Amen
Audio version of the article
- Amen Theological-Liturgical Dictionary
- Amen Bible Encyclopedia
- Amen Brockhaus Bible Encyclopedia
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Amen (Heb. ןאמ, “truly, truly, let it be”, Greek ἀμὴν) is a word expressing a statement of truth and fidelity. In Hebrew, this word has the same root as words meaning “solid,” “reliable,” “constant,” as well as “to believe,” “to trust.”
The word "amen" is used in several cases.
Firstly, it is pronounced at the end of a prayer, a sermon, the text of the Holy Scriptures (Gospels or Epistles), reading the Creed and is an integral part of liturgical practice, that is, a liturgical formula.
Secondly, it is found in Holy Scripture as a form designed to strengthen the fidelity of the truths of Divine Revelation. The Apostle Paul used this word in this sense: “For the Son of God, Jesus Christ, who was preached among you by us, by me and Silvanus and Timothy, was not “yes” and “no”; but in Him was “yes,” for all the promises of God are in Him “yes,” and in Him “amen”” (2 Cor. 1:20). This word was used in this meaning by the Lord Jesus Christ Himself. Moreover, the word “Amen” is often translated by the word “truly”: “For truly I say to you, until heaven and earth pass away, not one jot or one tittle will pass from the law, until all is fulfilled” (Matthew 5:18) .
The word Amen also appears as one of the names of God in the book of the prophet Isaiah (Is. 65:16 - in the Synod. Transl. - “God of truth”), emphasizing the faithfulness of God. It also appears as the name of God in the Revelation of St. John the Theologian: “And write to the angel of the church of Laodicea: Thus says the Amen, the faithful and true witness, the beginning of the creation of God” (Rev. 3:14).
The words “amen” and “hallelujah” are Hebrew words that remained untranslated and entered the Russian language almost unchanged.
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Amen
Yu.I. Ruban
Amen - (“truly”, “certainly”, “so be it”) is a Hebrew word used at the conclusion of a prayer, as well as to express affirmation, approval or desire. Borrowed from the Old Testament, the word amen is perhaps the most common ("icon") religious term, with similar affinity to Judaism, Christianity and Islam. It appears thirteen times in the Masoretic Hebrew Bible (and three more times in additional passages in the Septuagint, the Greek translation of the Bible).
For the first time (in the aspect of the chronology of the formation of the biblical text, and not “biblical history”) amen is used in the Third Book of Kings (1:36), where it serves as an introduction to an affirmative answer, then goes to the end of the speech (in the Book of the Prophet Jeremiah, etc.). This “final amen” was used in solemn vows, when a short energetic exclamation has a greater effect than the final phrase. In Old Testament worship, amen (along with hallelujah) during the Persian era (6th–4th centuries BC) served as the people's response to the praise of the priests and Levites. In the New Testament it occurs 119 times, and in 52 cases in a meaning unknown to the Jewish Holy Books - at the beginning of the teaching, without any connection with what was said before (that is, in the previous teaching).
The formation of Christian worship on the basis of synagogue Jewish worship led to the borrowing of amen as an important liturgical term. Already during the time of Justin (Justin) the Martyr (mid-2nd century), the amen was pronounced by the people after the Eucharistic prayer , read loudly by the primate (First Apology, 65, 67). In a broad sense, amen is understood in Christian religious usage as a “seal”, or a “sealing word”, expressing the will of praying people, their acceptance of responsibility before God and the hope that the prayer will be heard. (In ancient times, the exclamations or calls of the bishop or priest performing the service were answered by the believing people, the real participants in the service, and not by the choir, as at the present time.) Therefore, it is pronounced (or sung) at the end of each prayer or priestly exclamation. By this, believers join the primate leading the service, testifying to their agreement and (ideally) understanding of the meaning of the words of the prayer he pronounces. In addition, amen expresses the correlation between the ministries of the priest and the people, revealing the dialogical nature of Christian worship as such and linking the primate and the “people of God” led by him into one organic whole. It is also significant that amen seals the narrative of the Christian Bible, being its last word (Rev. 22:21).
Russian and Eastern Slavic languages adopted the word amen in Greek medieval pronunciation (instead of amen, as in the Western tradition, focused on ancient pronunciation, according to Erasmus of Rotterdam), giving it a significant wealth of derivative meanings and phraseological units that did not exist in biblical and church usage.
Lit.: Amen // Jewish Encyclopedia. M., 1991; Schmeman A., prot. Eucharist. The Mystery of the Kingdom. 2nd ed. M., 1992; Trofimkina O.I. Biblical amen in Slavic languages // Slavic collection: In honor of the 70th anniversary of Professor P. A. Dmitriev. St. Petersburg: St. Petersburg State University, 1998. pp. 220–226.
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See HALLELUJAH
Russian Orthodox Church
(Heb. amen
), a biblical and liturgical formula that has the meaning of confirming what was said: “So be it.”
Remaining untranslated from the Hebrew language (not in all cases), this formula passed into Greek, Latin and other translations of the Bible.
In the Old Testament, “Amen” means an approving response by a believer or the entire community to words of prayer (1 Chron. 16.36), blessing (Neh. 8.6) or curse (Deut. 27.15–26 - the earliest use of “Amen” in the Old Testament ); sometimes used in a legal sense (eg, 3 Kings 1.36); in the Old Testament, "Amen" is said only in response to the words of another.
