A History of Eastern Christianity (Routledge Revivals) [1 ed.] 9781032505619, 9781003399063, 9781032505688, 1032505613

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Routledge Revivals

A History of Eastern Christianity

A History of Eastern Christianity (1968) is a scholarly and comprehensive account of the history of the non-Greek churches of Eastern Christendom. Alexandrine and Antiochian Christianity, with their ramifications in Africa and Asia, are the subjects of an overall survey that ranges from their origins to modern times. The author deals with every Eastern Church, Coptic, Ethiopian, Jacobite, Nestorian, Armenian, Indian and Maronite, as well as the vanished churches of Nubia and North Africa. He gives a preliminary outline of each church, followed by an analytical summary of the faith and culture. He deals not only with the hierarchy, rites, ceremonials and monastic rule, but also with music, art, architecture and literature.

A History of Eastern Christianity

Aziz S. Atiya

First published in 1968 by Methuen & Co Ltd This edition first published in 2023 by Routledge 4 Park Square, Milton Park, Abingdon, Oxon, OX14 4RN and by Routledge 605 Third Avenue, New York, NY 10017 Routledge is an imprint of the Taylor & Francis Group, an informa business © 1968 Aziz S. Atiya All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or reproduced or utilised in any form or by any electronic, mechanical, or other means, now known or hereafter invented, including photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publishers. Publisher’s Note The publisher has gone to great lengths to ensure the quality of this reprint but points out that some imperfections in the original copies may be apparent. Disclaimer The publisher has made every effort to trace copyright holders and welcomes correspondence from those they have been unable to contact. A Library of Congress record exists under LCCN: 68097975 ISBN: 978-1-032-50561-9 (hbk) ISBN: 978-1-003-39906-3 (ebk) ISBN: 978-1-032-50568-8 (pbk) Book DOI 10.4324/9781003399063

Detail from the Bawi:t Icon. Reproduced by courtesy of the Musee du Louvre.

A History of Eastern Christianity Aziz S. Atiya Distinguished Professor of History, University of Utah

Methuen & Co Ltd ·

I I

New Fetter Lane · London EC4

First published I968

l?J Methuen and Co Ltd New Fetter Lane, London EC4 © I968 Aziz Atfya Printed in Great Britain l?J Butler and Tanner Ltd, Frome aud London Set in Monotype Garamond I I

CONTENTS Acknowledgements Preface List of Maps PART I: ALEXANDRINE CHRISTIANITY THE COPTS AND THEIR CHURCH I

page

1x

xi I

II

INTRODUCTORY

The Term 'Copt' Coptic Language Ancient Egyptian Religion Flight of the Holy Family 2

ORIGINS OF COPTIC CHRISTIANITY

St Mark the Founder Age of Persecution The Catechetical School Saints and Heretics: Age of Athanasius and Cyril 3

THE COPTS AND THE WORLD

Missionary Enterprise CEcumenical Movement Monastic Rule 4

49

AFTERMATH OF CHALCEDON

Monophysitism versus Diophysitism The Henoticon Monotheletism THE

COPTS

UNDER

ARAB

RULE

The Arab Conquest First Five Centuries Age of the Crusades

6

MODERN TIMES

The Ottoman Turks The Copts under the French Age of Cyril IV, Father of Coptic Reform Cyril V: Clerical Conservatism versus Popular Constitutionalism Coming of the Missionary An Innovation Modern Reform Internationalism and CEcumenicity v

79

99

vi ·

CONTENTS

7

COPTIC FAITH AND CULTURE

8

THE ETHIOPIANS

Introductory Historical Background Church Origins and Development Ethiopian Faith and Culture PART II:

ANTIOCH AND THE JACOBITES

9

ORIGIN AND DEVELOPMENT

10

THE JACOBITES IN HISTORY

Historical Setting Apostolic Visitations and Early History Nicrea to Chalcedon Jacob Baradreus Ascetics and Stylites Under the Caliphate First Three Centuries Age of Decline Mongols, Turks and Kurds Missionary Movement

