Proverbs readings in the Liturgy

[MarcoPolo]

Does anyone have a good book on when we read Proverbs during the Liturgy and what other passages are read in concert with those passages? According to textweek.com we only read from Proverbs 4 times every 3 years? Can that be right?

Specifically I’m trying to find out when we read either Proverbs 16:6, Proverbs 10:12, or I would also take Sirach 3:30 (and what passages are read with those). Anyone know?

 

[OraLabora]

Does anyone have a good book on when we read Proverbs during the Liturgy and what other passages are read in concert with those passages? According to textweek.com we only read from Proverbs 4 times every 3 years? Can that be right?

Specifically I’m trying to find out when we read either Proverbs 16:6, Proverbs 10:12, or I would also take Sirach 3:30 (and what passages are read with those). Anyone know?

Don’t forget that “liturgy” also includes the Liturgy of the Hours.

Proverbs 16:1-9 is read annually on the 6th Friday in Ordinary Time, at the Office of Readings.

Proverbs 10:6-32 is read annually on the 6th Friday of Ordinary Time at the Office of Readings.

Communities using the two-year lectionary will be different.

 

[MarkThompson]

Does anyone have a good book on when we read Proverbs during the Liturgy and what other passages are read in concert with those passages? According to textweek.com we only read from Proverbs 4 times every 3 years? Can that be right?

Specifically I’m trying to find out when we read either Proverbs 16:6, Proverbs 10:12, or I would also take Sirach 3:30 (and what passages are read with those). Anyone know?

I looked through the lectionary listing on this site and was not able to find those verses on any day. You can double-check, though, since maybe I missed it. The closest was the 22nd Sunday in Ordinary Time in Year C, where the Old Testament reading is Sir 3:17-18, 20, 28-29.

As to the frequency with which Proverbs is read, make sure you look through the listings for daily Masses, commons, and so on. I didn’t keep count, but it’s more than 4.

 

[MarcoPolo]

Don’t forget that “liturgy” also includes the Liturgy of the Hours.

Proverbs 16:1-9 is read annually on the 6th Friday in Ordinary Time, at the Office of Readings.

Proverbs 10:6-32 is read annually on the 6th Friday of Ordinary Time at the Office of Readings.

Communities using the two-year lectionary will be different.

I’m looking for what other passages are read with those. Are those the only passages read on those days?

 

[laszlo]

In the Traditional Office Proverbs was read in the first week of August and Ecclesiasticus (Sir) in the 4th and 5th weeks of August. Both were used widely in other hours (Capitula, Responsories) and in the Masses, mostly as Introit, Offertory and Communion verses.

The Bible has 72 books.

 

[Chatter163]

In the back of the lectionary there is a chart that lists when all scripture is read. You can look up each book and see when it is read in both the three-year Sunday and two-year daily cycles. These are the instances:

Prov 3:27-24 is read on Tuesday of the 4th week of ordinary time, year two.

Prov 8:22-31 is read on the Monday of 25th week in OT, year C.

Prov 9:1-6 is read on 20th Sunday in OT, year B.

Prov 21:1-6, 10-13 is read on 25th Tuesday in OT, year one.

Prov 30:5-9 is read on 25th Tuesday in OT, year two.

Prov 31: 10-13,19-20,30-31 is read on 33rd Sunday of OT, year one.

That’s it. One might expect more, especially in a lectionary that claims to read most of the scriptures within a three-year period, but apparently Proverbs did not make the cut.

 

[Friar_David_O.Carm]

In the current Liturgy of the Hours, Office of Readings, Proverbs is started on Sixth Sunday of Ordinary Time. The ones you are interested in are read on the Friday of the Sixth Week of Ordinary Time. Proverbs is also one of the alternate readings for the Common of Holy Women.

Sirach is reading in the Office of Readings starting on Monday in the First Week of Ordinary Time through that Friday. It is also read on the Tenth Sunday of Ordinary Time, the Saturday of the Fourteenth Week of Ordinary Time, and during Advent/Christmas/Lent in the Comon of Martyrs - For One Martyr.

