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Messenger and bishops at the Third Council of Toledo. Photo: AGE
The Cathedral of Seville celebrates today Monday, April 27, at 10:00 a.m., the solemn Mass in Hispanic-Mozarabic rite at its high altar on the occasion of the feast of Saint Isidore of Seville, which this year is transferred to Monday as April 26 falls on a Sunday.
The celebration, of a choral nature, constitutes one of the most singular liturgical traditions maintained in the Cathedral. The Hispanic-Mozarabic rite, of Visigothic origin, presents its own structure that combines elements of the Roman liturgy with Byzantine and Visigothic influences, and incorporates prayers attributed to Saint Isidore himself, preserved as a valuable jewel of Seville’s spiritual and cultural heritage.
Saint Isidore of Seville was born in Cartagena around the year 560 and died in Seville in 636. He was Archbishop of Seville from the year 599 until his death, and is considered one of the great scholars of the early Middle Ages. His body rested for centuries in Seville, a city to which he was deeply connected and where he exercised a decisive influence.
He promoted the integration of the Visigoths in Hispania after centuries of presence in the peninsula, encouraging their political, social and spiritual assimilation. He favored the conversion of the Visigothic monarchy from Arianism to Catholicism and led key processes of religious and cultural unity. He presided over the second Provincial Synod of Baetica in Seville (618-619), attended by bishops from Hispania, Narbonne and Gaul, and later the Fourth Council of Toledo in 633, already in his old age. This council established the creation of seminaries and cathedral schools, following his directives, promoting the study of Greek, Hebrew and the liberal arts, in addition to law and medicine. It also consolidated the liturgical unification of Visigothic Spain through the Hispanic or Mozarabic rite—also called Isidorian—which endured for centuries until the progressive implementation of the Roman rite.
The council reflected his thinking not only religious, but also political, highlighting the organization of royal power and its relationship with the Church.
Saint Isidore was also a prolific writer of philosophical, linguistic, theological and historical treatises. Among his works stand out De natura rerum, De ordine creaturarum, Regula monachorum and De differentiis verborum. However, his most important work is the Etymologiae or Originum sive etymologiarum libri viginti, a monumental encyclopedia of twenty books and 448 chapters that systematizes all the knowledge of his time—theology, history, law, grammar, cosmology or natural sciences—and which allowed the preservation and transmission of classical knowledge to Visigothic Europe.
Although this Mass is traditionally celebrated every April 26 at the high altar of the cathedral, in 2026 it is exceptionally transferred to Monday the 27th, maintaining its usual schedule. Likewise, the Hispanic-Mozarabic rite has been celebrated on other occasions extraordinarily in different churches of the city, contributing to the preservation of this ancient liturgical tradition.