WHAT ARE THE PSALMS

n  What are the Psalms

The Book of Psalms in the OT

In the Jewish Tradition, the Old Testament is

referred to as TANACH—which is an acronym for

the three major sections of the OT: 1) TORAH, the

first five books, 2) NEVI’IM, the prophets and 3)

K’TUVIM, writings, third section which is a miscellany of

various and varied literature, including the Song of Songs,

the Book of Esther, Lamentations, and the so called

“wisdom literature” of Koheleth (Ecclesiastes), Proverbs,

and Job. 

The Book of Psalms is found in this third

section of the Old Testament, the K’TUVIM

n  King David and the Psalms

n  Traditionally, Psalms is said to have been written by King David. Indeed, the Book of Psalms is frequently referred to as the Psalms of David. Midrah Tehillim, a medieval commentary on the Book of Psalms says: “Moses gave Israel the Five Books of the Torah and correspondingly, David gave them the Five Books of Psalms.

n  There is a lovely midrash—a rabbinic story—about King David.

n  It is said that when David went to sleep at night, he hung his harp over his bed.

n  As he slept, the four winds came and plucked the strings of his harp.

n  David would awake and sing along.

n  According to the story, these songs became the Psalms.

n  Why did King David’s association with the Psalms arise?

n  The most obvious reason is that out of the 150 Psalms, 73 begin with the superscription (introductory phrase) L’David.

n  The most obvious translation of the phrase L’David is “of David,” although it also has various other meanings.

n  The 73 Psalms then were taken to be that of David, and thus, by David.

n  By extension, the work as a whole was attributed to him.

n  The Book of Psalms can also be attributed to David because the very literary form of the work fits nicely with what we know about him.

n  The biography of David contained in the two Books of Samuel tells us a number of things that connect him to this work.

n  In his youth David was a skillful lyre player and an inventor of musical instruments.

n  He is said to have been a composer of songs and won his first public recognition as a singer.

n  He was acclaimed as the “sweet singer of Israel.”

n  Later, he is said to have been responsible for organizing the guilds of Temple singers and musicians.

n  Another reason for ascribing the Books of Psalms to King David is that many of the Psalms portray circumstances and emotional states that harmonize with what we read about David’s life in the books of First and Second Samuel and First Kings.

n  Thus one can associate some of the Psalms with specific aspects of the life of David.

n  Psalm 2 is easily linked to the establishment of the Davidic dynasty.

n  The shepherd motif of Psalm 23 and other Psalms can certainly be connected with David’s occupation in his younger days.

n  Psalm 110 can be read as depicting David’s coronation as king.

n  Most notably, Psalm 18 is duplicated in its entirety in 2 Samuel, Chapter 22.

n   Jewish tradition found this association with the life of King David so compelling that much of the commentary on the Book of Psalms is devoted to associating particular Psalms to events in David’s life.

n  Modern scholarship suggests that King David may not have written all of the Psalms, or any of them.

n  What can be stated with certainty is that many of the Psalms originated in a time much later than David’s lifetime (which was around 1000 BC).

n  Many appear to come from the time when the first Temple was standing, which was well after David’s death.

n   Some reflect specific historic events from later periods.

n  Most famously, Psalm 137 talks about the Babylonian Exile—hundreds of years after David’s death.

n  Others portray the return of the exiles to Jerusalem, the rebuilding of the Temple, and perhaps even its dedication.

n  However, there is a beautiful and rich theological significance of DAVID as the central human figure in the Book of Psalms.

n  He is a paradigm for Israel, for the whole of humanity, for each one of us.

n  For in the biblical David the FUNDAMENTAL EXPERIENCE OF HUMAN LIFE CAN BE FOUND:

n  He sought God.

n  He fell in love.

n  He sinned.

n  He repented.

n  He experienced forgiveness.

n  He is a man of ambition

n   He experienced deep joy and profound grief. 

n  He has many friends as well as enemies.

n  He knew loyalty as well as betrayal in friendship.

n  He was innocent as he was guilty.

n  He experienced birth and death of loved ones.

n  He was persecuted as well as lifted up.

n  He was generous yet greedy.

n  He was a king who suffered defeat and emerged triumphant.

n  He knew peace as well as violence.

n  In short, HE IS A MAN WHO KNEW LAUDS AND SUPPLICATIONS.

n  HE KNEW HOW IT IS TO PRAISE AND TO PRAY!

n  The Book of Psalms as the most unique

n  The 5 books of the Torah record the history of salvation.

n  They narrate and reveal the wonders God has done, beginning from the creation of the world, the establishment of His people, freedom from Egypt, to their journey to the promised land.

