Volumen 85 Fasciculus I 2019

ORIENTALIA
CHRISTIANA
PERIODICA
COMMENTARII DE RE ORIENTALI AETATIS CHRISTIANAE
S A C R A E T P R O FA N A E D I T I C U R A E T O P E R E
PONTIFICII INSTITUTI ORIENTALIUM STUDIORUM

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PONTIFICIUM INSTITUTUM ORIENTALIUM STUDIORUM

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Nr. 1 / 2019

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SUMMARIUM

ARTICULI
Predrag Bukovec, Die vielen Einsetzungsberichte von Addai und
Mari . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5-22

Lisa D. Maugans Driver, Pastoral Physicians and Communal Health

in Late Antique Antioch . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 23-44

Enrico Cattaneo, S.J., Eunomio e gli Anomei nel Commento a Isaia

di Basilio di Cesarea . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 45-75
Ayda Kaplan, Reclassement des planches datées de l’Album de Hatch
à la lumière des nouvelles théories sur le développement des
écritures syriaques . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 77-111

Daniel Galadza, Liturgy at the Great Lavra of St. Sabas from its
Beginnings to the First Crusade: A Preliminary Survey . . . . . . . . . 113-138

István Baán, The Metropolitanate of Turkia. A historical fact or a

Gordian knot of historical writing? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 139-166

A. Nikiforova, The Consecration of Holy Myron in the Near East: A

Reconstruction Attempt of the Greek-Melkite Rite (with the Edition
of Sinai Greek NF/ E 55 + Fragment E sine numero, A.D. 1156) . . . 167-216

ANIMADVERSIO

A. Sidarus, Textes hermétiques dans des sommes théologiques copto-

arabes médiévales . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 217-225

RECENSIONES

L’apport des Assomptionnistes français aux études byzantines. Une

approche critique. Actes du colloque de Bucarest, 25-27 septembre
2014. Édités sous la direction de Marie-Hélène BLANCHET et Ionuž-
Alexandru TUDORIE (V. Ruggieri) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 227-231

Les exégètes syriaques, Patrimoine Syriaque. Actes du colloque XIII,

textes réunis par Mgr. Paul Féghali (Dahlia Khay Azeez) . . . . . . . . 231-233

‫ ﻧﴩ أﻋامﻟﻪ وﻧﻘﻞ ﻧﺼﻮﺻﻪ اﻹﻧﻜﻠﻴﺰﻳﺔ‬،‫ أﻋامل اﳌﺆمتﺮ اﻟﺜﺎﻟﺚ ﻋﴩ‬.‫ اﻟﱰاث اﻟﴪﻳﺎين‬،‫اﳌﻔﴪون اﻟﴪﻳﺎن‬
ّ
،2015 ‫ ﻟﺒﻨﺎن‬،‫ أﻧﻄﻠﻴﺎس‬،‫ ﻣﺮﻛﺰ اﻟﺪراﺳﺎت واﻷﺑﺤﺎث اﳌﴩﻗﻴّﺔ‬،‫واﻟﻔﺮﻧﺴﻴﺔ اﳌﻮﻧﺴﻨﻴﻮر ﺑﻮﻟﺲ اﻟﻔﻐﺎﱄ‬
(Dahlia Khay Azeez) .259 ‫ص‬ 231-233

GALADZA, Daniel, Liturgy and Byzantinization in Jerusalem (V. Ruggie-

ri) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 233-236

Handboek oosters christendom, onder redactie van Herman TEULE en

Alfons BRÜNING met medewerking van Leo van LEIJSEN (G. Ruyssen) 236-241

THIBAUT DE MAISIÈRES, Marie – NAJM, Simon, Chrétiens d’Orient – Mon

Amour (G. Ruyssen) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 236-241
ISIDORE DE PÉLUSE, Lettres. Tome III. Lettres 1701-2000. Texte critique,
traduction et notes Pierre ÉVIEUX †, avec la collaboration de Nicolas
VINEL. Sources Chrétiennes 586 (Ph. Luisier) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 241-243

KOSSEVA, Diana – TOTEV, Konstantin, Kamennata plastika ot sredno-

vekovnata bãlgarska stolica Tãrnovo (1185-1393) / Stone Plastic in
Bulgaria’s Medieval Capital Turnovo (1185-1393) (T. L. Lechintan) . 243-247

NASRALLAH, Joseph † – HADDAD, Rachid, Histoire du Mouvement littéraire

dans l’Église melchite du Ve au XIXe siècle. Vol. I. Période byzantine
451-634 (Ph. Luisier) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 247-250

SCERRI, Hector, The Gentle Breeze from the Peripheries: The Evolving
Role of Episcopal Conferences. Foreword by Ladislas Örsy (E. G.
Farrugia) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 250-253

SLESINSKI, Robert F., The Holy Mysteries: Celebrating Christ’s Sacra-

mental Presence (E. G. Farrugia). . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 253-255

SLESINSKI, Robert F., Holy Tradition: An Essay in Reparation (E. G.

Farrugia) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 253-255

VOSSEL, Vincent van, The Anaphoras of the Church of the East accord-
ing to the Mar Esha‘ya Manuscript, Text, Translation, Interpretation
(‫( )اﻟﻨﻮاﻓري اﳌﴩﻗﻴﺔ ﺑﺤﺴﺐ ﻣﺨﻄﻮط ﻣﺎر أﺷﻌﻴﺎ اﻟﻨﺼﻮص واﻟﺘﺤﺎﻟﻴﻞ‬Dahlia Khay Azeez) 255-256

VOSSEL, Vincent van, Le Dieu du silence. Patrimoine des couvents en

Irak. Reconstruire un passé ou construire un monde nouveau?, Pa-
trimoine Oriental Commun (V. Ruggieri) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 256-257

SCRIPTA AD NOS MISSA . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 258

ISSN 0030-5375
 Daniel Galadza

Liturgy at the Great Lavra of St. Sabas

from its Beginnings to the First Crusade:
A Preliminary Survey*

According to the established narrative in Byzantine liturgical studies,

St. Theodore Stoudite (759 – 11 November 826) sought out the help of Pal-
estinian monks to fight Iconoclasm after he moved his whole monastery
from Bithynia to Constantinople. These Palestinian monks, whose liturgy
has been described as “more sober, desert prayer,” brought with them the
Palestinian Horologion, which St. Theodore then fused with the Constan-
tinopolitan Euchologion, resulting in one of the most important chapters
in the development of the Byzantine liturgical tradition, namely the “Stou-
dite synthesis.”1 This statement is frequently repeated, but little more is
said about the liturgy at the Great Lavra of Sabas, also referred to as the
monastery of Mar Saba or the Lavra of St. Sabas the Sanctified,2 before,
during, or after this putative synthesis. What do we actually know about
liturgy at the Palestinian monastery that holds such an important place in
the history of the Byzantine Rite?
In recent years, the synthesis narrative has been questioned by scholars
of Byzantine history and literature and nuanced by liturgiologists. Olivier
Delouis has studied the history of the Stoudios Monastery in Constantino-
ple, from its establishment in 454 until 1204, noting that — for lack of

* This paper was presented at the Sixth International Congress of the Society of Oriental
Liturgy, 11-16 September 2016, at the Mother See of Holy Etchmiadzin, Armenia, in prepa-
ration for the International Conference “The Lavra of St. Sabas: Liturgy and Literature in
Communities and Contexts,” 15-17 May 2019, at the Catholic University of Leuven. I wish to
particularly thank Gabriel Radle and Nina Glibetiò for their invaluable comments and sugges-
tions for improvements to this paper, and Tinatin Chronz, Diego Fittipaldi, and Peter Galadza
for corrections and several references to liturgical sources of which I was previously unaware.
All remaining errors are my own.
1 See, for example, R. F. Taft, The Byzantine Rite: A Short History (Collegeville, MN: The

Liturgical Press, 1992), 52-66; id., “Mount Athos: A Late Chapter in the History of the Byzan-
tine Rite,” DOP 42 (1988), 179-194, here 182.
2 I use these various names interchangeably, following Leslie S. B. MacCoull, “Sabas,

Great Lavra of (Mar Saba),” in ODB III, 1823-1824, in order to avoid imposing a clear distinc-
tion between “medieval” and “contemporary” periods in the monastery’s history, since these
are not clearly defined.

OCP 85 (2019) 113-138

114 DANIEL GALADZA

evidence — much of the liturgical activity associated today with Theodore

Stoudite’s reform must have occurred either before 799 or after Theodore
had died, and the importance and influence of the Stoudios Monastery in
Constantinople was not felt until the second half of the ninth century.3 A
closer examination of the letters of St. Theodore Stoudite shows that he
did not request books from the monks of Palestine, but from his fellow
Stoudite monks while he was himself in exile on the island of Chalke (Χάλ-
κη).4 Liturgiologists have also pointed to a more nuanced reading of the
“Stoudite synthesis,” either focusing on its spiritual reform of monastic life
and piety — rather than its liturgical innovations5 — or pointing out closer
contacts and more fluid interactions between cathedral and monastery in
both Constantinople and Palestine than had previously been admitted.6
Today, we have greater access to sources other than Constantinopolitan
Euchologia and Palestinian Horologia, making it possible to revisit some
of these questions. The purpose of this paper is to step back from the afore-
mentioned narratives and to look at one part of the puzzle with greater
attention, namely liturgy as it was celebrated at Mar Saba Lavra, from its
foundation by St. Sabas the Sanctified (439 – 5 December 532) in the fifth
century until the period of the First Crusade in the twelfth century. Because
the development of the Horologion and Typikon are complex questions
requiring further detailed investigation,7 I will instead pay particular at-

3 O. Delouis, Saint-Jean-Baptiste de Stoudios à Constantinople. La contribution d’un mo-

nastère à l’histoire de l’Empire byzantin (v. 454-1204), 2 vols., unpublished doctoral thesis
(Paris: Université Paris I-Panthéon Sorbonne, 2005).
4 See especially Letter 150 (A.D. 816), which mentions a Tropologion but deals with Theo-

dore’s exile, not his contact with Palestine. See G. Fatouros, Theodori Studitæ epistulæ, Corpus
Fontium Historiae Byzantinae 31/1 (Berlin: De Gruyter, 1991), vol. 1, 251*-252* and vol. 2,
415-418.
5 T. Pott, Byzantine Liturgical Reform: A Study of Liturgical Change in the Byzantine Tradi-

tion, trans. P. Meyendorff, Orthodox Liturgy Series 2 (Crestwood, NY: St. Vladimir’s Seminary
Press, 2010), 115-151; id., “Réforme monastique et évolution liturgique. Le réforme stoudite,”
in Crossroad of Cultures: Studies in Liturgy and Patristics in Honor of Gabriele Winkler, eds.
H.-J. Feulner, E. Velkovska, R. F. Taft, OCA 260 (Rome: Pontificio Istituto Orientale, 2000),
557-589.
6
A. Lingas, “How Musical was the ‘Sung Office’? Some Observations on the Ethos of
the Byzantine Cathedral Rite,” in The Traditions of Orthodox Music, eds. I. Moody, M. Taka-
la-Roszczenko (Joensuu: International Society of Orthodox Church Music, 2007), 217-234;
S. Parenti, “The Cathedral Rite of Constantinople: Evolution of a Local Tradition,” OCP 77
(2011), 449-469; E. Velkova Velkovska, “The liturgical books of the Byzantine Rite: history and
culture,” in Liturgische Bücher in der Kulturgeschichte Europas, ed. Hanns Peter Neuheuser,
Bibliothek und Wissenschaft 51 (Wiesbaden: Harrasowitz, 2018), 137-154, especially 141-145.
7 For the most recent studies of the Horologion, see the work of S. Frøyshov, “Erlangen

University Library A2, A.D. 1025: A Study of the Oldest Dated Greek Horologion,” in Rites
and Rituals of the Christian East, eds. B. Groen et al., Eastern Christian Studies 22 (Leuven:
Peeters, 2014), 201-253; for the Typikon, see D. R. Fittipaldi, “The Typicon of Mâr Saba in
 LITURGY AT THE GREAT LAVRA OF ST. SABAS 115

tention to the Eucharistic Synaxis and the liturgical calendar in the period
after the Muslim conquest of Palestine in 638. The sources for this exami-
nation are hagiographical texts and liturgical manuscripts. These sources
show that the liturgy of Mar Saba Lavra was initially a local variant of the
liturgy of the Anastasis in Jerusalem, before it became Byzantinized and
much closer to the rite of the Great Church of Constantinople.

