Program / Course 20: Spiritual Theology / Lesson 3.3
What you will learn
- Explain the biblical and Jewish background of fixed hours of prayer.
- Describe the two early patterns, the cathedral office and the monastic office, and how they combined.
- Name the hours in Benedict’s Rule, in the Catholic Liturgy of the Hours and in Orthodox worship.
- Explain what the Office means theologically as the prayer of the whole church.
The big idea
The Divine Office, also called the Liturgy of the Hours, is the church’s cycle of public prayer at fixed times of day, built mainly from the Psalms, readings, hymns and intercessions. Its roots lie in the Jewish habit of set hours and in the practice of the first Christians. Two early patterns, one of morning and evening praise in city churches and one of long psalm-reading in monasteries, merged into the forms known today. Catholic, Orthodox and Anglican traditions each keep a form of it. Theologically, it is understood as the prayer of Christ continued in the church, offered for the whole world.
Key terms
- Divine Office
- The traditional name for the church’s daily prayer at set hours. Office comes from the Latin word for duty or service.
- Liturgy of the Hours
- The current official Catholic name for the Divine Office, revised after the Second Vatican Council.
- Canonical hours
- The fixed times of prayer assigned in the church’s tradition, such as Lauds, Vespers and Compline.
- Cathedral office
- A pattern of public prayer, mainly morning and evening, in city churches with the bishop, clergy and people, with hymns, psalms and intercession.
- Monastic office
- A pattern of daily prayer in monasteries, with many hours and the regular reading of the whole Psalter.
- Horologion
- The Orthodox book of the hours, which contains the services for the day.
- Breviary
- The book that contains the texts of the Office. The word means abridgement.
Background
Praying at set times is rooted in the Old Testament. Daniel is said to have prayed three times a day toward Jerusalem (Daniel 6:10), and the psalmist says he praises God seven times a day (Psalm 119:164) and rises at midnight to give thanks (Psalm 119:62). The temple had a daily morning and evening sacrifice. The first Christians, who were Jews, kept some of these habits. Acts shows Peter and John going to the temple at the hour of prayer, the ninth hour (Acts 3:1), Peter praying at the sixth hour (Acts 10:9) and Paul and Silas praying and singing hymns at midnight (Acts 16:25).
Early Christian writings show the practice taking shape. The Didache, an early manual, tells believers to say the Lord’s Prayer three times a day. Tertullian and Cyprian, in the third century, mention prayer at the third, sixth and ninth hours, in addition to morning and evening. The Apostolic Tradition, a church order often attributed to Hippolytus (though that attribution is debated), mentions prayer on rising, at set hours and at night.
Scholars distinguish two patterns by the fourth century. In city churches, a cathedral office developed, with morning and evening services in which clergy and people sang hymns and psalms chosen for the hour, and offered incense and intercessions. In the desert and in monasteries, a monastic office developed, in which monks recited long sequences of psalms and readings, often through the night. Over time, the two blended. This lesson studies the shape of the Office, and Course 25 treats how to pray it.
Step-by-step explanation
Step 1: The hours in Benedict’s Rule
Benedict’s Rule, in chapters 8 to 18, sets out a day of eight services. Vigils, also called Matins, is held in the night. Lauds comes at dawn. Prime is at the first hour, Terce at the third, Sext at the sixth and None at the ninth. Vespers is at evening, and Compline is at the end of the day, before sleep. Benedict arranges the Psalter so that all 150 psalms are said in a week, and he adds readings, responses, hymns and the Lord’s Prayer. He calls the whole round the Work of God, and writes that nothing is to be put before it.
He explains the seven daytime hours by quoting Psalm 119:164 and the night hour by Psalm 119:62, which shows how Scripture informed the structure.
Step 2: The Catholic Liturgy of the Hours
The Second Vatican Council, in the constitution on the sacred liturgy, called for a revision of the Office so that it could serve the whole church and fit the day. The revision, completed in 1970, set five elements. Morning Prayer and Evening Prayer are the two hinges, with the Office of Readings, daytime prayer and Night Prayer. Prime was suppressed. The Psalter is spread over four weeks. Clergy and religious are bound to pray it, and laypeople are encouraged to join in.
The Council stated that the Hours are the prayer of Christ together with his body, and that those who pray them do so in the name of the Church.
Step 3: The Orthodox cycle
The Orthodox cycle begins at sunset, in keeping with the Jewish and biblical way of reckoning the day (Genesis 1:5). It includes Vespers, Compline, the Midnight Office, Matins and the little hours called the First, Third, Sixth and Ninth Hours. The texts vary with the day of the week, the season and the feast, and are collected in books such as the Horologion and the Octoechos. Parish churches commonly keep Vespers and Matins on Saturday evening and Sunday morning, and monasteries keep the full cycle.
Orthodox worship includes many hymns of the church and long litanies, and the Psalter is read through each week, more often in Lent.
Step 4: The Anglican and Protestant forms
In 1549, Thomas Cranmer, Archbishop of Canterbury, condensed the medieval hours into two services in English, Morning Prayer and Evening Prayer, with a plan for the congregation to hear most of the Psalter in a month and the Bible in a year. This became the center of the Book of Common Prayer. Lutheran churches kept versions of Matins and Vespers. Many other Protestant churches did not keep a fixed daily office, though some have revived forms of daily prayer. The next lesson looks at these.
Step 5: What the Office means
Theologically, the Office rests on the conviction that Christ is the great pray-er of the Father, and that the church joins in his prayer by the Spirit. The command to pray without ceasing (1 Thessalonians 5:17) is understood by the tradition as fulfilled in part by marking the day with prayer. The Office also sanctifies time, so that morning, midday and evening are given to God. And it is communal: even a person praying alone is understood to pray with the whole church, and for it.
