It is a service of veneration to the Mother of God, linked to the Feast of the Annunciation, which falls during Great Lent. In our current practice, we perform part of it on the evening of every Friday of the first four weeks of fasting, and then we repeat it in full in the fifth week. Basically, it consists of two types of praises, “Qandaq” and “Qanun,” which we recite as part of the minor sleep prayer service.

The Qandaq is a poetic style in which hymns and church hymns were written in Greek in the sixth and seventh centuries. It relies on narrative narration, and mentions important incidents related to the occasion being celebrated. The Qandaq generally consists of a short introduction summarizing its content, followed by sections called “verses,” ranging in number from 20 to 30 verses, each of which ends with a refrain phrase that is the last phrase of the introduction. The Qandaq was recited during the dawn prayer.

The praise service is structured around this type of poetic writing. It is a symbol of the incarnation of the Word and the Annunciation of the Virgin. It consists of a basic introduction, which is, “The incorporeal one has taken to knowing what was secretly commanded to him,” and twenty-four verses, which constitute the first letters of the Greek alphabet with their twenty-four letters. The song of praise is distinguished by two refrains: the first, “Rejoice, O bride who has no bride,” ends the single verses of the number. The second, the phrase “Hallelujah,” ends the double-numbered verses.

In terms of style, we find in Qandaq’s formulation of praise the use of two literary types. The first is the so-called poetic songs, in which double verses and the openings of single verses are formulated. It is noted that each double verse consists of six poetic sentences according to the division in the original Greek language, as well as each opening of the single verses. Thus, we have twelve poetic sentences in every two verses.

The second type is the style of supplication hymns, in which the poetic sentences that come after the openings of the individual verses, and which begin with the phrase “Rejoice,” are formulated in the style of parallelism that is frequently used in biblical psalms, which is to repeat one meaning in two sentences with different expressions. Here too we find reliance on the number 12 in the division.

The number 12 entered the poetic structure of praise because of its importance, as it symbolizes the Mother of God, “the woman who had on her head a crown of twelve stars,” as referred to in Revelation 12:1.

In terms of content, Qandaq divides the praise into two parts: historical and theological. The historical section includes the first 12 verses, and it contains a narration of the events of the Annunciation, the birth, and the entry into the temple as mentioned in the first two chapters of the Gospels of Matthew and Luke. As for the theological section, it includes the last 12 verses, which contain a declaration of the doctrine of the incarnation, and a reflection on the role of the Mother of God.

As we saw above, the Qandak of Praise was originally written to be recited on the morning of the Feast of the Annunciation, and it was celebrated on the twenty-sixth of December as a prelude to Christmas, which was coupled with the Feast of the Divine Epiphany on the sixth of January. During the reign of Emperor Justinian (527-567), the Feast of the Annunciation was moved to the twenty-fifth of March, and the service was preserved in the Qandak, while the twenty-sixth of December became a comprehensive feast of the Mother of God. Until that date, the Canticle of Praise was recited once a year on the morning of the Feast of the Annunciation.

On August 7, 626, after Constantinople was saved from the hands of the Persians and Avarians who were besieging it, the people gathered in the Church of Divine Wisdom, and chanted a standing hymn of praise after Patriarch Sergius added another introduction to it, “I am your city.” Since that time, the Qandaq began chanting again on the Feast of the Deliverance of Constantinople on August 7th. Later this holiday merged with the Feast of the Annunciation.

After the ninth century, there was a decline in the use of Qandaq in general. The introduction was kept from it, and it became called the Qandaq, and one of its many verses. This is what we find in our liturgical books in the “Qandaq” and the “Bayt,” which we recite immediately before starting the katavasiyas. We find this abbreviation in the magic of the Feast of the Annunciation, where the Qandaq is “I am your city,” and the verse is the first verse of the complete Qandaq, appearing after the sixth verse of the Qanun.

The author of Qandaq Al-Praise is Saint Romans the Psalmist, originally from Homs (he lived in the sixth century), and he was a pioneer in writing this type of poetry.

As for the qanun, it is a new poetic style that emerged with the decline of the use of the qandaq. Church hymns were written there between the eighth and eleventh centuries. The qanun usually consists of nine parts called “odias” (singular “odias”). Each odia consists of multiple syllables chanted to the tune and meter of the first syllable, called arimas.

The law of praise was compiled by Saint Joseph the Creator (ninth century), who organized most of the laws found in liturgical books. He was inspired to write Maani Al-Qandaq. As for the nine main stanzas, or Aramis, meaning “I open my mouth...” and what follows them, they are composed by Saint John of Damascus (eighth century), and Joseph the Builder built his law on their basis. The first letters of the Greek canon of praise form the following phrase: “O repository of joy, to you alone is greeting worthy of peace. To Joseph.”

Patriarch of Constantinople Photius Kandaq transferred the praise of the magic of the Annunciation to the fifth Saturday of Lent, due to the possibility of the Feast of the Annunciation falling between the Holy Week and the Wednesday after Easter, and added to it the law of Joseph the Creator. Since then, it has been celebrated as the Feast of Praise on the fifth Saturday of Lent. For this reason, in our current practice, we recite it in its entirety at that time.

As for dividing it into cycles, distributing it over four weeks, and linking it to the minor bedtime prayer, it is a later tradition.

Why praise the lady?

After the hymn of praise was composed, the Church of Constantinople, in particular, adopted it as a collective supplication, offering it to the Mother of God after the “soldier-defender” saved “her city” several times “from all kinds of adversity.” The Eulogy became famous for the victory of Constantinople, and the experience of the Church of Constantinople was spread to the churches east and west (the Eulogy was translated into Latin around the year 800). Then praise entered the realm of fixed collective worship (parishes hold it on the evenings of the first five Fridays of Great Lent, and monks recite its verses in the monasteries daily as part of the minor bedtime prayer), and circumstantial (it is performed in churches or homes on occasion during distress, danger, distress, epidemic, or war. Or grief or persecution.

