Earliest Form Of Mass?

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Anyone know which which church sui juris had the first regulated Holy Mass/Qurbana/Divine Liturgy/etc? Or in which region it had regularly occurred?
 
I think the earliest extant Liturgy that we have is the Liturgy of St. James, which is from the Jerusalem Patriarchate. I don’t know whether they still use it or not, though I know some churches use it occasionally.
 
Just a bit confused about the Holy Mass on some points::confused:

What is the Church’s view of the Last Supper?
Did the apostles worship the bread and the cup on that night?
According to the Church’s Sacred Tradition, was every bit of a modern Mass ritual (eg. the bowings, doing 20-30 sign of the cross etc) done by the Lord during that night?
What kind of altar did he have? surely its not like the extravagantly decorated ones we have today? I can imagine that they had the candles but why do we have such detailed altars today with all the statues, images, precious stone etc?

Also, why do we get to hold the wafer now while in the past, they put it into our mouth while we kneeled? Why is it also wafers instead of bread or unleavened bread?
Why also do we never get the wine? Didnt the Lord give them the wine and let them all handle the bread? I heard some churches give you the wine now, though I’ve never been to one.

If the ritual on that night was not like Today’s Mass, why did they make the modern Mass the way it is? and when?

Is there any infallible ex-cathedra declarations relating to any aspects of what I wrote above? or any aspects relating to the Mass or its rituals?

Thanks.
 
the Didache may be able to help you on this one.

It may or may not be in there can’t remember.
 
Bonocorium said:
Just a bit confused about the Holy Mass on some points::confused:

What is the Church’s view of the Last Supper?
Did the apostles worship the bread and the cup on that night?
According to the Church’s Sacred Tradition, was every bit of a modern Mass ritual (eg. the bowings, doing 20-30 sign of the cross etc) done by the Lord during that night?
What kind of altar did he have? surely its not like the extravagantly decorated ones we have today? I can imagine that they had the candles but why do we have such detailed altars today with all the statues, images, precious stone etc?

Also, why do we get to hold the wafer now while in the past, they put it into our mouth while we kneeled? Why is it also wafers instead of bread or unleavened bread?
Why also do we never get the wine? Didnt the Lord give them the wine and let them all handle the bread? I heard some churches give you the wine now, though I’ve never been to one.

If the ritual on that night was not like Today’s Mass, why did they make the modern Mass the way it is? and when?

Is there any infallible ex-cathedra declarations relating to any aspects of what I wrote above? or any aspects relating to the Mass or its rituals?

Thanks.
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A few things on this point:

The Church has never worshipped the “Bread and the Cup”, She has always worshipped the body and blood of our Lord present in every Mass under the forms of bread and wine, since the Last Supper/Calvary.

This is the very core of our Holy Mass the re-presentation of the Sacrifice of Calvary-the Pascal victim and the Pascal Meal. Not renewed but re-presented. The other aspects(outside of the institution narrative and consecration) are non-essential(in a strict sense) and have developed over the last 2000 years as part of the unfolding Tradition of the Church.

The Bread of the Last Supper would most likely have been unleavened passover bread and we in the west continue this practice, our eastern brethren generally use leavened bread(this is neither wrong nor bad), but as long as it is wheat bread and grape wine that is used it doesn’t matter.

The precious Blood(under the form of wine) is often distributed to the laity during Mass today. To draw conclusions from this based on the Last Supper would be unhelpful as the Apostles were the initial Priests and Bishops of the new Covenant(Sharing in the ministerial priesthood of Christ).

To sum up as long as wheat bread and grape wine are consecrated with the correct intention by a validly ordained priest using the words Christ himself gave us at the Last Supper then you have the Core of the Mass which has never changed.

I hope that helps, God Bless.
 
I think the oldest forms of the Holy Offering would be The Liturgy of Saint James and The Holy Qurbana of Addai and Mari.
 
Bonocorium said:
Did the apostles worship the bread and the cup on that night?
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Eucharistis Adoration is a fairly recent development in the Church. While the belief of the Real Presence has been there from day 1, worship was never directed specifically to the Eucharist in the early Church. In fact, not part of the First Millennium Church.
 
