And in everything there is love. In the main thing - unity, in the secondary - freedom, in everything - love

IN Orthodox world The calendar year begins with the Nativity Fast, which lasts until the Nativity of Christ. On January 7, a continuous week begins, called the Christmastide Church, and among the people simply called Christmastide.

Traditionally, multi-day fasts are intended for introspection, prayer and spiritual deeds. During fasting, there are special rules that cannot be broken. As a rule, the week is divided into Monday, Wednesday and Friday, when you can only eat food, Tuesday and Thursday, when you can hot food without oil, and Saturday and Sunday, when it is permissible to add vegetable oil into dishes.

Continuous weeks serve as consolation after multi-day fasts, help to stock up on strength before the upcoming spiritual test (after all, there are several fasts), and do not allow one to imagine oneself as “eternally limiting oneself to fasting.”

A continuous week is the week from Monday to Sunday, when even weekly fasts on Wednesday and Friday are canceled, and it is allowed to eat any food.

Such weeks are often preparatory to the 4 main Lents (Great, Petrov, Dormition and Nativity) and are tied to church holidays.

Types of weeks

During the year in the Orthodox calendar, the Church established five continuous weeks before one or another fast.

Holy Week

The end of the Nativity Fast will mark the beginning of Holy Week. Strictly speaking, it lasts not seven days, but 11. The week covers the period from the Birthday of Christ, who came into our world in the name of the salvation of mankind, until the Baptism of the Lord - from 7 to 18 January.

“Holy days” or “Holy evenings” have been revered in the Church since ancient times. These days, by Charter Pr. Savva the Sanctified was forbidden to fast, genuflect and marry.

The sanctity of the continuous week was violated by remnants pagan holidays: for example, fortune telling.

Week of the Publican and Pharisee

The Week of the Publican and the Pharisee received its name thanks to the parable of the same name from the Gospel of Luke, which talks about the need for humility, not pride and exaltation of one’s virtues.

The Publican and the Pharisee are the heroes of the parable who came to repentance. The second convinced himself of his own exaltation and closeness to God so much that he stopped noticing his own pride, and the first sincerely admitted his sins and asked for forgiveness.

This Week is one of a series of preparatory weeks on the eve of Great Lent.

The Church Charter does not establish exact date continuous week, because it is tied to the date of Easter. Such a week must take place 14 days before the start of fasting.

Week of the Prodigal Son

Before Great Lent there is one more preparatory week - the Sunday of prodigal son. The Gospel of Luke contains a parable that tells the story of a father and son. A son wandering around the world, having squandered everything that was in his soul and given by his father, returns home to sincerely beg for forgiveness, and receives it.

Drawing an analogy, before Great Lent it is necessary to repent of sins and return to the bosom of the church, hoping for His mercy.

Week of the Last Judgment

The last 7 days before Great Lent in Orthodoxy, the Parable of the Last Judgment, and the whole week is dedicated to the memory of the deceased, inveterate and not inveterate by the church. These days we should remember that God is a fair judge, and not only merciful.

Carnival

Pagan Maslenitsa actually merged with the last preparatory week before Lent, the continuous Cheese Week, which is revered by the Orthodox churches. In the Christian sense, during Cheese Week it is necessary to devote oneself to communication with neighbors and reconciliation with them.

The emergence of such church tradition associated with the vow of the Byzantine emperor Heraclius I, who waged a grueling war with the Persians. He made a vow not to eat meat a week before the start of Lent, and when the victory was won, the Church included such a rule in the Charter.

A distinctive feature of Cheese Week is food restrictions associated with the proximity of fasting. This week you can eat fish, dairy products, cheese and eggs, but meat dishes are no longer allowed.

Bright Week

For Easter week Jesus met with his disciples several times until they finally believed what had happened. The Savior’s last meeting was with the Apostle Thomas, who for the longest time refused to believe in the resurrection of the Lord and wanted to see the wounds and be convinced of the miracle.

