Czech and Slovak Orthodox Church
The Orthodox Church of the Czech Lands and Slovakia is a self-governing body of the Eastern Orthodox Church that territorially covers the countries of the Czech Republic and Slovakia. Archbishop Rastislav of Prešov was elected by the Extraordinary Synod held on January 11, 2014, as the new primate. On December 9, 2013, the Synod removed Archbishop Simeon of Olomouc and Brno from his position as Locum Tenens, appointed Archbishop Rastislav in his place, an action against which Archbishop Simeon protested and, deplored by Patriarch Bartholomew I of Constantinople; the Church of the Czech Lands and Slovakia presents both an ancient history as well as a modern history. The present day church occupies the land of Great Moravia, where the brothers Ss. Cyril and Methodius began their mission to the Slavs, introducing the liturgical and canonical order of the Orthodox Church, translated into the Church Slavonic language, using Greek calques to explain concepts for which no Slavic term existed. In doing this they developed the first Slavic alphabet, a mixture of Greek and Hebrew-based characters with a few invented characters of their own to represent unique Slavic sounds.
This was done at the express invitation of the powerful ruler Rastislav of Moravia. Yet within the Moravian state there was a Frankish party among the nobility who desired closer ties with the Kingdom of Francia, whose ruler, Louis the German, was Ratislav's nominal suzerain, a Frankish bishop had ecclesiastical jurisdiction over a small part of Ratislav's domain that had earlier converted to Christianity. Despite the Photian Schism, the churches of Rome and Constantinople still preserved some semblance of unity, Pope Nicholas I did not want to see the formation of a large independent Frankish church in Central Europe; when an appeal of the ecclesiastical issue was made to Rome, Nicholas summoned both Cyril and Methodius and the complaining Frankish parties to his court to hear them out. Nicholas died before their arrival, but the new Pope Adrian II reached a compromise after hearing both sides: Old Church Slavonic was confirmed as a liturgical language alongside Greek and Latin, Methodius was confirmed as bishop with a Frankish co-adjutor, Wiching.
Adrian was convinced by Cyril's impassioned defence of the Slavic liturgy in which he cited 1 Corinthians 14:19 "Yet in the church I had rather speak five words with my understanding, that by my voice I might teach others than ten thousand words in an unknown tongue." Cyril fell ill while the brothers were still at Rome, on his deathbed he asked Methodius to swear to return to Moravia and complete the mission to the Slavs instead of returning to the monastic life on Mount Olympus as he had intended to do. Methodius kept his word and returned, but his mission was interrupted by the death of Ratislav, as the new ruler, Svatopluk I of Moravia sided with the pro-Frankish party and had Methodius imprisoned for three years, until he was freed through the intercession of Pope John VIII. For the next ten years, Methodius continued his work, but the death of John VIII in 882 removed his papal protection, Methodius died in 885. After this, Pope Stephen V of Rome confirmed his Swabian co-adjutor Wiching as bishop.
Methodius's disciples were imprisoned, expelled to Bulgaria, like Gorazd and many others, or enslaved. The expelled, led by Clement of Ohrid and Naum of Preslav, were of great importance to the Orthodox faith in the Christian from year 864 Bulgaria, after they were released from prison and escorted to the Danube. In AD 870 the Fourth Council of Constantinople granted the Bulgarians the right to have the oldest organized autocephalous Slavic Orthodox Church that little from autonomous Bulgarian archbishopric, became Patriarchate. Major event that strengthens the process of Christianization was the developement of the Cyrillic script in Bulgaria at the founded by Naum and Clement Preslav Literary School in the 9th century; the Cyrillic script and the liturgy in Old Church Slavonic called Old Bulgarian, were declared official in Bulgaria in 893. The Eastern Orthodox ecclesiastical order survived in present-day eastern Slovakia and neighboring regions due to its nearness and influence to Kievan Rus among the population of Rusyn people, until the middle of 17th century when the Union of Uzhhorod was brought about in the Kingdom of Hungary.
