When it is said
It comes early in the morning prayers of the Russian prayer book, after the three hymns on rising and “Lord, have mercy” said 12 times. Psalm 51 (Psalm 50 in the Orthodox numbering), the Creed and the prayers of St Macarius follow it.
Greek Orthodox Christians pray it as well. Their small prayer book calls it the prayer of thanksgiving and sets it after the same hymns.
Where it comes from
Author doubtful
Where it comes from
The Russian prayer book took this prayer, and the hymns on rising before it, from the book of hours (Horologion). There the two open the prayers said alone on rising, before the Midnight Office, the Church’s service of prayer in the night. In his history of the morning prayers, the Russian priest Pyotr Pchelintsev found both among those prayers in a Psalter of the first half of the 1500s.
Priest Pyotr Pchelintsev, on the history of the morning and evening prayers, Azbyka.ru (in Russian)
Who wrote it?
A Greek book of hours printed in the 1800s heads it “Prayer of thanksgiving with supplication”, and the Russian prayer book calls it a prayer to the Most Holy Trinity. Neither names an author. St Basil the Great’s name stands over it only in the Jordanville prayer book, an English edition of the Russian book.
Horologion to mega, Greek, catalogued as 1851, pages 2 and 3 (scan on the Internet Archive); Azbyka.ru, the morning prayers (in Russian); Jordanville Prayer Book, the morning prayers
What the words mean
Why “confession” in a prayer of thanks?
The old wording asks to “hymn Thee in heartfelt confession”, which sounds like owning up to sins. A Russian note on the prayer reads the line as praising God and singing to Him with a grateful heart, so the plain wording has “with a thankful heart”.
The Scripture in it
I ask that the eyes of your heart may be enlightened, so that you may know the hope of His calling, the riches of His glorious inheritance in the saints …
O Lord, open my lips, and my mouth will declare Your praise.
Teach me to do Your will, for You are my God. May Your good Spirit lead me on level ground.
Bible text: Berean Standard Bible, public domain.
In Greek
Ἐκ τοῦ ὕπνου ἐξανιστάμενος εὐχαριστῶ Σοι, Ἁγία Τριάς·
ὅτι διὰ τὴν πολλήν Σου ἀγαθότητα καὶ μακροθυμίαν,
οὐκ ὠργίσθης ἐμοὶ τῷ ῥαθύμῳ καὶ ἁμαρτωλῷ,
οὐδὲ συναπώλεσάς με ταῖς ἀνομίαις μου,
ἀλλ’ ἐφιλανθρωπεύσω συνήθως,
καὶ πρὸς ἀπόγνωσιν κείμενον ἤγειράς με,
εἰς τὸ ὀρθρίσαι καὶ δοξολογῆσαι τὸ κράτος Σου.
Καὶ νῦν φώτισόν μου τὰ ὄμματα τῆς διανοίας·
ἄνοιξόν μου τὸ στόμα,
τοῦ μελετᾶν τὰ λόγιά Σου,
καὶ συνιέναι τὰς ἐντολάς Σου,
καὶ ποιεῖν τὸ θέλημά Σου,
καὶ ψάλλειν Σοι ἐν ἐξομολογήσει καρδίας,
καὶ ἀνυμνεῖν τὸ πανάγιον ὄνομά Σου,
τοῦ Πατρὸς, καὶ τοῦ Υἱοῦ καὶ τοῦ Ἁγίου Πνεύματος,
νῦν, καὶ ἀεὶ, καὶ εἰς τοὺς αἰῶνας τῶν αἰώνων· Ἀμήν.