The liturgical use of “Amen” dates back to the time of King David; “Amen” also serves as an indication of the end of 4 sections of the Psalter (Ps 41, 72, 89, 106). In the intertestamental era, “Amen” began to be used as the conclusion of those praying their own prayer (Tov 8.8; Qumran manuscripts). Later in Judaism, “Amen” was preserved as a liturgical formula (similar to its use in the Old Testament and intertestamental literature).
In the texts of the New Testament, except for the Gospels, “Amen” retains the character of a confirming answer to prayer (for example, 1 Cor 14:16) and the completion of a doxology (for example, Rom 1:25).
On the contrary, in the Gospels the word “Amen” is used in a completely new meaning - instead of serving as the end of prayers and similar statements, in the mouth of the Savior it serves to confirm the truth of His words and always comes first in the formula that appears many times in the Gospels, pronounced only by the Lord Himself: “Amen [in the synodal translation: Truly] I say to you (you)” (in the Gospel of John the word is even doubled: “Amen, amen I say...”). This formula indicates the special significance of the Lord's words and confirms their authority. In manuscripts and liturgical books, “Amen” is also usually placed at the end of the Gospels.
Another unusual use of the word “Amen” in the New Testament is its personification and use as one of the names of God in the book of Revelation (Rev 3:14; cf. Isa 65:16).
In the Orthodox liturgical tradition, the use of “Amen” is preserved as the people’s response to the prayers and blessings of the leader, as well as as the usual conclusion of any prayer, including private ones. “Amen” is also said at the most important moments during the celebration of the sacraments.
The use of “Amen” is known not only in Christianity and Judaism, but also in Islam - both during worship and in the practice of personal piety.
RUSSIAN WAY
Interview with Vladimir Semenko for the newspaper and website “Zavtra”
"Tomorrow"
:
Vladimir Petrovich, we learned that your site was attacked by hackers. Our readers are interested in details
.
V. Semenko
: Yes, that is right. On the night of April 13-14, a DDOS attack was carried out from a certain IP address in the Netherlands. The site was not accessible for several hours. The system administrators took their measures, and now it is working. What will happen next, of course, is not known.
– Do you have any thoughts about who might be behind this?
– Well, as for the address in the Netherlands, I myself, of course, am not an expert, but, as the programmers explain, this is a common hacker practice when the attack is carried out from “left”, fake addresses. There are such special technologies. If we are talking about the customer, then, of course, I cannot say anything for sure here. Observing the correctness that is extremely necessary in such cases, we can only talk about facts. And they are as follows.
The site has been regularly publishing sharply critical materials regarding church policy for quite some time now, mainly the Russian Orthodox Church. In all this time, nothing like this has happened. It is even more strange to attack a resource with relatively low traffic. Therefore, it is logical to assume that it was a spontaneous reaction to something specific. The attack began a few hours after my last article
, also published by
you
.
It would seem that, from the point of view of sharpness and analysis, it is not much different from my other works
.
However, if we talk about specifics, then, among other things, it presents a very specific account of people (although not directly named, but well known to everyone), so to speak, ex officio responsible for the tragic situation in which our canonical Orthodox Church in Ukraine. We are talking, of course, not about the Ukrainian schismatics, the hierarchs of Constantinople or their American curators, that is, external forces, but about those diplomats from the Russian Orthodox Church who, by their actions, essentially made this situation possible, at least in fact, in the result contributed greatly to their activities. 've written a lot about this
before , but never so definitely. Perhaps this aroused a spontaneous reaction from the customer, although, of course, nothing can be said with complete certainty.
– Has something similar happened before, if not to you, then to others? We mean your colleagues
–
Orthodox journalists
.
– Somewhere in late July – early August 2011, an even more powerful attack was launched on the RNL (“Russian People’s Line”), which was then repelled with great difficulty.
– And what are they for?
– Again, there are different opinions on this matter, and it is impossible to say anything for sure. One can, as in our case today, only speculate. As always, I prefer to talk only about facts. Then our relationship with my colleague Stepanov was completely different, not the same as it is now. I was one of the leading authors of RNL. Around the same time, shortly before the attack, my article was published on the site, which quite definitely spoke about the connections between the Russian Orthodox Church and the Vatican Bank, which were supervised by people from the DECR. I was by no means the author of the investigation; I took the information from the publication of the famous Vatican scholar Olga Chetverikova, who at that time was not such a well-known, promoted figure as she is now. It so happened that my article was used at the highest level, which had quite important consequences, significantly affecting subsequent events. Whether there is some connection here or not, who knows. I repeat, I am only talking about facts. If you wish, you can quite say that we are dealing with a random coincidence. At the same time, other events occurred that I don’t want to talk about today. This means that an attack on my website is by no means a unique event in our recent history.
– How do you think events will develop now?
Well, who can foresee this? Everything is in God's hands. However, one thing is clear: the ruling bureaucracy, both secular and ecclesiastical, has recently been seriously tightening the screws on the remnants of the independent patriotic community of Russia, while in relation to all kinds of liberals, on the contrary, more and more concessions are being made. Apparently, a decision is being implemented according to which no Russian patriotism, independent of the will of the ruling bureaucracy, should remain in Russia at all. Everything must finally become systemic and manageable. Well, all sorts of “jealousy”, standing for Orthodoxy and similar “dissident” pranks, by definition, should finally be outlawed.
From the editor.
We remind you that the author’s evening by V.P. Semenko will take place at the A.F. House-Museum. Loseva on Stary Arbat, 33, April 18 at 6 p.m. Directions metro station "Arbatskaya",
Source: https://zavtra.ru
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