Altar

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Altar

In religions around the world, from prehistoric times to the present, an altar has almost always been regarded as a central locus of worship, a holy place set apart for divine-human interaction. Derived from the Latin word altus, meaning "high place," altars have occasionally consisted of earthen mounds or of wood, but most of them have been made of stone, providing a fixed surface on which sacrifices could be offered to supernaturals thought to be important in particular cultures. Jewish altars figured importantly in the Jerusalem Temple of biblical times, and the practice of making both thank offerings and guilt offerings has remained embedded in the Judeo-Christian heritage.

Early Christianity throughout the Mediterranean world featured altars as central foci of worship. Some of them served simply as tables on which believers shared a common meal. Most of them, however, were viewed in a more sacrosanct way: as the place where the Eucharist, Holy Communion, or Mass was celebrated. This perspective became increasingly dominant as local practices developed into ecclesiastical traditions. Consecrated to sacred use by church officials, the altar came to be regarded as a symbol of Christ's presence, a place where his sacrificial death was reenacted as a sacrament beneficial to whose witnessing the liturgical act.

During the Middle Ages altars were placed at the apse, the eastern end, or back of churches, essentially obscuring them from public access. They were placed behind rood screens (screens containing a crucifix) in Western practice and behind an iconostasis among the Eastern Orthodox. In this seclusion altars became quite ornate, offering a medium for displaying crosses, candles, statues, monstrances, elaborate carvings, reliquaries, tabernacles, paintings, and tapestries. The magnificence of these secondary elements often made altars the most notable features in churches built between 500 and 1500.

Protestantism, which emerged in the sixteenth century, often devalued the significance and use of altars in Reformed liturgies. Rejecting the idea of the Mass as a sacrifice, Protestants of many varieties retained only a table, using it to celebrate the Lord's Supper. Most of them also retained the traditional elements of bread and wine, but congregations usually thought of themselves as observing no more than a commemorative meal.

In modern times use of altars persists in both perspectives. Many churches stemming from Calvinist or evangelical traditions make pulpits the center of their worship, and altars survive only as tables, a means of nurturing group solidarity, not a place of sacramental significance. Protestants of Anglican and Lutheran heritage have stayed much closer to perennial attitudes regarding altars in Christian worship, those ideas maintained in Roman Catholicism since the earliest centuries of Christianity.

Changes authorized in 1963 by the Second Vatican Council have occasioned noticeable modifications. Modern liturgical renewal has stressed a simpler altar, a streamlined shape placed centrally amid the congregation, with officiants facing the people. Simple, dignified decoration exhibits a cross and candles with moderate use of images. Less ornate altars, placed much nearer the people and featuring celebrants who do not turn their backs on worshipers, convey once again how the Eucharist is both spatially and theologically central to many contemporary Christians. Modern altars thus replicate the sacrificial connotations that they have projected for thousands of years.