During the times of suppression, remaining Eastern Orthodox Christians from the region kept their ties with neighboring Eastern Orthodox Eparchy of Buda of the Serbian Patriarchate of Peć and with the Metropolitanate of Karlovci. One of the most northern parishes of the Serbian Orthodox Church existed in the Slovak city of Komárno with local church built in 18th century still standing today. After the creation of Czechoslovakia in 1918, legal restraints to Eastern Orthodoxy were removed. In the new state, Eastern Orthodox communities were located in the eastern parts of the country, including Carpathian Rusynia, incorporated into Czechoslovakia in 1919. In that region, the city of Mukačevo was located with its traditions going back to the old Eastern Orthodox Eparchy of Mukačevo, that existed before the Union of Užgorod. In the spirit of Eastern Orthodox revival, many people in the region left the Greek Catholic Church. Since there were no Eastern Orthodox bishops in Czechoslovakia, local leaders looked to the Serbian Orthodox Church because Serbs were and ethnically close to Czechs and Rusyns.
That view was supported by state authorities of Czechoslovakia. In order to regulate the ecclesiastical order, Bishop Dositej Vasić of Niš arrived in Prague and
Monk
A monk is a person who practices religious asceticism by monastic living, either alone or with any number of other monks. A monk may be a person who decides to dedicate his life to serving all other living beings, or to be an ascetic who voluntarily chooses to leave mainstream society and live his or her life in prayer and contemplation; the concept is ancient and can be seen in many religions and in philosophy. In the Greek language the term can apply to women, but in modern English it is in use for men; the word nun is used for female monastics. Although the term monachos is of Christian origin, in the English language monk tends to be used loosely for both male and female ascetics from other religious or philosophical backgrounds. However, being generic, it is not interchangeable with terms that denote particular kinds of monk, such as cenobite, anchorite, hesychast, or solitary. In Eastern Orthodoxy monasticism holds a special and important place: "Angels are a light for monks, monks are a light for laymen".
Orthodox monastics separate themselves from the world in order to pray unceasingly for the world. They do not, in general, have as their primary purpose the running of social services, but instead are concerned with attaining theosis, or union with God. However, care for the poor and needy has always been an obligation of monasticism, so not all monasteries are "cloistered"; the level of contact though will vary from community to community. Hermits, on the other hand, have little or no contact with the outside world. Orthodox monasticism does not have religious orders as are found in the West, nor do they have Rules in the same sense as the Rule of St. Benedict. Rather, Eastern monastics study and draw inspiration from the writings of the Desert Fathers as well as other Church Fathers. Hesychasm is of primary importance in the ascetical theology of the Orthodox Church. Most communities are self-supporting, the monastic’s daily life is divided into three parts: communal worship in the catholicon.
Meals are taken in common in a sizable dining hall known as a trapeza, at elongated refectory tables. Food is simple and is eaten in silence while one of the brethren reads aloud from the spiritual writings of the Holy Fathers; the monastic lifestyle takes a great deal of serious commitment. Within the cenobitic community, all monks conform to a common way of living based on the traditions of that particular monastery. In struggling to attain this conformity, the monastic comes to realize his own shortcomings and is guided by his spiritual father in how to deal with them. For this same reason, bishops are always chosen from the ranks of monks. Eastern monasticism is found in three distinct forms: anchoritic and the "middle way" between the two, known as the skete. One enters a cenobitic community first, only after testing and spiritual growth would one go on to the skete or, for the most advanced, become a solitary anchorite. However, one is not expected to join a skete or become a solitary. In general, Orthodox monastics have little or no contact with the outside world, including their own families.
The purpose of the monastic life is union with God, the means is through leaving the world. After tonsure, Orthodox monks and nuns are never permitted to cut their hair; the hair of the head and the beard remain uncut as a symbol of the vows they have taken, reminiscent of the Nazarites from the Old Testament. The tonsure of monks is the token of a consecrated life, symbolizes the cutting off of their self-will; the process of becoming a monk is intentionally slow, as the vows taken are considered to entail a lifelong commitment to God, are not to be entered into lightly. In Orthodox monasticism after completing the novitiate, there are three ranks of monasticism. There is only one monastic habit in the Eastern Church, it is the same for both monks and nuns; each successive grade is given a portion of the habit, the full habit being worn only by those in the highest grade, known for that reason as the "Great Schema", or "Great Habit". The various profession rites are performed by the Abbot, but if the abbot has not been ordained a priest, or if the monastic community is a convent, a hieromonk will perform the service.