Christ gave him such a chance by personally visiting Thomas, returning the student to the true path. The example of the apostle shows that the Church does not close the door to a person who wants to believe, but does not have the inner strength to do so.

The first week after Easter is called Bright Week - a time of joy, happiness, and a great miracle.

At this time, all services will be similar to Easter.

It is strictly forbidden to observe fasting, asceticism and even kneel. Throughout the whole week, people celebrate the Resurrection of the Lord: they rejoice and have fun. You can eat any food on all days.

Trinity Week

The last continuous week in the calendar year is Trinity, following the feast of the Holy Trinity - the Birthday of the Church. According to legend, it was on this day that the Holy Spirit descended on the apostles and gave them the knowledge of languages.

In total, according to the Bible, there were 9 such gifts, including the gift of tongues. The Holy Spirit descended on believers, giving them the opportunity to attract those who do not have faith to the Church and edify themselves and others.

During the week you will be able to eat whatever you want - the restrictions of Lent are ahead.

The end of Trinity Week is also the beginning of the summer Petrov (Apostolic) fast, which has different durations, but always ends on July 12 - the Day of Peter and Paul.

Orthodox fasts and weeks are inseparable from each other: the former provide an opportunity to accomplish a spiritual feat, purify oneself and engage in introspection, while the latter provide time to take a break from asceticism and experience the other side of life. It is important to remember that continuous weeks are given not for sheer fun, but for thoughtful fun - each of them is filled with inner meaning, open to believers.

If you don’t understand something, your faith is not strong, or you are looking for a mentor, go to church. Pray to God or talk to a minister.

After the Day of the Holy Trinity, the continuous Trinity Week begins, its features and preparation for Peter's Fast, Spiritual Day, folk traditions- “iron” week.

Trinity Week in 2018 May 27 – June 2. Trinity Week has long been treated specially in Rus'; it was called “iron”, “mermaid”, and also “green Christmastide”. It was surrounded by many beliefs and customs, which boiled down to various prohibitions on working with land, called for caution on the water, in some areas it was not allowed to even stray far from their villages during this week. This time, when pressing summer concerns always began, was the most filled with various beliefs in Rus'.

The ban on cultivating the land was due to the fact that the Earth was considered the “birthday girl” on that day. Swimming and going far from villages were not allowed, since it was believed that on these days mermaids came out of the water and tried in every possible way to harm people.

Russian Orthodox Church does not introduce any special restrictions this Trinity week. It is forbidden to do only what harms a person’s soul, as in any other period of the year. Thus, to consider that “it is a sin to plant and dig during the iron week” and the like is precisely a contradiction Christian doctrine and a reason to think about how and what we believe.

Orthodox Christian knows that the only peculiarity of this week is that it is continuous, as it serves as preparation for Peter’s Fast. Thus, the difference between this week is that it does not fast on Wednesday and Friday; you can eat dairy foods and eggs on all days.

Of course, if possible, during this week they try to work less in order to free up time for joyful communication with each other before Lent, because during Lent, entertainment must be limited. We must remember that this week you can start communion without observing three days fast Before this, only special prayer preparation and confession are necessary.

In addition, from the beginning of this week the countdown of the annual cycle begins, which is called “after Pentecost,” which is reflected in all complete Orthodox calendars.

After the liturgy for Trinity, that is, starting from Vespers on the Day of the Holy Spirit, they begin church prostrations, which they perform at certain moments of the service, as well as before the Holy Gifts and before revered icons. Prostrations have not been performed since Easter.

This week also differs from the previous Easter weeks in that from the Spiritual Day all initial prayers again include a prayer to the Holy Spirit “Heavenly King.”

A continuous week is a week in which there are no one-day fasts on Wednesday and Friday, when you can eat all foods. The exception is solid Cheese week before Great Lent, when, by its Charter, the Church gradually develops a person’s habituation to fasting, making his diet easier.

Continuous weeks are established to achieve several goals, so to speak, in a complex. On the one hand, in terms of food, to accumulate strength for fasting or, conversely, to gain a little comfort after a long fast, such as on Bright Week or Christmastide. On the other hand, it is to give a person the opportunity to relax before a long and intense spiritual feat: a kind of rest before a campaign or battle. On the third side, to prevent us from falling into delusion and imagining that we are “great” fasters and ascetics.

