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Elements for a connected history of Eastern Orthodoxy, 14th-19th c.

Church without Borders: A Successful Project of the Hesychast Patriarchs of the 14th Century

Église sans frontières : un projet réussi des patriarches hésychastes du xive siècle
Lidia Cotovanu

Résumés

Cet article vise à tracer les principales lignes directrices de la politique du Patriarcat de Constantinople dans la seconde moitié du xive siècle. À l’époque, le siège œcuménique est occupé par des prélats issus du mouvement hésychaste. Forts d’une robuste tradition juridique et diplomatique, les patriarches hésychastes ont consacré leurs efforts à l’expansion de l’Église byzantine bien au-delà des limites de plus en plus restreintes de l’État byzantin séculaire, en vue de rassembler le monde orthodoxe autour de la Grande Église de Constantinople. D’une part, ils se sont orientés vers les diocèses slaves du sud afin de récupérer ce qui, à leurs yeux, tombait légitimement dans la juridiction du siège œcuménique. D’autre part, ils se sont consacrés à obtenir la juridiction sur les Églises de Russie, de Valachie et de Moldavie, sous un pouvoir autocratique séculaire qui était indépendant de l’État byzantin. L’autre but majeur était de solliciter les princes orthodoxes afin d’assurer le patronage financier de l’Église orthodoxe dans son ensemble, à commencer par les monastères de l’Athos.

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Notes de l’auteur

This article is a reworked and expanded version of a communication presented at the International conference “Religions and Politics in Europe’s Orients (15th-20th c.)”, Thessaloniki, 11-12 December 2009.

Texte intégral

  • 1 For the emergence and sanctioning of the Hesychast in Byzantium, see in particular Meyendorff 1974, (...)

1The 14th century was decisive for the survival of Orthodoxy, which was facing great difficulty at the time due to the political decline of the Byzantine Empire, the Catholic penetration in the Christian Orient, and the Ottoman advances in the Balkans. The safeguard of Orthodoxy was secured by the Hesychast movement which, born inside the Athonite monastic circles, had entered the Constantinopolitan political scene at the beginning of the century. Throughout the 14th century, following the official adoption of the Hesychast doctrine in Byzantium, the ecumenical see was led by an important number of patriarchs who shared this new orientation. Two of the most important figures among them were Philotheos Kokkinos I (1353-1354, 1364-1376), and Kallistos I (1350-1353, 1355-1363)1.

  • 2 The political dimension of the Hesychast movement has been since long underlined by Tachiaos 1962; (...)
  • 3 Nastase 1979.
  • 4 Halecki 1972; Nerantzi-Varmazi 1993.

2Contrary to the Byzantine humanists who were oriented toward the collaboration with the West and the Union of the Churches, the Hesychast movement, whose political significance is not any longer contested2, intended to confront the Catholic propaganda and the Ottoman peril with the power of the Orthodox tradition, and canonical and secular diplomatic gains of the Great Church of Constantinople. In fact, the policy of the Hesychast patriarchs aimed at more than gathering the armed forces of the orthodox states (Byzantium, the Bulgarian Tsardom divided between Tărnovo and Vidin, the Serbian kingdom, and the Principality of Wallachia)3 or of Christians more generally4, to confront the rise of the Ottoman power and the expansion of the Catholic influence in the Christian Orient.

  • 5 Lomize 1993, pp. 89-96; Panaite 1997, pp. 155-156; Nicol 2001, p. 236; Spiridonakis 1990, pp. 208-2 (...)
  • 6 According to Dagron 1996, p. 239, already around 880, at the time of patriarch Photios, “on a plein (...)
  • 7 Darrouzès 1981, Notitia 20. See also, Mayeur et al. 2000, pp. 145, 146-147.
  • 8 For instance, the metropolitan of Vicina, Makarios, was engaged in writing, at his election to the (...)

3Drawing lessons from the religious tolerance practiced by the advancing Turks, who were conquering Eastern Orthodox provinces5, the patriarchs of Constantinople soon realized the possibility of the dogmatic and institutional survival of the Orthodox Church outside the borders of the secular Byzantium, which was being increasingly reduced to the capital and its surroundings6. As a result, they started multiplying the metropolitan sees in the conquered lands in order to better govern from Constantinople7. Moreover, since 1338, the metropolitans appointed to the sees located in territories conquered by the Muslims had to sign a written commitment to reside in their occupied dioceses and to not return to Constantinople, nor to request a transfer8.

  • 9 Meyendorff 1981; Obolensky 1998, pp. 292-293; Meyendorff, Papadakis 2001, pp. 133-427.
  • 10 Meyendorff, Papadakis 2001, pp. 242-265; Maltezou 2002; Tsirpanlis 2002, with older bibliography.

4Strengthened by this experience, which had been cultivated over many decades already, the Hesychast patriarchs of the mid-14th century developed a vast project of expanding their effective authority beyond the Byzantine state, accompanied with the unification and centralization of the Orthodox world around the Great Church of Constantinople9. The Latins, having barred them the access to the orthodox space under their rule10, these patriarchs focused the bulk of their efforts toward the Balkan Churches (Serbian and Bulgarian), those of the recently founded Danubian Principalities (Wallachia between 1290-1330, Moldavia in 1359), and the extended Russian Church. This article will deal precisely with this direction of action followed by the ecclesiastical circles of Constantinople.

The Great Church of Constantinople beyond the secular Byzantium

  • 11 See the rich bibliography gathered by Mureşan 1999, pp. 5-16.
  • 12 For the role of Mount Athos and the Bulgarian Parorea in the spreading of hesychasm in the Orthodox (...)

