Tag Archives: Isaiah

O Clavis David

Leave a reply
Christ trampling the gates of hades with all their locks and keys and setting the prisoners (Adam and Eve) free from darkness.

Christ trampling the gates of hades with all their locks and keys and setting the prisoners (Adam and Eve) free from darkness.

O Key of David, and Sceptre of the house of Israel, that openeth and no man shutteth, and shutteth and no man openeth, come to liberate the prisoner from the prison, and them that sit in darkness, and in the shadow of death.

O Clavis David, et sceptrum domus Israel; qui aperis, et nemo claudit; claudis, et nemo aperit: veni, et educ vinctum de domo carceris, sedentem in tenebris, et umbra mortis.

The fourth of the O Antiphons, O Clavis David, addresses Christ by another title that comes from the book of Isaiah. In Isaiah 22, a scene is described in which a new ruler replaces an old, and this is accomplished by the Lord, who says of this new ruler that “… I will place on his shoulder the key of the house of David. He shall open, and none shall shut; and he shall shut, and none shall open” (Isa 22:22-23). Continue reading →

O Radix Jesse

Leave a reply
Tree Of Jesse, fresco in the cathedral at Limburg.

Christ pictured as the fruit of the Tree of Jesse, with his ancestors represented below him and Jesse out of frame at the bottom. Fresco, cathedral at Limburg.

O Root of Jesse, which standest for an ensign of the people, at Whom the kings shall shut their mouths, Whom the Gentiles shall seek, come to deliver us, do not tarry.

O Radix Jesse, qui stas in signum populorum, super quem continebunt reges os suum, quem Gentes deprecabuntur: veni ad liberandum nos, jam noli tardare.

On December 19, five nights before Christmas Eve, the third of the great O Antiphons, Radix Jesse, is traditionally sung at the Magnificat during Vespers in the Western tradition of the Church. This antiphon is slightly more enigmatic than the the first two, but only until you’re familiar with the Scripture quotations from which it is almost entirely composed. Continue reading →