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INTRODUCTION

The canon, which is written to the same set of Irmi as the Resurrection canon in Tone 8, is anonymous. There might be a clue in the use of the kalopoiïa in Ode 3. This word, which is not in the lexica, I have only noticed elsewhere in a canon by Joseph. Since, however, Joseph always ‘signs’ his canons in the ninth ode, the use of the word is probably not significant. The number of troparia in each ode varies, Odes 1, 4 and 7 each having five troparia, the rest four. Odes 4 and 7, which come after the breaks in the canon, frequently have one more troparion than the others. Here Ode 1, which begins the canon, also has an ‘extra’ troparion. The number of troparia may have been influenced by the acrostic, which forms a correct heroic hexameter. I have not attempted to reproduce the acrostic, though the translation of the acrostic itself forms a six foot iambic line, since English does not naturally accomodate the hexameter.

The canon would seem to be fairly late, since apart from the ‘refrains’ in Odes 7 and 8, allusions to the biblical canticles are almost entirely lacking. There is no reference to the Song of Moses, which is almost de rigueur, in Ode 1, none to the Song of Avvakoum in Ode 4, not even to the ancient refrain from the ’sung’, or ’Cathedral’, office ‘Glory to your power, O Lord!’, none to Jonas in Ode 6, while in Ode 9 the word ‘magnify’ does not occur at all. All these allusions are, however, found in the Irmi on which the canon is based.

THE CANON

Its Acrostic is:
I SING THE RANKS OF ALL THE SAINTS WITH MANY NAMES

Ode 1. Tone 8

As I sing the praise of the ranks of your Saints, I beg you that my soul may be flooded with your light at their prayers. For you are the unapproachable light1, who dispel the gloom of ignorance by your torches, O Word of God, Christ Giver of light.

When you were lifted up on the Tree, Master, you drew to knowledge of you the whole inheritance of the nations2, and made it radiant with the light of the holy Trinity through your holy Apostles, through whom you drove out deception.

Obedient to your commandment, O Christ, your glorious Apostles devoutly renounced everything on earth; and by the light of grace they made bright the whole inhabited world as through the Gospel they proclaimed you.

Rejoicing, the noble Martyrs took up your Cross and unflinchingly imitating your sacred passion, they did not tremble at the threats of tyrants, nor at fire, sword, scourges, nor even at starvation or death.

Theotokion

The virgins, adopting a manly resolve, unflinchingly endured the contests of martyrdom, and after you3, as in the Psalms, all-pure Virgin, divinely rejoicing together, they were offered to your Son, the King of all.

Ode 3

The Priests and Shepherds, having put on the sacred priesthood, wisely guided it, O Christ, and worthily adorned it, truly enriched with the word of teaching from on high.

Made fair by the beauties of the first source of beauty4, and revealed as unerring beacons, you made Christ’s Church a heaven, O Saints, each in your place adorning it in varied ways.

Obedient to your law, the companies of the blessed, radiant with virtues of many kinds, have joyfully filled5 the heavenly mansions; for they all filled these worthily, one one and one another.

Theotokion

Mother of God, from a virgin womb for us you gave birth to the Word, God from God; whom pure maidens desired in a manner fitting God, and after you6 they all followed him.

Ode 4

The company of your Saints, joined together through love, and with sincerity and purity delighting in you, dances around you in joy with the perpetual dance of the Angels, O All-seeing, the God and Lord of all.

Once gleaming with the divine anointing of the priesthood, glorious and all-blessed Martyr Priests, like youths you bound on the Martyrs’ wreath of victory; and so, fittingly receiving double crowns, you rejoice with Christ eternally.

God-bearing Fathers, you subjected every fleshly thought to the spirit, withering their unruly assaults by fasting and ascetic discipline; and now aflame with the light of dispassion, you have received the rewards of your labours.

As Martyrs of Christ, the Protomartyr, you endured great torments, bravely and outstandingly struggling, glorious Saints, as though in bodies not your own; and now, revealed as heirs of the kingdom, you are a source of healings for the faithful.

Theotokion

Bride of God, you became Mother of God; for you gave birth for us in bodily form to the pre-eternal Word, in whom women too have led holy lives and, adorned through you by contests of many kinds, have restored the fall of our Foremother.

Ode 5

As godly Prophets you were found worthy to foresee the things to come, longing for which with nobility of soul, you purified yourselves by holy living, O God-bearers, enlightened by the strength of the Spirit.

The choir of the Saints is now made bright by divine gifts of grace, all those before the law, Patriarchs, Prophets, Apostles, companies of Martyrs, Ascetics, Teachers and the Just with Martyr Priests.

As we see the throng of your Saints, O Saviour, shining today with your brightness and with unquenchable lamps of grace, we unceasingly sing the praise of your divine riches and unstinted blessings.

Theotokion

All-holy women, filled with love of your most wondrous Offspring, reckoned the delights of life as nothing, O All-pure, desiring passionately his brightness, his alone, and his divine radiance.

Ode 6.

The Saints, Master, having found you in Sion placed as a precious, chosen cornerstone7, an unshakeable foundation, as chosen stones built themselves on you.