5The realization of this project followed two trajectories, each with long-term expectations. Firstly, the high Hesychast clergy tried to achieve the dogmatic, liturgical and cultural homogenization, corresponding to the new Hesychast ideology, of the Orthodox Churches inside and outside the Byzantine state11. A similar work was underway in the monastic centers of Mount Athos, and Parorea, in Bulgarian territory, which started to spread the new models to be followed throughout the Orthodox world, and even faraway Russia12.

  • 13 Guran 2002, pp. 109-124.
  • 14 Mošin 1946; Mešanović 1991; Bojović 1995, pp. 555-558; Ferjančić 1998; Mureşan 2005, chapter I.2, § (...)
  • 15 Lascaris 1931, pp. 171-175; Laurent 1944, pp. 303-310; Tarnanidis 1988, pp. 52-59; Meyendorff 1990, (...)
  • 16 Miklosich, Müller 1860, no CCC, pp. 553-555; Darrouzès, Regestes, I/V, no 2611, pp. 514-515, but al (...)
  • 17 Miklosich, Müller 1860, no CCCIV, pp. 558-560; Darrouzès, Regestes, I/V, no 2614, p. 517. A similar (...)
  • 18 Miklosich, Müller 1860, no CCLXXII, p. 528 (1370, July 24); Darrouzès, Regestes, I/V, no 2586, p. 4 (...)
  • 19 Miklosich, Müller 1860, no CCXLIV, p. 502; Darrouzès, Regestes, no 2547, pp. 461-462 and no 2586, p (...)
  • 20 Miklosich, Müller 1860, no CCXCVI, pp. 551-552; Darrouzès, I/V, no 2607, p. 511.
  • 21 Djurić 1980, pp. 31-50; Meyendorff 1990, pp. 53-54.

6The other way was institutionalization, which consisted of placing the churches outside Byzantium under the direct obedience of the ecumenical Patriarchate, which assumed from then on, in an official manner, the central place within Eastern Christianity13. The effects of this effort appeared in the Balkan regions right after the defeat of the Serbian forces at the Battle of Maritsa in 1371. The ecumenical Patriarchate seized the occasion to achieve reconciliation with the Serbian Church, which had been self-elevated to the rank of Patriarchate in 1346 and had been in canonical rupture with Constantinople since 1350-135114, and bring it back under its jurisdiction15. At a time when the Turkish advance was dramatically challenging the very existence of the Serbian state, the Patriarchate of Constantinople recuperated, one by one, the dioceses of Serres, Melenikon, and Drama, which had once been conquered by Stefan Dušan of Serbia (1331-1355)16. In addition, the metropolitan of Drama was accorded the mandate of patriarchal exarch over the Serbian territories of despot John Ugleša17. Just a year earlier, in 1370, the jurisdiction of the Metropolis of Varna was extended to the region of Silistra (Durostorum), which until that time was dependent on the Bulgarian patriarchal see of Tărnovo18. The Metropolis of Vidin was also recovered, having been entrusted in επίδοσις to the metropolitan of Messembria (1369), a prelate consecrated in Constantinople19. In 1371, the jurisdiction of the Metropolis of Vidin was extended to the region of Sofia20. The patriarchal policy aimed at the Patriarchate of Tărnovo itself, which had been elevated to this rank since 1235, when the Latin conquest of Constantinople had put the ecumenical Patriarchate in a particularly constraining position21.

  • 22 Miklosich, Müller 1860, no 157, pp. 350-351; Darrouzès, Regestes, no 2366, pp. 302-303; Meyendorff (...)
  • 23 Darrouzès, Regestes, no 2336, pp. 278-279, no 2366, p. 302.
  • 24 Miklosich, Müller 1860, no 186, pp. 436-442; Darrouzès, Regestes, I/V, no 2384, p. 318, no 2442, pp (...)

7The ecumenical patriarch Kallistos I seized the opportunity to re-open the file of the Bulgarian Patriarchate in 1352, with the intention of establishing his authority over the Western part of the Russian Principality, when the patriarch of Tărnovo Theodosius II (1348-1371) was asked by Prince Oglierd of Lithuania (1345-1377) to consecrate his own candidate at the head of the Metropolis of Kiev and of Lithuania22. In the same year, the Lithuanian prince’s candidate was excommunicated, his ordination in Tărnovo considered by Constantinople to be non-canonical. This action aimed at preserving the integrity of the Russian Church and holding it under Constantinopolitan control, a topic which will be discussed hereinafter23. A decade later, in 1362, Kallistos I demanded that the Bulgarian Church respect his position as ecumenical patriarch, and reminded it that its patriarchal rank had only an honorary dimension, when, in reality, it was only a metropolitan diocese like any other suffragan Metropolis of the ecumenical Patriarchate24.

  • 25 Turdeanu 1947, pp. 69-139; Tachiaos 1974, pp. 117-118; Bernard 1979, pp. 27-39; Constantinescu 1986
  • 26 In August 1394, the metropolitan of Moldavia Jeremiah, ordained in Constantinople, was assigned the (...)

8Twenty years later, in 1375, the same year that the question of the Serbian Patriarchate of Peć was revisited, the patriarch of Constantinople Philotheos Kokkinos succeeded in imposing the Hesychast Euthymius on the see of Tărnovo. Eventually, he became a prominent figure of the dissemination of Hesychasm in the Southern Slavic world25. Finally, after the Ottoman capture of the city of Tărnovo, in 1393, the Bulgarian Church was definitely brought back under the jurisdiction of the ecumenical see, and in the following years it returned to the rank of Metropolis26. It remained in this position until 1870, when it acceded to the rank of Exarchate, and finally reached its old status of Patriarchate in 1953.

