Modlitby nad ženou – rodičkou a ich teológia

This article offers a study of the prayers of “purification” or “churching” of the mother on 1^st and 40^th day after childbirth. These prayers, which are situated in the first and the third chapter of Malyj trebnik (recensione ruthena, Rome 1952), are more recent than the prayers for the child. There’re no prayers for the “purification” of the mother in the most ancient manuscripts of Byzantine euchology. The theology of these prayers is connected with the Old Testament notion of the ritual impurity of the mother after the childbirth (Lv 12). Recently some of Byzantine churches are discussing, changing and even removing these prayers for socio-theological reason, that the flow of blood connected with birth is no longer thought of as ritual impurity of the mother.