History of the Eastern Orthodox Church

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The Eastern Orthodox Churches trace their roots back to the Apostles and Jesus Christ. Eastern Orthodoxy reached its golden age during the high point of the Byzantine Empire, and then continued to flourish in Russia after the Fall of Constantinople. Numerous autocephalous churches were established in Eastern Europe and Slavic areas.

Four stages of development can be distinguished in the history of the Eastern Orthodox Churches. The first three centuries, through the age of Constantine the Great constitute the apostolic and ancient period. The medieval period comprises almost ten centuries from the death of Constantine to the Fall of Constantinople. The age of captivity (under Islam) starts, roughly, for the Greek and Balkan communities in the fifteenth century with the Fall of Constantinople, and ends about the year 1830, which marks Greek and Balkan independence from the Ottoman Empire. The last stage is the modern period.

The Orthodox churches with the largest number of adherents in modern times are the Russian and the Romanian Orthodox churches. The most ancient of the Orthodox churches of today are the Churches of Constantinople, Alexandria (which includes all of Africa), Georgia, Antioch, and Jerusalem.

Apostolic era

Christianity first spread in the predominantly Greek-speaking eastern half of the Roman Empire. Paul and the Apostles traveled extensively throughout the Empire, establishing communities in major cities and regions, with the first communities appearing in Antioch, Alexandria, Jerusalem, and then the two political centers of Rome and Greece and what became Byzantium. Orthodoxy believes in the Apostolic Succession that was established by the Apostles in the New Testament; this played a key role in the communities' view of itself as the preserver of the original Christian tradition. Historically the word church did not mean building or housing structure (which would actually be the word Basilica) but meant community or gathering of like peoples (see Ecclesia).

The original church community of the East before the schisms, is the Greek communities founded by Saint Paul and later Byzantine churches or communities, the Coptic (or Egyptian) churches founded by Saint Mark (including the Ethiopian of Africa or Abyssinia), the Syrian (or Assyrian) and Antiochian churches founded by Saint Peter, along with the Georgian and Russian churches founded by Saint Andrew. By tradition, the Armenian church, as well as the churches of Samaria and Judea were founded by Saint Jude and Saint Bartholomew, while the church of Israel was founded by Saint James.The church of Rome by tradition was founded by both Saint Peter and Saint Paul.

Systematic persecution of the early Christian church caused it to be an underground movement. The first above-ground churches were officially built in Armenia (see Echmiadzin). Armenia was the first country to legalize Christianity around 301 AD under King Tiridates III and also embrace it as the state religion in 310 AD. However, illegal churches before "Christian legalization" are mentioned throughout church history; such an example would be in the persecutions of Diocletian. Of the underground churches that existed before legalization, some are recorded to have existed as the catacombs in Europe, Rome, and also in the underground cities of Anatolia such as Derinkuyu Underground City (also see Cave monastery). Today the gates though which Paul escaped, named Bab Kisan, and mentioned in the Second Epistle to the Corinthians, have been converted into a church in Paul's memory. This is a structure still standing that dates from the time of the Apostles.

The Patristic Age and Biblical Canon

The Biblical canon began with the officially accepted books of the Koine Greek Old Testament (which predates Christianity). The Septuagint or seventy is accepted as the foundation of the Christian faith along with the Good news (gospels), Revelations and Letters of the Apostles (including Acts of the Apostles and the Epistle to the Hebrews). The earliest text of the New Testament was written in common or Koine Greek. The many texts in the many tribal dialects of the Old Testament were all translated into a single language, Koine Greek, in the time of Ptolemy II Philadelphus in 200BC.

The earliest forms of Christianity were Greek as contemporary ecclesiastical historian Henry Hart Milman writes: "For some considerable (it cannot but be an undefinable) part of three first centuries, the Church of Rome, and most, if not all the Churches of the West, were, if we may so speak, Greek religious colonies. Their language was Greek, their organization Greek, their writers Greek, their scriptures Greek; and many vestiges and traditions show that their ritual, their Liturgy, was Greek.

The early Christians had no way to have a copy of the works that later became the canon and other church works accepted but not canonized (see Church Fathers and Patristics). Much of the original church liturgical services functioned as a means of learning these works. Orthodox Church services today continue to serve this educational function. The issue of collecting the various works of the eastern churches and compiling them into a canon, each being confirmed as authentic text was a long protracted process. Much of this process was motivated by a need to address various heresies. In many instances, heretical groups had themselves begun compiling and disseminating text that they used to validate their positions, positions that were not consistent with the text, history and traditions of the Orthodox faith.

Much of the official organizing of the ecclesiastical structure, clarifying true from false teachings was done by the bishops of the church. Their works are referred to as Patristics. This tradition of clarification can be seen as established in the saints of the Orthodox church referred to as the Apostolic Fathers, bishops themselves established by Apostolic succession. This also continued into the age when the practice of the religion of Christianity became legal (see the Ecumenical Councils).

Divine Liturgy

Liturgical services and in specific the Eucharist service, are based on repeating the actions of Jesus ("do this in remembrance of me"), using the bread and wine, and saying his words (known as the words of the institution). The church has the rest of the liturgical ritual being rooted in the Jewish Passover, Siddur, Seder, and synagogue services, including the singing of hymns (especially the Psalms) and reading from the Scriptures (Old and New Testament). The final uniformity of liturgical services became solidified after the church established a Biblical canon, being based on the Apostolic Constitutions and Clementine literature.

The Bible

Many modern Christians approach the Bible and its interpretation as the sole authority to the establishment of their beliefs concerning the world and their salvation. From the Orthodox point of view, the Bible represents those texts approved by the church for the purpose of conveying the most important parts of what it already believed. The oldest list of books for the canon is the Muratorian fragment dating to ca. 170AD (see also Chester Beatty Papyri). The oldest complete canon of the Christian Bible was found at St Catherine's Orthodox Monastery (see Codex Sinaiticus) and later sold to the British by the Soviets in 1933. Parts of the codex are still considered stolen by the Monastery even today. These texts were not universally considered canonical until the church reviewed, edited, accepted and ratified them in 368 AD (also see the Council of Laodicea). Salvation or Soteriology from the Orthodox perspective is achieved not by knowledge of scripture but by being a member of the church or community and cultivating phronema and theosis through participation in the church or community.

Medieval period

Systematic Roman persecution of Christians stopped for a time in 313 when Emperor Constantine the Great proclaimed the Edict of Milan. Systematic persecutions under Roman Paganism did however resurface later, though temporarily, under Emperor Julian the Apostate. Legalization included the calling of the Ecumenical Councils to resolve disputes and establish church dogma on which the entire church would agree. Thus defining what it means to be a Christian in a universal or broad sense of the word the Greek word for universal being katholikós or catholic. These councils being also the continuation of the church council tradition that predated legalization (see Synod).

Sometimes Patriarchs (often of Constantinople) were deposed by the emperor; at one point emperors sided with the iconoclasts in the eighth and ninth centuries.

In the 530s the second Church of the Holy Wisdom (Hagia Sophia) was built in Constantinople under emperor Justinian I. The first church was destroyed during the Nika riots. The second Hagia Sophia would become the center of the ecclesiastical community for the rulers of the Eastern Empire of Roman or Byzantium.

The Pentarchy

By the fifth century, the ecclesiastical had evolved a hierarchical "pentarchy" or system of five sees (patriarchates), with a settled order of precedence. Rome, as the ancient center and largest city of the empire, was understandably given the presidency or primacy of honor within the pentarchy into which Christendom was now divided. Plainly, this system of patriarchs and metropolitans was exclusively the result of ecclesiastical legislation; there was nothing inherently divine in its origin. None of the five sees, in short, possessed its authority by divine right. Though it was and still held that the patriarch of Rome was the first among equals. The original Pentarchy of the ancient Roman Empire: East and West.

