The 'O Antiphons' (an antiphon is a spoken response in a church service) have been used in liturgical Christian traditions since as far back as the sixth century. They are spoken before reading the Magnificat at Evening Prayer during the last seven days of Advent.
My thanks to Malcolm Guite for these poetic reflections. Here is the one for 21st December: O Oriens – O Sunrise
O Oriens
O Oriens, splendor lucis aeternae,
et sol justitiae: veni, et illumina sedentes
in tenebris, et umbra mortis.
O Morning Star,
splendour of light eternal and sun of righteousness:
Come and enlighten those who dwell in darkness and the shadow of death.
O Oriens
E vidi lume in forme de riviera Paradiso XXX.61
First light and then first lines along the east
To touch and brush a sheen of light on water
As though behind the sky itself they traced
The shift and shimmer of another river
Flowing unbidden from its hidden source;
The Day-Spring, the eternal Prima Vera.
Blake saw it too. Dante and Beatrice
Are bathing in it now, away upstream. . .
o every trace of light begins a grace
In me, a beckoning. The smallest gleam
Is somehow a beginning and a calling:
“Sleeper awake, the darkness was a dream
For you will see the Dayspring at your waking,
Beyond your long last line the dawn is breaking.”
O Antiphons - 20th December
Posted by Kath Williamson Labels: Advent, antiphon, Malcolm Guite, poem, reflectionThe 'O Antiphons' (an antiphon is a spoken response in a church service) have been used in liturgical Christian traditions since as far back as the sixth century. They are spoken before reading the Magnificat at Evening Prayer during the last seven days of Advent.
My thanks to Malcolm Guite for these poetic reflections. Here is the one for 20th December: O Clavis David – O Key of DavidO Clavis
O Clavis David, et sceptrum domus Israel;
qui aperis, et nemo claudit;
claudis, et nemo aperit:
veni, et educ vinctum de domo carceris,
sedentem in tenebris, et umbra mortis.
O Key of David and sceptre of the House of Israel;
you open and no one can shut;
you shut and no one can open:
Come and lead the prisoners from the prison house,
those who dwell in darkness and the shadow of death
Even in the darkness where I sit
And huddle in the midst of misery
I can remember freedom, but forget
That every lock must answer to a key,
That each dark clasp, sharp and intricate,
Must find a counter-clasp to meet its guard,
Particular, exact and intimate,
The clutch and catch that meshes with its ward.
I cry out for the key I threw away
That turned and over turned with certain touch
And with the lovely lifting of a latch
Opened my darkness to the light of day.
O come again, come quickly, set me free
Cut to the quick to fit, the master key.
O Antiphons - 19th December
Posted by Kath Williamson Labels: Advent, antiphon, Malcolm Guite, poem, reflectionThe 'O Antiphons' (an antiphon is a spoken response in a church service) have been used in liturgical Christian traditions since as far back as the sixth century. They are spoken before reading the Magnificat at Evening Prayer during the last seven days of Advent.
My thanks to Malcolm Guite for these poetic reflections. Here is the one for 19th December: O Radix Jesse – O Root of JesseO Radix
O Radix Jesse, qui stas in signum populorum,
super quem continebunt reges os suum,
quem Gentes deprecabuntur:
veni ad liberandum nos, jam noli tardare.
O Root of Jesse, standing
as a sign among the peoples;
before you kings will shut their mouths,
to you the nations will make their prayer:
Come and deliver us, and delay no longerAll of us sprung from one deep-hidden seed,
We knew the virtues once of every weed,
Rose from a root invisible to all.
But, severed from the roots of ritual,
We surf the surface of a wide-screen world
And find no virtue in the virtual.
We shrivel on the edges of a wood
Whose heart we once inhabited in love,
Now we have need of you, forgotten Root,
The stock and stem of every living thing
Whom once we worshiped in the sacred grove,
For now is winter, now is withering
Unless we let you root us deep within,
Under the ground of being, graft us in.O Antiphons - 18th December
Posted by Kath Williamson Labels: Advent, antiphon, Malcolm Guite, poem, reflectionThe 'O Antiphons' (an antiphon is a spoken response in a church service) have been used in liturgical Christian traditions since as far back as the sixth century. They are spoken before reading the Magnificat at Evening Prayer during the last seven days of Advent.
My thanks to Malcolm Guite for these poetic reflections. Here is the one for 18th December: O Adonai – O LordO Adonai
O Adonai, et Dux domus Israel, qui Moysi in igne flammae rubi apparuisti,
et ei in Sina legem dedisti:
veni ad redimendum nos in brachio extento.
O Adonai, and leader of the House of Israel,
who appeared to Moses in the fire of the burning bush
and gave him the law on Sinai:
Come and redeem us with an outstretched arm
Unsayable, you chose to speak one tongue,
Unseeable, you gave yourself away,
The Adonai, the Tetragramaton
Grew by a wayside in the light of day.
O you who dared to be a tribal God,
To own a language, people and a place,
Who chose to be exploited and betrayed,
If so you might be met with face to face,
Come to us here, who would not find you there,
Who chose to know the skin and not the pith,
Who heard no more than thunder in the air,
Who marked the mere events and not the myth.
Touch the bare branches of our unbelief
And blaze again like fire in every leaf.
O Antiphons - 17th December
Posted by Kath Williamson Labels: Advent, antiphon, Malcolm Guite, poem, reflectionThe 'O Antiphons' (an antiphon is a spoken response in a church service) have been used in liturgical Christian traditions since as far back as the sixth century. They are spoken before reading the Magnificat at Evening Prayer during the last seven days of Advent.
Here is a list of them - you can see that they comprise different ways of addressing Jesus.
O Sapientia – O Wisdom – 17th December
O Adonai – O Lord – 18th December (Adonai is actually plural - O Lords)
O Radix Jesse – O Root of Jesse – 19th December
O Clavis David – O Key of David – 20th December
O Oriens – O Sunrise – 21st December
O Rex Gentium – O Sovereign of the nations – 22nd December
O Emmanuel – O Emmanuel - 23rd December (where Emmanuel means 'God with us')
During these seven days I will be posting a poetic reflection each day courtesy of Malcolm Guite.
Here is his contribution for 17th December.O Sapientia
O Sapientia, quae ex ore Altissimi prodiisti, attingens a fine usque ad finem, fortiter suaviterque disponens omnia:
veni ad docendum nos viam prudentiae.
O Wisdom, coming forth from the mouth of the Most High,
reaching from one end to the other mightily,
and sweetly ordering all things:
Come and teach us the way of prudence.I cannot think unless I have been thought,
O Word beneath the words with which I speak,
Nor can I speak unless I have been spoken.
I cannot teach except as I am taught,
Or break the bread except as I am broken.
O Mind behind the mind through which I seek,
O Light within the light by which I see,
O founding, unfound Wisdom, finding me,
O sounding Song whose depth is sounding me,
O Memory of time, reminding me,
My Ground of Being, always grounding me,My Maker’s Bounding Line, defining me,
Come, hidden Wisdom, come with all you bring,
Come to me now, disguised as everything.
Thank you, Malcolm, for allowing me to use your work.