n  The Torah tells the story of God’s creative work and gift of salvation, God’s promises and their unfolding and fulfillment.

n  The original and fundamental revelation is thus contained in the Torah.

n  The Prophets on the other hand contain the word, another fundamental element, that interprets the history of salvation narrated in the Torah.

n  Moreover, the other books found in K’TUVIM, especially the wisdom literature are religious teachings.

n  They can be said to be another word of interpretation.

n  We take note of the MOVEMENT—from the STORY (the Torah) to the WORD OF INTERPRETATION (Prophets and The Writings, esp. the Wisdom Literature).

n   Then comes the Book of Psalms that contains the response of Israel to the STORY and ITS INTERPRETATION.

n  It is noteworthy that the Book of Psalms is divided in 5 sections.

n  This brings us back to the First Five Books of the OT, the Torah.

n  It thus signifies that the Book of Psalms is but a response as a prayer to God’s works of wonders and His salvation narrated in the Torah.

n  It is the cry of the human who needs God’s wonders and His salvation.

n  Therefore, the Book of Psalms is the STORY and ITS INTERPRETATION becoming into a PRAYER.

n  In this way, the Book of Psalms is the most unique of all the books in the Old Testament.

n  It is the book that teaches us to lift our hands in praise and thanksgiving to the wonder of God’s creation.

n  It teaches us as well to bend our knees in supplication when in need of His salvation.

THE EVOLUTION OF PSALMS

• The Evolution of the Psalms
• “The Living Psalms”
• C. Westermann, The Living Psalms (W.B.Eerdmans, 1989), pp.4-8.
• The Psalms emerged from Israel’s public worship.
• They were not first written then sung: rather, it was the other way round. Most of the Psalms were sung and prayed long before being written down.
• They were first committed to writing in the process of the growth of the whole collection. The collection of Psalms presupposes an already long, rich and varied life for them in oral tradition and in the context of worship.
• When we say that the Psalms were formed in Israel’s worship, we mean a worship that at the time was the heartbeat of the whole community and the center of Israel’s common life.
• In relation to the Psalms, what is the implication to this fact that worship was the center of Israel’s common life?
• If worship was the heart of the people’s common life, then the nation’s history must be reflected in the history of its worship, that is, the worship must contain elements that reveal the historical development of Israel as a people and in turn to some degree must be reflected in the Psalms.
• Now the most significant division in the Book of Psalms in general is between community Psalms and individual Psalms.
• The reason for this is that the history of the nation Israel was preceded by a history of families, whose traditions are preserved in the patriarchal narratives.
• The characteristic features of the patriarchal worship is that of the invocation of God in the Psalms, lament, praise, petition, expression of trust, making a vow. 
• These are all taken up and developed in the Book of Psalms in the form of individual Psalms, that is, Psalms from the area of personal and family life.
• The emergence of the nation brings with it the communal Psalms and from then on both types continue to exist side by side.
• In both, and in the relationship between them, developments occur, caused by historical developments  in Israel’s worship.
• The most important development after the settlement was the establishment of the monarchy. With it arrived the royal Psalms.
• After the end of the monarchy, a further development occurred: now the praise of God as king moved into the foreground (Psalms 47; 93-99) and the old royal Psalms were interpreted messianically.
• The Psalter also frequently reflects the profound change brought about the collapse of the monarchy and the Temple.
• Changes in the worship of the post-exilic community led to far-reaching changes in the Psalms.
• It is particularly noteworthy that communal psalms of narrative praise, like the victory songs, disappear almost entirely.
• The contrast now is no longer between Israel and her political enemies but between the pious and the godless.
• Thus, it is only in recognizing that worship is the unifying center of Israel’s common life that we can describe and understand the Psalms as originating from Israel’s public worship.
• It is not always possible to utter one’s plea to God in the sanctuary.
• It can happen outside the sanctuary, when the individual or community is confronted with an occasion of joy or of distress: the sick may pray on his bed, the prisoner prays in his cell, the man threatened by a storm prays on the ship (Ps 107), while the victory song rises from the battlefield and a thanksgiving to God is uttered when a child is born.
• Prayer in public worship would lose its force without these experiences outside the sanctuary: such prayer is only given life by the movements inwards from outside and back again into daily life.
• Within this movement, prayer in worship functions to bring together those many experiences of the need to invoke God and to give verbal expression to them in a way in which all the members of the community can join.
• The secret of the language of the Psalms lies in the fact that many people and many succeeding generations can recognize and utter it as their own prayer.
• That the Psalms are to be understood in the light of this movement to and from worship is indicated by the titles that were later added to the Psalms by those who collected them together, titles which ascribe the occasion of their composition to real-life situations, for example Psalm 3:1, ‘A Psalm of David, when he fled from Absalom his son’ or Psalm 102:1, ‘A Prayer of one afflicted, when he is faint and pours out his complaint before the Lord.’
• It is important then bear in mind that every particular Psalm must be read as the product of an evolutionary development, of which the final stage is its fixation in writing as part of the entire collection of the Psalter.
• In its earlier stages, the Psalm was the prayer of many different persons in diverse situations and its present form represents the collecting together in worship of these different voices.
• It received its liturgical shape only after many generations, during which it was transmitted in the worshipping center from parents to children for centuries.
• A vivid example of this process is Psalm 107, where various experiences of delivery from mortal dangers are brought together in a single Psalm, which thereby became a Psalm of the worshipping community.