  • 27 Nastase 1979, pp. 125-126; Spiridonakis 1990, p. 212.
  • 28 Yerasimos 1992, pp. 148-151.

9The patriarchal policy toward the Bulgarian and Serbian Churches was, without doubt, facilitated by the political disintegration of the two Southern Slavic States, and by the successive submission of their crowned heads to the Sultan27. This made it difficult to maintain the integrity of the two Churches, but, on the other hand, helped their integral submission to Constantinople. And, to be more specific regarding the case of both Churches, for Constantinople it was a question of recovering and re-integrating two ancient dioceses in the body of the Orthodox Church canonically governed by the ecumenical Patriarchate. Contrary to the Bulgarian Church, which had to wait more than five centuries before breaking away from the ecumenical Patriarchate, once again the Serbian Church had the coveted rank of Patriarchate acknowledged again as early as 1577. This took place because the Ottoman authorities had obvious political interests in supporting such a measure28.

10The situation was completely different for the Churches of the young Principalities of Wallachia and Moldavia, as well as for Russia, which were countries undergoing full political development, and whose territories had never been included within the borders of the Byzantine state. And, yet, the ecumenical Patriarchate aimed at extending its effective authority beyond the Danube, as well as over the Church of Russia. In the regions South of the Danube, the Turkish advancement, which the Patriarchate of Constantinople would have liked to be opposed by all means, had finally, paradoxically, brought it gains by allowing it to recover those ancient dioceses. On the contrary, in the case of Wallachia, Moldavia, and Russia, it had to count on its own means and mainly on the power of its legal and diplomatic skills.

  • 29 Miklosich, Müller 1860, no CLI, pp. 336-340; Darrouzès, Regestes, I/V, no 2363, pp. 298-299; Cotova (...)

11It was Philotheos I Kokkinos who personally explained the reasons of the particular importance that Constantinople accorded to these Churches in a letter addressed to the Great Duke of Moscow and Vladimir, John II (1353-1359). More specifically, they were distinct by the great distance that separated them from the Byzantine capital (μακρὰν διακειμένων τοιούτων ἁγιοτάτων ἐκκλησιῶν), by their large populations (πλήθει πολυανθρώπου ἔθνους), but above all, and this is the most important, by the fact that they had their proper secular power (ὑπεροχῇ ῥηγικῆς ἐξουσίας διαφερουσῶν)29.

12The existence of a local secular power in these regions, a power with a strong centralizing tendency, constituted a great advantage for the ecumenical Patriarchate, which considered it essential to unify and centralize each one of the Wallachian, Moldavian, and Russian Churches around a single prelate, according to the Byzantine practice of power distribution: to a single secular leader corresponded a ecclesiastical one.

  • 30 Declaration of patriarch Anthony IV (1389-1390, 1391-1397), which follows to the letter the policy (...)

The province of Russia was placed from the beginning under a single metropolitan in a way that this nation only had a single common spiritual leader. Given the divisions of the territory between the multiple civil authorities, local and provincial, opposing each other, the fathers judged it advantageous for the country to have only a single common spiritual authority, capable of maintaining their union with it and among themselves, in a way that by following this guide they were aligned under a unique head which is the image of Christ, unique head of the body of the Church30.

  • 31 See, more recently, Papacostea 2009, with previous bibliography.
  • 32 For the Metropolis of Vicina, founded between 1204 and 1261, and its last holders, see Năsturel 197 (...)
  • 33 Cotovanu 2003a and infra.

13This point of view perfectly suited the interests of the local princes, who intended to support the political centralization of their states upon the unification and centralization of their Churches. But the ecumenical see clashed with the will of the local princes, who wished to manage the ecclesiastical affairs of their countries. In fact, in 1354, the Russian authorities had chosen a local candidate, known under the name of Alexis, as their future metropolitan, and asked for his recognition by Constantinople (infra). Five years later, it was the Prince of Walachia, Nicolae-Alexandru (1352-1364), who asked patriarch Kallistos I to recognize his own candidate, Hyacinth of Vicina, as metropolitan of his country (infra). It was agreed right away that for the Prince of Wallachia, and later it would also be the case of Moldavia, the elevation of his country’s Church to the rank of Metropolis, under obedience to the ecumenical Patriarchate, merited the official recognition of his state, of his independence from the Hungarian crown, and of the autocratic character in the exercise of power within his country31. The Wallachian request indicates that the problem was not so much the candidate for the metropolitan see himself, since Hyacinth, supported by prince Nicolae-Alexandru, was the former metropolitan of Vicina on the Danube, and had been previously ordained by Constantinople32. Rather, the problem rose from the fact that the prince had assumed the authority to personally choose his metropolitan, an assumption that compromised the supreme and universal authority of the ecumenical Patriarchate, which reserved henceforth for itself the exclusive right to manage the affairs of its immense ecclesiastical Empire33.

  • 34 According to the resolutions of the First Ecumenical Council of Nicaea (325), the election of bisho (...)
  • 35 Patrologia Graeca, ed. Paul Migne, vol. CXLIV, coll. 108-109, “Περὶ πατριάρχου”, coll. 1109-1112, “ (...)
  • 36 Translated in Slavonic in 1342, the first manuscript of Syntagma to arrive North of Danube date app (...)
  • 37 See the case of the king of Serbia Stefan Dušan who, in order to remove his kingdom from the hierar (...)
  • 38 Alivizatos 1998, pp. 143-150, with further bibliography.

