Ode I
Irmos. After
crossing the sea as if it were dry ground and escaping the wickedness of Egypt,
the Israelite cried out: Let us sing to God, our redeemer.
Now that you have fallen asleep in the Lord in a
holy manner, Father Nicholas Planas, you have become the companion of the
saints, and I entreat you to beseech God to deliver me from sins and
misfortunes.
Being as zealous as the Fathers, O Father Nicholas
Planas, you performed the divine sacrifice, completing the liturgy and praying
as many times as there were days.
Since you were bathed with tears of earthly
compunction, O Father Nicholas Planas, pray to the Lord to grant forgiveness of
sins to those who have asked you, O holy one.
You joyfully put the sins of all men on your
shoulders, O Father Nicholas Planas, and you helped all men
zealously, ever praying to the Mother of God.
Ode III
Irmos. You
covered the vault of the sky with a roof, O Lord, and built the church; confirm
me in your love, O summit of desires, support of the faithful and only clement
Lord.
You were a blossom of the island of Naxos and the
second blossom of Paradise with Nicodemus, whom you join eager to entreat
your God and Master that grace and mercy be given to Naxians.
Holiest, fervent father of Vouliagmeni and priest of
the temple of the Forerunner, by your holy and sacerdotal intercessions entreat
your God to give us illumination and divine mercy.
Imitating the life of the seraphim and the other
ranks of angels, you lived on earth as a poor man and not as one entangled in
earthly things, and you distributed your wealth to your relatives and emptied
out your wallet to the poor.
You were a consolation to all sinners and you
offered prayers fervently to the Mother of God in the church of Elisha; you
performed vigils and as one inspired by God you lifted up every man
from the earth.
Ode IV
Irmos. I
have heard, O Lord, the mystery of your dispensation; I have meditated on your
works and glorified your divinity.
You prolonged every pain in the recesses of your
soul when you remained without a wife, O saint, and you yearned after the
solitary life.
You renounced, Nicholas, every ordinary desire of
the flesh and you lived as an angel on earth with complete self-control.
Although you lived amid the roar of many waters,
Father Nicholas, sometimes with dry feet you reached the church of Elisha and
kept vigil.
For the greatest number of hours, holy saint, you
were offering up your divine intercessions to God and you awaited the fervent
entreaty of the Mother of God, begging her importunately.
Ode V
Irmos. Illumine
us with your commandments, O Lord, and by your lofty arm grant us your peace, O
merciful God.
Only gracious, all-merciful and compassionate Lord,
by the intercessions of Nicholas Planas grant me your peace and the forgiveness
of my sins.
Merciful and compassionate Lord, by the fervent
prayers of your saint grant your mercy and the forgiveness of trespasses now to
all men.
You hearkened to the law, O good one; prescribe the
laws for me by your divine instructions so that I may find the solid road of
Christ.
I beg of you, my gracious Queen and Queen Mother, to
give me your goodwill and holy affection by the prayers of Nicholas.
Ode VI
Irmos. I
will pour out my supplication to the Lord and to him will I declare my
afflictions, for my soul has been filled with troubles and my life has
approached Hades, so like Jonah I pray: Raise me up from death, O
God.
O Father Nicholas, beseech the Forerunner and the
prophet Elisha, for whom you, all-blessed one, performed services with fiery
zeal every day when you prayed as a priest, and grant to all men the
intercession of the prophets and the saints, O saint.
I beg you by your intercessions to deliver me, for I
have fallen into the enemy’s net; keep me safe and sound in this present life,
O saint, and pray that I may attain to the summit of blessings.
Set me free from the passions and from various
temptations and diseases, as many as now afflict my body, for it is mortal,
corrupt and wretched; give me strength, might and health and divine assistance.
O most celebrated Virgin, our all-holy intercessor,
since we are piteously needy, by the fervent intercessions of Nicholas give to
all of us, who are miserably needy, pardon, forgiveness of trespasses and your
divine assistance, so that we may flee the enjoyment of the world.
Prayers following Ode VI
Nicholas, as the recipient of the abundant grace of
the Lord, pour upon us Naxians this same grace and illumine the hearts of all.
O Nicholas Planas, all-blessed saint and most famous
son of Naxos, pray with the wondrous Nicodemos of the Holy Mountain forever
before the throne of God and of our father, O saint, that your mother even now
be gracious and merciful to every wretched soul, O saint glorified by God.
