CHRISTIAN EAST. — In addition to the individual entries to which reference is made, it is necessary to take a general overview that will serve as an introduction to this vast subject.
OUTLINE:
I. Geographical and historical survey
II. Characteristics
III. The problem of union
IV. Christian art.I. GEOGRAPHICAL AND HISTORICAL SURVEY
1. DEFINITION OF THE EASTERN CHURCHES AND THEIR ORIGINAL TERRITORIAL DIVISIONS
By "Christian East" are meant the Churches of the eastern part of the Roman Empire and the communities that arose in dependence upon them beyond the Empire’s borders. The division of the Empire, initiated for administrative reasons by Diocletian, became definitive after the death of Theodosius (395). The boundary was marked by the rivers Sava and Drina. In the eastern part, the patriarchates of Alexandria, Antioch, and Constantinople were established. That of Jerusalem arose later, separating from Antioch in 451 (Council of Chalcedon). For the history of the patriarchates, see the individual entries. The first Churches founded beyond the imperial borders at a time when the patriarchates were still in the process of formation are: the Church of Persia, with its capital at Seleucia-Ctesiphon, which came into existence in the 2nd century, apparently under the jurisdiction of| 10 | 15 | 20 | 25 | 30 | 35 | 40 | 45 | 50 | 55 | 60 | 65 | 70 | 75 | 80 | 85 | 90 | 95 | 100 | 105 | 110 | 115 | 120 | 125 | 130 | 135 | 140 | 145 | 150 | 155 | 160 | 165 | 170 | 175 | 180 | 185 | 190 | 195 | 200 | 205 | 210 | 215 | 220 | 225 | 230 | 235 | 240 | 245 | 250 | 255 | 260 | 265 | 270 | 275 | 280 | 285 | 290 | 295 | 300 | 305 | 310 | 315 | 320 | 325 | 330 | 335 | 340 | 345 | 350 | 355 | 360 | 365 | 370 | 375 | 380 | 385 | 390 | 395 | 400 | 405 | 410 | 415 | 420 | 425 | 430 | 435 | 440 | 445 | 450 | 455 | 460 | 465 | 470 | 475 | 480 | 485 | 490 | 495 | 500 | 505 | 510 | 515 | 520 | 525 | 530 | 535 | 540 | 545 | 550 | 555 | 560 | 565 | 570 | 575 | 580 | 585 | 590 | 595 | 600 | 605 | 610 | 615 | 620 | 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| 9260 | 9265 | 9270 | 9275 | 9280 | 9285 | 9290 | 9295 | 9300 | 9305 | 9310 | 9315 | 9320 | 9325 | 9330 | 9335 | 9340 | 9345 | 9350 | 9355 |
The only entirely Catholic group is the Maronites (Antioch; West Syrian Rite). Near East and dispersed (1932): 366,000
Total Catholics: 9,122,809
N.B. The figures are approximate. Some, e.g., those for the Russians and Armenians, are very problematic. Where a date is added, the figures are taken from an official census.
III. THE HISTORICAL DEVELOPMENT OF THE DISSENTING CHURCHES IN THE CHRISTIAN EAST
What strikes one most today in the situation of the Christian East is the variety and diversity of rites, dogmas, and jurisdictions. The principal cause is the fact that in the East there was no predominant ecclesiastical center, such as Rome in the West, but several centers of great authority: Jerusalem, Antioch, and Alexandria, while Constantinople was added to them only later and never succeeded in unifying the Christian East to the extent that Rome unified the West. The diversity in faith is the sad legacy of the Christological disputes, which led to the schism of several Churches. Nestorianism, condemned at the Council of Ephesus (431), was nevertheless adopted, also for reasons of political opposition to the Roman Empire, by the Church of Persia at the Synod of Seleucia-Ctesiphon in 486 (v. NESTORIUS). This Church carried on a very significant missionary activity as far as India and China. Remnants of those Churches founded by the Nestorians are still found today among the Eastern Christians of India, who in part, around the middle of the 17th century, passed to the opposing heresy of Monophysitism and to the West Syrian rite. Monophysitism, condemned by the Council of Chalcedon (451), brought division to the patriarchates of Antioch and Alexandria and detached from the universal Church the entire Churches of Armenia and Ethiopia. In the patriarchate of Antioch, nearly half of the people remained in the true faith. Around the middle of the 6th century, the Monophysite portion of the patriarchate was organized into a separate Church by James Baradaeus, whence the Monophysite Syrians are called “Jacobites” (v.). In Egypt, almost the entire population accepted Monophysitism after Orthodoxy had lost its support from Constantinople following the Arab invasion (ca. 640). The Monophysites there are called “Copts” (v.), i.e., “Egyptians.” Those who remained in the true faith in the patriarchates of Antioch, Jerusalem, and Alexandria were called by their Monophysite adversaries “Melkites,” i.e., “imperial” (from malak bazilèz, Byzantine emperor).In the Churches that had separated from the Catholic Church because of the Christological disputes, the ancient rites remained, while in the rest of the Christian East the Byzantine rite prevailed, which explains why today the vast majority of Eastern Christians follow that rite, given also the fact that the number of Nestorians and Monophysites greatly diminished because of Islamic domination, to which the Churches of Syria, Palestine, Egypt, Persia, and Armenia were subjected for no less than thirteen centuries. Constantinople, which as the Second Rome became the most important ecclesiastical center of the Christian East, thus succeeded to a large extent in unifying the Eastern Churches in rite, discipline, and faith, but could not, being separated as it was from the 11th century onward from the center of the universal Church, i.e., Rome, maintain the unity of jurisdiction in the Christian East, which instead crumbled into a considerable number of autocephalous Churches. Constantinople introduced its rite into the Churches it founded among the Slavic peoples, but failed to maintain them under its jurisdiction, since they, basing themselves on the same principle that had given rise to the primacy of Constantinople, namely that the capital of a Christian kingdom has a right to preeminence even in the ecclesiastical sphere (canon 28 of the Council of Chalcedon), successively demanded and obtained their independence: the Bulgarian Church first in 927 and definitively in 1870, the Serbian in 1346 and definitively in 1830, the Russian in 1448. The Romanian Church, of Latin origin, was Byzantinized toward the end of the 9th century because of political dependence on Bulgaria of the regions now called Romania. This Church obtained its independence in 1865.
The ancient patriarchates of Alexandria, Antioch, and Jerusalem were Byzantinized beginning in the 10th century. Weakened by Christological controversies and the Arab invasion, they sought the support of Byzantium. The political expansion of Byzantium in the second half of the 10th century in Syria favored the Byzantinization of the patriarchate of Antioch. At the time of the Crusades, the patriarchates of Antioch and Jerusalem were almost all resident in Constantinople and naturally became subject to II. This dependence became complete at the time of Turkish domination because of the policy of the sultans, who wished the patriarch of Constantinople to be the head of all “Orthodox” Christians in their empire. Likewise, Alexandria was subjected to Constantinople. Recently, these patriarchates have again regained their independence.
The tables speak of the “Orthodox” Churches of Central Europe and the Baltic countries. The “Orthodox” of Czechoslovakia are mostly Ruthenians who had immigrated to the Subcarpathian regions. The same is true of a large part of the “Orthodox” of Hungary; the other part is of Romanian origin. The “Orthodox” of the Baltic countries derive from “Orthodox” propaganda carried out in those countries by the Russians in the era of the tsars. The “Orthodox” Churches of the Baltic countries, except for the Finnish one after the Second World War, were incorporated into the Patriarchal Church of Moscow, to which the “Orthodox” of Czechoslovakia and Hungary also submitted.
Christian East — Christ given vinegar to drink. The iconoclasts cover the images of Christ with whitewash. Miniature from the 9th century.
