Pasyon and

Pastores

Pasyon

The Pasyon is a verse narrative about the life and suffering of Jesus Christ. The verses are structured in five-line stanzas, with each line containing eight syllables. The pasyon is commonly sung during Holy Week, starting Holy Monday. The reading of the pasyon is a traditional religious practice in the Philippines and people gather around the reader of the pasyon to listen and reflect. It is seen by many of its practitioners as a vow or panata.

The Origin of Pasyon

The tradition of chanting the pasyon is not rooted to the Spanish language that the songs were originally written in. but is connected to the singing of epics during cultural celebrations among indigenous Filipinos. The pasyon is usually chanted a capella though occasionally the chanters may be accompanied by guitars or a rondalla band.

The first version of the Tagalog pasyon was written by Gaspar Aquino de Belen in 1704. It was entitled Mahal na Passion ni Jesu Christong Panginoon Natin na Tola (The poem of the Passion of our Lord Jesus Christ). Belen's pasyon went through at least four revisions, with the fifth edition printed in 1760.

Another popular version of the pasyon is the Casaysayan nang Pasiong Mahal niJesuCristong Panginoon Natin na Sucat Ipag-alab nang Puso nang Sinomang Babasa (The History of the Passion of Jesus Christ our Lord that will set afire theheart of whosoever reads it), which was published by an unknown writer in1814. This text continues to be used to the present day among the Tagalogsthough different versions and translations of the pasyon can be found amongother Filipino subcultures.

Versions of PasyonSeveral versions of the pasyon

began to circulate afterwards, written by anonymous authors. These versions were branded heretical by Spanish friars. In the early 19th century, a native priest named Mariano Pilapil compiledseveral of these texts and purged them of heresies. The resulting work isknown as the Pasyong Pilapil or Pasyong Henares.

Pastores

Pastores is Christmas season folk dance and song practiced in many parts of Samar. The pastores (shepherds) recounts the story of the shepherds who visited the child Jesus in the manger through a song. They go house to house singing the daygon (worship). In some place the song is also called pastores or pastorada. These are songs of happy mood with a uniform message that tells the people to rejoice because the Savior was born. Most of the daygon are sung in Waray but the oldest ones are in Spanish or mixed diglot.

A daygon version found in Can-avid, Eastern Samar was a diglot with opening line goes like “ Bulan han Diciembre, bulan nga bulahan. Kami nga mga pastores nagrarayhak..." The song is ended with a Spanish invitation: "Vamos, vamos pastores de Belen". Dancing then became inevitable because of the happy mood. Women bring in some bagol (coconut shell halves struck together) and wear hats with red ribbons.

By: Dan Andre L. Azucena