The Present Form of the Armenian
Church Calendar
The Armenian
Typicon (Donatsuyts) in use in the Armenian Church today
received its final shape in the time of Catholicos Simeon of Erevan,
who first published it in 1775.1
The Armenian
Church adopted the Gregorian calendar on November 6, 1923-with the
exceptions of Tiflis and in the Armenian Patriarchate of Jerusalem
where, because of "the status quo of the Holy Places," the Julian
calendar is still followed.
There
is an interesting mechanism inherent in the Armenian calendar which
differs from the calendar systems of other churches. In all other
Christian communities (except for the Chaldaeans), all feasts other
than the movable cycle of Easter and the feasts dependant upon it are
celebrated on a fixed date each year.
2 The Armenian Church has developed a
different system, based on the weekly cycle. This is a remnant of the
earlier tradition in which the days of the week, especially Sunday
(and later the fast days Wednesday and Friday) were the controlling
element in Christian festive celebration. The Armenian calendar
respects this primitive practice in that feasts of the saints can
never be celebrated on Sunday, Wednesday, or Friday. Though the saints
have a date assigned for remembrance in the synaxary, when that date
falls on a Sunday, Wednesday, or Friday, the commemoration must be
transferred. Some important feasts of Our Lord and the Virgin are
transferred to the Sunday nearest their fixed date. Consequently,
about 150 days of the year are put aside for tasting and penance,
during which time saints cannot be commemorated. Another 150 or so
days remain for the commemoration of the saints. The feasts of the
Lord are observed during the remaining days of the year.3
Hence, all the feast days in the Armenian calendar are movable except
for six:4
1. Theophany and
Nativity (January 6)
2. Presentation of the Lord to the Temple (February 14)
3. Annunciation (April 7)
4. Feast of the Birth of St. Mary the Virgin (September 8)
5. Presentation of the Holy Mother-of-God (November 21)
6. Conception of the Virgin Mary by St. Anne (December 9)
Except for the
feast of Theophany and Nativity, borrowed from the Byzantines at an
early date, and the feast of the Presentation of the Lord to the
Temple, these fixed commemorations were introduced into the Armenian
calendar during the Middle Ages. The Annunciation and Birth of St.
Mary the Virgin were introduced during the thirteenth century, and the
Presentation and Conception were accepted in the seventeenth century.
5 In the practice of the Armenian
Church, all other feasts are celebrated on a different date each year,
though they may have a fixed date assigned to them in the synaxary.
The Armenian Weekly Cycle
In the Armenian tradition there are
three types of commemorations during the week:
6
1. Terowni
(Dominical feasts). All Sundays are dedicated to the feasts of the
Lord. The commemoration of the saints may never be celebrated on
Sundays.
7 Some important fixed Dominical
feasts and the feasts of the Holy Virgin are transferred to the Sunday
nearest their fixed date.
2.
Srboc (Feasts of the saints). The feasts of the saints are
distributed over Mondays, Tuesdays, Thursdays, and Saturdays. Notable
saints' days occur on Saturdays. Dominical feasts or days of
abstinence may also be observed on these four days of the week.8
3.
Pahoc (Days of abstinence). Wednesdays and Fridays are the days of
abstinence, on which the feasts of the saints are not commemorated.
The character of the office during these two days of the week is
penitential. Wednesdays are dedicated to the Annunciation and
Incarnation, Fridays to the Crucifixion.9
The Armenian Annual Cycle
The liturgical
year of the Armenian Church is divided into eight great periods or
seasons,10
namely:
1. Theophany and Nativity
2. Lent
3. Easter
4. Pentecost
5. Transfiguration
6. Assumption
7. Exaltation of the Holy Cross
8. Advent
This annual cycle also manifests
primitive traits, since all its seasons (with the exception of
Epiphany) are moveable and vary in strict dependence on the cycle's
primary element, the annual paschal cycle. But the Armenian annual
cycle, like the East Syrian or Chaldean, also shows further evolution
compared to, say, the Roman or Byzantine calendars. For while the
former have filled the entire year with specific periods or seasons,
the Roman calendar, for example, distinguishes only the lenten-paschal
cycle and Advent from the rest of the year, which is just "ordinary
time."
The present
Armenian system was fully developed by the twelfth century.
11 The liturgical year of the Armenian
Church is divided into four sections:
1. The Period of Theophany (Advent).
2. The Great Period of Pascha (Eastertide).
3. The Period of Transfiguration (Assumption-Tide).
4. The Great Period of Extra-Pascha (Exaltation-Tide).
___________________
*
Archbishop Khajag Barsamian, THE CALENDAR OF THE ARMENIAN
CHURCH, ST.VARTAN PRESS, Diocese of the Armenian Church of America,
New York, 1995, p. 3-5.
1.
Ormanean 1914. II, p. 3101.
2.
Adontz 1927-28, p. 101; see also de Quarenghi 1906, p. v.
3.
Adontz 1927-28, p. 101.
4.
De Quarenghi 1906, p. 1.
5.
Cf. de Quarenghi 1906, pp. 1-2, where the author suggests that the
Feast of the Presentation of the Lord in the Temple was a
thirteenth-century introduction into the Armenian calendar. Yet we
find the celebration of that feast in the Armenian Lectionary of
Jerusalem, which indicates the early presence of the feast in the
Armenian liturgical year.
6.
Adontz 1927-28, p. 102; cf. also de Quarenghi 1906, p. 4.
7.
De Quarenghi 1906, p. 2.
8.
De Quarenghi 1906, p. 3.
9.
Ibid.
10.
Cf. Renoux 1976, p. 278.
11.
Adontz 1975, p. 102.
