AT VESPERS

**After the Opening Psalm, we read** Blessed is the man**, the first Kathisma.**

O Joyful Light**, and the Prokeimenon of the day,** The Lord is King. ****

At Lord, I have cried**, we insert ten Stichera: six of the Resurrection in the Tone of the week from the Oktoichos, and the following four Prosomia from the Triodion:**

**Theotokion from the Oktoichos.**

Tone 6. Having set all your hope.

The Lord my Creator took me as dust from the earth, and with the breath of life he gave me a soul and made me a living creature. He honoured me as ruler on earth over all things visible and as a companion of the Angels. But Satan the deceiver, using the serpent as his instrument, enticed me by food, separated me from the glory of God and gave me over to the earth and to the lowest depths of death. But as Master and compassionate call me back again.

Wretch that I am, I have cast off the robe woven by God, disobeying your divine command, Lord, at the counsel of the enemy, and I am clothed now in fig leaves and in garments of skin. I am condemned to eat the bread of toil in the sweat of my brow, and the earth has been cursed so that it bears thorns and thistles for me. But, Lord, who in the last times were made flesh of a Virgin, call me back and bring me into Paradise again.

O precious Paradise, unsurpassed beauty, tabernacle built by God, unending gladness and delight, glory of the just, joy of prophets, and dwelling place of saints, with the sound of your leaves implore to the Maker of all to open for me the gates which I closed by my transgression, and may count me worthy to partake of the Tree of Life and of the joy in which I delighted when I dwelt in you before

Adam was banished from Paradise through disobedience and cast out from delight, beguiled by the words of a woman. Naked he sat opposite the place, lamenting ‘Woe is me!’ Therefore let us all make haste to accept the season of the Fast and obey the traditions of the Gospel, that through them we may become well-pleasing to Christ and once more receive Paradise as our dwelling.

Adam sat opposite Paradise and, lamenting his nakedness, he wept, ‘Woe is me ! By evil deceit was I persuaded and robbed, and exiled far from glory. Woe is me ! Once naked in my simplicity, now I am in want. But, Paradise, no longer shall I enjoy your delight; no more shall I look upon the Lord my God and Maker, for I shall return to the earth whence I was taken. Merciful and compassionate Lord, I cry to you, ‘Have mercy on me who am fallen’.