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The spread of Eastern Orthodoxy began in the eastern area of the Mediterranean Basin within Byzantine Greek culture. [1] Its communities share an understanding, teaching and offices of great similarity, with a strong sense of seeing each other as parts of one Church.
Aug 31, 2021 · Who is the Eastern Orthodox Church? Where did they come from? And will they share their baklava with you (probably, if you're not a jerk about it)? Let's take a look at the history and practice of one of the world's oldest and largest traditions of the Christian faith.
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Jan 1, 2024 · The Eastern Orthodox Church’s story begins with the Christian communities established by the Apostles in the Eastern Roman Empire. As Christianity spread, these communities developed distinct theological and liturgical traditions, influenced by the cultural and intellectual milieu of the Hellenistic world.
- Overview
- The church and the world
- Missions: ancient and modern
- Orthodoxy and other Christians
The schism between the Greek and Latin churches coincided chronologically with a surge of Christian missionary activity in northern and eastern Europe. Both sides contributed to the resultant expansion of Christianity but used different methods. The West imposed a Latin liturgy on the new converts and thus made Latin the only vehicle of Christian c...
The schism between the Greek and Latin churches coincided chronologically with a surge of Christian missionary activity in northern and eastern Europe. Both sides contributed to the resultant expansion of Christianity but used different methods. The West imposed a Latin liturgy on the new converts and thus made Latin the only vehicle of Christian c...
The Christian East, in spite of the integrating forces of Christian Hellenism, was always culturally pluralistic: since the first centuries of Christianity, Syrians, Armenians, Georgians, Copts, Ethiopians, and other ethnic groups used their own languages in worship and developed their own liturgical traditions. Even though, by the time of the Greek missions to the Slavs, the Byzantine church was almost monolithically Greek, the idea of a liturgy in the vernacular was still quite alive, as is demonstrated by the use of the Slavic language by the missionaries led by Saints Cyril and Methodius in the 9th century.
The Turkish conquest of the Middle East and of the Balkans (15th century) interrupted the missionary expansion of the Orthodox church. The expansion of Islam into formerly Christian territories in the Middle Ages meant that the Christians could survive only in enclaves and were legally excluded from proselytizing among Muslims.
The Russian church alone was able to continue the tradition of Saints Cyril and Methodius, and it did so almost without interruption until the modern period. In the 14th century St. Stephen of Perm translated the Scriptures and the liturgy into the language of a Finnish tribe of the Russian north and became the first bishop of the Zyrians. The expansion of the Russian Empire in Asia was accompanied by efforts of evangelization that—sometimes in opposition to the avowed policy of Russianization practiced by the government of St. Petersburg—followed the Cyrillo-Methodian pattern of translation. This method was utilized among the Tatars of the Volga in the 16th century and among the various peoples of Siberia throughout the 18th and 19th centuries. In 1714 a mission was established in China. In 1794 monks of the Valamo Abbey reached Alaska; their spiritual leader, the monk Herman, was canonized by the Orthodox church in 1970. Missions in the Islamic sphere resumed to the extent that by the year 1903 the liturgy was celebrated in more than 20 languages in the region of Kazan.
The Alaskan mission was under the direction of a modest priest sent to America from eastern Siberia, Ivan Veniaminov. During his long stay in America, first as a priest, then as a bishop (1824–68), he engaged in the work of translating the Gospels and the liturgy into the languages of the Aleuts, the Tlingit Indians, and the Eskimos of Alaska.
In Japan an Orthodox church was established by St. Nikolay Kasatkin. The distinctively Japanese character of this church enabled it to survive the political trials of the Russo-Japanese War (1904–05), the Russian Revolution, and World War II. The church of Japan received full autonomy from the Russian church in 1970.
The missionary tradition has also been revived in Greece. Various Greek associations are dedicated to the pursuit of missionary work in Africa, where sizable indigenous groups have recently joined the Orthodox church.
Since the failure of the unionist Council of Florence (1439), there have been no official attempts to restore unity between Eastern Orthodoxy and Roman Catholicism. In 1484 an Orthodox council declared that Roman Catholics desiring to join the Orthodox church were to be received through chrismation (or confirmation). In the 18th century, however, the relations deteriorated to the point that the Ecumenical Patriarchate of Constantinople decreed that all Roman Catholic and Protestant sacraments, including baptism, were totally unauthentic. A parallel attitude prevailed in Russia until the 17th century, when large numbers of Eastern Rite Roman Catholics (“Uniates”) were received back into Orthodoxy by a simple confession of faith, and this practice was adopted in the acceptance of individual Roman Catholics as well.
In the 16th century, during the Reformation, a lengthy correspondence took place between a group of reformers headed by Philipp Melanchthon and the ecumenical patriarch Jeremias II. It led to no concrete results, for the East generally considered the Protestants as only a branch of deviation of the altogether erroneous Roman church.
Various attempts at rapprochement with the Anglican Communion, especially since the 19th century, were generally more fruitful. Several private associations of ecclesiastics and theologians promoted understanding between Eastern Orthodoxy and the “Anglo-Catholic” branch of Anglicanism. The Orthodox, however, were reticent in taking any formal step toward reunion before a satisfactory statement on the content of Anglican faith, taken as a whole, could be obtained.
The contemporary ecumenical movement has from its inception involved the Orthodox church. Eastern Orthodox representatives took part in the various Life and Work (practical) and Faith and Order (theological) conferences from the very beginning of the 20th century. One by one the various independent Orthodox churches joined the World Council of Churches, created in 1948. Often, and especially at the beginning of their participation, Orthodox delegates had recourse to separate statements, which made clear to the Protestant majorities that, in the Orthodox view, Christian unity was attainable only in the full unity of the primitive apostolic faith from which the Orthodox church had never departed. This attitude of the Orthodox could be understood only if it made sufficiently clear that the truth—which historic Eastern Orthodoxy claims to preserve—is maintained by the Holy Spirit in the church as a whole and not by any individual or any group of individuals on their own right and also that the unity of Christians—which is the goal of the ecumenical movement—does not imply cultural, intellectual, or ritual uniformity but rather a mystical fellowship in the fullness of truth as expressed in eucharistic communion.
According to the Eastern Orthodox tradition, the history of the Eastern Orthodox Church is traced back to Jesus Christ and the Apostles. The Apostles appointed successors, known as bishops, and they in turn appointed other bishops in a process known as Apostolic succession.
Mar 28, 2009 · The Orthodox Church consists historically of the local Churches of the Eastern Roman empire, including Constantinople, Alexandria, Antioch and Jerusalem, as well as the Churches that came into being as a result of their missions. During the first millennium of Christianity, this communion included the Church of Rome.
According to the Eastern Orthodox tradition, the history of the Eastern Orthodox Church is traced back to Jesus Christ and the Apostles. The Apostles appointed successors, known as bishops, and they in turn appointed other bishops in a process known as Apostolic succession.