IV. ORIGIN OF THE UNITED COMMUNITIES
On the Eastern Schism, i.e., that of the patriarchate of Constantinople, V. this entry. The schism that occurred in the 11th century tore the entire Christian East away from the unity of the Church. Today at least 9 million people have found the way back. The various united groups have formed almost all in modern times. The only entirely Eastern Catholic community is that of the Maronites (v.) of Lebanon, who were united with Rome, according to the barely credible testimony of William of Tyre, in 1181. At the time of the Crusades, the union of the Armenians of Cilicia was also effected (1198), but it lasted only until the collapse of that kingdom (1375). The unions of the Greeks, concluded at the Councils of Lyons (cf. v.) 1274) and Florence (cf. v.) 1439), were not very lasting. The discussions at Florence, however, were useful, since they served to clarify dogmatic differences and thus prepare for subsequent unions.CATOLICS
Chaldeans, Iraq, Iran, dispersed (1937): 141,000
Malabars (1947): 947,100
Total: 1,088,100
Syrians, Near East and dispersed (1932): 71,300
Malankars, India: 60,000
Copts (1948): 63,000
Ethiopians: 35,000
Armenians, Near East and dispersed: ca. 100,000
Total: 329,300
Greeks in Constantinople and in Greece: 3,000
Melkites, Near East and dispersed: ca. 170,000
Ruthenians in Poland, Czechoslovakia, Hungary, Romania, America (1932): 5,162,400
Russians dispersed: ca. 3,000
White Russians, Poland: 40,000
Serbo-Croats: 43,000
Bulgarians (see Ruthenians): 6,000
Romanians: 1,700,000
Hungarians of the Hajdu-Dorogh diocese, Albanians: a few, 142,000
Italo-Albanians of Italy and dispersed: 70,000
Estonians: a few
Georgians: a few
Total: 7,339,400
The most important unions of the modern era in Europe were those of the Ruthenians (v.) and the Romanians. From the 14th century onward, the western and southwestern part of the metropolis of Kiev was politically incorporated into the Lithuanian-Polish state, which favored its orientation toward Rome. The principal and immediate reason for the actual union was the decline of the “Orthodox” Church in those regions. The union was signed by two bishops delegated to Rome on December 23, 1595, and then ratified by a synod held at Brest-Litovsk in October 1596.
The union of the Romanians of Transylvania was facilitated by the conquest of that country by Emperor Leopold (1691) and prepared by the unionist work of the Jesuits. The union was concluded first at a synod held in Alba Iulia in March 1697 and again in October 1698. These two united Churches, which are by far the largest, now find themselves in dire straits under the communist regime. In March 1946, the union of the Ruthenians in Galicia was officially suppressed, and in December 1948, that of the Romanians in Transylvania. In the spring of 1949, the united Ruthenian Church of Subcarpathia, formerly part of Czechoslovakia and now incorporated into the U.S.S.R., was also suppressed. The same fate befell the united Church in Slovakia in 1950.
In the Near East and Africa, relatively important united communities have formed, so that 28% of the Christians in those regions are Catholic. It is true that the number of these Christians is not very large due to centuries of oppression by Muslims. The credit for the conversion of a considerable part of Eastern Christendom goes to Latin missionaries. The conversion was favored by the hope of protection from the West, particularly from France.
The first to convert were a group of Nestorians, who became Catholic around the mid-16th century. The occasion was a double election. One of the elected, Giovanni Sullà, sought support from the Franciscans of the Holy Land, who sent him to Rome, where he became Catholic. This first union lasted only a little over a century. Patriarch Simon XIII (1667–1700) returned to Nestorianism. Today’s Nestorians descend from those apostates. With those who remained faithful, mainly in Diyarbakir, and those who remained Nestorian in 1552 and are now converted, the present-day Chaldean Catholic Church was formed around 1800.
The Syrian Catholics converted from the early 17th century onward through the work of missionaries initially had their own patriarch in Bishop Andrea Akhijan (1667–1677). The series of Melkite Catholic patriarchs begins with Cyril VI Tanas in 1724; that of the Armenians with Bishop Abraham of Aleppo in 1740. In Constantinople, the Armenian Catholics have had their own bishop since 1758. The Coptic Catholic community was formed in the 19th century. Leo XIII gave it its own hierarchy in 1895.
In India, after the arrival of the Portuguese, the reunion of the Nestorian Christians of Malabar (Malabaresi) took place in the 16th century. By the mid-17th century, almost all of them, especially due to a lack of understanding on the part of Portuguese Jesuit missionaries, temporarily lapsed into schism. Italian Carmelites succeeded in bringing most of them back into union. The rest found support with the Jacobite patriarch of Antioch and thus became Jacobites. Among them, a very promising movement toward union has begun since 1930.
In Ethiopia, the union effected by the Jesuits in the first half of the 17th century did not last, also due to errors committed by the missionaries. The missions were considered successful only in 1839 through the work of the Lazarists under the guidance of Bl. Giustino de Jacobis. Thus began the formation of an Ethiopian united community, which had its own bishop in 1930.
There are also some smaller groups of united Christians in Europe. Not a few Serbs emigrated from Turkey to the domains of the Austro-Hungarian monarchy toward the end of the 16th century and in part became Catholic. For them, the diocese of Križevci was founded in 1777, which, since the end of the war of 1914, includes all Eastern Catholics in Yugoslavia belonging to different ethnic groups.
The Italo-Albanians (v.) of Calabria and Sicily descend from Albanians who emigrated to Italy in the second half of the 15th century and became Catholic. Their position was regulated by the constitution *Etsi pastoralis* of Benedict XIV (1742). Among the Bulgarians of Constantinople, a movement toward union began around 1860. Later, Catholic groups formed in Thrace and Macedonia. After the war of 1914, almost all sought refuge in Bulgaria itself. Since 1923, they have had an apostolic administrator. Among the Greeks, it was only toward the end of the last century that some Catholic communities were established in Thrace, which in 1911 had their own bishop in the person of the convert Isaiah Papadopoulos. After the First World War, many Greek Catholics emigrated with their bishop from Turkey to Athens. Since 1932, those remaining in Constantinople also have their own bishop. In the eastern territories of Poland, promising union work among the White Russians began in 1923; they had already been united but had lapsed into schism only under pressure from the restructuring government. The war has gravely damaged this work. Small groups of Catholics are also found among the Russians who emigrated to Europe, America, and the Far East.
Thus, the work for union has already achieved considerable success and has regained for the unity of the Church about 5–6% of Eastern Christians. It is true, however, that even today the Eastern Churches separated from Rome form a strong bloc that opposes every unionist effort with tenacious resistance. In vast regions, such as Russia, Bulgaria, and Greece, efforts have so far yielded only insignificant success. Indeed, in many “Orthodox” circles, there remains a kind of hostility toward everything Catholic, and every attempt at rapprochement is interpreted as a thirst for domination and a design to subjugate and annihilate “Orthodoxy.”
Humanly speaking, the most serious causes of this difficulty seem to derive from the Eastern system of the state Church, that is, from the identification of Church and nation. For the Eastern Churches, whose borders coincide with those of the nation and which have conducted an autonomous life for centuries, the idea of submitting to a head who does not belong to their own nation is almost inconceivable. They have forgotten that they too were subject to such a head before the schism, even though such submission would be felt more today than in the early centuries. Moreover, reunion would mean for the separated having to renounce much of their past, acknowledging their own error and the heresy, or at least the schism, of their great men. Not to mention their, in this case unjustified, fear of losing their distinctive ecclesiastical characteristics, especially in their liturgies. Isolated and peripheral cases of Latinization contrary to Roman norms have also hindered unionist work.
II. CHARACTERISTICS
I. JURIDICAL
The following may be indicated as general characteristics of Eastern canon law (especially the law of dissident Churches): a) the multiplicity of legal systems admitted within the same Church; b) its traditionalism; c) its particular attitude toward the State, different from that of Catholics and Protestants; d) its practical character and the absence of systematic and scientific elaboration.1. Those who have dealt with Latin canon law and begin to study the Eastern canon law are struck, at the outset, by the multiplicity of legal systems included in it: not only among Churches that consider themselves heretical or schismatic toward one another (Nestorians, Monophysites, the so-called “Orthodox,” Eastern Catholics), but also among the different parts of the same Church there are often profound differences.