The abbot or hieromonk who performs a tonsure must be of at least the rank he is tonsuring into. In other words, only a hieromonk, tonsured into the Great Schema may himself tonsure a Schemamonk. A bishop, may tonsure into any rank, regardless of his own. Novice, lit. "one under obedience"—Those wishing to join a monastery begin their lives as novices. After coming to the monastery and living as a guest for not less than three days, the revered abbot or abbess may bless the candidate to become a novice. There is no formal ceremony for the clothing of a novice, he or she simply
Abbot
Abbot, meaning father, is an ecclesiastical title given to the male head of a monastery in various traditions, including Christianity. The office may be given as an honorary title to a clergyman, not the head of a monastery; the female equivalent is abbess. The title had its origin in the monasteries of Egypt and Syria, spread through the eastern Mediterranean, soon became accepted in all languages as the designation of the head of a monastery; the word is derived from the Aramaic av meaning "father" or abba, meaning "my father". In the Septuagint, it was written as "abbas". At first it was employed as a respectful title for any monk, but it was soon restricted by canon law to certain priestly superiors. At times it was applied to various priests, e.g. at the court of the Frankish monarchy the Abbas palatinus and Abbas castrensis were chaplains to the Merovingian and Carolingian sovereigns’ court and army respectively. The title abbot came into general use in western monastic orders whose members include priests.
An abbot is the head and chief governor of a community of monks, called in the East hegumen or archimandrite. The English version for a female monastic head is abbess. In Egypt, the first home of monasticism, the jurisdiction of the abbot, or archimandrite, was but loosely defined. Sometimes he ruled over only one community, sometimes over several, each of which had its own abbot as well. Saint John Cassian speaks of an abbot of the Thebaid. By the Rule of St Benedict, until the Cluniac reforms, was the norm in the West, the abbot has jurisdiction over only one community; the rule, as was inevitable, was subject to frequent violations. Monks, as a rule, at the outset was the abbot any exception. For the reception of the sacraments, for other religious offices, the abbot and his monks were commanded to attend the nearest church; this rule proved inconvenient when a monastery was situated in a desert or at a distance from a city, necessity compelled the ordination of some monks. This innovation was not introduced without a struggle, ecclesiastical dignity being regarded as inconsistent with the higher spiritual life, before the close of the 5th century, at least in the East, abbots seem universally to have become deacons, if not priests.
The change spread more in the West, where the office of abbot was filled by laymen till the end of the 7th century. The ecclesiastical leadership exercised by abbots despite their frequent lay status is proved by their attendance and votes at ecclesiastical councils, thus at the first Council of Constantinople, AD 448, 23 archimandrites or abbots sign, with 30 bishops. The second Council of Nicaea, AD 787, recognized the right of abbots to ordain their monks to the inferior orders below the diaconate, a power reserved to bishops. Abbots used to be subject to episcopal jurisdiction, continued so, in fact, in the West till the 11th century; the Code of Justinian expressly subordinates the abbot to episcopal oversight. The first case recorded of the partial exemption of an abbot from episcopal control is that of Faustus, abbot of Lerins, at the council of Arles, AD 456; these exceptions, introduced with a good object, had grown into a widespread evil by the 12th century creating an imperium in imperio, depriving the bishop of all authority over the chief centres of influence in his diocese.
In the 12th century, the abbots of Fulda claimed precedence of the archbishop of Cologne. Abbots more and more assumed episcopal state, in defiance of the prohibition of early councils and the protests of St Bernard and others, adopted the episcopal insignia of mitre, ring and sandals, it has been maintained that the right to wear mitres was sometimes granted by the popes to abbots before the 11th century, but the documents on which this claim is based are not genuine. The first undoubted instance is the bull by which Alexander II in 1063 granted the use of the mitre to Egelsinus, abbot of the monastery of St Augustine at Canterbury; the mitred abbots in England were those of Abingdon, St Alban's, Battle, Bury St Edmunds, St Augustine's Canterbury, Croyland, Glastonbury, Gloucester, St Benet's Hulme, Malmesbury, Ramsey, Selby, Tavistock, Westminster, St Mary's York. Of these the precedence was yielded to the abbot of Glastonbury, until in AD 1154 Adrian IV granted it to the abbot of St Alban's, in which monastery he had been brought up.