• Rome (Sts. Peter and Paul), i.e. the Pope, the only Pentarch in the Western Roman Empire.
• Alexandria (St. Mark), currently in Egypt
• Antioch (St. Peter), currently in Turkey
• Jerusalem (St. James), currently in Israel
• Constantinople (St. Andrew), currently in Turkey

It is important to note that two Patriarchs are noted to have been founded by St Peter, the Patriarch of Rome and the Patriarch of Antioch. The Eastern Churches accept Antioch as the church founded by St Peter (see the Syriac Orthodox Church).

The Eastern Monastic or Ascetic tradition

With the elevation of Christianity to the status of a legal religion of the Roman Empire by Constantine the Great, with the edict of Milan (313), many Orthodox felt a new decline in the ethical life of Christians. In reaction to this decline, many refused to accept any compromises and fled the world or societies of mankind, to become monastics. Monasticism thrived, especially in Egypt, with two important monastic centers, one in the desert of Nitria, by the Western Bank of the Nile, with Abba Ammoun (d. 356) as its founder, and one in the desert of Skete, south of Nitria, with Saint Makarios of Egypt (d. ca. Egypt 330) as its founder. These monks were anchorites, following the monastic ideal of St. Anthony the Great, Paul of Thebes and Saint Pachomius. They lived by themselves, gathering together for common worship on Saturdays and Sundays only. This is not to say that Monasticism or Orthodox Asceticism was created whole cloth at the time of legalization but rather at the time it blossomed into a mass movement. Charismatics as the ascetic movement was considered had no clerical status as such. Later history developed around the Greek (Mount Athos) and Syrian (Cappadocia) forms of monastic life, along with the formation of Monastic Orders or monastic organization. The three main forms of Ascetics' traditions being Skete, Cenobite and Hermit respectively.

Ecumenical councils

Several doctrinal disputes from the 4th century onwards led to the calling of ecumenical councils which from a traditional perspective, are the culmination and also a continuation of previous church synods. The first ecumenical council in part was a continuation of Trinitarian doctrinal issues addressed in pre-legalization of Christianity councils or synods (see Synods of Antioch between 264-269AD). These ecumenical councils with their doctrinal formulations are pivotal in the history of Christianity in general and to the history of the Eastern Orthodox Church in particular. Specifically, these assemblies were responsible for the formulation of Christian doctrine. As such, they constitute a permanent standard for an Orthodox understanding of the Trinity, the person or hypostasis of Christ, the incarnation. The tradition of councils within the church started with the council of Jerusalem but this council was not an ecumenical council by tradition possibly because it was not convened in order to arrive at a catholic or universal understanding of what Christianity is (see also sobornost). Instead it was convened to address the Abrahamic tradition of circumcision and its relation to converted Gentiles (Acts 15). Although its decisions are accepted by all Christians and later definitions of an ecumenical council appear to conform to this sole biblical Council, no Christian church includes it in their number.

Seven ecumenical councils were held between 325 (the First Council of Nicaea) and 787 (the Second Council of Nicaea), which the Orthodox recognize as the definitive interpretation of Christian dogma.

1. The first of the Seven Ecumenical Councils was that convoked by the Roman Emperor Constantine at Nicaea in 325, condemning the view of Arius that the Son is a created being inferior to the Father.
2. The Second Ecumenical Council was held at Constantinople in 381, defining the nature of the Holy Spirit against those asserting His inequality with the other persons of the Trinity. Under Theodosius I this council marks the end of the Arian conflict in the Eastern Roman Empire..
3. The Third Ecumenical Council is that of Ephesus in 431, which affirmed that Mary is truly "Birthgiver" or "Mother" of God (Theotokos), contrary to the teachings of Nestorius.
4. The Fourth Ecumenical Council is that of Chalcedon in 451, which affirmed that Jesus is truly God and truly man, without mixture of the two natures, contrary to Monophysite teaching.
5. The Fifth Ecumenical Council is the second of Constantinople in 553, interpreting the decrees of Chalcedon and further explaining the relationship of the two natures of Jesus; it also condemned the teachings of Origen on the pre-existence of the soul, and Apocatastasis, etc.
6. The Sixth Ecumenical Council is the third of Constantinople in 681; it declared that Christ has two wills of his two natures, human and divine, contrary to the teachings of the Monothelites.
7. The Seventh Ecumenical Council was called under the Empress Regnant Irene in 787, known as the second of Nicea. It affirmed the making and veneration of icons, while also forbidding the worship of icons and the making of three-dimensional statuary. It reversed the declaration of an earlier council that had called itself the Seventh Ecumenical Council and also nullified its status (see separate article on Iconoclasm). That earlier council had been held under the iconoclast Emperor Constantine V. It met with more than 340 bishops at Constantinople and Hieria in 754, declaring the making of icons of Jesus or the saints an error, mainly for Christological reasons.

The Eastern Orthodox Church does not recognize as dogma any ecumenical councils other than these seven. Orthodox thinking differs on whether the Fourth and Fifth Councils of Constantinople were properly Ecumenical Councils, but the majority view is that they were merely influential rather than dogmatic and therefore not binding.

Confronting Arianism

The first ecumenical council was convened to address again the divinity of Christ (see Paul of Samosata and the Synods of Antioch) through the teachings of Arius, an Egyptian presbyter from Alexandra. Arius taught that Jesus Christ was divine and was sent to earth for the salvation of mankind but that Jesus Christ was not equal to the Father (infinite, primordial origin) and to the Holy Spirit (giver of life). Under Arianism, Christ was instead not consubstantial with God the Father. Since both the Father and the Son under Arius where made of "like" essence or being (see homoiousia) but not of the same essence or being (see homoousia). Much of the distinction between the differing factions was over the phrasing that Christ expressed in the New Testament to express submission to God the Father. This Ecumenical council declared that Jesus Christ was a distinct being of God in existence or reality (hypostasis), which the Latin fathers translated as persona. Jesus was God in essence, being and or nature (ousia), the Latin fathers translated as substantia.

It should be noted that when Emperor Constantine I was baptized, the baptism was performed by an Arian bishop and relative, Eusebius of Nicomedia. Also the charges of Christian corruption by Constantine (see the Constantinian shift) ignore the fact that Constantine deposed Athanasius of Alexandria and later restored Arius, who had been branded a heresiarch by the Nicene Council. .

Constantine I was succeeded by two Arian Emperors Constantius II and Valens and a Pagan Emperor in Julian the Apostate. Even after Constantine I, Orthodox Christians remained persecuted but to a much lesser degree than when Christianity was an illegal community (see Persecution of early Christians by the Romans, Shapur II and Basil of Ancyra). It was not until Emperor Gratian that an Orthodox Emperor was again put on the throne in the East and West seats of Emperor (Jovian was only Emperor for 6 months). Emperor Gratian established the Spaniard Theodosius as his co-emperor in Byzantium. It was not until the co-reigns of Gratian and Theodosius that Arianism was effectively wiped out among the ruling class and elite of the Eastern Empire. Theodosius' wife St Flacilla was instrumental in his campaign to end Arianism. This later culminated into the killing of some 300,000 Orthodox Christians at the hands of Arians in Milan in 538AD.

Nestorianism

Nestorian churches are Eastern Christian churches that keep the faith of only the first two ecumenical councils, i.e., the First Council of Nicaea and the First Council of Constantinople. "Nestorian" is an outsider's term for a tradition that predated the influence of Nestorius. Thus, "Assyrian Church of the East" is a more neutral term.

The Nestorian Schism was the first major schism of the Eastern Churches and was addressed with the Third Ecumenical Council held in Ephesus in 431. This council established the tradition of Mary the mother of Jesus being referred to as Theotokos. Nestorianism taught that is was proper to call Mary the Christotokos because as Nestorian had taught Mary only gave birth to Jesus Christ the person not Jesus Christ as God. Cyril of Alexandria charged that this teaching of Nestorius implied that there had been in fact two Jesus Christs; one Christ was a man born of the virgin Mary and the other was divine and not born but also Jesus Christ.

