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Church and State in the Byzantine Empire: A Reconsideration of The Problem of Caesaropapism

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  28 July 2009

Deno J. Geanakoplos
Affiliation:
Professor of History, University of Illinois

Extract

In the medieval theocratic societies of both the Byzantine East and the Latin West, where the influence of Christian precepts so strongly pervaded all aspects of life, it was inevitable that the institutions of church and state, of sacerdotium and regnum to use the traditional Latin terms, be closely tied to one another. But whereas in the West, at least after the investiture conflict of the eleventh century, the pope managed to exert a strong political influence over secular rulers, notably the Holy Roman Emperor, in the East, from the very foundation of Constantinople in the fourth century, the Byzantine emperor seemed clearly to dominate over his chief ecclesiastical official, the patriarch.

Type
Research Article
Copyright
Copyright © American Society of Church History 1965

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References

1. The literature on the relationship of Byzantine emperor and church, especially on the specific question of the term Caesaropapism is inadequate. A few authorities who support the thesis of a more limited imperial control over the church are: Ostrogorsky, G., “Relations between Church and State in Byzantium” (in Russian), Annales de l'institut Kondakov, IV (1931) 121ff.Google Scholar; Dvornik, F., “Emperors, Popes, and General Councils,” Dumbarton Oaks Papers, no. 6 (1951) 123CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Baynes, N., “The Byzantine State,” Byzantine Studies and Other Essays (London, 1955) esp. 51ff.Google Scholar; Barker, E., Social and Political Thought in Byzantium (Oxford, 1957) 92Google Scholar; Ensslin, W., “The Emperor and the Imperial Administration,” Byzantium: An Introduction to East Roman Civilizatian (Oxford, 1948) ed. Baynes, and Moss, esp. 275ff.Google Scholar; Hussey, J., The Byzantine World (London, 1957) 21 etc.Google Scholar; Ph. Sherrard, The Greek East and the Latin West: A Study in the Christian Tradition (London, 1959) 26, 91.Google ScholarAlivizatos, A., “Caesaropapismus in den byzantinischen Kirchlichen Gesetzen und den Canones,” Acts of XI International Byzantine Congress 1958 (Munich, 1960) 1520.Google Scholar Examples of scholars supporting the view of absolute imperial control over the church are: Jugie, M., Le Schisme byzantin (Paris, 1941) 10Google Scholar (“Caesaropapism incontestably should bear the chief responsibility for the preparation of the schism.”); Ch. Diehl, Byzantium: Greatness and Decline (New Brunswick, 1957) 29 (“The emperor was as absolute and infallible in the spiritual as in the temporal sphere.”); Diomedes, A., “Source and Extent of Imperial Power in Byzantium” (in Greek), Byzantina-Metabyzantina, I (1949) 3969Google Scholar (“He ruled the church as he ruled the state consecrating bishops.”); Anastos, M., “Political Theory in the Lives of the Slavonic Saints Constantine and Methodius,” Harvard Slavic Studies, II (Cambridge, 1954) 13Google Scholar (“The emperor was supreme on earth … and prevailed even in the formulation of dogma.”); Anastos, “Church and State during the First Iconoclast Controversy 726–87” Ricerche di storia religiosa I, 2 4, Studi in onore di G. La Piana (1957) 279ff. Cf also Dölger, F., Byz. Zeit., 43 (1950) 146f.Google Scholar, 38 (1938) 240, 36 (1936) 145–57. Vasiliev, A., History of the Byzantine Empire (Madison, 1952) 258Google Scholar writes: “Leo III's view was the accepted Caesaropapistic view of the Byzantine Emperors.” And now Pilati, G., Chiesa e stato nei primi quindici secoli (Rome, 1961)Google Scholar uses the term Caesaropapism, 60, etc.

2. The Oxford Dictionary of the Christian Church, ed. F. Cross (London, 1957)Google Scholar under “Caesaropapism” says that the term means absolute control over all aspects of the church “including matters (e.g., doctrine) normally reserved to ecclesiastical authority.” This is the interpretation of the term as used in this study.

