Kýrie, eléison.
Kýrie, eléison.
Kýrie, eléison.
Christe, eléison.
Christe, eléison.
Christe, eléison.
Kýrie, eléison.
Kýrie, eléison.
Kýrie, eléison.

Kyrie Eleison (Greek for „Lord have mercy“; […]) is a very old, even pre-Christian, expression used constantly in all Christian liturgies. Arrian quotes it in the second century: „Invoking God we say Kyrie Eleison“ (Diatribæ Epicteti, II, 7). A more obvious precedent for Christian use was the occurrence of the same formula in the Old Testament (Psalm 4:2, 6:3, 9:14, 25:11, 121:3; Isaias 33:2; Tobit 8:10; etc., in the Septuagint). In these places it seems already to be a quasi-liturgical exclamation. So also in the New Testament the form occurs repeatedly (Matthew 9:27, 20:30, 15:22; Mark 10:47; Luke 16:24, 17:13). The only difference is that all these cases have an accusative after the verb: Kyrie eleison me, or eleison hemas. The liturgical forumula is shortened from this.