Oxford history of the christian church

5. The Ecumenical Patriarch and his election.

The Church, like the secular government, had its own institutions and administrative departments. These were marked by conservative adherence to tradition. There was also change in emphasis and detail. But intermittent and scanty sources make it difficult to follow the development of such changes. Circumstances seemed to have been met as they arose; in a sense this was living by 'economy', adaptability, despite efforts at strict adherence to hierarchical status as laid down in the (occasionally revised) Notitiae Episcopatuum or the imperial handbooks on protocol. Moreover Byzantine ecclesiastical history was riddled with conflicts over authority spured on by a passion for debater.

In the post- sixth-century period the final choice of a patriarch rested with the Emperor. Initially the metropolitans met in the standing synod in Constantinople and selected three names. Only they could vote, but as in other synodal business, views could be expressed unofficially by others outside the metropolitan circle, such as the leading officials of the Great Church. The three names were submitted to the Emperor who could either select one of these or a fourth candidate of his own choice. The De Cerimoniis describes in detail how the announcement (εὶυuεa) and investiture (πpò+́ßλnσιϓ) were made by the Emperor in the Magnaura palace in the presence of senate and clergy. The Patriarch was then escorted to his own palace, the patriarcheion adjoining Hagia Sophia. He was enthroned in the Great Church on the following Sunday after receiving the patriarchal insignia from the Emperor and he was consecrated by the metropolitan of Heracleia.

Thus in practice the Emperor could put in his own man. He was similarly influential in bringing about deposition or resignation. Only rarely did he choose one of his own family: it was Leo VI and Romanus I in the tenth century who did this. There were obvious reasons why an Emperor (or an Empress) might want a man with a particular outlook, such as the statesmanlike Tarasius who cleared up iconoclast problems, or there might be a desire to further political ends, as in the appointment of the unsuitable monk Eustratius Garidas, the protϩgϩ of Anna Dalassena who was thus won over to accept an unpalatable Ducaena as daughter-in-law. And the fourteenth-century hesychast controversies, as well as family rivalries, saw a prolonged see-saw of resignations and reappointments according to the views of the dominant Emperor. But in spite of certain unfortunate appointments this system by no means produced a series of sycophants or weaklings — Nicephorus I, Tarasius, Photius, Nicholas Mysticus, and most of the eleventhcentury patriarchs were among those who upheld the dignity of their high office. They were enlightened and educated men, often originating from a lay or non-monastic milieu. Normally they were priests on their election, but one or two were actually laymen, as Photius and Nicephorus. During the latter middle ages many were monks, appointed for their views for or against union with Rome, or in the fourteenth century for their hesychast or anti-hesychast associations, men who in addition to their patriarchal activities often left a body of writings, Callistus I for instance, or Philotheus Coccinus also important for liturgy. This move towards monastic appointments is in keeping with the significant role of the monastic world in general during the later middle ages. The Church's awareness of its own authority and its desire to stress this is also reflected in the fifteenth-century work of archbishop Symcon of Thessalonica on ordinations. He said that the formal pronouncement of the election of a new patriarch was made by both 'our powerful and sacred ruler' and by 'the sacred and holy synod', and though he allowed the imperial right of selection he specifically emphasized that the choice was really that of the metropolitans. ²⁹ In the case of resignations whatever pressure might have been brought to bear on various patriarchs their resignations had to be accepted by the synod, as the patriarchal registers show, and they were not always automatically endorsed without question. And in reverse the synod could not depose without imperial confirmation.