3. In Barker, E., Social and Political Thought in Byzantium (Oxford, 1957) 92.Google Scholar

4. Ibid., 96. Also cf. the famous novel of Justinian (In Barker, 75) which likewise emphasizes the concord between the two powers. And see a letter of John II Comnenus to the pope on the division of spheres (in Lampros, S., Neos Hellenomnemon [in Greek] XI [Athens, 1914] 109–11)Google Scholar.

5. Not all critics agree about Ceruiarius' actual intentions; it is sometimes said, perhaps not quite accurately, that he aspired to be a Byzantine Hildebrand. On this see the qualifying remarks of Hussey, J., Church and Learning in the Byzantine Empire (London, 1937) 152–57Google Scholar and esp. Michel, A., Humbert und Kerullarios (Paderborn, 19251930)Google Scholar; also Bréhier, L., La schisme orientale du XIe siècle (Paris, 1899)Google Scholar (old but still useful); and Bury, “Roman Emperors,” in Selected Essays (Cambridge, 1930) 210–14.Google Scholar

6. See below, text and note 69.

7. See below text and note 50. This seems to have been demanded by the patriarch first from the Monophysite-leaning Anastasius in the late sixth century. On the insistence of certain later patriarchs on the moral fitness of the emperor for his office see below text and notes 31, 32.

8. See Balsamon, , “In canonem XVI Concilii Carthaginiensis,” ed. MPG, vol. 138, p. 93Google Scholar (cited in this respect by A. Vasiliev, History of the Byzantine Empire, 470). In another passage Balsa- mon (in Rhalles and Potlis, Syntagma of Divine and Holy Canons [in Greek], IV, 544–45), says that “the power and activity of the emperor concern body and souls while the power and activity of the patriarch concern only the soul”

9. Balsamon's conclusion is that since a bishop can order priests and monks to engage in certain secular work, so all the more can the emperor do so, as he can nominate bishops (Rhalles and Potlis, II, 229). But note again this does not here refer to dogma. Cf. Zonaras, op. cit., III, 336.

10. Horos is the Byzantine term for the decision of an ecumenical council regarding dogma. See Alivizatos, H., The Holy Canons (in Greek) (Athens, 1949) 21.Google Scholar

11. See Bréhier, L., Diet. d'histoire et geog. eccl., IX, cols. 160–61.Google Scholar

12. John of Euchaita of the eleventh century speaks of both emporor and patriarch as “Christio - the anointed of the Lord,” (MPG, vol. 120, cols. 1163, 1183)Google Scholar. See title 3, pt. 1, of Epanagoge (Barker, op. cit., 91): “The patriarch is a living animate image of Christ.” For Vlastares see Rhalles and Potlis, VI, p. 428, who calls the patriarch the “living icon of Christ.” I cannot find this term used of the patriarch in the earlier canonists and its use during the later centuries may therefore be meaningful with respect to the imperial-patriarchal power relationship. Also see Balsamon in Rhalles and Potlis, III, 44–45.

13. Cf. Bury, , Selected Essays, 120–21,Google Scholar and Ensslin, “The Emperor and Imperial Administration,” 280.

14. On “Caesaropapism” and the Roman Pontifex Maximus see esp. Ostrogorsky, “Relations between Church and State in Byzantium,” (in Russian) 122f. Cf. Sherrard, Greek East and Latin West, 91f. For bibl. on Eusebius see below, note 18.

15. Title used by Balsamon, e.g., in Rhalles and Potlis, III 44 (christos Kyriou).

16. See Eusebius', Triakontaeterikos, pt. 1, 197,Google Scholar 11. 1–3, and pt. 3, p. 201, 11. 19–21, in Werke, Eusebius, I (Leipzig, 1902) ed. by I. A. Heikel.Google Scholar

17. This celebrated phrase of course has been variously interpreted. See Straub, J., “Kaiser Konstantin als episkopos, ton ektos,” Studüa patristica, I (1957), 678–95.Google Scholar See also the recent work of Demetropoulos, P., The Faith of the Ancient Church as Canon of Life and the World (in Greek) (Athens, 1959) 52.Google Scholar

