West Syrian rite on the night of Great Monday, the special rite “ Ascension to Heaven ” (otherwise, “ 10 Lamps ” or “ 10 Maidens ”) is performed. Elders and deacons go around the temple (or from north to south), singing psalm 117 and special hymns reminiscent of “Behold, the Bridegroom is coming at midnight.” Then, in complete darkness, the repentant psalm 50 is sung, a series of biblical readings are made (including the parable of the ten virgins ( Matthew 25: 1-13 )), after the litany, the primate touches the altar curtain three times with a cross, the royal gates and the curtain are opened, all temple temples are lit. lamps, and a procession of clergy enters the altar ^[3] .

The Armenian Church , emphasizing the special mourning character of Great Monday, as well as the next two days, does not perform the liturgy. In the Western and East Syrian rites on these three days the liturgy of the blessed gifts is served ^[3] .

• The service of the Orthodox Church (reprint edition of 1912). - M .: Dar , 2005 .-- S. 366-367.
• Monday of the Great Week. Chants of Triodi Lenten on the site Orthodoxy.Ru
• Great Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday // Orthodox Encyclopedia