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THEODORE OF STUDIUM
CHAPTER I.-
CHAPTER II.-
CHAPTER III.-
CHAPTER IV.-
CHAPTER V
CHAPTER VI.-
CHAPTER VII
CONTROVERSY CONCERNING THE REHABILITATION OF THE STEWARD JOSEPH —
THEODORE’S SECOND EXILE— DEATH OF NICEPHORUS AND ACCESSION OF MICHAEL I. —
RESTORATION OF THEODORE — DEATH OF ABBOT PLATO
IF Nicephorus had been
somewhat more wary in his ecclesiastical policy, he might, throughout his
reign, have had the Church on his side. The reasons why he took measures which
were certain to alienate the monastic influence are not clear. We can assign
three possible causes: he may possibly have desired a trial of strength, in
order to assert his authority. This view is adopted by many historians, but
does not seem altogether probable. Or he may have been actuated by a political
motive, and have wished to secure the fidelity of those who looked back with
regret to the days of the strong Isaurian Emperors. It is noteworthy that more
than fifty years later, two successive pretenders arose, claiming to be the dethroned
(and unblinded?) Constantine. That name was still a
potent one to conjure with. Or there may have been lurking in his mind a
possible return to the policy of iconoclasm. Charity might suggest a fourth
hypothesis: that Nicephorus only desired to unite all parties and make them
promise to let bygones be bygones. But if this was his object, he appears in
the light of an exacting and persecuting advocate of toleration,—a character
after all not unknown to history. He was tolerant to heretics of certain types,
and thereby vexed his orthodox subjects. The sovereign of a distracted realm
must often feel drawn to seek for unity by means of toleration, but when such
means are taken as are contrary to law and privilege, all the liberty-loving
instincts of the people will join hands with their fanatical passions to oppose
the suggestion. In the Eastern Empire there was not much liberty in the state
nor in the bishops and clergy, but there was still a spirit of freedom and a
sense of spiritual equality surviving among the monks. Religious innovations
called forth a constitutional opposition such as was impossible in secular
matters. In attempting to use imperial authority to allay strife as to points
of doctrine, two strong Emperors, Zeno and Justinian, had signally failed. Nor
was Nicephorus likely to succeed in asserting his authority on a question of
ecclesiastical discipline.
In narrating the course of
the controversy between the Emperor Nicephorus and the Patriarch on the one
hand, and the monks on the other, we may say at the outset that the exact order
of events is not to be determined with absolute precision, since our data are
somewhat scattered. It is easy, however, to discern the main current of
affairs and the part played by each of the principal actors in the drama.
It seems to have been soon after the appointment of the Patriarch
Nicephorus that the Emperor began to devise means for restoring to the
priesthood the man who had been the scapegoat in the last controversy—the
steward Joseph. This might be done, he considered, by the Patriarch, in virtue
of a special dispensation or act of grace. Nicephorus the Patriarch showed no
objection, and held a small council, chiefly of bishops, to decide on the
matter. Theodore was in custody, but was brought out of the place of
confinement where he lay owing to the former troubles, to be present on the
occasion. The following day, fearing that the meaning he had expressed had not
been made clear, he wrote a letter to the Patriarch. In this letter his
attitude is mainly apologetic. He does not repeat the arguments which he had
stated the day before, but explains his personal position. He is anxious not to
appear fractious or inflexible. He is willing even to admit of dispensations
in special cases where there is just cause for such. His acceptance of the
apologies made by Tarasius and his acknowledgment of the office of the present
Patriarch show his disposition in that respect. Though his language is full of
deference, and though he appeals to Nicephorus, as a good shepherd, to exclude
one diseased sheep from the fold, lest the whole flock should be infected, yet
there is a threatening tone in his language: “We testify to your Holiness in
the presence of Christ and in the hearing of the holy angels, that you are
causing a great schism in our church. If, being men, we bow to authority, yet
it is by the authority of the sacred and divine canons, knowingly, or against
our will, that we are ruled and are obliged to live”.