Cyril of Alexandria regarded the embodiment of God in the person of Jesus Christ to be so mystically powerful that it spread out from the body of the God-man into the rest of the race, to reconstitute human nature into a graced and deified condition of the saints (Jesus Christ as the new Adam), one that promised immortality and transfiguration to believers (see theosis). Nestorius, on the other hand, saw the incarnation as primarily a moral and ethical example to the faithful, to follow in the footsteps of Jesus. Cyril repeatedly stressed the simple idea that it was God who walked the streets of Nazareth (hence Mary was Theotokos or Mother of God), and God who had appeared in a transfigured humanity (see the theophany). Nestorius spoke of the distinct 'Jesus the Man' and 'the divine Logos' in ways that Cyril thought were too dichotomous, widening the ontological gap between man and God in a way that would annihilate the person (hypostasis) of Christ a position termed dyophysite.

Ecumenism between the Assyrian church and the Roman Catholic church is an on-going process. Most recently, on November 11, 1994, an historic meeting of Mar Dinkha IV and Roman Catholic Pope John Paul II took place in the Vatican and a Common Christological Declaration was signed. One side effect of this meeting was that the Assyrian Church's relationship to the Chaldean Catholic Church was improved.

In September 2006, Mar Dinkha IV paid a historic visit to Northern Iraq to give oversight to the churches there and to encourage the governor of the Kurdish region to open a Christian school as well as a library in Arbil.

Oriental Orthodoxy

Eastern Orthodoxy strives to keep the faith of the seven Ecumenical Councils. In contrast, the term "Oriental Orthodoxy" refers to the churches of Eastern Christian traditions that keep the faith of only the first three ecumenical councils — the First Council of Nicaea, the First Council of Constantinople and the Council of Ephesus — and rejected the dogmatic definitions of the Council of Chalcedon. Those who disagreed with the Council of Chalcedon are sometimes called "Oriental Orthodox" to distinguish them from the Eastern Orthodox, who accepted the Council of Chalcedon. Oriental Orthodox are also sometimes referred to as "monophysites", "non-Chalcedonians", or "anti-Chalcedonians", although today the Oriental Orthodox Church denies that it is monophysite and prefers the term "miaphysite", to denote the "joined" nature of Jesus. The council of Chalcedonia was held to clarify that the opposite of Nestorian's heresy was not established. Nestorianism did not necessarily oppose the divinity of Christ, but it did assert that the divinity of Christ was separate from the person born of Mary. In the case of the council of Chalcedon, Jesus Christ's existence (one hypostasis) was established to have both a human and a divine will. The difference was that the Eastern Orthodox insisted that Christ be expressed as having both human and divine natures (physis) that are separate from one another and did not mix, yet are in one existence or reality (hypostasis) called the hypostatic union. The dogma chosen by the Oriental Orthodox was interpreted to express that Jesus Christ had two natures (both human and divine) that were mixed into a one single nature (physis). This was interpreted from the Byzantine position to be an argument that greatly diminished the human reality of Christ, by also making the human will of Christ one not of freewill.

The Church in Egypt or the Coptic church and the (Patriarchate of Alexandria) split into two groups following the Council of Chalcedon (451). Eventually this led to each group (Eastern Orthodox and Oriental Orthodox) having its own Patriarch (Pope) established in Alexandria. Those that remained in communion with the other patriarchs (those who accepted the Council of Chalcedon) were called "Melkites" (the king's men, because Constantinople was the city of the emperors) [not to be confused with the Melkite Catholics of Antioch], and are today known as the Greek Orthodox Church of Alexandria, currently led by Patriarch Theodore II. Those who disagreed with the findings of the Council of Chalcedon are today known as the Coptic Orthodox Church of Alexandria. This included the Ethiopian Orthodox Tewahedo Church and the Armenian Orthodox church. There was a similar split in Syria (Patriarchate of Antioch) into the Greek Orthodox Church of Antioch and the Syriac Orthodox Church.

Both the Eastern Orthodox and Oriental Orthodox churches formally believe themselves to be the continuation of the true church and the other to have fallen into schism, although in the past 20 years much work had been done toward ecumenism or reconciliation between the Oriental and Eastern Orthodox churches. There has been an attempt to achieve ecumenism (Russian: sobornost) between the Antiochian and Oriental Orthodox churches. At Chambesy in Switzerland, plenary talks were held resulting in agreements in 1989, 1990 and 1993. All official representatives of the Eastern Orthodox and the Oriental Orthodox reached agreement in these dialogues that the Christological differences between the two communions are more a matter of emphasis than of substance. Although elements in a number of the Eastern Orthodox Churches have criticized the apparent consensus reached by the representatives at Chambesy, the patriarch and holy synod of the Antiochian Orthodox Church welcomed the agreements as positive moves towards a sharing in the Love of God, and a rejection of the hatred of insubstantial division. As recommended in the Second Chambesy Agreement of 1990, the Antiochian (Eastern) Orthodox Patriarch Ignatius IV formally met with the Syriac (Oriental) Orthodox Patriarch, Ignatius Zakka I, on July 22, 1991. At that meeting, the two patriarchs signed a pastoral agreement which called for "complete and mutual respect between the two churches." Antiochian Orthodox Archidioces of Australia & New Zealand. . It also prohibited the passing of faithful from one church to the other, envisaged joint meetings of the two holy synods when appropriate, and provided for future guidelines for inter-communion of the faithful and Eucharistic concelebration by the clergy of the two churches. The Church of Antioch expects these guidelines to be issued when the faithful of both churches are ready, but not before. Patriarch Ignatius has also overseen participation in a bilateral commission with the Melkite Greek Catholic Church, which is exploring ways of healing the 18th century schism between the Melkite Catholics and the Antiochian Orthodox. In an unprecedented event, Melkite Patriarch Maximos V addressed a meeting of the Orthodox holy synod in October 1996. The members of the holy synod of Antioch continue to explore greater communication and more friendly meetings with their Syriac, Melkite, and Maronite brothers and sisters, who all share a common heritage.

Iconoclasm

Resolved under the Seventh Ecumenical Council, Iconoclasm was a movement within the Eastern Christian Byzantine church to establish that the Christian culture of portraits (see icon) of the family of Christ and subsequent Christians and biblical scenes were not of a Christian origin and therefore heretical. There were two periods of Iconoclasm 730-787 and 813-843. This movement itself was later defined as heretical under the Seventh Ecumenical council. The group destroyed much of the Christian churches' art history, which is needed in addressing the traditional interruptions of the Christian faith and the artistic works that in the early church were devoted to Jesus Christ or God. Many Glorious works were destroyed during this period. Two prototypes of icons would be the Christ Pantocrator and the Icon of the Hodegetria. In the West the tradition of icons have been seen as the veneration of "graven images" or against "no graven images" as noted in Exodus 20:4. From the Orthodox point of view graven then would be engraved or carved. Thus this restriction would include many of the ornaments that Moses was commanded to create in the passages right after the commandment was given i.e. the carving of cherubim Exodus 26:1. The commandment as understood by such out of context interpretation would mean "no carved images". This would include the cross and other holy artifacts. The commandment in the East is understand that the people of God are not to create idols and then worship them. It is "right worship" to worship which is of God, which is Holy and that alone.

Hesychast Controversy

Under church tradition the practice of Hesychasm has it beginnings in the bible, Matthew 6:6 and the Philokalia. The tradition of contemplation with inner silence or tranquility is shared by all Eastern ascenticism having it's roots in the Egyptian Traditions of Monasticism exemplified by such Orthodox monastics as St Anthony of Egypt. About the year 1337 Hesychasm attracted the attention of a learned member of the Orthodox Church, Barlaam, a Calabrian monk who at that time held the office of abbot in the Monastery of St Saviour's in Constantinople and who visited Mount Athos. There, Barlaam encountered Hesychasts and heard descriptions of their practices, also reading the writings of the teacher in Hesychasm of St Gregory Palamas, himself an Athonite monk. Hesychasm is a form of constant purposeful prayer or experiential prayer, explicitly referred to as contemplation. It is to focus ones mind on God and pray to God unceasingly. The hesychasts stated that at higher stages of their prayer practice they reached the actual contemplation-union with the Tabor Light, i.e. Uncreated Divine Light or photomos seen by the apostles in the event of the Transfiguration of Christ and Saint Paul while on the road to Damascus. It is depicted in icons and theological discourse also as tongues of fire.