18. For a fine summary of certain aspects of Eusebius' political thought see Baynes, N., “Eusebius and the Christian Empire,” Annuaire de l'institut de philologie et d'histoire orientales, II (19331934) 1318.Google Scholar Cf. Sherrard, Ph., Greek East and Latin West (London, 1959) 92ff.Google Scholar Much fuller is Schwartz, E., Kaiser Constantin und die christliche Kirche, 2nd ed. (Leipzig, 1936)Google Scholar; also Cranz, F., “Kingdom and Polity in Eusebius of Caesarea,” Harvard Theological Review, 45 (1952) 4766,CrossRefGoogle Scholar and bibl. p. 48. And now cf. Congar, Y., After Nine Hundred Years (New York, 1959) 1417.Google Scholar

19. Dölger, F., review in Byz. Zeit. (1931) 449Google Scholar of Ostrogorsky, “Church and State,” says: “The power balance of church and state was regulated according to the personalities who faced each other at various times.” For the celebrated Western phrase “Vicar of Christ” there seems to be no exact equivalent in Greek. E. Kantorowicz's suggestion, in a lecture, of Christomimetes (“imitator of Christ”) is good but with not the same emphasis. The term commonly used on imperial Byzantine bulls, Pistos Basileus, is probably more or less equivalent to “Defender of the Faith.”

20. For a general account of these clashes (in English) see Bury, J., Later Roman Empire (London, 1923)Google Scholar and Later Roman Empire, 1st ed. (London, 1889).Google Scholar Constantius imposed Arianism during his reign, Zeno for a time leaned toward Monophysitism, and Heraclius imposed Monothelitism as a solution, while Leo III issued his edict outlawing the icons in 730 and Constantine V and Leo V continued this iconoclasticpolicy.

21. Bury, , Later Roman Empire, 403,Google Scholar notes cogently that Basiliscus by his Encyclical and Zeno by his Henoticon, virtually “assumed the functions of anecumenical council.”

22. Ostrogorsky, G., “Relations between Church and State” (in Russian), IV (1933) 121ff.Google Scholar (cf. Dölger, review, Byz. Zeit., 31 [1931] 449)Google Scholar cites artistic evidence to show that in the earlier period the emperor was portrayed as the priest-king Melchisedek, but later artists presented the emperor and patriarch standing side by side as Moses and Aaron.

23. Cf. Hussey, J., The Byzantine World, 9092.Google Scholar Cf. Moss, H. review, in Journal of Ecclesiastical History (1960) 114Google Scholar who favors the view of imperial absolutism over the church.

24. See above notes 3–4.

25. Phrase is from Ph. Sherrard, Greek East and Latin West (London, 1955), 93.Google Scholar

26. On tradition (paradosis) see Gavin, F., Some Aspects of Contemporary Greek Orthodox Thought (London, 1923) 2530Google Scholar and esp. Ch. Androutsos, , Dogmatike of the Orthodox Eastern Church (Athens, 1956) 7ff.Google Scholar

27. Gasquet, A., De l'autorité impériale en, natiêre rekgieuse á Byzance (Paris, 1879)Google Scholar. Sherrard, , Greek East and Latin West, 92.Google Scholar

28. See Dölger, review, Byz. Zeit. (1931) 449.Google Scholar It is of significance according to Ensslin “The Emperor and the Imperial Administration,” 255, that in the ceremonial of the tenth century both emperor and patriarch paid each other the tribute of formal proskynesis.

29. Constantine Porphyrogenitus De ceremoniis (Bonn ed.) pt. 1, pp. 564–66.Google Scholar Pseudo-Codinus, De officiis, agrees (PG., 156, col. 116.17). On the arbitrariness of the emperor's choice of patriarch, see Laurent, V., “Le rituel de linvestiture du patriarch byz. au debut du XVe siécle,” in Bulletin Sect. Hist. Acad. Roum., 28 (1947) 218–32.Google Scholar Also, Dölger, , Byz. Zeit. (1931) 449f.Google Scholar; 28 (1947) 218–32. Cf. Bréhier, L., “L'investiture des patriarches de Constantinople au Moyen Age,” Studi e Testi, no. 3 (Rome, 1946) 368–72,Google Scholar who points out that “not a single patriarch was chosen except by the emperor's will.” (Yet witness the case of 1450, see note 33 below). Bréhier says that the imperial power of selection had been recognized by custom, if not by juridical act, since the ninth and tenth centuries.

