DOI Page / Citation link:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.43337#0379
376 I THE WALL PAINTINGS OF AKHTALA MONASTERY
Conventionally the words «Take eat, this is my body,» and «Drink ye
all of it; for this is my blood of the New Testament», are located over
the two groups of apostles depicted receiving the consecrated bread
and wine, respectively. In the Akhtala murals, however, the inscrip-
tion has been significantly altered, the second phrase being repeat-
ed over the first scene as well. Evidently the person who painted the
handsome letters in mediaeval Greek used the language as his native
tongue62. And considering how important and well-known a quo-
tation it was, the probability of a simple error is excluded. The only
reasonable explanation must be that the deviser of the iconographic
programme wished, tactfully and without disrupting the traditional
iconography, to emphasize the especial significance of the wine in the
Eucharist. Since this was a Chalcedonian church where the congrega-
tion, from the earliest times, had taken communion «in both kinds»,
we must ask why such insistence was necessary.
It is only by examining the relations between the different Chris-
tian confessions at the turn of the 13th century, in our view, that we
can understand this unusual emphasis. Shortly before the union of
1199 an envoy came to Cilician Armenia from the Pope, with uncom-
promsing demands that the Armenian Church adopts Catholic rites.
Some were indeed adopted, and there are direct indications of this
in the works of Nerses of Lambron63. Among the rituals discussed or
even perhaps adopted was communion «sub una specia», i.e. the tak-
ing only of consecrated bread without wine by the congregation, one
of the most distinctive innovations of the Catholic rite64. This became
the subject of wide discussion, one may suppose, in Eastern Armenia
as well: all the shifting fortunes of the union were attentively followed
62 For a detailed Linguistic analysis of
the inscription, see Kaukhchishvili T.S.
Greek inscriptions in the Georgian fres-
coes // Atti del Primo Simposio Inter-
nationale sull arte georgiana. Milano,
1977, pp. 142-3.
63 The Synodal Sermon of Nerses of
Lambron, Archbishop of Tarsus / Trans-
lation and preface by N. Emin. Moscow,
1865, pp. 14-15.
64 Gatterer M. Kommunion I I Lexikon fur
Theologie und Kirche, bd. 6. Freiburg im
Breisgou, 1934, p. 104.
there. The repetition of the phrase «this is my
blood» in the Akhtala frescoes which gives
the symbolic and dogmatic justification for
communion in two kinds seems very likely,
in this light, to have been an echo of current
theological disputes. The erroneous Roman
Catholic rite was thereby rejected and the
obligatory communion in two kinds in the
Armenian-Chalcedonian church asserted in
the iconographic programme.
Conventionally the words «Take eat, this is my body,» and «Drink ye
all of it; for this is my blood of the New Testament», are located over
the two groups of apostles depicted receiving the consecrated bread
and wine, respectively. In the Akhtala murals, however, the inscrip-
tion has been significantly altered, the second phrase being repeat-
ed over the first scene as well. Evidently the person who painted the
handsome letters in mediaeval Greek used the language as his native
tongue62. And considering how important and well-known a quo-
tation it was, the probability of a simple error is excluded. The only
reasonable explanation must be that the deviser of the iconographic
programme wished, tactfully and without disrupting the traditional
iconography, to emphasize the especial significance of the wine in the
Eucharist. Since this was a Chalcedonian church where the congrega-
tion, from the earliest times, had taken communion «in both kinds»,
we must ask why such insistence was necessary.
It is only by examining the relations between the different Chris-
tian confessions at the turn of the 13th century, in our view, that we
can understand this unusual emphasis. Shortly before the union of
1199 an envoy came to Cilician Armenia from the Pope, with uncom-
promsing demands that the Armenian Church adopts Catholic rites.
Some were indeed adopted, and there are direct indications of this
in the works of Nerses of Lambron63. Among the rituals discussed or
even perhaps adopted was communion «sub una specia», i.e. the tak-
ing only of consecrated bread without wine by the congregation, one
of the most distinctive innovations of the Catholic rite64. This became
the subject of wide discussion, one may suppose, in Eastern Armenia
as well: all the shifting fortunes of the union were attentively followed
62 For a detailed Linguistic analysis of
the inscription, see Kaukhchishvili T.S.
Greek inscriptions in the Georgian fres-
coes // Atti del Primo Simposio Inter-
nationale sull arte georgiana. Milano,
1977, pp. 142-3.
63 The Synodal Sermon of Nerses of
Lambron, Archbishop of Tarsus / Trans-
lation and preface by N. Emin. Moscow,
1865, pp. 14-15.
64 Gatterer M. Kommunion I I Lexikon fur
Theologie und Kirche, bd. 6. Freiburg im
Breisgou, 1934, p. 104.
there. The repetition of the phrase «this is my
blood» in the Akhtala frescoes which gives
the symbolic and dogmatic justification for
communion in two kinds seems very likely,
in this light, to have been an echo of current
theological disputes. The erroneous Roman
Catholic rite was thereby rejected and the
obligatory communion in two kinds in the
Armenian-Chalcedonian church asserted in
the iconographic programme.