THE BOOK OF PSALMS

• THE BOOK OF PSALMS
• Introduction
• Costacurta, Bruna, Class notes: Biblical Exegesis on Selected Psalms. (1st Semester 2001-2002, Pontifical Gregorian University, Rome).
• Polish, Daniel, Bringing the Psalms to Life: How to Understand and Use the Book of Psalms. (Woodstock, 2000).
• The Book of Psalms in the life of the Church and Israel
• As priests and religious, we intimately encounter the Psalms daily.
• In fact many a times during the day.
• The Divine Office, the official prayer of the Church to sanctify the different hours of the day and to give glory to our God, Father, Son and Holy Spirit, is essentially  based on the Psalms.
• More importantly when we celebrate the Eucharist to listen to the Word of God and to partake of His Body and Blood, it is the Psalms that put words into our hearts and lips so that we can fully respond to the Word of God being proclaimed in our midst.
• The Psalms in the Life of Israel, God’s Chosen People
• A note about the place of Psalms in the lives of the Chosen People of God, Israel, is worth mentioning.
• The Psalms themselves are but fruits of their own encounters with God as His Chosen People through the ends and outs of their history and daily lives.
• For Israel, they find POWER IN THESE ANCIENT POEMS.
• They experienced being pulled by these hymns, a pull that causes them to read the Psalm over and over again, a pull that long ago led people to evolve the worship service itself so that they could visit—and reinterpret—psalms regularly.
• In a word, the Psalms are so BELOVED by Israel.
• A clue to the power of the Book of Psalms can be found in the life of a well-known contemporary hero of the Jewish people, former Soviet refusenik Anatoly Sharansky, who became Nathan Sharansky when he migrated to Israel in 1986.
• Sharansky had been held prisoner by Soviet authorities, detained in solitary confinement for years with nothing to read but this book of Psalms.
• His wife Avital wrote about the imprisonment of Sharansky.
• She said,

  “Anatoly has been educated to his Jewishness in a lonely cell in Chistopol Prison, where locked alone with the Psalms of David, he found expression for his innermost feelings in the outpourings of the king of Israel thousand of years ago.”