30. See Barker, op. cit., 8. Emperor Anastasius in 495 had a synod of bishops depose the patriarch Euphemius (Charanis, P.Church and State in the Later Roman Empire [Madison, 1939] 27.Google Scholar) There is no canon or canonist's opinion explicitly stating the emperor had the right to depose a patriarch.

31. On Photius see Dvornik, F., The Photian Schism, History and Legend (Cambridge, 1948)Google Scholar. On Nicholas Mysticus, see Ostrogorsky, Byzantine State, 230–31.

32. On Cerularius see above, note 5. On Arsenios see Geanakoplos, , Emperor Michael Palaeologus and the West (Cambridge, 1959) 235, 272, etc.Google Scholar

33. See Bréhier, , Cambridge Medieval History, IV, 624Google Scholar and Pears, E., The Destruction of the Greek Empire (London-New York, 1903) 202.Google Scholar Under the influence of the anti-unionist George Scholarios, the synod deposed the patriarch Gregory. It used to be thought erroneously that he was replaced by the monk Athanasius. See Ch. Papaioannou, , “The Praktika of the alleged final synod in St. Sophia,” in Eccesiastike Aletheia (in Greek) XV (1896)Google Scholar; and Gennadios, of Helioupolis, , “Was there ever a Patriarch Athanasios II? Orthodoxia (in Greek), XVIII (1943) 117–23.Google Scholar

34. Also Balsamon in Rhalles and Potlis, Syntagma ton Hieron Canonon (in Greek) (Athens, 1852) II, 23 (“It is given to the emperor to accomplish changes of episcopal sees.”) We should mention here also the emperor's authority, in practice, to control ecclesiastical property. But though in this respect the emperor usually secured his aims, the church's opposition could at times be very strong. Note for example Nicephorus Phocas' edict of 964 (following the example of Romanus Lecapenus) issued in the aim of curbing the increase in ecclesiastical property. This had to be withdrawn, however.

35. In a recent lecture (yet unpublished) Professor G. Florovsky set forth the view, certainly correct, that modern Western scholarly views on Byzantine conciliar theory have been shaped far too much by the influence of the theories of the Western Conciliar movement-theories of course alien to the Byzantine East. (He also mantains that the ecumenical councils are to be considered as ad hoc events rather than institutions.) See also Stephanides, “The Last Stage in the Development of Church-State Relations in Byzantium,” Ep. Het. Byz. Spoudon (1953) 2740.Google Scholar

36. See Geanakoplos, D., “The Council of Florence and the Problem of Union between Greek and Latin Churches,” Church History (1955) text and note 91.Google Scholar Also Gill, J., The Council of Florence (Oxford, 1959), 288.Google Scholar

37. On the non-ecumenicity of Lyons for the Greeks, who considered it a “Robber Council,” see Geanakoplos, , Emperor Michael, 263ff.Google Scholar

38. See Geanakoplos, , “Council of Florence,” text and notes 2529.Google Scholar

39. E.g., the ecclesiastical tomos henoseos of a council in 920, signed by the emperor, became part of the law of the land. (Grumel, V., Regestes des actes du patriarchat de Constantinople, II, Reg. 669).Google Scholar

40. See text and notes 11 to 15.

41. See esp. Bréhier, L., “Hiereus kai Basileus” (title in Greek), Memorial L. Petit (Bucharest, 1948), 4145.Google Scholar A Gasquet, L'autorité impériale, 50–55, refers to the emperor's “sacerdotal” character with respect to these privileges. Also Mitard, M., “be pouvoir imperial an temps de Leon VI, le Sage,” Mélanges Diehl, I (1930) 219Google Scholar: “in certain respects he was a sacerdotal personnage.” See Constantine Porphyrogenitus, De Ceremoniis, I, 621–22.Google Scholar

42. On the cutting of a certain amount of hair from the head of the Porphyrogenitus in his infancy, a kind of tonsure or a sort of koura see Bréhier, loc. cit., 42–43. Source, is De Ceremoniis, I, 621–22.Google Scholar

43. Monnier, H., Les Novelles de Leon le Sage (Bordeaux, 1923) 211ff.Google Scholar Also Ostrogorsky, Byzantine State, 215–16.