14In the case of Russia, a Metropolis had existed since the 11th century and the metropolitans were sometimes elected by Constantinople and sometimes elected locally34, which was not the preference of the Hesychast patriarchs. How then, did the ecumenical Patriarchate intend to deal with such a situation and take over the control on the Russian diocese, and later of the Wallachian and Moldavian ones, while the local princes had all the intention of proposing their own candidates? The problem consisted in the inexistence of any canonical regulation on the relations of the ecumenical Patriarchate with any secular power located outside the Empire. Moreover, in Byzantium itself, a clear canonical relationship between the patriarch and the emperor had only just been established. It was derived from the legal work of the Hesychast monk Matthew Blastares, who in 1335 established that the patriarch was supposedly the one to exercise justice, the only representative of the divine law, “the living image of Christ, who, by his acts and his words, expresses the truth”. The emperor on his side, submitted henceforth to the law, ought to defend the Church with the force of arms, to ensure its material needs, and to make donations to it, without interfering in its administrative affairs35. Although this text had circulated very early in the Orthodox South Slavic world, outside of Byzantium, the princes had difficulty accepting its message. And although the Hesychast patriarchs took every precaution to preserve the universal character of the Byzantine imperial power, be it on a symbolic or ideological basis, in the eyes of the Orthodox world36, they were far from being able to exercise any effective pressure on the secular leaders of faraway Orthodox provinces37. In addition, since the rules were not sufficient, the ecumenical Patriarchate called on its old methods upon which it had the exclusive right of usage. It resorted precisely to the principle of οικονομία, which consisted in tolerating a constraining situation without attacking the norms, on the condition that this would arrange things to the advantage of the Orthodox Church. This principle, however, could only be effective in a situation of reciprocal compromises: the two parties involved were supposed to give up one thing and to gain another38.

  • 39 Pointed out by Meyendorff 1990, pp. 202-203.

15The common interest of the Great-Duke of Russia John II (1353-1359) and of Patriarch Philotheos Kokkinos I in the affair of the ordination of the local candidate as metropolitan of the “entire Russia”, was the safekeeping of the unity of the diocese. For the Russian prince this brought strong support to the centrality of his own power, which was threatened by the Lithuanian princes on the Western part of Russia39. As I mentioned previously, the Lithuanians had, in fact, just appealed to the Patriarchate of Tărnovo to ordain their proper candidate at the head of the distinct Metropolis of Kiev and Lithuania. For the ecumenical Patriarchate, on the other hand, accepting the candidate of the Muscovite prince implied the gathering of all Orthodox of Russia, the border regions of Lithuania, and of the Kingdom of Poland under the authority of a single metropolitan residing next to the local prince, which would allow for better control of such a large and distant diocese. Profiting from the difficult situation of the Russian prince, patriarch Philotheos imposed his own conditions for his consent on the local candidacy of the future metropolitan Alexis. He wrote to the great-duke:

  • 40 Miklosich, Müller 1860, no 151, pp. 336-39; Darrouzès, Regestes, I/V, no 2363, pp. 298-299.

From our point of view, although this is outside the custom and of little certainty for the Church, taking into account the value of the witnesses [an inquiry had been conducted on the issue of the candidate L.C.], we have decided to concede the fact in favor of kyr Alexis; that is to say, that we have no intention to concede that in the future a metropolitan from Russia would be established over there; it will be someone from Constantinople, of proven virtue and well-versed in canonical science, who will be called to manage this Christian population, and we demand that our successors stick to this measure40.

  • 41 Darrouzès, Regestes, I/V, no 2363, pp. 298-299.
  • 42 For a broader commentary, see Cotovanu 2003a, pp. 535-542, with sources and bibliography.

16Just after having evoked the terms of this exception, the patriarch adds: “After this promotion according to the canons, metropolitan Alexis will return to his diocese as if he were himself from here and elected here [i.e. in Constantinople – L.C.].41” In light of this document, we clearly understand that the exception was meant to start a new canon, the implementation of which started in the exception itself42.

  • 43 Cotovanu 2003a, pp. 549-551; Mureşan 2010, pp. 340-356.
  • 44 Miklosich, Müller 1860, no 171 (I), pp. 383-385, no 171 (II), pp. 386-388; Darrouzès, Regestes, I/V (...)

17In 1359, the same process was used in the case of Wallachia. Patriarch Kallistos accepted the candidate of the local prince, Hyacinth of Vicina, but he specifically requested the voivode’s written engagement that the Wallachian Metropolis would henceforth remain, as long as the Principality existed, under the authority of the ecumenical Patriarchate. Moreover, after the death of the metropolitan who had just been ordained, another one would be requested from Constantinople, and under no circumstances would the country accept a prelate from anywhere else, which was also an allusion to the Patriarchate of Tărnovo43. In the event that either the prince himself or his successors refused to respect this commitment, the patriarch established the consequence of the heavy sentence of excommunication44.

  • 45 On this disciplinary instrument and political weapon at the disposal of the Great Church of Constan (...)
  • 46 Supra, n. 12.
  • 47 Laurent 1947; Gorovei 1985, pp. 183-207; Zaharia 1987; Papacostea 1991, pp. 137-138; Solomon 2004, (...)
  • 48 Cotovanu 2004, passim and especially pp. 40-48.
  • 49 Cotovanu 2004, passim and especially pp. 40-48.
  • 50 On the impact of the first Ottoman siege of Constantinople on the affair of the Moldavian Church, s (...)

