Collect for Epiphany (1928 BCP)

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Collect for Epiphany (1928 BCP) is the collect appointed in the 1928 American Book of Common Prayer for "The Epiphany, or the Manifestation of Christ to the Gentiles." It prays from the historical manifestation of Christ by the star to the Magi toward the Church's final vision of God: believers know God "now by faith" and ask after this life for "the fruition" of the divine glory.

Text of the Collect

O GOD, who by the leading of a star didst manifest thy only-begotten Son to the Gentiles; Mercifully grant that we, who know thee now by faith, may after this life have the fruition of thy glorious Godhead; through the same thy Son Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.

[1]

The opening address is simple, but the relative clause defines the feast: God manifested the only-begotten Son "to the Gentiles" by the leading of a star. The petition then moves in three steps. First, "we, who know thee now by faith" names the Church's present condition as real knowledge but not yet sight. Second, "after this life" gives the prayer an eschatological horizon. Third, "the fruition of thy glorious Godhead" asks for the final enjoyment and possession of the God whom faith already knows.

Appointed Readings

The 1928 Epistle gives the doctrinal argument behind the collect. The mystery revealed in Christ is that Gentiles are incorporated into the same promise and body, not merely admitted as observers:

For this cause I Paul, the prisoner of Jesus Christ for you Gentiles, if ye have heard of the dispensation of the grace of God, which is given me to you-ward: how that by revelation he made known unto me the mystery; (as I wrote afore in few words, whereby, when ye read, ye may understand my knowledge in the mystery of Christ) which in other ages was not made known unto the sons of men, as it is now revealed unto his holy apostles and prophets by the Spirit; that the Gentiles should be fellow-heirs, and of the same body, and partakers of his promise in Christ by the gospel.

[2]

The appointed Gospel supplies the narrative image named by the collect. The star's leading brings Gentile worshippers to the child, and their gifts turn manifestation into adoration:

When they had heard the king, they departed; and, lo, the star, which they saw in the east, went before them, till it came and stood over where the young child was. When they saw the star, they rejoiced with exceeding great joy. And when they were come into the house, they saw the young child with Mary his mother, and fell down, and worshipped him: and when they had opened their treasures, they presented unto him gifts; gold, and frankincense, and myrrh.

[3]

The collect therefore gathers Ephesians iii and Matthew ii into one petition. Matthew gives the visible sign: the star, the Magi, and their worship. Ephesians gives the apostolic interpretation: Gentiles share in the promise "in Christ by the gospel." The prayer's movement from faith to fruition adds the Church's own hope, so that Epiphany is not only remembered but prayed.

Octave and Office Use

The 1928 book adds an octave direction immediately after the collect, extending the text beyond the one feast day:

This Collect is to be said daily throughout the Octave.

[4]

Morning Prayer reinforces the same missionary and eucharistic horizon with Malachi's prophecy:

From the rising of the sun even unto the going down of the same my Name shall be great among the Gentiles; and in every place incense shall be offered unto my Name, and a pure offering: for my Name shall be great among the heathen, saith the LORD of hosts.

[5]

The Morning Prayer invitatory sentence turns manifestation into adoration:

On the Epiphany and seven days after, and on the Feast of the Transfiguration. - The Lord hath manifested forth his glory : O come, let us adore him.

[6]

Evening Prayer gives the prophecy of Isaiah lx in compressed form:

And the Gentiles shall come to thy light, and kings to the brightness of thy rising.

[7]

At Holy Communion, the Proper Preface for Epiphany connects manifestation with the Incarnation. Christ's glory is manifested "in substance of our mortal flesh," so the feast does not detach divine glory from the assumed humanity of the Son:

Upon The Epiphany, and seven days after. THROUGH Jesus Christ our Lord, who, in substance of our mortal flesh, manifested forth his glory; that he might bring us out of darkness into his own glorious light. Therefore with Angels, etc.