This is especially true of the Greek-Russian Church. Compare, for example, the law of the Russian Church with its voluminous collections of ordinances, decrees, and decisions, and the archaic law of a patriarchate of Antioch or Jerusalem. This difference is the result of the so-called principle of autocephaly, according to which all particular Churches are independent of one another and subject only to the ecumenical council, the last one recognized by all being that of Nicaea II (787). On the other hand, however, among all these Churches—especially those united in a single body—there exists, despite ecclesiastical and even other differences, a certain kinship and certain common principles and traits that distinguish them from Western legal systems. There is a common basis of laws and canons, and for many a shared history lived under the same external conditions, which has led to a common assimilation.
2. Another common trait among the various laws of the Eastern Churches is traditionalism. The so-called Apostolic Canons, those of the ecumenical and regional councils of the 4th century and following, are still in force. It was a strange sight for a Latin to see, in the years 1926–27, Metropolitan Anthony of Kiev and Metropolitan Eulogius of Paris contesting the legitimacy of mutual claims with citations from the Apostolic Canons, the Canons of Antioch, Sardica, etc. In many of the smaller Churches, the main core of the law consists of sources from the 4th to the 10th centuries; after the 14th century, the law has remained unchanged, except for certain customs whose authority is uncertain.
3. While the Catholic Church, especially after the 11th century (but even before—cf. GELASIUS I), has strongly insisted on its independence from the State, the Eastern Church has regarded the ideal of its relations with the State in terms of concord and mutual harmony, to the point that, in exchange for the protection granted by the State, the Church is ready to grant it broad authority in ecclesiastical matters. Thus, until recent times, the task of legislating on the constitution of the Church, the administration of goods, matrimonial law, etc., in States with an “Orthodox” majority has generally fallen to the civil authority, excluding only matters pertaining to faith and worship.
4. The canons of ecumenical and regional councils, the decrees of patriarchs, the canonical decisions of bishops or jurists that make up canonical collections (v.) and monastic rules owe their origin to practical needs and were issued without systematic regard. Only in recent times have partial codifications been made and ordinances of a more general character promulgated. The Russian Church, in particular, had embarked on this path; the All-Russian Council of Moscow (1917–18) had undertaken the codification, if not of the entire canon law, at least of a large part of II.
Canon law scholarship has also produced some noteworthy systematic expositions of canon law among the Russians, Greeks, Romanians, Serbs, etc. The best-known authors are Bishop Nikodim (Milasch), Suvorov, Pavlov, Berdnikov, Zankov, and Constantine Rhallis.
Emilio Herman
II. LITURGICAL
Despite differences in faith and ecclesiastical jurisdiction, Easterners and Westerners share a common Christian liturgy: a single Sacrifice in bread and wine mixed with water, seven sacramental rites (though in some Churches one or another may have fallen into disuse), the consecration of the altar, of chrism, of monks, of virgins, the blessing of water, of a new house, etc., funeral rites; moreover, the liturgical year with its cycle of Christmas and Epiphany, and the Paschal cycle preceded by Lent and extended to Pentecost; also the veneration of the Cross, of the Blessed Virgin Mary and the saints; then, the use of a church building divided into two main parts, the nave and the raised sanctuary, the use of incense, candles, sacred vestments, etc.; finally, the great Christian dogmas expressed in word and action or symbolized in liturgical rites and usages.The characteristics of the Eastern rites fall under three main headings:
1. **Exterior elements**: in the church the sanctuary is separated from the nave by a wall with doors (if the wall is adorned with images, it is called an iconostasis), or by a veil; the altar has retained the form of a table; among the sacred vestments the *phelonion* of the Byzantines or the *cappa* of the others differs in form from the Latin *planeta*; *epimanikia* fasten the ends of the sleeves of the priest’s inner garment; the *orarion* of the deacon hangs from his left shoulder; in some rites the sign of the Cross is made from right to left; in all rites the priest blesses with a handheld cross; besides genuflection on both knees, they know the prostration of bending (not full prostration as in the Latin rite), during which the forehead lightly touches the ground; the chant is monodic (like Gregorian chant) except among the Slavs and Armenians, who also use polyphony; however, at least during the Holy Sacrifice, the chant accompanies the actions of the celebrants and is not performed for its own sake; the deacon is not only the minister of the celebrant but also directs the collective prayer of the faithful; as for concelebration, it should be noted that true and full concelebration exists among Catholics of the Byzantine and Maronite rites and among the dissenters of the Russian Church; among the others there is an imperfect, decorative, or honorary concelebration, because only the principal celebrant pronounces the words of consecration. The Eucharistic bread is leavened, except in the Armenian rite and among the Maronites and Malabarese.
2. **Each Eastern rite has some ceremony or usage peculiar to itself; much rarer are the ceremonies found in all rites in contrast to Western rites.** To this category belongs the rite of genuflection performed by all Easterners on Pentecost Sunday. Likewise, in the manner of arranging an office, especially in beginning and ending it, each Eastern rite employs certain fixed elements (prayers, invocations, dialogue, greetings, readings, blessings, etc.) and arranges them in a very stable order; some resemblance might be found between the ritual structures of the Byzantine, Armenian, and West Syrian rites.
Yet for all, the most evident case is that of the anaphora, which is a logical literary composition, highly homogeneous and, apart from a few anomalies, composed in all rites of the same prayers in the same order: dialogue of the preface, the theological oration, the Sanctus, the christological oration, the anamnesis, the epiclesis, the intercessions, and the final doxology.
3. **The religious thought expressed in the texts.** Since we are dealing here with nuances and emphases, one must be careful to avoid any exaggeration and even more so any exclusions. Some study on this subject has been done only for the Byzantine rite and not without preconceived ideas.
It may be said that in Christ the emphasis is placed on His divinity; through His Incarnation humanity was saved, and less is said about individual salvation to be achieved through personal cooperation and appropriate means; not only humanity but the whole cosmos participates in the renewal brought by the Incarnation of the Word, in the triumph of life over death in Christ’s Resurrection, and awaits with deep longing His second coming in glory. From their misery, the suppliant cries of the faithful rise often to the merciful God, as the celebrant frequently confesses his unworthiness and asks the Spirit to supply for his spiritual weakness—words that Western liturgical prayer does not ignore but places less often on the lips of its priests and faithful.
The Eastern rites are distinguished from the Latin negatively in that they lack certain Latin usages to which it would be wrong to attribute a necessary dogmatic value, so that their absence would denote an error in faith; for example, the *Filioque*, unknown in the Creed even at Rome before the tenth century, simple genuflection on one knee (a feudal usage), genuflection at the “Incarnatus est” in the Creed, the elevation after each consecration with the attendant genuflections, the rubrics regarding the manner of holding the hands joined or extended, of keeping the thumb joined to the index finger after consecration, and the well-defined rubrics for the so-called low Mass—all these are foreign to the Eastern rites. They also do not know the use of the organ, statues, confessionals, nor certain feasts of the Lord and the Blessed Virgin introduced in recent centuries. The so-called extra-liturgical cult, such as the exposition of the Blessed Sacrament, the Way of the Cross, and the May devotion, did not arise where the liturgy, still sufficiently understood by the people, nourished the piety of the faithful. Yet, under the influence of various causes that it is not opportune to determine here, Eastern Catholics and sometimes dissenters have adopted, according to circumstances, some or many of the above-mentioned Latin usages, such as, for example, the episcopal mitre.
It is therefore not always easy at first glance to determine which usages are characteristic of the Eastern rites.
Alfonso Races
III. **Spirituality.** To attempt to summarize Eastern spirituality and its centuries-old history in a few lines is necessarily to resort to formulas that are either too rigid or too vague. The reader of this summary will have to nuance or specify it from case to case.
The term “spirituality” has two meanings: a) in a broad sense it comprehends all theology, as the principle and foundation of Christian life; b) in a strict sense it is the ensemble of practical consequences of this theology for life. Many discussions come to nothing because this distinction is not taken into account. Moreover, the link between the two domains is not so tight that any dogmatic difference immediately entails a divergence in spiritual character. East and West lived for a long time in such profound spiritual communion that scholastic controversies, whether in the ninth or fourteenth century, could not have notable repercussions on the spirit of the Christian people. The controversy over the procession of the Holy Spirit at the time of Photius, or that over the nature of grace at the time of Gregory Palamas, did not destroy the ancient fundamental spiritual unity, nor did they prevent the Greeks and Russians of more recent centuries from drawing their piety from Latin and Italian sources. Only in our own day have some Eastern theoreticians attempted to transfer speculative differences into practical spirituality. This spirituality, despite its fundamental unity, nevertheless presents particularities that distinguish it from the West (there are also nuances between the different parts of both Eastern and Western Christendom).