• In his love of the Psalms, and in FINDING HIS DEEPEST FEELINGS GIVEN VOICE IN THE PSALMS, Sharansky was the embodiment of every Jew for the last three hundred years, and every Christian, too.
• Somehow the Psalms put us in TOUCH WITH WHAT MATTERS MOST TO US, and EXPRESS THOSE FEELINGS MORE CLEARLY AND MOVINGLY THAN WE CAN EXPRESS THEM OURSELVES.
• Psalms as Beloved
• More than any other part of Scriptures, we can say that the Psalms are not beloved because they are holy, but that THEY ARE HOLY BECAUSE THEY ARE BELOVED.
• We do not turn the Psalms out of a sense of obligation. We read Psalms because they help us CONFRONT the PAINS and CHALLENGES that are PART OF EVERY HUMAN LIFE.
• Psalms help us PUT INTO WORDS what WE EXPERIENCE and FEEL; more than many will tell you, Psalms help us OVERCOME OUR PROBLEMS and BEAR the BURDENS that LIFE PLACES ON ALL OF US.
• What has made the Psalms so BELOVED and POWERFUL is NOT their divinity , but THEIR HUMANITY.
• For Psalms GREW out of the SOIL of HUMAN EXPERIENCE.
• They talk to us in the VOICE of a FELLOW JOURNEYER ALONG LIFE’S PATH, and they have within them the resources to help us when the journey gets difficult.
• An Invitation to Becoming Friends with the Book of Psalms
• Given these Christian and Jewish perspectives of the Psalms, may I invite you as individuals and as a community, to consciously and personally MAKE  the Book of Psalms YOUR FRIEND.
• Like a good and faithful friend, the Psalms help us UNDERSTAND MORE ABOUT OURSELVES.
• In fact if we will strive to become friends with the Psalms, we can turn to them AS TRUE FRIENDS FOR HELP in our TIMES OF NEED.
• Just like what Jesus did as He painfully hung Himself on the Cross, it was to Psalm 22 that He turned Himself for help: “My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me? Why art thou so far from helping me, from the words of my groaning?”
• Each of us brings our own particular experience to everything each of us does.
• Our histories and struggles shape the way we see our world and the way we understand everything we study.
• No book of the Bible lends itself as much as Psalms does to being read through the lenses of our own circumstances and search.
• The Book of Psalms talks to our SPIRITUAL QUEST: our DESIRE TO FIND GOD and our FRUSTRATION that God often seems REMOTE, HIDDEN, UNAPPROACHALBE, and UNKNOWABLE.
• Psalms talks to human PAIN—ILLNESS and FEAR, and to the SENSE that we sometimes have of being ABANDONED.
• Psalms knows the STING of FAILURE and the DISTRESS of being BETRAYED by people WE TRUSTED.
• Psalms can be the voice through which we CRY OUT FOR HELP, and Psalms can be the GUIDE through which the LOST BEGIN to be FOUND.
• The power of the Psalms lies in their ability to speak directly and personally to the human condition.
• As St. Athanasius, Bishop of Alexandria, wrote:

   “The Psalms embrace the entire human life, express every emotion of the soul, every impulse of the heart—[The Psalms speak for you] when your soul yearns for penance and confession, when your spirit is depressed or joyous…when your soul is yearning to express its thanks to God, or its pain…”

• Psalm 51:1-2  Have mercy on me, O God, according to thy steadfast love; according to thy abundant mercy blot out my transgressions.  2 Wash me thoroughly from my iniquity, and cleanse me from my sin!
• Psalm 31:10-12   For my life is spent with sorrow, and my years with sighing; my strength fails because of my misery, and my bones waste away.  11 I am the scorn of all my adversaries, a horror to my neighbors, an object of dread to my acquaintances; those who see me in the street flee from me.  12 I have passed out of mind like one who is dead; I have become like a broken vessel.
• Psalm 9:1-2  I will give thanks to the LORD with my whole heart; I will tell of all thy wonderful deeds.  2 I will be glad and exult in thee, I will sing praise to thy name, O Most High.
• Indeed the Psalms are remarkably human.
• They validate the whole range of human emotions.
• Psalms start with the recognition of just how fragile life is : we suffer, we experience fear and exaltation, we meet with success and failure, we know contentment and anxiety, we experience betrayal, have enemies, even know rage and the desire for revenge, and we find vindication, comfort, new confidence.
• The Psalms give voice to all of these emotions and help us put them in context.
• They help us marshal our resources so that we can move from HURT to HEALING, from the VALLEY OF THE SHADOW OF DEATH back to the HIGH PLACES of life.
• The Psalms hold out hope for us, even in our darkest hours.
• Above all, the Psalms encourage us to give voice to our emotions and pour our hearts to God.
• In Psalms, we watch the DRAMA of SALVATION ENACTED—not salvation on the grand cosmological scale, but the SIMPLE STORY OF PEOPLE SAVED FROM THE BURDENS THAT OPPRESSED THEM.
• Psalms talks of THANKSGIVING—breaking out in SHOUTS of JOY and GRATITUDE when DARKNESS that THREATENED to ENVELOP US is pierced by RAYS of HOPE.
• Psalms shows us the PATH to TRIUMPH and provides the SONGS to SING when we have PREVAILED.
• Psalm 33:1-5  Rejoice in the LORD, O you righteous! Praise befits the upright.  2 Praise the LORD with the lyre, make melody to him with the harp of ten strings!  3 Sing to him a new song, play skilfully on the strings, with loud shouts.  4 For the word of the LORD is upright; and all his work is done in faithfulness.  5 He loves righteousness and justice; the earth is full of the steadfast love of the LORD.
• One can say that Psalms does all of this AS ANY FRIEND SHOULD—without LECTURING, DEMANDING, OR COERCING.
• Psalms TEACHES BY EXAMPLE, by SHOWING US, “I’VE BEEN THERE, THAT HAS HAPPENED TO ME, AND THIS IS HOW I MADE IT THROUGH.”
• This PERSONAL MESSAGE of the Book of Psalms is the REASON people have turned to it for thousand years.
• It is the POWER LATENT in Psalms that has made it THE FIRST REFUGE OF PEOPLE IN DISTRESS.
• That power has not diminished over time.
• It remains EVER-PRESENT and AVAILABLE to us, if we know how to find it.
• Turning to the Book of Psalms, learning where to look and how to understand it, is a study we undertake not from some lofty, theoretical vantage, but from the VERY HUMAN NEED TO MAKE OUR LIVES BETTER, MORE AT EASE, and WHOLE.
• We are drawn to Psalms, as generations before us were, not by abstract curiosity, but by COMPULSION—NOT FIGURATIVE, but LITERAL—TO SAVE OUR LIVES, or better still, THAT OUR LIVES BE SAVED, since it is beyond us to SAVE ourselves.
• Psalms still holds the power to help us through the DARKEST TIMES, give us our BEARINGS, and ENRICH our lives.
• I hope and pray that this exposition may lead us to REDISCOVER THE WHOLE-MAKING and HEALING POWER of the Psalms.
• May we truly make the Psalms our FRIENDS.