Have continuous weeks in the church yearly calendaronly five:

1. Christmas time - from Christmas to Epiphany , from 7 to 18 January (this, strictly speaking, is not a week, but 11 days).

2. The Publican and the Pharisee - two weeks before Lent.

3. Cheese (Maslenitsa) - the week before Lent (eggs, fish and dairy are allowed throughout the week, but without meat).

4. Easter (Light) - week after Easter.

5. Trinity - the week after Trinity (the week before Peter's Fast).

All such continuous weeks, except for the time of Christmastide at Christmas, are quite mobile in nature, since they are tied to the celebration of the Great Holiday of Easter.

Is it possible to receive communion during the continuous week? Of course, you can take communion. No Divine Liturgy, behind which believers would not be able to partake of the Holy Mysteries of Christ. And in this sense no continuous week is a period when Orthodox man should not receive communion if he has the urge and desire to do so. The celebration of the Divine Liturgy by a priest presupposes the communion of those present. On those days when you cannot receive communion and the Liturgy is not served, for example, on Good Friday on Holy Week.

Regarding the question of Should I fast before communion during the whole week? , then, guided by the spirit and letter of the Typicon, it should be noted that to establish a fast for oneself at a time when the Church abolishes it means, at a minimum, to self-inflict and impose burdens that do not need to be imposed.

From the point of view of external preparation for communion, everything is simple: During the whole week, eat what is allowed, that is, modest, but do not arrange a feast for yourself “from the belly” on the eve of communion. After all, it is clear that on a fast day you can eat three kilograms of fried potatoes until you then suffer from indigestion; this also will not be a proper way of preparing for the reception of the Holy Mysteries of Christ. Moreover, you should refrain from inappropriate drinking of alcohol.

What obstacles may arise for those wishing to receive communion during the continuous week? There can only be one obstacle: It is unacceptable for someone who deliberately and slyly postpones communion to begin the Holy Mysteries whole week so as not to prepare for it. Suppose a person receives communion three or four times a year, and instead of waiting for Lent, talking, and getting together, he says: “I will take communion during the continuous week after the Week of the Publican and the Pharisee, on Maslenitsa and on Bright Week - this way it will be possible not to fast before receiving the Holy Mysteries.” It is clear that if the idea of ​​communion during this period is not aspiration to Christ, but an escape from fasting, then a person who is guided by such thoughts is acting craftily; he can be advised, for the benefit of his spiritual and physical health, to think about himself and not take communion for now.

Every believer needs to know when there are continuous weeks, because this helps him correctly distribute his spiritual potential for further awareness of faith and everything connected with it. In other words, this is how he “tests” himself for fortitude, strong-willed qualities and moral priorities. But we should also not forget that everyone is free to make their own choice, the main thing is that it is closely connected with Orthodoxy, which is fundamental to everything that happens in the life of a devoted Christian.

Trinity has passed, but customs must be observed, as our ancestors did and lived like this for centuries
On the 50th day after Easter, the feast of the Resurrection of Christ, the whole christian world celebrates Trinity (Pentecost) - one of the main holidays church calendar.
In Christianity, the holiday of Pentecost was formed in the 4th century, after the church accepted the dogma of the Trinity - the existence of one God in three hypostases. “Go and teach all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit” (Matthew, 28, 19) - this is how Christ instructed his disciples shortly after his resurrection. And, according to the Bible, on the day Jewish holiday Shavuot - Pentecost, the holy spirit descended on the apostles from heaven and went among the nations, “speaking in other tongues, as the spirit foretold them” (Acts 2:1-4).

The celebration of the Trinity among European peoples absorbed the rites of the end of spring - beginning of summer, which existed among them before. These festivals of vegetation, based on the belief in magical power potions and flowers, very loved by young people. They were celebrated with songs, dances, and entertainment. This caused condemnation of Protestant, Catholic, Orthodox clergy: their synods made appropriate decisions.