1. Mar Saba Lavra in the History of the Byzantine Rite

At its peak in the fifth and sixth centuries, Palestinian monasticism
counted at least sixty-four monasteries.8 The largest and most famous of
these was the Great Lavra, whose “residual core” is known today as the
Lavra of Mar Saba, 14.5 kilometres southeast of Jerusalem. Initially estab-
lished in 483 as a lavriote community by St. Sabas the Sanctified (439-532),9
the monastery later adapted to coenobitic life.10 The standard obediences of
the monks at the Lavra included the duty of priest (πρεσβύτερος),11 deacon
(διάκονος),12 and canonarch (κανονάρχης).13 The last of these also served as
sacristan and guardian of church vessels and vestments (κειμηλιάρχης).14
Other functionaries (οἱ κληρικοί) included monks who announced the be-

the XIII Century or What and When to Read in the Monastic Byzantine Liturgy,” Temas Me-
dievales 23 (2015), 89-113.
8 The best surveys are D. J. Chitty, The Desert a City: An Introduction to the Study of Egyp-

tian and Palestinian Monasticism under the Christian Empire (Oxford: Basil Blackwell, 1966);
Y. Hirschfeld, The Judean Desert Monasteries in the Byzantine Period (New Haven, CT: Yale
University Press, 1992). For a list of these monasteries, see S. Vailhé, “Répertoire alphabé-
tique des monastères de Palestine,” ROC 4 (1899), 512-542; 5 (1900), 19-48 and 272-292. For
an updated list based on archaeological discoveries, see Y. Hirschfeld, “List of the Byzantine
Monasteries in the Judean Desert” in Christian Archaeology in the Holy Land: New Discoveries.
Essays in Honour of Virgilio C. Corbo, OFM, eds. G. C. Bottini, L. Di Segni, E. Alliata, Studium
Biblicum Franciscanum, Collectio Maior 40 (Jerusalem: Franciscan Printing Press, 1990),
1-90. See also J. Ball, “Saint Sabas and the Monks of the Holy Land,” in Jerusalem, 1000-1400:
Every People Under Heaven, eds. B. Drake Boehm, M. Holcomb (New York: Yale University
Press, 2016), 76-78, as well as 88-93 for catalogue descriptions of exhibition items at the Met-
ropolitan Museum of Art.
9 A. Kazhdan, N. Patterson-Ševçenko, “Sabas,” in ODB III, 1823.
10 J. Patrich, Sabas, Leader of Palestinian Monasticism. A Comparative Study in Eastern

Monasticism, Fourth to Seventh Centuries (Washington, DC: Dumbarton Oaks Research Li-
brary and Collection, 1995), 57-66. See also S. Vailhé, “Le monastère de Saint-Sabas,” EO 2
(1898-1899), 332-41; 3 (1899-1900), 18-28 and 168-177.
11 Life of Sabas, Chapters 44 and 88, in Kyrillos von Skythopolis, ed. E. Schwartz, TU 49.2

(Leipzig: Hinrichs, 1939), 88 and 196.

12 Life of Sabas, Chapter 73, in Schwartz, Kyrillos von Skythopolis, 178.
13 Ibid., Chapter 43, 134.
14 Ibid., Chapter 58, 159.
116 DANIEL GALADZA

ginning of services with the symandron and lit the candles (κανδηλάπτηρ).15
In one case during a famine, St. Sabas ordered the canonarch to send the
prosphora baker (προσφοράριος) to Jerusalem to sell certain church vessels
or vestments on Friday in order that the services of Saturday and Sunday
might be held with the necessary bread and wine.16 That such a day trip
to Jerusalem was even possible shows the close proximity and contact be-
tween Mar Saba and the city of Jerusalem.
The architectural corpus of the Lavra was scattered across the Kidron
Valley, but was subsequently consolidated in an elevated area of approxi-
mately 100 by 600 metres. This is where St. Sabas built the first prayer
house (εὐκτήριον). The house was replaced by the Great Church of the An-
nunciation, consecrated on 1 July 501 by Patriarch Elias,17 and the “God-
built” (θεόκτιστος) cave church, now dedicated to St. Nicholas of Myra.18
The tomb of St. Sabas is presently located in the main courtyard (μεσί-
αυλον) of the monastery. Other structures included a hostel, bakery (μα-
γκιπεῖον), hospital (νοσοκομεῖον), and numerous monastic cells.19 Joseph
Patrich admits that little is known of the construction of the original Great
Church, as the present structure is a later edifice.20

2. Sources of Sabaite Liturgy

Understanding the role of Sabaite monks in all aspects of Jerusalem’s
liturgical life is crucial for an analysis of both early Hagiopolite liturgy and
the later Byzantine Rite, after the former was “Byzantinized” — meaning
local liturgical practices were lost as a result of adopting liturgical practices
from Constantinople.21 Hagiographical sources, along with other archaeo-
logical and literary evidence, present a picture of the rise of monasticism
in Palestine as well as glimpses of daily life at Mar Saba, supplemented by
liturgical manuscripts only after the eighth century. The common liturgical

15 Patrich, Sabas, 187.

16 Life of Sabas, Chapter 58, in Schwartz, Kyrillos von Skythopolis, 159-160. For more on
the administration of the Lavra of St. Sabas and the various offices and duties of the monks,
see Patrich, Sabas, 169-195.
17 Life of Sabas, Chapter 32, in Schwartz, Kyrillos von Skythopolis, 117-118; Patrich, Sabas,

72-75.
18 Life of Sabas, Chapter 18, in Schwartz, Kyrillos von Skythopolis, 102; Patrich, Sabas,

69-72.
19 For plans of the monastery, see Patrich, Sabas, 60 (fig. 8), 69 (fig. 12), and 78 (fig. 22).
20 Patrich, Sabas, 72.
21 For the phenomenon of Byzantinization, see D. Galadza, Liturgy and Byzantinization in

Jerusalem (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2018).

 LITURGY AT THE GREAT LAVRA OF ST. SABAS 117

language of Mar Saba Lavra was Greek, but Syriac- and Georgian-praying
monks were integral members of these communities.22

2.1. Early Sabaite Liturgy in Hagiography

Due to the absence of any liturgical manuscripts before the eighth cen-
tury, the earliest testimonies of Sabaite liturgy come from hagiographical
texts. The best-known collection of texts by Cyril of Skythopolis (ca. 525-
559) gives information on liturgical practices in the monastery.23 For exam-
ple, in the Life of St. Sabas we read that Armenian monks were permitted to
serve the canonical hours (τῆς ψαλμῳδίας κανόνα) in their own language (τῇ
τῶν Ἀρμενίων διαλέκτῳ), but were to join the Greeks for the Divine Liturgy
(προσκομιδή).24 This is one of many clear testimonies of liturgical variety at
the multilingual community of Mar Saba Lavra. Although, as in Jerusalem,
the official language for liturgy and daily affairs was Greek, a reference to
the practice of multiple, multilingual services is repeated in the twelfth-
century redaction of the founder’s Typikon of St. Sabas Lavra, considered
the will and testament of St. Sabas himself.25

22 See L. Perrone, “Monasticism as a Factor of Religious Interaction in the Holy Land dur-
ing the Byzantine Period,” in Sharing the Sacred: Religious Contacts and Conflicts in the Holy
Land. First-Fifteenth Centuries CE, eds. A. Kofsky, G. G. Stroumsa (Jerusalem: Yad Izhak Ben
Zvi, 1998), 67-95, here 68. The most recent study of monasticism’s place within the Church
of Jerusalem is P. Booth, Crisis of Empire: Doctrine and Dissent at the End of Late Antiquity,
Transformation of the Classical Heritage 52 (Berkeley, CA: University of California Press,
2014).
23 Schwartz, Kyrillos von Skythopolis; B. Baldwin, A.-M. Talbot, “Cyril of Skythopolis,” in

ODB I, 573. Apart from the vitae of Cyril of Skythopolis, the Narration of John and Sophronios
and the Spiritual Meadow give some insight into liturgy among Palestinian monks, although
their direct connection to Mar Saba is not always clear. See A. Longo, “Il testo integrale della
«Narrazione degli abati Giovanni e Sofronio» attraverso le «῾Ερμηνεῖαι» di Nicone,” RSBN 12-
13 (1965-1966), 223-267; John Moschos, Λειμών (Pratum), PG 87.3:2852-3112; The Spiritual
Meadow by John Moschos (also known as John Eviratus), trans. J. Wortley, Cistercian Studies
Series 19 (Kalamazoo, MI: Cistercian Publications, 1992).
24 “ἐν τῷ καιρῷ τῆς θείας προσκομιδῆς ἔρχεσθαι μετὰ τῶν Ἑλληνισταρίων καὶ τῶν θείων μετα-

λαμβάνειν μυστηρίων.” Life of Sabas, Chapter 32, in Schwartz, Kyrillos von Skythopolis, 117.
For an explanation of the term προσκομιδή used for the Divine Liturgy, see S. Parenti, “Nota
sull’impiego del termine προσκομιδὴ nell’eucologio Barberini gr. 336 (VIII sec.),” EL 103
(1989), 406-417; Pavlos Koumarianos, “Prothesis and Proskomide: A Clarification of Liturgi-
cal Terminology,” Greek Orthodox Theological Review 52:1-4 (2007), 63-102, especially 68-72.
See also A. A. Dmitrievskij, “Что такое κανὼν τῆς ψαλμωδίας, так нерѣдко упоминаемый въ
жизнеописанiи препод. Саввы Освященнаго?” Руководство для сельскихъ пастырей 38 (1889),
69-73.
25 “Μὴ ἔχειν δὲ ἐξουσίαν μήτε τοὺς Ἴβηρας, μήτε τοὺς Σύρους, ἢ τοὺς Φράγγους λειτουργίαν

τελείαν ποιεῖν ἐν ταῖς ἐκκλησίαις αὐτῶν, ἀλλὰ συναθροιζομένους ἐν αὐταῖς ψάλλειν τὰς ὥρας καὶ
τὰ τυπικά, ἀναγινώσκειν δὲ τὸν Ἀπόστολον καὶ τὸ Εὐαγγέλιον τῇ ἰδίᾳ διαλέκτῳ, καὶ μετὰ ταῦτα
εἰσέρχεσθαι εἰς τὴν μεγάλην ἐκκλησίαν καὶ μεταλαμβάνειν μετὰ πάσης τῆς ἀδελφότητος τῶν θείων
118 DANIEL GALADZA

The general practice of lavriote monasticism was for the monks to pray
privately in their cells and to gather for common services in the monastery’s
main church on Saturday and Sunday.26 This is the origin of the Sabaite
lavriote “all-night vigil” (ἀγρυπνία) and explains its absence in coenobitic
monasticism, for example within Stoudite monasteries. Nikolai Uspensky
and Miguel Arranz, however, observed that the all-night vigil was absent
in Stoudite sources and suggested the Sabaite vigil service arose, or was
revived, only in the twelfth century, assuming that if it had existed in the
eighth or ninth century, Stoudite monasteries would have adopted it along
with other Sabaite practices.27 Nevertheless, the practice of the Saturday
all-night vigil in Palestine is mentioned explicitly in the Life of Sabas,28 in
the Life of Stephen the Sabaite,29 and in the testament of St. Sabas preserved
in the twelfth-century manuscript Sinai Gr. 1096.30 Because there is no ex-
plicit reference to the decline of this service between the sixth century and
the twelfth century, assumptions of the genesis or revival of the Sabaite
vigil only in the twelfth century are based on the silence of sources.31
The state of the situation at Mar Saba in the turmoil following the Arab
conquest of Palestine in 638 depends on which sources one reads. Muslim
rule notwithstanding, Palestine was a safer refuge than Constantinople or
other regions of the Byzantine Empire for persecuted Iconophile monks
during the eighth century, according to the Life of St. Stephen the Young-

