The Greater Ferias of Advent Revised

by Fr. William Rock, FSSP

[Having reviewed the writings of Durandus after this article had originally been posted, I realized that I had misinterpreted his treatment of the antiphons at Lauds during the Greater Ferias.  Having come to this realization and having consulted with and receiving some information which is vital for having a proper understanding of this matter from a friend, I have prepared this revision. – Fr. Rock] 

It is not uncommon for Advent to be compared to Lent.  After all, they are both times of preparation for major feasts, the latter for Easter and the former for Christmas.  The liturgical color for both is violet, the Gloria is omitted, flowers are absent, the organ is silent, the Deacon and Subdeacon traditionally wear folded chasubles in place of their dalmatic and tunicle, and the Benedicamus Dominio is traditionally used instead of the Ite, Missa est.  And in both, some relaxation of these penitential aspects, along with the wearing of rose vestments, is allowed on the Sundays near their midpoints.

But, despite these similarities, there are also some significant differences between these two seasons as well.  One of the most striking is their lengths.  Lent will always be 46 days long (40 days of fasting starting on Ash Wednesday plus the 6 Sundays).  Advent, however, will vary in length year to year from 22 to 28 days inclusively.  This is because, unlike Lent, Advent in the Roman tradition follows a checklist to determine its length and observances rather than simply counting backwards a set number of days from the major feast.  This list is as follows:

• Christmas, the Feast of Our Lord’s Nativity, is always celebrated on December 25th, regardless of on what day of the week it falls.
• Advent has four Sundays counting backwards from Christmas.
• December 24th is the Vigil Day of Christmas, which may correspond with the Fourth Sunday of Advent depending on the year.  This day has a proper antiphon for the Benedictus (Luke 1:68-79), also known as the Canticle of Zachary, sung at Lauds, and the Christmas Proclamation is chanted during Prime.
• The 7 Greater Ferias of Advent are kept from December 17th to December 23rd inclusively.  These days have proper Psalm and Benedictus antiphons at Lauds in the morning.  The “Great Antiphons” or the “O Antiphons” (as they all start with “O”) are sung as antiphons with the Magnificat (Luke 1:46–55), or Canticle of Mary, at Vespers in the evenings.  The antiphon “Nolíte timére; quinta enim die véniet ad vos Dóminus noster / Fear not: for on the fifth day, Our Lord shall come unto you [plural]”¹ is sung at Lauds on December 21st.
• The Winter Ember Days are observed following the Third Sunday of Advent.

Returning to the comparison with Lent, the Greater Ferias of Advent could be paired with Holy Week, as they are a more intense time of preparation, and the Vigil Day of Christmas with Holy Saturday, as they are both the final day of preparation with the festival quality of the next day being participated in by the liturgy of the current.²

It is worthwhile to note at this point that if anything is the Christian answer to the riotous Roman-pagan Saturnalia, it is the Greater Ferias,³ not Christmas (even if, eventually, some of the trappings of Saturnalia were adopted by the Christians for their celebration of Christmastide).  Although it began as a one-day celebration on December 17th, the festivities were extended so that before the first century A.D., Saturnalia “ran from December 17[th] to December 23[rd],”⁴ the same dates as the Greater Ferias, but was never celebrated on December 25th.  The Christian-Roman celebration of the Nativity of the Lord has been observed on December 25th since at least A.D. 335-6.⁵  Only a few decades later, in A.D. 380, a local council in Saragossa, Spain, urged the faithful to be present at church during the days of, and as a “counterobservance to,” Saturnalia (and to continue to be present through the Nativity and until the Epiphany).⁶  The O Antiphons, for their part, were “known and used as early as the beginning of the sixth century [A.D. 500s].”⁷  This would not be the only instance at this time of the year where the Church responded in such a way to pagan festivities.  As Mr. Gregory DiPippo has pointed out, “a common feature of the liturgies of January 1st [is] that they were designed at least in part as an answer to and reproof of riotous pagan celebrations of New Year’s Day.”  For example, the Epistle for January 1st (Tit 2:11-15) exhorts: “denying ungodliness and worldly desires, we should live soberly and justly and godly in this world,” and not behave as the pagans are currently.