II

FAITH AND CULTURE

The Hierarchy Rites and Liturgy Art and Architecture

12

page 12.2

The Hierarchy Rites and Ceremonials Coptic Art Coptic Architecture Coptic Music Coptic Literature

146

167 169

193

219

PART III: THE NESTORIAN CHURCH

2 37

ORIGINS AND DEVELOPMENT

239

Introductory Age of Legend Historic Origins Nestorians in Persia

CONTENTS • 13

EXPANSION OF THE NESTORIAN CHURCH

Arabia Central Asia China Other Places Conclusion 14

THE NESTORIANS AND THE CALIPHATE

First Three Centuries Beginning of Decline I

5

THE NESTORIANS IN MODERN TIMES

Seclusion, Schism and Re-Discovery The Last Phase 16

FAITH AND CULTURE

The Hierarchy Monasticism Rites and Liturgy Art and Architecture Waning of Syriac Literature PART IV: 17

THE ARMENIAN CHURCH

INTRODUCTION

General Remarks Historical Background 18

ORIGINS AND DEVELOPMENT OF ARMENIAN CHRISTIANITY

Pre-Gregorian Christianity and the Age of Legend St Gregory the Illuminator Fourth-Century Reform and the Armenian Bible The Armenians and Chalcedon 19

TIMES OF TRIAL

The Caliphate The Crusades The Five Patriarchs Coming of the Missionary 20

ARMENIAN FAITH AND CULTURE

General Character Liturgy and Armenian Rites Hierarchy Literature Art and Architecture

vii

page 257

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CONTENTS

PART V: THE ST THOMAS CHRISTIANS OF SOUTH INDIA page 357 21

HISTORICAL SURVEY

Malabar and its People The St Thomas Tradition Pre-Portuguese History The Portuguese and Romanism Schisms, Confusions and Solutions 22

359

SOCIAL AND RELIGIOUS LIFE

Social Setting Education and the Bible The Hierarchy Faith and Rites PART VI:

THE MARONITE CHURCH

23

PRELUDE

24

ORIGINS AND DEVELOPMENT

St Maro and the Age of Legend StJohn Maron and the Maronites The Crusades and Romanization 25

MODERN HISTORY

Maronites and Druzes: Massacres of the Sixties The Church, Independence and Nationalism

26

ORGANIZATION, FAITH AND CULTURE

412

The Hierarchy Rites and Liturgies Monasticism Maronite Culture PART VII 27

THE VANISHED CHURCHES

Introductory Carthage The Pentapolis Nubia Advent of Islam: Beginning of the End 28

EPILOGUE

442

SELECT BIBLIOGRAPHY

449 457

List of Plates Index

459

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

Professor Kurt Weitzmann of Princeton University, Dr Wachtang Djobadze of the University of Utah, Mr Fred Anderegg of the University of Michigan, Mr Anis Rizkallah of the Institute of Coptic Studies and Dr Otto Meinardus of the American University at Cairo have generously supplied me with much of their photographic material from which I made a selection of some of my illustrations. I am truly thankful to all of them for their immediate response to my request. Acknowledgement should also be made to the authorities of the Louvre, the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City and the Coptic Museum in Cairo for permission to reproduce some of their valuable art objects. A. S. ATIYA