By action, even more than
by words, Theodore showed that he did not wish to push matters to extremities.
For two whole years, apparently, it was possible for Theodore to refrain from
communicating with the Patriarch and yet to avoid an open breach. As he
repeatedly declared, it was not really with the Patriarch that the offence lay,
nor yet with the Emperor, but with the steward Joseph. As things were, however,
to communicate with the Patriarch would have been, in his own eyes and those of
the world, to communicate with Joseph, and to offend against canonical law.
The crisis was brought
about, apparently, on the return of the Emperor from an expedition against the Saracens,
in 808, when the Master of the Public Post conducted an inquiry into Theodore’s
conduct in thus holding aloof. At the same time he made similar complaints
against Theodore’s brother Joseph, who had just been made Bishop of
Thessalonica. When Joseph replied that he had nothing to say against either the
Pious Emperors or the Patriarch, only against the wicked steward, the Logothete replied somewhat brusquely : “The Pious Emperors
do not want you, either in Thessalonica or anywhere else”. This amounted to a
declaration that Joseph had been deprived of his see by the imperial authority.
He had already had to send an apology for having accepted it, and had been
forbidden to come to Court. His plea was that the people of Thessalonica had
sent a special deputation begging him to take it, and that the Emperors had
given their consent. It would have been wrong to shirk the task, though he
would personally have preferred waiting till the question of the steward was
settled. This excuse, however, did not satisfy the Emperor. Joseph had to
suffer for the cause, and throughout the conflict stood by his brother, who, in
addressing him, expresses, along with much brotherly affection, all the
deference due from an abbot to a bishop.
With regard to the main
issue, the Studites had plenty to say to the Master of the Post, and to other
interrogators. The ground on which Theodore stood was the fact that the steward
Joseph, having been guilty of an uncanonical act,
could not be released from the ban under which he lay, and restored to the
priesthood, by means of the secular authority. As regards the point
immediately in question, the matter seemed a small and personal one. But it
rested on two great principles: that the rules of ordinary morality are as
binding on sovereign princes as they are on private individuals: and that
ecclesiastical censures can only be removed by the free action of the
ecclesiastical power.
With regard to the
illegality of Joseph’s act, Theodore quoted a canon which forbade a priest to
take part in a wedding feast in the case of a second marriage. How much more
must he refrain from so doing when the marriage is actually of a bigamist? He
cited the beautiful words of the Eastern marriage service, to show the
profanity of applying them in a wedding of this kind: “Stretch forth Thy hand,
0 Lord, from Thy holy habitation, and join this Thy servant to this Thy
handmaid. Bind them together in unity of mind. Make those whom Thou art pleased
to join to be of one flesh. Let this marriage be honoured.
Keep their bed undefiled. Be pleased to let their dwelling together be without
offence, in purity of heart”.
The excuse that Joseph had
acted at the bidding of the Patriarch was no excuse. If the ceremony were a
lawful one, why did not Tarasius perform it himself? The unlawfulness had been recognised in Joseph's double degradation. True,
there was a time for restoration. But Joseph ought to have applied within a
year of his degradation, and to have sought absolution for his sin. In resuming
priestly functions, without long previous penance, and doing so publicly and
without shame, he had brought scandal upon the Church.
Of course the reply might
be made, and was made that dispensations from general rules must be allowed in
special cases. St. Chrysostom and St. Basil had thus remitted punishments. But
the cases, it was urged, were not in any way parallel. Again, the second
marriage of Valentinian I was by no means a desirable precedent. The plea put
forward by the opponents : that the peace of the Church demanded a compromise,
was turned back against them by Theodore. For if only those in authority would
now do what was just and fitting, peace and harmony would be at once restored.
