Eastern Orthodox Church

The Eastern Orthodox (from Greek "right believing") faith is directly descended from the spiritual communities established by the apostles of Jesus Christ in the eastern Mediterranean region; Eastern Orthodox Christianity officially separated from the Western (Roman Catholic) branch of the Christian church in 1054, though the split had begun centuries earlier with the division of the Roman empire. Today Eastern Orthodoxy flourishes in Greece as the Greek Orthodox Church. The Russian, Bulgarian, Romanian, Serbian, and Georgian Orthodox churches have also reemerged following the collapse of Communism in Eastern Europe in the 1980s and 1990s. Sizable Orthodox populations also exist in America and Australia.

The majority of early Christian communities, founded by St. Paul or his followers, shared common beliefs and liturgy, but worship was conducted in different languages. However, Syrian beliefs, originating from St. Thomas, emphasized the humanity of Christ. After the Roman emperor Constantine I (324–337) first adopted Christianity, he assumed the secular leadership of the Church and the patriarch of Constantinople (his capital) laid claim to religious authority over the whole church. Constantinople remained the center of Eastern Orthodoxy until the city fell to the Turks in 1453. Even today the patriarch of Constantinople has authority over the Greek communities in Turkey, the Greek islands, northern Greece, and the rest of the world. The other spiritual leaders of the early Christian church were the patriarchs of Rome, Alexandria, Antioch, and Jerusalem.

Eastern Orthodoxy recognizes the authority of seven ecumenical councils, starting with the first Council of Nicaea (325), which were convened to decide matters of doctrine. Constantine imposed his personality on the council of Nicaea, but subsequently interpatriarchal rivalry emphasized differences. At the third council (the Council of Ephesus, 431), the Nestorian church diverged, and at the fourth council (the Council of Chalcedon, 451), dispute about the nature of Jesus caused the Armenian, Syrian, and Coptic churches to secede. The other councils were the first, second, and third Councils of Constantinople (381, 553, and 680) and the second Council of Nicaea (787).

From the sixth century many Asian and Mediterranean Christians came under Persian and then Islamic Arab rule. The conquerors divided the Orthodox population into separate self-governing communities led by their own patriarchs. Except during times of war, Arab occupation did not cut cross-border contacts; the three Eastern patriarchs (of Alexandria, Antioch, and Jerusalem) and bishops were able to attend church councils; pilgrims continued to visit the shrines in the Holy Land. The Orthodox church in Asia was at its maximum extent in around 901, with 405 bishops, including fifty-four metropolitans and fifty autocephalous (independent) bishops; Orthodox missionaries also converted the Slavs, Bulgars, and Russians.

Eastern and Western Christianity diverged gradually. In 800 Pope Leo III anointed Charlemagne as Holy Roman Emperor, thus placing the Western church under the protection of France; from this time forward Western Christianity regarded the Roman pope as the prime religious authority. The Eastern Church, however, asserted its historical precedence, and differences between East and West eventually led to a complete schism in 1054. Among the doctrinal differences dividing Eastern Orthodox and Western believers is the nature of the relation of elements of the divine trinity (Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.) The Nicene creed adopted by the Western Church says that the Holy Spirit proceeds "from the father and the son," but the Eastern Church believes that the Holy Spirit proceeds from the Father alone. The final insurmountable issue was a dispute over who had jurisdiction where: Pope Leo IX and Michael Cerularius, the patriarch of Constantinople, mutually excommunicated each other. Rome and Byzantium cooperated to some degree during the Crusades, but in 1204, during the Fourth Crusade, Westerners besieged and looted Constantinople.

After the fall of Constantinople Sultan Mehmed II (1432–1481) set fairly generous rules for the surviving fifty thousand members of the Orthodox community and recognized the patriarch as the head of all the Christians in the Turkish empire. Saint Sophia, the central church in Orthodoxy, was immediately dedicated to Islam, but most churches remained in use. (Today, most surviving Orthodox churches in Turkey have become museums.) Superior training and knowledge of languages enabled much of the Orthodox community to monopolize the Turkish diplomatic service. The Orthodox patriarchate thus survived in Constantinople partly by collaboration with the Muslim overlords.

Informal leadership of Orthodoxy in time moved to the Russian church; in 1589 it received its own patriarch, but in 1721 Peter the Great (1672–1725) abolished it (it was reestablished in 1917). In the nineteenth century, when the Orthodox peoples of Asia were freed from Turkish rule, the Balkan states and Greece won church and state independence, and the patriarchate of Constantinople lost whatever religious powers it had enjoyed.

During World War I and the War of Turkish Independence Greco-Turkish animosities led to atrocities. The burning of Izmir is still referred to by Orthodox Greeks as the Catastrophe. In 1923 about 800,000 Greek Christians (Orthodox and Catholic) living in Turkey were exchanged with a population of 1.2 million Muslims living in Greece; about 100,000 Greek Christians, protected by the Treaty of Lausanne, remained in and around Istanbul. Today only an estimated 3,000 Greek Orthodox remain in Turkey.

Orthodox doctrines have always lacked precision, partly due to the conviction that it is presumptuous to define God, partly because, in Byzantine times, theology was a universal intellectual hobby. Few doctrinal differences separate Orthodoxy from Catholic Christianity; the dividing issues remain the governance of the church, papal versus conciliar authority, and a married priesthood. The seven sacraments of Catholic Christianity (baptism, confirmation, marriage, holy orders, penance, anointing of the sick, and the Eucharist) are augmented in Eastern Orthodoxy by others for special occasions. Both churches rescinded the mutual excommunications of 1054 in the twentieth century, and following Roman Catholicism's Second Vatican Council (1962–1964), ecumenical dialogue between the Eastern Orthodox Church and the Roman Catholic Church was undertaken.

Kate Clow

Alexandris, Alexis. (1992) The Greek Minority of Istanbul and Greek Turkish Relations, 1918–74. Athens, Greece: Center for Asia Minor Studies.

Herrin, Judith. (1987) The Formation of Christendom. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.

Runciman, Steve. (1968) The Great Church in Captivity. Cambridge, U.K.: Cambridge University Press.