Hosanna (Palm Sunday)

pray, save us

*begin with five hallelujahs*

and on the occasion of the passover holiday, the disciples drew near to the god of righteousness, toward mount olivet, going down to keep the city of the lord(of-the-nation), and received many people, elders and infants, taking palm branches, they said, hosanna in the highest, burdened upon a colt, he entered the city of jerusalem, with joy and glee, giving them power and authority

-holy jared the aksumite

this is the portion that i have translated above, in its ge’ez:

this is the full video of the mezmur:

Spiritual songs and hymns in the jaredian tradition always begin with hallelujah(s). mezmur be’halé, neger be’misalé, Tej be’birilé, as the amharic adage goes, begin psalms with hallelujah(s), public matters with illustrative examples, and drink moonshine honeywine in its particular libatious vessel, or not at all!

I do not know enough about the calendar differences to explain the intricacies to you all, but I can tell you the Anglo-Saxon (English speaking and German speaking) Christians uncritically adopted the Latin Rite’s 16th century departure, from the three communions (Greek, Afroasiatic, East Syriac) East of it, in their celebration of Easter; which we call Pascha (Passover). In ge’ez, faseeka. Ps and Fs are interchangeable in the Near East. Anyhoo, ወርኅ (werh) is the ge’ez word for moon and month. This is not an accident. We are on a lunar calendar, and this is why our Passover celebration keeps lining up with the Jewish Passover, whereas the aforementioned Anglo-Saxon-Latin triumvirate does not.

Those seeking a deeply ‘theological’ argument from Holy Jared will be deeply disappointed. The ge’ez and the syriac fathers are known more for teaching, and doing so through hymnography, than constant polemics. And before you hop in with a counterexample that is an exception that does not negate the rule. H/T to evolutionary biologist Bret Weinstein, who recently had Jonathan Pageau on his show; humans have ten fingers, five on each hand, but you may still come across a man with six fingers on one hand allegedly responsible for the murder of the father of Inigo Montoya.

Instead, Holy Jared talks to us about righteousness. This word tsdq is sometimes translated as the abstraction of truth, but he is only familiar with practical truth or wisdom which is applied knowledge in his day-to-day life. Food for the breath-of-life. And he shares it with you all and I, unto eons of eons. Likewise, as the five extra virgins had their olive oil in their lamps, we too should never forget our olive oil… I mean doing mercy, with one another, and especially strangers and enemies.

The worship of Christ is all-inclusive. The totality of age groups is included, and none are shunned. Instead of man-made constructs and buildings, God-made nature, palm branches, is used as a tool of worship, alongside a term, hosanna, that is transliterated, rather than translated, from Biblical Hebrew. You have to learn Hebrew to maximally please God. This is a reversal of the rebellion of Adam and Eve, epitomized in their attempts to cover and guard and protect themselves with nature as opposed to using nature to obey God.

His humility is expressed in his arrival on a simple colt rather than an armored Scythian chariot accompanied by,

ten thousand of his holy ones to execute judgment on all, and to convict all the ungodly amongst them of all their works of ungodliness which they have done in an ungodly way, and of all the hard things which ungodly sinners have spoken against him.

The hymn concludes with power and authority that can be traced to no earthly source and resemble no earthly power nor authority. The joy and glee we receive from him cannot be snatched away by any ruler or any emissary of any ruler.

Set your eyes on Jesus Christ, and fix them there forever. Do not say hosanna today, only to say, after a fleeting moment, crucify him, crucify him, crucify him…