[8]

Historical and Theological Interpretation

Francis Procter and Walter Howard Frere read the Epiphany collect, Epistle, and Gospel as a coherent liturgical unit:

For the Epiphany the Collect and Gospel are taken from the old services; but a new passage is assigned for the Epistle instead of the old Lesson from Isaiah, which was transferred to be the first Lesson at Mattins. These show clearly the design of the feast, which is to show our gratitude to God for admitting the Gentiles to those religious privileges, which had been confined to the Jews.

[9]

Anthony Sparrow, writing in the seventeenth-century Prayer Book tradition, treats the Magi as the first of several Epiphany manifestations:

This Feast is called in Latin Epiphaniae, Epiphanies, in the plural; because upon this day we celebrate three glorious apparitions or manifestations, all which happened upon the same day, though not of the same year.

[10]

Sparrow then names the collect's Gospel image directly:

The first manifestation was of the Star, (mentioned in the Gospel) the Gentiles guide to Christ.

[11]

John Henry Blunt's annotated edition connects the Epiphany Gospel, Isaiah lx, and Ephesians iii with the same light-and-Gentiles theme:

There is a beautiful and very instructive unity about the Scriptures used on the Epiphany. The first morning Lesson is the 60th chapter of Isaiah... and the Epistle reads like an expansion of this verse, shewing how the Light of Christ is manifested to the world at large, in and by the Church.

[12]

These historical sources support the article's main reading. The collect is not an isolated devotional sentence; it belongs to a Prayer Book complex in which the star, the Magi, Ephesians iii, Isaiah lx, Morning and Evening Prayer, and the eucharistic preface all confess Christ as manifested to the nations and as the light who brings worshippers from faith toward final vision.

Clause-by-Clause Summary

The collect begins with divine initiative: God manifests the Son. The star is an instrument of providence, not an independent omen. Its function is to lead Gentiles to Christ.

"Only-begotten Son" gives the prayer its christological center. The one manifested to the Magi is not merely a royal child but the eternal Son whose glory is confessed in the Church's worship.

"To the Gentiles" makes the collect missionary and catholic. The appointed Epistle says Gentiles are "fellow-heirs"; the appointed Gospel shows Gentiles worshipping the child; the Office sentences add Malachi and Isaiah to the same pattern.

"We, who know thee now by faith" places the praying Church in continuity with the Magi. Present faith is real knowledge of God, but it is also pilgrimage.

"May after this life have the fruition of thy glorious Godhead" completes the collect's ascent. The feast begins with light given in history and ends with the hope of beholding and enjoying God himself.

