Orthodox Church - Simple Guides

Easter

List of Illustrations

Early icon of Christ Pantocrator

Contemporary icon of the Mother of God

Byzantine icon of the Archangel Gabriel

Early Christian painting of Jesus and his disciples

The martyrdom of St Ignatius of Antioch

St Anthony the Great

Bronze head of Constantine

Icon of Saint Constantine and Saint Helen

Mosaic of Constantine from Hagia Sophia

The First Council of Nicaea

Iconostasis in a Greek village church

The Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew

Monks, priests and cantor

Chapel in the Cyclades

Vesper service

Iconostasis of the Ekatontapyliani

Church altar

Celebrating the sacrament of Holy Unction

Icon of the Resurrection of the Dead

Icon painter at work

Bas relief of the Byzantine eagle

The Crusader sack of Constantinople

Abbot, cantor and priest at a chapel consecration

Christ Pantocrator, Ruler of all. Sixth-century icon, St Catherine’s Monastery, Sinai

Preface

At the time I first encountered Orthodoxy, I had had no connection with any religion whatever for decades. Raised Presbyterian as a child, I was at first put off by Orthodox practices like kissing icons, and was shy of the clergy, who appeared so awesome and so stern. I found almost everything about Orthodoxy strange, even intimidating – the ornate surroundings, the unfamiliar objects, the medieval clerical garb, the highly formal services, the language, the incense.

But as I grew to know the often tiny, intimate churches, the non-judgemental, helpful and insightful clergy, and the Orthodox believers themselves and their all-pervading relationship with their religion, I came to love this Church. Ironically, what particularly attracted me, a professional ‘wordsmith’, were its many unspoken, unwritten ‘languages’: the symbolism, the artwork, the ritual, the traditions, the objects with their special significances, the physical gestures of the laity and clergy: these expressed things that words never could. These are the languages of the logos, religious meaning, and I believe they are the truest medium for worshipping and communicating with God. Especially the icons – at first so cool and remote – came to ‘speak’ to me.

As for actual language, the words of the Liturgy and other services and the Bible, particularly the Psalms, expressed far better than my own what I wished to say to my Lord; and they instructed me far better than any sermon. As I began to use Orthodox prayers and hymns regularly, they opened up ever profounder meanings to me.

Finally, the Orthodox Church’s very antiquity and unchanging practices convinced me of the depth and universality of its message, and of its power as a vehicle for worship. The Church’s lack of hierarchy, organisation or even consistency only persuaded me the more. It really is the Holy Spirit, and no human institution, who guides the Orthodox Church and holds it together.

KATHERINE CLARK

Introduction

This book aims to help Western readers to gain enough insight into the Greek Orthodox Church (and by extension the Eastern Orthodox Church generally) to put them at ease in Orthodox churches, explain what they see, and give them an idea of what is going on there. It assumes that the reader is new to Orthodoxy and may even know little of Christianity generally. Focus is on the essential: what absolutely cannot be left out of any picture of Orthodoxy. The physical church, especially icons, services and common practices are explained, and suggestions are offered to visitors on how to conduct themselves appropriately, so that they are well accepted and feel comfortable.

Several chapters concern the life of Jesus and the beginnings of Christianity. The origins and history of the Church are pursued to the point at which it more or less assumed its present form, with particular attention to its great champion, Constantine the Great. The early centuries of Christianity are stressed because they are largely unfamiliar in the West, and also because Orthodoxy has remained essentially unchanged since then, with the original faith intact.

The book outlines the tenets, nature and holy days of Orthodox belief with the Western reader in mind. The present structure of the Church is described in brief. Finally, the split between the Eastern Church and the Western Church is related and their differences explained in simple terms.

For more detailed information about Orthodoxy and Byzantine history, I especially recommend Metropolitan Kallistos Ware’s excellent books, The Orthodox Church and The Orthodox Way. I also recommend A History of God, by Karen Armstrong; Pagans and Christians, by Robin Lane Fox; Byzantium, by John Julius Norwich; History of the Byzantine State, by George Ostrogorsky; The Byzantine Theocracy, by Steven Runciman; The Divine Liturgy Explained, by Rev. Nicholas M. Elias; The Holy Sacraments for Orthodox Christians, by Bishop Valerian D. Trifa; and, in German, Konstantin der Grosse und seine Zeit, by Manfred Clauss; Die Kirchenväter und ihre Zeit, by Hartmut Leppin; Byzanz, by Ralph-Johannes Lilie; Kunst und Liturgie der Ostkirche in Stichworten unter Berücksichtigung der Alten Kirche, by Konrad Onasch; and Geschichte des Frühen Christentums, by Friedhelm Winkelmann. These, along with my personal experience, are the sources of the information here.

