On Great Saturday our focus is on the Tomb of Christ. This is no
ordinary grave. It is not a place of corruption, decay and defeat. It
is life-giving a source of power, victory and liberation.

O
happy tomb! It received within itself the Creator, as one asleep, and
it was made a divine treasury of life, for our salvation who sing: O
God our Deliverer, blessed art Thou.

The Life of all submits to be laid in the tomb,
according to the law of the dead, and He makes it a source of
awakening, for our salvation who sing: O God our Deliverer, blessed art
Thou.

(Hymns of the 7th Ode)

Great
Saturday is the day between Jesus’ death and His resurrection. It is
the day of watchful expectation, in which mourning is being transformed
into joy. The day embodies in the fullest possible sense a
joyful-sadness, which has dominated the celebrations of Great Week.

Great Saturday is the day of the pre-eminent rest. Christ observes a
Sabbath rest in the tomb. His rest, however, is not inactivity but the
fulfillment of the divine will and plan for the salvation of humankind
and the cosmos. He who brought all things into being, makes all things
new. The recreation of the world has been accomplished once and for
all. Through His incarnation, life and death Christ has filled all
things with Himself. He has opened a path for all flesh to the
resurrection from the dead, since it was not possible that the author
of life would be dominated by corruption.

Moses
the great mystically prefigured this present day, saying: "And God
blessed the seventh day." For this is the blessed Sabbath, this is the
day of rest, on which the only-begotten Son of God rested from all His
works. Suffering death in accordance with the plan of salvation, He
kept the Sabbath in the flesh; and returning once again to what He was,
through His Resurrection He has granted us eternal life, for He alone
is good and loves mankind.

(Hymn of the Ainoi)