The Office of Readings contain one long passage of Scripture with a reading from a Saints writing or a Church Document.

For the two you have listed, Proverbs 10:12 and 16:6 and Sirach 3:30, the Saints readings are “Explanations of the Psalms by Saint Ambrose, bishop” (Proverbs 10:12), “Tractates on the first letter of John by Saint Augustine, bishop” (Proverbs 16:6), and Sirach 3:30 is not read.

Hope that helps.

Proverbs 16:6, Proverbs 10:12, or I would also take Sirach 3:30

 

[JReducation]

In the Traditional Office Proverbs was read in the first week of August and Ecclesiasticus (Sir) in the 4th and 5th weeks of August. Both were used widely in other hours (Capitula, Responsories) and in the Masses, mostly as Introit, Offertory and Communion verses.

The Bible has 72 books.

We have to be very careful when we use such terms as “the Traditional Office.” There was always the Roman Breviary. Traditional is not the word that the Church would apply to it, because it was used only dy diocesan clergy. This is the breviary which is mentioned in SP. There have been and are many versions of the breviary that are older than the Roman Breviary. The Benedictines have one, the Carthusians, Dominicans, Franciscans, Jesuits and some of the rites within the Latin Church, such as the Carmelites. They don’t always coincide.

The same is true for the Gospel book and the lectionary used at mass. We never had one book and one calender. We have several books and several calendars. The latest edition of the Liturgy of the Hours is just another version of the Divine Office. We’ve been introducing different versions of the Divine Office since the beginning of Christianity as well as different versions of the lectionary.

You may want to look at the different editions and you’ll find that some use Sir more than others. It depends on the tradition behind the particular edition of the breviary and lectionary, also on the calendar that one follows. There are at least five calendars in the Latin Church, along with the Roman Calendar. The other calendars try to follow the Roman Calendar, but deviate from it when there are special feasts for a particular tradition. We have to expand our use of the term “traditional” to include all of these diverse forms and books. What you don’t find in one, you may find in another.

Fraternally,

Br. JR, OSF

 

[laszlo]

We have to be very careful when we use such terms as “the Traditional Office.” There was always the Roman Breviary. Traditional is not the word that the Church would apply to it, because it was used only dy diocesan clergy. This is the breviary which is mentioned in SP. There have been and are many versions of the breviary that are older than the Roman Breviary. The Benedictines have one, the Carthusians, Dominicans, Franciscans, Jesuits and some of the rites within the Latin Church, such as the Carmelites. They don’t always coincide.

By my best knowledge St Benedict adopted the Scriptural sequences from the Roman Office with the change that for summertime only the Sunday office has full scriptural readings, but Proverbs is still for the first Sunday, and Ecclesiasticus for the 4th and 5th Sunday of August. They also used 3 full Vigils with readings for Summertime for a long while. Just for joking, all the other orders are second millennium, so not really traditional.

The name Breviary is in use only from the 12th Century, when the private recitation and the appropriate books for that, were copied first. It means also in original sense the style of the book and not the office itself.

Otherwise I strictly believe that de gustibus and nominibus non est disputandum, except if the name is pejorative for the Holy.

 

[Friar_David_O.Carm]

For me I fail to see how praying the Psalms in the current Divine Office can be seen as being “untraditional” which some may assume when one calls the old Latin Office the Traditional Office.

 

[JReducation]

By my best knowledge St Benedict adopted the Scriptural sequences from the Roman Office with the change that for summertime only the Sunday office has full scriptural readings, but Proverbs is still for the first Sunday, and Ecclesiasticus for the 4th and 5th Sunday of August. They also used 3 full Vigils with readings for Summertime for a long while. Just for joking, all the other orders are second millennium, so not really traditional.

