If you’ve watched our video “The Form of the Divine Service” (time marker 15:35), you probably noticed that during the Nicene Creed, all the servers (and some of the parishioners) genuflect beginning with the words “and came down from heaven . . . ,” through the words “and was crucified for us . . . .” This is a common practice among The Gottesdienst Crowd, but it is not universally observed in this manner (genuflection) and at that particular moment in the Creed.

Instead of genuflection, some have opted for the bow of the body. Instead of beginning at the words “and came down from heaven . . . ” through the words “and was crucified for us . . . ,” some have opted for beginning at the words “and became man . . . ” through the words “and was raised again from the dead,” and still others have begun at the words “and was incarnate by the Holy Spirit . . . ” through the words “and became man.” Some have a combination of these two manners (the what) with these two moments (the when).

The What: Genuflection or Bow?

The sources are not univocal on this point. The Roman Rite calls for genuflection, a slow genuflection so that the right knee hits the ground at the homo factus est, and then back up again in the same slow manner (see Fortescue, The Ceremonies of the Roman Rite, 49). The old Latin rubric from the late Middle Ages, which was officially recognized in 1502, is the basis for this. How long it was in practice before then, I do not know. But seeing how additions to the rite and ceremony of the liturgy were accepted only if they had developed organically according to the Vincentian Canon—Everywhere, Always, By All—may give us some indication that it was fairly wide spread even before 1502 (See Reid, The Organic Development of the Liturgy).

The Anglicans call for a bow of the body for all days except for at the Christmas Day Mass, when a full genuflection is used in place of the bow of the body (see Lamburn, Ritual Notes, 51–83).

The Lutherans are a mix of the two. Luther refers to this ceremony in one of his Saturday Vespers sermons on the Gospel of John from 1537.[1] “And when the congregation came to the words ‘from the Virgin Mary, and was made man,’ everyone genuflected and removed his hat” (Luther’s Works, Vol. 22, 102).

Ernst Zeeden records: “It may perhaps be mentioned in this context that four boys had to genuflect at the altar in the castle church of Mansfield during the words ‘and became man’ (Homo factus est) in order to defend against the Flacian error” (Zeeden, Faith and Act, 21). He notes further that this is also the case for the 1572 Hoya church order. Though there is no mention of the ceremony of the celebrant, deacon, subdeacon, or people.

The Church Order for Braunschweig-Wolfenbüttel by Marin Chemnitz and Jacob Andreae gives no other direction other than either to say or sing the Creed or sing Luther’s hymn Wir Glauben. Löhe’s agenda, too, provides no futher rubrics other than that the Creed shall either be spoken or sung.

In The Lutheran Church—Missouri Synod, there are three rubrical manuals that take this up. Paul H. D. Lang states that the celebrant (and attending servers): “Bowing or kneeling when the words of the Nicene Creed are said, ‘And was incarnate by the Holy Ghost . . . and was made man,’ expresses reverent awe over God’s grace in becoming man in order to redeem us” (Lang, Ceremony and Celebration, 62). He also has this rubric for the laity in the congregation: “Then he [the layman] says the Nicene Creed, and in doing so, he may bow his head at the words, ‘God,’ ‘Jesus Christ,’ and ‘worshiped and glorified.’ For the words, ‘and was made man,’ he may bow or kneel” (Lang, Ceremony and Celebration, 111).

In Conduct of the Service, Arthur Carl Piepkorn states: “He [the celebrant] may bow from the waist at the words, ‘And was incarnate’ and remain bowed through the words, ‘Was crucified also for us;’ he raises himself erect again before the words ‘Under Pontius Pilate.’ . . . In some parts of the Church of the Augsburg Confession the celebrant placed the extremities of his fingers on either side of the Corporal and knelt on his right knee from the words, ‘And was incarnate’ through the words, ‘and was made man’” (Piepkorn, Conduct of the Service, 19).

Charles McClean, in his Conduct of the Services, echos Piepkorn, though without the reference to the genuflection: “He [the celebrant] may bow from the waist at the words, ‘and was incarnate’ and remain bowed through the words, ‘was crucified as for us.’ He stands erect again before the words, ‘under Pontius Pilate’ are said” (McClean, Conduct of the Services, 41).

While the sources vary on their prescriptions, there is a common thread that runs through them all: Doing something, whether a bow of the body or genuflection, is preferred than doing nothing at all. Here Luther, in the same series of sermons on the Gospel of John, appears to agree:

“The following tale is told about a coarse and brutal lout. While the words ‘And was made man’ were being sung in church, he remained standing, neither genuflecting nor removing his hat. He showed no reverence, but just stood there like a clod. All the others dropped to their knees when the Nicene Creed was prayed and chanted devoutly. Then the devil stepped up to him and hit him so hard it made his head spin. He cursed him gruesomely and said: ‘May hell consume you, you boorish ass! If God had become an angel like me and the congregation sang: ‘God was made an angel,’ I would bend not only my knees but my whole body to the ground! Yes, I would crawl ten ells down into the ground. And you vile human creature, you stand there like a stick or a stone. You hear that God did not become an angel but a man like you, and you just stand there like a stick of wood!’ Whether this story is true or not, it is nevertheless in accordance with the faith (Rom. 12:6). With this illustrative story the holy fathers wished to admonish the youth to revere the indescribably great miracle of the incarnation; they wanted us to open our eyes wide and ponder these words well” (Luther’s Works, Vol. 22,105).[2]

The When: Descendit de Caelis, Incarnatus Est, or Homo Factus Est?