Trained in Western Scholastic theology, Barlaam was scandalized by Hesychasm and began to campaign against it. As a teacher of theology in the Western Scholastic mode, Barlaam propounded a more intellectual and propositional approach to the knowledge of God than the Hesychasts taught. In particular, Barlaam took exception to, as heretical and blasphemous, the doctrine entertained by the Hesychasts as to the nature of the uncreated light, the experience of which was said to be the goal of Hesychast practice. It was maintained by the Hesychasts to be of divine origin and to be identical to that light which had been manifested to Jesus' disciples on Mount Tabor at the Transfiguration. Barlaam held this concept to be polytheistic, inasmuch as it postulated two eternal substances, a visible (immanent) and an invisible God (transcendent).

On the Hesychast side, the controversy was taken up by Antonite St Gregory Palamas, afterwards Archbishop of Thessalonica, who was asked by his fellow monks on Mt Athos to defend Hesychasm from the Barlaam's attacks. St Gregory was well-educated in Greek philosophy (dialectical method) and thus able to defend Hesychasm using Western precepts. In the 1340s, he defended Hesychasm at three different synods in Constantinople, and also wrote a number of works in its defense.

In 1341 the dispute came before a synod held at Constantinople and was presided over by the Emperor Andronicus; the synod, taking into account the regard in which the writings of the pseudo-Dionysius were held, condemned Barlaam, who recanted and returned to Calabria, afterwards becoming a bishop in the Roman Catholic Church. Three other synods on the subject were held, at the second of which the followers of Barlaam gained a brief victory. But in 1351 at a synod under the presidency of the Emperor John VI Cantacuzenus, Hesychast doctrine was established as the doctrine of the Orthodox Church.

One of Barlaam's friends, Gregory Akindynos, who originally was also a friend of Gregory's, later took up the controversy. Another opponent of Palamism was Manuel Kalekas who sought to reconcile the Eastern and Western Churches. Following the decision of 1351, there was strong repression against anti-Palamist thinkers. Kalekas reports on this repression as late as 1397, and for theologians in disagreement with Palamas, there was ultimately no choice but to emigrate and convert to Catholicism, a path taken by Kalekas as well as Demetrios Kydones and Ioannes Kypariossiotes. This exodus of highly educated Greek scholars, later reinforced by refugees following the Fall of Constantinople of 1453, had a significant influence on the first generation (that of Petrarca and Boccaccio) of the incipient Italian Renaissance.

Up to this day, the Roman Catholic Church has never fully accepted Hesychasm, especially the distinction between the energies or operations of God and the essence of God, and the notion that those energies or operations of God are uncreated . In Roman Catholic theology as it has developed since the Scholastic period, the essence of God can be known, but only in the next life; the grace of God is always created; and the essence of God is pure act, so that there can be no distinction between the energies or operations and the essence of God (see, e.g., the Summa Theologiae of St Thomas Aquinas). .

Contemporary historians Emperor John VI Kantakouzenos and Nicephorus Gregoras deal very copiously with this subject, taking the Hesychast and Barlaamite sides respectively. The Orthodox perspective is one that states that there is scientific knowledge based on demonstration and spiritual knowledge based on demonstration. That the two understandings must remain separate in order to have a proper understanding of both in order to reject dualism. The Eastern approach to understanding God and spiritual matters as one that should not be approached with a Scholastic and or dialectical method (philosophy).

Modern Ecumenism

Modern Ecumenism between different Orthodox groups of the Mideast is a long and evolving process as can be seen in the mention in this article of the very active Ecumenist movement between the Oriental Orthodox and the Eastern Orthodox. Also the very active communication between Rome and Roman Catholicism and the Eastern Orthodox communities.

Modern Ecumenism under such organizations as the World Council of Churches or WCC is seen by critics as a movement that at its core, has the reversal of the Early church councils as its intention. Rather than seeking God as truth and submitting to God as truth the modern movement appears to place unity as the highest priority, at the expense of truth.

Tensions between the East and the West

The cracks and fissures in Christian unity which led to the East-West Schism started to become evident as early as the fourth century. Although 1054 is the date usually given for the beginning of the Great Schism, there is, in fact, no specific date on which the schism occurred. What really happened was a complex chain of events whose climax culminated with the sacking of Constantinople by the Fourth Crusade in 1204 .

The events leading to schism were not exclusively theological in nature. Cultural, political, and linguistic differences were often mixed with the theological. Any narrative of the schism which emphasizes one at the expense of the other will be fragmentary. Unlike the Coptics or Armenians who broke from the Church in the fifth century and established ethnic churches at the cost of their universality and catholicity, the eastern and western parts of the Church remained loyal to the faith and authority of the seven ecumenical councils. They were united, by virtue of their common faith and tradition, in one Church.

Nonetheless, the transfer of the Roman capital to Constantinople inevitably brought mistrust, rivalry, and even jealousy to the relations of the two great sees, Rome and Constantinople. It was easy for Rome to be jealous of Constantinople at a time when it was rapidly losing its political prominence. In fact, Rome refused to recognize the conciliar legislation which promoted Constantinople to second rank. But the estrangement was also helped along by the German invasions in the West, which effectively weakened contacts. The rise of Islam with its conquest of most of the Mediterranean coastline (not to mention the arrival of the pagan Slavs in the Balkans at the same time) further intensified this separation by driving a physical wedge between the two worlds. The once homogeneous unified world of the Mediterranean was fast vanishing. Communication between the Greek East and the Latin West by the 600s had become dangerous and practically ceased.

Two basic problems -- the primacy of the bishop of Rome and the procession of the Holy Spirit -- were involved. These doctrinal novelties were first openly discussed in Photius's patriarchate.

By the fifth century, Christendom was divided into a pentarchy of five sees with Rome holding the primacy. This was determined by canonical decision and did not entail hegemony of any one local church or patriarchate over the others. However, Rome began to interpret her primacy in terms of sovereignty, as a God-given right involving universal jurisdiction in the Church. The collegial and conciliar nature of the Church, in effect, was gradually abandoned in favor of a supremacy of unlimited papal power over the entire Church. These ideas were finally given systematic expression in the West during the Gregorian Reform movement of the eleventh century. The Eastern churches viewed Rome's understanding of the nature of episcopal power as being in direct opposition to the Church's essentially conciliar structure and thus saw the two ecclesiologies as mutually antithetical.

This fundamental difference in ecclesiology would cause all attempts to heal the schism and bridge the divisions to fail. Characteristically, Rome insisted on basing her monarchical claims to "true and proper jurisdiction" (as the Vatican Council of 1870 put it) on St. Peter. This "Roman" exegesis of Mathew 16:18, however, was unknown to the patriarchs of Eastern Orthodoxy. For them, specifically, St. Peter's primacy could never be the exclusive prerogative of any one bishop. All bishops must, like St. Peter, confess Jesus as the Christ and, as such, all are St. Peter's successors. The churches of the East gave the Roman See, primacy but not supremacy. The Pope being the first among equals, but not infallible and not with absolute authority.

The other major irritant to Eastern Orthodoxy was the Western interpretation of the procession of the Holy Spirit. Like the primacy, this too developed gradually and entered the Creed in the West almost unnoticed. This theologically complex issue involved the addition by the West of the Latin phrase filioque ("and from the Son") to the Creed. The original Creed sanctioned by the councils and still used today by the Orthodox Church did not contain this phrase; the text simply states "the Holy Spirit, the Lord and Giver of Life, who proceeds from the Father." Theologically, the Latin interpolation was unacceptable to Eastern Orthodoxy since it implied that the Spirit now had two sources of origin and procession, the Father and the Son, rather than the Father alone. In short, the balance between the three persons of the Trinity was altered and the understanding of the Trinity and God confused. The result, the Orthodox Church believed, then and now, was theologically indefensible. But in addition to the dogmatic issue raised by the filioque, the Byzantines argued that the phrase had been added unilaterally and, therefore, illegitimately, since the East had never been consulted.

