We stand here at the close of the deepest degradation and on the threshold of the highest elevation of the papacy. The synod of Sutri and the reign of Leo IX. mark the beginning of a disciplinary reform. Simony or the sale and purchase of ecclesiastical dignities, and Nicolaitism or the carnal sins of the clergy, including marriage, concubinage and unnatural vices, were the crying evils of the church in the eyes of the most serious men, especially the disciples of Cluny and of St. Romuald. A reformation therefore from the hierarchical standpoint of the middle ages was essentially a suppression of these two abuses. And as the corruption had reached its climax in the papal chair, the reformation had to begin at the head before it could reach the members. It was the work chiefly of Hildebrand or Gregory VII., with whom the next period opens. CHAPTER V. THE CONFLICT OF THE EASTERN AND WESTERN CHURCHES AND THEIR SEPARATION. § 67. Sources and Literature. The chief sources on the beginning of the controversy between Photius and Nicolas are in MANSI: Conc. Tom. XV. and XVI.; in HARDUIN: Cont. Tom. V. HERGENRÖTHER: Monumenta Græca ad Photium ejusque historiam pertinentia. Regensb. 1869. 1. On the GREEK side: PHOTIUS: Εγκύκλιος ἐπιστολή, etc. and especially his Λόγος περὶ τῆς τοῦ ἁγίου Πνεύματος μυσταγωγίας, etc. See PHOTII Opera omnia, ed. Migne. Paris, 1860-61, 4 vols. (Patr. Gr. Tom. CI.-CIV.) The Encycl. Letter is in Tom. II. 722-742; and his treatise on the uvoTaywyía Tov dyíov ПIvevμaros in Tom. II. 279–391. Later champions: CERULARIUS, NICETAS PECTORATUS, THEOPHYLACT (12th century). A. N. MOURAVIEFF (Russ.): Question religieuse d'Orient et d'Occident. GUETTÈRE: La papauté schismatique. Par. 1863. A. PICHLER: Gesch. d. kirchlichen Trennung zwischen dem Orient und Occident von den ersten Anfängen bis zur jüngsten Gegenwart. München, 1865, 2 Bde. The author was a Roman Catholic (Privatdocent der Theol. in München) when he wrote this work, but blamed the West fully as much as the East for the schism, and afterwards joined the Greek church in Russia. ANDRONICOS DIMITRACOPULOS: 'IoTopía Tov oxioμaros. Lips. 1867. Also his Bi3hodhan έKKλŋo. Lips. 1866. THEODORUS LASCARIS JUNIOR: De Processione Spiritus S. Oratio Apologetica. London and Jena, 1875. II. On the LATIN (Roman Catholic) side: RATRAMNUS (Contra Græcorum Opposita); ANSELM of Canterbury (De Processione Spiritus S. 1098); PETRUS CHRYSOLANUS (1112); THOMAS AQUINAS (d. 1274), etc. LEO ALLATIUS (Allacci, a Greek of Chios, but converted to the Roman Church and guardian of the Vatican library, d. 1669): De ecclesia occident. atque orient. perpetua consensione. Cologne, 1648, 4to.; new ed. 1665 and 1694. Also his Græcia orthodoxa, 1659, 2 vols., new ed. by Lämmer, Freib. i. B. 1864 sq.; and his special tracts on Purgatory (Rom. 1655), and on the Procession of the Holy Spirit (Rom. 1658). MAIMBURG: Hist. du schisme des Grecs. Paris, 1677, 4to. STEPH. DE ALTIMURA (Mich. le Quien): Panoplia contra schisma Græcorum. Par. 1718, 4to. MICHAEL LE QUIEN (d. 1733): Oriens Christianus. vols. fol. Par. 1740, 3 Abbé JAGER: Histoire de Photius d'après les monuments originaux. 2nd ed. Par. 1845. LUIGI TOSTI: Storia dell'origine dello scisma greco. Firenze, 1856. 2 vols. H. LAMMER: Papst Nikolaus I. und die byzantinische Staatskirche seiner Zeit. Berlin, 1857. AD. D'AVRIL: Documents relatifs aux églises de l'Orient, considerée dans leur rapports avec le saint-siége de Rome. Paris, 1862. KARL WERNER: Geschichte der apol. und polemischen Literatur. Schaffhausen, 1864, vol. III. 3 ff. J. HERGENRÖTHER (Prof. of Church History in Würzburg, now Cardinal in Rome): Photius, Patriarch von Constantinopel. Sein Leben, seine Schriften und das griechische Schisma. Regensburg, 1867-1869, 3 vols. C. Jos. VON HEFELE (Bishop of Rottenburg): Conciliengeschichte. Freiburg i. B., vols. IV., V., VI., VII. (revised ed. 1879 sqq.) III. PROTESTANT writers: J. G. WALCH (Luth.): Historia controversiæ Græcorum Latinorumque de Processione Sp. S. Jena, 1751. GIBBON: Decline and Fall, etc., Ch. LX. He views the schism as one of the causes which precipitated the decline and fall of the Roman empire in the East by alienating its most useful allies and strength. ening its most dangerous enemies. JOHN MASON NEALE (Anglican): A History of the Holy Eastern Church. Lond. 1850. Introd. vol. II. 1093-1169. EDMUND S. FOULKES (Anglic.): An Historical Account of the Addition of the word Filioque to the Creed of the West. Lond. 1867. W. GASS: Symbolik der griechischen Kirche. Berlin, 1872. H. B. SWETE (Anglic.): Early History of the Doctrine of the Holy Spirit, Cambr. 