καὶ ἀχράντων καὶ ζωοποιῶν μυστηρίων.” Sinai Gr. 1096 (12th c.), 148r; Dmitrievskij I, 222-223;
G. Fiaccadori, “42. Sabas: Founder’s Typikon of the Sabas Monastery near Jerusalem,” in
Byzantine Monastic Foundation Documents, eds. John Thomas, Angela Constantinides Hero,
Dumbarton Oaks Studies 35 (Washington, DC: Dumbarton Oaks Research Library, 2000),
vol. 4, 1316.
26 Allusions are made to this practice in the Life of Sabas, Chapters 18, 20, and 58, in

Schwartz, Kyrillos von Skythopolis, 102, 105, and 159; Life of John the Hesychast, Chapter 7, in
Schwartz, Kyrillos von Skythopolis, 206; Patrich, Sabas, 206.
27 See M. Arranz, “N. D. Uspensky: The Office of the All-Night Vigil in the Greek Church

and in the Russian Church,” St. Vladimir’s Theological Quarterly 24 (1980), 169-195, here 174.
This claim is based solely on the fact that St. Theodore Stoudite does not adopt the ἀγρυπνία
at Stoudios Monastery, which leads Uspensky to believe it did not exist at the time.
28 “ἐθέσπισεν δὲ ὥστε κατὰ δὲ κυριακὴν εἰς τὴν θεοτόκου ἐπιτελεῖσθαι ἐκκλησίαν καὶ ἀπαρα-

λείπτως ἀπὸ ὀψὲ ἕως πρωὶ ἀγρυπνίαν ἐν ἀμφοτέραις γίνεσθαι ταῖς ἐκκλησίαις κατά τε κυριακὴν καὶ
δεσποτικὴν ἑορτήν.” Life of Sabas, Chapter 32, in Schwartz, Kyrillos von Skythopolis, p. 118.
29 See note in AASS, July III, 601-602; The Life of Stephen of Mar Sabas, ed. J. C. Lamor-

eaux, CSCO 578/Ar. 50, 579/Ar.51, (Leuven: Peeters, 1999), § 72.6.

30 Sinai Gr. 1096 (12th c.), 148r; Dmitrievskij I, 222-223; Fiaccadori, “Sabas Founder’s

Typikon,” 1316.
31 For a recent discussion of this question, see M. Lüstraeten, Die handschriftlichen arabi-

schen Übersetzungen des byzantinischen Typikons. Zeugen der Arabisierung und Byzantisierung
der melkitischen Liturgie, Jerusalemer Theologisches Forum 31 (Münster: Aschendorff, 2017).
 LITURGY AT THE GREAT LAVRA OF ST. SABAS 119

er.32 On the other hand, monastic chronicler Theophanes writes that “the
famous lavras in the desert, that of St. Chariton and that of St. Sabas, and
the other monasteries and churches were made desolate” in the early ninth
century and those monks who could, sought refuge in Constantinople or
Cyprus.33
After the Arab conquest, there is no collection of hagiographical texts
that provide as much information, and clear knowledge of Sabaite litur-
gical practices in the eighth through eleventh centuries consists of frag-
mentary notices.34 Many hagiographical texts are martyrdom accounts,
such as the martyrdom of twenty monks of Mar Saba Lavra killed on 20
March 796.35 The Life of Stephen the Sabaite36 was originally written by
Leontios the Sabaite in Greek, partially preserved in only one manuscript,
Paris Coislin 303, and soon translated into Arabic by Yannah b. Iṣṭafan
al-Fâkhûrí, himself a monk of Mar Saba Lavra, in 903.37 A Georgian trans-
lation was made from the Arabic text no later than 983.38 The vita men-

32 BHG 1666; Stephanus Constantinopolitanus Diaconus, Vita Sancti Stephani Junioris,

Monachi et Martyris, PG 100:1120; La Vie d’Etienne le Jeune par Etienne le Diacre, ed. M.-F.
Auzépy, Birmingham Byzantine and Ottoman Monographs 3 (Aldershot: Variorum, 1997),
125-126. See also M. Detoraki, “Greek Passions of the Martyrs in Byzantium,” in The Ashgate
Research Companion to Byzantine Hagiography, vol. 2: Periods and Places, ed. S. Efthymiadis
(Burlington, VT: Ashgate, 2014), 85-89.
33 “ὁμοίως δὲ καὶ αἱ κατὰ τὴν ἔρημον διαβόητοι λαῦραι τοῦ ἁγίου Χαρίτωνος καὶ τοῦ ἁγίου Σάβα,

καὶ τὰ λοιπὰ μοναστήρια καὶ αἱ ἐκκλησίαι ἠρημώθησαν.” Theophanis Chronographia, vol. 1, ed. C.
de Boor (Hildesheim: Olms, 1980), 499; The Chronicle of Theophanes Confessor: Byzantine and
Near Eastern History AD 284-813, trans. C. Mango, R. Scott (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1997),
683; S. H. Griffith, “Byzantium and the Christians in the World of Islam: Constantinople and
the Church in the Holy Land in the Ninth Century,” Medieval Encounters 3 (1997), 231-265,
here 232; M. Gil, A History of Palestine, 634-1099, trans. E. Broido (Cambridge: Cambridge
University Press, 1997), 474-475.
34 J. Nasrallah, Histoire du Mouvement littéraire dans l’Église melchite du Ve au XXe siècle,

vol. II, no. 1 (634-750) (Damascus: Éditions de l’Institut français de Damas, 1996), 69; K. A.
Panchenko, “Иерусалимская православная церковь,” Православная Энциклопедия, ed. Sergei
L. Kravets (Moscow: Церковно-научный центр «Православная Энциклопедия», 2009), vol.
21, 472. The closest equivalent would be the Greek manuscript Paris BNF Coislin 303 (10th-
11th c.), a collection of hagiography dedicated to Sabaite and Palestinian monks. For more on
this manuscript, see the entry in Pinakes: http://pinakes.irht.cnrs.fr/notices/cote/49444/
35 BHG 1200; Gil, History of Palestine, 474; C. MacEvitt, The Crusades and the Christian

World of the East: Rough Tolerance (Philadelphia, PA: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2008),
32-33.
36 BHG 1670.
37 The two manuscripts that preserved this text are Sinai Ar. 505 (13th c.) and Sinai Ar. 409

(2 October A.D. 1238). See G. Garitte, “Le début de la Vie de S. Étienne le Sabaïte retrouvé en
arabe au Sinai,” AB 77 (1959), 332-369; J. C. Lamoreaux, “Some Notes on a Recent Edition
of the Life of St. Stephen of Mar Sabas,” AB 113 (1995), 117-126; Lamoreaux, Stephen of Mar
Sabas, vii.
38 G. Garitte, “Un extrait géorgien de la vie d’Étienne le Sabaïte,” Mus 67 (1954), 71-92;
120 DANIEL GALADZA

tions that Stephen performed prayers “according to the ancient tradition

of the Fathers” (κατὰ πατρικὴν καὶ ἀρχαίαν παράδοσιν),39 served the Eucharist
on Saturdays, and kept vigil (ἀγρυπνία) during the night from Saturday to
Sunday.40 Marie-France Auzépy, based on an erroneous note in the Acta
Sanctorum, suggested that Stephen the Sabaite celebrated the Liturgy of
St. Basil.41 A closer examination of the text, however, shows the liturgical
quotation in question, “Τὰ ἅγια τοῖς ἁγίοις,” is known in all of the possible
Eucharistic liturgies celebrated at Mar Saba, whether the Liturgies of St.
James, St. Basil, or St. John Chrysostom.42
Despite most likely being legendary, the Martyrdom of Michael the Sa-
baite gives important information on liturgical practice and Sabaite ideol-
ogy. The Lavra was close enough for Michael’s body to be carried from
Jerusalem to Mar Saba in a few hours and buried there. As regards Eucha-
ristic liturgies (ჟამის წირვაჲ, àamis cirvay), these were celebrated sponta-
neously based on need and the arrival of visitors. Emphasis is placed upon
continuity between the spiritual tradition of St. Sabas, which he inherited
from St. Euthymios, as a friend of St. Theodosios, and handed down to his
disciples Stephen, John, Thomas, and Theodore Abû Qurrah.43
During this period the Lavra of St. Sabas in Palestine became the centre
of a Greek Byzantine intellectual revival after the Arab conquest, contrary
to what one might assume, considering the trend of Arabization in Pal-
estine at the time and the fact that after the seventh century, Mar Saba
never again found itself within the borders of the Byzantine Empire.44 The

Lamoreaux, Stephen of Mar Sabas, xi.

39 “ἐπεὶ δὲ τὸ σεβάσμιον ἐκεῖνο, ὡς ἔφην, εἰσεληλύθαμεν ἡσυχαστήριον, πρώτης μὲν ἢ καὶ δευ-

τέρας φυλακῆς διαδραμούσης, καὶ τὴν ὀφειλομένην εὐχήν, κατὰ πατρικὴν καὶ ἀρχαίαν παράδοσιν,
πεποιήκαμεν.” Life of Stephen the Sabaite, § 40; AASS, July III, 520; M.-F. Auzépy, “De la Pales-
tine à Constantinople (VIIIe-IXe siècles): Étienne le Sabaïte et Jean Damascène,” Travaux et
Mémoires 12 (1994), 183-218, here 190. For similar expressions in the writing of St. Theodore
Stoudite, see Letter 554, Fatouros, Theodori Studitæ epistulæ, vol. 2, 849; S. Alexopoulos, The
Presanctified Liturgy in the Byzantine Rite: A Comparative Analysis of its Origins, Evolution, and
Structural Components, Liturgia Condenda 21 (Leuven: Peeters, 2009), 27.
40 Life of Stephen the Sabaite, §§ 8 and 12; AASS, July III, 533 and 535; Auzépy, “De la

Palestine à Constantinople,” 190.

41 Life of Stephen the Sabaite, § 9; AASS, July III, 533 and n. i, 534-535; Auzépy, “De la

Palestine à Constantinople,” 190.

42 For more on this phrase, see R. F. Taft, A History of the Liturgy of St. John Chrysostom,

vol. 5: Precommunion Rites, OCA 261 (Rome: Pontifico Istituto Orientale, 2000), 199-211.
43 M. J. Blanchard, “The Georgian Version of the Martyrdom of Saint Michael, Monk of

Mar Sabas Monastery,” ARAM 6 (1994), 149-163; Gil, History of Palestine, 471-472.
44 Mango, “Greek Culture in Palestine,” 149; S. F. Johnson, “Introduction. The Social

Presence of Greek in Eastern Christianity, 200-1200 CE,” Languages and Cultures of Eastern
Christianity: Greek, ed. S. F. Johnson, The Worlds of Eastern Christianity 6 (Burlington, VT:
Ashgate, 2015), 2-122.
 LITURGY AT THE GREAT LAVRA OF ST. SABAS 121

monastery served as the home of great hymnographers and theologians,45

although the association of some of these figures is grounded mainly in
legend. St. Sophronios, later patriarch of Jerusalem (ca. 560-638),46 and St.
Andrew of Crete (d. 4 July 740) were monks of the Anastasis in Jerusalem,47
but their connection to Mar Saba is unclear. The hymnographer and apolo-
gist St. John of Damascus is now believed not to have been a monk of Mar
Saba, since the earliest tradition connecting him to that monastery dates
from the eleventh century. He was in fact a monk at the Church of the
Anastasis in Jerusalem.48 Little is known about the monks of the Anastasis,
but they may be the same as monks known as Spoudaioi (οἱ μοναχοὶ Σπου-
δαῖοι; სპონდიელნი, spondielni), meaning ‘zealous ones,’ who served at the
Anastasis and had their own order of services, according to the Typikon of
the Anastasis. These monks supposedly lived in the monastery of the The-
otokos of the Spoudaioi (ἡ Θεοτόκος τῶν Σπουδαίων) founded in Jerusalem
near the Anastasis by Patriarch Elias (reigned 494-516) in 494.49 Marie-
France Auzépy has claimed that a “Palestinian lobby” in Constantinople in-
terested in creating a history of the Lavra of Mar Saba monopolized on the
Iconoclast crisis and used the name of St. John of Damascus as a guarantor
of their importance to the interests of Constantinople.50 The connection
of polemicist Theodore Abû Qurrah, bishop of Ḥarrân, to Mar Saba Lavra
has also been called into question and there is little evidence to support the
claim that he was a monk there.51
What is more certain, however, is the presence of Syriac- and Arabic-
praying monks at the Lavra from at least the seventh century. “Syrian”
served as the unifying designation for speakers of Christian Palestinian Ar-

45 For a general overview of the literary work of the residents of St. Sabas Lavra, see A.

Peristeris, “Literary and Scribal Activities at the Monastery of St. Sabas” in Patrich, Sabaite
Heritage, 171-194.
46 C. von Schönborn, Sophrone de Jérusalem: vie monastique et confession dogmatique

(Paris: Beauchesne, 1972); A. Papadakis, “Sophronios,” in ODB III, 1928-1929.