In the final analysis, only another ecumenical council could introduce such an alteration. Indeed the councils, which drew up the original Creed, had expressly forbidden any subtraction or addition to the text.

Photian schism

In the 9th-century-AD, a controversy arose between Eastern (Byzantine, later Orthodox) and Western (Latin, Roman Catholic) Christianity that was precipitated by the opposition of the Roman Pope John VII to the appointment by the Byzantine emperor Michael III of Photius I to the position of patriarch of Constantinople. Photios was refused an apology by the pope for previous points of dispute between the East and West. Photius refused to accept the supremacy of the pope in Eastern matters or accept the filioque clause, which the Latin delegation at his council of his consecration pressed him to accept in order to secure their support.

The controversy also involved Eastern and Western ecclesiastical jurisdictional rights in the Bulgarian church, as well as a doctrinal dispute over the Filioque (“and from the Son”) clause. That had been added to the Nicene Creed by the Latin church, which was later the theological breaking point in the ultimate Great East-West Schism in the eleventh century.

Photius did provide concession on the issue of jurisdictional rights concerning Bulgaria and the papal legates made do with his return of Bulgaria to Rome. This concession, however, was purely nominal, as Bulgaria's return to the Byzantine rite in 870 had already secured for it an autocephalous church. Without the consent of Boris I of Bulgaria, the papacy was unable to enforce any its claims.

Conversion of Eastern and Southern Slavs

The Slavs were among the last of the European peoples to become Christianized. Adoption of Christianity was a long and complex process, but, at the same time, an unavoidable one. The neighboring lands had become Christian centuries before and the paganism of the Slav nations stood out in sharp contrast against this Christianized milieu. It was only a matter of time and circumstance before the Slavs would also become Christian. Part of the question revolved around language. The Roman churches held their liturgy in Latin whereas the Greek churches held their liturgy in Greek. The Slavs resisted adopting Christianity in a language foreign to them.

In the ninth and tenth centuries, Christianity made great inroads into Eastern Europe mainly in Bulgaria, including Kievan Rus'. The evangelization, or Christianization, of the Slavs was initiated by one of Byzantium's most learned churchmen - the Patriarch Photius. Photius has been called the "Godfather of all Slavs". For a period of time, there was a real possibility that all the newly baptized South Slav nations: Serbs, Bulgars, Croats would be placed under Roman, i.e. Papal, spiritual jurisdiction. In the end, only the Croats wound up in the Roman Catholic Church.

Mission to Great Moravia

When Rastislav, the king of Great Moravia, asked Byzantium for teachers who could minister to the Moravians in their own language, Byzantine emperor Michael III chose two brothers, Constantine and Methodius. As their mother was a Slav from the hinterlands of Thessaloniki, the two brothers had been raised speaking the local Slavonic vernacular. Once commissioned, they immediately set about creating an alphabet, the Cyrillic alphabet; they then translated the Scripture and the liturgy into Slavonic. This Slavic dialect became the basis of Old Church Slavonic old Bulgarian which later evolved into Church Slavonic which is the common liturgical language still used by the Russian Orthodox Church and other Slavic Orthodox Christians. The missionaries to the East and South Slavs had great success in part because they used the people's native language rather than Latin or Greek.

In Great Moravia, Constantine and Methodius encountered Frankish missionaries from Germany, representing the western or Latin branch of the Church, and more particularly representing the Holy Roman Empire as founded by Charlemagne, and committed to linguistic, and cultural uniformity. They insisted on the use of the Latin liturgy, and they regarded Moravia and the Slavic peoples as part of their rightful mission field.

When friction developed, the brothers, unwilling to be a cause of dissension among Christians, traveled to Rome to see the Pope, seeking an agreement that would avoid quarreling between missionaries in the field. Constantine entered a monastery in Rome, taking the name Cyril, by which he is now remembered. However, he died only a few weeks thereafter.

Pope Adrian II gave Methodius the title of Archbishop of Sirmium in Bulgaria (now Sremska Mitrovica in Serbia) and sent him back in 869, with jurisdiction over all of Moravia and Pannonia, and authorization to use the Slavonic Liturgy. Soon, however, Prince Ratislav, who had originally invited the brothers to Moravia, died, and his successor did not support Methodius. In 870 the Frankish king Louis and his bishops deposed Methodius at a synod at Ratisbon, and imprisoned him for a little over two years. Pope John VIII secured his release, but instructed him to stop using the Slavonic Liturgy.

In 878, Methodius was summoned to Rome on charges of heresy and using Slavonic. This time Pope John was convinced by the arguments that Methodius made in his defense and sent him back cleared of all charges, and with permission to use Slavonic. The Carolingian bishop who succeeded him, Wiching, suppressed the Slavonic Liturgy and forced the followers of Methodius into exile. Many found refuge with King Boris of Bulgaria (852-889), under whom they reorganized a Slavic-speaking Church. Meanwhile, Pope John's successors adopted a Latin-only policy which lasted for centuries.

Conversion of the Serbs

Methodius' next project was to convert the Serbs. Building on the legacy of Constantine I being of Serbian descent. The Byzantine Empire achieved a great success in 870 when it managed to baptize the Serbian rulers, thus opening the way to the mass conversion of the Serbs to Christianity, accompanied by strong political and cultural influences from the Empire. The Serbian principalities were subordinated to the ecclesiastical metropolises in Split and Syrmium. With Christianization, some of the differences among the tribes were pushed into the background, especially those which were rooted in pagan beliefs, and the path to unification was opened up on the basis of a common Christian culture.

Conversion of the Bulgarians

Some of the disciples, namely St. Kliment and St. Naum who were of noble Bulgarian descent and St. Angelaruis, returned to Bulgaria where they were welcomed by the Bulgarian Tsar Boris I who viewed the Slavonic liturgy as a way to counteract Greek influence in the country. In a short time, the disciples of Cyril and Methodius managed to prepare and instruct the future Bulgarian clergy into the Glagolitic alphabet and the biblical texts and in AD 893, Bulgaria expelled its Greek clergy and proclaimed the Slavonic language as the official language of the church and the state.

Conversion of the Rus'

The success of the conversion of the Bulgarians facilitated the conversion of other East Slavic peoples, most notably the Rus', predecessors of Belarusians, Russians, and Ukrainians. By the beginning of the eleventh century most of the pagan Slavic world, including Russia, Bulgaria and Serbia, had been converted to Byzantine Christianity.

Bulgaria was officially recognized as a patriarchate by Constantinople in 945, Serbia in 1346, and Russia in 1589. All these nations, however, had been converted long before these dates.

The traditional event associated with the conversion of Russia is the baptism of Vladimir of Kiev in 989, on which occasion he was also married to the Byzantine princess Anna, the sister of the Byzantine Emperor Basil II. However, the presents of Christianity in these areas is documented to have predated this event.

The East-West Schism

In the 11th century the East-West Schism took place between Rome and Constantinople, which led to separation of the Church of the West, the Roman Catholic Church, and the Eastern Orthodox Church. There were doctrinal issues like the filioque clause and the authority of the Pope involved in the split, but these were exacerbated by cultural and linguistic differences between Latins and Greeks. Prior to that, the Eastern and Western halves of the Church had frequently been in conflict, particularly during the periods of iconoclasm and the Photian schism. The Orthodox East perceived the Papacy as taking on monarch type characteristics that where not inline with the church's historical tradition.

The Crusades against the Eastern Orthodox

The final breach between East and West is often considered to have arisen after the capture and sacking of Constantinople by the Fourth Crusade in 1204. Crusades against Christians in the East by Roman Catholic crusaders was not exclusive to this crusade nor the Mediterranean. The sacking of Constantinople and the Church of Holy Wisdom, and the establishment of the Latin Empire in Constantinople and also throughout West Asia Minor and Greece (see the Kingdom of Thessalonica, Kingdom of Cyprus) are considered definitive though. This is in light of perceived Roman Catholic atrocities not exclusive to the capital city of Constantinople in 1204. The establishment of the Latin Empire in 1204 was intended to supplant the Orthodox Byzantine Empire. This is symbolized by many Orthodox churches being converted into Roman Catholic properties and churches like Hagia Sophia and Church of the Pantokrator, and it is viewed with some rancor to the present day. Some of the European Christian community activily endorsed the attacking of Eastern Christians.