Next after the abbot of St Alban's ranked the abbot of Westminster and Ramsey. Elsewhere, the mitred abbots that sat in the Estates of Scotland were of Arbroath, Coupar Angus, Holyrood, Kelso, Kinloss, Paisley, Scone, St Andrews Priory and Sweetheart. To distinguish abbots from bishops, it was ordained that their mitre should be made
Eastern Orthodox theology
Eastern Orthodox theology is the theology particular to the Eastern Orthodox Church. It is characterized by monotheistic Trinitarianism, belief in the Incarnation of the divine Logos or only-begotten Son of God, a balancing of cataphatic theology with apophatic theology, a hermeneutic defined by a polyvalent Sacred Tradition, a concretely catholic ecclesiology, a robust theology of the person, a principally recapitulative and therapeutic soteriology; the Eastern Orthodox Church considers itself to be the one, holy and apostolic church established by Christ and his apostles. For the early years of the church, much of what was conveyed to its members was in the form of oral teachings. Within a short period of time traditions were established to reinforce these teachings; the Eastern Orthodox Church asserts to have been careful in preserving these traditions. When questions of belief or new concepts arise, the Church always refers back to the original faith. Eastern Orthodox see the Bible as a collection of inspired texts that sprang out of this tradition, not the other way around.
The Bible has come to be a important part of "Tradition", but not the only part. The Eastern Orthodox Church has always recognized the gradual development in the complexity of the articulation of the Church's teachings, it does not, believe that truth changes and therefore always supports its previous beliefs all the way back to what it holds to be the direct teachings from the Apostles. The Church understands that not everything is clear, it is this contention. The Church sees this as the action of the Holy Spirit on history to manifest truth to man; the Church is unwavering in upholding its dogmatic teachings, but does not insist upon those matters of faith which have not been defined. The Eastern Orthodox believe. Individuals are permitted to hold theologoumena so long as they do not contradict traditional Eastern Orthodox teaching. Sometimes, various Holy Fathers may have contradictory opinions about a certain question, where no consensus exists, the individual is free to follow his or her conscience.
Tradition includes the Nicene Creed, the decrees of the Seven Ecumenical Councils, the writings of the Church Fathers, as well as Eastern Orthodox laws, liturgical books and icons, etc. In defense of extrabiblical tradition, the Eastern Orthodox Church quotes Paul: "Therefore, stand fast, hold the traditions which ye have been taught, whether by our spoken word, or by our epistle.". The Eastern Orthodox Church believes that the Holy Spirit works through history to manifest truth to the Church, that He weeds out falsehood in order that the Truth may be recognised more fully. Eastern Orthodoxy interprets truth based on three witnesses: the consensus of the Holy Fathers of the Church; the consensus of the Church over time defines its catholicity—that, believed at all times by the entire Church.{{refn|group=note|St. Vincent of Lerins, wrote in his Commonitoria, that Church doctrine, like the human body, develops over time while still keeping its original identity: "n the Orthodox Church itself, all possible care must be taken, that we hold that faith, believed everywhere, always, by all" Those who disagree with that consensus are not accepted as authentic "Fathers."
All theological concepts must be in agreement with that consensus. Those considered to be authentic "Fathers" may have some theological opinions that are not universally shared, but are not thereby considered heretical; some Holy Fathers have made statements that were defined as heretical, but their mistakes do not exclude them from position of authority. Thus an Eastern Orthodox Christian is not bound to agree with every opinion of every Father, but rather with the consensus of the Fathers, only on those matters about which the church is dogmatic; some of the greatest theologians in the history of the church come from the 4th century, including the Cappadocian Fathers and the Three Hierarchs. However, the Eastern Orthodox do not consider the "Patristic era" to be a thing of the past, but that it continues in an unbroken succession of enlightened teachers from the Apostles to the present day. 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 Eastern 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 believes. The Church more or less accepted the preexisting Greek Septuagint version of Hebrew Scriptures as handed down to them from the Jews.
