A Rí na hAoine

Padraigín Clancy on the traditions of Easter in Ireland

Good Friday is when grown men in my local church, who tend to spend the liturgical year at the back, suddenly come forward, form a line in front of the altar and, in an act of humility, kiss the cross one after the other. This same gesture is repeated in churches throughout Ireland. Perhaps it is an indication of the strong identification with the suffering of Christ in our tradition.

Celtic mythology from Fionn to Lugh to Cúchulainn to St Patrick emphasises the hero's struggle with darkness, dragons and demons on behalf of the community. Jesus dons various aspects of the Celtic warrior as he descends into hell following his crucifixion and battles with the heart of darkness in what the Irish tradition termed Argain Ifrinn – the plundering of the underworld.

The confrontation with inner and outer demons is pivotal in the redemptive-heroic process. Jesus emerges the wounded hero, as the paschal candle with its nails representing the five wounds of Christ reminds us. Poems dating from the tenth century in the Irish language invoke the power and protection of the cross of Christ over the senses and the limbs of the body. In folklore Jesus is invoked as "a Rí na hAoine, a d'fhulaing na mílte loit" ("O King of Friday who suffered the many thousand wounds").

Jesus is also referred to widely as Mac Muire, the Son of Mary, and from the earliest period there is a strong affinity with Mary's suffering. In Gaeltacht areas the lamentation of Mary or Caoineadh Mhuire is still to be heard in the "m'ochón ó agus m'ochón ó" which is customarily raised in the sean nós singing tradition on Good Friday. Those of us who struggled through Peig for our Leaving Certificate can never forget the stark image of her joining her keen with Mary's by placing the statue of Our Lady beside her when preparing her son's body for waking after his fall from the cliffs on the Great Blasket Island.

Jesus is not only Rí na hAoine but also Rí an Domhnaigh (King of Sunday) and creation equally exults in his resurrection. In folklore, it was widely held that the farmer who sowed seed on Good Friday would be ensured a good crop that year.

In the year that we celebrate the 90th anniversary of 1916 it can be of little surprise, given his intimate knowledge of the Gaelic tradition and his strong Christian faith, that Patrick Pearse chose the Easter tridiuum for a pivotal act in Irish history. It is also significant that, since the Good Friday Agreement, those same three days are destined in a new way to remain a part of the language of the Irish political landscape forever. The heroic journey continues its process.