18In fact, when the principle of οικονομίa was proven inefficient, since the exception could not be justified, the ecumenical patriarch had recourse to his formidable weapon: excommunication45. It was used when the Serbian Church proclaimed itself to the rank of Patriarchate in 134646, and again in 1352, in the unprecedented case of the Lithuanian prince’s claims on the Western part of the Russian diocese, for which he had ordained a metropolitan at Tărnovo, Bulgaria (supra). The ecumenical see implemented it again in the case of Moldavia, which in the 1380s and 1390s took steps for the ordination of a local candidate at the head of the Moldavian Church47. In this case, complications occurred due to the intervention of Cyprian, the new metropolitan of Russia, who wanted to exercise his own control over the Moldavian Church. I will leave aside the details of this affair since I have analyzed it elsewhere48, by summarizing incidentally that accepting the candidate of the Moldavian authorities as an exception would signify that the ecumenical Patriarchate was allowing the Moldavian Church to fall under the authority of the metropolitan of Russia, who already enjoyed a strong influence in the region49. In this unprecedented case, the entire country of Moldavia was excommunicated and the anathema was only lifted ten years later, when Constantinople was experiencing again a constraining political context. As a matter of fact, from 1394-1402, the Byzantine capital endured the first, albeit unsuccessful, Ottoman attack. A compromise was, nevertheless, reached, where after the ordination of a Moldavian candidate, all the subsequent Moldavian metropolitans until the Byzantine Empire were to be ordained by Constantinople50.

  • 51 Supra, n. 9.

19Thus, around 1400, while the Ottomans had already solidly established themselves in the Balkans and the Byzantine state was coming to an end, the Patriarchate of Constantinople had succeeded in consolidating its power51. Thanks to processes like οικονομία, or excommunication, but also to its long tradition and diplomatic experience, it had brought together the Orthodox world under its authority, despite a few exceptions, and the resistance it occasionally met.

The Orthodox princes beyond their own Churches

20Extending its authority beyond the Danube and to Russia was not the only preoccupation of the ecumenical see. The implicit goal was to ensure the material means for the survival of ecclesiastical institutions. For this reason it was according particular importance to dioceses which disposed of their own temporal power, that is, the Danubian Principalities and Russia, countries which were not caught in the tempest of the political convulsions occurring in Balkan regions. The request for help addressed by the ecumenical patriarch Matthew I (1397-1410) to Cyprian of Russia is extremely eloquent:

  • 52 Darrouzès, Regestes, I/VI, no 3112, pp. 360-361; Meyendorff 1990, pp. 308-309.

Our needs are immense and we expect a lot from your territories. We do not want Your Holiness to be deprived of the blessing of the Fathers for this good act; work tirelessly like in the past as a friend of the Romans. Teach everyone that the contributions for the safekeeping of the City rank above those for the liturgy, the alms, the poor, and the liberation of prisoners, and the donor will have a greater merit than if he was building a church and monasteries and making donations to them, because this holy city is the glory of the universe. Who will (ever) build as many monasteries, deliver enough prisoners to equal the number of the monasteries of the city and of its inhabitants, whose founder and liberator he can become? And it is you who will cause all this by your action52.

21At the time that the patriarchs of Constantinople were undertaking the integration of the Orthodox Churches around their see, their Hesychast colleagues of Mount Athos worked hard to rally the rising Orthodox princes in order to materially sponsor the Church. They were made to understand that the Church’s authority did not end at the borders of their secular power. Rather, as patrons of their own Churches, the Orthodox princes could also subsidize the Church outside their states. This was meant to be done in the image of the Byzantine emperor who, despite the shrinking of his state, held the obligation to defend the Church with arms, and to ensure the Church’s material needs and to make donations, without interfering in its administrative affairs:

  • 53 Text excerpted from the du Syntagma of Blastares: Patrologia Graeca, ed. Paul Migne, vol. CXLIV, co (...)

The goal of the emperor is to preserve and safe-keep by his virtue the present property, to recover lost property by vigilant diligence, to acquire by his wisdom, his righteous victories and good practices missing goods. The function of the emperor is to do good; that’s why he is called ευεργέτης (benefactor)53.

  • 54 Nastase 1979, pp. 148-150.
  • 55 Lemerle 1988, no 29, 19-20, p. 113.

22For the Northern princes, this really meant an imitation of the ancient Orthodox emperors and kings as Chariton, the abbot of the Athonite monastery of Koutloumousiou, preached to Vladislav I of Wallachia (1364-1377) in 1369. By inciting him to restore his monastery, which was crippled by debts, Chariton “lured Vladimir I with the idea that he could gain a glory uncommon among the emperors and the princes of his time”54 (περιποιήσασθαι [...] δόξαν οὐ τὴν τυχούσαν παρά τε καὶ βασιλεῦσι καὶ ἄρχουσιν)55.

  • 56 Lemerle 1988, no 26, pp. 102-105, no 29, pp. 111-116, no 30, pp. 116-121, no 36, pp. 134-138, with (...)
  • 57 Năsturel 1986, pp. 73-74.
  • 58 Năsturel 1986, passim; Moldoveanu 2007, passim.