SACRAMENT OF MARRIAGE

• Marriage and Sacrament of Marriage

Michael lawler- dq

• Pre-note

1. Catholic teaches that Marriage is a SACRAMENT.
2. Two realities involved in marriage as sacrament: Marriage and the sacrament of marriage.
3. Love: common human reality of two realities.
4. Three things to consider this chapter: sacrament of marriage, marriage, and marital love.

• The sacrament of marriage

1. Early Scholastics defined sacrament as both a SIGN and a cause of GRACE. They looked upon marriage as a sign but not cause of grace (not listed among sacraments) because it involved SEXUAL INTERCOURSE which Augustine had thought was always SINFUL, even between husband and wife, except in the case when it was for the procreation of a child. Conjugal intercourse for the sake of offspring is not “sinful but sexual intercourse, even with one’s spouse to satisfy concupiscence is a venial sin. ”

2. For Augustine, it is not sexual intercourse ITSELF that is sinful but CONCUPISCENCE (the sexual appetite OUT OF CONTROL).

3. Peter Lombard (12^th century) defined sacrament in the categories of SIGN and CAUSE: “A sacrament, properly speaking, is a SIGN OF GRACE and the form of INVISIBLE GRACE in such a way that it is its IMAGE and its CAUSE.”

4. 13^TH century Dominicans, Albert the Great and his pupil, Thomas Aquinas, who securely established marriage among the sacraments of the Church.

                Albert the Great: “Marriage confers grace for doing good, not just any good but that specific good that a married person should do.”

                Thomas Aquinas: “Marriage, in so far as it is contracted in FAITH in Christ, confers grace to do these things which are required in marriage.” In his Contra Gentiles: “It is to be believed that through this sacrament (marriage) grace is given to the married.”

5. The first church document to list marriage as a sacrament was by the Council of Verona (1184) against the Cathari (preached that sexuality and marriage were sinful).

6. Council of Lyons (1274) to which Aquinas was traveling when he died, first listed marriage among seven sacraments as part of the formula for healing the great schism between East and west.

7. Council of Florence (1439): The seven sacraments both contain GRACE and confer GRACE ON THOSE WHO RECIEVEIT WOTHILY.

8.  Council of Trent (16^th century): Marriage is a SACRAMENT, that it CONTAINS and CONFERS GRACE, that is, indissoluble.

9. A marriage is a sacrament: it reveals and celebrates the intimate COMMUNION of life and love, and GRACE between God and God’s people and between Christ and Christ’s people, the Church.

• marriage

1. For a valid marriage, only one moment of the ritual radically counts, the solemn moment of giving CONSENT.
2. Ancient Roman: Mutual consent between the parties makes marriage.
3. Ancient Germanic: Sexual intercourse between the spouses makes a marriage.

4. Gratian (Master of the University of Bologna) proposed a compromise solution which combined both views: Consent initiates a marriage (ratum); subsequent sexual intercourse then completes or consummates it. This opinion which settled the debate and is today is still enshrined in CIC (Can 1061) that governs marriages in the Roman Catholic Church.

5. Consent initiates marriage and sexual intercourse then consummates it.

6. A sacramental marriage is not just a wedding to be celebrated (event) but it is also, and more critically, an EQUAL and LOVING PARTNERSHIP to be  lived for the whole life.

• Marital love

1. In contemporary American usage, love always means romantic love, usually a passionate feeling of affection for another person of the opposite sex. That is not entirely what love means. Feeling is frequently part of love but it is not always part of it, and it is certainly not all there is to love.