Trinity (HELP)

But in the process of the development of Christianity and the decline of pagan rituals associated with traditional forms of economic management, these contradictions were smoothed out.

In some cases, purely Christian rituals remained (Italy, Spain, Portugal), in others, both traditions were combined, forming a new layer of rituals (Slavic peoples).

Trinity, green (Trinity, will strike) Sunday, green Christmastide - these are the popular names of this Ukrainian cycle calendar rituals, which presents all the moments characteristic of similar rituals of European peoples. According to church tradition, the first day of the holiday (Sunday) is Spiritual Day, the second is Trinity itself.

In Russia, before the holiday (spirit, green Saturday), homes were decorated with a potion. They covered the house with branches of maple and linden - over windows, doors, outbuildings, and stuck branches into the ground on rye crops. In the yard, at the gate, they placed a small birch or aspen brought from the forest. The floor of the house was covered with a fragrant potion: calamus (yavgir, tatarka - local names), lovage - bouquets of thyme, cornflowers, and mint were placed on the windows. Green Christmastide is a holiday of blossoming trees and lush greenery. According to the ideas of the pagan Slav, the green power of the forest, the spirit of the tree, helped a person to improve health, protect the estate from harm, and contributed to the harvest. It was as amulets that the klechannya was placed at the entrance (on doors, windows, gates). The aspen was supposed to scare away witches. In addition, the felled Osyka was brought into the house on Saturday at night, and in the morning they looked: if the leaves remained green, although withered overnight, everyone in the family would live until the next Trinity Saturday, but if the leaves turned black, then there would be a dead person in the house.

The Trinity potion was not thrown away, but dried and washed in decoctions of it to prevent headaches, soothe sore legs, and put it under the head of the deceased - “so that he would smell in the next world.” Dry calamus drove away mice, and in the hen's nest it helped hatch chicks. The potion consecrated in the church was especially valued.

Trinity Day

On the first day of Trinity in Ukraine (Rivne region, Volyn) and now you can find the most archaic in origin ritual of driving the Bush. The young girl is dressed in greenery, decorated with ribbons and led through the village with songs, receiving gifts from the owners of the house. In the central regions of Ukraine, the ritual had a different name - “driving a poplar.” While driving the poplar, the girls sang:

There was a poplar on the edge of an open field,

Stop, just a little, don’t develop,

Don't give in to the stormy wind...

In the Chernigov region on Trinity Day, a milestone was installed in the village square - a high pole entwined with a potion, with a cart wheel on top. In the Kiev region, they dug a tree high up, decorated with flowers and ribbons - ash. Young people walked, sang and danced around them. Obviously, the milestone and the “sycamore” are the embodiment of the world tree, an analogue of the “Maypole” known to all European peoples.

Ukrainians (as well as Bulgarians, Poles, Czechs) have many beliefs about mermaids associated with green Christmastide.

It was believed that during the week after Trinity (it is called mermaids, Rusalnitsa) mermaids walk on the earth. Former spirits moisture and plants with the adoption of Christianity turned into “ungodly rubbish.”

According to popular imagination, mermaids are girls or young women who drowned while swimming. Mermaids departed from everyday earthly existence for centuries and moved to a mysterious sphere, to the bottom of deep rivers and lakes, to fabulous chambers miraculously built from transparent crystal.

Third Person of God

The moon and stars call mermaids from the water. With the quiet splash of the waves, unwrapping the thick reeds with their pale hands, the mermaids come ashore. They are without clothes, they have a pale body, long wavy grass-green hair, and their eyes are ardent and blue, like the depths of the sea. Each mermaid has a wreath of sedge on her head, and only the eldest, the princess, has one of water lilies. Coming out of the water, the mermaids sit on the shore, comb their long hair, or they hold hands and lead amazing round dances with a mysterious whisper. Sometimes mermaids climb onto trees and swing on the branches, like on a swing, and sing songs. Mermaid songs are dangerous: whoever hears them will come close to them, enchanted, and the mermaids will then lure the stranger to themselves, accept him into their circle, and play with him, and then tickle him and drag him into the river, to the bottom.

