HOLY WEEK.
Origins (§ 1).
Palm Sunday in the East (§ 2).
In the West (§ 3).
Monday to Thursday (§4).
Good Friday (§5).
Holy Saturday (§6).
Protestant Usage (§ 7).
Holy Week, that is, the week before Easter, was originally called the " great week." The oldest witnesses for this designation are the pilgrim Egeria in the account of her travels, the so-called Peregrinatio Silviw (text and Eng. transl. in pub-
Holy Week
THE NEW SCHAFF-HERZOG
lications of Palestine Pilgrim's Text Society, London, 1896), and Chrysostom {Horn., xxx., c. 1 in
Gen. x. et xi.). In the account of travi. Origins, els of Egeria from the time about 385
we find a detailed description of the rich liturgical celebrations by which the " great week," beginning with Palm Sunday, was distinguished in Jerusalem (in CSEL, xxxix. 78-92). From this account two conclusions may safely be drawn: (1) The liturgical usages, especially the custom to celebrate solemnly this week before Easter, owe their origin to the custom in Jerusalem; (2) at the time when Egeria wrote, similar celebrations must have been unknown in the Occident; the customs in Jerusalem are evidently strange and new to her. The great week in the East was distinguished in the first place by strict fasting; but the custom was not uniform; some fasted the whole week, others only four or three, or even only two, days, namely, Friday and Saturday. As early as the time of Chrysostom all public amusements were forbidden, all public offices closed, prisoners dismissed, slaves benefited in every way, especially by their release, and the poor were provided with plentiful alms. The Occidental Church adopted the same name for this week; for its official designation in the Roman Church is still to-day hebdomada magna or major It was called also sancta. It is mentioned in liturgical writings as early as the twelfth century. The German expression Karivoche (Karfreitag) is derived from karen, " to wail, to mourn," hence denotes week of mourning or lamentation. With the Greeks the " great week " began only with the Monday after Palm Sunday, while in the Occident it commenced with that Sunday. Originally it was the same way in 'the East.
The oldest description of the liturgical celebration of this day in Jerusalem in the fourth century is
given in the Peregrinatio Silvice (CSEL,
2. Palm xxxix. 82 sqq., Eng. transl. of Palestine
Sunday Pilgrim's Text Society, pp. 57 sqq.).
in the The festival began at one o'clock in the
East. afternoon in the church upon the
Mount of Olives, with singing of hymns and antiphones and the reading of lessons. The characteristic feature of the celebration was the several processions from one church to another which took place accompanied by the repeated acclamation of the people, " Blessed is he that cometh in the name of the Lord." Children held branches of palms or olives in their hands and accompanied the bishop, who represented the Lord and rode upon an ass. Ephraem the Syrian (q.v.) testifies that the same procession of palms took place as early as the fourth century in Edessa. In the fifth century the festival of palms had spread over the whole of Palestine. It should be noticed that the oldest testimonies for the procession of palms on Palm Sunday are entirely silent concerning a consecration of the palms, and these testimonies prove that Palm Sunday was considered throughout as a day °f j°y, not as a day of mourning; moreover, the epistle read on this day was Phil. iv. 4-9.
In the Occident there was originally no such celebration with branches of palms or other branches on
this day. The oldest Western testimonies for Palm Sunday agree that the day bore entirely the character of a Passion Sunday, consequently that
of mourning. It was still the same
3. In the way at the time of Leo the Great (d.
West. 461), who calls this Sunday Dominica
passionis because the history of the Passion was read. With this agrees entirely the fact that the Spanish pilgrim evidently, until that time, had not known of a procession of palms as she experienced it in Jerusalem. The oldest Occidental testimony for the procession of palms and their consecration is found in the Liber ordinum of the Visigothic Church (ed. Ferotin, Paris, 1904). There can be no doubt that this Spanish ceremonial belongs to the Visigothic time, hence to the sixth century. It must have been in the course of the fifth century that the Eastern custom either directly or indirectly penetrated Spain. Apart from the consecration of palms, there is an unmistakable agreement between the Spanish celebration and that of Jerusalem as described in the Peregrinatio Silvia; (ut sup.). The consecration of palms is probably of Occidental origin, and was at first entirely independent of the celebration. Such a consecration was hardly necessary for the procession, but the consecrated branches were believed to possess the power of exorcism, to expel diseases, and to guard against demons, lightning, fire, and tempests. It is not known at what time and place consecration of palms and procession were combined. One of the oldest testimonies of a special celebration of Palm Sunday in the Occident is a passage in the work of the Anglo-Saxon bishop, Aldhelm of Sherborne (q.v.), De laudibus virginitatis (MPL, lxxxix. 128). He speaks of a "very holy solemnity of the palms." At the celebration on this day there was sung antiphonally Benedictus qui venit in nomine Domini, to joyful airs. Amalarius of Metz (q.v.) testifies that on Palm Sunday branches were carried through the churches while Hosannah was sung (MPL, cv. 1008); he says nothing of the consecration of palms. In the later Middle Ages the procession developed so as to imitate as faithfully as possible the entrance of Jesus into Jerusalem. As in the East, the bishop, as Christ, rode upon an ass or a horse. There developed, on the other hand, also the ceremony of consecration. Not only were branches consecrated, but also flowers, which were then carried in the procession. Therefore the Sunday was called also pascha, floridum, dominica florum et ramorum, les pdques fleuries ; flower day. On the same day the symbol was given to the competitors in various territories of the Church, as in the fifth and sixth centuries in Gaul and Spain; therefore Palm Sunday was called in some places dominica or pascha competentium. In the Roman Catholic Church the following solemn observances take place on Palm Sunday: (1) the consecration of palms; (2) the procession; (3) the mass, which throughout bears the character of mourning. As the Greek Church does not count Palm Sunday as belonging to the " great week," and has given to this day from the beginning the character of joy, it does not now employ the procession, but only the consecration of