The root of the matter was contained in the principle that the wishes or
commands expressed by the sovereign rulers had nothing whatever to do with
moral right or canonical legality. If Constantine VI had broken any of the
commandments, he was not to be excused any more than a private person. If
Nicephorus wanted to go against the decisions of the Church in order to
vindicate Constantine and those who had sanctioned his conduct, the wishes of
Nicephorus could count for nothing. “The laws of God are supreme over all men”.
If not by words, by deeds, Joseph and his abettors had declared that John the
Precursor had erred in reproving Herod, and had not been worthy of the martyr’s
crown.
These arguments occur in
varying order and connection in Theodore’s letters, with a good deal of
repetition, even in writings addressed to the same person. Of course we have
not the arguments on the other side, except as stated merely for purpose of
confutation. But there can be no doubt that in this case Theodore was the
champion of moral law and of spiritual equality.
Meanwhile he was in
correspondence with friends about Court. He wrote two letters (perhaps three)
to Simeon the Monk, who seems to have been related to the imperial family, and
one to Simeon the Abbot; also one to the high official Theoctistus. But none of
them seem to have effected anything for him in high quarters, any more than
they succeeded in changing his own views. The priest Simeon he pronounced to be
double-tongued. Of the Patriarch he seems to have soon lost all hope. “What is
the use of saying anything to the Patriarch, who sends no answers, and will not
listen to any representations, but manages everything for the Emperor?”
However, he sent, probably after the return of the Emperor, a last desperate
appeal to the Patriarch Nicephorus. He complained bitterly that he had heard
from a colleague and pupil John, who had gone to pay his respects to
Nicephorus, that the latter had stigmatized Theodore and his party as guilty of
schism. He insisted on his orthodoxy, and on his recognition of the
Patriarchate of Nicephorus, whom he commemorates in the daily services. He had
refrained himself for two years, considering that an abbot has not so great a
right to make protests as a bishop. He suggests as the only admissible
compromise that he may be left in quiet. He would only implore the Patriarch to
avert a schism.
But the Emperor and the
Patriarch had made up their minds to resort to force. Studium was seized by a
band of soldiers, and Plato, Theodore, and Bishop Joseph were again taken into
custody. It is not surprising that they should have stood firm, but it is more
remarkable that the brothers in Studium, deprived of the stimulating presence
of their fathers, should have shown equal tenacity. The Emperor sent for them
to the Palace of Eleutherium, and demanded that they
should return to communion with the Patriarch. Those who would comply were to
go to the right, those who refused, to the left. When every single man passed
to the left, the Emperor ordered that they should be distributed in various
monasteries, the whole community being broken up. Either before or after this
event, a council of the clergy was called, at which, in spite of the Studites,
resolutions were carried in the sense desired by Emperor and Patriarch.
Under these circumstances
Theodore once more found himself a prisoner and an exile, and yet again
separated from his brave old uncle, on whom, owing to his age and infirmity,
the blow came with greater force. Plato was, according to Theodore, treated
with shameful brutality, and kept in close imprisonment. Theodore himself was
moved from place to place, and probably detained for the greater part of the
time in Prince's Island. What became of the monastic buildings we do not know.
They were probably for a time left empty. But the imprisonment was not in all
cases so severe as to prevent any sort of communication with the outside world.
Thus Theodore was able to write to some members of his Rock as well as to influential
people at a distance, and his “sons” or “brothers” must have been able to
receive his letters. Notably there is one from which we have had to quote which
was addressed to the Brothers in Saccudio, and which shows that this monastery,
the mother of the revived Studium, had been reoccupied, and was in close
alliance with the community to which its leading men had migrated.
Theodore had two main
objects in view: to keep his party together, especially by showing how the
right lay on his side; and beyond this, if possible, to bring some pressure to
bear that might lead to a reversal of policy at Byzantium.