See Also

References

  1. ↑ Protestant Episcopal Church in the United States of America, The Book of Common Prayer, Standard Book accepted in 1928, "The Collects, Epistles, and Gospels," "Collect for Epiphany" under "The Epiphany, or the Manifestation of Christ to the Gentiles," January 6, PDF p. 10 of the Society of Archbishop Justus scan; The 1928 Book of Common Prayer: The Collects, Epistles and Gospels. Complete collect compared word for word with local source sources/justuspropers/ReadingsA.htm, lines 680-689, and with tmp/revision-research/collect-for-epiphany/1928-propers-pypdf.txt, lines 609-619. The local comparative HTML preserves an older ending in the running text, but its side note at lines 702-704 and the 1928 PDF confirm the 1928 ending "through the same thy Son Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen."
  2. ↑ Protestant Episcopal Church in the United States of America, The Book of Common Prayer, Standard Book accepted in 1928, "The Collects, Epistles, and Gospels," The Epiphany, Epistle, Ephesians iii. 1, PDF p. 10 of the Society of Archbishop Justus scan; The 1928 Book of Common Prayer: The Collects, Epistles and Gospels. Quotation checked against sources/justuspropers/ReadingsA.htm, lines 710-730, and tmp/revision-research/collect-for-epiphany/1928-propers-pypdf.txt, lines 621-644; local OCR artifacts "tire" and "time fellowship" corrected from the PDF extraction.
  3. ↑ Protestant Episcopal Church in the United States of America, The Book of Common Prayer, Standard Book accepted in 1928, "The Collects, Epistles, and Gospels," The Epiphany, Gospel, St. Matthew ii. 1, PDF p. 10 of the Society of Archbishop Justus scan; The 1928 Book of Common Prayer: The Collects, Epistles and Gospels. Quotation checked against sources/justuspropers/ReadingsA.htm, lines 731-756, and tmp/revision-research/collect-for-epiphany/1928-propers-pypdf.txt, lines 645-673.
  4. ↑ Protestant Episcopal Church in the United States of America, The Book of Common Prayer, Standard Book accepted in 1928, "The Collects, Epistles, and Gospels," The Epiphany octave rubric, PDF p. 10 of the Society of Archbishop Justus scan; The 1928 Book of Common Prayer: The Collects, Epistles and Gospels. Quotation checked against sources/justuspropers/ReadingsA.htm, lines 707-709, and tmp/revision-research/collect-for-epiphany/1928-propers-pypdf.txt, lines 619-620.
  5. ↑ Protestant Episcopal Church in the United States of America, The Book of Common Prayer, Standard Book accepted in 1928, "The Order for Daily Morning Prayer," Epiphany opening sentence, Malachi i. 11; The Order for Daily Morning Prayer. Quotation checked against local source sources/justus1928/MP.htm, lines 107-112; small-cap formatting normalized to LORD.
  6. ↑ Protestant Episcopal Church in the United States of America, The Book of Common Prayer, Standard Book accepted in 1928, "The Order for Daily Morning Prayer," seasonal sentence before the Venite; The Order for Daily Morning Prayer. Quotation checked against local source sources/justus1928/MP.htm, lines 318-322; typographic dash normalized.
  7. ↑ Protestant Episcopal Church in the United States of America, The Book of Common Prayer, Standard Book accepted in 1928, "The Order for Daily Evening Prayer," Epiphany opening sentence, Isaiah lx. 3; The Order for Daily Evening Prayer. Quotation checked against local source sources/justus1928/EP.htm, lines 94-96.
  8. ↑ Protestant Episcopal Church in the United States of America, The Book of Common Prayer, Standard Book accepted in 1928, "The Order for the Administration of the Lord's Supper, or Holy Communion," Proper Preface for Epiphany; The Order for Holy Communion. Quotation checked against local source sources/justus1928/HC.htm, lines 479-485.
  9. ↑ Francis Procter and Walter Howard Frere, A New History of the Book of Common Prayer, with a Rationale of Its Offices, revised edition (London: Macmillan and Co., 1907), p. 531, chapter XIII, "Collects, Epistles, and Gospels"; Society of Archbishop Justus transcription, A New History of the Book of Common Prayer: Chapter 13. Quotation checked against tmp/revision-research/collect-for-epiphany/procter-frere-ch13.html, lines 315-331.
  10. ↑ Anthony Sparrow, A Rationale upon the Book of Common Prayer (London, 1672), "Epiphany"; Project Canterbury transcription, A Rationale upon the Book of Common Prayer: Epiphany. Quotation checked against fetched source tmp/revision-research/collect-for-epiphany/sparrow-epiphany.html, lines 38-41.
  11. ↑ Anthony Sparrow, A Rationale upon the Book of Common Prayer (London, 1672), "Epiphany"; Project Canterbury transcription, A Rationale upon the Book of Common Prayer: Epiphany. Quotation checked against fetched source tmp/revision-research/collect-for-epiphany/sparrow-epiphany.html, lines 42-43.
  12. ↑ John Henry Blunt, ed., The Annotated Book of Common Prayer: Being an Historical, Ritual, and Theological Commentary on the Devotional System of the Church of England, new edition (London and New York: Longmans, Green, and Co., 1895), pp. 258-259, notes on "The Epiphany"; Internet Archive, The Annotated Book of Common Prayer. Quotation checked against local OCR source tmp/revision-research/collect-for-epiphany/blunt_annotated_bcp_1895.txt, lines 59420-59436; ellipsis marks omitted intervening quoted Isaiah text.

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