2. Love would end when the transient things that fuel romantic love end.

3. Marriages based on feeling-love would also end, as many of them indeed do. If love were merely FEELING, the love of neighbors and enemies commanded by Jesus would be impossible, for few of us can feel love  for some of our neighbors and even fewer for all of our enemies (Mt 22:39; 5:44).

4. Love that is STEADFAST and LASTING and that gives STABILITY to marriages is more than feeling, it is also WILLING or INTENDING. It wills the good of the beloved.

5. Love is FREE.  An ancient maxim : nihil amatum nisi praecognitum (nothing is loved that is not first known).

6. The first movement of love is a RESPONSE, a response to the knowledge of the other’s being, the other’s goodness, beauty, and lovableness.

7. To that extent that one is responsible, love is free. It is something to do as well as something that happens; it is action as well as passion.

8. As a freely willed act, love is a species of PROMISE or COMMITMENT, the giving of word to do something, namely, to will the good of another. The action in which commitment is expressed in the SYMBOL OF LOVE and the symbol of one’s intention to love for the whole life.

9. The symbol not only expresses to the one loved one’s intention for the whole life but it also confirms the intention. Both mutually commit to one another as lovers to make love permanent and to communicate it as permanent.

10. Love can intend to be indissoluble and can make it indissoluble, for love stretches out into the unknown future along with life.

11. The commitment to love is also a commitment is also a commitment to the principle of honor and to fidelity to that honor.

13. Mutual commitment of love between lovers creates between them an interpersonal relationship and a bond which is morally binding. That interpersonal bond can be further bound by further ritual: in Christian marriage, it can be bound by SACRAMENT and the GRACE OF GOD.

14. In Christian marriage, therefore, there are three bonds binding the spouses: the bond of love, the bond of legal marriage, and the bond of sacrament. None of these bonds occurs in any physical reality, they occur only, but really and ontologically in the INTERPERSONAL SPHERE OF THE HUMAN SPIRIT.

15. Togetherness is to be created in a marriage; the spouses have to become one coupled-We. Admired, valued, and cherished otherness, however, is also integral to true love and marriage. It is very coupled otherness, the marriage that is the communion between distinct I and a distinct Thou, with all its negative conflicted,  and sad moments as well as its positive, peaceful and happy moments.

HISTORY OF MARRIAGE

Highlights of the History of Marriage

Fr. Virgilio hernandez

Scientia Liturgica:

San beda college graduate school of liturgy research journal,

volume 111, no. 1, 2008

• Pre-note

1. This attempts to look into the development and evolution of the rite of Christian marriage in the course of history. It does not intend to delve much into the rite, but rather to show the rite developed and evolved through the various epochs in the West, that is, in the Latin Church.

2. The origin of the ritual history of Christian marriage is to be looked into not only on the basis of Scripture but also in the light of the social customs and practices of the time and place in which Christians live.

3. The development of the rite of marriage represents two main stages. In the first stage, no Christian Church has offered any ritual celebration of marriage. It accepted the view of marriage as largely a SECULAR REALITY originating in the act of human freedom and expressed in a multiplicity of concrete forms. It was considered a Holy and Sacred State but not subjected to canonical legislation or ecclesiastical intervention.

                In the second stage, from the 11^th century onward, weddings were only gradually introduced into the formal sphere and canonical power of the Church. Wedding celebrations were gradually INCORPORATED into the canonical regulations and liturgical rituals of the Church. 

• I. Christian marriage in the first three centuries

1. Liturgical documents are sparse in the Pre-Constantine period. There was NO HINT whatsoever of any sacred GESTURE or any Christian PRAYER of marriage. No evidence could be found attesting to the existence of a liturgical blessing or participation of a priest in the rite of marriage.

2. The first generation Christians retained the customary practices of their own culture so far as they do not conflict with the tenets of Christianity. They followed the customary folk marriage celebrations, regulated by existing local traditions and laws. They perceived marriage on the basis of the teachings of Christ and the Apostles. The Church’s concern was exclusively PASTORAL.

3. Marriage is celebrated according to the practices and tradition of the people AS LONG AS they conformed to the Christian faith (e.g. Marriage is union of Christ and the Church). As a minority, the Christians did not bother to distance themselves from the customs of the people. They were very conscious and cautious about avoiding any IDOLATROUS elements in the ceremony, as well as the licentious ASPECTS of the celebrations.

4. The Letter to Diognetus best describes the situation in the first three centuries when he wrote that “Christians do not DIFFER from other men and women in country or language or customs… they MARRY like EVERYONE else.”

