40
edits
Changes
added reference to Hussey
Within a couple of generations, in 858, a new situation came to pass. The Eastern Emperor Michael III removed [[Ignatius of Constantinople|Ignatius I]] as patriarch of Constantinople. The emperor replaced him with a layman, St. [[Photius the Great]], who was the first Imperial Secretary and Imperial Ambassador to Baghdad. However, Ignatius refused to abdicate. Michael and Photius invited Pope [[Nicholas I of Rome]] to send legates to preside over a synod in Constantinople to settle the matter. With the council, the legates confirmed the patriarchate of Photius, much to Nicholas's chagrin, who then declared that they had "exceeded their authority."
In opposition to this removal of Ignatius, the bishop of Rome supported Ignatius as legitimate patriarch. Moreover, contrary to existing canons, Photius had been ordained to the office of bishop very quickly. Some scholarship <font size="1">(who?)</font> suggests that violation of these canons was the main reason the bishop of Rome rejected the appointment of Photius. J. M. Hussey argues that the pope also wanted to regain ecclesiastic control of Bulgaria, a program in which Ignatius would not interfere, though Photius would (and did) (Hussey <i>The Orthodox Church in the Byzantine Empire</i> Oxford History of the Christian Church 1986). This and other major actions by Nicholas to bolster his power and position as pope puts his intervention in Eastern ecclesiastical matters more firmly in the context of his general programme of the growth of papal monarchy.
Therefore, after the arrival of an embassy from Ignatius, in 862, Nicholas said that Photius was deposed, as well as the bishop who ordained him and all the clergy Photius had appointed. The sheer temerity of this action did not even generate a response from Constantinople. However, several years later in 867, Photius finally rejected the Pope's assertion, particularly because of the activities of Latin missionaries in Bulgaria, who were, as St. Photius says, turning the Orthodox Christians there away from their pure Orthodox faith and leading them into [[heresy]]—most notably, the ''filioque''. Photius' response cited the ''filioque'' as proof that Rome had a habit of overstepping its proper limits.
*Rome resisted the inclusion of the ''filioque'' for centuries. Leo III, the Pope of Rome at the time the ''filioque'' began its history in Western theology, strongly advised against its inclusion, even though he agreed with the soundness and validity of the doctrine contained in ''filioque''. Later, however, Rome contradicted its previous more Orthodox stance by the promulgation of the ''filioque'', thus anathematizing its own spiritual forebears.
==External links==