Old Testament quotations are from the Septuagint, the English translation by Sir Lancelot Charles Lee Brenton (first published in 1844). New Testament quotations are from the King James version of the Bible.

My warmest thanks for well-informed and active assistance to those fine writers and good friends Willard Manus and Jeffrey Carson, to Pfarrer Gerd Stauch, to my siblings in the faith Anastasia and Steven Charters, and, as in all I do, to my husband and mentor James A. Clark, sine qua non.

The instruction of the Lord God

opens my ears, and I do not disobey,

nor do I dispute.

Isaiah 50: 5

The Mother of God the Most Holy Theotokos and Ever-Virgin Mary. Contemporary Greek icon

Chapter 1

Jesus’ Life

The life of Jesus Christ and the events that immediately preceded and followed it are at the root of all Christian worship. Thus our account of the Eastern Orthodox Church is best begun with the Christian ‘story’.

What we know of Jesus’ life comes from the Gospels (from godspel in Old English: the ‘good news’) of SS Matthew, Mark, Luke and John in the New Testament of the Bible. These texts were written between about AD 60 and 80 – that is, about thirty to fifty years after Jesus died. He was born to a Jewish family in Bethlehem in Judea, just southwest of Jerusalem, during the reign of the Roman Emperor Augustus, nominally in the first year of our era. Since our era begins with Christ’s birth, dates are preceded by AD, in Latin anno domini, ‘in the year of our Lord’, or followed by BC for ‘before Christ’. Much of what is now Israel and the Palestinian Territories was then a kingdom within the Roman Empire, occupied by Roman forces and under the supervision of a Roman governor. At the time of Jesus’ birth, the king of Judea was Herod the Great.

Jesus’ parents were from Nazareth in what is now northern Israel. His earthly father, Joseph, was a carpenter, a widower who already had children by his first wife. But in fact Jesus had no earthly father: his young mother, Mary, though promised to Joseph, was still a virgin: she conceived her child miraculously, through the Holy Spirit, upon the visit to her of the Archangel Gabriel. This event, the Annunciation, is celebrated each year on 25 March. In religious art, one sees the winged Angel Gabriel addressing the Virgin, robed in blue, a dove representing the Holy Spirit hovering between them, as often depicted on the holy gates at the centre of the iconostasis (see Chapter 7: Visiting an Orthodox Church).

Byzantine icon of the Archangel Gabriel, c. 1387–95

Jesus was born nine months later, on 25 December, in Bethlehem, where his father had taken the family for tax registration purposes. Although the Gospels tell us that the birth took place in a stable, the inn in Bethlehem being full, Orthodox art shows the nativity in a cave, in accord with the events related in the Protoevangelium of James, a non-canonical early Christian account. Three wise men or kings from the East, guided by a star, came to adore the infant Jesus, as did shepherds, to whom an angel had appeared in their fields, announcing the miraculous birth, accompanied by a ‘multitude of the heavenly host’ singing ‘Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace, good will toward men’. We celebrate the birth of Jesus Christ with the holiday that bears his name: Christmas (Christ’s mass).

His parents presented him at the Temple forty days later, on 2 February. This scene, too, is popular in Orthodox iconography: the mother presenting the baby to the aged priest Simeon, to whom God had promised that he would see the world’s salvation before he died. Simeon, beholding the child, expressed his joy in the beautiful words that are repeated every evening at the vesper service: ‘Lord, now lettest thou thy servant depart in peace, according to thy word: For mine eyes have seen thy salvation, which thou hast prepared before the face of all people; a light to lighten the Gentiles, and the glory of thy people Israel.’ (Luke 2: 29–32.) To this day Orthodox mothers present their babies to the priest at their church forty days after giving birth.

We then lose sight of Jesus until he is about twelve years of age, when he appears in the Temple in Jerusalem, disputing on equal terms with the learned scholars there. After that he drops out of sight again until he is about thirty, when he is baptised in the Jordan river by his cousin John, a popular preacher and hermit living in desert places. John foresaw Jesus’ coming, saying to the people who came to hear him preach, ‘I indeed baptize you with water, but one