The author writes from a lifetime of worship and scholarly research in the Byzantine liturgical tradition. This "Short HIstory" of the origins and evolution of the Byzantine liturgical synthesis is the fruit of over 30 years' immersion in the sources of its history and theology.
Robert Francis Taft, S.J., an American Jesuit of the Byzantine-Slavonic Rite is the author of five books and over 250 scholarly articles and reviews, mostly on eastern liturgy. Recognized internationally as a major authority on Byzantium and its worship, Father Taft has lived in Rome for twenty-seven years, where he is professor of oriental liturgy at the Pontifical Oriental Institute, editor-in-chief of the Orientalia Christiana Analecta, consultor for liturgy of the Vatican Congregation for the Oriental Churches, and member of several commissions of the same congregation.