47 A. Kazhdan, “Andrew of Crete,” in ODB I, 92-93.
48 O. Petrynko, “War Johannes von Damaskus ein Sabaït?” in Historia magistra vitae: Le-

ben und Theologie der Kirche aus ihrer Geschichte verstehen. Festschrift für Johannes Hoffmann
zum 65. Geburtstag, eds. A. Blumberg, O. Petrynko, Eichstätter Studien 76 (Regensburg: Ver-
lag Friedrich Pustet, 2016), 399-424.
49 Papadopoulos-Kerameus, Anastasis Typikon, 3, 7, and 161-162; Kekelidze, Канонарь,

265-267; Dmitrievskij, Древнѣйшіе Патріаршіе Типиконы, 111-113; S. Pétridès, “Le monastère

des Spoudæi à Jérusalem et les Spoudæi de Constantinople,” EO 4 (1900-1901), 225-228; id.,
“Spoudæi et Philopones,” EO 7 (1904), 341-348. See Life of Sabas, Chapter 31, in Schwartz,
Kyrillos von Skythopolis, 116 (lines 4-8).
50 M.-F. Auzépy, “De la Palestine à Constantinople,” 183-218.
51 J. C. Lamoreaux, “The Biography of Theodore Abû Qurrah Revisited,” DOP 56 (2002),

25-40.
122 DANIEL GALADZA

amaic and Arabic in Palestine until the ninth or tenth century.52 Another di-
rective of St. Sabas’s testament states that Syrians, despite their efficiency
and practicality, were never permitted to be abbots in the Lavra and, thus,
Syriac never held liturgical primacy within the multilingual monastic com-
munity of Mar Saba.53 This may also explain why very few Syriac liturgical
manuscripts show a clear connection to the Lavra of Mar Saba, despite the
important translations of texts into Syriac carried out at the monastery.54
Between the eighth and tenth centuries, Mar Saba was also the focal
point of Georgian scribal activity outside the Caucasus. It was here that
the first redaction of the Georgian Bible, known as that of “St. Sabas”
(საბაწმიდური, sabacmiduri), was formed between the eighth and tenth
centuries.55 After 980, Georgian scribes abandoned the Lavra and moved
to Sinai, where Georgians were known already since the late sixth centu-
ry.56 The most notable Georgian figure in Palestine in the tenth century
is the scribe Iovane Zosime, who was familiar with a variety of liturgi-
cal traditions in Palestine and Sinai.57 Contact between Sinai and Pales-
tine was quite common at the time, and several routes facilitated travel.58
52 K. Leeming, “The Adoption of Arabic as a Liturgical Language by the Palestinian Mel-

kites,” ARAM 15 (2003), 239-246, here 240-241.

53 Sinai Gr. 1096 (12th c.), fol. 149v; Dmitrievskij I, 224; Fiaccadori, “Sabas Founder’s

Typikon,” 1317.
54 Some texts of Isaac of Nineveh were translated from Syriac into Greek at Mar Saba

Lavra for a Melkite audience and are now preserved in Sinai Syr. 24, with parts in Milan and
Paris. See S. P. Brock, “Melkite literature in Syriac,” in Gorgias Encyclopedic Dictionary of
the Syriac Heritage (= GEDSH), eds. Sebastian P. Brock et al. (Piscataway, NJ: Gorgias Press,
2011), 285-286; id., “Isḥaq of Nineveh,” in GEDSH, 213-214; id., “From Qatar to Tokyo, by
way of Mar Saba: the translations of Isaac of Beth Qatraye,” ARAM 11/12 (1999/2000), 275-84;
id., “Syriac into Greek at Mar Saba: the translation of St Isaac the Syrian,” in Patrich, Sabaite
Heritage, 201-208. Contact between Syrian and Georgian monks in Palestine was particularly
strong in the ninth and tenth centuries at Mar Saba Lavra. See S. P. Brock and J. W. Childers,
“Georgian Christianity, Syriac contacts with,” in GEDSH, 173-175.
55 M. Tarchnišvili, Geschichte der kirchlichen georgischen Literatur, ST 185 (Vatican City:

Biblioteca Apostolica Vaticana, 1955), 62-63.

56 See Life of Theodosius the Cenobiarch (BHG 17766); Antonini Placentini Itinerarium, ed.

P. Geyer, CCL 175 (Turnhout: Brepols, 1965), 148 (§ 37, V 184.4); Tarchnišvili, Geschichte, 62
and 69.
57 Tarchnišvili, Geschichte, 109-114; G. Garitte, Le calendrier palestino-géorgien du Sinaiti-

cus 34 (Xe siècle), Subsidia Hagiographica 30 (Brussels: Société des Bollandistes, 1958), 16; B.
Outtier, “Langue et littérature géorgiennes,” in Christianismes orientaux. Introduction à l’étude
des langues et des littératures, eds. M. Albert et al., Initiations au christianisme ancien (Paris:
Cerf, 1993), 263-296, here 289. The most recent and complete biography of Iovane Zosime is
in S. S. R. Frøyshov, L’Horologe «géorgien» du Sinaiticus ibericus 34, 2 vols., unpublished doc-
toral thesis, Université de Paris-Sorbonne (Paris IV), Institut Catholique de Paris, Institut de
théologie orthodoxe Saint-Serge (Paris, 2004), vol. 2, 217-230. Zosime’s name is absent from
the Prosopographie der mittelbyzantinischen Zeit.
58 For the various routes connecting Jerusalem and Sinai, see P. Figueras, “Pilgrims to
 LITURGY AT THE GREAT LAVRA OF ST. SABAS 123

In the eleventh century, Georgian contact between Mar Saba and Mount
Athos was also strong: Proxore, a monk of Mar Saba, restored the Church
of the Holy Cross in Jerusalem at the command of Euthymios of Athos,
and George Mtacmideli visited Jerusalem.59 Perhaps one of the clearest
witnesses of Georgian contact to Mar Saba Lavra comes in the life of the
eighth/ninth-century St. Gregory Xanc‘teli (გრიგოლ ხანცთელი; A.D. 759-
861).60 His life, written in 951 by George Merç‘ule (10th c.), mentions that
Gregory asked a man travelling to Jerusalem to “write down the ordo of
St. Sabas [საბა წმიდისა წესისა] and send it to him.”61 Once the man had
returned from Jerusalem and handed over the ordo of the monastery of St.
Sabas, Gregory laid down regulations for his own church and monastery,
as selected and compiled from those in force at all the holy places (წმიდათა
ადგილთა).62 Intertwined with George Merç‘ule’s focus on monastic and
spiritual virtues of steadfastness are his vivid descriptions of liturgical life,
which are particularly detailed in Chapter 17. Here, we learn that when all-
night vigils (ღამის-თევათა) were served, they were preceded by the Liturgy
of the Hours on the previous day at the appointed times; the Divine Liturgy
was served at the Ninth Hour along with a Litany;63 the Litany “For peace
from on high” was said at every Divine Liturgy before the Trisagion; on
Sundays, the Trisagion was said six times during the Divine Liturgy;64 dur-

Sinai in the Byzantine Negev,” in Akten des XII. Internationales Kongresses für Christliche Ar-
chäologie, Bonn 22.-28. September 1991. 2 vols., eds. E. Dassmann, K. Thraede, J. Engemann,
Jahrbuch für Antike und Christentum. Ergänzungsband 20,1 (Münster: Aschendorff, 1995),
756-762. See also Y. Tsafrir, “The Maps Used by Theodosius: On the Pilgrim Maps of the Holy
Land and Jerusalem in the Sixth Century C.E.,” in DOP 40 (1986), 129-145; I. Roll, “Roads
and Transportation in the Holy Land in the Early Christian and Byzantine Times,” in Akten
des XII. Internationales Kongresses für Christliche Archäologie, 1166-1170.
59 Tarchnišvili, Geschichte, 154-174; Gil, History of Palestine, 451.
60 Георгій Мерчулъ, Житіе св. Григорія Хандзтійскаго. Грузинскій текстъ, ed. and trans.

N. Marr, Тексты и разысканія по армяно-грузинской филологіи 7 (St. Petersburg, 1911), 1-82

(Georgian text) and 83-151 (Russian translation); “Vita Gregorii Chandztensis,” in Titus: Old
Georgian Hagiographical Texts, vol. 1, part no. 102, http://titus.uni-frankfurt.de/texte/etcs/cauc/
ageo/gh/gh1/gh1.htm; P. Peeters, “Vie de S. Grégoire de Khandztha” in AB 36-37 (1917-1919),
207-309; “Gregory of Khandzta and the Georgian National Revival” in D. Marshall Lang, Lives
and Legends of the Georgian Saints (London: George Allen and Unwin Ltd, 1956), 134-153. For
more on Gregory Xanc‘teli, see E. Gabidzashvili, “Григорий Хандзтийский” in Православная
Энциклопедия, ed. Sergei L. Kravets (Moscow: Церковно-научный центр «Православная Эн-
циклопедия», 2006), vol. 13, 74-75.
61 Георгій Мерчулъ, Житіе св. Григорія Хандзтійскаго, 19 (chapter 12) and 97; Lang, Lives

and Legends, 145.

62 Георгій Мерчулъ, Житіе св. Григорія Хандзтійскаго, 20-21 (chapter 16 and 17) and 98-

100; Lang, Lives and Legends, 146.

63 “ჟამის-წირვაჲ ჟამსა ცხრა-ჟმისასა, და კუერექსთა შემატებაჲ.” Георгій Мерчулъ, Житіе

св. Григорія Хандзтійскаго, 21 (lines 22-23).