Generally speaking, it can be said that Eastern spirituality is dominated on the one hand by a very profound sense of the divine transcendence (St. Ephrem, the anti-Eunomians, the Pseudo-Dionysius, the liturgy) and on the other by an acute sense of sin and the struggle that must be waged against it (Origen, the Desert Fathers, St. John Chrysostom, monasticism, etc.). Between this dizzying theology and this tragic anthropology, the economy or Christology appears in all its theoretical splendor and practical importance. It has been said that Eastern Christianity sees in Christ the Logos with such a preference that it ends up excluding devotion to His holy Humanity or to His Passion. This is an error against which the writings and lives of the most illustrious Easterners testify, from St. Ignatius of Antioch, through Origen and St. Maximus the Confessor, up to Nicholas Cabasilas and the most recent Russian saints. The mystery of Christ is especially a traditional theme. With Christ, then, the East honors the Theotokos Mary and the saints, particularly through the veneration of icons, so violently opposed and so heroically defended from the 7th to the 9th century. All these different elements come together in a vast theocentric synthesis: man having been created in the image and likeness of God, but having lost this likeness through sin, the Word of God became man to restore man (St. Gregory Nazianzen): “by becoming Himself what was His image, He restored the likeness and made man like the invisible Father through the visible Word” (St. Irenaeus, Adv. haer., 5, 16 [ed. W. Harvey, II, Cambridge 1857, p. 368]).
As for the means used to attain the salvation wrought by the Incarnation and Redemption, these are, along with the Sacraments (sometimes held in little esteem by Messalianism, or neglected by certain excesses of anchoritism), the various ascetical practices, from rigorous mortification—especially of one’s own will—to prayer in all its forms, which constitutes its summit. The tendency toward contemplation, whether in its speculative structure (more Evagrian or Dionysian) or in its simpler varieties—charismatic and “neptic”—is affirmed everywhere: “remembrance of God,” unceasing prayer, “compunction,” “spiritual feeling,” “theology” in the sense of mystical perception. The great manifestation of this quest for salvation and this desire for union with God is monasticism (q.v.), whose importance and influence throughout the East cannot be overstated. The command given to St. Arsenius by a heavenly voice—“Flee, be silent, live in stillness (ἀγαγὰς)”—represents an ideal for ascetics of all times, to the extent that the last great outburst of mysticism, in the 14th century, bears the name of Hesychasm (q.v.), because it culminates in the teachings, examples, and aspirations of all previous hesychasts.
There are, however, two novelties in this movement that merit the name of neo-Hesychasm: on the practical side, a method of “physical and scientific” prayer designed to hasten the attainment of contemplation; on the theoretical side, the Palamite doctrine of grace with its theological presuppositions. Not all saints and doctors were equally favorable to this contemplative tendency; some of the greatest, such as St. Basil and St. Theodore the Studite, and in general the advocates of cenobitism, insist rather on asceticism and social virtues: they are more directly connected to the spirituality of primitive Christianity, where, however, the martyrdom of conscience or submission takes the place of bloody martyrdom. The contemplatives or hesychasts, then, depend more or less consciously and to varying degrees on Christian Alexandrianism. Moreover, all are agreed in theory to seek perfection in charity toward God and neighbor. The difference lies in the way charity is considered: more in its subjective or personal demands, or more in its objective unfolding. The subjective and personal viewpoint predominates in the anchoritic and hesychast tendency (already reproached by St. Basil: Reg. fus., 7: PG 31, 928-33): particular emphasis is placed on apatheia, though without falling, except in exceptional cases, into the excesses that would justify the suspicions of St. Jerome or Gerson; great, sometimes excessive, importance is given to experience and feeling, and if these are not declared necessary (as by the Messalians, Pseudo-Macarius, St. Symeon the New Theologian), at least their normality and sweetness are insistently preached. For this reason, a Vladimir Soloviev believed he had to accuse the East of easily lapsing, under the guise of contemplation, into a lazy passivity. This reproach is unjust even with regard to the Church, and also with regard to cenobitic monasticism; for there have been many institutions of charity and magnificent examples of lives devoted to others (such as, e.g., St. John the Almsgiver [619]). Messalianism itself, if it devoted less attention to external works of charity, nevertheless effectively cultivated among its adherents and in the Christian people the purity of such charity, its disinterestedness, and its exquisite delicacy—qualities characteristic of Eastern hagiography.
III. THE PROBLEM OF UNION
### I. NORMS OF THE HOLY SEE
The schism of the 11th century tore the entire Eastern Christianity away from Rome, except for the Greek-rite communities of southern Italy. When, a century and a half later, the Fourth Crusade subjected a vast part of the Byzantine Empire to Latin domination, the question arose of how to treat these Christians, hitherto schismatic, and how to judge their rites. After some hesitation, the Fourth Lateran Council (1215) decreed that such rites and usages would be tolerated, provided they did not endanger souls or conflict with ecclesiastical propriety. This decree marks the beginning of a long series of papal declarations (Honorius III, Innocent IV, Nicholas III, Eugene IV, Leo X, Clement VII, Clement VIII, Paul V, Benedict XIII, Benedict XIV, Pius VI, Pius IX, Leo XIII, Benedict XV, Pius XI, Pius XII, and others: cf. A. Petrani, *De relatione iuridica inter diversos ritus*, Rome 1930, pp. 14-25), which have given Orientals solemn assurances for the preservation of their particular rites—at first in a more reserved manner, later with spontaneous and generous enthusiasm, but always making such understanding the basis of their reunion with the Roman Church.
The decretal *Sub catholicae fidei* of Innocent IV (1344) sought to provide more concrete norms for the application of the principles established in the case of the Greeks of Cyprus and the Archipelago. However, there were conflicts over the introduction of these criteria, even when, for nearly two centuries, the Armenians of the Kingdom of Little Armenia remained united to the Catholic Church. The modern era marks a new epoch for the apostolate among the separated of Eastern Christianity. The same zeal for souls that drove the religious of ancient and recent Orders to the spiritual conquest of the New World also infused new ardor into the apostolate among dissident Christians. Of the unions achieved in the 16th century, mention has been made above.
In Rome, colleges for the Easterners were established and the printing of Eastern liturgical books was undertaken. But especially the establishment of the Sacred Congregation for the Propagation of the Faith (1622) united and coordinated these initiatives. A quite different apostolate from that of the Middle Ages began, in which the Holy See had sought to proceed mainly by diplomatic means, winning over the patriarchs and civil leaders of the nations. Now the general front was set in motion. The Sacred Congregation of Propaganda Fide directed everything with its instructions, decrees, and responses. In the *Collectanea S. Congregationis de Propaganda Fide* (2 vols., Rome 1907), numerous sources regarding this apostolate are collected. However, few documents have general scope; rather, it is the continuity in the application of norms that gradually created a uniform discipline regarding the Eastern Rite. These norms received solemn and further confirmation through the work of that great canonist on the Chair of Peter, Benedict XIV. In a series of classical constitutions, he fixed Eastern canon law in its relations with Catholic tradition; these include the constitutions: *Etsi pastoralis* (1742), issued for the Italo-Greeks; *Demandatam* (1734), addressed to the hierarchy of the Melkite Church; *Eo quamvis tempore* (1745) and *Anno vertente* (1750), which concern the Copts; *Ex quo primum* (1756), published on the occasion of the second edition of the Greek Euchologion. But especially the constitution *Allatae sunt* (1755), addressed to missionaries in the East, touches upon the fundamental questions of their apostolate. Subsequently, the Sacred Congregation of Propaganda Fide, based on these papal documents, created a body of norms and rules that constituted almost a code for missionary work among Catholics and dissidents in the East.