23For the Hesychast monks there was a very clear distribution of the roles: the prince provided monetary support, and the Athonites provided spiritual compensation and dealt with the administration of the donated goods. The negotiations were not free of conflicts, but in the end the Wallachian prince consented to the demand of the Athonite abbot and repaired the monastery of Koutloumousiou with his own money, and, furthermore, endowed it with other property necessary for the successful administration of the monastery56. The same voivode Vladislav I had offered to the Athonite monastery of the Great Laura the icon of its first founder Saint Athanasius, which is still preserved in the recipient monastery to this date57. With these acts the material patronage of establishments on Mount Athos by the Danubian princes began. It ceased only after the secularization of monastic property of the United Principalities of Wallachia and Moldavia, proclaimed by Prince Alexander I Cuza in 186358.

  • 59 Năsturel 1990.
  • 60 The bibliography of the subject is too vaste to be cited here. We do not have yet a monograph which (...)

24The first princely donations of Vladislav I of Wallachia were soon followed by that of a great boyar of the country (1398)59, which inaugurated the growing deposition of local nobles for the patronage of the Athonite monastic community, extended in time to the entire Orthodox Church60.

  • 61 Năsturel 1986, pp. 180-182.
  • 62 Năsturel 1986, pp. 99-100, 183-194, 249-250, 269-272; Mertzimekis 1999; Marinescu, Mertzimekis 2004 (...)

25The princes of Moldavia followed the same path once the conflict with the Patriarchate of Constantinople regarding the elevation of the Moldavian Church to the rank of Metropolis had been resolved (supra). The process started with the reign of Elias and his brother co-regent Stephen (1436-1442), who donated an annual sum of money to the monastery of Zographou (1442)61, and that of Stephen the Great (1457-1504), who assumed the patronage of many Athonite monasteries62.

  • 63 Cotovanu 2015, 2016.

26In the image of the last Byzantine emperors, the Wallachian and Moldavian princes, as well as the sovereigns of Russia, had at their disposal an effective autocratic power through their material patronage of the Church. Such power, supreme and absolute, within their states, did not hinder them from exercising a power charged with symbolic significance outside the borders of their countries. This ideology, exported through the Hesychast movement, fully proved its political and economic value after the definitive eclipse of the Byzantine State. On the one hand the jurisdictional expansion of the Great Church of Constantinople on the northern bank of the Danube created the legal framework within which the Greek Patriarchates would acquire more than a hundred μετόχια (churches or monasteries with their respective properties) from the 16th c. onwards thanks also to the complicity of migrants from Ottoman Rumeli to Wallachia and Moldavia63. On the other hand, the princes of those two latter entities, just as the Russian Czars, bestowed on the Orthodox Orient as a whole incredible wealth whether in monetary, material (in the form of liturgical objects) or land form. In a sense, it was a form of αντίδωρον for the symbolic or real power they were acquiring through their patronage.

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Notes

1 For the emergence and sanctioning of the Hesychast in Byzantium, see in particular Meyendorff 1974, 2002; Tachiaos 1962, 1974, 1983; Rigo 1993, 2004; Sinkewicz 2002, pp. 131-188. For patriarchs Philotheos I Kokkinos and Kallistos I, see Θρησκευτική και ηθική εγκυκλοπαίδεια, vol. 7, Athens, 1965, coll. 264-265, and vol. 11, Athens, 1967, coll. 1119-1126; Gonis 1980; Congourdeau 2007.

2 The political dimension of the Hesychast movement has been since long underlined by Tachiaos 1962; Prokhorov 1979; Ševčenko 1996a, 1996b.

3 Nastase 1979.

4 Halecki 1972; Nerantzi-Varmazi 1993.

5 Lomize 1993, pp. 89-96; Panaite 1997, pp. 155-156; Nicol 2001, p. 236; Spiridonakis 1990, pp. 208-209, 212-213.

6 According to Dagron 1996, p. 239, already around 880, at the time of patriarch Photios, “on a pleinement conscience que les frontières du patriarcat peuvent ne pas coïncider avec celles de l’Empire à peine sorti de récession, et que l’arme spirituelle est plus efficace que l’arme temporelle pour définir une chrétienté orientale”.

7 Darrouzès 1981, Notitia 20. See also, Mayeur et al. 2000, pp. 145, 146-147.

8 For instance, the metropolitan of Vicina, Makarios, was engaged in writing, at his election to the see of Vicina, to not leave his church despite the Tatars. (Vicina fell in Muslim hands in 1337 or 1338): Laurent 1946, pp. 225-232 (facsimile reproduction of Makarios’ commitment in Laurent, Năsturel 1946, Planche 1); Miklosich, Müller 1860, no 84, p. 184; Darrouzès, Regestes, I/V, no 2184, pp. 141-142; Năsturel 1971-1976, p. 38; Mayeur et al. 2000, p. 156.

9 Meyendorff 1981; Obolensky 1998, pp. 292-293; Meyendorff, Papadakis 2001, pp. 133-427.

10 Meyendorff, Papadakis 2001, pp. 242-265; Maltezou 2002; Tsirpanlis 2002, with older bibliography.

11 See the rich bibliography gathered by Mureşan 1999, pp. 5-16.

12 For the role of Mount Athos and the Bulgarian Parorea in the spreading of hesychasm in the Orthodox world, see among others, Turdeanu 1947, p. 36; Dujčev 1969, pp. 297-302; Tachiaos 1974, p. 116 sq.; Năsturel 1986, pp. 30-31; Nastase 1979.

