Palm Sunday – the popular name of one of the major festivals of Christians – Entry into Jerusalem. This celebration of the Orthodox calendar falls on the last Sunday of Lent.
The holiday is dedicated to the day when Jesus rode into Jerusalem. People happily greeted Jesus with songs and flowers, as well as the stele under his feet, his ass clothes and palm branches – the plants, symbolizing purity and infallibility. Catholics are called this holiday – Palm Sunday.
But a palm tree in our latitudes is not growing, so in the Orthodox tradition, it was replaced by willow – plant, which blooms after the first onset of winter and symbolizes the beginning of a new life. The willow branch symbolizes Palm Sunday for the people of theUkraine. Since few palm trees grow in their country Ukrainians long ago substituted willows for them ore traditional palm branch as a symbol of the holiday.
After Palm Sunday services, it was customary for Ukrainians exiting church to gently tap each other with the blessed pussy willow branches. This custom, known as “Boze Rany” (“God’s Wounds”) was done to imitate the scourging of Jesus by His captors on Holy Friday. But the tapping of friends with the pussy willow branches was actually a wish for good health, wealth and happiness. That is because the tapping was usually accompanied by the phrase: “Bud’ velyki yak verba, zdorovi ’yak voda, bohati yak zemlia’ (This expression translates as: “Be as big as the willow, healthy as water, rich as the earth”) and folk verses like:
Не я б’ю,
Верба б’є,
За тиждень Великдень
Не далеко червоне яєчко!
Which translates to
It’s not me hitting you,
It’s the willow hitting you,
In a week it will be Easter,
Soon you will have a red egg.
Ukrainians call Palm Sunday Kvitna (“Flower”) or Verbna (“Willow”) Sunday.
The blessed willow branches were then taken home. Some were planted by the father or oldest son. If they took root, it meant many good things would come to the family that year. Most of the blessed pussy willow branches were placed in front of, behind or above holy pictures in the home. These branches would replace the branches that had been placed there the previous year. The branches which were taken down were carefully burned.
A few sprigs of willow can be put into the water, and when they take root, planted near the house, but the other day. If twigs take root, is a plant grown will protect family home from adversity.
Ukraine, the first three days of Holy Week, also called the Pure (“Chystyi”) Week or Great (“Velykyi”) Week, was a very busy period. All significant housework, repairs and cooking had to be accomplished on these three days before Holy Thursday. The women and girls of the home would do house cleaning and prepare foods and the Pysanky for the basket of blessed food. This included the baking of the Paska and Babka. The men and boys cleaned the barn and outbuildings and stored the firewood needed for the Holy Week.
If the Palm Sunday to remember a loved one, it is on this day will come.
Palm Sunday falls on Lent, so tumultuous festivities suit is not necessary, but that day, a harbinger of Easter should be bright and cheery.