Rawb said:
I think the earliest extant Liturgy that we have is the Liturgy of St. James, which is from the Jerusalem Patriarchate. I don’t know whether they still use it or not, though I know some churches use it occasionally.
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The Liturgy of St. James is the principal liturgy of the Syriac Orthodox Church. I thought it was celebrated on a regular basis by the EO in Jerusalem proper, but I could be wrong about that.

A sample of the Liturgy of St. James, prayed by Syriac Orthodox Metropolitan of Jerusalem Mor Severius Malki Mourad (note: the first prayer of this portion, lasting until ~0:19, is in Arabic, then H.E. and the people switch to Syriac.)
 
ConstantineTG said:
Eucharistis Adoration is a fairly recent development in the Church. While the belief of the Real Presence has been there from day 1, worship was never directed specifically to the Eucharist in the early Church. In fact, not part of the First Millennium Church.
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I’m not sure how this addresses the OP’s concern. He asked if the Apostles worshipped “the bread and wine” during the celebration of the Eucharistic supper. I assume they did if they recognized the bread and wine to be Christ Himself.

Actually, yes we do worship Christ in the form of bread and wine. It is in the words of our Liturgies. When the Body and Blood are offered to God, we refer to them as our Lord (because it IS), the Lamb of God.

Blessings,
Marduk
 
dzheremi said:
The Liturgy of St. James is the principal liturgy of the Syriac Orthodox Church
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Learn something new every day.
I thought it was celebrated on a regular basis by the EO in Jerusalem proper, but I could be wrong about that.
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Honestly, I think it might be too, but I’m not sure and so I didn’t want to say. Pretty sure I heard that though.
 
mardukm said:
I’m not sure how this addresses the OP’s concern. He asked if the Apostles worshipped “the bread and wine” during the celebration of the Eucharistic supper. I assume they did if they recognized the bread and wine to be Christ Himself.

Actually, yes we do worship Christ in the form of bread and wine. It is in the words of our Liturgies. When the Body and Blood are offered to God, we refer to them as our Lord (because it IS), the Lamb of God.

Blessings,
Marduk
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Perhaps we can think of the meal in Emmaus, where the Lord first taught from the Scriptures and then broke bread with the disciples. It was at this point that they recognized him. This, in a way, was the first mass. “Where two are gathered in my name…"
 
mardukm said:
I’m not sure how this addresses the OP’s concern.
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How many times are you going to bug me with posts like this? Seriously mardukm? Just trying to find a “win” after being so soundly defeated and utterly refuted so many times? You yourself has so many posts in so many threads not addressing the OP but another post in the thread. Unless you are hired as a moderator of these forums, will you please stop bothering me with senseless posts like this? And you only do this to me so obviously you have a personal agenda against me.
 
ConstantineTG said:
How many times are you going to bug me with posts like this? Seriously mardukm? Just trying to find a “win” after being so soundly defeated and utterly refuted so many times? You yourself has so many posts in so many threads not addressing the OP but another post in the thread. Unless you are hired as a moderator of these forums, will you please stop bothering me with senseless posts like this? And you only do this to me so obviously you have a personal agenda against me.
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So you can’t answer the question?🤷

Blessings,
Marduk
 
dzheremi said:
The Liturgy of St. James is the principal liturgy of the Syriac Orthodox Church. I thought it was celebrated on a regular basis by the EO in Jerusalem proper, but I could be wrong about that.
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I was also under this impression. Perhaps one of us will have to go to Jerusalem to find out. 😃
 
Cavaradossi said:
I was also under this impression. Perhaps one of us will have to go to Jerusalem to find out. 😃
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Well, seeing as how Coptic Orthodox are not allowed to travel to Jerusalem (HH Pope Tawadros II has upheld HH Pope Shenouda III’s ban), I think you’ll probably get there before me. 🙂
 
dzheremi said:
Well, seeing as how Coptic Orthodox are not allowed to travel to Jerusalem (HH Pope Tawadros II has upheld HH Pope Shenouda III’s ban), I think you’ll probably get there before me. 🙂
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Why?
 
To emphasize solidarity with the Palestinians, I suppose. I don’t quite understand it myself, but it is what it is.
 
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