Hymnographers often play on the words "eleon" (accusative masc.), mercy, and "elaion" (neuter), oil, and we sometimes have the opportunity to imitate the play on words by associating the "grace" of mercy with the "fat" matter of oil!

The Greek word Eleos, translated as Mercy, has the same root as the Greek word for oil, and more specifically olive oil, so important in the Mediterranean world, used not only as a foodstuff but also sometimes as a cure by drinking it and in profusion as a soothing massage agent for bruises and superficial wounds.

The oil was poured (and still is today, along with the holy oil of night-lights or the myrrh of miraculous icons) onto bruises, which were gently massaged, soothing, relieving and healing the injured part of the body.
And the Hebrew word Hesed, which also means both oil and mercy, is the word for unfailing love.

So "Kyrie Eleison" is translated everywhere as "Lord have mercy", but in my humble opinion it would be preferable to say at least something like "Lord be merciful", or even better "Lord take (good) care of me (or us)", because we're really talking about care in the sense of "taking care of" as well as "healing".

Jesus is our doctor (he spent his life on earth caring for souls wounded by sin and bodies outraged by disease, even corrupted by death), and to implore him with "Kyrie Eleison" is to ask him "Lord, soothe me, relieve me, deliver me from my pain, heal me and show me your unfailing love".

So this meaning of the word pity refers less to the justice of the dreaded tribunal and the acquittal of the condemned according to the inevitable and so negative Western interpretation pure sugar than to the infinite Love-tenderness of God and His compassion for the sufferings of His children whose every step He knows.

The formula of the prayer to Jesus found everywhere, and now even among Catholic mystics (like the icons of the Holy Family and of God the Father) "Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God, have mercy on me a sinner", far from leading to humility and surrender into the hands of the Savior in the certainty of being saved, rather, with each bead of the rosary, it builds up the layers of guilt so dear to the culture of the "Christian" and de-Christianized (i.e. "politically correct") West, which leads nowhere but to crushing, discouragement and acedia.

Moreover, the formula inscribed and offered to pilgrims in the monasteries of the Holy Mountain is reduced to "Kyrie Issou Christe eleison me".
But if the formula as it stands has survived the centuries, despite concomitant translations, it's probably not for nothing. In the end, it's probably better not to translate it, but rather to keep it as it is, as a precious gift from the Holy Spirit, whose holy oil anoints our beings more surely and more deeply through the repetition of the ectenies and the prayer of the heart.

In any case, Orthodoxy is a "religion" of oil: from holy anointings to the oozing of miraculous icons, it's always about oil and light, and not so much about blood, gaping wounds, tears, condemnation and reparation, and finally the pity of a God who manages to make others pay for what He gives to some out of pity.

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