64 “ხოლო ჟამის-წირვასა ყოველსა ‘წმიდაო ღმერთოსა’ წინა კუერექსი ‘ზეცით გარდამოჲ,’
124 DANIEL GALADZA

ing the liturgical offering, vestments with fringe and fur were not permit-
ted; commemorative services for the dead were held on the third, seventh,
and fortieth day, as well as on the anniversary of death.65
From the eleventh century onwards, we have less information on Mar
Saba Lavra. Lazaros of Mount Galesion (d. 7 November 1053), an impor-
tant witness of church life in the Holy Land during the late-tenth/early-
eleventh century, became a monk at Mar Saba after reaching the Holy
Land between 990 and 993. During his time at the monastery, Lazaros was
canonarch (κανονάρχης), later assistant ecclesiarch (παρεκκλησιάρχης) and
also ordained to the priesthood.66 Lazaros was a witness of the rampage of
al-Ḥâkim in Jerusalem, but Mar Saba Lavra was spared destruction. With
the arrival of the Crusaders, the monks of Mar Saba had contact with both
the Crusaders and with Constantinople, although no register or archive
from Mar Saba has survived to give more information on these contacts.67

2.2 Liturgical Manuscripts Connected to Mar Saba Lavra

Despite the absence of an archive or a library at the monastery today,
we know that Mar Saba Lavra was an important scribal centre until the
Crusades. Reference to a calligrapher (καλλιγράφος), the Galatian monk
Eustathios,68 as well as numerous biblical and patristic citations in the
writings of Cyril of Skythopolis, suggest the presence of a significant li-
brary at St. Sabas already in the fifth century.69 The state of the library
before the fourteenth century is not well known, but at the beginning of the
eighteenth century two libraries, one on the south side of the monastery’s
Great Church and the other in the Tower of Justinian, existed at the monas-
tery and contained the books of the Lavra’s former Jerusalemite metochion
of the Archangels and books from monastic cells in the desert around Mar

და კჳრიაკეთა ჟამის-წირვასა ‘წმიდაო ღმერთოჲ’ ექუსი.” Георгій Мерчулъ, Житіе св. Григорія
Хандзтійскаго, 21 (lines 23-25).
65 Георгій Мерчулъ, Житіе св. Григорія Хандзтійскаго, 21 and 99; Lang, Lives and Leg-

ends, 148.
66 The Life of Lazaros of Mt. Galesion: An Eleventh-Century Pillar Saint, trans. R. P. H.

Greenfield (Washington, DC: Dumbarton Oaks, 2000), especially 94-99 and 172. See also A.-
M. Talbot, “Byzantine Pilgrimage to the Holy Land from the Eighth to the Fifteenth Century,”
in Patrich, Sabaite Heritage, 97-110, here 101.
67 The monks of Mar Saba sold the Latin Canons of the Holy Sepulchre some property in

1163/1164 which the Lavra had received from Queen Melisende. John IX Merkouropoulos,
Patriarch of Jerusalem (ca. 1157-1166), was a monk at Mar Saba before moving to Constanti-
nople. Based on the account of Lazaros of Mount Gelasion. See Gil, History of Palestine, 444;
MacEvitt, Rough Tolerance, 122 and 132-133.
68 Life of Sabas, Chapter 84, in Schwartz, Kyrillos von Skythopolis, 189.
69 Patrich, Sabas, 189-192.
 LITURGY AT THE GREAT LAVRA OF ST. SABAS 125

Saba. Many of the most valuable manuscripts and church objects were,
however, destroyed by fire during the middle of the eighteenth century.70
One of the earliest extant liturgical manuscripts connected to the Lavra
of Mar Saba is the ninth-century Horologion Sinai Gr. 863 studied by Juan
Mateos, with additional folios rediscovered by Stefano Parenti.71 The man-
uscript clearly identifies itself as an “Horologion according to the canon of
the Lavra of our holy father Sabas” (Ὡρολόγιον κατὰ τὸν κανόνα τῆς Λαύρας
τοῦ ἁγίου πατρὸς ἡμῶν Σάβα).72 A key characteristic of the Horologion, which
only includes services for weekdays, is that communion is received in the
evening in the context of Vespers without a celebration of the Divine Lit-
urgy. What other liturgical books do we have from Mar Saba Lavra?73

2.2.1. Typikon
After the Horologion, the liturgical book type most commonly associ-
ated with Mar Saba Lavra is its Typikon. Surprisingly, the oldest extant
copy of this manuscript dates to no earlier than the twelfth century and is
preserved in the manuscript Sinai Gr. 1096, a collection of various docu-
ments related to daily life at the Lavra of Mar Saba.74 The title of this codex

70 For a brief survey of the scribal production of the Lavra, see S. Vailhé, “Les écrivains

de Mar-Saba,” EO 2 (1898-1899), 1-11 and 33-47; A. Peristeris, “Literary and Scribal Activities
at the Monastery of St. Sabas,” in Patrich, Sabaite Heritage, 171-194, here 175-177. Another
manuscript copied at Mar Saba is Jerusalem Sabas Gr. 25 (10th c.), texts of St. John Chrysos-
tom. See L. Perria, Repertorio dei manoscritti greci di area orientale (palestino-sinaitica) (Mes-
sina: n.p., 2000), 19 and 26. For an index of scribes, see F. Euangelatou-Notara, ‘Σημειώματα’
ἑλληνικῶν κωδικῶν ὡς πηγὴ διὴ τὴν ἔρευναν τοῦ οἰκονομικοῦ καὶ κοινωνικοῦ βίου τοῦ βυζαντίου ἀπὸ τοῦ
9ου αἰώνος μέχρι τοῦ ἔτους 1204, Βιβλιοθήκη Σοφίας Ν. Σαριπόλου 47 (Athens: Ἐθνικὸν καὶ Καποδι-
στριακὸν Πανεπιστήμιον Ἀθηνῶν, Φιλοσοφικὴ Σχολή, 1982).
71 J. Mateos, “Un horologion inédit de Saint-Sabas. Le Codex sinaïtique grec 863 (IXe
siècle),” in Mélanges Eugène Tisserant, ST 233 (Vatican City: Biblioteca Apostolica Vaticana,
1964), vol. 3, 47-76; S. Parenti, “Un fascicolo ritrovato dell’horologion Sinai gr. 863 (IX seco-
lo),” OCP 75 (2009), 343-358; C. Lutzka, Die Kleinen Horen des byzantinischen Studengebetes
und ihre geschichtliche Entwicklung, Forum Orthodoxe Theologie 7 (Berlin, 20102), 41-52, es-
pecially 43-46; V. Rudeyko, Часослов за каноном лаври святого отця нашого Сави. Впровадження,
переклад, коментарі, forword by S. Parenti (Lviv: Видавництво Українського католицького
університету, 2016).
72 Mateos, “Un horologion inédit de Saint-Sabas,” 48. See also J. Mateos, “Quelques an-

ciens documents sur l’office du soir,” OCP 35 (1969), 347-374.

73 For Georgian manuscripts connected to Mar Saba Lavra, see Z. Skhirladze, “Georgian

Manuscripts in the Lavra of St. Sabas,” Mus 116:1-2 (2003), 217-231; S. S. R. Frøyshov, “The
Georgian Witness to the Jerusalem Liturgy: New Sources and Studies,” in Inquiries into East-
ern Christian Worship. Selected Papers of the Second International Congress of the Society of Ori-
ental Liturgy, Rome, 17-21 September 2008, eds. B. Groen, S. Hawkes-Teeples, S. Alexopoulos,
Eastern Christian Studies 12 (Leuven: Peeters, 2012), 227-267, here 254-259.
74 This manuscript was not photographed during the 1950 Sinai expedition of the Library

of Congress. Dmitrievskij’s description has been compared with the state of the manuscript
126 DANIEL GALADZA

is “Typikon of the Ecclesiastical Service in Jerusalem of the Holy Lavra of

Our Venerable and God-bearing Father Sabas” (Τυπικὸν τῆς ἐκκλησιαστικῆς
ἀκολουθίας τῆς ἐν Ἱερουσαλύμοις εὐαγοῦς λαύρας τοῦ ὁσίου θεοφόρου πατρὸς
ἡμῶν Σάββα).75 The manuscript’s 193 folios begin with a description of a
liturgical office characteristic of Sabaite monasticism — the vigil (ἀγρυ-
πνία, fol. 1r-10r), followed by various chapters regulating readings, times
of services, and other aspects of liturgical and daily life at the monastery
(fol. 10v-24v).
Of greatest interest here is the calendar of the liturgical Typikon (fol.
25r-129r), from 1 September until 31 August, with commemorations for
every day except 21 to 24 March.76 The commemorations are virtually iden-
tical to the calendar of the Great Church of Constantinople and Stoudite
Typika, and share few similarities with the calendar of Jerusalem preserved
in the Georgian lectionary of Jerusalem.77 A significant number of days in
the year are days of “Alleluia” that had a penitential character and followed
what we would consider a “Lenten” liturgical order without the celebra-
tion of the Eucharist. The local character of this calendar is highlighted
by the presence of numerous Sabaite saints in the sanctoral. The constant
addition of hymnography to St. Sabas (Περὶ τῶν παρασκευῶν καὶ σαββάτων,
fol. 19r),78 even beyond his feast and the unique octave surrounding it (fol.
55r),79 and the frequent processions to the tomb of St. Sabas and other
specific chapels of the Lavra during the all-night vigil at the end of both
Vespers and Matins, also make it clear that this Typikon was intended to
be used at Mar Saba Lavra.80 The remainder of the manuscript contains,
among other things, the “Founder’s Typikon” of the Lavra of St. Sabas (Τύ-

as observed in July 2012, when the total number of extant folios was 193, as opposed to 185
described by Dmitrievskij. See Dmitrievskij III, 20-65. For the earliest Georgian and Syriac
versions, namely Sinai Syr. 129 (A.D. 1255) and Sinai Syr. 136 (13th c.), see A. Pentkovsky,
“Иерусалимский типикон в Константинополе в Палеологовский период,” Журнал Москов-
ской Патриархии (May 2003:5), 77-87, especially 85.
75 Dmitrievskij III, 20.
76 Ibid., 28-55.
77 See M. Tarchnischvili, Le grand lectionnaire de l’Église de Jérusalem (Ve-VIIIe siècle),

CSCO 188/Iber.9, 189/Iber.10 and 204/Iber.13, 205/Iber.14 (Leuven: Secrétariat du CSCO,

1959-1960); J. Mateos, Le Typicon de la Grande Église. Ms. Sainte-Croix nº 40, Xe siècle, 2 vols.,
OCA 165-166 (Rome: Pontificio Istituto Orientale, 1962-1963); A. Pentkovsky, Типикон патри-
арха Алексия Студита в Византии и на Руси (Moscow: Издательство Московской Патриархии,
2001).
78 Dmitrievskij III, 26.
79 Ibid., 34-35.
80 Ibid., 21-22 and 24-25.
 LITURGY AT THE GREAT LAVRA OF ST. SABAS 127

πος καὶ παράδοσις καὶ νόμος τῆς σεβασμίας λαύρας τοῦ ἁγίου Σάββα, fol. 148r-
149v).81
The influence of the Sabaite Typikon spread to other monasteries, such
as the monastery on Mount Sinai, as evidenced by the second-oldest extant
dated Greek manuscript known to have been produced on Mount Sinai,
manuscript Sinai Gr. 1097 (A.D. 1214), which, according to Alexei Dmit-
rievskij, represents a Sinaitic redaction of the Typikon.82

2.2.2. Euchologion
In order to serve the Divine Liturgy, monks at Mar Saba would need to
have an Euchologion or some other book which contained the text of the
Anaphora and a eucharistic formulary. Based on what is known from the
earliest such manuscripts from Mar Saba — all of them in Georgian — the
Eucharistic Liturgy celebrated there was the Liturgy of St. James.83 A note
at the end of the Liturgy of St. James in Sinai Geo. O. 53 (9th-10th c.) notes

81 This last work was edited separately by Dmitrievskij and was later included in the

Dumbarton Oaks series on monastic foundation documents. See E. Kurtz, “Review of A. Dmit-
rijevskij, ‘Die Klosterregeln des hl. Sabbas’ (russ.), Arbeiten (Trudy) des kiewischen Geistli-
chen Akademie (Januar 1890), 170-192,” BZ 3 (1894), 168-170; Dmitrievskij I, 222-224; Fiac-
cadori, “Sabas Founder’s Typikon,” 1311-1318.
82 “Τυπικὸν κατὰ τὸν τύπον τῆς λαύρας τοῦ ὁσίου πατρὸς ἡμῶν Σάββα τῆς ἐν Ἱεροσολύμοις