The Teutonic Order's attempts to conquer Orthodox Russia (particularly the Republics of Pskov and Novgorod), an enterprise endorsed by Pope Gregory IX, can also be considered as a part of the Northern Crusades. One of the major blows for the idea of the conquest of Russia was the Battle of the Ice in 1242. With or without the Pope's blessing, Sweden also undertook several crusades against Orthodox Novgorod. Many in the East saw the actions of the West in the Mediterranean as a prime determining factor in the weakening of Byzantium which led to the Empire's eventual conquest and fall to Islam. Another though minor point of contention (primarily with the Serbs) is the looting of the Serbian country side during the People's Crusade and also the establishment of the Empire of Trebizond in Ukraine by the Fourth Crusade. Some Eastern Orthodox see a continuation of Roman Catholic hostility in the establishment of the Uniate or Eastern Catholic Churches (see the sainting of Bissarion in 1950).

In 2004, Pope John Paul II extended a formal apology for the sacking of Constantinople in 1204; the apology was formally accepted by Patriarch Bartholomew of Constantinople. Many things that were stolen during this time: holy relics, riches, and many other items, are still held in various Western European cities, particularly Venice.

Byzantine Empire

The establishment of the Eastern Roman Empire

It was in the establishment of the Eastern Roman Empire by Constantine I that Christianity was legalized. Christianity as Orthodox (or those who rejected the theology of Arius) was not established as the State Religion in the Eastern part of the Roman Empire until Theodosius I convened The First Council of Constantinople or the (second ecumenical council) in 381. This council putting an end to the Arian controversy by establishing the Trinitarian doctrine.

The Roman-Persian Wars

Lasting from 92BC to 627AD the conflict between the Persian and Roman Empires was a protracted struggle which was arguably a continuation of the Greco-Persian Wars. The Roman-Persian Wars led to weakening of the neighboring Arab states to the South and East of the Eastern Roman Empire. The conflict so drained both the Persian and Byzantine empires that once the conquests of Muhammad started, neither could mount an effective defense against the onslaught. Persia fell to the Muslims (see conquests).

Byzantine-Arab Wars

Following the death of Muhammad in 632, there was a vigorous push by the Arab Muslims to conquer Arab tribes of the East such as the mostly Christian Ghassanids. The Byzantine-Muslim Wars were a series of wars between the Arab Muslims Caliphates and the Eastern Orthodox Byzantine Empire. These started during the initial Muslim conquests under the Rashidun and Umayyad caliphs and continued in the form of an enduring border tussle until the beginning of the Crusades. As a result the Byzantines saw an extensive loss of territory.

The initial conflict lasted from 629-717, ending with the Second Arab Siege of Constantinople that halted the rapid expansion of the Arab Muslim Empire or Umayyad dynasty into Asia Minor. Conflicts with the Caliphate however continued between the 800s and 1169. The Muslim victories resulted in the Byzantine emperor Alexius I Comnenus request for military aid from Pope Urban II at the Council of Piacenza in 1095; one of the events often attributed as precursors to the First Crusade.

Ottoman Empire

In 1453AD, the city of Constantinople the last stronghold of the Byzantine Empire fell to the Ottoman Empire.

By this time Egypt had been under Muslim control for some seven centuries. Jerusalem had been conquered by the Umayyad Muslims in 638, won back by Rome in 1099 under the First Crusade and then finally reconquered by the Ottoman Muslims in 1517.

Orthodoxy however was very strong in Russia which had recently acquired an autocephalous status; and thus Moscow called itself the Third Rome, as the cultural heir of Constantinople.

Under Ottoman rule, the Greek Orthodox Church acquired power as an autonomous millet. The ecumenical patriarch was the religious and administrative ruler of the entire "Greek Orthodox nation" (Ottoman administrative unit), which encompassed all the Eastern Orthodox subjects of the Empire.

The Ottoman Empire was marked by periods of limited tolerance and periods of often bloody repression of non-Muslims. One of the worst such episodes occurred under Yavuz Sultan Selim I. These event include the atrocities against the Serbs in AD 1804-1878 the Greeks in AD 1814-1832 . and the Bulgarian AD 1876-1877 to selectively name but a few instances (also see Phanariote). As well as many individual Christians being made martyrs for stating their faith or speaking negatively against Islam. The Janissary army corps consisted of young men who were brought to Istanbul as child-slaves (and were often from Christian households) who were converted, trained and later employed by the Sultan (the devshirme system).

Isolation from the West

As a result of the Ottoman conquest of the Byzantine Empire in 1453, and the Fall of Constantinople, the entire Orthodox communion of the Balkans and the Near East became suddenly isolated from the West. For the next four hundred years, it would be confined within a hostile Islamic world, with which it had little in common religiously or culturally. Only the Russian Orthodox Church was the only part of the Orthodox communion which remained outside the control of the Ottoman empire. It is, in part, due to this geographical and intellectual confinement that the voice of Eastern Orthodoxy was not heard during the Reformation in sixteenth century Europe. As a result, this important theological debate often seems strange and distorted to the Orthodox; after all, they never took part in it and thus neither Reformation nor Counter-Reformation is part of their theological framework.

Religious Rights Under the Ottoman Empire

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The new Ottoman government that arose from the ashes of Byzantine civilization was neither primitive nor barbaric. Islam not only recognized Jesus as a great prophet, but tolerated Christians as another People of the Book. As such, the Church was not extinguished nor was its canonical and hierarchical organization completely destroyed. Its administration continued to function though in lesser degree, no longer being the state religion. One of the first things that Mehmet the Conqueror did was to allow the Church to elect a new patriarch, Gennadius Scholarius. The Hagia Sophia and the Parthenon, which had been Christian churches for nearly a millennium were, admittedly, converted into mosques, yet countless other churches, both in Constantinople and elsewhere, remained in Christian hands. They were endowed with civil as well as ecclesiastical power over all Christians in Ottoman territories. Because Islamic law makes no distinction between nationality and religion, all Christians, regardless of their language or nationality, were considered a single millet, or nation. The patriarch, as the highest ranking hierarch, was thus invested with civil and religious authority and made ethnarch, head of the entire Christian Orthodox population. Practically, this meant that all Orthodox Churches within Ottoman territory were under the control of Constantinople. Thus, the authority and jurisdictional frontiers of the patriarch were enormously enlarged.

However, these rights and privileges (see Dhimmitude), including freedom of worship and religious organization, were often established in principle but seldom corresponded to reality. The legal privileges of the patriarch and the Church depended, in fact, on the whim and mercy of the Sultan and the Sublime Porte, while all Christians were viewed as little more than second-class citizens. Moreover, Turkish corruption and brutality were not a myth. That it was the "infidel" Christian who experienced this more than anyone else is not in doubt. Nor were pogroms of Christians in these centuries unknown (see Greco-Turkish relations and Massacres during the Greek Revolution). Devastating, too, for the Church was the fact that it could not bear witness to Christ. Missionary work among Muslims was dangerous and indeed impossible, whereas conversion to Islam was entirely legal and permissible. Converts to Islam who returned to Orthodoxy were put to death as apostates. No new churches could be built and even the ringing of church bells was prohibited. Education of the clergy and the Christian population either ceased altogether or was reduced to the most rudimentary elements.

Corruption

The Orthodox Church found itself subject to the Turkish system of corruption. The patriarchal throne was frequently sold to the highest bidder, while new patriarchal investiture was accompanied by heavy payment to the government. In order to recoup their losses, patriarchs and bishops taxed the local parishes and their clergy. Nor was the patriarchal throne ever secure. Few patriarchs between the fifteenth and the nineteenth centuries died a natural death while in office. The forced abdications, exiles, hangings, drownings, and poisonings of patriarchs are well documented. But if the patriarch's position was precarious so was the hierarchy's. The hanging of patriarch Gregory V from the gate of the patriarchate on Easter Sunday 1821 was accompanied by the execution of two metropolitans and twelve bishops.