We have already seen by
what arguments he maintained his cause, and also how eager he was to meet the
accusation of causing a schism in the Church. He contended again and again that
not he but his opponents were schismatics and
heretics, and invented an ugly name for this new heresy—the Moechianic,
or Adulterous. He consequently had to meet a further charge : that of
indifference to matters of faith, since it was the accepted view that heresy
consisted in wrong belief, not in perverted principles of action. There was a
certain non-catholic sect—they are mentioned in the
great work on heresies written by John of Damascus—called Gnosimachi,
or opponents of subtle religious inquiry, who held that Christianity consisted
not in knowledge but in action. In an interesting though not very lucid
passage. Theodore refers to these heretics, and also to those who make much of gnosis and seems to regard both alike as
bound to recognize heresy in his opponents. No number of names, whether of the
learned or the unlearned, can prevail against the voice of truth and of the
established law.
But it was in gaining or
seeking to gain support from a distance that Theodore struck out a bolder line.
It is of great importance here to observe his relations to Rome, and his
correspondence with Pope Leo, whom he hoped to make his ally.
The relations between
Constantinople and Rome in matters ecclesiastical were, throughout the reign of
Nicephorus, unfriendly if not hostile. According to Theophanes, Nicephorus the
Patriarch was not allowed to hold any communications with the Papacy till after
the Emperor’s death. Cause and effect may here have been working mutually. The
strained relations between the Empire of the East and the Papacy, necessitated
by the hand-in-hand alliance of Leo and Charles, along with the hostile
attitude of the two sovereigns to one another, especially in Venetia, may have
led Theodore to hope for sympathy in Rome. At the same time, a suspicion that
the Pope was in correspondence with the recalcitrant monks may have made the
Emperor all the more desirous to have nothing to do with the Church of Rome.
We have already suggested
that Theodore’s notions of ecclesiastical politics had probably been affected
by converse with deputies from Rome. Certainly, in his letters to Leo, he shows
no trace of any recognition of the “ecumenical patriarchate” of Constantinople,
the assertion of which had led long before Gregory the Great to read a lecture
on humility to the aspiring metropolitan of Byzantium. Theodore believed, as we
shall see in the later controversy, in the patriarchal system,—according to
which the assent of the five great bishops (of Rome, Constantinople, Antioch,
Alexandria, and Jerusalem) was necessary to make valid the decrees of councils
professing to be ecumenical. But he shows at this juncture and after that the
authority of Rome ought, in his opinion, to preponderate over all others. For
the Pope is the successor of St. Peter, who had received from Christ the gift of
the keys and the injunction “Feed my sheep”.
Theodore did not approach
the Pope without efforts to gain other supporters in Rome. In a letter to a
certain Abbot Basil, resident in Rome, he powerfully urges his cause. The chief
intermediary, however, seems to have been a Studite named Epiphanius. The first
letter from Theodore to Leo has been lost. The second is addressed to him in
even more than Byzantine terms of adulation. At the same time Theodore has no
hesitation in exhorting the Pope to fulfill his high vocation, following in the
steps of Christ, who saved His disciples in the storm, and who deigned to communicate
in writing with King Abgarus; also in those of the
earlier Leo, who had stifled the heresy of Eutychius. The ruling authorities in
the East had arrogated to themselves, for heretical purposes, the power of
calling a synod, a power which, apart from the sanction of Rome, they did not
lawfully possess, even if their purpose had been orthodox. Let the Pope call a
council of legitimate authority, to annul all their wicked acts, or let him at
least send an authoritative letter. Theodore writes in his own name only,
because his uncle, Plato, and his brother, Bishop Joseph, though sympathizing
with all his sentiments, arc in separate custody and so cannot subscribe to the
letter.