When your side was pierced streams of blood dropped from it along with deifying water8 and refashioned the world and summoned a godly throng of all the Saints, O Benefactor.9

With true devotion we sing the praise of the inspired cloud of Martyrs10, made radiant by grace and shining brilliantly with the purple of their blood and with the crimson of their valiant contest.

Theotokion

We all know you as most truly Mother of God, through whom women’s nature was given strength, O All-blameless, and so competed on behalf of Christ and became filled devoutly with every virtue.

Ode 7

The ranks of Saints, as they praise in never silent hymns the One who rests among the Saints, now enjoy divine delight, and joyfully they dance and sing, ‘Blessed is the God of our Fathers’.

The companies of the Saints, suffused with divine rays of triple-sunned outpouring of light, devoutly proclaim a Unity in number three, the Father without beginning and the Son and the Holy Spirit.

When you appear, O God, in your ineffable glory in the midst of the gods, granting to each their desserts and apportioning crowns, then count all worthy to sing to you, ‘Blessed is the God of our Fathers’.

With gladness let us make melody to the throng of all the Saints, welded together from every race and rank and way of life, and let us sing with them, Blessed is the God of our Fathers’.

Theotokion

All you maidens, having together formed a godly choir, cry out to Mary, the immaculate and all-holy Mother of God, ‘Be glad, you who made the source of our joy gush forth’.

Ode 8

Rejoice, Martyrs, Prophets, Apostles, honoured company of Martyr Priests, godly choir of the Just, of Ascetics and Teachers, making melody with the Myrrhbearing women, ‘Youths, bless; priests, praise; people, highly exalt him to all the ages’.

Saints, who bear in yourselves the radiance beyond understanding and are filled with divine joy and gladness, gods you are declared by your nearness to God; familiar11with the rays of the divine operation12, and enlightened by the beams of the ineffable glory, you highly exalt Christ to the ages.

Appearing as beacons with many lights, O Saints, you make the heaven of the Church radiant with gifts of grace of many kinds, and divers beauties: with justice, sobriety, courage and prudence13, as you cry, ‘You priests, praise; you people, highly exalt Christ to the ages’.

Theotokion

All you women wise in God and made perfect in Christ by the Spirit, as you now stand round the all-pure Virgin and true Mother of God, who ransomed us from the curse of our foremother Eve, with joy sing the praise of her fruit to the ages.

Ode 9

The company of the elect, armed with the breastplate of hope and love and fenced about by faith14, rejoiced as they nobly endured all the threats of the tyrants, the tortures and scourges, for, as outstanding witnesses of truth, their wealth was Christ who gives victory in contests.

Let us now fittingly praise as a harbour of salvation, the Baptist, Apostles, Prophets and Martyrs, with Ascetics, godly Teachers and Priests, the company of Patriarchs and far-famed Martyr Priests, God-loving women, the holy and the just.

Tested by the fire of temptations and not allured by pleasures, you rejoice sincerely in heaven, glorious company of the Saints, as you stand around the Master’s throne formed of light, now that mirrors15 have been abolished and shadow has passed away16 by the manifestation of the truth.

Theotokion

You appeared as the one who unites things that were parted; for through you humans have truly become companions of the Angels in heaven, and now the ranks of all the Saints bear witness with them, Virgin Mother of God, as they sing the praise of your Offspring in everlasting songs.

  1. 1 Timothy 6,16.
  2. cf. John 12,32.
  3. Psalm 44,15.
  4. The word kallopoiïa is unattested in the lexica. It also occurs in the 9th Ode of the canon for St Artemios on 20 October, whose author is given as ‘Joseph’. The cognate adjective is, however, common and means ‘creating/producing beauty’. In the canon for St Artemios the noun refers to the ‘struggles’ of the martyr and the phrase used means something like ‘made lovely by the struggles that create beauty’. Here the reference is presumably to God.
  5. There is a problem of text here. The Apostoliki Diakonia has ‘filled’, while Phos has ‘inherited’. These differ by only one letter in Greek. HTM reads ‘inherited’, which is perhaps the better reading, and takes the final clause to refer to ‘virtues’ rather than ‘mansions’, translating the verb by ‘accomplish’. It is difficult, however, to take ‘these’ as referring to the remoter object.
  6. Psalm 44,15.
  7. cf. Isaias 28,16; 1 Peter 2,6; Ephesians 2,20.
  8. cf. John 19,34.
  9. The HTM version of the final clause of this troparion is wildly inaccurate, since they take the direct object of the verb as the subject.
  10. cf. Hebrews 12,1, where, of course, the translations have ‘witnesses’.
  11. I see no justification for HTM’s ‘standing in the presence of’ for homilountes.
  12. The adjective theourgikos is characteristic of the language of St Denys the Areopagite and I am not happy with HTM’s ‘deifying effulgences’.
  13. The four traditional ‘cardinal’ virtues, taken over from Plato and Aristotle.
  14. cf. Ephesians 6,13-17.
  15. cf. 1 Corinthians 13,12.
  16. The allusion is to Hebrews 10,1, but there is a closer parallel in the first Doxastikon for Saturday Vespers in Tone 2, ‘The shadow of the law has passed, now that grace has come’, which in turn suggests John 1,17.

This Translation © Archimandrite Ephrem, 1997

All texts and translations on this page are copyright to
Archimandrite Ephrem ©

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This page was last updated on 10 February 2001