Devshirmeh

Devshirmeh was the system of the collection of young boys from conquered Christian lands by the Ottoman sultans as a form of regular taxation in order to build a loyal slave army (formerly largely composed of war captives) and the class of (military) administrators called the "Janissaries", or other servants such as tellak in hamams. The word devşirme means "collecting, gathering" in Ottoman Turkish. Boys delivered to the Ottomans in this way were called ghilmán or acemi oglanlar ("novice boys").

Fall of the Ottoman Empire in the East

The fall of the Ottoman was precipiated by the Roman Catholic and Eastern Orthodox disputed possession of the Church of the Nativity and the Church of the Holy Sepulchre in Jerusalem. During the early 1850s, the two sides made demands which the Sultan could not possibly satisfy simultaneously. In 1853, the Sultan adjudicated in favour of the French, despite the vehement protestations of the local Orthodox monks. The ruling Ottoman siding with Rome over the Orthodox provoked out right war (see the Eastern Question). As the Ottoman Empire had been for sometime falling into political, social and economic decay (see the Sick Man of Europe) this conflict ignited the Crimean War in 1850 between Russia and the Ottoman Empire.

Persecution by the "Young Turks"

During 1894-1923 the Ottoman Empire conducted a policy of genocide against the Christian population living within its extensive territory. The Sultan, Abdul Hamid, issued an official governmental policy of genocide against the Armenians of the Ottoman Empire in 1894. Systematic massacres took place in 1894-1896 when Abdul savagely killed 300,000 Armenians throughout the provinces. In 1909 government troops killed, in the towns of Adana alone, over 20,000 Christian Armenians.

When World War I broke out, the Ottoman Empire was ruled by the "Young Turks" that allied the empire with Germany. In 20th century, the number of Orthodox Christians, and of Christians in general, in the Anatolian peninsula has sharply declined amidst complaints of Turkish governmental repression of various Eastern and Oriental Orthodox groups.

In the first two decades of the 20th century, there were massacres of Orthodox Greeks, Slavs, and Armenians in the Ottoman empire, culminating in the Armenian Genocide, the exodus of Pontian Greeks resulting in the deaths of hundreds of thousands Pontic Greeks, and the near destruction of the ancient Assyrian community in Anatolia or Asia Minor.

Republic of Turkey

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During the Lausanne Conference in 1923, the Turkish and Greek sides after some discussions accepted the proposal of a population exchange. Muslims in Greece (save the ones in Eastern Thrace) were expelled to Turkey, and Greek Orthodox people in Turkey (save the ones in Istanbul) were expelled to Greece.

In September 1955, a pogrom was directed primarily at Istanbul's 100,000-strong Greek minority. In 1971, the Halki seminary in Istanbul was closed along with other private higher education institutions in Turkey.

The modern Turkish state requires the Patriarch of Constantinople to be a Turkish citizen but allows the Synod of Constantinople to elect him.

Orthodoxy in other Muslim-majority states of the Middle East and Central Asia

Orthodoxy under the Palestinian National Authority (including Gaza). Orthodoxy in Saudia Arabia, Yemen, Jordan, Syria, Iran, Iraq, Afghanistan, Tajikistan, Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan, Turkmenistan (see Melkite and Kurdish Christians).

Russia under Muslim Mongol rule

Russia lay under Mongol rule from the 13th through the 15th century. The Mongol invasion of Rus of 1237–1242AD lead to what is called the Tatar period in Russian History. This period lead to great calamity for the internal structure of Russia. Much of Russia was ruled by Mongols and Russian Princes (of whom had limited power). The eventual end of the reign of the Golden Horde is said to have begun with the Battle of Kulikovo September 8, 1380. Which involves the famous Eastern Orthodox legend of Monk and Russian champion Alexander Peresvet and his death that mark the battle's beginning. The final pseudo-battle or face off that ended Mongol rule in Russia was the Great stand on the Ugra river in 1480AD. The death toll (by battle, massacre, flooding, and famine) of the Mongol wars of conquest is placed at about 40 million according to some sources.

Orthodox Church in China

The Chinese Orthodox Church was an autonomous Eastern Orthodox church in China, which, prior to the Chinese Cultural Revolution in 1966, was estimated to have as many as twenty thousand members. Nowadays, Orthodox Christianity is practiced primarily by the ethnic Russian minority in China.

Medieval period

An early medieval mission of the Assyrian Church of the East brought Christianity to China but it was suppressed in the 9th century. The Christianity of that period is commemorated by the Nestorian Stele and Daqin Pagoda of Xi'an,

Russian Mission

Eastern Orthodoxy arrived in China via Siberia in 1685. In that year, the Kangxi Emperor resettled 31 inhabitants from the captured fort of Albazin on the Amur River. Maxim Leontiev, the priest who led the 30 others, dedicated the first Eastern Orthodox church in Beijing. Their descendants, or Albazinians, though thoroughly Sinicized in other respects, still adhere to Eastern Orthodoxy.

The first mission establishment was begun in 1715 at Beijing by an Orthodox Archimandrite, Hilarion. Under Sava Vladislavich's pressure, the Chinese conceded to the Russians the right to build an Orthodox chapel at the ambassadorial quarters of Beijing. The intention of the mission was not to evangelize among the Chinese but merely to serve as chaplains to the original mission and, later, to the Russian diplomatic mission staff as well.

In the first 150 years of its presence in China, the church did not attract a large following. In 1860 it was estimated that there were no more than 200 Orthodox Christians in Beijing, including the descendants of naturalized Russians. There was, however, a resurgence in membership after 1860.

The Boxer Rebellion and the Cultural Revolution

The Boxer Rebellion of 1898–1900 saw violent attacks on Chinese converts to Christianity. Some Orthodox Chinese were among those killed, and in June every year the 222 Chinese Orthodox, including Father Mitrophan, who died in 1900 are commemorated as remembered on the icon of the Holy Martyrs of China. The mission's library at Beijing was also burned down. In spite of the uprising, by 1902 there were 32 Orthodox churches in China, with close to 6,000 adherents. The church also ran schools and orphanages.

106 Orthodox churches were opened in China by 1949. In general the parishioners of these churches were Russian refugees, and the Chinese part was composed of about 10,000 people. The Cultural Revolution obliterated or nearly obliterated the Chinese Orthodox Church. Many churches where destroyed during the Cultural Revolution.

Today

Although the People's Republic of China extends official recognition to some religious communities (Protestantism, Islam, Taoism, and Buddhism), Orthodox Christianity and Roman Catholicism are not among them (though with the latter, the Chinese government had formed a "Patriotic Catholic Church" or "Patriotic Catholic Association" that is not in communion with Rome). The officially declared reason for the government's non-recognition of the Orthodox Church is the government's fear that external political forces from outside nations—in this case, primarily Russia—could achieve influence within China. This places the Church in the legal status of religia-illicitata.

Several Orthodox congregations continue to meet in Beijing and northeast China (in Heilongjiang and elsewhere), with, apparently, the tacit consent of the government. There are also Orthodox parishes in Shanghai, Province of Guangdong, Hong Kong, and Taiwan.

Meanwhile, as of the early 21st century, The Church operates relatively freely in Hong Kong (where the Ecumenical Patriarch has sent a metropolitan, Bishop Nikitas and the Russian Orthodox parish of St Peter and St Paul resumed its operation) and Taiwan (where archimandrite Jonah George Mourtos leads a mission church).

Orthodox Evenkis

Although many of them have adopted Lamaism — which is the mainstream form of Tibetan Mahayana Buddhism — the Evenks of both the Russian Federation and the People's Republic of China are a nominally Orthodox Christian people. Along with their Evenks cousins and a few other tribes in Siberia or in China, they are some of the only Asiatic peoples who nominally practice Orthodox Christianity, which they had voluntarily (as opposed to being coerced to do so) adopted during contacts from Russian expansion into Siberia.