The singing of praise continued until the shock struck: “The City” fell on the night of Tuesday, May 29, 1453. The glory of Constantinople had disappeared, and the irony was that the city’s anthem had not ceased. What are the reasons that made the Orthodox to recite a prayer to this day that failed to save “their city”?

Orthodoxy has realized that those who stood in the Church of “Holy Wisdom” in Constantinople, on that final night, and their adherence to praise led them to “set their hearts up high” and “think they are standing in heaven” before martyrdom snatches them there. She also realized that “here we do not have a lasting city, but we seek the one to come” (Hebrews 13:14). She was certain that the lady would remain until the last day a “soldier and advocate” for “her city,” and that her city was every city, or rather it was the capital of cities, it was “the whole heart.” She understood that “our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against...the darkness of this age, against the spiritual forces of evil” (Ephesians 6:12), and that “all evils” that threaten people “come from within, out of people’s hearts” (Mark 7:21- 23).

Then, the prayers that sanctified “such a cloud of witnesses” generation after generation are able, if performed with understanding, to sanctify every generation in our days, until the last day.

Since the Orthodox Church, during Great Lent (i.e. from Monday to Friday of each week), stops reciting the texts of the New Testament, in order to prepare its believers for Easter with the words of the Old Testament in the prayers of this season, the service of “Praise in which He does not sit,” which is a service Biblical par excellence, especially replete with images of the Old Testament that describe the Virgin Mary, her divine choice, her birth of the Lord Jesus Christ, her virginity, and her holiness.

Below we present excerpts from the praise service, with reference to the biblical references that the scribe drew inspiration from to describe the Mother of God:

• The Queen Mother (Psalm 45:9)
• A living book of Christ, sealed with the Spirit (Isaiah 29:11)
• A court for the only king (Psalm 45:15)
• A fiery throne for the Almighty (Daniel 7:9)
• The rose has sprung up that does not wither (Ezekiel 47:12 and Psalm 1:3)
• You gave birth to the fragrant apple (Song of Songs 7:8)
• O Susanna (Song of Songs 2:2 and 16)
• A fountain (Song of Songs 4:12)
• Like a land that has never been cultivated (Jeremiah 26:18 and Micah 3:12)
• A living table containing the bread of life (1 Kings 7:48)
• She gave birth to a boy without blemish (Leviticus 21:17-18, 21)
• She carried the Lamb of God (John 1:29)
• O bright morning (Revelation 22:16)
• Christ brought us the sun (Psalm 84:11, Malachi 4:2)
• O dwelling place of light (Psalm 132:13)
• The only door through which the Word alone passed (Ezekiel 44:1-2)
• Jesus... sitting in glory on the divine throne (Isaiah 6:1 and John 12:14)
• Jesus…responded to a swift cloud (Isaiah 19:1)
• O lampstand and vessel containing manna (Exodus 31:8)
• O ladder, you brought them all up (Genesis 28:12)
• Oh, unfathomable depth (Job 11:7)
• Oh, indescribable high (Job 22:12)
• You who braided a wreath for the world (Revelation 12:1)
• You who saved the world from the flood of sin (Genesis 7:7)
• O shining chamber (Psalm 45:13)
• O chariot of fire for the word (2 Kings 2:11)
• O living paradise, containing in your midst the Lord, the Tree of Life (Genesis 2:9)
• O city of the King of all (Daniel 9:19)
• O mountain from which you were not cut down (Daniel 2:45)
• Dew has fallen from you and extinguished the flame of idolatry (Daniel 3:19-30)
• O stained fleece that Gideon saw of old (Judges 6:38)
• O my burning bush (Exodus 3:2)
• O bright cloud (Matthew 17:5)
• The bright-minded youth did not worship creation rather than the Creator, but rather stepped on the feast of fire with courage (Daniel 3:19-30)
• O true vine, you have brought forth a ripe cluster (Isaiah 27:2)
• O staff, a symbol of it (Numbers 17:8)
• O scroll, in which the word was written by the Father’s finger (Psalm 40:7 and Ezekiel 3:1-3)
• The birth of the Mother of God preserved the pure boys in the furnace (Daniel 3:19-30)
• Moses realized in the bush the secret of your birth (Exodus 3:2)
• The young men depicted this in advance... by standing in the middle of the fire and not being burned (Daniel 3:19-30)
• In ancient times we were exposed to deception (Genesis 3:7)
• We...sitting in the darkness of transgressions have seen the light (Isaiah 9:2)
• With it we are exalted from the earth to the heights (Genesis 28:12)
• O star that never sets (2 Peter 1:19)
• A star...bringing into the world the great sun (Ezekiel 44:2)
• You who opened our closed house (Genesis 3: 23-24)
• O pillar of fire that leads people to the upper life (Exodus 13:21)
• O you who alone are beautiful among women (Song of Songs 1:8)
• O ark (2 Samuel 6:9 and 11 compared to Luke 1:43 and 56)
• A breathing ark containing in its midst the Lord, the source of life (Hebrews 9:4)

It remains to add that listing the attributes of the Most Holy College in every praise in the mouths of its devotees and in their ears every Friday evening of this blessed season leads the souls of the worshipers to imitate the Mother of God, and thus the praises escalate to reach two virgins: the Virgin Mary, and the Virgin Church struggling in the desert of Lent until the Bridegroom appears. Raised on the cross.

From my parish bulletin 2005
A compilation of two issues published in the same year