5. In Rome, the Greco-Latin culture managed to influence even the customs surrounding marriage. The custom of Roman society showed the important place occupied by the FAMILY. In fact, the only celebration of marriage that Christians experienced until the Constantinian Peace were these rites performed within the family.

                According to the Roman Law, a valid marriage consisted essentially in a mutual consent (consensus), which required only a few conditions such as (1)AGE, (2)PERMISSION FROM PARENTS or parental consent, and (3)ABSENCE OF IMPEDIMENTS like kinship, affinity, or civil law.

                As early as 3^rd century, among the Greco-Romans, there are two distinct and separate MOMENTS in the lives of future spouses: Betrothal and Marriage.

               

                (1) Betrothal was distinct from marriage; it was celebrated at a family meal: the fiancee, after the exchange of promises, gave his future wife an iron ring, which she wore on the 4^th finger of her left hand (there is a vein which carries the blood to the heart), and some presents a dowry (arrhae sponsaliciae) as a pledge of their future union. Likewise a kiss, which may have been introduced in the 3^rd century, gave a juridical value to the promise of marriage.

                (2) The ceremony, on the other hand, itself of marriage has three stages:

                A. The first stage consisted of the dressing/ vesting of the bride who wore a crown of myrtle or orange branches and a yellow veil with red highlights (flammeum) as the distinctive mark of married women. The donning of the veil was so important that it was synonymous to “marrying.”

                B. The second stage (presentation of the bride) took place in the home of the bride. It went as follows: (1)the bride was presented by a married woman (the pronuba) acting as a kind of maid of honor, (2) the consultation of soothsayers which was always favorable, and, (3) above all, the reading of the tabulae nuptiales (marriage contract) in the presence of witnesses who affixed their names on it.

                (4) After the exchange of consent (consensus), (5) the bride (wife) was delivered by the pronuba, sometimes a father or the guardian of the bride, to her groom (husband) by having them join their right hands (dexterarum iunctio).

               

                 C.  The third stage (procession to the bridal chamber) took place in the evening with a torch-light procession accompanying the bride to the house of the husband (cf. the parable of the bridegroom). Then, they were conducted to the bridal chamber where he (husband) removed the cloak of his bride. At this juncture, everyone else withdrew (for their eyes only- obvious ba?).

• ii. Christian marriage in the west from 4^th to 10^th century

                The absence of the any liturgical rite of marriage before the 4^th century consequently led to its development on the basis of the SECULAR customs of the people. It was inevitable that the blessing of Christ should find visible expression in the blessing given by the father of the family or the bishop or a priest invited to the wedding.

1. Velatio Nuptialis. At the end of the 4^th century in Rome and Milan, a ceremony called “velatio Nuptialis, ” subsequently described by Paulinus of Nola (c. 353-431) in his poem 25, was referred to by Ambrose (374-397) and Pope Siricius (384-399).

                Here, the groom’s father leads the betrothed couple to the altar while the bride’s FATHER gives the nuptial blessing to the spouses, whose heads are covered during the entire prayer by a veil (cf. shekinah; vel=veil), that is separated from the red highlights (flammeum).

                As late as the 5^th century the blessing seems not to have has a set text. The Verona Sacramentary entitles it Velatio Nuptialis and provides a formulary for both the blessing and the Mass. The nuptial blessing, which is a solemn prayer in the Roman Liturgy, speaks only of the WIFE; later, though the veil was extended to cover the shoulders of the husband as well.

                It was to this veiling that Rome gave liturgical status: Like the virgin who is betrothed to Christ, her only spouse, a Christian woman who is being joined to a Christian man in marriage receives a veil from the hands of the Church as a sign of her new state.

                The blessing paints a picture of a Christian wife, setting the holy women of the Old Testament before her as models, while at the same time seeing the marriage in the perspective both of GENESIS and of the marriage of CHRIST and the CHURCH, and asking the grace of fruitfulness for the new wife. What a typology!

                The nuptial blessing was traditionally given during Mass before the celebrant’s Pax Domini (“Lord Jesus you said to your apostles…) and the Kiss of Peace, which he gave to the husband (at least safe) and the husband to the wife (and not the other way around). From Rome and Milan, the nuptial blessing passed into Southern Gaul and subsequently made its way elsewhere as the Roman Rite was adopted. 

2. Benedictio in Thalamo. The most widespread form of marriage liturgy in Gaul and the Celtic countries consisted in a blessing of the spouses in the BRIDAL CHAMBER. The priest or bishop was invited to give the blessing to the spouses in the bridal chamber.