44. Androutsos, Dogmatike (in Greek), 52. The sole significant difference between Orthodox and Catholics is the exact moment the miraculous transformation into Christ's body and blood takes place. Yet the Eastern church objects to the Western Scholastic differentiation between accidents and substance.

45. Rhalles and Potlis, II, 467.

46. Rhalles and Potlis, II, 467. Cf. Balsamon, Ibid., IV, 544, which refers to dikir (two candles) not trikir (three candles). Dikir symbolizes the dual nature of Christ, trikir refers to the Trinity.

47. Greek priests are not anointed at ordination, there being merely a laying on of hands and prayer. This constitutes a sacrament, however.

48. The most important recent, authoritative works on this controversial question are by Ostrogorsky, G., “Zur Kaisersalbung und Schilderhebung im spätbyzantinischen Krönungszeremoniell,” Historia, IV (1955) 246–56Google Scholar (cf. Ostrogorsky, , Byzantine State, 380)Google Scholar and the earlier article of Ostrogorsky and Stein, E., “Die Krönungsordnungen des Ceremomenbuches,” Byzantion, VII (1932) 200,Google Scholar which affirms unction formed no customary part of the Byzantine coronation ceremony until the 13th Century. Cf. Brightman, F., “Byzantine Imperial Coronations,” Jl. of Theological Studies, II (1901) 383ff.Google Scholar See also the very recent work of Christophiopoulou, C., Election, Proclamation and Coronation of the Byzantine Emperor (Athens, 1956).Google Scholar Cf. Runciman, S., Byzantine Civilization (New York, 1933), 66,Google Scholar who says however, that it was the Palaeologan emperors who introduced the Western custom of anointment. On the Western custom of royal anointment see Schramm, P., A history of the English Coronation (Oxford, 1937), Chap. 1.Google Scholar

49. See esp. Sichel, W., “Das byzantinische Krönungrecht bis zum 10. Jahrhundert”, Byz. Zeit., VII (1898) 548Google Scholar and Stephanides, B., Ecclesiastical History (in Greek) (Athens, 1948) 138,Google Scholar note 1, who believes anointment began probably under Basil I. Cf. also Ensslin, , “The Emperor and Imperial Administration”, 273.Google Scholar A passage of Balsamon, in Rhalles and Potlis, IV, 544–45, seems to speak of emperors and patriarchs being anointed already in the 12th century (“as the emperors are, so are the patriarchs great in the ability to teach through the power of the holy chrism”.) But this is doubtless a metaphorical use of the term, since it is certainly clear that the patriarchs were never anointed. Also Kantocowicz, E., Laudes regiae (Berkeley, 1946) passim.Google Scholar

50. Charanis, P., Church and State in the Later Roman Empire. The Religious Policy of Anastasius I (Madison, 1939) 12.Google Scholar

51. Ostrogorsky, , Byzantine State, 260Google Scholar (source, Leo the Deacon, Bonn ed., 98f.)

52. Ostrogorsky, , Byzantine State, 56Google Scholar; Bury, “Constitution”, 118; Charanis, , “The Crown Modiolus once More”, Byzantion, XIII (1938) 337–81.Google Scholar

53. When a Protestant is converted to Orthodoxy he is not rebaptized but given the chrism. Greek priests cannot perform all the sacraments: they cannot ordain priests and only bishops have the right to bless the chrism of baptism, though priests can administer it.

