Did the faithful of the apostolic age observe the prayers of the canonical hours?

We read in the Didache , “The Lord’s Teaching Through the Twelve Apostles to the Nations”: “Do not keep the same fast-days as the hypocrites … Your prayers, too, should be different from theirs. Pray as the Lord enjoined in His Gospel, thus: Our Father, who art in heaven … Say this prayer three times every day.”¹²³ This document, which dates back to between 70 and 150 A. D., shows us that in the era of the apostles, the faithful prayed three times daily, although their precise timing was not yet specified, being a well-established practice inherited by the Church from Jewish tradition, which includes the prayers of the

120 Tertullian, On Prayer 25 (ANF 3:690).

121 Tertullian, On Prayer 25 (ANF 3:690).

122 Tertullian, To My Wife (Ad Uxorem) 2.5 (ANF 4:46).

123

“The Didache” in Early Christian Writings , trans., Maxwell Staniforth and Andrew Louth (Penguin, 1987) 8: p. 194.

third, sixth, and ninth hours. Jungmann¹²⁴ believes that these prayers are based on Daniel the prophet (Dan. 6:10) who was accustomed to go to his house, open his windows towards Jerusalem, and kneel to pray three times a day.

The Didache does not mention the morning and night-time prayers, perhaps because the faithful would pray these communally, so there was no need to command the people to pray them. This is apparent in the Didascalia’s commandment to bishops: “When you teach, command and remind the people, that they be constant in the assembly of the Church; so that you be not hindered, but that they be constantly assembled, that no one diminish the Church by not assembling, and make smaller by a member the body of Christ.”¹²⁵ The Didache mentions the Lord’s prayer because while Christians were accustomed to participate in the synagogues in singing psalms and in the Jewish prayers, they could not share the Lord’s prayer with them.

The Acts of the Apostles describes the practice of praying the canonical hours in the early Church. Of the third hour we read: “For these are not drunk, as you suppose, since it is only the third hour of the day” (Acts 2:15). Of the sixth hour : “Peter went up on the housetop to pray, about the sixth hour” (Acts 10:9). Of the ninth hour : “Now Peter and John went up together to the temple at the hour of prayer, the ninth hour” (Acts 3:1). And of the midnight prayer : “But at midnight Paul and Silas were praying and singing hymns to God, and the prisoners were listening to them” (Acts 16:25).

St. Basil the Great says, “Prayer time should cover the whole of life, but since there is absolute need at certain intervals to interrupt the bending of the knee and the chanting of psalms, the hours appointed for prayer by the saints should be observed. The mighty David says, ‘I rose at midnight to give praise to you for the judgments of your justification’ (Ps. 119:62); and we find Paul and Silas following his example, for they praised God in prison at midnight (Acts 16:25). Then too, the same Prophet says: ‘Evening and morning and at noon (Ps. 55:17). Moreover, the coming of the Holy Spirit took place at the third hour, as we learn in the Acts when, in answer to the Pharisees who were jeering at the disciples because of the diversity of tongues, Peter said that they were not drunk who were speaking these words: ‘seeing that it is the third hour’ (Acts 2:15). Again, the ninth hour recalls the Lord’s Passion, which took place that we might live (Matt. 27:45; Mark 15:33–34). But, since David says: “Seven times a day I have given praise to you, for the judgments of your justice” (Ps. 119:164), and the times for prayer which have been mentioned do not make up this sevenfold apportionment, the mid-day prayer should be divided, one part being recited before the

124 Josef Jungmann, The Early Liturgy, to the Time of Gregory the Great , trans., Francis Brunner (University of Notre Dame Press, 1959): p. 99.

125 The Didascalia Apostolorum in English , trans., Margaret Dunlop Gibson (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1903) 13: p. 67.

noon repast and the other afterward. In this way, the daily seven-fold praise of God distributed throughout the whole period of the day may become a pattern for us also.”¹²⁶