13 Guran 2002, pp. 109-124.

14 Mošin 1946; Mešanović 1991; Bojović 1995, pp. 555-558; Ferjančić 1998; Mureşan 2005, chapter I.2, § 4 “L’excommunication dans la politique étrangère de Byzance”.

15 Lascaris 1931, pp. 171-175; Laurent 1944, pp. 303-310; Tarnanidis 1988, pp. 52-59; Meyendorff 1990, pp. 198-199; Djurić 1996, p. 26, n. 1; Mureşan, loc. cit. It was under the Ottoman strike that the Serbian Church, with its leader refugee in Smederevo, rejoined de facto the jurisdiction of the Patriarchate of Constantinople in 1459: Tarnanidis 1988, pp. 62-64; Yerasimos 1992, p. 148.

16 Miklosich, Müller 1860, no CCC, pp. 553-555; Darrouzès, Regestes, I/V, no 2611, pp. 514-515, but also no 2612 and no 2614. See also Rigo 1997, pp. 124-126. 

17 Miklosich, Müller 1860, no CCCIV, pp. 558-560; Darrouzès, Regestes, I/V, no 2614, p. 517. A similar strategy was used later on, in 1411, by the archbishop of Ohrid, who took advantage of the Ottoman tolerance and helping hand in order to take hold of the Metropolis of Vidin and Sofia, which were thus subjected to Patriarchate of Constantinople: Lomize 1993, p. 91.

18 Miklosich, Müller 1860, no CCLXXII, p. 528 (1370, July 24); Darrouzès, Regestes, I/V, no 2586, p. 496. The metropolitan of Varna, Alexis, was ordained in the month of May 1370: Darrouzès, Regestes, I/V, no 2572, pp. 480-481, no 2657, p. 550.

19 Miklosich, Müller 1860, no CCXLIV, p. 502; Darrouzès, Regestes, no 2547, pp. 461-462 and no 2586, p. 496 (Critique).

20 Miklosich, Müller 1860, no CCXCVI, pp. 551-552; Darrouzès, I/V, no 2607, p. 511.

21 Djurić 1980, pp. 31-50; Meyendorff 1990, pp. 53-54.

22 Miklosich, Müller 1860, no 157, pp. 350-351; Darrouzès, Regestes, no 2366, pp. 302-303; Meyendorff 1990, pp. 195-207, with the precision that Olgierd had the intention to grant the autocephaly to the Russian Church, especially as it could not have remained long under the authority of the Bulgarian Patriarchate; Cotovanu 2003, pp. 535-538.

23 Darrouzès, Regestes, no 2336, pp. 278-279, no 2366, p. 302.

24 Miklosich, Müller 1860, no 186, pp. 436-442; Darrouzès, Regestes, I/V, no 2384, p. 318, no 2442, pp. 368-369; Meyendorff 1990, p. 142; Mureşan 2005, chapter I.2, § 5 « La rupture de la communion avec le Patriarcat de Tărnovo ». 

25 Turdeanu 1947, pp. 69-139; Tachiaos 1974, pp. 117-118; Bernard 1979, pp. 27-39; Constantinescu 1986.

26 In August 1394, the metropolitan of Moldavia Jeremiah, ordained in Constantinople, was assigned the administration of the Bulgarian Church of Tărnovo: Miklosich, Müller 1862, no CCCCLXXII, p. 223; Darrouzès, Regestes, I/VI, no 2968, p. 240 and Critique, p. 241; Tachiaos 1963, pp. 67-82. It was only in 1415 that a metropolitan of Tărnovo was ordained in Constantinople: Tarnanidis 1986, pp. 67-68.

27 Nastase 1979, pp. 125-126; Spiridonakis 1990, p. 212.

28 Yerasimos 1992, pp. 148-151.

29 Miklosich, Müller 1860, no CLI, pp. 336-340; Darrouzès, Regestes, I/V, no 2363, pp. 298-299; Cotovanu 2003, pp. 541-542.

30 Declaration of patriarch Anthony IV (1389-1390, 1391-1397), which follows to the letter the policy launched by his predecessors Philotheos I Kokkinos and Kallistos I: Miklosich, Müller 1862, no CCCCIV, p. 116; Darrouzès, Regestes, I/VI, no 2847, p. 139.

31 See, more recently, Papacostea 2009, with previous bibliography.

32 For the Metropolis of Vicina, founded between 1204 and 1261, and its last holders, see Năsturel 1971-1976, 1987.

33 Cotovanu 2003a and infra.

34 According to the resolutions of the First Ecumenical Council of Nicaea (325), the election of bishops was effected by the decision and the vote of the episcopal Synod of each province, while Canon 28 of the Council of Chalcedon (451) granted to the patriarch of Constantinople the right to appoint the metropolitans of the Pontic dioceses in Asia and in Thrace. Yet, Canon 28 referred only to the dioceses within the borders of the Byzantine Empire. It was in the 12th century that the Byzantine canonists Zonaras and Balsamon linked the Russians to Canon 28 of the Council of Chalcedon (“It is in Constantinople that will be ordained, too, the bishops of the barbarian peoples, among which the Alans and the Russians, the former having been subjected to the pontic diocese and the latter to that of Thrace”): Meyendorff 1990, pp. 93-94. Out of 23 metropolitans mentioned by the chronicles for the years before the Mongol occupation (13th century), 17 were consecrated in Constantinople, and only 2 were elected locally (we ignore the mode of election for the remaining four): Meyendorff 1990, pp. 28, 110. Since the 13th century and until the mid 14th century, “Greeks” and “Russians” are recorded alternately. In 1354, the ecumenical patriarch had to acknowledge, another Russian candidate, Alexis, Alexis, this time under the condition that it will not be repeated in the future: infra.

