When it is said
The Russian prayer book prints a long commemoration of the living and the departed at the end of the morning prayers. It says to read it if you can, in place of the short prayers for the living and the departed.
These three petitions close it. You bow after each one and say the last one three times.
Where it comes from
No author known
From the Russian prayer book
The Russian prayer book names no author for this commemoration and gives no date. G. V. Shann put it into English in 1891, in a chapter he called “Diptychs, or Remembrancer”. Today the Jordanville Prayer Book prints it in English at the end of the morning prayers, as the Slavonic books do.
G. V. Shann, Euchology: A Manual of Prayers of the Holy Orthodox Church (1891), chapter XXVI; Jordanville Prayer Book (Holy Trinity Monastery), the morning prayers
Bishops before family
The commemoration of the departed opens with a petition for patriarchs, bishops, priests and monks who have died. Shann’s English of 1891 and the Jordanville book both begin that petition with Orthodox kings and queens. Only after it does the one praying name their own parents and relatives, then every Orthodox Christian laid to rest anywhere.
Molitvoslov, Pomyannik o zhivykh i usopshikh, Azbyka.ru; G. V. Shann, Euchology (1891), “For the departed”; Jordanville Prayer Book (Holy Trinity Monastery), “For the Departed”
What the words mean
Why “fallen asleep”?
The Slavonic word for the departed means “those who have fallen asleep”. The Russian prayer book explains it in a note: they are called that because one day they will rise from their graves, as if from sleep. Paul speaks of the dead the same way when he tells Christians not to grieve like those who have no hope (1 Thessalonians 4:13-14).
The Scripture in it
Brothers, we do not want you to be uninformed about those who sleep in death, so that you will not grieve like the rest, who are without hope. For since we believe that Jesus died and rose again, we also believe that God will bring with Jesus those who have fallen asleep in Him.
Many ask, “Who can show us the good?” Shine the light of Your face upon us, O LORD.
Bible text: Berean Standard Bible, public domain.
In Church Slavonic
Помяни́, Го́споди, ду́ши усо́пших рабо́в Твои́х,
роди́телей мои́х (имя), сро́дников (имя), и вся ближния рода моего, и други
и прости́ и́х вся́ согреше́ния во́льная и нево́льная,
да́руя и́м Ца́рствие Небесное и прича́стие ве́чных Твои́х благи́х
и Твоея́ безконе́чныя и блаже́нныя жи́зни наслажде́ние.
Помяни́, Го́споди, и вся́ в наде́жди воскресе́ния и жи́зни ве́чныя усо́пшия,
отцы́ и бра́тию на́шу, и сестры́, и зде́ лежа́щия и повсю́ду Правосла́вныя Христиа́ны,
и со святы́ми Твои́ми, иде́же присеща́ет све́т лица́ Твоего́, всели́,
и на́с поми́луй, я́ко Бла́г и Человеколю́бец. Ами́нь.
Пода́ждь, Го́споди, оставле́ние грехо́в все́м пре́жде отше́дшим в ве́ре и наде́жди воскресе́ния,
отце́м, бра́тиям и се́страм на́шим, и сотвори́ и́м ве́чную па́мять.
From the Church Slavonic prayer book on Azbyka.ru, the commemoration of the living and the departed.