It is hardly necessary to
say that Leo did not act as Theodore desired. Apart from the fact that he must
have desired, as soon as possible, the establishment of peaceful relations
between the two Courts, he must have seen that this was not a seasonable
occasion for intervention. In fact, to anyone really conversant with the
circumstances, there would have seemed something grotesque in the notion that
the Pope should come forward as universal censor in matters matrimonial, seeing
that his doughty champion, the pious and orthodox—and really heroic—Emperor
Charles, had divorced at least one wife, and had had five recognized
concubines, besides three other regular successive consorts. However, Leo sent
a letter to Theodore, which gave him some satisfaction, and called forth a
response, in which the name of Plato was associated with his own. But while he
professed himself greatly gratified by the Pope’s consolations, and the
assurance of his prayers, he insists again on the necessity of a lawful
council. He goes a little more into the facts of the case, and insists very
strongly on the evil of admitting “respect of persons” in matters of morality.
He has to defend himself against the charge of heresy, which, as Epiphanius has
related, has been preferred against him in Rome, and anathematizes the
heretical leaders whose opinions he was supposed to favor.
That these letters should
have been allowed to go to Rome (though in the case of the second, we have no
actual certainty) seems to show that Theodore’s confinement in the islands by
no means isolated him from the world. He managed, at the same time, to pour
forth letters of exhortation and confirmation to his followers and friends. He
compiled, from the writings of Eulogius of
Alexandria, a treatise on the vexed question of dispensations. He devised a
system of cypher by means of which he might the more freely communicate with
his correspondents. He laid down principles as to communion with persons
infected with heresy; examined, following St. Basil, the nature of heresy,
schism, and segregation; explained again and again the nature of the
grounds of his disagreement with the authorities. Nor does his labour seem to have been entirely in vain. The Patriarch,
certainly, did not find it possible, during the Emperor s lifetime, to retrace
his steps, but he became very ready for peace as soon as any accommodation was
possible. And among the people generally, the cause of the monks seems to have
gained ground.
The end of the whole matter
came about by the unsuccessful expedition of the Emperor against the Bulgarians
and their terrible king, Crumn, which brought about
the death in battle of Nicephorus (July 811) and the severe wounding of his
son, Stauracius. Even if Stauracius had been whole, he would probably not have
succeeded his father, for Nicephorus was unpopular, and the minister
Theoctistus (to whom Theodore had written an appeal, and who was probably a
friend to the monastic cause), had a rival candidate. This was Michael,
Guardian of the Palace, who had married a daughter of Nicephorus, and who stood
high in reputation for piety and orthodoxy. The result was that Stauracius was
forced to retire into a monastery, where he soon after died. His wife, Theophane, whom he had illegally married, also withdrew
from the world. Michael I. was crowned by Nicephorus, and promised to defend
the faith and restore peace to the Church; and the exiled monks were permitted
to return.
Whether or not the story is
true that Theodore had foretold the destruction of Nicephorus, if he went forth
to fight with Crumn, there is no doubt that he and
all his party looked upon the death of Nicephorus and that of Stauracius as an
intervention of Divine justice on behalf of the good cause. What is more to
their credit, they readily embraced the proposals of the Patriarch and the new
Emperor, and when once the single point at issue was satisfactorily decided,
the schism came to an end. Joseph the priest was once more degraded. The aged
Plato, with all the other sufferers, entered into peace with Nicephorus and the
Church, and returned to their deserted monastery.
But Plato only came home to
die. He was nearly seventy-nine years old, and his afflictions must have
diminished his remaining strength. Nevertheless, he bitterly regretted that
necessity compelled him to abandon his ascetic practices, and to use the
comforts which his spiritual children were so ready to provide for him. After
his death, in March 812, Theodore composed, for the Studite brothers, the
stirring account of his life from which we have often had to quote. Plato’s
sister, Theoctista, had probably died before the last troubles began. The
memory of the two, and the constant friendship of his brother Joseph, remained
as a strength to Theodore in the strenuous and troubled days to come. He had
much to endure, but was spared at least one of the most grievous pains by which
loving and devout souls are often assailed,—the conflict between the claims of
family affection and those of religious and public duty.
CHAPTER VIII
REIGN AND OVERTHROW OF MICHAEL RHANGABE— RENEWAL OF THE ICONOCLASTIC
PERSECUTION BY LEO V.
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