Mount Sinai
Mount Sinai known as Mount Horeb or Gabal Musa, is a mountain in the Sinai Peninsula of Egypt, a possible location of the biblical Mount Sinai, considered a holy site by the Abrahamic religions. Mount Sinai is mentioned many times in the Book of Exodus and other books of the Bible, the Quran. According to Jewish and Islamic tradition, the biblical Mount Sinai was the place where Moses received the Ten Commandments. Mount Sinai is a 2,285-metre moderately high mountain near the city of Saint Catherine in the Sinai region, it is next to Mount Catherine. It is surrounded on all sides by higher peaks of the mountain range. Mount Sinai's rocks were formed in the late stage of the Arabian-Nubian Shield's evolution. Mount Sinai displays a ring complex that consists of alkaline granites intruded into diverse rock types, including volcanics; the granites range in composition from syenogranite to alkali feldspar granite. The volcanic rocks are alkaline to peralkaline and they are represented by subaerial flows and eruptions and subvolcanic porphyry.
The nature of the exposed rocks in Mount Sinai indicates that they originated from differing depths. The biblical Mount Sinai is one of the most important sacred places in the Jewish and Islamic religions. According to the Hebrew Bible, it was the mountain. However, the earliest Christian traditions place this event at the nearby Mount Serbal, at the foot of which a monastery was founded in the 4th century; the earliest references to Jebel Musa as Mount Sinai or Mount Sinai being located in the present-day Sinai peninsula are inconclusive. There is evidence that prior to 100 CE, well before the Christian monastic period, Jewish sages equated Jebel Musa with Mount Sinai. Graham Davies of Cambridge University argues that early Jewish pilgrimages identified Jebel Musa as Mount Sinai and this identification was adopted by the Christian pilgrims. R. K. Harrison states that "Jebel Musa... seems to have enjoyed special sanctity long before Christian times, culminating in its identification with Mt. Sinai."Christians settled upon this mountain in the third century AD.
Georgians from the Caucasus moved to the Sinai Peninsula in the fifth century, a Georgian colony was formed there in the ninth century. Georgians erected their own churches in the area of the modern Mount Sinai; the construction of one such church was connected with the name of David The Builder, who contributed to the erection of churches in Georgia and abroad as well. There were political and religious motives for locating the church on Mount Sinai. Georgian monks living there were connected with their motherland; the church had its own plots in Kartli. Some of the Georgian manuscripts of Sinai remain there, but others are kept in Tbilisi, St. Petersburg, New York City, Paris, or in private collections; some modern biblical scholars now believe that the Israelites would have crossed the Sinai peninsula in a direct route, rather than detouring to the southern tip, therefore look for the biblical Mount Sinai elsewhere. According to some scholars, the Song of Deborah suggests that God dwelt at Mount Seir, so many scholars favour a location in Nabatea.
Alternatively, the biblical descriptions of Sinai can be interpreted as describing a volcano, so a small number of scholars have considered equating Sinai with locations in northwestern Saudi Arabia, such as Jabal al-Lawz, as there are no volcanoes on the Sinai peninsula. Saint Catherine's Monastery lies on the Sinai Peninsula, at the mouth of an inaccessible gorge at the foot of modern Mount Sinai in Saint Catherine at an elevation of 1550 meters; the monastery is a UNESCO World Heritage Site. According to the UNESCO report and website hereunder, this monastery has been called the oldest working Christian monastery in the world – although the Monastery of Saint Anthony, situated across the Red Sea in the desert south of Cairo lays claim to that title. There are two principal routes to the summit; the longer and shallower route, Siket El Bashait, takes about 2.5 hours on foot, though camels can be used. The steeper, more direct route is up the 3,750 "steps of penitence" in the ravine behind the monastery.