35 Patrologia Graeca, ed. Paul Migne, vol. CXLIV, coll. 108-109, “Περὶ πατριάρχου”, coll. 1109-1112, “Περὶ βασιλέως”. See on this subject, the comments of Dagron 1996, pp. 237, 239; Guran 2002, pp. 109-124; Mureşan 2005, chapter I.1 “Matthieu Blastarès et la redécouverte de l’Eisagôgè toû nomou (première moitié du xive siècle)”.

36 Translated in Slavonic in 1342, the first manuscript of Syntagma to arrive North of Danube date approximately from the third quarter of the 14th century, according to the dating proposed by Barbu 1984, pp. 44-45. See also Mureşan 2005, chapitre I.2 “La politique balkanique du Patriarcat de Constantinople (deuxième moitié du xive siècle)”. The Constantinopolitan prelates appointed by the ecumenical Patriarcate at the head of the Churches of Hongrovalachia and of Moldavia, and also of Russia, in the 14th century, must have had their own share for the diffusion of the Syntagma in these Orthodox countries.

37 See the case of the king of Serbia Stefan Dušan who, in order to remove his kingdom from the hierarchisation of the Orthodox states imposed by the hesychast ideology of Constantinople, drew up his own legal code, the Codex Tripartitus : Mureşan 2005, sub-chapter I.2, § 6 “La réplique serbe au Syntagma: la codification de Dušan”, with sources and bibliography.

38 Alivizatos 1998, pp. 143-150, with further bibliography.

39 Pointed out by Meyendorff 1990, pp. 202-203.

40 Miklosich, Müller 1860, no 151, pp. 336-39; Darrouzès, Regestes, I/V, no 2363, pp. 298-299.

41 Darrouzès, Regestes, I/V, no 2363, pp. 298-299.

42 For a broader commentary, see Cotovanu 2003a, pp. 535-542, with sources and bibliography.

43 Cotovanu 2003a, pp. 549-551; Mureşan 2010, pp. 340-356.

44 Miklosich, Müller 1860, no 171 (I), pp. 383-385, no 171 (II), pp. 386-388; Darrouzès, Regestes, I/V, n2411, pp. 338-339, no 2412, p. 340; Cotovanu 2003a, pp. 543-544.

45 On this disciplinary instrument and political weapon at the disposal of the Great Church of Constantinople, see the comments and bibliography gathered by Mureşan 2005, chapter I.2, § 3, “L’excommunication politique et l’attitude du Syntagma”, and § 4, “L’excommunication dans la politique étrangère de Byzance”.

46 Supra, n. 12.

47 Laurent 1947; Gorovei 1985, pp. 183-207; Zaharia 1987; Papacostea 1991, pp. 137-138; Solomon 2004, pp. 126-142.

48 Cotovanu 2004, passim and especially pp. 40-48.

49 Cotovanu 2004, passim and especially pp. 40-48.

50 On the impact of the first Ottoman siege of Constantinople on the affair of the Moldavian Church, see Nastase 1987. For the définitive solution of the conflict and the “Greek” metropolitans of Moldavia, see Laurent 1972; Solomon 2004, pp. 145-186; Mureşan 2005, chapter I.4 “L’évolution de la métropole de Moldavie dans la politique œcuménique du Patriarcat”.

51 Supra, n. 9.

52 Darrouzès, Regestes, I/VI, no 3112, pp. 360-361; Meyendorff 1990, pp. 308-309.

53 Text excerpted from the du Syntagma of Blastares: Patrologia Graeca, ed. Paul Migne, vol. CXLIV, coll. 1109-1112, “Περὶ βασιλέως”; Dagron 1996, p. 239.

54 Nastase 1979, pp. 148-150.

55 Lemerle 1988, no 29, 19-20, p. 113.

56 Lemerle 1988, no 26, pp. 102-105, no 29, pp. 111-116, no 30, pp. 116-121, no 36, pp. 134-138, with the comments of the editor, pp. 8-13; Năsturel 1986, pp. 39-52; Nastase 1979, pp. 131-166; Cotovanu 2003b, pp. 48-50; Cotovanu 2005.

57 Năsturel 1986, pp. 73-74.

58 Năsturel 1986, passim; Moldoveanu 2007, passim.

59 Năsturel 1990.

60 The bibliography of the subject is too vaste to be cited here. We do not have yet a monograph which would gather and analyze all the Walachian and Moldavian donations to places of cult other than the Athonite monastic community (the patriarchates, the Holy Sepulchre in Jerusalem, the monasteries of Mount Sinai, the churches and monasteries of Serbia, Bulgaria, Epirus and elsewhere).

61 Năsturel 1986, pp. 180-182.

62 Năsturel 1986, pp. 99-100, 183-194, 249-250, 269-272; Mertzimekis 1999; Marinescu, Mertzimekis 2004.

63 Cotovanu 2015, 2016.

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Lidia Cotovanu, « Church without Borders: A Successful Project of the Hesychast Patriarchs of the 14th Century »Bulletin de correspondance hellénique moderne et contemporain [En ligne], 2 | 2020, mis en ligne le 23 décembre 2020, consulté le 18 avril 2024. URL : http://journals.openedition.org/bchmc/387 ; DOI : https://doi.org/10.4000/bchmc.387

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Lidia Cotovanu

Institut d’Histoire « N. Iorga », Académie roumaine

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