Ad orientem, meaning 'to the east' in Ecclesiastical Latin, is a phrase used to describe the eastward orientation of Christian prayer and Christian worship, comprising the preposition ad (toward) and oriens (rising, sunrise, east), participle of orior (to rise).
Ad orientem has been used to describe the eastward direction of prayer that the early Christians faced when praying,"Cum ad orationem stamus, ad orientem convertimur, unde caelum surgit" (Augustini De Sermone Domini in Monte, II, 5, 18; translation: "When we stand at prayer, we turn to the east, whence the heaven rises" (Augustine, On the Sermon on the Mount, Book II, Chapter 5, 18). a practice that continues in the Eastern Orthodox Church, Oriental Orthodox churches, Mar Thoma Syrian Church, Assyrian Church of the East, as well as the Eastern Catholic and Eastern Lutheran churches. It was normative in the Roman Catholic Church until the 1960s, and remains so in the Tridentine Mass; some Lutheran and Anglican churches continue to offer their respective liturgies ad orientem. Although the Second Vatican Council never ordered any change from ad orientem to versus populum, a posture facing the people, in the aftermath of the council the change was nevertheless widespread and became the norm. Ad orientem was never forbidden, however: the Pauline Missal, indeed, presumes that Mass is said ad orientem in its rubrics, indicating that in the celebration of the Mass the priestly celebrant faces the altar with his back to the congregants, so that they all face in the same direction.
Since the time of the Early Church, the eastward direction of Christian prayer has carried a strong significance, attested by the writings of the Church Fathers. In the 2nd century, Syrian Christians hung a Christian cross on the eastern wall of their houses, symbolizing "their souls facing God, talking with him, and sharing their spirituality with the Lord". Two centuries later, Saint Basil the Great declared that "facing the east to pray was among the oldest unwritten laws of the Church". Nearly all Christian apologetic tracts published in the 7th century in the Syriac and Arabic languages explained that Christians prayed facing the east because "the Garden of Eden was planted in the east () and ... at the end of time, at the second coming, the Messiah would approach Jerusalem from the east."
Parishes of the Coptic Church, a church of Oriental Orthodox Christianity, are designed to face east and efforts are made to remodel churches obtained from other Christian denominations that are not built in this fashion.
Christian prayer facing east
In the time of the early Church, the eastward direction of Christian prayer was the standard and carried a strong significance, attested by the writings of the Church Fathers.
Origins of the practice The eastward direction of prayer among early Christians is a custom inherited from the Jews.Uwe Michael LangFranz Joseph Dölger, Sol salutis: Gebet und Gesang im christlichen Altertum : mit besonderer Rücksicht auf die Ostung in Gebet und Liturgie (Aschendorff 1925), pp. 28−88, cited in Uwe Michael Lang, Turning Towards the Lord: Orientation in Liturgical Prayer (Ignatius Press 2009), pp. 35−36 At the time of the formation of Christianity, Jews commonly prayed not only towards the Temple of Solomon, where the presence of the transcendent God (shekinah) [resided] in the Holy of Holies of the Temple, but also toward the east, although to what extent this practice was widespread is disputed.Lang (2009), pp. 42−45 After the Temple was destroyed, synagogical liturgy continued the practice of praying in that direction, "inseparably bound up with the messianic expectation of Israel."Lang (2009), pp. 37 Some rabbinic traditions encouraged Jews to construct synagogues with their entrances facing east, in imitation of the Temple of Jerusalem following its destruction, although this guideline was only sporadically implemented in practice. It was the practice, Paul F. Bradshaw says, of the Jewish sects of the Essenes and the Therapeutae, for whom "the eastward prayer had acquired an eschatological dimension, the 'fine bright day' for which the Therapeutae prayed being apparently the messianic age and the Essene prayer towards the sun 'as though beseeching him to rise' being a petition for the coming of the priestly Messiah." Eventually, a "process of mutual stimulus and disaffection" between Jews and early Christians seems to have brought about the end of Jewish prayer towards the east, and Christian prayer towards Jerusalem.Lang (2009), p. 44 The Islamic practice of praying initially towards Jerusalem, as well as the concept of praying in a certain direction, is derived from the Jewish practice, which was ubiquitous among the Jewish communities of Syria, Palestine, Yathrib and Yemen.
