Sacred Song in the Late Antique and Byzantine East: Comparative Explorations 3-6 May, 2015 Brown University

Sacred Song in the Late Antique and Byzantine East: Comparative Explorations 3-6 May, 2015 Brown University Spyridon Antonopoulos City University, London “ 'We shall clearly hear him say 'Rejoice!' as we sing': Hearing, Intelligibility, and Performance in Byzantine Chant" The complex strophic poems known as the Kanons were first composed during a flourishing of literary creativity that took place in and around the Palestinian monastery of St Sabas in the seventh and eighth centuries. Kanons typically consisted of eight or nine textually and melodically unique heirmoi, to which multiple thematically linked troparia (contrafacta) were adapted. The heirmoi formed the basis for the notated musical collection of the Heirmologion, which can be found in its most archaic form as early as the tenth century. The heirmoi found in medieval Heirmologia were unascribed, brief, and mostly syllabic. By the fourteenth century, while traditional styles of psalmody continued to be sung and written, a new style of singing and composition – kalophonia – had begun to touch nearly every genre of liturgical poetry, including the Kanon’s heirmoi. Thus, elaborate kalophonic heirmoi, composed by named musicians, appear at least by the fourteenth century, characterized by long, melismatic phrases, text troping, insertion of non-textual elements, modal variety, and an expanded melodic range. This paper shall provide an analysis of select kalophonic heirmoi in contrast to their syllabic forebears in order to confront questions of aural reception, intelligibility, and performance. Thomas Arentzen University of Oslo “Voices Interwoven: Refrains and Vocal Participation in Late Ancient Kontakia” The refrain constitutes an indispensable element of the kontakion. It ties the stanzas together, but it also contributes to a sort of repetitive concentration in these songs; whichever spirals and ellipses the narratives move in, the refrain remains a gravity center. Scholars have generally been fascinated by the narrative disposition of kontakia or their ability to expand on Biblical stories in almost homiletic ways. If we take the performance context into consideration, however, the role of the refrain cannot be neglected. This repeated line was most probably sung by the congregation or, alternatively, by the congregation represented by the choir. For a short moment, every so often, the whole assembly would participate. After some twenty stanzas of narration and exhortation individual churchgoers may have paid attention to different aspects of the songs – if they had paid attention at all – but what none of them can have missed is the last line of every stanza. Some kontakia feature simple refrains like “hallelujah,” while others – especially those of Romanos – weave the refrain into a complex web of voices and polysemous turns. The congregation, which provides the voice of the refrain, thus gets interwoven into these bent warps. This paper explores how the more advanced refrain constructions involve the congregation and how they serve or not serve a positioning of the faithful among the characters of the kontakion narratives. Susan Ashbrook Harvey Brown University “Poetry, Prayer, Presence: Invocations in the Mimre of Jacob of Sarug” This text session will present several examples of introductory invocational prayers from the mimre of Jacob of Sarug. These prayers show pronounced patterns in style and content that serve to demarcate distinctive identities and roles for both preacher and congregation in the event of the mimro’s performance. They further construct particular expectations for divine presence in the event. Mary B. Cunningham Nottingham University “Is There Room for doubt in Christian Faith? Romanos and John the Monk on the Apostle Thomas” This presentation will deal with the hymnographic treatment of a doubting presence in Byzantine liturgical celebration: the apostle Thomas and his commemoration on the first Sunday after Easter. I will examine and contrast two hymns that were sung on this feast, including the sixth-century kontakion by Romanos the Melodist and the eighth- or ninth- century kanon that is attributed to John the Monk. Although the two hymns differ in structure and style, they both feature dialogues between Christ and the doubting apostle. I will explore a shared preoccupation of the two hymnographers as they demonstrate that faith develops out of doubt with the help of physical contact; however, it is noticeable that the two liturgical poets teach this lesson in different ways, which are influenced by the particular hymnographic genres that they employ. The emphasis of this presentation will be on performative issues, that is, poetic performance in the context of religious ritual. The hymnographers’ desire to induce a deeper sense of faith and liturgical involvement in their audiences is visible in both compositions on doubting Thomas. In addition to this, they seek to create a dynamic encounter between the biblical characters within their sacred