AT VESPERS
Anastasis liturgical translations — translated by Ephrem Lash
Lord, I have cried**, Prosomia.**
Or Cross-Theotokion.
Tone 6. Having placed all your hope.
You were revealed as in every way most sacred and a bearer of light, in the Holy Spirit invested with divine and holy anointing, always radiantly approaching the Holy of Holies, ablaze with the brightness that comes from God and initiated by grace into the saving mysteries as a sacred initiator into mysteries; and as a truly far-famed Hierarch with boldness you make intercession for our souls.
Your life blazed with the torches of the virtues and enlightened believers, and dispelled the fog of error, for you truly appeared as a radiant sun, all-blessed Hierarch, and now you have made your dwelling where the light that knows no evening shines; by the grace of the Holy Spirit you have become a son of the day, therefore as we celebrate your godly, light-bearing and revered memory, ever-remembered Father, with love we honour you.
Your mind, its inclinations towards the divine, made fair by faith and radiantly made divine, all-revered, all-wise Father, meditated on incorruption while in a mortal and corruptible body, and acquired the splendour of the Bodiless powers, becoming far from passions and adorned with dispassion, O Father and wisest Hierarch, most radiant beacon and intercessor for those who honour with faith your memorial.
Whenever the fearful tribunal of your Son comes into my mind, All-pure Virgin, and the universal assize, I am at a loss, I am afraid, quailing and trembling at the examination of my deeds; for all are base and full of every shame, and truly worthy of darkness and punishment and rejection. See my distress, and see the ruin of my soul, and deliver me from that constraint and punishment.
A sword, as Symeon said, passed through your heart, All-holy Lady, when you saw the One who had shone from you by an ineffable word, lifted up on a Cross by lawless men as one condemned, tasting vinegar and gall, pierced in the side, nailed by hands and feet; and grieving you cried aloud with lamentation as a mother: My sweetest Child, what is this new mystery?
Translated by Ephrem Lash. Edition lash.en.anastasis.