Three, nine, forty, & the crescent/cross

[Hugh Olmsted]

Dear Genevra et al.,

Explanations for the choice of 3d, 9th, and 40th days in Orthodox catechetical
and reference works tend to run something as follows:
3d day:   the pominovenie expresses the desire that the soul of the one who has
fallen asleep arise into eternal life on the example of the Lord Jesus, who
arose from the dead on the third day.
9th day:  that the soul of the deceased be reckoned among the 9 angelic ranks.
40th day: that the soul of the deceased, having worthily undergone its test or
judgment (which is traditionally taken by the Church as having occurred by that
time)  might be raised by God's grace to its place in the mansions of the
blessed.

Maybe it's worth mentioning, since the yearly anniversary has been referred to,
that the namesday and birthday are also so commemorated.

As to the half-moon shape sometimes met at the bottom of crosses on Orthodox
churches, it's clear that the configuration is met well before the 18th
century.  While it's hardly the final word, I can offer no less (and no later!)
an authority's best guess on the subject than that of prepodobnyi Maksim Grek,
who wrote precisely on this question in the sixteenth century.  Evidently one of
his correspondents had asked him for an explanation of the half-moon cross;
Maksim's brief composition in answer has survived in numerous manuscripts of his
works (including those of his own lifetime) and in his published Sochineniia
(Kazan': pri Kazanskoi dukhovnoi akademii, 1859-62, 3 vols., where it appears in
vol. 3, p. 124-125  as:
      Inoka Maksima Greka Skazanie o tom, chto pod krestom na tserkvi okruzhen
aki mesiats mlad.
      nach.: o sem U, v nemzhe kresty vodruzheny sut' na tserkvakh, vezhd',
iako....

The answer Maksim offers is formulated diffidently, without claims of authority.

He proposes two possible explanations,  both based on the presumed symbolic use
not of the crescent moon, but of the Greek letter upsilon / ypsilon (similar in
form,  with its curved form and upturned points).  The first attempt turns on
the word (h)ypsos 'high', on the assumption that the ypsilon on the cross refers
to Christ's resurrection, with the cross itself then naturally signifying
Christ's height and glory.

The second proposed explanation is even less direct: since the numerical
significance of ypsilon in Greek cipher is 400 (in Slavonic in this function
ypsilon's descedant, izhitsa, has been replaced by the digraph ou), Maksim takes
the possible significance coded into this form of the cross as combining 4 (the
four corners of the world to which Christian teaching and salvation have spread)
and 100 (the 100 sheep in the parable, from among which the one who has gone
astray is brought back to the fold by the Good Shepherd, and thus signifies the
discovery of Christ and the Cross itself).

Maksim closes with a formula of modesty: "That's as much as my meagre mind can
achieve: anyone capable of more, let him enlighten us!" (Toliko dostizaet khudyi
um moi, a mogii bol'shi togo, da prosvetit nas!)

So I offer this partly just as historical testimony to the half-moon cross's
occurrence by the 16th century, noting that Maksim evidently takes for granted
its presence in the Byzantine world; and partly as an example of the degree of
hesitancy in the  attempt by one pre-modern Orthodox bookman (not the least-well
informed)  to puzzle out its meaning.

Other proposed explanations can be found in the book, A.A. Sviatoslavskii, A.A.
Troshin,  Krest v russkoi kul'ture: ocherk russkoi monumental'noi stavrografii
(M. : Drevlekhranilishche, 2000), p. 25-26  et passim.  Among these
interpretations (with further citations of other sources) are:

1. That the bent lower bar represents a snake, and thus Christianity's victory
over heathendom.
2. It represents the protecting hand-guard at the point where a sword's blade
meets the hilt--thus the cross as weapon of the church militant.
3. The cross in this form represents an anchor.
4. The crescent shape represents a cup or goblet into which Christ's blood
flowed -- thus representing the Eucharist Chalice.
...and others...

It's interesting that there seems so little firm evidence, so little consensus.
A more substantial and convincing historical explanation must still be out there
somewhere...

Hugh Olmsted

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