Among the most important documents for relations between missionaries and Easterners are, for example, the responses given to the Apostolic Delegate of Egypt on December 11, 1838 (*Collectanea*, I, no. 879, p. 500). Numerous are also the responses and instructions regarding *communicatio in sacris* (cf. I. J. Szal, *The communication of catholics with schismatics*, Washington 1948). Pius IX, in the constitution *In suprema* (1848) and again in *Arcano divinae providentiae*, on the occasion of the Vatican Council (1869), renewed the invitation to separated Easterners to return to the Church. Leo XIII did the same in *Orientalium dignitas* (1894). This solemn act, together with other testimonies given by the papal invitation in favor of the Eastern Rite, aroused new hope and fervor. Among other initiatives, thought was also given to an apostolate among the educated classes, with the establishment of a college of Greek culture, preferably in Constantinople. The plan did not succeed at that time. But the Assumptionists, who, at the invitation of the Supreme Pontiff, had dedicated themselves particularly to the apostolate for the East, began at that time the noted journal *Échos d’Orient* from their house in Kadiköy. A measure of exceptional importance was taken by Benedict XV when, in 1917, he erected a new Sacred Congregation solely for Eastern affairs, at the same time suppressing the Sacred Congregation for the Propagation of the Faith for Eastern Rites, established by Pius IX in 1862. In the same year, the Pontifical Oriental Institute was opened in Rome, intended for higher studies regarding the Eastern Rite and, according to the founding *motu proprio*, open even to dissident Easterners. The successor of Benedict, Pius XI, placed even clearer emphasis on the necessary conditions for achieving the return of separated brethren to the Church. In the encyclical *Ecclesiam Dei*, published on the occasion of the third centenary of the death of St. Josaphat (1923), he invited all Catholics to collaborate with him, well aware that such unity is to be promoted more by examples and works of a holy life—especially by charity toward Slavic brethren and other Easterners—than by discussions and other stimuli. “Just as the dissident Easterners must, by laying aside old prejudices, strive to know the true life of the Church, so too Latins must better and more deeply understand the history and customs of the Easterners...” The encyclical *Rerum Orientalium* (1928) concerns the importance of Eastern studies for the reunion of dissidents and strongly recommends the Pontifical Oriental Institute to the hierarchy of the entire Catholic world.
Finally, Pius XII followed in the footsteps of his predecessors. While in the encyclicals *Orientalis Ecclesiae* (1944), in honor of St. Cyril of Alexandria, *Orientalis omnes* (1945), published on the occasion of the 250th anniversary of the union of the Ruthenian Church with Rome, and *Sempiternus Rex* (1951), commemorating the 150th anniversary of the Council of Chalcedon, he reaffirmed that dissidents need not fear that their traditional rites and customs will be diminished, with the issuance of the *motu proprio* *Crebrae allatae sunt* (on matrimonial law) and *Sollicitudinem nostrum* (on trials), he gave the first fruits of the new Eastern Code of Canon Law, a work long in preparation and which shows the effective interest of the Holy See in the spiritual well-being of the Eastern Rite (cf.; V. PONTIFICAL COMMISSIONS). Emilio Herman
II. CATHOLIC WORKS FOR UNION
I. Prayer for Union
The most important prayer is undoubtedly the Votive Mass *ad tollendum schisma*, formerly called *ad unitatem Ecclesiae*, which, although composed to end the Great Western Schism, is now directed especially to implore the return of the separated, “ut omnes unum sint.” It is followed by the novena of Pentecost, ordered by Leo XIII in the encyclical *Divinum illud munus* (May 9, 1897) for all Catholic churches and accepted even by many Anglicans, Old Catholics, and “Orthodox.” Greater diffusion has been given to the Octave of Prayer for Unity from the Feast of the Chair of St. Peter to the Conversion of St. Paul (January 18–25), an initiative of the Episcopalian pastor Paul Watson and accepted in the Catholic Church by Pius X. The *Dies Orientis*, or Day of Prayer for the East, is particularly recommended by the Holy See to seminaries and Catholic colleges. In 1851, the Prayer Union for the Conversion of Russia and for the end of the schism among the Slavic peoples was founded in Brussels; and in 1855, another at Bourges, established to obtain “through the Immaculate Mary the conversion of schismatic Greeks.” More well-known and important is the Prayer Association in honor of the Immaculate Mary for the return of the Greek-Russian Church to Catholic unity, founded before 1862 by the Barnabite Fr. Cesare Tondini de Quarenghi, also called the Work of Fr. Schuwalov. In 1887, the Primary Archconfraternity of Prayer and Good Works for the Return to Catholic Unity of the Dissident Churches of the Eastern Rite was established, placed under the patronage of Our Lady of the Assumption, through the work of the Augustinians of the Assumption, who rapidly spread it through various nations of Europe and the Near East. Other similar initiatives could be mentioned here, such as the League of Sacrifices for Russia, which, founded on January 9, 1929, by the Apostolic Administrator of Lugano, quickly gathered the adhesion of more than 700 religious houses.2. Associations
In addition to prayer for the East, there are associations that promote unity. Among these may be listed: the Association of SS. Cyril and Methodius for the return of separated brethren to the bosom of the Catholic Church, founded in 1851 by Bishop Antonio Martino Stankek of Marburg, later known as the Apostolate of SS. Cyril and Methodius under the protection of the Blessed Virgin Mary, which has been and continues to be the most fruitful in unionistic works and publications; the Catholica Unio of the Benedictine Fr. Agostino von Galen, established in Vienna in 1923; the Society of St. John Chrysostom of English Catholics, founded in 1926; the Catholic Near East Welfare Association, founded in the United States by the Jesuit Fr. Walsch; the *Het Apostolat der Hereeniging*, a center of the powerful unionistic movement in the Netherlands; the flourishing *Obra Misional* of the O. C. in Spain, definitively established in 1947 under the protection of the Primate Cardinal of Spain. In Italy, two unionistic associations arose in 1930: the Pious Association of St. Nicholas of Bari in Rome, and in Palermo the Italian Catholic Association for the O. C., which, under the direction of Cardinal L. Lavitrano, carried out a true and profound unionistic apostolate, chiefly through the *Settimane Orientali* (Eastern Weeks) organized in Italy’s principal cities. While the upheaval of the last world war significantly diminished the activity of these two associations, Fr. C. Boyer, professor at the Gregorian University, founded in 1945 the *Unitas*, which, however, concerns itself with dissidents in general, whether “Orthodox” or Protestant.
These associations have promoted the holding of unionistic congresses, sometimes with the participation of separated Orientals; among the most important of these have been the *Conventus Velehradenses*, now suspended, which were held periodically in Velehrad (Moravia-Czechoslovakia) from 1910 until the outbreak of the war.
3. Study Centers
In the desire to prepare a select clergy for work in the East, Gregory XIII already opened in Rome the Greek College of St. Athanasius, followed by others, chiefly under the pontificates of Leo XIII and Pius XI. Currently, there exist in Rome the Greek College of St. Athanasius, the Ruthenian College of St. Josaphat (temporarily closed), the Maronite College, the Armenian College, the Romanian College, the Russian College, the Ethiopian College, and the Institute of St. John Damascene, intended for priests of the various Eastern rites who pursue advanced studies.
These institutes aim at the formation of the clergy. Benedict XV, on 15 October 1917, established the Pontifical Oriental Institute, open without distinction to Latins and Orientals, to Catholics and dissidents, for the cultivation of Eastern ecclesiastical studies, with the faculty to confer academic degrees. Other Eastern institutes, though without university status, have arisen elsewhere, such as the Seminary of St. Basil and the student residence *Istina* in Lille, the Benedictine priory of Amay-sur-Meuse (later transferred to Chevetogne), the Missionary Institute of Lublin, and the Seminary of Dubno. To these may be added the Catholic schools of the East, among which the Jesuit University of St. Joseph in Beirut stands preeminent.
4. The Press
A flowering of these efforts is the unionistic press, with numerous journals published in various languages, such as *Apostolat Sv. Cyrilla a Metodije* of Olomouc (Moravia), *Der christliche Orient* of Munich, *Apostolat der Hereeniging* in the Netherlands, *L’Unité de l’Église* (until 1937) and *Russie et chrétienté* in France, *Oriens* in Poland, *The Eastern Churches Quarterly* of the Benedictines of Ramsgate in England, *Cirillometodski* of Zagreb, *Oriente* of Madrid, *Irénikon* of Chevetogne (Amay) in Belgium, and in Italy the *Bollettino della Badia Greca di Grottaferrata*, *L’O. C. e l’unità della Chiesa* by Monsignor Cesare Spallanzani of Reggio Emilia (until 1943), and *Unitas*, the organ of the association of the same name, published in Rome in Italian, French, and English.
