Liturgical fan in Eastern Christianity

The hexapterygon, ripidion, or seraphic fan is a ceremonial fan used in Eastern Christian worship (including in the Orthodox Church, the Non-Chalcedonian or Oriental Orthodox Churches, the Assyrian Church, and the Eastern Catholic Churches).[1][2] Ripidia are carried by the altar servers at all processions with Eucharistic gifts and the Gospel Book.[3]

Eastern Christian ripidion, 19th century (Pskov museum).

In the Eastern Churches, the sacred ἑξαπτέρυγον, hexapterygon, plural: ἑξαπτέρυγα hexapteryga—literally, "six-winged"), have been used from the first centuries to the present day. It is generally made of metal, round, having the iconographic likeness of an angel with six wings, and is set on the end of a pole. Hexapteryga of carved, gilded, or painted wood are also found. They are usually made in pairs. For historical use in Western Christianity, especially the Latin Church, see flabellum.

Armenian silver ripidion, with six-winged seraphim.

In the Byzantine Rite, the hexapteryga are carried during the Great Entrance and at all processions; in the Russian Orthodox tradition they are often also used to honour a particularly sacred icon or relic. When not in use, the hexapteryga are usually kept in stands behind the Holy Table in the Greek Orthodox and Melkite Greek Catholic traditions; in the Slavic traditions they may be kept either there or out of sight elsewhere in the altar. The latter is especially true in northern Russia, where icons of Christ and the Theotokos are usually placed behind the Holy Table.

Hexapteryga used in the Maronite and Oriental (e.g., Coptic, Armenian, Ethiopian) traditions are distinctive, having little hoops of metal or bells all around the circumference of the disks, symbolizing the hymns of the angels to God. At particularly solemn points of the liturgy, these are shaken gently to produce a tinkling and jingling sound, akin to the sound of multiple altar bells.

Further reading

Enhanced Strong’s Lexicon, James Strong, Oak Harbor, WA, Logos Research Systems, 1995. (Αρ. λέξης 03742). The Anchor Bible Dictionary, Freedman, David Noel, New York, Doubleday, 1997/1992. Pseudo-Dionysius Areopagita, De coelesti hierarchia, [Patristische Texte und Studien 36. Berlin: De Gruyter, 1991]

Εγκυκλοπαίδεια, «Πάπυρος, Larousse, Britannica», Εκδόσεις Πάπυρος, Αθήνα, 1976/2006 Catholic Encyclopedia Ο κόσμος των αγγέλων Αρχιμανδρίτου Ιωάννου Καραμούζη

gollark: It wouldn't be very hard. I could probably write such a thing now.
gollark: Basically, you can set a setting to make it not boot from disks by default, then make a program which loads the code off the disk as if it is booting as normal but is really logging the code on the disk somewhere.
gollark: I could still get around that with 1337 h4xx.
gollark: I could probably get around that with enough work.
gollark: Either way, the real-world credit card system... honestly seems woefully insecure and the only reason it works most of the time is the law and people being somewhat trustworthy.

References
  1. Liturgical fans
  2. The Metropolitan Museum - Liturgical fan
  3. The Divine Liturgy (OCA web site)
This article is issued from Wikipedia. The text is licensed under Creative Commons - Attribution - Sharealike. Additional terms may apply for the media files.