When it is said
At an Orthodox funeral the priest says it quietly during each litany for the one who has died. A litany is a set of short petitions, each answered “Lord, have mercy”. Then he says the prayer’s last words aloud.
It is said at every memorial service too. In the Russian Church that service is the Panikhida; in the Greek Church, the shorter Trisagion. Memorial services are held before the burial, on the third, ninth and fortieth days after a death, and on its anniversary.
Anyone may pray it at home. The Orthodox Church in America prints it among its everyday prayers, under “For the Departed”.
Where the prayer gives a place for a name, say the name of the one you are praying for.
Where it comes from
No author known
Who wrote it?
No one knows. It is a prayer of the Greek service books, and today it is prayed in Greek, in Church Slavonic and in English. The Greek ends “Your law is truth”, the words of Psalm 119.
Greek Orthodox Archdiocese of America, the Trisagion for the departed (Greek); Orthodox Church in America, Common Prayers: For the Departed
An old name for God
The prayer opens with words Moses and Aaron used when they prayed: “God of the spirits of all flesh”. Christians took them up early. St Clement of Rome ended his letter to the church in Corinth with a blessing from “the All-seeing God and Master of spirits and Lord of all flesh”.
Numbers 16:22; J. B. Lightfoot and J. R. Harmer, The Apostolic Fathers (1891): St Clement to the Corinthians
The third, ninth and fortieth days
Praying for the dead is an old Christian custom. The Apostolic Constitutions, an early book of church rules, already has prayers for the dead. It names the third, ninth and fortieth days after a death, and the anniversary, as days to remember them. The Orthodox Church keeps the same days today.
Hermogen Shimansky, Liturgika (Liturgics), on the commemoration of the departed (in Russian)
What the words mean
Light, green pasture, refreshment
The prayer asks for a place of light, of green pasture and of refreshment. The green place recalls the Lord’s “green pastures” in Psalm 23. The place “where pain, sorrow and sighing have fled away” is Isaiah’s picture of God’s people coming home to Him with joy.
The Scripture in it
But Moses and Aaron fell facedown and said, “O God, the God of the spirits of all flesh, when one man sins, will You be angry with the whole congregation?”
Now since the children have flesh and blood, He too shared in their humanity, so that by His death He might destroy him who holds the power of death, that is, the devil …
He makes me lie down in green pastures; He leads me beside quiet waters.
So the redeemed of the LORD will return and enter Zion with singing, crowned with everlasting joy. Gladness and joy will overtake them, and sorrow and sighing will flee.
When they sin against You—for there is no one who does not sin—and You become angry with them and deliver them to an enemy who takes them as captives to his own land, whether far or near …
Your righteousness is everlasting and Your law is true.
Jesus said to her, “I am the resurrection and the life. Whoever believes in Me will live, even though he dies.”
Bible text: Berean Standard Bible, public domain.
In Greek
Ὁ Θεὸς τῶν πνευμάτων καὶ πάσης σαρκός, ὁ τὸν θάνατον καταπατήσας, τὸν δὲ διάβολον καταργήσας, καὶ ζωὴν τῷ κόσμῳ Σου δωρησάμενος, Αὐτός, Κύριε, ἀνάπαυσον τὴν ψυχὴν τοῦ κεκοιμημένου δούλου Σου (δεῖνα), ἐν τόπῳ φωτεινῷ, ἐν τόπῳ χλοερῷ, ἐν τόπῳ ἀναψύξεως, ἔνθα ἀπέδρα ὀδύνη, λύπη καὶ στεναγμός.
Πᾶν ἁμάρτημα τὸ παρ’ αὐτοῦ πραχθὲν ἐν λόγῳ ἢ ἔργῳ ἢ διανοίᾳ, ὡς ἀγαθὸς καὶ φιλάνθρωπος Θεός, συγχώρησον· ὅτι οὐκ ἔστιν ἄνθρωπος, ὃς ζήσεται καὶ οὐχ ἁμαρτήσει· Σὺ γὰρ μόνος ἐκτὸς ἁμαρτίας ὑπάρχεις, ἡ δικαιοσύνη Σου δικαιοσύνη εἰς τὸν αἰῶνα, καὶ ὁ νόμος Σου ἀλήθεια.
Ὅτι Σὺ εἶ ἡ ἀνάστασις, ἡ ζωή, καὶ ἡ ἀνάπαυσις τοῦ κεκοιμημένου δούλου Σου (δεῖνα), Χριστέ ὁ Θεός ἡμῶν, καὶ Σοὶ τὴν δόξαν ἀναπέμπομεν, σὺν τῷ ἀνάρχῳ Σου Πατρί, καὶ τῷ παναγίῳ καὶ ἀγαθῷ καὶ ζωοποιῷ Σου Πνεύματι, νῦν καὶ ἀεί καὶ εἰς τοὺς αἰῶνας τῶν αἰώνων. Ἀμήν.