                Spain was also familiar with 2 gestures that would be taken over in the medieval rituals:

                A. The giving of the bride to the groom (traditio puellae) by the priest in the place and name of the father, and,

                B. The Ordo arrharum, which was the result of the importance attached to the betrhotal.

                The betrothal included the giving of pledges, a dowry (arrhae sponsaliciae) to the girl’s family and was the occasion for a blessing. The engaged couple brought two rings to the priest, the prayer which followed  was both a blessing of the rings and an invocation of God’s favor on the couple. The betrothal is sealed by the exchange of a kiss. The Church also recognized the family rites of betrothal but played no part in them.

• iii. Christian marriage from the 11^th century until vatican ii

1. The beginning of the 11^th century saw the SECULAR RITE turned into a LITURGICAL ACTION that was celebrated immediately BEFORE MASS (specifically before the Liturgy of the Eucharist), but outside the Church, in facie ecclesiae. It is the rite of betrothal which became part of the rite of marriage but in facie ecclesiae.

2. The betrothal precedes the Mass, coming immediately before the wedding Mass. The gathering went INTO the Church ONLY FOR THE EUCHARISTIC CELEBRATION and the BLESSING. It, thus, marked the GRADUAL TRANSFER of the discipline of marriage and the regulations of the ceremonies TO THE AUTHORITY OF THE CHURCH.

3. As early as 9^th and 10^th centuries, synods and capitularies demanded that marriage be celebrated IN PUBLIC (public character) to ensure the woman’s FREE consent;  they insisted that the spouses must receive the NUPTIAL BLESSING and that priests must make a prior PRE-NUPTIAL INVESTIGATION (interview and banns).

4. In order to ensure the PUBLIC CHARACTER OF MARRIAGE, the old rite of the blessing in  thalamo (blessing at the bridal chamber) was revived in Normandy and spread through the whole of France. On the evening of the marriage, the priest blessed the spouses themselves as well as the bridal chamber and the wedding ring, even if the couple had not received a blessing in the Church on that day.

5. In 1012, the Synod of Rouen forbade the practice and called for the blessing and the marriage rite to be celebrated IN A CHURCH (not in bridal chamber). This did not, however, prevent the blessing in  thalamo (blessing at the bridal chamber) from being continued, but it now lacked any juridical or sacramental value.

6. In order to give maximum PUBLICITY to the exchange of consents, it was decided that it should NO LONGER take place in HOME of the bride but at the DOOR OF THE CHURCH, in facie ecclesiae.

7. Only the joining of right hands (dexterarum iunctio) had belonged specifically to the ancient ceremonies of marriage proper, but this gesture is no longer understood as the giving of the young girl to the bridegroom (traditio puellae)  by the pronuba. It is seen rather as a symbol of the RECIPROCAL giving of the spouses to each other, a giving that also finds expression in the exchange of consent. The expression could be reduced to a “YES”  in response to questions asked by the priest.

               

 

8. In the 11^th century, the part played by the spouses caused  the original priest to be forgotten. His function had been to supervise the giving of the young girl to the bridegroom (traditio puellae)  in the PLACE and NAME of the girl’s father, that is, to ensure the husbands freedom of consent in cases of a marriage being forced by the parents.

                Such was the original meaning of the words “ego coniungo vos” ( “I acknowledge it as valid and legitimate”) of the priest’s action of joining the couple’s hands.

9. In 1563, the Council of Trent, was the first to require canonical form for validity, the appearance of the couple before their own parish priest as provided in the decree Tametsi.

10. In 1614 Roman Ritual (known as the Ritual of Paul V), emphasized the role of the priest at the expense of that couple. It also called for the rite to take place before the celebration of the Mass IN THE CHURCH and no longer in facie ecclesiae.

• conclusion

1. As seen, there are three important stages in the development of the rite of Christian marriage through the centuries until Vatican II:

                A. Marriage in the family home until the 11^th century, with the first intervention of the priest being the Mass and the blessing of the bride;

                B. Marriage in facie ecclesiae in the 11^th century, the first clear evidence of the rite of the sacrament itself, followed by the Mass and nuptial blessing already used before;

                C. The rite introduced by Vatican II: the celebration of the sacrament after the Liturgy of the Word, the nuptial blessing which is now addressed to both spouses, and an epiclesis of more recent introduction.

2. The study of the history of the rite would hopefully leads us to better appreciate not only the THEOLOGY of the Sacrament of Marriage but also its CELEBRATION and the elements that have formed part of the rite in the course of HISTORY. Remember, HISTORIA MAGISTRA!