Office of the Dead
Evening Prayer (Vespers) includes Psalms 121 [120], 130 [129], and a canticle from Philippians, known sometimes as the Kenotic Hymn (Phil 2:6-11).
The absence of the introduction, "Deus in adjutorium", the hymns, absolution, blessings, and of the doxology in the psalms also recall ancient times, when these additions had not yet been made.
The use of some of these psalms in the funeral service is of high antiquity, as appears from passages by Augustine and other writers of the fourth and fifth centuries.
The lessons from Job, so suitable for the Office of the Dead, were also read in very early days at funeral services.
It is also a very ancient composition (see Cabrol, "La descente du Christ aux enfers" in "Rassegna Gregor.
The "Libera me de morte æterna", which is found more complete in the ancient manuscripts, dates also from an early period (see Cabrol in "Dict.
Not to speak of the variety of ceremonies of the Mozarabic, Ambrosian, or Eastern rites, even in countries where the Roman liturgy prevailed, there were many variations.
It is fortunate that the Roman Rite preserved carefully and without notable change this office, which, like that of Holy Week, has retained in its archaic forms the memory and the atmosphere of a very ancient liturgy.
For the Ambrosian Rite, see Magistretti, "Manuale Ambrosianum", I (Milan, 1905), 67; for the Greek Ritual, see Burial, pp. 77–8.
[1] The Office of the Dead has been attributed at times to Isidore, to Augustine, to Ambrose, and even to Origen.
Pierre Batiffol attributes it to Amalarius of Metz,[2] who does refer to the "Agenda Mortuorum" contained in a sacramentary,[3] but without claiming authorship.
[5] The Gregorian Antiphonary contains a mass and an office in agenda mortuorum, but it is admitted that this part is an addition; a fortiori this applies to the Gelasian.
The Maurist editors of St. Gregory are inclined to attribute their composition to Albinus and Etienne of Liège (Microl., lx).
But if it is impossible to trace the office and the mass in their actual form beyond the 9th or 8th century, it is notwithstanding certain that the prayers and a service for the dead existed long before that time.
Gregory of Nyssa, Jerome, and Augustine, Tertullian, and the inscriptions in the catacombs afford a proof of this (see Burial, III, 76; PRAYERS FOR THE DEAD; Cabrol, "La prière pour les morts" in "Rev.
Even in the 11th, 12th, and 13th centuries, it was recited chiefly by the religious orders (the Cluniacs, Cistercians, Carthusians), like the Little Office of Our Lady (see Guyet, loc.
It has even been said that it was to remove the obligation of reciting it that the feasts of double and semi-double rite were multiplied, for it could be omitted on such days (Bäumer-Biron, op.
Even then it was not obligatory, for the bull "Quod a nobis" of the same pope merely recommends it earnestly, like the Office of Our Lady and the Penitential Psalms, without imposing it as a duty (Van der Stappen, "Sacra Liturgia", I, Malines, 1898, p. 115).
In the ancient rite of the Roman Catholic Church, with bull Supremi omnipotentis Dei of 11 March 1572, Pope Pius V granted the indulgence of 50 days for those who recite the penitential psalms.