1873; and History of the Doctrine of the Procession of the Holy Spirit from the Apost. Age to the Death of Charlemagne. Cambr. 1876.. IV. OLD CATHOLIC WRITERS (irenical): JOSEPH LANGEN: Die Trinitarische Lehrdifferenz zwischen der abendländischen und der morgenländischen Kirche. Bonn, 1876. The Proceedings of the second Old Catholic Union-Conference in Bonn, 1875, ed. in German by HEINRICH REUSCH; English ed. with introduction by Canon LIDDON (Lond. 1876); Amer. ed. transl. by Dr. SAMUEL BUEL, with introduction by Dr. R. NEVIN (N. Y. 1876). The union-theses of Bonn are given in SCHAFF: Creeds of Christendom, vol. II., 545–550. § 68. The Consensus and Dissensus between the Greek and Latin Churches. No two churches in the world are at this day so much alike, and yet so averse to each other as the Oriental or Greek, and the Occidental or Roman. They hold, as an inheritance from the patristic age, essentially the same body of doctrine, the same canons of discipline, the same form of worship; and yet their antagonism seems irreconcilable. The very affinity breeds jealousy and friction. They are equally exclusive: the Oriental Church claims exclusive orthodoxy, and looks upon Western Christendom as heretical; the Roman Church claims exclusive catholicity, and considers all other churches as heretical or schismatical sects. The one is proud of her creed, the other of her dominion. In all the points of controversy between Romanism and Protestantism the Greek Church is much nearer the Roman, and yet there is no more prospect of a union between them than of a union between Rome and Geneva, or Moscow and Oxford. The Pope and the Czar are the two most powerful rival-despots in Christendom. Where the two churches meet in closest proximity, over the traditional spots of the birth and tomb of our Saviour, at Bethlehem and Jerusalem, they hate each other most bitterly, and their ignorant and bigoted monks have to be kept from violent collision by Mohammedan soldiers. I. Let us first briefly glance at the consensus. Both churches own the Nicene creed (with the exception of the Filioque), and all the doctrinal decrees of the seven œcu menical Synods from A. D. 325 to 787, including the worship of images. They agree moreover in most of the post-ocumenical or medieval doctrines against which the evangelical Reformation protested, namely: the authority of ecclesiastical tradition as a joint rule of faith with the holy Scriptures; the worship of the Virgin Mary, of the saints, their pictures (not statues), and relics; justification by faith and good works, as joint conditions; the merit of good works, especially voluntary celibacy and poverty; the seven sacraments or mysteries (with minor differences as to confirmation, and extreme unction or chrisma); baptismal regeneration and the necessity of water-baptism for salvation; transubstantiation and the consequent adoration of the sacramental elements; the sacrifice of the mass for the living and the dead, with prayers for the dead; priestly absolution by divine authority; three orders of the ministry, and the necessity of an episcopal hierarchy up to the patriarchal dignity; and a vast number of religious rites and ceremonies. In the doctrine of purgatory, the Greek Church is less explicit, yet agrees with the Roman in assuming a middle state of purification, and the efficacy of prayers and masses for the departed. The dogma of transubstantiation, too, is not so clearly formulated in the Greek creed as in the Roman, but the difference is very small. As to the Holy Scriptures, the Greek Church has never prohibited the popular use, and the Russian Church even favors the free circulation of her authorized vernacular version. But the traditions of the Greek Church are as strong a barrier against the exercise of private judgment and exegetical progress as those of Rome. II. The dissensus of the two churches covers the following points: 1. The procession of the Holy Spirit: the East teaching the single procession from the Father only, the West (since Augustin), the double procession from the Father and the Son (Filioque). |