Through Their own Eyes: Liturgy as the Byzantines Saw it Robert F. Taft S.J. Fr. Robert Taft, the leading scholar of Byzantine Liturgy, presents in vivid detail the actual experience of the Byzantine Church's liturgy throughout the centuries. In this examination, he offers the words of Byzantine commentators themselves on the details of Byzantine rituals, from the processional liturgies processing through the streets of Constantinople to the sometimes unruly and unseemly behavior of the people in attendance. Some of the material presented in these Distinguished Lectures acts as a corrective to the all-too-common myth of some "Golden Age" of Byzantine Liturgy which, "instead of being 'scrutinized,' has often been invented and exploited to justify decisions already made, or reduced to cliches in support of some vision or other of reality that will not stand up to a rereading of the sources." Rt. Rev. Archimandrite Robert F. Taft, S.J. was Professor of Oriental Liturgy at the Pontifical Oriental Institute in Rome (1970-2002), where he also served as Prefect of the Library (1981-85), and Vice-Rector of the Institute (1995-2001). In addition, he has been Visiting Professor of Liturgy at the University of Notre Dame since 1974, and was Director of the Graduate Program in Liturgical Studies there in 1977-79. He served as Editor-in-Chief of Orientalia Christiana Periodica and is presently Director of Publications at the Pontifical Oriental Institute. He has published hundreds of articles and, at last count, he has written and edited thirty-five books.