Orthodox Study
Isaac Lambertsen

Ode I

Menaion — translated by Isaac Lambertsen

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¶1

Irmos: I will open my mouth, and with the Spirit will it be filled; and I shall utter discourse unto the Queen and Mother, and shall appear, keeping splendid festival; and, rejoicing, I will hymn her wonders.

¶2

Katavasia: I shall open my lips

¶3

Theotokion: The tongues of orators are at a loss how to describe thy conceiving, which is beyond recounting, O most pure one; for thou gavest birth to God in the flesh, Who in His goodness became like unto us.

¶4

Canon to the Directress, the all-holy Theotokos, with six troparia, including the Irmos, the composition of the Hieromonk Ignatius, in Tone IV —

¶5

Irmos: Same as that of the preceding canon.

¶6

O pure one, joyously do I now offer my foremost praise: Rejoice! And with gladsome voice I cry out to thee, O Directress: Rejoice, and fill me with understanding as I begin to hymn thee!

¶7

Irmos: Come, ye people, let us chant a hymn to Christ God, Who divided the sea and guided the people whom He had led forth from the bondage of Egypt, for He hath been glorified.

¶8

Rejoice, O all-hymned one who gavest birth unto Christ our everlasting Joy! O Directress, thou hope of the Orthodox, all-hymned Virgin, fill me with the joy which the world hath desired.

¶9

All men and angels join chorus, ever crying out together in heaven and on earth, O Directress: Rejoice, O Virgin, for by thy birthgiving thou hast filled all things with joy!

¶10

O Directress, vouchsafe joy unto those who with fear cry out to thee Rejoice!, in that thou art the Mother of joy who deliverest from all tribulations; and have mercy on all that have recourse unto thee.

¶11

Another canon of the feast, with eight troparia, in the same tone —

¶12

The captains of the angels reverence thee, O Theotokos; and the ranks of the saints minister to thee with honor; the righteous adorn themselves and bless thee as the Mediatress of heavenly things; heaven and earth together praise thee splendidly in gladness. And we sinners ask mercy: Illumine our hearts, O Mistress, that we may chant a hymn to the revelation of thy holy icon.

¶13

Come ye, O Christian people, having mystically cleansed your minds, and assemble in the holy church of the Mother of Christ our God; for from her holy icon there poureth forth upon us inexhaustibly a spiritual wellspring which healeth the souls and bodies of those who cry out in song: Blessed is our God Who was born of thee!

¶14

The strange wonder of thy divine birthgiving striketh every ear with wonder and awe, O all-immaculate one: how thou didst conceive the Creator of the cherubim; how thou didst bear in the flesh Him Who is life, and for the whole world didst give birth to life: the God and Man!

¶15

Beneath thy shelter do all of us, the generations of man, flee, O Virgin Lady. With the light of thy birthgiving enlighten us, thy sinful servants who earnestly pray, bowing down before thine all-pure icon, asking to receive from thee great mercy.

¶16

Canon of the holy hierarch, the acrostic whereof is: “I hymn the great glory of Abercius”, the composition of Joseph,

¶17

in Tone II —

¶18

Illumined with the radiant splendor of the three-Sunned Godhead, O Abercius, thou becamest a light enlightening those in darkness and dispelling all the darkness of the demons.

¶19

On earth thou didst live a heavenly life, O all-blessed one, living in the flesh like one of the incorporeal ones and mortifying the passions; and thou didst receive the gift of the priesthood.

¶20

Having within thyself the evangelical discourse, O father, thou didst destroy the irrationality of the vain-minded, casting down the temples of the demons and their false graven images.

Translated by Isaac Lambertsen. Edition menaion.en.lambertsen.

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