- What does it mean to mark the day with prayer, and what could that change in my own day?
- Why might a tradition insist on fixed hours rather than prayer whenever one feels moved?
- How do I react to the idea of praying in the name of the whole church?
- What might I gain from the cathedral pattern of morning and evening praise?
- How should I weigh the risk of formal prayer becoming empty against the risk of spontaneous prayer becoming haphazard?
- Which hour of the day is the hardest for me to pray, and why?
Examples
Benedict’s eight hours
A modern reader looks at a table of the eight hours and notices that a monk’s day is punctuated by prayer about every three hours, from before dawn to nightfall. Work, meals and rest are fitted around the Work of God, not the reverse.
Evening as the day’s turning
The Orthodox reckoning begins the new day at sunset. A family that attends Saturday Vespers is therefore beginning Sunday, in the church’s sense, on Saturday evening.
Two ways of arranging the Psalter
Benedict’s monks recited the entire Psalter each week. Cranmer’s Prayer Book assigned the Psalter across a month. A parish that wants a daily office must choose a pattern that its people can keep. (A teaching comparison.)
Different perspectives
Catholic
The Church teaches that the Liturgy of the Hours extends the praise offered in the Mass through the day, and that it is the prayer of Christ with his body. It is obligatory for clergy and religious and recommended to laypeople, and the Church sees it as a source of devotion and a school of prayer.
Orthodox
Orthodox Christians treat the daily services as the normal pattern of the church’s prayer, kept fully in monasteries and in part in parishes. They see the cycle of the day, the week and the year as a way of living in the mystery of Christ, and they value the unity of text, hymn and chant.
Anglican and Lutheran
Anglican Christians keep Morning and Evening Prayer as the standard daily offices, and Lutheran traditions keep Matins, Vespers and Compline in varied forms. Both claim continuity with the ancient pattern while insisting that services be in the people’s language and centered on Scripture.
Other Protestant and scholarly views
Many Protestant traditions have no required office and emphasize private devotions and preaching, though some Reformed and evangelical writers have recently recommended fixed-hour prayer. Liturgical historians note that the line between the cathedral and monastic patterns, drawn by scholars in the twentieth century, is debated in details but remains useful.
Why it matters
The Office is the oldest continuous pattern of Christian prayer across the traditions. Knowing its history and meaning helps a student to see why prayer at set hours is not mere routine, and why the church’s Psalms, readings and hymns carry weight beyond one person’s mood. It also prepares the student to read the monastic sources, which assume the Office throughout.
Common misunderstandings
Misunderstanding: The Divine Office is only for monks and clergy.
Correction: It began in the practice of the whole church. The cathedral office involved the people, and the Catholic Church today encourages laypeople to pray it.
Misunderstanding: Fixed prayer is less sincere than spontaneous prayer.
Correction: Jesus and the apostles kept set times. The tradition sees fixed forms as a support for sincerity, though it admits they can become mechanical.
Misunderstanding: The hours were invented by Benedict.
Correction: He arranged a pattern that grew over several centuries from Jewish and early Christian practice, and used earlier monastic rules.
Misunderstanding: Protestants reject the daily office.
Correction: Anglicans and Lutherans kept versions of it. Other Protestants differ, and many have rediscovered it.
Knowledge check
What biblical texts show set hours of prayer?
Daniel 6:10 shows Daniel praying three times a day, and Psalm 119:164 speaks of praise seven times a day. In Acts, Peter and John go to the temple at the ninth hour, Peter prays at the sixth hour, and Paul and Silas pray at midnight. These support the later pattern.
What is the difference between the cathedral and monastic offices?
The cathedral office was public prayer in city churches, mainly morning and evening, with hymns, psalms and intercessions. The monastic office had many hours and continuous reading of the Psalter. They blended into the forms of Benedict, the Catholic Hours and the Orthodox cycle.
Name the eight hours in Benedict’s Rule.
Vigils (Matins), Lauds, Prime, Terce, Sext, None, Vespers and Compline. Benedict assigns a set structure to each and arranges the Psalter so that all 150 psalms are said in one week. He calls the whole cycle the Work of God.
What did Cranmer do to the medieval hours?
In 1549 he reduced the eight hours to two services in English, Morning and Evening Prayer, with a lectionary that read much of the Bible and the Psalter regularly. They became the heart of the Book of Common Prayer, and a model for Anglican daily prayer.
Think it through
- What hours of your day, if any, are already marked by prayer?
- What does it mean for an individual to pray in the name of the church?
- Why might the Orthodox and Jewish habit of beginning the day at sunset appeal to you or not?
Independent assignment
A study of one hour
In your notebook, write 350 to 500 words. Choose one hour, such as Lauds, Vespers or Compline, and read its structure in a source such as the Rule of Benedict or a Prayer Book. Describe its parts, the psalms and readings it uses, and what it says about the time of day. Then explain how it fits the theology of the Office as the prayer of the whole church. Do not share this with anyone.
Further study
- Benedict of Nursia, The Rule of St. Benedict Read chapters 8 to 20 on the Work of God.
- John Cassian, The Institutes Read the second and third books on the prayers and psalmody of the monks of Egypt.
- Timothy (Kallistos) Ware, The Orthodox Church Read the section on the Orthodox cycle of services.
- Catholic Church, Catechism of the Catholic Church Read the section on the liturgy and on the Liturgy of the Hours.
- Daniel 6:10 Daniel prays three times a day.
- Psalm 119:164 Seven times a day I praise thee.
- Acts 3:1 Peter and John go up to the temple at the hour of prayer.
- 1 Thessalonians 5:17 Pray without ceasing.