The summit of the mountain has a mosque, still used by Muslims. It has a Greek Orthodox chapel, constructed in 1934 on the ruins of a 16th-century church, not open to the public; the chapel encloses the rock, considered to be the source for the biblical Tablets of Stone. At the summit is "Moses' cave", where Moses was said to have waited to receive the Ten Commandments. Hashem el-Tarif Jebel Musa, Morocco, a named mountain in Morocco Mount Sinai travel guide from Wikivoyage Caucasian Albanian Alphabet Discovered and Deciphered, Azerbaijan International, Vol. 11:3. Six articles. View OF Mount Sinai Information about the town of St. Katherine and the Sinai mountains A Report on Mount Sinai Map of Mount Sinai, 18th century. Eran Laor Cartographic Collection, National Library of Israel
Serbian Orthodox Church
The Serbian Orthodox Church is one of the autocephalous Eastern Orthodox Christian Churches. It is the second-oldest Slavic Orthodox Church in the world; the Serbian Orthodox Church comprises the majority of the population in Serbia and the Republika Srpska entity of Bosnia and Herzegovina. It is organized into metropolises and eparchies located in Serbia and Herzegovina, Croatia, but all over the world where Serb diaspora lives; the Serbian Orthodox Church is an autocephalous, or ecclesiastically independent, member of the Eastern Orthodox communion. Serbian Patriarch serves as first among equals in his church; the Church achieved autocephalous status in 1219 under the leadership of St. Sava, becoming independent Archbishopric of Žiča, its status was elevated to that of a patriarchate in 1346, was known afterwards as the Serbian Patriarchate of Peć. This patriarchate was abolished by the Ottoman Turks in 1766; the modern Serbian Orthodox Church was re-established in 1920 after the unification of the Patriarchate of Karlovci, the Metropolitanate of Belgrade and the Metropolitanate of Montenegro.
Christianity spread to the Balkans beginning in the 1st century. Florus and Laurus are venerated as Christian martyrs of the 2nd century. Constantine the Great, born in Niš, was the first Christian Roman Emperor. Several bishops seated in what is today Serbia participated in the First Council of Nicaea, such as Ursacius of Singidunum. In 380, Eastern Roman Emperor Theodosius decreed that his subjects would be Christians according to the Council of Nicea formula. Greek was used in the Byzantine church. With the definite split in 395, the line in Europe ran south along the Drina river. Among old Christian heritage is the Archbishopric of Justiniana Prima, established in 535, which had jurisdiction over the whole of present-day Serbia. However, the Archbishopric did not last, as the Slavs and Avars destroyed the region sometime after 602, when the last mention is made of it. In 731 Leo III attached Illyricum and Southern Italy to Patriarch Anastasius of Constantinople, transferring the papal authority to the Eastern Church.
The history of the early medieval Serbian Principality is recorded in the work De Administrando Imperio, compiled by the Byzantine Emperor Constantine VII Porphyrogenitus. The DAI drew information on the Serbs among others, a Serbian source; the Serbs were said to have received the protection of Emperor Heraclius, Porphyrogenitus stressed that the Serbs had always been under Imperial rule. His account on the first Christianization of the Serbs can be dated to 632–638; the establishment of Christianity as state religion dates to the time of Prince Mutimir and Byzantine Emperor Basil I. The Christianization was due to Byzantine and subsequent Bulgarian influence. At least during the rule of Kocel in Pannonia, communications between Serbia and Great Moravia, where Methodius was active, must have been possible; this fact, the pope was aware of, when planning Methodius' diocese as well as that of the Dalmatian coast, in Byzantine hands as far north as Split. There is a possibility that some Cyrillomethodian pupils reached Serbia in the 870s even sent by Methodius himself.
Serbia was accounted Christian as of about 870. The first Serbian bishopric was founded at Ras, near modern Novi Pazar on the Ibar river. According to Vlasto, the initial affiliation is uncertain; the early Ras church can be dated to the 9th–10th century, with the rotunda plan characteristic of first court chapels. The bishopric was established shortly after 871, during the rule of Mutimir, was part of the general plan of establishing bishoprics in the Slav lands of the empire, confirmed by the Council of Constantinople in 879–880; the names of Serbian rulers through Mutimir are Slavic dithematic names, per the Old Slavic tradition. With Christianization in the 9th century, Christian names appear; the next generations of Serbian royalty had Christian names, evident of strong Byzantine missions in the 870s. Petar Gojniković was evidently a Christian prince, Christianity was spreading in his time; the Bulgarian annexation of Serbia in 924 was important for the future direction of the Serbian church, by at latest, Serbia must have received the Cyrillic alphabet and Slavic religious text familiar but not yet preferred to Greek.