Over the course of time, these seven Greater Ferias with their seven O Antiphons acquired spiritual meanings.  William Durandus the Elder, Bishop of Mende (d. A.D. 1296), who did for the liturgy what St. Thomas Aquinas did for theology, will be our guide as we explore these interpretations (Rationale Divinorum Officium, VI, XI, 4-6).  But, before that, it should be explained that “feria” comes from a Latin word meaning “free day” or “festival day.”  When a day on the liturgical calendar does not have a feast, it is called a feria, that is, a free day to be spent in contemplating God and the things of God.

In his treatment, Durandus first explains that each of the O Antiphons, and thus each of the seven days, can be seen as corresponding to one of the seven Gifts of the Holy Ghost with which Christ is anointed as foretold by the Prophet Isaias: “And there shall come forth a rod out of the root of Jesse, and a flower shall rise up out of his root.  And the spirit of the Lord shall rest upon him: [1] the spirit of wisdom, and [2] of understanding, [3] the spirit of counsel, and [4] of fortitude, [5] the spirit of knowledge, and [6] of godliness.  And he shall be filled with [7] the spirit of the fear of the Lord” (Isa 11:1-3).  These same Gifts are also those bestowed on those illuminated by Baptism.

These seven days also signify the longing of the ancient fathers for the coming of Christ, which was manifested by their maintaining a sevenfold structure of observance (“septenario servientes“).  St. Thomas Aquinas explains this sevenfold observance in the Prologue to his Commentary on the Psalms: “seven also signifies the Old Testament, for the Old Testament fathers maintained a sevenfold structure of observance (septenario serviebant).  They observed the seventh day [that is the Sabbath Day/Saturday]; the seventh week [that is the Feast of Weeks/the Jewish Pentecost]; the seventh month [the month with the Feast of Trumpets/Rosh Hashanah, Yom Kippur/the Day of Atonement, and Sukkot/the Feast of Tabernacles]; and the seventh year of the seventh decade, which is called the jubilee (cf. Lev 25:8–10).”

Additionally, Durandus notes that “by these seven antiphons, the Church shows the manifoldness of vice, and asks for the remedy for each vice, for, before the coming of the Son of God in the flesh, we were ignorant or confused, doomed to eternal punishments, slaves of the devil, bound by the evil habit of sin, covered by darkness, driven out and exiled from our homeland” (Rationale, VI, XI, 5).  In each of the Antiphons, a remedy is requested from the longed-for Son: for ignorance, “Dec 17 O Wisdom, come and teach us the way of prudence;” from the doom of eternal punishment, “Dec 18 O Lord, come and redeem us with an outstretched arm;” for slavery to the devil, “Dec 19 O Root of Jesse, come and liberate us, and delay no longer;” for the habits of sin, “Dec 20 O Key of David, come and lead the prisoners from the prison house, those who dwell in darkness and the shadow of death;” for darkness, “Dec 21 O Orient, come and enlighten those who dwell in darkness and the shadow of death;” for exile for both the Gentiles – “Dec 22 O King of the Gentiles, come and save the human race which you fashioned from clay;” and for the Jews – “Dec 23 O Emmanual, our king and our lawgiver, come and save us, O Lord our God.”  Durandus also explains how the order of the Antiphons themselves follows the order in which these remedies should be applied.  For example, one must be redeemed before being liberated from the prison, and so on.

At Lauds during the Greater Ferias of Advent, proper antiphons, which change daily, are appointed for the Psalms and Old Testament Canticles.  These antiphons are also used during the diurnal Minor Hours of their respective days.  Historically, however, there were only six sets, not seven, of these antiphons in order to leave room for propers of the Feast of St. Thomas, Apostle, which always falls during the Greater Ferias.⁸  In these six sets, Durandus sees represented the six ages of the world, where “the first age is reckoned from Adam to Noah; the second, from Noah to Abraham; and, as Matthew the evangelist duly follows and distinguishes, the third, from Abraham to David; the fourth, from David to the carrying away into Babylon; the fifth, from the carrying away into Babylon to John the Baptist; the sixth, from John the Baptist to the end of the world.”⁹  The first five of these ages, and part of the sixth, occurred entirely before the Advent of Our Lord and thus represent the periods which the ancients spent preparing for the Lord’s First Advent.  These six sets of antiphons also represent the six works of mercy enumerated by Our Lord by which we are to prepare for His Second Advent (the season of Advent is concerned with both the First and the Final Coming of Our Lord, along with His intermediate coming into the soul by grace) – “[1] For I was hungry, and you gave me to eat: [2] I was thirsty, and you gave me to drink: [3] I was a stranger, and you took me in: [4] naked, and you covered me: [5] sick, and you visited me: [6] I was in prison, and you came to me” (Mat 25:35-36).

