Continuing my series with some summary notes to get you started, and links to where to find out more, today some notes on the sixth of the day hours, Vespers.
What is Vespers?
Vespers is technically the parallel hour to Lauds, and so was originally said at sunset. In late antiquity it was also often known as lucernarium, for the lamp-lighting ceremony that was often part of it, and which symbolised the idea of Christ as light in the darkness.
In Rome, however, unlike the East and many other places, lucernarium seems to have been strictly a domestic ceremony, and so was, so far as the evidence can show, never incorporated into the liturgy of Vespers as such.
For that reason, perhaps, St Benedict's Rule actually somewhat subverts the idea of it as paralleling Lauds, by suggesting that the monks say it a little earlier in order to have dinner without needing to light the lamps and candles.
Instead, Benedictine Vespers, focuses more on the humility theme that runs through Prime to None, particularly the proposition that the humble will ultimately triumph, while the proud will ultimately fall, both through the use of the Magnificat at the hour, and verses in the psalms each day around the same theme.
Where to find Vespers in your book
Because Vespers uses the psalm sequence 109 - 147 (jumping over a few used at other hours along the way), it appears towards the end of the psalter section, starting at page 203 in the Monastic Diurnal.
The structure of Vespers
Vespers has a similar structure to Lauds, but with no invitatory or fixed psalm, and only variable four psalms (or parts of psalms) each day.
But although the basic structure of the hour is always the same, Vespers can be a difficult hour to locate all the necessary texts for since, as the table below indicates, pretty much every element of it (except the opening and closing formulas and the Magnificat) can change according to the season and/or feast.
Where Lauds, for example, has only one set of 'festal' psalms, there are many different variants for Vespers.
The structure of Vespers | |
Opening prayers | MD 1 |
Antiphons (normally said before and after each psalm) and psalms | Sunday: MD 203 ff (or of the feast) Monday: MD 212 ff (or of the feast). Tuesday: MD 220 ff (or of the feast). Wednesday: MD 226 ff (or of the feast). Thursday: MD 235 ff (or of the feast). Friday: MD 243 ff (or of the feast). Saturday: MD 249 ff. |
Chapter | Of the day, season or feast. |
Short Responsory | Of the day, season or feast. |
Hymn | Of the day, season or feast. |
Versicle | Of the day, season or feast. |
Antiphon for the Magnificat (repeated before and after the canticle) | Saturday: For I Vespers of the Sunday of the liturgical year. Sunday: For the Sunday of the liturgical year (or feast). Monday to Friday: For day, season or feast. |
Magnificat | MD 209 |
Closing prayers | MD 210 |
Collect | Of the week of the liturgical year, day or feast. |
Tips and traps
First, note that the opening of the hour (Deus in adjutorium) is not written out in full for each day at Vespers - if you don't know it by heart, go back to page 1 of the psalter section of the book and put a ribbon there until you have learn it!
Secondly, the short responsory at Vespers works the same way as that for Lauds - but remember that the Diurnal doesn't usually write it out in full, you need to treat the words as cues only.
Thirdly, Saturday Vespers has a variable antiphon for the Magnificat which generally links to the book of the Bible being read at Matins. From August to November, they are labelled for the calendar month (starting on page 451* in the Diurnal) rather than the Sunday after Pentecost.
Related to this, the collect for Saturday Vespers is that of the next day (Sunday), not the previous one.
Finally, remember that first class feasts have a 'first Vespers' the night before the feast. I've provided some more detailed notes on the effect of feasts in the more detailed series on Vespers, but here is a summary to help you prepare.
LEVEL OF FEAST | EFFECT ON VESPERS |
Memorial | None (Lauds only). |
Class III without proper antiphons | Psalms and antiphons of the day; Chapter, responsory, hymn etc from the Common |
Class III with proper antiphons | Psalms of Sunday or the Common; antiphons of the feast; chapter etc for the feast (from the proper of the feast or the Common) |
Class II | All for the feast (or from the Common of Saints or season), including psalms of feast, Sunday or Common |
Class I | All for the feast (or from the Common of saints or season) with I Vespers the night before |
