The Lord have mercy - Kyrie eleison prayer
Question:
I am curious, in the Jordanville prayer book. "Lord Have Mercy" is repeated twelve times in the morning and evening prayers. What is the significance of twelve repetitions? Peace+
Answer:
Christ is Risen!
The "Lord have mercy" prayer, or Kyrie eleison in the original Greek, is probably the shortest prayer we have on our prayer "armamentarium" if you wish. It is a short, yet complex prayer, encompassing in it the whole mistery of our salvation.
When we call God "Lord" we aknowledge His supremacy in our lives, He becomes our Master and we His servants, in a relationship of deep love and mutual respect. We recognize Him as the Creator and Ruler of all things on heaven and on the earth.
"Mercy" has also a deep spiritual meaning since you only ask for mercy from someone when you want that person's help, love, understanding etc., but in the same time you know that you are not worthy to receive it, and yet you ask for a favour. So asking for mercy we recognize God as our Saviour because in His goodness we trust that He will save us, granting us all the wishes that are deemed apropriate for our spiritual becoming.
So when we say Lord have mercy we recognize God as the Creator of all, we aknowledge our sins, we repent for them and ask Him, as a Saviour, to lift us from sin to virtue and from death to life, as the greatest possible act of mercy.
For these reasons the "Lord have mercy" prayer is used throughout all the Orthodox services as a universal response. During the proper Church services, the priest will intone a number of Petitions, or requests, at which the faithful respond with "Lord have mercy". e.g. Priest: Let us pray for the peace of the world. People: Lord have mercy! This sets of petitions vary in length and number depending on the service conducted. e.g. Divine Liturgy, Vespers, Matins etc.
However, when any service is performed without a priest (either in church - as a "reader service" - or at home - as in "personal prayer") , the lay people have to ommit all the parts that belong to an ordained priest: the blessings, the petitions etc. All the blessings are replaced with the phrase "Through the prayers of our Holy Fathers Lord Jesus Christ our God have mercy on us" . All the sets of petitions that are ommited will be replaced with a number of repeated "Lord have mercy". Based on the length/number of petitions replaced we will say generally 3, 12 or 40 "Lord have mercy".
The significance of the numbers is also important.
- 3 is the number of the Persons of Holy Trinity (Father, Son and Holy Spirit).
- 12 is the number of the Holy Apostles and the number of the tribes of Israel.
- 40 is the number of days Jesus Christ spent in the wilderness, the number of years spent by the people of Israel in the desert etc., trying to emphasize the need for spiritual struggle.
As you can see in Her millenary wisdom the Church gives meaning to everything we do. Nothing is random but well thought out for the edification of the faithful.
May the mercy of the Lord and His love for mankind be with you always!