**
Maurizio Gordillo
III. The O. C. and Non-Catholic Christians, Especially Anglicans
### 1. Up to 1800
In 1574, German Lutherans sent a Greek translation of the Augsburg Confession to the Patriarch of Constantinople, Jeremiah II; this was followed by a correspondence. From 1624, the archdeacon Chrysanthos, who had studied for seven years at Oxford, spent three years among German and Swiss theologians, for whom he wrote a Confession of Faith. Meanwhile, in Poland, Orthodox and Protestants temporarily united to oppose the recently formed Uniate Ruthenian Church (1596), and in Constantinople, Catholics and Protestants, supported by the diplomatic action of their coreligionist ambassadors, sought to win over the “Orthodox,” already greatly weakened within the Ottoman Empire.
The high point came when Cyril Lucaris, then Patriarch, issued a profession of faith (1629) almost entirely Calvinist in character. Protestants used it in their propaganda to demonstrate the orthodoxy of their doctrine; Catholics to demonstrate the necessity of union with Rome; the “Orthodox” reacted by condemning it in no fewer than six synods during the 17th century and approving (Jerusalem 1672; Constantinople 1691) a point-by-point refutation in the Confession of Dositheus.
Between 1716 and 1727, some of the English Nonjurors, prompted by the visit to England of delegates from the Patriarchate of Alexandria to collect funds, conducted a lengthy correspondence with the four Eastern Patriarchs through the intermediary and with the approval of Peter the Great of Russia, with the aim of achieving union with the “Orthodox.” This correspondence ended only when the Archbishop of Canterbury, Wake, explained to Constantinople the schismatic status of his correspondents with respect to the Anglican Church.
Russia (1840–51), then Greece, but he failed to persuade these Orthodox Churches of the orthodoxy of the Anglican position, and finally (1855) became Catholic. Between 1860 and 1870, first the Protestant Episcopal Church of America and then the Church of England established committees with the aim of promoting relations with the “Orthodox,” and there was some exchange of letters. In 1874 and 1875 official conferences took place at Bonn between the “Orthodox” (Russians and Greeks, and in 1875 also Romanians and Serbs), English and American Anglicans, and the “Old Catholics”; at these meetings all parties agreed on certain declarations regarding the canons of Scripture, Tradition, Confession, the Eucharist, and the doctrine of the Trinity, with a compromise on the *Filioque* that was in part prudently vague; nonetheless, the agreement did not receive the full approval of the Holy Synod of Russia nor of some Anglicans. Since then, all the Lambeth Conferences have made reference to Anglican relations with the “Orthodox,” and no opportunity for official contact and courteous cooperation has been missed.
In 1897 the Anglican response to the papal *Apostolicae curae* was sent to all “Orthodox” Churches, where it aroused great interest and prompted a large number of Russian and Greek studies on the validity of Anglican ordinations, studies that criticized the Thirty-Nine Articles and called for doctrinal reforms in the Anglican Church as a prerequisite for any exchange.
In 1901 the Anglicans circulated among the “Orthodox” an explanation of their teaching, which was favorably received by some Greeks. In 1902 Joachim III of Constantinople sought the opinions of eight “Orthodox” Churches on union with the West. The longest response came from Russia, which in fact demanded that all Anglicans, not merely those of the High Church, should desire and embrace the “Orthodox” faith in every detail. In 1906 the Association of Anglican and Western “Orthodox” Churches was founded, and it remains active. Shortly afterward, the patriarch of Constantinople consented that Anglicans and Greeks might administer certain Sacraments to members of each other’s Churches when no minister of their own Church was available.
In 1912 the Holy Synod of Russia invited an Anglican clergyman to hold courses on Anglicanism in Russia. During this period, however, the initiative always came from the Anglicans, whose efforts were directed toward the Russian Church rather than the Greek, and although their spokesmen always surpassed Protestant elements by emphasizing agreement with Catholic doctrine (sometimes to the point of dishonesty), no tangible result was achieved: they were always urged to repudiate the Thirty-Nine Articles and to amend their other formularies in favor of the “Orthodox.”
3. From 1916 onward
After the Bolshevik Revolution, the Anglicans turned increasingly toward Constantinople. Indeed, events moved rapidly. In 1918 Archbishop Meletios of Athens, while in America and England on business, held conferences with Anglicans. In 1919 permanent committees for the study of union were established in Constantinople, Athens, London, and America. In 1920 Constantinople issued an encyclical letter “to all Churches of Christ wherever they may be,” urging friendly relations and especially cooperation on practical matters. “Orthodox” delegates were invited to the Lambeth Conference of 1920, and Meletios, then patriarch of Constantinople, sent one who declared that the Anglicans ardently desired intercommunion but that their conception of the Church allowed for diversity of opinion even on essential doctrines, and advised caution above all because the Anglicans were at the same time seeking union with nonconformist sects. Nevertheless, the visit bore some fruit.One of the patriarch’s delegates, Professor Comnenos, wrote a pamphlet (1921) in favor of Anglo–Filial Orders, and in 1922 the patriarch, in a letter to Canterbury and an encyclical to all “Orthodox” Churches, announced that Anglo–Filial Orders could “administratively,” by economy, be considered valid by the “Orthodox” in the same way as Catholic and Armenian Orders. Only Jerusalem and Cyprus immediately followed Constantinople. From then on signs of friendship multiplied. In America and Australia, Anglo–Filial clergy were permitted to administer Baptism and Matrimony to individual “Orthodox.” There was an exchange of letters of “non-objection” between Canterbury and Constantinople regarding new appointments to these sees. In 1925 all “Orthodox” Churches (with the exception of Yugoslavia and, naturally, Russia) were represented at the Nicene celebrations in Westminster Abbey. In 1928 the Society of SS. Alban and Sergius was founded to promote friendly relations between Anglo–Filial Christians and Russians in exile.
The experiment of 1920 was repeated at the Lambeth Conference of 1930, when a large “Orthodox” delegation visited London, led by Meletios, then patriarch of Alexandria. Discussions were held with a committee of Anglican bishops, in which the “Orthodox” were again assured that the Anglican Communion admits a real presence in the Eucharist as a mystery and that ordination confers the grace proper to each order and that this too is a mystery. To satisfy “Orthodox” doubts, these and other declarations were submitted to a plenary session of the Conference and were declared “a sufficient account of the doctrine and practice” of the Anglican Communion. On 25 December 1930 Alexandria extended recognition *ad administrandum* to Anglican Orders. In 1931 “Orthodox” and Anglicans met in conference for further doctrinal discussions, which, however, produced no immediate result. On their way back, the “Orthodox” delegates met with the “Old Catholics” in Bonn, but since they had only authorization to report to their respective Churches, although they reached verbal doctrinal agreement they could not arrive at definitive decisions. The “Orthodox” had hoped to convene a pan-“Orthodox” synod at which Anglican Orders and union would be discussed and settled in common, but this was prevented by opposition from the Turkish government. Thus in 1936 the Romanian Church invited an Anglican delegation to Bucharest, and this reached agreement with the Romanian delegates on a formula including “apostolic succession,” Holy Order, the Sacraments in general, Tradition, and Justification, which, after being accepted by the Holy Synod of Romania and by both English convocations (as “a legitimate interpretation of Anglican faith”), albeit not without opposition in both countries, appeared in a Romanian recognition of Anglican Orders. In 1938 the Greek Church, though with broad reservations, admitted that “the Church, after examining the special circumstances, may administratively recognize the Orders of an Anglican who enters the ‘Orthodox’ Church.”