μονῆς, οἰκονομηθὲν καὶ ἀφιερωθὲν τῇ πανσέπτῳ καὶ ἁγίᾳ μονῇ τῆς ὑπεραγίας Θεοτόκου, τῆς ἐν
τῷ ἁγίῳ ὄρει Σινᾶ ἱδρυμένης, ἐν ᾗ τετίμηται καὶ ὁ θεόπτης μέγας προφήτης Μωϋσῆς, ἐπεκτίσθη δὲ
ἐκ προστάξεως τοῦ ἐν ταύτῃ ἀρχιερατεύοντος τοῦ παναγιωτάτου καὶ οὐρανοπολίτου πατρὸς ἡμῶν
μοναχοῦ κυροῦ Συμεών. Μηνὶ Φευρουαρίῳ ἰνδικτιῶνος β´, ἔτους ͵ςψκβ´.” fol. 5r; Dmitrievskij
III, 394; Ševçenko, “Manuscript Production,” 241; ead., “Typikon,” 275 and 284. Nancy P.
Ševçenko’s comments regarding this manuscript are preliminary in anticipation of a com-
plete study of the entire manuscript. The manuscript contains a “Short Description of Church
Order of the Monasteries in Jerusalem” (Ἔκφρασις ἐν ἐπιτομῇ ἐκκλησιαστικῆς διατάξεως τῶν
ἐν Ἱεροσολύμοις μοναστηρίων, fol. 25v-33r), which is a description of how the psalter is read
during various liturgical services. Dmitrievskij III, 394-419, here 403; G. Parpulov, Toward
a History of Byzantine Psalters ca. 850-1350 AD (Plovdiv: n.p., 2014), 94-102. A calendar for
the year, entitled “Service of the Ecclesiastical Psalmody of the Whole Year” (Ἀκολουθία τῆς
ἐκκλησιαστικῆς ψαλμῳδίας τοῦ ὅλου ἐνιαυτοῦ, fol. 67r-138v), occupies the remainder of the
manuscript. Here the Typikon contains both Constantinopolitan commemorations that be-
came universally accepted within the Byzantine Rite as well as local commemorations proper
to Sinai, such as the feast of the Prophet Moses (4 September), St. Catherine (24 November),
the martyred Monks at Sinai and Raithou (14 January), and the earthquake of 1201 (1 May).
Some of these, such as the feast of the Prophet Moses and the earthquake, were celebrated
solemnly and had prefeasts. It should be noted that the folio numbering cited by Dmitrievskij
does not match the current folio numbering on the manuscript, as witnessed in the microfilm
at the Library of Congress.
83 For more on the Euchologion of Jerusalem and Palestine, see H. Brakmann and T.

Chronz, “Ist das Jerusalemer Euchologion noch zu retten?” Archiv für Liturgiewissenschaft
54 (2012), 1-28.
128 DANIEL GALADZA

that the manuscript, written in asomtavruli script, was copied at Mar Saba:
“This liturgy was written at the Lavra of St. Sabas by the hand of Ambakum
Turmaneuli and whoever you are, pray when you use it” (fol. 35r). After
the Liturgy of St. James, which is given in its longer version, the rest of
the manuscript contains New Testament readings, psalms, and troparia
specific to the Liturgy of St. James.84
Other Euchologia manuscripts show that Mar Saba and other Palestin-
ian monasteries were not isolated from the sacramental life of the Church.
We know from other sources that rites, such as baptism, also took place
at monasteries.85 The ninth- or tenth-century manuscript Sinai Geo. N. 58,
labelled as a “liturgical collection,” contains the short version of the Lit-
urgy of St. James (fol. 1v-46v), followed by scriptural readings according
to the Jerusalem lectionary for various commemorations. Its calendar of
feasts for the liturgical year (fol. 59r-69r) is similar to that of Iovane Zosime
found in Sinai Geo. O. 34 (10th c.). Stéphane Verhelst has speculated that
this calendar may be the “Jerusalem” source used by Zosime for his own
calendar, which he compiled based on four different sources.86 The last
section of the manuscript contains prayers from the Euchologion, includ-
ing a funeral rite and prayers for the dead “according to the order [განგება,
gangeba] of St. Sabas Lavra” (fol. 69v-85v).87
Despite the contextual evidence placing Greek on a pedestal as the pri-
mary liturgical language of Mar Saba, we have no extant Euchologion in
Greek that is clearly Sabaite. The closest possible witness of a Greek Eu-
chologion from Mar Saba is the “Archimedes Palimpsest” Euchologion,
whose text was written over a lost text of Archimedes in 1229 and is held
today in the collection of the Walters Art Gallery in Baltimore, Maryland.88
Stefano Parenti has noted that, even if the manuscript was “palimpsested”
at Mar Saba Lavra, there are few signs that it was intended for use at the
Lavra, particularly because its litanies mention “this city” (ὑπὲρ τῆς πόλεως
ταύτης) and its rites include prayers related to child birth and marriage —

84 S. Verhelst, Liturgia Ibero-Graeca Sancti Iacobi. Editio, translatio, retroversio, commen-

tarii, Jerusalemer Theologisches Forum 17 (Münster: Aschendorff, 2011), 20-21.

85 M. Ben-Pechat, “Baptism and Monasticim in the Holy Land: Archaeological and Liter-

ary Evidence,” in Christian Archaeology in the Holy Land, 501-522; Perrone, “Monasticism,” 80.
86 S. Verhelst, Le lectionnaire de Jérusalem. Ses traditions judéo-chrétiennes et son histoire

suivant l’index des péricopes évangeliques, conclu par le sanctoral du Sin. géo. 58 novus, Spi-
cilegii Friburgensis Subsidia 24 (Freiburg: Academic Press Fribourg, 2012), 231 and 233-245
(edition and translation).
87 Aleksidze et al., Sinai Georgian New Finds Catalogue, 417-418; Liturgia Ibero-Graeca

Sancti Iacobi, 18-19.

88 See www.archimedespalimpsest.org; http://pinakes.irht.cnrs.fr/notices/cote/8838/
 LITURGY AT THE GREAT LAVRA OF ST. SABAS 129

rites that are not foreign to later Euchologia copied at monasteries, but
nevertheless are not characteristic of a monastic context.89

2.2.3. Lectionary
One of the most distinctive liturgical books of the Jerusalem Patriar-
chate is the lectionary, with its unique pericope order from at least the fifth
century preserved in Armenian, Georgian, and Greek manuscripts.90 As al-
ready noted, no liturgical manuscripts from this early period are known to
originate at Mar Saba. Lidia Perria speculates that the bilingual Greek-Ar-
abic Epistle lectionary, Sinai Gr. NE ΜΓ 2 (9th c.), may have been copied at
Mar Saba or Bethlehem.91 Because of the liturgical limitations imposed on
the various linguistic communities at Mar Saba, Arabic liturgical texts are
generally limited to lectionaries, such as the New Testament codex Vatican
Ar. 13 (9th c.), which was probably copied and used among Arabic-praying
monks at Mar Saba Lavra.92 Several eleventh- and twelfth-century Greek
lectionaries were acquired from Mar Saba Lavra in 1834 by Lord Robert
Curzon, and these manuscripts are now in the collection of the British Li-
brary.93 Although these manuscripts were kept at Mar Saba Lavra until the
nineteenth century, there is little to connect them to the liturgical practice

89 S. Parenti, “La tradizione liturgica dell’eucologio ‘di Archimede Pitagorico’” in Id., A

Oriente e occidente di Costantinopoli. Temi e problemi liturgici di ieri e di oggi, Monumenta

Studia Instrumenta Liturgica 54 (Vatican City: Libreria Editrice Vaticana, 2010), 137-145,
especially 135-137; G. Radle, “The Rite of Marriage in the Archimedes Euchology & Sinai gr.
973 (a. 1152/3), Scripta & e-Scripta 12 (2013), 187-199.
90 See A. Renoux, Le Codex Arménien Jérusalem 121, vol. 2: Édition comparée du texte et de

deux autres manuscrits, PO 168 (36.2) (Turnhout : Brepols, 1971). For the use of the Jerusalem
lectionary pericope order as a criterion for determining the provenance of a liturgical manu-
script, see C. Renoux, Le lectionnaire albanien des manuscrits géorgiens palimpsestes N Sin 13
et N Sin 55 (Xe-XIe siècle). Essai d’interprétation liturgique, PO 234 (52.4) (Turnhout: Brepols,
2012); D. Galadza, “Sources for the Study of Liturgy in Post-Byzantine Jerusalem (638-1187
CE),” DOP 67 (2013), 75-94.
91 Perria, Repertorio, 34.
92 F. D’Aiuto, “Graeca in codici orientali della Biblioteca Vaticana,” in Tra oriente e oc-

cidente, ed. L. Perria, Testi e studi bizantino-neoellenici 14 (Rome: Università degli Studi di
Roma “La Sapienza”. Istituto di studi bizantini e neoellenici, 2003), 227-296, here 241-245 and
tab. 1-3; J. Blau, “A Melkite Arabic Literary ‘lingua franca’ from the Second Half of the First
Millennium,” Bulletin of the School of Oriental and African Studies (University of London) 57
(1994), 14-16; H. Kashouh, The Arabic Versions of the Gospels: The Manuscripts and their Fami-
lies, Arbeiten zur Neutestamentlichen Textforschung 42 (Berlin: De Gruyter, 2012), 143 n. 37.
93 The manuscripts in question are London BL Add 39598 (A.D. 1009), a Praxapostolos;

London BL Add. 39587 (11th-12th c.), a Psalter with biblical odes; London BL Add. 39595 (12th-
13th c.), a Tetraevangelion; London BL Add. 39604 (12th-13th c.), an Evangelion; London BL
Add. 39597 (A.D. 1271/1272), a Tetraevangelion; and London BL Add. 39591 (13th-14th c.), a
Tetraevangelion. Perria, Repertorio, 34, 45, 49, 54, 55, 57, and 58-59.
130 DANIEL GALADZA

of Mar Saba and there is no proof that they were used there in the elev-
enth or twelfth century. The same is the case for other manuscripts that
remained in Palestine, such as Jerusalem Greek Orthodox Patriarchate Gr.
218 (12th-13th c.), a standard Byzantine Tetraevangelion.94
One of the most important Greek lectionaries from Jerusalem, Sinai
Gr. 210 (A.D. 861/862), may have been copied at Mar Saba Lavra. On the
verso of one of its folios found in the Sinai “new finds,” Sinai Gr. Ν.Ε. Σπ.
ΜΓ 12, there is a damaged inscription,95 which Linos Politis suggested once
included the name of the monastery of Mar Saba.96 Other palaeographers
have accepted this conclusion, since this Gospel lectionary “represents the
Palestinian textual tradition by its content, and also serves as an important
witness of a larger group of Palestinian-Sinaitic codices” written in char-
acteristic Palestinian uncial script, through its script and binding.97 One of
the characteristics of this lectionary is that it is faithful to the Jerusalem
pericope order, but unlike the Armenian or Georgian lectionaries of Jerusa-
lem, does not indicate the location of any liturgical stations, either in Jeru-
salem or elsewhere in Palestine. Later Greek lectionaries, such as Princeton
University Library, Garrett 3 (A.D. 1135/1136), a Gospel lectionary copied
at Mar Saba at the behest of John, steward (οἰκονόμος) and guest master
(ξενοδόχος) of the monastery, reflects the Byzantine pericope order.98

2.2.4. Hymnal
Several hymnals — both Greek and Georgian — also originate at Mar
Saba Lavra. The “Parchment-Papyrus Iadgari,” Tbilisi H2123 (9th-10th c.),
was copied at St. Sabas Lavra in Palestine, where it remained until 1850.
It was later taken by Porphyri Uspensky to St. Petersburg and then trans-

94 Papadopoulos-Kerameus, Ἱεροσολυμιτικὴ Βιβλιοθήκη, vol. 4, 188-189.

95 D. Harlfinger, D. R. Reinsch, and J. A. M. Sonderkamp, with G. Prato, Specimina Sinait-
ica. Die datierten griechischen Handschriften des Katharinen-Klosters auf dem Berge Sinai. 9. bis
12. Jahrhundert (Berlin: Dietrich Reimer Verlag, 1983), 13. For more on this manuscript see
Galadza, Liturgy and Byzantinization in Jerusalem, 361-363; E. Velkovska, “Sinai Chest I and
the Collections of Sinai Fragments of James Rendell Harris,” BBGG III s. 10 (2013), 223-252.
96 L. Politis, “Nouveau manuscrits grecs découverts au Mont Sinai,” Scriptorium 34

(1980), 5-17, here 10-11.

