Psalms 62 and 66

The ancient beauty of Laudes that was ripped away by the 'reform' of 1911

This is a revised and expanded version of an article I published during the early days of this Substack. I am republishing it now with some slight changes in hopes that it might reach a wider audience.

VI Nonas Iulii (2 July) Anno Incarnationis MMXXV

The Feast of the Visitation

Day IV of the Octave of Saints Peter and Paul

(For a long time I labored under the opinion that the changes made by Pius X to the Breviary Psalter in 1911 were a good and necessary thing and that, unlike the changes made to the Mass in 1969, these were real and necessary reforms made to address a host of very real problems that had crept into the recitation of the Divine Office since the Council of Trent.  It was only the discovery of what Pius X did to the Office of Laudes in this so called ‘reform’ which shattered that illusion.)

The Psalms of the Roman Office of Laudes are extraordinarily ancient.  Their commonalities with what is found in Saint Benedict’s Rule¹ make it clear that the Psalms of this Hour as we find them in the Breviaries of 1910 are in all probability the exact same as they had been in his time fourteen centuries before - and in all likelihood for quite some time before that. 

We find here at Laudes as well some striking similarities with the East that seem very much to be a common inheritance from the ancient past.  And yet… it is precisely these same unfathomably ancient features, in this case the daily recitation of Psalms 62 and 66, which unite the Roman Office to those of the East that were unceremoniously excised from the clerical Office by the so called ‘reform’ of 1911.

Laudes is offered at first light and the Roman custom throughout the centuries has been that after two² other initial Psalms have been sung, each with a Gloria Patri being recited at their conclusion, that Psalms 62 and 66 are recited together under a single antiphon with nothing separating them, and the Gloria Patri only being prayed at the conclusion of Psalm 66.

Both of these Psalms are eminently suited to be sung at the hour when light first begins to pierce the darkness.  Psalm 62, Deus Deus meus, is David’s cry to the Lord when he had been driven into the Judean desert.  As night passes into day the Church along with the prophet cries to God that her soul thirsts for Him. She appears before her Lord in a trackless, barren, and waterless land just as she would in the holy place.  Her only desire is to see his power and to praise Him.  She then expresses her confidence in his protection and his power over the enemies that seek her life.

Immediately afterward begins Psalm 66, Deus misereatur nostri, in which the Church along with the prophet begs the Almighty to show mercy upon herself and upon all the nations of the earth.  As the light of the sun makes its first appearance in the morning sky the Church beseeches Him to illuminate his countenance over all the earth that we may know his ways and that all the nations may praise and fear Him. 

Just stop and meditate for a moment on the unfathomable spiritual power of these ancient words and the immense benefit that would be brought to both the Church and the world of them by them being recited at dawn every day:

God, my God, I have watched for you from the dawn! How my soul has thirsted for You and in manifold ways my flesh!  I have appeared before You in the pathless land, the waterless desert, just as I would in the holy place: that I may see your power and your glory.  For your mercy is better than life.  My lips will praise you.  So I will bless You in my life and in your Name I will lift up my hands.  My soul will be filled as with the abundance of the fat of the earth and my rejoicing lips will praise your name.  If I remembered You upon my bed in the morningtime I will meditate on You for you have been my help.  I will exult under the cover of your wings: my soul clings to you and your right hand lifts me up.  But they have sought my life in vain; they will go down into the depths of the earth.  They will be delivered into the hands of the sword and will be the foxes’ prey.  But the King will rejoice in the Lord and they will be praised who bind themselves by oath to the Lord - for the mouth of those who speak evil will be shut up.

May God have mercy on us and bless us – may his face illuminate us and may He have mercy upon us.  That we may know your way upon the earth and your salvation among all the peoples.  Let the peoples praise You God, let all the peoples confess your Name.  Let the nations exult and rejoice - for You judge the peoples fairly and You guide the nations upon the earth.  Let the peoples praise You God let all the peoples confess your Name: the earth has borne its fruit.  May God our God bless us: may God bless us and let all of the ends of the earth fear Him.³

Unity with the East⁴

In the various liturgical hours prayed by our brethren in the ancient churches of the East we also find Psalm 62 being prayed at first light.  In the Greek Horlogion⁵ it is the third of six Psalms found at the hour of Matins.  In the Syrian Shehimo⁶ it is second of two Psalms, immediately following Psalm 50 the Miserere mei that are sung at the hour of Sapro which is more or less equivalent to Roman Laudes. 

And in the Coptic Agpeya⁷ in the first hour of the morning after a long series of initial Psalms that bears somewhat of a resemblance to Roman Sunday Matins all of the sudden the arrangement skips forty Psalms and finds itself at Psalm 62 - which curiously enough just as in the Roman Office of Laudes is immediately followed by Psalm 66.

