Anaphoras and Liturgies

The Church’s eucharistic prayers, family by family: the Roman Canon and the three new prayers of 1968, the Byzantine anaphoras of Chrysostom and Basil, the Alexandrian prayers of Egypt and Ethiopia, the Syriac anaphoras East and West, the Armenian prayer, and the earliest witnesses — papyri, the Didache, and the first church orders.

Roman

  • The ancient and, until 1968, sole eucharistic prayer of the Roman rite, prayed unchanged from 1570; the First Eucharistic Prayer of the reformed Missal.

  • The shortest of the new eucharistic prayers of 1968, modelled on the ancient anaphora of the Apostolic Tradition; the Church's weekday workhorse.

  • The new eucharistic prayer of 1968 built on Cipriano Vagaggini's draft 'Canon B', with a variable preface; the Sunday prayer alongside the Canon.

  • The 1968 eucharistic prayer with a fixed preface narrating salvation history, modelled on the Egyptian anaphora of St Basil.

Byzantine

  • The ordinary eucharistic prayer of the Byzantine rite, used on Sundays and feast days; traditionally ascribed to St John Chrysostom.

  • The longer Byzantine eucharistic prayer, used on ten days of the year; traditionally ascribed to St Basil of Caesarea.

  • Vespers joined to communion from Gifts consecrated at an earlier Liturgy; traditionally ascribed to St Gregory the Dialogist.

Alexandrian

  • The ordinary anaphora of the Coptic Church, used most days of the year; traditionally ascribed to St Basil, judged of Syrian origin.

  • The festal anaphora of the Coptic Church, used at Christmas, Epiphany, Easter and Palm Sunday; traditionally ascribed to St Gregory of Nazianzus.

  • The rarely-used Coptic recension of the ancient Alexandrian liturgy of St Mark, ascribed to St Cyril of Alexandria; the only Coptic anaphora keeping intercessions before the Sanctus.

  • The ordinary anaphora of the Ethiopian and Eritrean Churches, ascribed to the Apostles; its earliest form belongs to the Aksumite stratum of Ge'ez translations.

  • The Marian anaphora of the Ethiopian missal, of Ethiopian authorship and fifteenth-century date; traditionally ascribed to Heryacos of Behnesa.

West Syriac

  • The ordinary anaphora of the West Syriac tradition, ascribed to St James the Lord's brother: a Greek Jerusalem prayer translated into Syriac before the end of the sixth century.

  • A Syriac anaphora of the Antiochene family, traditionally ascribed to St Luke, living in the Maronite Book of Offering among its eight anaphoras.

  • An ancient Edessan anaphora of the Maronite tradition, also called the Apostles' anaphora or Third Peter; unused for centuries, surviving in the Great Friday Signing of the Chalice.

Armenian

East Syriac

Early witnesses

  • The terse ordination anaphora of a disputed third-century church order, long ascribed to Hippolytus; the model behind the Roman Missal's Eucharistic Prayer II.

  • A complete fourth-century anaphora on papyrus from Egypt, bilingual in Latin and Greek, whose invocation precedes the institution narrative.

  • A fourth-century Egyptian anaphora from the prayer-book ascribed to Sarapion of Thmuis, invoking the divine Word rather than the Holy Spirit over the gifts.

  • Six fragments of a fourth- or fifth-century Greek papyrus leaf preserving an early Alexandrian eucharistic prayer; whether it was complete is disputed.

  • The Teaching's disputed meal thanksgivings, cup before bread: eucharistic prayers to some scholars, an agape's blessings to others.

  • The great literary liturgy of the Apostolic Constitutions' eighth book: a complete fourth-century Antiochene anaphora that was probably never celebrated.

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