Of the trees, mermaids love maple and oak the most. Swinging on the branches, they sometimes have fun: they unwind threads on the trees, which they steal from those women who fell asleep without prayer. Sometimes mermaids run through fields sown with rye; clapping their hands, they exclaim: “Wow, wow... Straw spirit! " From time to time, mermaids kindle fires that burn over graves, in groves and forests. Here are some of the songs of the mermaids' repertoire:

Oh, the sweet girl is running, running,

And behind her and the little mermaid,

Listen to me, beautiful young lady,

I'll tell you three riddles...

In Ukraine, for a long time, a custom among women was preserved - during the week of mermaid life, they hung canvas on the trees, which the mermaids allegedly took for their shirts. And they laid out hot bread on the windows, thinking that the mermaids would be satisfied with its smoke. During the mermaid week, you should not throw away the shells of eggs; if they fall into the water, the mermaids will harm people. You can't sow flour directly into the barrel, because there will be a lot of mermaids.

By the Holy Spirit every soul is alive

In mermaid week (the week after Trinity), on Thursday, you cannot work, so as not to anger the mermaids; so that they do not harm livestock, poultry and the entire household. This day is called Rusalka Easter. In the morning, as soon as the sun rises, the girls go to the field to gather bread and take with them rye flour bread, specially baked for this purpose. This bread is kneaded in holy water. In the field, the girls break the bread into several pieces, share it equally, and then each goes to her father’s field, where the rye grows, and there she lays bread for the forest mermaids (mavok) - “so that the rye will give birth.”

In addition, on this day the girls secretly went into the forest, took wormwood, lovage or garlic with them, and in the forest threw woven wreaths to the mermaids so that they would send them rich suitors. Starting from Thursday of Mermaid Week, the girls did not go alone to the field and did not swim, “so that the mermaids would not tickle them.”

They carried wormwood and lovage with them - because all this scared away the mermaids. If you had to go into the water, then first you need to scribble wormwood and lovage and only then can you go into the water.

On the eve of Trinity, girls are not allowed to go into the forest, because mermaids may meet them there and ask: “Wormwood or parsley”? If a girl says “wormwood,” then the mermaid will respond: “You yourself will perish!” - And he will let go, and as the girl says: “parsley,” then the mermaid: “You are my darling!” - And tickle the girl to death.

During Green Week, you cannot bleach the canvas: the naughty mermaids could leave indelible marks on it.

At the end of the week after Trinity, the mermaids were solemnly escorted out of the village. “Go, little mermaids, go, and DO NOT break our rye,” girls sang in the Chernihiv region, escorting a girl dressed as a mermaid (in a wreath and shirt) outside the village.

Today is the day of the Holy Spirit

In Russia they believed that everyone who died or drowned on Christmastide became a mermaid. Spiritual Saturday was considered a day of remembrance for drowned people and small unbaptized children, whom the church forbade to commemorate on other days. memorial days. Almost all over Ukraine people always visited the cemetery on Trinity Monday. Fresh graves were decorated with Klechenie. In the Rivne region and Volyn we went to the cemetery on Thursday, for the Nava Trinity. This day was also called “Dry Thursday”: it was forbidden to work in the fields, it was necessary to dry clothes.

The cult of ancestors is represented to one degree or another in the Trinity rites of all Europeans. Every folk holiday usually covers all sides economic activity person, his personal life. Trinity rituals strengthened human health and added fertility to the field, and protected the house from evil. Pets were not left unattended either. In Volyn, shepherds decorated cows with wreaths on Trinity Sunday (so that they would milk well), for which they received a gift from the owners of the cattle (by the way, the same tradition existed in Holland). In other regions of Ukraine, the housewife always brought a gift to the shepherd on Trinity Sunday. For the Greeks, Trinity was exclusively a memorial day - with the preparation of koliv and funeral services in the church.