The sources again appear to vary on when the bow of the body or the genuflection should occur in the Creed. But I think it only appears that way. The variances come in how they seek to describe the entire action, so some describe it in one manner and others in a different way. But the goal of the description is the same: the lowest point of the bow of the body or the genuflection is to occur during the words: “and he became man.” All the surrounding descriptions are intended to instruct the gathered how to get to that point. That is, the surrounding descriptions indicate when the bow or genuflection should begin so that one is at the lowest point during those words. The prepositions help us to sort it out. The words at, during, through all indicate that moment we are to be at the lowest is when we confess that God is become man. So let your focus be to have the lowest part of the bow of the body or genuflection occur during the homo factus est and plan accordingly, working backwards from there. Here Fortescue is the clearest: “As he [the celebrant] says the words Et incarnatus est, etc., he lays the hands on the altar outside the corporal and genuflects on one knee. He does not rise from this genuflection till he has said Et homo factus est. It is better to make the whole genuflection slowly, rather than to rest with one knee on the ground” (Fortescue, The Ceremonies of the Roman Rite, 49).

The Why: Ceremony as an Incarnate Confession

Like the When, the Why is variously described. Most describe it as a confession of reverence and adoration for the incarnation and humiliation of our Lord. But they do so with some diversity. Here is Luther: “It would still be proper and appropriate to kneel at the words “and was made man,” to sing them with long notes as formerly, to listen with happy hearts to the message that the Divine Majesty abased Himself and became like us poor bags of worms, and to thank God for the ineffable mercy and compassion reflected in the incarnation of the Deity” (Luther’s Works, Vol. 22, 102). Piepkorn and McClean offer this rationale: “The explanation given for this was that the soldiers of the Roman procurator knelt and bowed before Our Lord in mockery during His Passion” (Piepkorn, Conduct of the Service, 19; McClean, Conduct of the Services, 41). Lang describes it this way: “Kneeling is also the expression of . . . adoration, for example, at the words ‘and was made man’ in the Nicene Creed” (Lang, Ceremony & Celebration, 61).

Martin Mosebach, in his The Heresy of Formlessness, gives us a fuller picture. Kneeling in the Christian liturgy has its roots in the New Testament itself, where we read:

“‘And he fell down and worshipped him.’ The expression is not restricted to Saint John’s account of the healing of the blind man: it occurs again and again wherever someone suddenly realizes the divinity of Jesus. This New Testament kneeling is utterly unliturgical: it occurs when someone is momentarily overwhelmed; it is the response to a gracious epiphany. In the New Testament one has the impression that the person is thrown to his knees by a lightning flash of insight. At this moment, on his knees, he sees more than those standing around him, and he can find no better word in response to what he sees than the word Credo. . . (Mosebach, The Heresy of Formlessness, 90).

This is not limited to the New Testament. Indeed, the whole of Scripture makes this plain. Daniel “knelt down three times a day” to pray (Daniel 6:10), Solomon knelt in the presence of all Israel at the dedication of his temple (1 Kings 8:54), and Esdras knelt in prayer (1 Esdras 9:5).  The Wise Men knelt before the Christ (St. Matthew 2:11), a leper knelt to beseech His mercy (St. Mark 1:40), Stephen knelt (Acts 7:59), St. Peter knelt (Acts 9:40), St. Paul knelt (Acts 20:36) and maintained the significance of genuflexion (e.g., Ephesians 3:14; Philippians 2:10), and most importantly, Christ Himself in Gethsemane knelt down to pray (St. Luke 22:41). 

Consider the following quotations from the Catalog of Testimonies published in many editions of The Book of Concord. These quotes are taken from Chapter 3 of the Concordia Reader’s Edition:

• Athanasius: “The holy catholic Church condemns anyone who says that the human flesh of our Lord is not to be worshiped and adored as the flesh of the Lord and God.”

• Ambrose: “Angels do not adore only the divinity of Christ, but also His footstool. . . . the prophet says that the earth the Lord took upon Himself when He assumed flesh is to be adored. Therefore, we understand ‘footstool’ to mean the earth, that is, the flesh of Christ, which we today also adore in the Sacraments, and which the apostles adored in the Lord Jesus.”

• Augustine: “He gave us this very flesh to eat for salvation. No one who eats this flesh does not first worship it . . . . We not only not sin by worshiping it, we sin if we do not worship it.”

So “When should one kneel at Mass? From the foregoing remarks it is quite clear: genuflection and kneeling signal and accompany the moments of the divine epiphany within the liturgy. The believer kneels down when entering the sacred space, the church, like Moses, who heard the voice from the burning bush telling him to take of his shoes because he was standing on holy ground. We genuflect during the Credo . . . , recalling the Incarnation in which God becomes visible. After uttering the words of Consecration, the priest venerates the sacred sacrificial gifts by genuflecting, and the people are kneeling. The congregation is kneeling as the priest shows them the Lord’s Body [and Blood], and Communion is received kneeling. Finally the faithful receive the priest’s blessing on their knees, expressing the fact that is a blessing from heaven, ‘from above’” (Mosebach, The Heresy of Formlessness, 92–93).

The homo factus est is just such an epiphany within the liturgy. It is a confession that the Word of God, the Second Person of the most holy Trinity, became man, flesh of our flesh and bone of our bone, one of us, for us. How could we not in some way not recognize this with our bodies bowed or our knees bent?

[1]  These sermons were preached while Bugenhagen was called away to Denmark. Luther had suggested in his 1526 Deutsche Messe that Saturday preaching services should be devoted to the Gospel of John. These sermons put into practice what Luther had suggested. See Luther’s Works, Vol. 53, 68.

[2] Hugh Latimer used this same tale in a sermon of 26 December 1552. The footnote says that the story appears in the Vita Christi by Ludolph of Saxony. This was written in 1374, so this is evidence of what was mentioned above. The practice was already in usage well before its official acceptance in 1502.