Prosomoion. Tone VI. Having
set aside all.
Having reserved from childhood your whole heart for
the sake of God, all-blessed Nicholas Planas, you longed to live most nobly and
you followed after the poverty of the priesthood and fulfilled the service and
the profession of the spiritual father. You excelled in the most numerous
miracles and all-night vigils; therefore we celebrate you, our holy,
Heaven-revealing priest and father.
Ode VII
Irmos. The youths from Judea, having come
to Babylon of old, by their faith in the Trinity trampled down the flame of the
furnace, chanting, O God of our fathers, blessed are you.
O holy Father, willingly listen to us who hymn you
and accept the entreaties and thanksgivings of the Naxians, O famous saint, and
give to all men joy and the health for which they long.
Having departed from the streams of life, Father,
you also followed the footsteps of the Lord and Savior of the world and you
offered your holy soul to him, imitating the fathers.
You showed that your heart was lit up like a
lamp in the darkness,
longing ceaselessly for the Lord; as a
priest you were a wonderworking and mystical officiant of the liturgy.
Receive my entreaties, though I am a thrice-wretched
sinner, O all-pure Mother, by the intercessions of Nicholas Planas of Naxos,
and bring my request now to your son so that I may be delivered from deception.
Ode VIII
Irmos. The
king of Heaven whom the hosts of angels hymn, hymn and exalt him above all
forever.
Because you humbled your body, Father, by fasts, by
sleeping on the ground, by vigils and by many other toils, you conversed with
angels.
When you were venerating the icons of the saints on
the walls, you looked at your small body and laughed at it, so that they were
moved to stretch out their feet for you to kiss.
Let us peoples of Naxos and Paros in like manner
worship in the temple of Nicholas, to which we have gathered together now out
of manifest longing for you.
See, Virgin Mother of God, Mary, the children of
Nicholas of Planas and give them your holy protection.
Ode IX
Irmos. O
Mother of God, we who have been saved through you fittingly confess you, and
with the incorporeal choirs magnify you, O pure Virgin.
Worthily we the people of Naxos and Athens as your
fellow countrymen and friends of Christ our God hymn you unceasingly.
Your fame, Father Planas, has gone equally far past
the boundaries of Naxos and Athens and all have recourse to you with
confidence.
Give me your grace, most holy father; I beg of you
for mercy, O holy Planas, that my oppressive sins may be blotted out.
Virgin Mother of God, pure Mary, with Nicholas
acceptably entreat Christ our God that I perform his divine commands.
ENDNOTES FOR THE
CIRCUMSPECT
The author of this
fine canon is Archimandrite Nicodemos Paulopoulou. At the time I did
this translation, I was doing it strictly for my private use and so did not
preserve the URL of the Greek original. It looks like https://wwwfyllades.files.wordpress.com/2015/08/cf80ceb1cf81ceb1cebacebbceb7cf84ceb9cebacf8ccf82-cebaceb1cebdcf8ecebd-ceb5e1bcb0cf82-cf84e1bdb8cebd-e1bc85ceb3ceb9cebfcebd-cebdceb9ceba.pdf
is the same.
I thank Zoilos for
his ever-illuminating comments on my translations from the Greek.
Ode I.
“When” (ἐπειδάν). The particle should be used with the
subjunctive to mean whenever,
not with the perfect to mean when.
“Sins and misfortunes” (πταισμάτων). Hard to say what our hymnographer
means—sins or misfortunes? Better put both in.
“Completing the
liturgy and praying as many times as there were days.” The saint is said to have performed the liturgy
every day for fifty years.
“To forgive etc.”
(Κυρίῳ ἐντειλαμένοις τήν ἄφεσιν δίδοσθαι) is an allusion to the prayer in Small
Compline by the Monk Antiochos of Pandektes (τοῖς ἐντειλαμένοις ἡμῖν τοῖς ἀναξίοις εὔχεσθαι ὑπὲρ αὐτῶν [infinitive used for the imperative]),
where τοῖς ἐντειλαμένοις ἡμῖν τοῖς ἀναξίοις
εὔχεσθαι ὑπὲρ αὐτῶν may be rendered as “for those who have asked us to
pray for them” (OCA.org), although “charged” (most lexica) or “bid” (Slater)
might do. (An Austrian version renders ἐντειλαμένοις as
gebeten.) So how do we take προσηύχεσο ὅσιε Κυρίῳ ἐντειλαμένοις τήν ἄφεσιν δίδοσθαι? I assume that the hymnographer
expected his audience to pick up an allusion to a prayer which is probably said
every day in a monastery and so could rely on them to fill in the blanks as I
have done. Here my interpolations are marked by brackets: “that
forgiveness [of sins] be given to those who have bid [us to pray for them].”
