A pericope (;
Greek , "a cutting-out") in
rhetoric
Rhetoric () is the art of persuasion, which along with grammar and logic (or dialectic), is one of the three ancient arts of discourse. Rhetoric aims to study the techniques writers or speakers utilize to inform, persuade, or motivate parti ...
is a set of verses that forms one coherent unit or thought, suitable for public reading from a text, now usually of
sacred scripture. Also can be used as a way to identify certain themes in a chapter of sacred text. Its importance is mainly felt in, but not limited to, narrative portions of Sacred Scripture (as well as poetic sections).
Manuscripts—often
illuminated—called pericopes, are normally
evangeliaries
The Evangeliary or Book of the Gospels is a liturgical book containing only those portions of the four gospels which are read during Mass or in other public offices of the Church. The corresponding terms in Latin are and .
The Evangeliary develo ...
, that is, abbreviated
Gospel Books only containing the sections of the
Gospels required for the
Masses of the
liturgical year
The liturgical year, also called the church year, Christian year or kalendar, consists of the cycle of liturgical seasons in Christian churches that determines when feast days, including celebrations of saints, are to be observed, and whi ...
. Notable examples, both
Ottonian, are the
Pericopes of Henry II and the
Salzburg Pericopes.
Lectionaries
A lectionary ( la, lectionarium) is a book or listing that contains a collection of scripture readings appointed for Christian or Judaic worship on a given day or occasion. There are sub-types such as a "gospel lectionary" or evangeliary, and a ...
are normally made up of pericopes containing the
Epistle
An epistle (; el, ἐπιστολή, ''epistolē,'' "letter") is a writing directed or sent to a person or group of people, usually an elegant and formal didactic letter. The epistle genre of letter-writing was common in ancient Egypt as par ...
and
Gospel readings for the
liturgical year
The liturgical year, also called the church year, Christian year or kalendar, consists of the cycle of liturgical seasons in Christian churches that determines when feast days, including celebrations of saints, are to be observed, and whi ...
. A pericope consisting of passages from different parts of a single book, or from different books of the Bible, and linked together into a single reading is called a ''
concatenation'' or ''composite reading''.
See also
*
Jesus and the woman taken in adultery, known as the "Pericope Adulteræ"
*
Parashah
The term ''parashah'' ( he, פָּרָשָׁה ''Pārāšâ'', "portion", Tiberian , Sephardi , plural: ''parashot'' or ''parashiyot'', also called ''parsha'') formally means a section of a biblical book in the Masoretic Text of the Tanakh (Heb ...
References
* Meinolf Schumacher: "Perikope" in ''Reallexikon der deutschen Literaturwissenschaft''. Vol. 3, edited by Jan-Dirk Müller, 43-45, Berlin and New York: Walter de Gruyter, 200
PDF
External links
Pericope in the ''Concordia Cyclopedia''
Rhetoric
Types of illuminated manuscript
Christian genres
Hebrew Bible
{{Hebrew-Bible-stub