It is also important to note here that in the East there is no variation in the Psalms from day to day as in large parts of the Roman Office. The same Psalms are recited every day at every hour.  Thus it is at the very least possible that this custom of reciting Psalms 62 and 66 together daily without fail at an hour where in the Psalter of Rome at least there is some day to day variation in the Psalms may have its origin in the earliest times when as yet little substantive difference had developed liturgically between East and West.

The lack of a Gloria Patri

At the conclusion of every Psalm in the Roman Office, or section of a Psalm in the case of Psalm 118, one recites in praise of the Most Holy Trinity Gloria Patri et Filio et Spiritui Sancto sicut erat in principio et nunc et semper et in saecula saeculorum - except at the Hour of Laudes.  There are two sets of Psalms at Laudes that are not separated by a Gloria Patri: Psalms 148, 149, and 150 at the conclusion of the Hour and Psalms 62 and 66 in the middle.

Why this departure here from the Roman tradition?  Why should the Gloria Patri be omitted from these particular Psalms and no others?  It is after all a very ancient custom unique to the West to add this praise of the Trinity at the conclusion of each Psalm and it is strange that it should be absent from these particular psalms.

There is a tradition⁸ which has attributed the beginnings of this practice of reciting the Gloria Patri to an initiative made by Pope Damasus during the latter part of the fourth century. In recent times of course the ‘scholars’ have sought to ridicule the idea that Damasus is the author of all this, but it is important to note that we actually do have a record of the Gloria Patri already being recited here in the West during the early part of the fifth century, some forty years after the death of Damasus.  

The monk John Cassian⁹ notes in his writings that he observed on the south coast of Gaul near modern Marseilles (and one would think very much within the liturgical orbit of Rome at that time) a custom he had never¹⁰ seen anywhere in the East: that of everyone standing at the conclusion of each Psalm and reciting Gloria Patri et Filio et et Spiritui Sancto…

Did that come from Damasus?  We do not know, but it is in no way inconsistent with the aforementioned tradition that dates the custom to epoch of his papacy in the latter part of the fourth century.  

The more important question however for our purposes is why Psalms 62 and 66 at Laudes were exempted from this custom and left without a Gloria Patri intervening between them?  Is it because this was already in the age of Damasus known to be an incredibly old custom thought to have come out of the East with the Apostles¹¹ and it just felt wrong, even in the fifth century, to stick a Gloria Patri in there?

All of these beautiful little oddities seem to have grated on the nineteenth century psychotic, hyper-rationalist thinking that was the foundation of the liturgical changes that Pius X inflicted on the Church in 1911. And so that incredibly stupid pope ripped this incredibly ancient custom out of the clerical Breviary¹² and it has yet to return.

1. Rule Chapter 13. Curiously, despite the universal presence of Psalm 62 in both Rome and the East, Saint Benedict limits its recitation to Sunday and assigns variable Psalms, (35, 56, 63, 87, and 75) to replace it.

Psalm 66 is however recited daily at the beginning of Laudes. The variable Psalms of Rome however (5, 42, 64, 89, 142, and 91) are all found in the Rule of Saint Benedict except that Friday and Saturday Psalms, 142 and 91, have their days reversed.

2. On Ferial days the first Psalm is Psalm 50 the Miserere mei followed by one of the variable Psalms. On Sundays and Festal days Psalm 92 is recited followed by Psalm 99.

3. Author’s translation from the pre-Vulgate Old Latin Psalter found in the 1593 Breviary produced for Saint Peter’s Basilica here

4. The information on the liturgies of the East, especially concerning their history, available in English or any other Western language can be fairly limited. If a reader encounters an error here or has better sources please leave a comment.

5. liturgy.io - Orthodox Horologion

6. LRD App produced by The Malankara Orthodox Syrian Church Diocese of South-West America

7. Coptic Agpeya App

8. Mention is made of this in lectio vi of the second nocturn of the Feast of Damasus and is even retained in the 1962 lectio iii.

9. De Coenobiorum Institutionibus Book II ch. viii English translation here

10. And to this day it never seems to have been adopted anywhere in the East.

11. This may sound like an incredibly strong claim but I think that the available evidence supports at the very least the possibility that this custom of reciting Psalms 62 and 66 together at first light is of Apostolic origin.

The content of Psalm 62 make it a natural for this hour, which explains its universality, and it is not out of the question that it was probably already being recited at first light in Israel under the Old Covenant which would have made it a natural tradition that the Apostles would have sought to preserve.

And finding Psalm 62 and 66 being linked together in the liturgies of both Alexandria and Rome, which were the two most authoritative Sees of the ancient Church, gives rise to the suspicion that this is indeed a quite ancient practice.

12. Psalm 62 was retained by itself in a position of some prominence being recited on Sundays and many Feast Days but Psalm 66 was relegated to insignificance. It was reduced to being recited only on Tuesday at Laudes and nowhere else, with no hint of its former glory.

Interestingly enough though, with the invention of the Liturgy of the Hours in 1971 Psalm 66 was offered as one of three options to serve as the Invitatory Psalm.