97 “Wie dem auch sei, unser Evangelienlektionar ist nicht nur inhaltlich ein Vertreter der

palästinesischen Texttradition…, sondern auch in Schrift und Buch ein wichtiger Zeuge einer
größeren Gruppe von palästinensisch-sinaitischen Codices in rechtsgeneigter Spitzbogenma-
juskel...” Harlfinger et al., Specimina Sinaitica, 14. For more on manuscripts of this script,
see L. Perria, “Scritture e codici di origine orientale (Palestina, Sinai) dal IX al XIII secolo.
Rapporto preliminare”, in RSBN 36 (1999), 19-33, especially 23-24.
98 See the colophon on fol. 260r and the index of pericopes on fol. 261r-276v; Jerusalem,

1000-1400: Every People Under Heaven, 91.

 LITURGY AT THE GREAT LAVRA OF ST. SABAS 131

ferred in 1923 to Tbilisi.99 As Charles Renoux observes, this manuscript has

fewer hymns prescribed for liturgical services than other Iadgari manu-
scripts. The difference here lies not in the fact that this manuscript is older,
since it does include “other” (სხუანი, sxuani) hymns, equivalent to ἄλλη
in Greek books, but because it reflects a monastic rite different from that
of the Church of the Anastasis in Jerusalem, for which the other Iadgari
manuscripts were written. Charles Renoux has identified eight main differ-
ences between the Sabaite Iadgari and other Iadgari manuscripts, the most
significant for our interests here being fewer processions at Mar Saba, less
frequent celebration of the Eucharist, and, in general, a distinct rite from
the Church of the Anastasis in Jerusalem.100 Stig Frøyshov has pointed out
that there is actually no explicit indication in this manuscript that it is from
Mar Saba Lavra, but nevertheless he finds Renoux’s observations tenable.101
A Greek Triodion from the end of the eleventh century has a surer con-
nection to Mar Saba. Copied on 25 January A.D. 1099 in the brief period of
renewed Fatimid control of Jerusalem after the Seljuks were driven out in
August 1098 and before the Crusaders captured the Holy City in June 1099,
the two codices Sinai Gr. 741 and Sinai Gr. 742 contain a Triodion that is
the oldest dated, extant Greek liturgical manuscript copied at Mar Saba
Lavra.102 Of particular note is the first Sunday of Lent (μνήμη τῶν ἁγίων
προφητῶν Μωϋσέως καὶ Ἀαρὼν καὶ τῶν λοιπῶν, Sinai Gr. 741, fol. 86v-91r),
which is not identified as the “Sunday of Orthodoxy” but retains the more
ancient Constantinopolitan commemoration of Moses and Aaron. The
Fifth Week of Lent (fol. 27r-71r) includes the Great Canon of St. Andrew of
Crete, but the end of the Sixth Week (fol. 82v-102v) makes no mention of
Hyperthesis. The two manuscripts do not include any scriptural readings
and contain primarily the hymnography composed by Theodore Stoudite,
and later revised by Joseph the Hymnographer (d. ca. 886) and Clement
Stoudite (9th c.),103 generally ordered according to its genre — kathismata,

99 ჭილ-ეტრატის იადგარი [Çil-etratis iadgari, Papyrus-Parchment Iadgari], eds. A.

Shanidze, A. Martirosov, A. Dzishiashvili (Tbilisi: Мецниереба, 1977). For a description of

the manuscript, see ჭილ-ეტრატის იადგარი, 213-219; B. Outtier, “Review of Le Iadgari sur
papyrus et parchemin, A. Chanidzé et al. (Tbilissi 1977),” Bedi Kartlisa 37 (1979), 336-341;
C. Renoux, L’hymnaire de Saint-Sabas (Ve-VIIIe siècle): Le manuscrit géorgien H 2123, vol. 1: Du
Samedi de Lazare à la Pentecôte, PO 224 (50.3) (Turnhout: Brepols, 2008), 249-250.
100 Renoux, L’hymnaire de Saint-Sabas, 251-257.
101 Frøyshov, “The Georgian Witness to the Jerusalem Liturgy,” 259.
102 Harlfinger et al., Specimina Sinaitica, 37-39 and tab. 83-87; Perria, Repertorio, 18, 26,

and 49. Gabriel Bertonière has studied this Triodion in his work on the Sundays of Lent, but
the content of the manuscripts has never been completely described. See G. Bertonière, The
Sundays of Lent in the Triodion: The Sundays Without a Commemoration, OCA 253 (Rome:
Pontificio Istituto Orientale, 1997), 162.
103 “ἀρχὴς σῦν Θεῷ τοῦ Τριωδίου τῆς ἁγίας μ´ καὶ μετὰ Χριστὸν τὸν Κυρίον· ποίημα Ἰωσὴφ καὶ
132 DANIEL GALADZA

stichera, or canons — so that the structure of the service within which the
hymns were sung is unclear.104 Overall, the two manuscripts witness to an
early stage in the development of the Triodion book type that is already
highly Byzantinized.105
A comparison of the Greek and Georgian hymnals reveals several no-
table differences. First, the hymnography for the commemorations found
in both sources is significantly different. For example, the Troparion or oxi-
tay in the two hymnals is different and common Greek hymns, such as the
Sticheron “Today the grace of the Holy Spirit has gathered us together…”
(Σήμερον ἡ χάρις τοῦ ἁγίου πνεύματος ἡμᾶς συνήγαγεν…), are absent from
the Georgian Sabaite Iadgari. Second, the Georgian book includes hym-
nography crucial for the proper celebration of the Liturgy of St. James,
namely the Troparion at the entrance into the church (ოხითაჲ, oxitay), the
Hymn for Hand Washing (ჴელთაბანისაჲ, ẋelt‘abanisay), and the Hymn of
the Holy Gifts (სიწმიდისაჲ, sicmidisay) at the transfer of the Gifts.106 Not
only are these all absent from the Greek Sabaite Triodion, but the Triodion
manuscript makes no reference at all to the Divine Liturgy, let alone to
Troparia and Kontakia to be sung during its celebration. Although the two
hymnals are supposedly copied within a century of one another and used
at Mar Saba Lavra, they represent two very distinct liturgical traditions.107

Θεοδώρου.” Sinai Gr. 741, fol. 4r; A. Kazhdan, D. E. Conomos, and N. Patterson Ševçenko,
“Joseph the Hymnographer,” in ODB II, 1074. For more on Clement (Κλήμης) Stoudite, see
Prosopographie der mittelbyzantinischen Zeit. 2. Abteilung (867-1025), ed. F. Winkelmann et al.
(Berlin: De Gruyter, 2013), no. 23705.
104 Occasionally rubrics for some stichera prescribe them “for the morning” (τῷ πρωΐ, i.e.

for Orthros). On Fridays, an exception is made to this order: the Sticheron of the Triodion for
Vespers — presumably the Liturgy of the Presanctified Gifts — is included after the Ninth Ode
of the Canon, apart from the other Stichera. Kontakia are not included in the Canon after the
Sixth Ode and Troparia at “The Lord is God” (Θεὸς Κύριος) are sometimes labelled as “Kathis-
mata at ‘The Lord is God’” (καθίσματα εἰς τὸν Θεὸς Κύριος). For more on the classification of
Triodion manuscripts and further comparison, see A. J. Quinlan, Sin. Gr. 734-735 (Newberry
Springs, CA: n.p., 2004).
105 M. Momina, “О происхождении греческой триоди,” Палестинский Сборник 28 (91)

(1986), 112-119, here 118.

106
See, for example Renoux, L’hymnaire de Saint-Sabas, 317-318, for the hymns at the
Divine Liturgy on Palm Sunday. Many of these are the same as those found in Tarchnischvili,
Le grand lectionnaire de l’Église de Jérusalem, par. 586-595. For more on these hymns, see D.
Galadza, Liturgy and Byzantinization in Jerusalem, 202-209.
107 Other hymnals from Mar Saba include Sinai Geo. O. 40 (10th c.), copied by Symeon

the Hymnographer at the order of Theodore of Palavra at St. Sabas Lavra (fol. 253r), but
later acquired by Presbyter Gregory of Sinai (fol. 253v-254r) after the exodus of Georgians
from Palestine to Sinai in the decade after 960. See C. Renoux, Hymnes de la Résurrection
II. Hymnographie liturgique géorgienne. Texte des manuscrits Sinaï 40, 41 et 34, PO 231 (52.1)
(Turnhout: Brepols 2010), 8-10. Jerusalem, Greek Orthodox Patriarchate Gr. 353 (A.D. 1580),
an Anthologion of hymns from the Menaion, Triodion, and Pentekostarion, was also copied
 LITURGY AT THE GREAT LAVRA OF ST. SABAS 133

3. Liturgical Contexts: Christological Controversies and Byzantinization

Allow me to summarize the main differences between these liturgical
sources, as they relate to the development of liturgy at Mar Saba Lavra and
the Byzantine Rite in general. The earliest hagiographic evidence points
to a Eucharistic celebration on Saturdays and Sundays, which is also con-
firmed by the Georgian hymnal. Eucharistic celebrations on weekdays
were less frequent. The Eucharistic liturgy that they would have celebrated
would have been that of St. James, based on extant Euchologia and ac-
companying hymnals with propers specific to the Liturgy of St. James.108
Early manuscripts confirm the lectionary used at Mar Saba was similar to
the Jerusalem lectionary and its hymnography was appropriate for the cel-
ebration of the Liturgy of St. James. By the twelfth century, Greek Sabaite
manuscripts prescribe the Liturgy of St. John Chrysostom or St. Basil the
Great, and the calendar and hymnography is similar to that of Constanti-
nople and the Byzantine Rite. This is summarized in the following table:

Euchologion Horologion Lectionary Hymnal Typikon

Pre-8th c. Eucharist on Sat. and Vigils from ? ? ?

Sun. Sat. to Sun.

9th c. Liturgy of St. James Fasting on Jerusalem Similar to ?

weekdays lectionary, Iadgari,
but without Liturgy of St.
stations James still
celebrated

10th c. Liturgy of St. James, Similar to ?

particular funeral rite Iadgari,
Liturgy of St.
James still
celebrated

11th c. Byzantine Similar to ?

lectionary Byzantine
Rite

at Mar Saba. See Papadopoulos-Kerameus, Ἱεροσολυμιτικὴ Βιβλιοθήκη, vol. 4, 328. For parallels
between marriage rites in Greek and Georgian manuscripts from Palestine, see G. Radle, “Un-
covering the Alexandrian Greek Rite of Marriage: The Liturgical Evidence of Sinai NF/MG 67
(9th/10th c.),” Ecclesia orans 28 (2011), 49-73.
108 This is also confirmed by the statement of Theodore Balsamon in Constantinople:

“… πρῶτος ὁ ἅγιος Ἰάκωβος ὁ ἀδελφόθεος ὡς πρῶτος ἀρχιερατεύσας τῆς Ἱεροσολυμιτῶν Ἐκκλησίας

παρέδωκε τὴν θείαν ἱεροτελεστίαν, ἥτις παρ᾽ ἡμῖν ἀγνοεῖται, παρὰ δὲ τοῖς Ἱεροσωλυμίταις καὶ τοῖς
Παλαιστιναίοις ἐνεργεῖται ἐν ταῖς μεγάλαις ἑορταῖς.” Theodore Balsamon, Canones Sanctorum
Patrum qui in Trullo Imperialis Palatii Constantinopoli Convenerunt, PG 137:621B.
134 DANIEL GALADZA

Euchologion Horologion Lectionary Hymnal Typikon

12th c. Liturgies of Chrysos- Byzantine Liturgies of

tom/Basil/Presancti- lectionary Chrysostom/
fied Gifts Basil/Pre-
sanctified
Gifts, Byz-
antine calen-
dar, Vigils

How are we to explain the peculiarities of, and differences between, the
liturgical manuscripts from Mar Saba Lavra outlined above? Two main
factors help to answer this question.
Christological controversies swept Palestine from the fifth century and
continued in the sixth and seventh centuries with the Origenist Contro-
versies.109 Attempts by Byzantine emperors to reconcile Chalcedonian and
non-Chalcedonian Christological positions through compromise led to
more disputes in Palestine. Origenism, which spread in the fifth and sixth
centuries, was in reality a broad label in Palestine that could also denote a
spiritual tradition of individual monastic contemplation.110 The close prox-
imity between Jerusalem and the monasteries of the Palestinian desert had
an impact on debates within Palestinian monasticism regarding Christo-
logical controversies in the sixth and seventh centuries. The main goal of
the Life of Euthymios and the Life of Sabas — to portray the organization
of the powerful movement of Chalcedonian monasticism in the Judean
wilderness111 — makes it easy to forget the strong opposition to Chalce-
don, as well as certain Origenist leanings, among groups of Palestinian
monks in the fifth and sixth centuries.112 The ensuing “crisis of empire” in

109 For a chronology of Christological and Origenist controversies at Mar Saba Lavra, see

Patrich, Sabas, 331-348.