Throughout this period there were many friendly contacts and exchanges of visits. The “Orthodox” Churches (with the exception of the Russian Church) took part in various ecumenical congresses (v. ECUMENISM), even though at Lausanne (1927) and Edinburgh (1937) they withdrew from the concluding statements. At Amsterdam (1948) only Constantinople and Greece were fully represented, and the majority of delegates again wished to make a special declaration, but this was frustrated by the minority. In the Greek Church, after Amsterdam, there is a strong divergence of opinion on the advisability of continuing to participate in all the topics of these conferences. The Russian Church and, along with it, all the other “Orthodox” Slav Churches, by a resolution approved at the centenary celebrations of 1948, refused to cooperate and condemned such movements, while at the same time expressing their opposition to recognizing Anglican Orders. In the central and permanent committees of the World Council of Churches and its resulting movements, the “Orthodox” were regularly represented by members, among whom may be noted the apocrisiary archbishop Germano of Constantinople at Canterbury, Prof. Alivisatos of Greece, and Fr. Florovsky of the Russian exiles; but it seems that doubts about this cooperation are growing ever greater, and the desire is gaining ground to limit cooperation to practical matters, omitting any doctrinal discussion.
IV. DOGMATIC DIVERGENCES
4. General character of the divergences between Catholics and dissident Orientals
For a century now there has been a tendency to make the dogmatic divergences between Catholics and separated Orientals almost disappear.In 1858 A. Ritschl, followed by numerous Protestant authors and some Catholics, reduced the controversy to mere liturgical differences. The importance which the Orientals attach to these was not denied, whether in their internal disputes among themselves (for example, the treatise of Dionysius Bar Salibi against the Armenians) or with regard to the Latin Church. But it is undeniable that the main struggle took place in the field of dogmatic truths. This is attested by the history of Catholic and Oriental relations; although in modern times more attention is paid to the different mentality of East and West than to individual truths, so that, as the metropolitan of Lviv, A. Szeptyckyj, puts it, the Orientals differ from the Occidentals even when they agree in affirming a doctrine. Indeed, in 1913 A. Harnack insisted on the different spirit of Eastern Christianity, which distances it from Western Christianity. With good reason, A. de Ivanka, in the article Orient et Occident (in Irenikon, 9 [1932], pp. 409-21), warns against exaggerating this contrast.
Christian East — Patriarch Athenagoras of Constantinople, after his visit to the President of the Republic of Ankara (Feb. 1949).
It is a fact that the doctrinal divergences have crystallized into precise dogmatic formulas, around which long disputes have been and still are carried on. These will be briefly treated here, restricting attention to the Churches of the Byzantine-Slavic East and leaving aside the Nestorian and Monophysite Churches, for whose doctrines V. ARMENIA; COPTI; ETHIOPIA; JACOBITES; MONOPHYSITES; NESTORIUS AND NESTORIANISM, V. The Nestorian Church.
5. Early lists.
— In the second half of the 9th century a first list of divergences between Latins and Byzantines is found in the encyclical letter of Photius to the Orientals written in 867 (PG 102, 721-41), where alongside the Saturday fast, the celibacy of the Latin clergy, and other disciplinary and liturgical usages, the doctrine of the Latins on the procession of the Holy Spirit from the Father and the Son is denounced. Neither in this document nor in his other writings (the treatise Against those who say that Rome is the first throne, which seems to be of a rather later date, being excluded) is there any open attack on the primacy. Nevertheless it is certain that Photius had this in view, as is shown by the letter of St. Nicholas I to Hincmar of Reims (PL 119, 1152-61), from which the list of Byzantine accusations is taken by the Corbeiensian and other Latin controversialists against Photius.
Christian East — Ecumenical Conference at Lambeth Palace (July 1948): from left to right: the parish priest Timiades, the metropolitan of Edessa, Prof. Alivisatos of the University of Athens, Archbishop Germanos of the Ecumenical Patriarchate of Constantinople — London.
Two centuries later, Patriarch Michael Cerularius, writing to Peter III of Antioch (PG 120, 789-96), enumerates 22 errors of the Latins, but these concern almost exclusively liturgical and canonical discipline. In the field of dogma, Filioque (v.) and to the Roman primacy, which he declares to have completely lapsed, since the Pope had admitted the heresy of the Filioque. Moreover, he attacks the use of unleavened bread (v.), opening a new controversy which gave rise to countless treatises on the Eucharistic bread. The accusations of Cerularius were collected and increased in number, as regards Latin usages, in the famous Opusculum against the Franks, attributed by Hergenröther to Photius but in reality written at the end of the 11th century and widely circulated in the Byzantine and Slavic East. The Byzantine controversialists, such as Matthew Angelos Panaretos and many others, sought new points of divergence (A. Palmieri collected as many as 62), for the most part liturgical. As regards doctrine, two new divergences appear: the question of Purgatory, raised in 1231 and already considered in the opusculum of the Dominican friars of Constantinople in 1250, and that of the Epiclesis, which is found for the first time, at least among the Byzantines, in Nicholas Cabasilas and Simeon of Thessalonica about the middle of the 14th century.
6. The five Florentine differences
Thus by 1438, at the opening of the Council of Ferrara-Florence, it was already common to speak of the five differences between Greeks and Latins, namely: 1) the procession of the Holy Spirit from the Father and the Son; 2) the insertion of the Filioque into the Nicene-Constantinopolitan Symbol; 3) Purgatory, a dispute which also extends to the general question of the Last Things; 4) the matter and form of the Holy Eucharist, for which the Byzantines required leavened bread and the invocation of the Holy Spirit, called the Epiclesis; 5) the primacy of the Roman Pontiff. These were the five topics discussed at the assemblies of Ferrara and Florence and defined in the decree of union of the Greeks, which, however, passes over them in silence once full agreement had been reached.These five divergences are found in the writings of both supporters and opponents of the Council of Florence, such as Joseph of Methone, Cardinal Bessarion, Mark Eugenicus, George Scholarius, and after them in the controversial works of Gabriel Severus, Maximus the Peloponnesian, Elias Miniates and many others.
7. New points of contrast
These latter writers also speak of baptism by infusion and of communion under one kind. The proclamation of the dogma of the Immaculate Conception in the bull *Ineffabilis* of 8 Dec. 1854 and the Vatican definition on the infallibility of the Roman Pontiff gave rise to fresh discrepancies, so that the Patriarch of Constantinople, Anthimus VII, in his encyclical of 1895, presents the following list of Latin errors: 1) the procession of the Holy Spirit from the Father and the Son; 2) the addition of the *Filioque* to the Symbol; 3) baptism by aspersion or infusion; 4) the use of unleavened bread; 5) the epiclesis; 6) communion under one kind; 7) Purgatory, indulgences and immediate retribution before the Last Judgment; 8) the Immaculate Conception of the Mother of God; 9) Roman primacy; 10) papal infallibility.8. Present state
It is quite clear that, over the nine centuries of separation, these doctrines have been proposed in forms that are quite diverse and cannot be explained in so brief a summary (v. AZIMI; BATTESIMO; EPIGLESI; FILIOQUE; IMMACOLATA CONCEZIONE; PRIMATO DI GESÙ CRISTO; PURGATORIO). It need only be added that, despite numerous disputes, the differences have rather widened and deepened; first with the rise of Palamism (v.), whose influence is so strong in the doctrine of Grace and in that of the Last Things; later with the contribution of ancient and modern Protestantism, whose influence is manifest in not a few points of sacramental theology, in the dogma of Redemption and chiefly in the field of ecclesiology. If for long centuries the predominant controversy was that of the *Filioque*, today, chiefly since the ascendancy of the Slavophile school of Alexis Stepanovich Khomiakov, it may well be said that the gravest divergence resides, more than in the doctrine on primacy, in the very concept of the Church and of its unity and catholicity.