54. Rhalles and Potlis, II, 467. See Ensslin, loc. cit., 275.

55. The minor orders of the Greek church (cantor, reader, etc.) may be considered clerics of a lower type, but since they must receive the heirothesia which the emperor did not (he was of course anointed), the emperor cannot even in this sense be considered a cleric. It might be noted that in contrast to the heirothesia of the lower orders, the higher order of clergy—deacon, priest, bishop—receive the heirotonia which is a sacrament. However, Diehl, Byzantium: Greatness and Decline, 29, calls the emperor a priest. Stephanides, Ecclesiastical History, 138 (quoting Demetrius Chomatianos, from Rhalles and Potlis, V, 428ff.) says the emperor could do anything in the church except administer the actual sacraments (“plen monon tou hierourgein”). But cf. Baynes, N., “The Byzantine State”, Byzantine Studies and Other Essays (London, 1955) 49,Google Scholar who says (referring to the earliest Byzantine emperors): “it took the Christian Emperor many a year to learn he was not a priest”.

56. I agree with Ostrogorsky, Byzantine State, 218Google Scholar: “However strongly imperial influence might exert itself on the ecclesiastical organization, the Emperor is still only a layman … and can be merely the protector, not the head of the church”.

57. M. Anastos, “Political Theory in the Lives of the Slavic Saints”, 13, says that “in general the emperors prevailed even in the formulation of dogma”.

58. On the peculiarly Byzantine concept of oikonomia there is little written. See now Alivizatos, H., Oikonomia and the Canon Law of the Orthodox Church (in Greek) (Athens, 1949)Google Scholar. Dvornik, , The Rhotian Schism, 8, 24,Google Scholar etc. Langford, J., A Dictionary of the Eastern Orthodox Church (London, 1923) 47ff.Google ScholarRunciman, , Eastern Schism, 5, calls oikonomia “elasticity in the interests of the Christian community”.Google Scholar Alivizatos, op. cit., shows oikonomia was “a way out of the anomaly created by and proceeding from the imposition of extreme severity and precision in observance of canonical order”. (We might possibly compare oikonomia to the principle of equity in civil law.) Oikonomia is, we may say, the relaxing of disciplinary canons—regarding performance of the sacraments but not dogma—for the benefit of the community, See Gavin, F., Some Aspects of Contemporary Greek Orthodox Thought (London, 1936) 292.Google Scholar The Byzantine historians Pachymeres (Bonn) 387, and Gregoras (Bonn) 127, imply that the ecclesiastics of Michael Palaeologus' reign, disturbed over his unionist policy, believed that oikonmia did not, however, apply where dogma was involved, but only with respect to church organization.

59. See Androutsos, , Dogmatike, 294ff.Google Scholar, and the interesting points of view in Sherrard, Ph., Greek East, 54ff.Google Scholar Also Gavin, , Orthodox Thought 272ff.Google Scholar On the sacraments, Gavin, 305–75. Dyobouniotes, C., The Dogmatics of Androutsos reviewed (Athens, 1907)Google Scholar thinks that the lower orders are sacramentalia. On sacramentalia, see also Gavin, 305.Google Scholar

60. The Epanagoge (Barker, op. cit., 90) reads that the emperor must maintain all that is contained in the Scriptures and all set down by the seven ecumenical councils and at Byzantine law.

61. See Androutsos, Dogmatike, 314ff., Gavin, , Orthodox Thought, 278ff.Google Scholar The first mention in the East of seven saccraments was by the monk Job in 1270, and by Michael Palaeologus at the Council of Lyons in 1274 (Androutsos, 314). Peter Lombard and Pope Alexander III apparently first enumerated seven in the West.

62. Bury, , Later Roman Empire, II, 375, 393.Google Scholar

63. See Ostrogorsky, G., “Les débuts de la Querelle des images”, Mélanges Diehl I (1930) 238ff.Google Scholar Previously the date was considered to be 726 (Diehl, , “Leo III and the Isaurian Dynasty”, in Cambridge Medieval History, IV, 9)Google Scholar.