ix

PREFACE

The present volume, though the fulfilment of a lifelong vow, saw its beginnings only during the academic year 1956-7 when I had the privilege of occupying the Henry W. Luce Visiting Professorship of World Christianity at Union Theological Seminary in New York City. It was then that I delivered a course of lectures in which I tried to outline the essentials of the extensive and complex but highly interesting subject of the Eastern Christian churches. From the very start I limited my thesis to the ancient non-Greek family of churches. Those were the Coptic and Ethiopic, the Jacobite, Nestorian, Armenian, Indian, Maronite, and the vanished churches of Nubia and North Africa.l As will be seen, the major churches of the Christian East were of Apostolic origin, and they invariably sprang into existence within living memory of the Ascension of Our Lord. Thus their importance in the early formative years of the faith, and their unbroken succession throughout the centuries leave no room for doubt as to the paramount value of this chapter 1 It has been suggested that the Georgian Church might have been included in our survey. But, though closely associated with Armenia in its earliest Christianity, Georgia chose the Western road from Chalcedon in 4 5I and became a member of the Greek family. Consequently, it has been considered outside our designated field. However, for reference, the following is a short bibliographical notice on Georgia and its Church: W. A. Allen, A History of the Georgian People (London, I932); M. F. Bosset, Histoire de Ia georgie, 3 vols. (Sainte-Peters bourg, I 849-5 8); E. T. Dowling, Sketches of Georgian Church History (London, I9I2); P. Joselian, A Short History of the Georgian Church, tr. from Russian by S.C. Malan (London, 1866); J. Karst, Litterature georgienne chritienne (Paris, 1934); D. M. Lang, Lives and Legends of the Georgian Saints, selected and tr. from original texts (London, 195 6); ibid., A Modern History of Georgia (London, I963); Jurgis Paltrusaitis, Etudes sur /'art medieval en Georgie et en Arminie (Paris, I929); M. Tamarati, L'eglise georgienne des origines jusqu'a nos iours (Rome, I9Io). Some original source material has been published in the Scriptores Iberici series by M. Tarchinisivli and G. Garitte as part of the Corpus Scriptorum Christianorum Orientalium. Other material is still unpublished and in some cases unknown, such as the Codex Georgianus, which I discovered in the library of the Monastery of St Catherine on Mount Sinai in I950. This is the oldest Georgian psalter inscribed on Egyptian papyrus which I showed to Mr Garitte during the Mount Sinai Expedition conducted by the Library of Congress and Alexandria University for microfilming its manuscripts. Since that time, I returned to the monastery to mount the fragile leaves under glass for preservation. The monastery also possesses a number of icons of Georgian provenance which have been photographed by the second Mount Sinai Expedition of Princeton and Michigan.

xi

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PREFACE

in Christian annals. I have tried to see and to judge the bare facts of the primitive Christianity of the East apart from the later accretions, and the barriers of media:val and modern polemics. Indeed, well-meaning theologians and brilliant interpreters of Christian sects and churches seem by their argument, to have caused the Western mind to become oblivious to much of the purity and simplicity of the Christian origins of the East. It was on the occasion of those lectures that Mr Melvin Arnold of Harper and Row approached me with the suggestion that I might formulate and elaborate my notes for publication in a single volume under the auspices of his house. The attraction of the proposal was overpowering in spite of my awareness of the magnitude of the task. Fortunately, a year of complete freedom of action spent at the Princeton Institute for Advanced Study afforded me the time to accumulate the essential data of my theme from the wealth of material in the seminary collections and splendid libraries of the eastern states. Yet this proved to be merely one stage in the fulfilment of a difficult and almost forbidding project. But my hand was already on the plough, and it was not possible for me to look behind. It is my hope that the years I have since devoted to this work have not been spent in vain. The material presented in the following pages must necessarily be regarded as a modest beginning, and not the end. My primary aim has been to make a brief survey of the story of each church from its foundation until approximately our own times, with emphasis on the historical factors at play in the genesis of world religious events. Often, as in the case of the disputed recumenical movement of the fourth and fifth centuries, I have felt that the elements of secular politics were drowned in an ocean of theological polemics. It will be noted that some churches of lesser importance in our day once had a most glorious ecclesiastical career. Thus the accomplishments of the Alexandrine divines, and the vast missionary enterprises of the Copts in the West and of the Nestorians in the East are objects of wonder and admiration. The danger of reading the past through the present must be averted if we are to paint a true picture of the Eastern churches whose claim to Apostolic succession is their pride and glory. Nothing is as distasteful to the Eastern mind as the allegations reiterated in numerous writings by responsible coreligionists that the Christians of the East are schismatics, worse than heretics. Those bearers of the fire of the faith in untold and distant terrains of bygone days question the theory of schism on the basis that the early churches of primitive Christianity had developed in the spirit of harmonious brotherhood and parallelism. In reality, the need for amending a multitude of such unilateral verdicts is nowadays increasingly felt in most camps. For a fuller understanding of each church, I have concluded my accounts with an enquiry into the institutional and cultural aspects and habits of every community, summarizing the hierarchical organization of the various