The name Breviary is in use only from the 12th Century, when the private recitation and the appropriate books for that, were copied first. It means also in original sense the style of the book and not the office itself.

Otherwise I strictly believe that de gustibus and nominibus non est disputandum, except if the name is pejorative for the Holy.

For me I fail to see how praying the Psalms in the current Divine Office can be seen as being “untraditional” which some may assume when one calls the old Latin Office the Traditional Office.

I believe that what is happening is that we’re calling the “traditional office” the Roman Breviary that was in use before the reforms after Vatican II. What we have to remember is that the Roman Breviary that as in use at that time, which is the one that SP and UE allow, is not the breviary of the Benedictine traditions.

The breviary that was in use as the Roman Breviary, was one of many. The one that most lay people know is the edition that was created for use by diocesan priests and diocesan seminarians. The diocesan clergy never prayed the entire psaltar in one wee, as did the Benedictines, because they did not have the time to do so, nor were they bound to pray all of the hours of the office as were religious in solemn vows.

The mandate to pray all the hours of the office was only for religious in solemn vows, ordained or not, men or women. Those who were in simple vows and diocesan priests used the simpler Roman Breviary. In other words, there were several versions of the Roman Breviary and there were also breviaries in other rites such Carmelite, Cathusian and Dominican.

For example, we have always used the traditional breviary. But what is traditional to a Franciscan is completely unfamiliar to a layman. We have always used either the Seraphic Breviary or the Roman-Franciscan Breviary. The Seraphic was in Latin and the Roman-Franciscan is in the vernacular. Both are very different from the Roman Breviary. The Seraphic Breviary was last edited in the 1950s and the original goes back to 1221 when Francis of Assisi wrote the Seraphhic Office. It does not cover all 150 psalms in one week. It has no music to it. It is meant to be recited, not chanted. It follows a different calendar and it only had seven hours, because two were combined into one. That edition has many readings from Sir during Matins. The Roman-Franciscan has them in the Office of Readings as Brother David said, except on Franciscan holy days when they are replaced by proper scripture readings for that day.

Proverbs is in there, one needs to know how to navigate each edition of the breviary. Currently there are at least five, as far as I know. Even Christian Prayer is grounded in the older Roman Breviary. For the sake of protability they have consolidated the minor hours and do not include the Office of Readings. But the major hours are the same as the Roman Breviary. It’s the minor hours that Christian Prayer repeats every week.

Fraternally,

Br. JR, OSF

 

[MarcoPolo]

For the two you have listed, Proverbs 10:12 and 16:6 and Sirach 3:30, the Saints readings are “Explanations of the Psalms by Saint Ambrose, bishop” (Proverbs 10:12), “Tractates on the first letter of John by Saint Augustine, bishop”

On the day Proverbs 16:6 is read, are there any other Scriptures prescribed to be read?

 

[Friar_David_O.Carm]

On the day Proverbs 16:6 is read, are there any other Scriptures prescribed to be read?

The way that the Office of Readings works is that there is a Scripture reading and then a reading from a Saint or Church document.

The readings for the Office of Readings for the Friday of the Sixth Week of Ordinary Time are Proverbs 15:8-9, 16-17, 25-26, 29, 33; 16:1-9; 17:5, the other reading is From the Tractates on the first letter of John by Saint Augustine, bishop.

The other readings for the day from the Office would depend on what week of the Breviary you are in, this year was Week 2 so it was as follows;

Morning Prayer: Ephesians 2:13-16
Daytime Prayer (Midmorning): Deuteronomy 1:31b
Daytime Prayer (Midday): Baruch 4:28:29
Daytime Prayer (Midafternoon): Wisdom 1:13-15
Evening Prayer: 1 Corinthians 2:7-10a
Night Prayer: 1 Thessalonians 5:23

Keep in mind that only one of the Daytime readings are typically done.

This year the Friday of the Sixth Week of Ordinary Time fell on February 18 so you can look up the Mass readings if you need them.

Now I ask, why are you asking this?