Christian Metatext of the Sermons of the Gospel in the History of Liturgical Practice Singing

Abstract

In all the Christian denominations, the Sermons remains an important factor for the preservation and dissemination of the Biblical values, concepts and symbols. Forming an integral part of the liturgical domain (the hierotopy of the church), it forms the Christian meta-text. An important channel for transmission of the religious experience in Orthodox Christianity, as well as in Catholicism and Protestantism, are the historical texts of the Gospels formatted into chant prior to the separation of the churches. Despite the confessional differences, the structure of the body of their musical texts comprises a unified axiological space within the Christian church in all of its hypostases. The homiletics of the historical Biblical texts is immutable. In the article the actualization of the sacred texts in historically and religiously different traditions is demonstrated on the material of the Great Doxology “Glory to God in the highest, and peace on earth, good will towards men.” A comparative analysis of the melodical lines of the incipits (beginings) of the Orthodox Christian, Catholic and Protestant chant “Glory to God in the highest!” demonstrates visibly the analogies in the constructions of the rocking melodies set to this text. In all these traditions the melody involves an ascending line followed with a reverse descending line, which is directly connected with the text which proclaims the harmonious unity of two worlds – the Divine (celestial) and the human (earthly). Keywords: texts of the Sermon in the Gospel, the Christian metatext in various traditions, the Great Doxology, analogy of melodic constructions.