In 1018–19, the Archbishopric of Ohrid was established after the Byzantines conquered Bulgaria. Greek replaced Bulgarian Slavic as the liturgical language. Serbia was ecclesiastically administered into several bishoprics: the bishopric of Ras, mentioned in the first charter of Basil II, became part of the Ohrid archbishopric and encompassed the areas of southern Serbia, by the rivers Raška, Ibar and Lim, evident in the second charter of Basil II. In the chrysobulls of Basil II d
Deacon
A deacon is a member of the diaconate, an office in Christian churches, associated with service of some kind, but which varies among theological and denominational traditions. Some Christian churches, such as the Catholic Church, the Eastern Orthodox Church and the Anglican church, view the diaconate as part of the clerical state; the word deacon is derived from the Greek word diákonos, a standard ancient Greek word meaning "servant", "waiting-man", "minister", or "messenger". One promulgated speculation as to its etymology is that it means "through the dust", referring to the dust raised by the busy servant or messenger, it is assumed that the office of deacon originated in the selection of seven men by the apostles, among them Stephen, to assist with the charitable work of the early church as recorded in Acts 6. The title deaconess is not found in the Bible. However, one woman, Phoebe, is mentioned at Romans 16:1–2 as a deacon of the church in Cenchreae. Nothing more specific is said about her duties or authority, although it is assumed she carried Paul's Letter to the Romans.
The exact relationship between male and female deacons varies. In some traditions a female deacon is a member of the order of deacons, while in others, deaconesses constitute a separate order. In some traditions, the title "deaconess" was sometimes given to the wife of a deacon. Female deacons are mentioned by Pliny the Younger in a letter to the emperor Trajan dated c. 112. “I believed it was necessary to find out from two female slaves who were called deacons, what was true—and to find out through torture ”This is the earliest Latin text that appears to refer to female deacons as a distinct category of Christian minister. A biblical description of the qualities required of a deacon, of his household, can be found in 1 Timothy 3:1–13. Among the more prominent deacons in history are Stephen, the first Christian martyr. Prominent historical figures who played major roles as deacons and went on to higher office include Athanasius of Alexandria, Thomas Becket, Reginald Pole. On June 8, 536, a serving Roman deacon was raised to Silverius.
The title is used for the president, chairperson, or head of a trades guild in Scotland. The diaconate is one of the major orders in the Catholic, Eastern Orthodox, Oriental Orthodox churches; the other major orders are those of bishop and presbyter and sub-deacon. While the diaconate as a vocation was maintained from earliest Apostolic times to the present in the Eastern churches, it disappeared in the Western church during the first millennium, with Western churches retaining deacons attached to diocesan cathedrals; the diaconate continued in a vestigial form as a temporary, final step along the course toward ordination to priesthood. In the 20th century, the diaconate was restored as a vocational order in many Western churches, most notably in the Latin Rite of the Catholic Church, the Anglican Communion, the United Methodist Church. In Catholic and Anglican churches, deacons assist priests in their pastoral and administrative duties, but report directly to the bishops of their diocese, they have a distinctive role in the liturgy of the Western Churches.
In the Eastern Church, deacons have a profound liturgical presence in the Divine Liturgy. In the Western Church, Pope St. Gregory the Great reduced the liturgical role of the deacon in the Roman Rite, limiting them to serving the bishop, the proclamation of the Gospel, assisting the celebrant at the altar aside from the deacon's calling of charity. Today, deacons are granted permission to preach. Beginning around the fifth century, there was a gradual decline in the permanent diaconate in the Latin church, it has however remained a vital part of the Eastern Catholic Churches. From that time until the years just prior to the Second Vatican Council, the only men ordained as deacons were seminarians who were completing the last year or so of graduate theological training, so-called "transitional deacons", who received the order after they complete their third year at the theological seminary, several months before priestly ordination. Following the recommendations of the council, in 1967 Pope Paul VI issued the motu proprio Sacrum Diaconatus Ordinem, restoring the ancient practice of ordaining to the diaconate men who were not candidates for priestly ordination.
These men are known as permanent deacons in contrast to those continuing their formation, who were called transitional deacons. There is no sacramental or canonical difference between the two, however, as there is only one order of deacons; the permanent diaconate formation period in the Roman Catholic Church varies from diocese to diocese as it is determined by the local ordinary. But it entails a year of prayerful preparation, a four- or five-year training period that resembles a collegiate course of study, a year of post-ordination formation as well as the need for lifelong continuing education credits. Diaconal candidates receive instruction in philosophy, study of the Holy Scriptures (
Media related to John Climacus at Wikimedia Commons
Greek Wikisource has original text related to this article: Ἰωάννης τῆς Κλίμακος