IV. CHRISTIAN ART.
As J. von Schlosser rightly observed, the political and administrative reform of the Roman Empire carried out by Diocletian, with a system of coordinates defined by the spheres of influence of the two Augusti and the two Caesars, determined the framework for all subsequent development in the lands around the Mediterranean. The north-south axis, separating Latin from Greek Christendom, grew ever more pronounced during the Middle Ages and produced that separation of the Western from the Eastern world which persists to this day. Yet along this axis conditions are not uniform, and from an archaeological standpoint two territories with distinctive and in many ways discordant characteristics emerge from the earliest Christian period. To the north lies the area centred on Byzantium, which embraces the whole Balkan peninsula, later incorporates the Slav lands and dominates a more or less extensive fringe along the northern, western and partly southern coasts of Anatolia, where that neo-Hellenism flourishes which we call Byzantine art. To the south and east of this line lie all the regions where Hellenism, already firmly established, must struggle against the resurgence of indigenous traditions with deep historical roots that penetrate and gradually come to dominate II. This is what should truly and solely be called the Christian East, and its entire archaeological history from the third to the eighth century may be said to consist in this struggle between a purely Asiatic mentality and the tenacious survival of Hellenistic tradition, which never wholly dies but always lurks beneath the surface and returns in unexpected ways.
While the Byzantine sphere was able for a time to maintain its unity under the hegemony of a capital-centred art (*Reichskunst*) that imposed itself, the Christian East from the outset displayed centrifugal forces, and the great theological disputes often masked ancient political rivalries and irreconcilable economic divergences. On the one hand, therefore, there was an artistic unity that was also a linguistic unity (the two things being in a sense one and the same); on the other, the rise of territorially delimited artistic schools contemporaneous with the formation of national languages. These languages attained literary significance precisely through the efforts of groups opposed to central authority and classified religiously as heretics: the Gnostic corpus with its writings, the Manichaean texts, the works of Hieracas, Syriac with Bardaisan, the original of the Acts of St Thomas, and so forth. These were both an index and a consequence of separatist tendencies and nationalist aspirations. Hence the Christian art of Egypt, Syria, Mesopotamia, Anatolia and Armenia quickly took on their own unmistakable characteristics, which, on closer inspection, can be seen to have been already present, albeit less pronounced, in the antecedent Hellenism. This Eastern Hellenism is in fact still poorly understood (one of the weakest points in archaeological studies of the Christian East in its early centuries), since the wholesale destruction of the great Hellenistic cities has deprived us of the fundamental evidence. The great architectural monuments of Alexandria, Antioch, Gaza and others have vanished, and we know them only from literary sources; our knowledge rests chiefly on secondary buildings and works of decorative art that, however fine in themselves, are not the most significant—save perhaps in a few cases in Syria. Our understanding is based above all on secondary constructions and decorative works that do not reveal the essential, even though among them are productions of the very highest order, such as the figured pavements recently brought to light by excavations at Antioch.
The presence or absence of a Hellenistic tradition clearly marks the formation and development of the various regional arts listed above; the contrast is sharpest between those that arose within the old imperial frontiers and that of Mesopotamia, which lay always beyond them (the ephemeral Trajanic conquest is of no account), where Hellenism was confined to a few select *poleis* that, though they preserved their structure under the Parthians, certainly lost it under the Sasanians. A telling example is that while in Egypt, Syria, Anatolia and the earliest Armenian monuments the church, with its variants and new features, derived its forms from the Hellenistic basilica, in Mesopotamia it took its model from the great halls of Oriental palaces. Other examples could be cited.
Among the various artistic schools into which the art of Christian **O.** has been divided, one holds absolute predominance for its creative force and expansive power: it is the architecture of Syria. It elaborated all possible transformations of the basilica conceived by **O.** and exported them not only to Asia but also to Egypt and Abyssinia, and, toward the West, into the Byzantine environment and, through it, into Italy. Yet, it must be noted, it did not succeed in surpassing the sphere of variations on the basilica motif nor in rising to a new conception of architectural space: this would be reserved for the Byzantines. Thus, Syrian architecture was able to elaborate numerous variations in the planimetry of central buildings, round or polygonal, from the "Great Church" of Constantine in Antioch onward, but it did not succeed in completing the architectural concept with the perfect solution for the roofing, namely the dome connected to the polygonal base. Although examples of the pendentive connection (already attempted in early Egyptian architecture) were known to Syrian Hellenism (baths of Gerasa, tomb of Samaria, etc.), and although the cushion capital of Asian invention and spread by the Sasanians was known, it did not go beyond the drum covered with a pyramidal wooden roof. Even the problem of the dome would mark a triumph of Byzantine architects. This proves the limitation of the architectural thought of Christian architects of the **O.**, which would develop only in Armenia, but after the 8th century, which marks the limit of the period under consideration here.
Where, instead, Christian **O.** fully developed its intrinsic vision, its characteristics, and its genius, was in the decoration of monuments and in what are called minor arts. Not in the mosaic pavements, of which a very rich series is available, especially in Palestine, precisely datable up to the 8th century. If we start from the rich series of Hellenistic mosaic pavements of Antioch (where only a few, not abundant, specifically Eastern and especially Sasanian motifs are observed), we see that this art lives and evolves while remaining within the vision of Hellenistic pictorialism, with its fantastic and intricate architectures, genre scenes, and representations of animals, outside the true Eastern spirit, and continues even into the first century of Muslim domination, when, indeed, a curious return to pure Hellenism is observed with the (parietal but only decorative) mosaics of the mosque of Damascus, which bring us back to the art of Pompeii and Herculaneum. Clearly, these are works by craftsmen who passed down from father to son the technique and spirit, and, while evolving, remained outside the true Eastern spirit. Where this spirit fully reveals itself is in figurative wall painting and in miniatures, with its characteristics already fully developed in the paintings of Dura-Europos. First, the purely Asian concept of continuous narration, which had already been triumphantly employed in Rome by the great architect of Hadrian, Apollodorus of Damascus; the love of portraiture and historical composition; the abstraction of the human figure from its environment, which is often eliminated or only hinted at rather than represented; and above all, the organization of the scene according to a principle of frontality, so that the viewer is drawn into it, which develops the transcendent and reinforces the meaning of the subjects, drawn almost entirely from religious history. In the more proper language of forms, an intense love of polychromy, a continual need for rich color that reveals itself in every production (even in jewelry and cloisonné metalwork), and a need to cover the entire surface (horror vacui), even if it means piling up scenes simply juxtaposed (as in the synagogue of Dura) or a complex of ornaments, as if the wall were covered with a carpet—a principle that develops to the point of absurdity in the subsequent Islamic era. These latter tendencies also apply to carved decoration, which tends to cover every part of the building, overlapping what should be the expression of its structural function: a Syrian door lintel is decorated as if it were a facing slab, and interlaces and meanders cover the shafts of columns from Egypt to Mesopotamia (columns reused in the courtyard of the mosque of Diyarbakir). Few examples remain from which one can see the result of the application of such principles: perhaps the best is given by the apses of the great triconch cell of the Red Monastery near Sohag, with the rich carved decoration framing the niches, while the rest of the walls and the columns were covered with painted decoration.
Christian **O.** made little use of figurative sculpture, whether in bas-relief, high relief, or in the round. Egypt is the region that has preserved the most numerous and important examples, with a series of sculptures that, from the place of origin of the most distinctive examples, was called the "school of Ahnas," but which was also widespread in other locations of Middle Egypt, especially at Bahnasa. The origin of its sculptural language probably lies in Nabataean surroundings: the reliefs of Ḥaurān at-Tannūr are compared. It certainly lasted until the 6th century, and a curious return of its forms occurs in the 8th century in the figural stuccoes of the Umayyad palace of Ḥirbat al-Mafjar. But the fact that the majority of the subjects it treated were drawn from Hellenic mythology and only a few were Christian suggests that it was the creation of one of those rearguard groups of paganism that had a long life in Egypt until the Justinianic period. All the remaining figurative sculpture that has come down to us from Christian **O.** has nothing to do with art. The same very late persistence of Hellenic motifs and subjects is documented in Egypt even in the art of weaving: but here, as has been observed for the Palestinian mosaic pavements, it is probably a matter of the transmission of workshop formulas within a guild as strongly organized as that of the weavers. Even ivory carving, which produced marvelous works such as the throne of Maximian now in Ravenna, shows the persistence of a Hellenistic artistic content and language, albeit combined but not fused with Eastern forms and spirit.
And it is in this dualism that Christian **O.** was unable to surpass—between a powerful Hellenistic tradition and a distinctly Eastern spirit—lies its tragedy and the impossibility of rising to a high sphere of expression.