Invitatory

''From the Catholic Encyclopedia of 1917'':

The Invitatory ( we know of did not contain an Invitatorium; for it is omitted in the primitive liturgy, which is represented in our days by that of the last three days of Holy Week . If we find it in the Office Of The Dead , it is because it was introduced at a later period. The Council Of Aachen (816) mentions the invitatory psalm "Venite" and forbids its use in the Office of the Dead. This same canon, in speaking of the manner of reciting the Invitatorium, employs the very words of the Rule of St. Benedict, which shows clearly that the use of this psalm was closely connected with the monastic Office.

The Invitatorium was purposely said slowly, like the preceding psalm: ''Domine quid multiplicati sunt''. This was to enable the , there was no Invitatorium. The psalmody began, and still begins, with the psalms of the first nocturn and their antiphons. ''Hodie non cantamus Invitatorium sed absolute incipimus'' (To-day we chant no Invitatory but begin without it) is an instruction in a rubric of the Vatican antiphonary. The psalm ''Venite'' was recited with its own antiphon in its proper place, that is to say, the last of the psalms of the second nocturn. Later this psalm became the first psalm of the third nocturn, and the antiphon was repeated just as when it was used at the Invitatorium. Amalarius Of Metz and Durandus Of Mende try as usual to explain it mystically, but the most probable explanation is that the Invitatorium was suppressed because the psalm was recited later and they did not wish to recite it twice in the same Office.

The Benedictine Breviary, which had hymns for its third nocturn, had not the same reason for excluding it and so retained it on the feast of the Epiphany. We see, nevertheless, that, before the ninth century, the Roman Liturgy had not the Invitatorium, at least not as regularly as the Benedictine Liturgy. It is likely that it was first introduced out of imitation of the monastic practice, on those days alone on which the people assisted at the vigil, when the Invitatorium would thus be addressed to some one. The ''Ordines Romani'' inform us that, on great festivals, two nocturnal offices were celebrated: one, without the Invitatorium, was recited by the priests of the papal chapel in their chapel; the other with the Invitatorium, at which the people assisted. Amalarius tells us that in his time only the Office for the vigil of Sunday had the Invitatorium, the ferial Office had not, because the people did not assist at it. On the feast of the Commemoration of the Dead the Invitatorium was recited, because the faithful came that day to pray for the deceased, but this brings us to a much later date. Most likely the origin of the Invitatorium is to be found in the call by which the monks were awakened: ''Venite adoremus Dominum'', which soon became the anthem or the refrain of the psalm ''Venite exultemus Domino'' which this prayer naturally recalled. Amalarius calls our attention to a peculiar fact. On week-days the Invitatorium was recited without the insertion of the antiphons: ''Invitatorium diebus festivis hebdomadibus sine modulatione Antiphone solet dici''. The version of the psalm ''Venite exultemus'' used in the Breviary is that of the ancient Roman psalter, which differs in some passages from the Vulgate .

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Invitatory