Prostration

Prostratio at a priestly ordination in Peru, 2009

Under prostration , and prostration or Prost Erna Transportation (lat. "Prostration") refers to the Roman Catholic , Old Catholic , Anglican and Orthodox liturgy the outstretched self-downing of a person in the sanctuary as a sign of humility , devotion and imploring. In some places it is customary to stretch out the arms horizontally during prostration so that the person lies in a cross shape in front of the altar.

The prostration is the intense form of the bow and squat that involves the whole body. This rite has its model in Judaism ( Ps 95,6  EU ); it is rare in the liturgy today and is therefore particularly impressive.

The prostration occurs:

• on Good Friday at the beginning of the celebration of the suffering and death of Christ . After the entry , priests and deacons prosternate , the other believers kneel in memory of the suffering and death of Jesus .
• In ordination liturgies ( bishops , priests and deacons ordinations ): The candidates prostrate themselves in front of the altar before their ordination to the singing of the All Saints' litany.
• in the same way with solemn profession and with the consecration of a virgin . The professed or candidates prosternate themselves to the song of the All Saints' Litany.

The corresponding prostration in the Orthodox tradition is called metany .

The prostration was also a central element of the medieval ritual of rule of the deditio , a symbolic submission of the lower ranked person to a higher ranked person in the end of conflicts by foot or knee fall .

It is also known as a rite among the Bahá'ís after the compulsory prayer, as prescribed in the Kitáb-I-Aqdas .

See also

• Proskynesis

literature

• Gerd Althoff : The privilege of the 'Deditio'. Forms of amicable ending of conflict in medieval aristocratic society. In: Otto G. Oexle (Ed.): Nobilitas. Function and representation of the nobility in ancient Europe (= publications of the Max Planck Institute for History 133). Göttingen 1997, ISBN 3-525-35448-7 , pp. 27-52.

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Rupert Berger et al. a .: Shape of the service. Linguistic and non-linguistic forms of expression. Verlag Friedrich Pustet, Regensburg 1987, ISBN 3-7917-1045-1 ( Church service. Handbook of liturgical science, part 3).