Additionally, the Christian custom of praying towards the east may have roots in the practice of the earliest Christians in Jerusalem of praying towards the Mount of Olives, to the east of the city, which they saw as the locus of key eschatological events and especially of the awaited Second Coming of Christ. Although the localization of the Second Coming on the Mount of Olives was abandoned after the destruction of Jerusalem in AD 70, the eastward direction of Christian prayer was retained and became general throughout Christendom.Lang (2009), pp. 37−41
Early Christianity Early Christians, who were largely persecuted, usually worshipped in house churches, and the Eucharist was never exposed to non-Christians. The church-hall, according to the evidence found at Dura-Europos, was oblong, with the people facing the eastern wall, where there was a platform where the table-altar of the Eucharist was offered by the presbyter/priest, who also apparently faced east. Images of biblical scenes and figures, including that of Christ, adorned the walls, including the eastern wall. In the 2nd century, Syrian Christians indicated the direction in which to pray by placing a cross on the eastern wall of their house or church, a direction that symbolized "their souls facing God, talking with him, and sharing their spirituality with the Lord." Believers turned towards it to pray at fixed prayer times, such as in the morning, evening and other parts of the day; this practice continues among some Christians today, along with the related custom of Christian families erecting their home altar or icon corner on the east wall of their dwellings.
Among the early Church Fathers, Tertullian used the equivalent phrase ad orientis regionem (to the region of the east) in his Apologeticus (A.D. 197)."Inde suspicio [solem credere deum nostrum], quod innotuerit nos ad orientis regionem precari" (Tertulliani Apologeticum, XVI, 9); translation: "The idea [that the sun is our god] has no doubt originated from our being known to turn to the east in prayer" (Tertullian, Apology, chapter XVI).Tertuliano, Apologeticus, 16.9–10; translation Clement of Alexandria () says: "Since the dawn is an image of the day of birth, and from that point the light which has shone forth at first from the darkness increases, there has also dawned on those involved in darkness a day of the knowledge of truth. In correspondence with the manner of the sun's rising, prayers are made looking towards the sunrise in the east." Origen (–253) says: "The fact that [...] of all the quarters of the heavens, the east is the only direction we turn to when we pour out prayer, the reasons for this, I think, are not easily discovered by anyone." Origen "firmly rejects the argument that if a house has a fine view in a different direction, one should face that way rather than towards the east.""quod ex omnibus coeli plagis ad solam orientis partem conversi orationem fundimus, non facile cuiquam puto ratione compertum" (Origenis in Numeros homiliae, Homilia V, 1; translation
In the fourth century, Saint Basil the Great declared that one of the many beliefs and practices that Christians derived not from written teaching but by the tradition of the apostles was to turn to the East when praying. Using the phrase ad orientem, Augustine of Hippo mentioned the practice at the end of the fourth century.
Syriac and Arabic Christian apologetics of the 7th century explained that Christians prayed facing east because "the Garden of Eden was planted in the east () and that at the end of time, at the second coming, the Messiah would approach Jerusalem from the east." Saint John of Damascus taught that believers pray facing east because it "reminds Christians of their need to long for and strive for the paradise that God intended for them" and because "Christians affirm their faith in Christ as the Light of the world" by praying in the direction of sunrise.
Later ecclesiastics In the eighth century, Saint John of Damascus, a Doctor of the Church, wrote:
Timothy I, an eighth-century patriarch of the Church of the East declared:
Moses Bar-Kepha, a ninth-century bishop of the Syriac Orthodox Church called praying towards the east one of the mysteries of the Church.
Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, who later became Pope Benedict XVI, described the eastward orientation as linked with the "cosmic sign of the rising sun which symbolizes the universality of God."The Spirit of the Liturgy, Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, Ad Solem, 2006 p. 64 He also states in the same book (The Spirit of the Liturgy) that:
Present-day practice
Members of Oriental Orthodox Churches, such as those belonging to the Indian Orthodox Church, Syriac Orthodox Church, Ethiopian Orthodox Tewahedo Church and Coptic Orthodox Church, as well as Oriental Protestant Churches such as the Mar Thoma Syrian Church, pray privately in their homes in the eastward direction of prayer at seven fixed prayer times; when a priest visits a home, he asks the family where the east is before leading them in prayer. Indian Christians and Coptic Christians in these traditions, for example, pray daily in private the canonical hours contained in the Shehimo and Agpeya, respectively (a practice done at fixed prayer times seven instances a day) facing the eastward direction.
Eastern Orthodox Christians, as well as members of the Church of the East, also face east when praying.
Members of the Pentecostal Apostolic Faith Mission continue to pray facing east, believing that it "is the direction from which Jesus Christ will come when he returns".
Liturgical orientation
The Ecclesiastical Latin phrase ad orientem is commonly used today to describe a particular posture of a priest in Christian liturgy: facing away from the people towards the apse or reredos or wall behind the altar, with priest and people looking in the same direction, as opposed to the versus populum orientation in which the priest faces the congregation. In this use, the phrase is not necessarily related to the geographical direction in which the priest is looking and is employed even if he is not facing to the east or even has his back to the east.