1. Blessed be the God and Father of our
Lord Jesus Christ 2 Cor. i. 3.. Blessed also
be His Only-begotten Son This clause is omitted in some
mss. Various forms of the Doxology were
adopted in Cyril’s time by various parties in the Church.
Thus Theodoret (Hist. Eccles. II. c. 19) relates that Leontius,
Bishop of Antioch, a.d. 348–357,
observing that the Clergy and the Congregation were divided into two
parties, the one using the form “and to the Son, and to the Holy
Ghost,” the other “through the Son, in the Holy
Ghost,” used to repeat the Doxology silently, so that those who
were near could hear only “world without end.”
The form which was regarded as the most
orthodox, and adopted in the Liturgies ran thus: “Glory to
the Father, and to the Son, and to the Holy Ghost, now and ever, and to
the ages of the ages.” See Suicer’s Thesaurus,
Δοξολογία.. For with the
thought of God let the thought of Father at once be
joined, that the ascription of glory to the Father and the Son may be
made indivisible. For the Father hath not one glory, and the Son
another, but one and the same, since He is the Father’s
Only-begotten Son; and when the Father is glorified, the Son also
shares the glory with Him, because the glory of the Son flows from His
Father’s honour: and again, when the Son is glorified, the
Father of so great a blessing is highly honoured.