The “Improperia,” which are often called the “Reproaches,” are a series of antiphons (sung verses used liturgically) that are used during the Good Friday liturgy of the Catholic Church1. They also happen to be tremendously beautiful. These texts, which (according to Wikipedia) go back to the 800s, are sung with two cantors chanting the text and two choirs responding to each other.
The text of the chant centers around Christ’s Passion on the cross, to the deliverance of the Israelites from Egypt and their subsequent wanderings in the desert, and in all of these, it places us in the shoes of one of those who had escaped Egypt. The text opens by connecting the delivery of humanity from sin (by the crucifixion) to the delivery of the Israelites from Egypt. The first stanza begins by comparing God’s generosity in leading his people out of Egypt to the countless sins of humanity, with the text telling us (from the perspective of Christ), “Quia edúxi te de terra Ægypti: parásti crucem Salvatóri tuo”–“Because I led thee out of the land of Egypt, thou hast prepared a cross for thy Saviour.” Here and elsewhere, the text contrasts the blessings and deliverances given by God to the continuous sin of mankind, the latter having made necessary and caused the crucifixion. Furthermore, the text always uses the singular you, “thee” in English, as it seeks to make known that it is referring to the hearer and that we understand that though (obviously) we did not personally cross the Red Sea with Moses, the deliverance given to Moses is much the same as that given to us, and that as recipients of grace in spite of our sin, all of humanity is like the early Israelites, who are not abandoned by God, even in their sin.
This is the profound point at the core of the Improperia: that mankind, then as now, is guilty, though one man has already born the punishment for that guilt, and to understand that it is by our sin that he chose willingly to be crucified as to free us. The Improperia thus juxtaposes scenes of the love of God with the suffering that he chose as a result of our sin. This juxtaposition is stark, be it when the text reminds us tells us how “[Christ] fed thee with manna in the desert” only to remind us that we repay this kindness with “blows and scourges,” or when it compares the water given in the desert to the vinegar given to Christ on the cross. All of the stanzas make clear one, very true, point, that we ourselves, as individuals, much like the Israelites in the desert, are at once great recipients of the love of God, a love which we cannot repay, and in fact that we oftentimes betray by our sins.
There are many good recordings of the Improperia (such as the one linked here), and these can help give a glimpse of why they are so beautiful. However, these recordings cannot compare to hearing the Improperia sung in person, especially within the liturgical context of Good Friday. In this context, they help illuminate the sorrowful and paradoxical nature of Good Friday, whereby the love of God is encapsulated in the same act that reveals the true depravity and depth of the sins of mankind.
- As far as I can tell, both in the Ordinary and Extraordinary Forms, though I have only witnessed them in the latter. My summary of the Improperia comes from my having witnessed it, as well as from the 1962 Missal that I use to follow along, which is produced by Baronius Press. ↩︎