May these reflections help us enter into these last days leading up to Christmas with the same spirit as our forefathers in the Faith, understanding them to be an invitation to separate ourselves from the riotousness of our post-Christian culture, at this time of year particularly, by a more assiduous assistance at the Church’s liturgies and by endeavoring for a greater devotion in prayer, and also as seeing them as representing the Seven Gifts of the Holy Ghost by which Christ and the Baptized are anointed; the longing of the ancient fathers for the coming of the Messiah; the sevenfold vices which held mankind captive and their sevenfold remedies sought from the Son; the ages of the world leading up to the first Advent of the same Son; and the good works we must do to prepare for His second.

Fr. William Rock, FSSP was ordained in the fall of 2019 and is currently assigned to St. Stanislaus Parish in Nashua, NH.

In support of the causes of Blessed Maria Cristina, Queen, and Servant of God Francesco II, King 

1. Guéranger, Prosper. The Liturgical Year, vol. 1 (Advent). Trans. Shepherd, Laurence. (Fitzwilliam: Loreto
   Publications, 2000), p. 494.
2. Traditionally, on 24 December, the Vigil Day of Christmas, the altar could be decorated with flowers and other trappings, the organ could be played without restraint, the solemn tone was used at Mass, all stood for the orations, and the Deacon and Subdeacon would wear dalmatic and tunicle, yet the color of the vestments was still violet, the Benedicamus Domino was used, and it was still a day of fasting and abstinence (Matters Liturgical [1956], 461.c, d, e).  For information about how the Easter Vigil, which is the Mass of Holy Saturday and not the “First Mass of Easter,” participates in the festivity of the next day, see here.  The festal liturgies proper of Christmas and Easter both begin with First Vespers celebrated in the evenings preceding.
3. Talley, T. J. The Origins of the Liturgical Year.  (New York: Pueblo Books, 1986), pp. 150-151.
4. Barber, Michael Patrick. The True Meaning of Christmas – The Birth of Jesus and the Origins of the Season. (San Francisco: Ignatius Press, 2021), p. 155.  See also Saturnalia: Meaning, Festival & Christmas | HISTORY.
5. Denis-Boulet, Noele M. Twentieth Century Encyclopedia of Catholicism, Section X – The Worship of the Church, vol. 113 – The Christian Calendar. Trans. Hepburne-Scott, P. (New York: Hawthron Books, 1960), p. 50.
6. Talley, pp. 150-151.
7. Cabaniss, J. Allen. Liturgy and Literature – Selected Essays. “A Note on the Date of the Great Advent Antiphons.” (University of Alabama, 1970), p. 100.
8. Previously, these sets of proper antiphons were for Monday through Friday inclusively, with Saturday only having only a proper antiphon for the Old Testament Canticle.  As each Sunday of Advent has proper antiphons as well, this rounded out the number to six sets.  If the Feast of St. Thomas (21 December) fell on a weekday, the set of antiphons for that day, excluding the antiphon for the Old Testament Canticle, would be used on Saturday together with the Saturday antiphon for the Canticle (unless Christmas Eve fell on the 4th Sunday of Advent, in which case, the antiphons of the 4th Sunday, excluding again the one for the Old Testament Canticle, would be used on Saturday instead of those of the Feria, six sets still being maintained).  A full set for Saturday was added during the breviary reform of Pope Pius X, and the rubrics governing the use of these antiphon sets were changed.  Mr. Gregory DiPippo gives the texts of these antiphons and a bit of their history in this post on the New Liturgical Movement blog.
9. St. Augustine’s Tractates (Lectures) on the Gospel of John, 9 (John 2:1-2), 6.