songs. The presentation could take the form either of a short paper or of a workshop, depending on the wishes of the conference organizers. Uffe Holmsgaard Eriksen Aarhus University ” ‘We have all come now to listen to what the Gospels say’ Romanos the Melodist as preacher and the question of genre” The kontakia of Romanos the Melodist have often been defined as ”sermon[s] in verse” (Trypanis), ”sung sermons” (Schork) or metrische Predigt-Hymnen (Koder). This definition puts emphasis on the sermonic dimension in favor of the more lyrical or dramatic. It also raises the question of genre, as many kontakia do not easily fit the prototypical sermon or homily; rather the kontakion is a hybrid-genre or perhaps even a genre-mosaic, consisting of several micro-genres such as prayer, exhortation, drama, dialogue and ekphrasis. This paper will focus on Romanos as preacher and on the sermonic dimension of the kontakia. How does Romanos expound the scriptures and how does he instruct his audience? The role of exegesis and typology will be re-adressed, as well as the use of (theo)logical argumentation. The research presented will be work in progress and will draw on a number of kontakia, including ”On the Epiphany” (SC 17), ”On the Ten Virgins I” (SC 31) and ”On the Second Coming (SC 50). The group of kontakia numbered 51-56 in the SC edition will also be included. In all these kontakia, retelling stories with vivid dialogue, so prominent a feature in many kontakia, is either absent or playing a minor role. In stead, Romanos devotes in these kontakia his poetic and rhetorical skills to catechesis and moral instruction of the audience. Georgia Frank Colgate University “The Problem of Pity in Romanos, ‘On Elijah’ “ This text session examines a metrical homily by the Christian hymnographer Romanos the Melodist. Comprising 33 stanzas, the sixth-century kontakion on Elijah focuses on the devastating drought the prophet brought upon Israel as a punishment for sin (1 Kings 17). Romanos recasts the subsequent episodes (being fed by ravens in the wilderness and the raising of the widow’s son at Sarepta) as a duty-bound God’s desperate ruses to persuade the prophet to withdraw the oath and end the drought. The subthemes of a stiff-necked prophet, God’s ruses, and the raven’s reputation for pitilessness all have precedents in Syriac poetry and greek homilies (e.g., Basil of Seleucia Pg 85.147-97). How Romanos adapted this familiar story is the focus of my remarks. Among other things, this session will focus on the hymnographer’s use of voices—divine, human, and animal—to resolve the divine dilemma and to achieve the prophet’s conversion from justified vengeance to pity. Sarah Gador-Whyte St. George’s College “Performing Repentance in the Kontakia of Romanos the Melodist” In a genre dominated by dialogue, speech becomes a key way in which Romanos explores theology, creates models of behaviour and engages listeners in enacting that behaviour. Through speech, and often through internal monologues or imagined dialogues, Romanos’ characters analyze their own actions and thoughts, explaining the nature of their sin and demonstrating their path to repentance. Thus biblical characters become practical models for Romanos’ congregation to imitate as they seek to live Christian lives; textual performances help to construct the actions of believers. given the centrality of speech and dialogue to Romanos’ theological outreach, silence is usually marked. The haemorrhaging woman’s silence and secrecy are symbols of her fear and lack of understanding (Oxf. 12). Speech is not always positive – Peter’s silence would have been preferable to his denial of Jesus (Oxf. 18) – but, whether external or internal and often involving shouting or weeping, it always forms an important part of repentance. grief, expressed by tears and shouting, is the response to sin god most desires, but this grief must be appropriate and expressed in a Christian community: Peter howls and weeps at his sin, and calls for others to lament with him (Oxf. 18). By contrast, the character of Judas (Oxf. 17) is completely mute, his repentance too late and his actions self-excluding. And yet Romanos manages to use even the story of Judas to encourage repentance and teach about mercy. This paper explores Romanos’ concept of repentance and its performance in the kontakia through the lenses of speech and silence, grief and tears, participation and exclusion, and song. Sidney H. Griffith The Catholic University of America “The Poetics of Scriptural Reasoning: Syriac Mêmrê at Work” Syriac-speaking Christians of Late Antiquity had a marked penchant for religious discourse in verse. St. Ephraem’s long admired madrōshê are the stellar examples of Syriac poetry at its best. But he and other writers of note in Patristic times, such as Jacob of Serūg and Narsai of Nisibis, also composed hundreds of lines of verse in the literary form of the mêmrô, a sort of metrical homily that typically explored the inner dimensions of scriptural texts set for proclamation in liturgical events.

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