64. See Anastos, M., “Justinian's Despotic Control over the Church as Illustrated by his Edict on Theopaschite Formula and Letter to Pope John in 533”, in Zbor, Bad. Viz. Inst. 312 (= Mélanges Oskogorsky, II [1964] 111.Google Scholar). Also see Alivizatos, H., “Les rapports de la legislation ecclésiastique de Justinien avec les canons do l'église, Atti del congresso internazionale di diritto romano, II (Rome, 1935) 79ff.Google Scholar

65. Geanakoplos, Emperor Michael, passim.

66. Ibid., 270 and 274, which also cites Metochites, G., Historia Dogmatica, in A. Mai, Patrum Nova Bibliotheca, VIII (Rome, 1871) 38.Google Scholar

67. Ducas (Bonn), 254 and 275.

68. Cf. Bury, , Later Roman Empire, 403,Google Scholar who says that Basiliscus' Encyclical and Zeno's Henoticon assert the imperial right to dictate to the church and pronounce on doctrine. (“They virtually assumed the functions of an ecumenical council”.) Niectas (Bonn), 275, complains that the emperors set themselves up as “definers of dogma”.

69. For the list of nine powers (all pertaining to administration of the church and control over its prelates, administratively speaking), see Laurent, V., “Les droits de l'empereur en matière ecclésiastique. L'accord do 1380–82”, Revue des etudes byzantines (19541955) 520.Google Scholar Cf. this article with B. Stephanides, “The Last Stage of the Development of Church-State Relations in Byzantium”, (in Greek), Ep. Het. Byz. Spoudon (1953) 29.Google Scholar

70. On Michael's persecution of the monks, clergy, and people see Geanakoplos, , Emperor Michael, 264–76.Google Scholar

71. See Gill, J., The Council of Florence, 384–85.Google Scholar Also Tomadakes, N., George Scholarios and his Political Ideas (in Greek) (Athens, 1954).Google Scholar In the Acta Graeca, ed. J. Gill, pt. 2, 433, Emperor John VIII is quoted as saying that the emperor must follow the council's decision in dogma because he feels the council cannot err. (The Acta Graeca was pro-unionist.)

72. See Bury, . Later Roman Empire, II, 383ff.Google Scholar (On Justinian's edict over the Three Chapters). Also Ibid., 381–83 (on Justinian's edict in 543 against the Origenists, but here he was influenced by the attitude of many ecclesiastics). See also Alivizatos, H., Die Kirchliche Gesetzgebung des Kaisers Justinian I (Berlin, 1913).Google Scholar

73. On Basiliscus see Bury, , Later Roman Empire, I, 403.Google Scholar On the other attempts to influence dogmatic formulation, ibid., passim.

74. Gill, , Council of Florence, 349ff.Google Scholar Source is Ducas, 216.

75. On this see Geanakoplos, , “Council of Florence”, text and notes 7284.Google Scholar

76. See Alivizatos, H., “The Conscience of the Church” (in Greek) (Athens, 1954).Google Scholar Also Tsankov, S., The Eastern Orthodox Church, trans. Lowrie, D. (London, 1929) 9092.Google Scholar He says the highest authority in the church is the community of the church, not the bishops alone nor the clergy nor the laity alone. “The real guardian of piety is the body of the church, the people itself”. Zernov, N., Eastern Christendom (New York, 1961) 231Google Scholar: “The Council's decisions require endorsement by the whole community”. This question of the conscience of the church was perhaps first put forth by the Russian scholar Chomjakov, A. S. in several studies including L'église latine et le Protestantisme au point de vue de; l'église d'Orient (Lausanne, 1872).Google Scholar Some modern Greek theologians subscribe to the theory (see above); others would place the final authority in the clergy as successors of Christ: cf. P. Trembelas, “The Laymen in the Orthodox Church”, (in Greek), Ecclesia (1930) 385ff. and later issues. Also cf. Dyobouniotes in his dogmatic work. See finally Kotsones, Io., The Position of Laymen in the Ecclesiastical Organism (in Greek) (Athens, 1956).Google Scholar

77. Ducas (Bonn) 216. Also cf. Gill, , Council of Florence, 349.Google Scholar

78. See Anastos, M., “Justinian's Despotic control over the Church” 111.Google Scholar

79. In 1721 Peter established a kind of “Spiritual Department” or Holy Synod to replace the old patriarchate. Peter tells us that this was established because the simple folk could not distinguish the spiritual from the sovereign power, believing the spiritual authority higher than the temporal.