Ode III.
“Now” (νῦν). This word is used seven times in this canon,
which makes me think it is a metrical stuffer. Unless the context seems
to favor its retention, I will silently omit it.
“Whom you join” (ὧ συνορμώμενος), relying on Stephanus’ report
(concurro, competo).
“Second” (δεύτερος). The opacity of our hymn does not permit us to say
for sure what is second. Blossom or saint? The context seems to
favor saint., but “saint of paradise” is not a collocation with any
records, so we are driven to awkwardly render blossom. In
fact, blossom is all the more likely since our hymnographers
tend to use conjunctions in an objectionable fashion.
"Fervent"
(ὁ ἔνθερμος). Our hymnographer makes two demands
upon us. First, ὁ ἔνθερμος is separated from πάτερ by a
distance which makes it an awkward hyperbaton (“the separation of words
naturally belonging together” [Smyth]). Second, the vocative Ἁγιώτατε πάτερ is coordinated with θύτης
γενόμενος, giving us “O holiest, fervent father of Vouliagmeni and having been
a priest.” There is no question of translating literally. I
dropped γενόμενος and treated θύτης as a vocative.
“Wealth” (περιουσίαν), Mr. K. reporting, thus
justifying Zoilus Primus' hunch.
"Engaged"
(ἔνυλος). The DGE suggests
reading ἔνυλος as “inmerso en
materia,” “que debe su existencia a la materia” or as “material.”
Zoilus is vindicated again.
“You raised” (ἀνύψωνες) is modern Greek. It looks like
Classical ἀνυψόω but is really
modern ανυψώνω. Remember that omicron and omega are pronounced the
same in the modern language. Note the epethentic nu.
Ode IV.
“O saint”
(πανόσιε), Lampe reporting. Lampe admits “all-holy,” but immediately
offers what is effectively a kenning. It seems to me more and more as if
the piling up of elative expressions was meaningful to a Late Antique culture
based on honorifics—the same one that gave us epithets like “Your
All-Holiness,” “Your Excellency” etc.—but annoying to anyone hailing from a
hundred-handed culture.
“Begging
importunately” (προσαιτούμενος). The main problem is the spelling
of προαιτούμενος. If we stick to it, we are left with ask in
advance. If, however, we suppose that προσαιτούμενος was
the intended verb, we get many useful translations (I ask furthermore, I
ask for a gift, I beg, I request [Hederich], ask
repeatedly [Strong] etc.), beg importunately [Lampe]).
Ode V.
“Compassionate” (φιλάνθρωπε). Or clement, benevolent. See
David Alan Parnell’s discussion of imperial clemency
in order to understand why the usual “lover of man” calque is so wrong-headed.
"Solid" (ἄσφαλτος, whence asphalt) looks like the word
for asphalt, but is really an adjective with a confusing hodge-podge of
definitions: probus,
bonus (Stephanos); unfehlbar, fehlerlos (LBG); solid, stable, well-built
(Montanari).
“Queen and Queen
Mother” (Παντάνασσά μου Δέσποινα). See the notes on the second
troparion of the first ode of St. Nektarios’ Theotokarion
https://www.blogger.com/blog/post/edit/3268267719829590831/4648748037476913271.
Ode VI.
“Praying as a
priest” (ὡς θύτην
δεόμενος). As it stands, the Greek is incoherent, since θύτην
ought to agree with δεόμενος. The solution I adopted is to translate
it as if it said ὡς θύτης δεόμενος.
“Summit” (ἀκρόρροιαν), which none of my sources seem to admit. I
conjecture that the hymnographer meant ἀκρώρειαν.
“Worldly comfort”
(κόσμου εὐπάθειαν). This phrase
shows up in other hymns. Alexander Press in his comments on Porphyry
renders εὐπάθειαν “comfort.”
Mother Mary and His Grace, Kallistos render τοῦ κόσμου τὴν εὐπάθειαν as “the ease of the world.”
“Heaven-revealing”
(οὐρανοφάντορ). This
epithet is rare. The dark day on which a hymnographer used it to
describe St. Basil in the Greek kontakion is probably the reason it ever saw
the light of day. In St. Gerasimos’ canon to St. Basil, he uses the
epithet several times, but never in an enlightening context—it is used like a
stock expression.