The Eastern Catholic Churches or Byzantine Rite Churches

Eastern Catholic Churches make up 2% of the membership of the Catholic Church, and less than 10% of all Eastern Christians. Most Eastern Catholic Churches have counterparts in other Eastern Churches, whether Assyrian or Oriental Orthodox, from whom they are separated by a number of theological differences, or the Eastern Orthodox Churches, from whom they are separated primarily by differences in understanding of the role of the Bishop of Rome within the College of Bishops.

The Eastern Catholic Churches were located historically in Eastern Europe, the Asian Middle East, Northern Africa and India, but are now, because of migration, found also in Western Europe, the Americas and Oceania.

Origins

The Eastern Catholic movement within the Antiochian church started after the Ottoman Turks' conquest of Antioch in the early 15th century, under whose control it remained until the breakup of the Ottoman Empire at the end of World War I. During this period, in 1724, the Church of Antioch was again weakened by schism, as a major portion of its faithful came into submission to the Roman Catholic Church. The resultant Uniate body is known as the Melkite Greek Catholic Church, which in the current day maintains close ties with the Orthodox and is currently holding ongoing talks about healing the schism and returning the Melkites to Orthodoxy.

The Uniate movement within the Eastern Bloc of the Roman Catholic church was started in 1698 by Habsburg emperor Leopold I in his bid to assimilate the Eastern Orthodox in his territories (including Romania). The movement asked the Eastern Orthodox patriarchs to accept Papal supremacy, the unleavened Eucharist bread, the existence of purgatory and the filioque doctrine. Leopold I offered in return that the various Eastern Orthodox churches who complied would receive equal privileges with the Hapsburg Catholics, along with an exemption for the clergy from labor services and other financial duties.

Conflict between Eastern Catholics and Eastern Orthodox

Since the beginnings of the Uniate movement, there have been periodic conflicts between the Orthodox and Unia in Poland and Western Russia. . During the Time of Troubles there was a plan (by the conquering Polish monarchy) to convert all of Russia to Roman Catholism. Patriarch Hermogenes was martyred by the Roman Catholics during this period (see also Polish-Lithuanian-Muscovite Commonwealth).

The Eastern Catholic churches consider themselves to have reconciled the East and West Schism by keeping their prayers and rituals similar to those of Eastern Orthodoxy, while also accepting the primacy of the Bishop of Rome.

Some Eastern Orthodox charge that joining in this unity comes at the expense of ignoring critical doctrinal differences and past atrocities. From the perspective of many Eastern Orthodox, Eastern Catholicism is a ploy by Roman Catholicism to undermine and ultimately destroy their church by undermining its legitimacy and absorbing it into the Roman Catholic church. It is feared that this ploy would diminish the power to the original eastern Patriarchs of the church and would require the acceptance of rejected doctrines and Scholasticism over faith.

In the 20th century, there have been conflicts which involved forced conversions both by the Roman Catholics and the Eastern Orthodox. In Croatia, the Ustaše forced the conversion of Eastern Orthodox to Roman Catholicism. Other forced conversions included the Roman Catholics inside the USSR and Eastern Bloc after the October Revolution..

Rejection of Uniatism

At a meeting in Balamand, Lebanon in June 1993, the Joint International Commission for the Theological Dialogue between the Roman Catholic Church and the Orthodox Church declared that these initiatives that "led to the union of certain communities with the See of Rome and brought with them, as a consequence, the breaking of communion with their Mother Churches of the East ... took place not without the interference of extra-ecclesial interests" (section 8 of the document); and that what has been called "uniatism" "can no longer be accepted either as a method to be followed nor as a model of the unity our Churches are seeking" (section 12).

At the same time, the Commission stated:

• 3) Concerning the Eastern Catholic Churches, it is clear that they, as part of the Catholic Communion, have the right to exist and to act in response to the spiritual needs of their faithful.
• 16) The Oriental Catholic Churches who have desired to re-establish full communion with the See of Rome and have remained faithful to it, have the rights and obligations which are connected with this communion.

Russian Orthodox Church in the Russian Empire

The Russian Orthodox Church held a privileged position in the Russian Empire, expressed in the motto, Autocracy, Orthodoxy, and National Character, of the late Russian Empire. At the same time, it was placed under the control of the Tsar by the Church reform of Peter I in the 18th century. Its governing body was the Most Holy Synod, which was run by an official, titled Ober-Procurator, appointed by the Tsar himself.

The church was involved in various campaigns of russification, and, as a consequence, it was accused of participating in anti-Jewish pogroms. In the case of anti-semitism and the anti-Jewish pogroms, no evidence is given of the direct participation of the church; it is important to remember that many Russian Orthodox clerics, including senior hierarchs, openly defended persecuted Jews, at least starting with the second half of the nineteenth century. Also, the Church has no official position on Judaism as such. In modern times, Alexandr Solzhenitsyn has been accused of antisemitism for his book Two Hundred Years Together, where he alleges Jewish participation in the political repression of the Soviet regime. Solzhenitsyn's book Two Hundred Years Together is an historical study of the relationship between Russian Orthodox Christians and Jews in Russia from 1772 to modern times.

The Church was allowed to impose taxes on the peasants.

The Church, like the Tsarist state was seen as an enemy of the people by the Bolsheviks and other Russian revolutionaries.

Russian Orthodox Church in the Soviet Union

The Russian Orthodox Church collaborated with the White Army in the Russian Civil War (see White movement) after the October Revolution. This may have further strengthened the Bolshevik animus against the church. According to Lenin, a communist regime cannot remain neutral on the question of religion but must show itself to be merciless towards it. There was no place for the church in Lenin's classless society.

Before and after the October Revolution of November 7, 1917 (October 25 Old Calendar) there was a movement within the Soviet Union to unite all of the people of the world under Communist rule (see Communist International). This included the Eastern European bloc countries as well as the Balkan States. Since some of these Slavic states tied their ethnic heritage to their ethnic churches, both the peoples and their church where targeted by the Soviet and its form of State atheism. The Soviets' official religious stance was one of "religious freedom or tolerance", though the state established atheism as the only scientific truth (see also the Soviet or committee of the All-Union Society for the Dissemination of Scientific and Political Knowledge or Znanie which was until 1947 called the The League of the Militant Godless and various Intelligentsia groups). Criticism of atheism was strictly forbidden and sometimes resulted in imprisonment.

The Soviet Union was the first state to have as an ideological objective the elimination of religion. Toward that end, the Communist regime confiscated church property, ridiculed religion, harassed believers, and propagated atheism in the schools. Actions toward particular religions, however, were determined by State interests, and most organized religions were never outlawed. It is estimated the some 20 million Christians (17 million Orthodox 3 million Roman catholic) died or where interned in gulags. Some actions against Orthodox priests and believers along with execution included torture being sent to prison camps, labour camps or mental hospitals. The result of this militant atheism was to transform the Church into a persecuted and martyred Church. In the first five years after the Bolshevik revolution, 28 bishops and 1,200 priests were executed.

The main target of the anti-religious campaign in the 1920s and 1930s was the Russian Orthodox Church, which had the largest number of faithful. Nearly all of its clergy, and many of its believers, were shot or sent to labor camps. Theological schools were closed, and church publications were prohibited. In the period between 1927 and 1940, the number of Orthodox Churches in the Russian Republic fell from 29,584 to less than 500. Between 1917 and 1940, 130,000 Orthodox priests were arrested. The widespread persecution and internecine disputes within the church hierarchy lead to the seat of Patriarch of Moscow being vacant from 1925-1943.

After Nazi Germany's attack on the Soviet Union in 1941, Joseph Stalin revived the Russian Orthodox Church to intensify patriotic support for the war effort. By 1957 about 22,000 Russian Orthodox churches had become active. But in 1959 Nikita Khrushchev initiated his own campaign against the Russian Orthodox Church and forced the closure of about 12,000 churches. By 1985 fewer than 7,000 churches remained active. Since the fall of the Soviet Union, the Russian Orthodox Church has recognized a number of New Martyrs as saints.

World War II

, , During the Second World War, two groups of Orthodox Christians were especially targeted for genocide by the Nazis and their allie