PREFACE •

xiii

churches, their rites and ceremonials, ecclesiastical art and architecture, and religious music and literature. Since all these accounts are in the nature of general background rather than detailed and intensive studies, it has been my policy to supplement them with comprehensive bibliographical footnotes. These are intended as a guide to future researchers in the vast labyrinth of sources both ancient and modern. Thus, while the Select Bibliography incorporates the major collections and the works of a universal character dealing with numerous churches and various movements, the footnotes are devoted to the sources of special topics within the framework of each church. Hitherto, literature on the Eastern churches could be classified under two categories. The first comprises the Roman Catholic authors, usually men of great learning and erudition who viewed the East from the narrow angle of their own profession with sectarian vehemence and considerable lack of understanding. Works of scholars such as Adrien Fortescue, Raymond Janin and Donald Attwater, have continuously come in for due appraisal in the course of our discussions. The second category consists of a group of well-meaning and sympathetic Protestant writers who, nevertheless, failed to come to grips with the essence of Eastern Christian primitivism. Among the older members of this class are J. M. Neale, Mrs E. L. Butcher, 0. H. Parry, J. W. Etheridge, G. P. Badger and many others whose names appear in the relevant sections of this study. Outside those categories, a small school of modern thought has been growing slowly around the names of some church historians such as A. P. Stanley, W. F. Adeney and B.]. Kidd. It is noteworthy, however, that all of them have treated both the Greek and the non-Greek family of churches in the same volumes, and invariably the space allotted to the latter was insignificant. Thus in spite of the scholarly qualities of their attempts, their works have remained as a whole inadequate. It is hoped that this volume may help in filling that lacuna in Eastern church history. As will be seen, a meticulous effort has been made to abide by the canons of historical research through the use of as many original documents as might be expected in a work of general character. The fruit of research accomplished by numerous scholars in many fields has been utilized to the full. However, the events here put forward, have been viewed from a somewhat different angle. It must be stated that I, a historian by vocation, am also a member of the Coptic Church by birth and upbringing. Consequently, the reader may be able to sense the deeper feeling with which the work is written from within the fold of the Churches of the East. As a matter of fact, I allowed myself to be persuaded into shouldering this arduous task, partly as a modest work of scholarship, and partly as an act of faith. My notes bear sufficient testimony of my debt to the innumerable Eastern and Western authors whose monographs have enriched our library. Without

:xiv •

PREFACE

these, it would have been impossible for me to complete my assignment. A preface is no place for a parade of such names. Reference is made to those innumerable monographs of masters, old and new. Though conscious of the controversial character of some of my arguments, I have decided not to relinquish even the most provocative amongst them so long as they have any foundation in available source material. My sole ambition has been to establish a base from which others can take over with some measure of confidence. In sum, if this work proves to be a modest counterweight to the galaxy of standard manuals of the history of Western Christianity, I shall be more than rewarded. At any rate, an attempt is here offered in prayerful hope that future generations of interested scholars may carry the torch until the whole truth and wisdom of the great fathers of the faith are fully revealed to all congregations throughout the world. A. S. ATIYA

MAPS

I II III IV

v

VI VII

The Early Christian World Christian Egypt Ethiopia Eastern Christian Communities Missionary Enterprises: Copts, Nestorians Malabarese Church Nubian Christianity

page

2

4 5 6

7 8

9

NORTH

OCEANUS ATLANTICU!J

L,

Vienna

Aquim