If we try to get
around the confusion by root meaning, we find that Great Scott reports
that φάντωρ means “one who displays.” However, in no
language do the meanings of words following directly from their components;
kennings are everywhere. Kennings are the leap from the components
to some other meaning. They are the whole which dismisses the parts.
In Die
Chronologie der Hymnen des Romanos, Maas admits of a hymn falsely ascribed to
St. Romanus that “one is almost ashamed to publish a verse like the following”
(https://archive.org/stream/bz-bib-1-23/bz-1906--15-complete_djvu.txt): Οὐρανοφάντωρ ὑψηλὸς ἀστράψας ἐv τῷ κόσμῳ ὡς ἄλλος ἑωσφόρος. τὸ σκότος ἀπελαύνων τῆς πολυϑέου ἀμυνῆς, ἔπεσι παφλάξων ἀδιαστάχτως ἡμῖν. These lines seem to offer the only clues to the meaning of
our word. St. Basil is described as ἀστράψας ἐv τῷ κόσμῳ ὡς ἄλλος
ἑωσφόρος and τὸ σκότος ἀπελαύνων. This evidence, paltry as it is, tips
the scales in the direction of (1), since the point is that St. Basil is
emitting light (ἀστράψας) like the morning star
(ἑωσφόρος) and drives away
darkness (τὸ σκότος ἀπελαύνων).
Nevertheless, just
because an imitator of St. Romanus took this word so literally does not mean
that that is how the author of the Greek kontakion took it.
The lexicographers
offer several definitions of this baffling word.
Great Scott
captures the first two with (1) shining up to Heaven and
(2) disclosing Heaven.
Under (1)
come whose splendor reaches to Heaven (Stephanus), the
splendor of which reaches to Heaven (Giles).
Under (2)
come revealer of heavenly mysteries (OCA.org), revealer
of celestial things (Sophocles), revealing Heaven (Lampe)
and Offenbarer des Himmels (LBG).
Definition (3) is
reported by Gkarpolas and Matakidos: shining in Heaven.
Definition (4) is
reported by Stephanus: heavenly orator. This
probably means (as Stephanus went on to say) one who discussed Heaven
(in Hexaemero scilicet). Stephanus mentions that this epithet was
popularly (vulgo) ascribed to St. Basil.
Stephanus seems to
be right to connect this epithet with St. Basil’s Hexaemeron.
However, how is
this epithet applicable to St. Nicholas? He did not write any
treatises. My hunch is that our hymnographer is simply playing loose
with the language in order to say something nice-sounding about our saint.
In an attempt to
hint at one of the many the grounds of St. Basil’s fame and to sound nice, I
settled on “Heaven-revealing.” This solution bears with it every
vice of a nonce-form, so the reader is encouraged to pick whichever definition
he likes.
Ode VII.
“Holy” (θεοφόρε). The question is whether to interpret this word
compositionally or as a kenning. Constantinidos and Stephanus
define θεοφόρος as Deum ferens and θεόφορος
as divino motu latus. The lexicographers seem to ignore the
distinction. For example, Lampe, Montonari, Kyriakides and Sophocles
define θεοφόρος as Deum ferens and do not acknowledge the
proparoxytone. Giles simply used both definitions for the
paroxytone. If we take it as a kenning, we get inspired or possessed
by a god (Great Scott, Konstantinidos); inspired (Sophocles);
divinely inspired (Giles); divine, sacred, holy (Mr.
K.); divinus,
plenus
Deo (Suicerus). In modern Greek, “the holy fathers” is rendered
as οἱ θεοφόροι πατέρες
(Kontopoulos).
“Streams”
(ρεόντων). Mr. K.’s definitions of ῥοῦς, the modern Greek version
of ῥόος, are
suggestive. First, he reports the literal meanings: course,
flow, stream, current. Thereafter the metaphorical:
thread,
chain (continuation, course). No modern Greek dictionaries which
I can consult dabble in metaphor or report any figure of speech. I
have to wonder if there is some allusion, though, which would permit us to read
“having departed from the (usual) course of life.” However, in view
of Ode IV’s reference to the repeated miracle of arriving at church dry-shod on
rainy occasions, I felt it best to retain the literal translation.
Ode VIII.
ὡμίλεις can also mean consort or associate
(with).
