<Palm Sunday>
31. (1) At one o’clock all the people go up to the Eleona Church on the Mount of Olives. The bishop takes his seat, and they have hymns and antiphons suitable to the place and the day, and readings too. When three o’clock comes, they go up with hymns and sit down at the Imbomon, the place from which the Lord ascended into heaven. (For when the bishop is present everyone is told to sit down, except for the deacons, who remain standing the whole time.) And there too they have hymns and antiphons suitable to the place and the day, with readings and prayers between them. (2) At five o’clock the passage is read from the Gospel about the children who met the Lord with palm branches, saying, “Blessed is he that cometh in the name of the Lord” <Matth. 21:9, cf. 21:15-16>. At this the bishop and all the people rise from their places, and start off on foot down from the summit of the Mount of Olives. All the people go before him with psalms and antiphons, all the time repeating, “Blessed is he that cometh in the name of the Lord.”
<Holy Thursday>
35. (2) Then everybody hurries home for a meal, so that, as soon as they have finished it, they can go to the church on Eleona which contains the cave which on this very day the Lord visited with the apostles. - - - (4) At about midnight they leave and go up with hymns to the Imbomon, the place from which the Lord ascended into heaven. And there they again have readings and hymns and antiphons suitable to the day, and the prayers which the bishop says are all appropriate to the day and to the place.
36. (1) When the cocks begin to crow, everyone leaves the Imbomon, and comes down with singing to the place where the Lord prayed, as the Gospels describe in the passage which begins, “And he was parted from them about a stone's cast, and prayed” <Luke 22:41>.
<Octave>
39. (3) On each of the eight days of Easter the bishop, with all the clergy, the “infants” who have been baptized, all the apotactites both men and women, and any of the people who wish, go up to the Eleona after their meal (the Eleona contains the cave where Jesus used to teach his disciples) and in that church they have hymns and prayers, and also at the Imbomon (the place from which the Lord ascended into heaven). (4) When the psalms and prayer are finished, they go down with singing to the Anastasis in time for Lucernare. - - -
40. (1) On the eighth day of Easter, the Sunday, all the people go up with the bishop immediately after midday to the Eleona. They start in this church, taking their places for a time and having hymns and antiphons, and prayers appropriate to the day and place. Then they go up to the Imbomon and do as on the Eleona. Then the time comes for all the people and apotactites to take the bishop with singing to the Anastasis, and they arrive there for Lucernare at the usual time.
<Pentecost>
43. (3) They have the reading (on Mt Sion) from the Acts of the Apostles, and afterwards the service proceeds as usual, and they make the Offering there. Then as the people are dismissed the archdeacon makes this announcement: “Let us all be ready today on the Mount of Eleona at the Imbomon immediately after midday.” (4) So all the people go home for a rest, and, as soon as they have had their meal, they go up Eleona, the Mount of Olives, each at his own pace, till there is not a Christian left in the city. (5) Once they have climbed Eleona, the Mount of Olives, they go to the Imbomon (the place from which the Lord ascended into heaven), where the bishop takes his seat, and also the presbyters and all the people. They have readings, and between them hymns and antiphons suitable to this day and to the place. Also the prayers which come between are concerned with subjects appropriate to the day and the place. They have the Gospel reading about the Lord's ascension, and then the reading from the Acts of the Apostles about the Lord ascending into heaven after the resurrection. (6) When this is over, the catechumens are blessed, then the faithful. It is already three o'clock, and they go down with singing from there to the other church on Eleona, containing the cave where the Lord used to sit and teach the apostles.
(transl. Wilkinson)
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