Qurbana Qadiša - East Syrian Liturgy of Mar Addai and Mar Mari

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• published: 02 Jul 2016
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The term 'Qurbana', is the direct Aramaic cognate with the Hebrew word Korban (קרבן). From the time when the Law of Moses was received on Mt. Sinai, until when the Temple last stood in Jerusalem in 70 CE, and sacrifices were still offered, "Korban" was a technical Hebrew term for the various offerings & sacrifices that were to be performed there by all observant Jews (cf. Book of Leviticus). [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Korban] Sung entirely in the East Syriac/Aramaic dialect -- on the one hand, it is of only slight difference to that spoken by Jesus (Yeshu/Isho), Mary (Maryam), and all the first disciples of the Church, while on the other, only barely preceding the mutually intelligible sister dialect that would be used for the compilation of the Talmud Bavli (Babylonian Talmud, c. 200-500 CE) in Rabbinic Judaism and further used onwards into the period of the Jewish Academies of the Babylonian Geonim (c. 800-1000 CE). This Holy Qurbana is traditionally attributed to Saint Addai, disciple of Saint Thomas the Apostle (Mar Thoma), and Saint Mari, a disciple of Saint Addai. One of the rarest liturgies in Christianity and the most evident in its Semitic and Jewish origin -- in part due to it having largely developed only outside the boundaries of the Byzantine Roman Empire and thus not subject to the Hellenisation that all other eastern Christian liturgies eventually underwent regardless of their antiquity, it is only used by the churches of the East Syrian tradition. These include the Syro-Malabar Catholic Church of India, the Chaldean Catholic Church, and the Assyrian Church of the East -- the last two being both found in Iraq and various territories of the former medieval Persian Empire. -- Archimandrite Robert F. Taft S. J., Vice-Rector of the Pontifical Oriental Institute* explains its singularly unique origin: "It was in these two cities, Antioch and Jerusalem, that Christian worship developed its finest symbolism. The West Syrian liturgy overflows with a wealth of poetic hymnology and symbolism. Its intensely human spirit reminds one of the spontaneity and drama of the Medieval West. But there is also a sense of mystery, a focus on the Second Coming, and the symbolism is directed at making this unutterable mystery felt. The East Syrian liturgy is the most primitive form of Catholic worship still used today. It evolved into its present form at an early date, beyond the Roman world, in small Christian communities where Jewish influence remained strong. It is a liturgy of great austerity and simplicity, with little rhetorical or ceremonial embellishment...In Persia, beyond the frontiers of the Roman Empire, the Syrian tradition had a different history. Christianity first spread to the Persian Empire from Edessa in Mesopotamia, a daughter Church of Antioch and an important center of Semitic culture. Antioch, Alexandria and Jerusalem were Greek in language and culture during this formative period of the early Church, and Greek was their liturgical language. Coptic and Syriac were introduced later, as the Church spread to the hinterlands of Egypt and Syria and customs were remodeled under the influence of the monasteries and small villages. But the East Syrian or Chaldean Rite which took shape in the Church of Edessa at a very early date preserved the Semitic stamp of the first Jewish Churches. This tradition is found today among the Chaldeans and 'Nestorians' [ed. having since been vindicated of the label**] of the Middle East and, in a form extremely Latinized but now being restored, among the Malabarese Christians of India." Excerpt from book, 'Eastern-Rite Catholicism: Its Heritage and Vocation - (1968)' -- * Taft has retired in 2011 after 46 years of teaching in Rome, and now holds an Professor Emeritus position within the Institute, while now living in the USA. [Bio: http://www.mhzh.ru/tafte.php] ** In 1994, Mar Dinkha IV, Catholicos-Patriarch of the Assyrian Church of the East, co-signed the "Common Christological Declaration between the Catholic Church and the Assyrian Church of the East" with Pope John Paul II. It affirmed the common understanding of the personhood of Jesus as taught at the First Council of Ephesus (431 CE), hence removing once and for all the charge of "Nestorian" that it had falsely been labelled with for centuries. It then further called on all parties to establish the necessary committees for the work of re-establishing full communion between the two churches. This process, having sadly been interrupted in a grave manner by the Iraq War of 2003 under President George W. Bush, has now only slowly started to regroup. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Common_Christological_Declaration_between_the_Catholic_Church_and_the_Assyrian_Church_of_the_East