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Пишет Misha Verbitsky (![[info]](http://lj.rossia.org/img/userinfo.gif){kind=small} tiphareth) |
https://www.alexdefircks.com/moment
The Easter greeting is an important tradition in the Orthodox Church. From the moment the church doors are flung open at midnight, and for at least the first week afterward and sometimes for forty days after Easter Sunday, one greets friends and fellow worshipers by saying “Khristos voskres” (Christ has risen), the other person replies, “Voistinu voskres” (in truth He is risen) and they then kiss three times – right cheek, left cheek, right cheek. The three kisses are meant to represent belief, hope and love and they are also meant to symbolise the Holy Trinity. How I hated those kisses when I was a child! Of course, Russians take any opportunity to be physically demonstrative, so I had to endure kisses all through the year. I became quite adept at ducking.
When worshipers return home in the early hours of Easter Sunday morning, they sit down to a banquet of all the food they have abstained from during the forty days of Lent. I wrote about the traditional Easter food in my last post.
The photo above is taken from my collection of Romanov postcards, inherited when my parents died. It shows Tsar Nicholas II giving the Easter greeting to Cossack troops in 1915. Nicholas II was known to spend between 2 and 4 days greeting his troops with the Easter greeting, three kisses for each of the men. He must have kissed thousands of them each year. The royal family also gave the Easter greeting to all of their servants as well as everyone in the Court. It would be a duty I could never imagine performing!
The Easter greeting is an important tradition in the Orthodox Church. From the moment the church doors are flung open at midnight, and for at least the first week afterward and sometimes for forty days after Easter Sunday, one greets friends and fellow worshipers by saying “Khristos voskres” (Christ has risen), the other person replies, “Voistinu voskres” (in truth He is risen) and they then kiss three times – right cheek, left cheek, right cheek. The three kisses are meant to represent belief, hope and love and they are also meant to symbolise the Holy Trinity. How I hated those kisses when I was a child! Of course, Russians take any opportunity to be physically demonstrative, so I had to endure kisses all through the year. I became quite adept at ducking.
When worshipers return home in the early hours of Easter Sunday morning, they sit down to a banquet of all the food they have abstained from during the forty days of Lent. I wrote about the traditional Easter food in my last post.
The photo above is taken from my collection of Romanov postcards, inherited when my parents died. It shows Tsar Nicholas II giving the Easter greeting to Cossack troops in 1915. Nicholas II was known to spend between 2 and 4 days greeting his troops with the Easter greeting, three kisses for each of the men. He must have kissed thousands of them each year. The royal family also gave the Easter greeting to all of their servants as well as everyone in the Court. It would be a duty I could never imagine performing!
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