110 For a discussion of the nature of Origenism in Palestine during this period, see Andrew

Louth, “The Collectio Sabaitica and Sixth-Century Origenism,” in Origeniana Octava: Origen
and the Alexandrian Tradition. Papers of the 8th International Origen Congress, Pisa, 27-31 Au-
gust 2001, 2 vols., ed. L. Perrone, Bibliotheca Ephemeridum Theologicarum Lovaniensium
164 (Leuven: Peeters, 2003), vol. 2, 1167-1175; T. E. Gregory, “Origen,” in ODB III, 1534;
Booth, Crisis of Empire, 18-22.
111 B. Flusin, “Palestinian Hagiography (Fourth-Eighth Centuries)” in The Ashgate Re-

search Companion to Byzantine Hagiography, vol. 1: Periods and Places, ed. S. Efthymiadis
(Burlington, VT: Ashgate, 2011), 199-226, here 210.
112 L. Perrone, La chiesa di Palestina e le controversie cristologiche: dal concilio di Efeso

(431) al secondo concilio di Costantinopoli (553) (Brescia: Paideia, 1980), 89-202; C. B. Horn,
Asceticism and Christological Controversy in Fifth-Century Palestine: The Career of Peter the
Iberian (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2006); A. Kofsky, “What Happened to the Monophy-
site Monasticism of Gaza?” in Christian Gaza in Late Antiquity, eds. B. Bitton-Ashkelony, A.
Kofsky, Jerusalem Studies in Religion and Culture 3 (Leiden: Brill, 2004), 183-194.
 LITURGY AT THE GREAT LAVRA OF ST. SABAS 135

the seventh century, in the fallout from Chalcedon and the Arab conquest
of vast tracts of Byzantine territory, resulted in a new monastic ideologi-
cal program promoted by John Moschos, Sophronios of Jerusalem, and
Maximos Confessor who saw the role of the monk at the service of the
Church and as an active participant in its sacramental life — rather than
as an aloof hermit in the Judean wilderness — who refused to contemplate
compromise or communion with heretics and excluded the emperor from
religious narratives.113
Despite the involvement of Sabaite monks in the sacramental and in-
stitutional life of the Church, former rifts regarding Christology within
the Jerusalem Patriarchate were still visible in liturgical sources, such as
the Georgian Lectionary of Jerusalem. According to Stéphane Verhelst,
Euthymian and Sabaite monastic foundations are not found among the
liturgical stations and were excluded from the stational liturgy of Jerusa-
lem. Verhelst proposes that these monasteries were excluded because of
their defence of Chalcedonian Christology or opposition to Monotheletism
and Origenism endorsed at the Patriarchate in Jerusalem at the time.114
Such exclusion from the Holy City’s stational liturgy affected the liturgi-
cal calendar of the Euthymian and Sabaite monasteries and provided an
opportunity for those monasteries to distinguish themselves by developing
liturgical practices that were different from those of the cathedral of Jeru-
salem. From the earliest liturgical books from Mar Saba until the twelfth
century, we have no complete extant liturgical calendars. Instead, books
containing generic propers have been preserved that allow the commemo-
ration of feasts and saints to be celebrated with common texts, rather than
specific hymns and readings. Many of these hymns and readings are found
in appendices to Georgian liturgical books, dubbed “liturgical collections”
(ლიტურგიკული კრებული, liturgikuli krebuli), also containing the Liturgy
of St. James.115
By the time of the earliest complete liturgical calendar from Mar Saba
Lavra in the Typikon Sinai Gr. 1096 of the twelfth century, we find a dif-
ferent situation. The Eucharistic liturgies prescribed for Mar Saba Lavra
are by now the standard Byzantine liturgies of St. John Chrysostom, St.
Basil the Great, and the Presanctified Gifts, the hymns — at least for the

113 Booth, Crisis of Empire, 338. Despite poor contacts with Constantinople — which

Moshe Gil claims based on the silence of sources — Mar Saba Lavra had good relations with
Rome, appealing to the Lateran Council of 649 to fight Monotheletism. Gil, History of Pales-
tine, 434.
114 S. Verhelst, “Les lieux de station du lectionnaire de Jérusalem. Ière partie: les villages et

fondations,” POC 54 (2004), 13-70, here 58-59.

115 Liturgia Ibero-Graeca Sancti Iacobi, 29-31.
136 DANIEL GALADZA

Divine Liturgy — are virtually the same as those from the Constantinopoli-
tan Typikon of the Great Church, and the calendar has an entry for almost
every day of the year. Virtually no remnants of Hagiopolite liturgical prac-
tice survive and the calendar is identical to that of Constantinople, with a
few local peculiarities, such as the veneration of St. Sabas with an octave
in December and hymnography dedicated to the founding saint included
throughout services. This change can be explained by the phenomenon
of Byzantinization. Following the Christological controversies of the sixth
century, the Sabaites’ negative view of the imperial capital and the emperor
changed drastically in Palestine after the victory over Constantinopolitan
Iconoclasm and increased persecution of Christians by Muslim rulers.116
Sabaite monks had greater contact with Constantinople and some, such as
John Merkouropoulos, became patriarchs of Jerusalem living in Constan-
tinopolitan exile.117 The Georgian monk Iovane Zosime’s familiarity with
many different calendars in the tenth century — among them Sabaite cal-
endars and others from beyond Palestine — suggests he witnessed the slow
evolution of Sabaite liturgy in the tenth century, before the form we know
from the twelfth century.118
By abandoning the local Hagiopolite foundation of their liturgical prac-
tices and, as a result of Christological controversies and other theological
conflicts, replacing them with a Byzantinized rite similar to that of Con-
stantinople, the Sabaite monks did not introduce any doctrinal changes to
their liturgy.119 Did they align their liturgy more closely with the liturgy of
Constantinople because they saw the capital of the Byzantine Empire as
a guarantor of orthodoxy after Iconoclasm and a place of prestige, or was
it simply part of the evolution of what we now call the Byzantine Rite?120

4. Preliminary Conclusions
Returning to where I began this paper, scholars have often made hy-
potheses about liturgy at St. Sabas Lavra without having all the facts. Is

116 Abbot Peter of Mar Saba was also sent to the Seventh Ecumenical Council in Nicaea

in 787. Jonas, the father of the Graptoi brothers Theodore and Theophanes, became a monk
at Mar Saba. Monks from Mar Saba were sent as part of a delegation to Charlemagne in 799.
See Gil, History of Palestine, 286 and 457-459.
117 F. Spingou, “John IX Patriarch of Jerusalem in Exile: A Holy Man from Mar Saba to St

Diomedes/New Zion,” BZ 109 (2016), 179-206.

118 Garitte, Calendrier palestino-géorgien, 114.
119 See D. Galadza, “Various Orthodoxies: Feasts of the Incarnation of Christ in Jerusalem

in the First Christian Millennium,” in Prayer and Worship in Eastern Christianities, 5th to 11th
Centuries, eds. D. Krueger, B. Bitton-Ashkelony (Farnham: Ashgate, 2017), 181-209.
120 See D. Galadza, Liturgy and Byzantinization in Jerusalem, 138-139.
 LITURGY AT THE GREAT LAVRA OF ST. SABAS 137

this a problem? Of course, but only if we refuse to test the hypotheses again
and again. As a senior liturgical scholar who will remain nameless once
mentioned in a private conversation, the idea of the Stoudite and Sabaite
synthesis is based on good intuitions, even if they are not always grounded
in a sufficient pool of data. Thus, the hypothesis of the Stoudite and Sa-
baite synthesis is the best we have now and remains so, until it is proved
wrong, based on closer examination of sources.
An analysis of the hagiographical texts and liturgical manuscripts as-
sociated with Mar Saba suggests the following conclusions to consider in
further studies of Sabaite liturgy:
1. Just as with any liturgical centre where liturgy is regularly celebrated,
Mar Saba had its own complete system of liturgical prayer, which was codi-
fied in Euchologia, Lectionaries, Hymnals, Horologia, and — to regulate
their interaction — in Typika. Thus, to speak of the Sabaite Horologion or
Typikon alone ignores many other aspects of liturgical prayer and worship
at Mar Saba.
2. The existence of a multilingual monastic community at Mar Saba
necessitates an investigation of the sources of liturgy at Mar Saba that is
equally multilingual. The better-known Greek and Georgian sources sug-
gest that several independent liturgical communities existed within the
monastery side-by-side, each favouring certain liturgical traditions over
others that evolved at a different pace. Syriac and Arabic liturgical books
connected to the Lavra remain to be found and examined within the con-
text of Sabaite liturgical practices.
3. The presence of hymnography in the liturgy of Mar Saba — some of
it written by monks of Mar Saba Lavra itself — as well as the performance
of processions, and the proximity of Mar Saba to, and contact and interac-
tion with, Jerusalem should discourage liturgiologists from referring to a
“more sober, desert prayer of Palestine” when comparing it with the liturgy
of cathedrals, such as the Great Church of Constantinople.121
4. According to further examination of the historical and theological
contexts of Mar Saba, the development of this liturgical prayer, from a
simplified form based on the urban liturgy of Jerusalem but without its
stational components, to a liturgy that was very close to that celebrated
in Constantinople, occurred in two stages. As a result of the sixth-century
Christological controversies, liturgy at Mar Saba distanced itself from the
liturgical practice of Jerusalem. Following Iconoclasm, Sabaite monasti-

121 Taft, “Mount Athos,” 182. For a correction to this view, see Lingas, “How Musical was

the ‘Sung Office’?”

138 DANIEL GALADZA

cism developed a respect for Constantinople and adopted liturgical prac-

tices of the imperial capital.
5. A certain Sabaite “label” — or even a “brand” — existed from the ninth
century and continues to exist, even in the absence of genuine Sabaite prov-
enance or significance. The biographies of important Palestinian monastic
figures, such as St. John of Damascus or Theodore Abû Qurrah, became
associated with Mar Saba Lavra, even though it is unlikely that they were
ever monks there. Likewise, the Sabaite label ended up being used to refer
to the whole network of monasteries associated with Mar Saba without any
critical distinction between the provenance of the attribution or specifica-
tion as to what the content of “Sabaite” entailed.

Centre for Advanced Studies Daniel Galadza

University of Regensburg
SGLG 319 [email protected]
93040 Regensburg

SUMMARY
The Great Lavra of St. Sabas in Palestine plays an important role in the established narra-
tive of the development of the Byzantine Rite. This paper examines the place of liturgy at Mar
Saba and within this history of interaction with Constantinople by investigating the sources
of Sabaite liturgy. Hagiographic accounts provide the context for understanding certain li-
turgical manuscripts connected with the monastery. These include manuscripts of liturgical
Typika, Euchologia, lectionaries, and hymnals, which are described and contextualized, ex-
panding the focus of Sabaite liturgy beyond simply the Horologion and presenting the sources
of the "system" of liturgical prayer at the multilingual Great Lavra.