THE AUTOCEPHALY OF THE ORTHODOX CHURCH IN UKRAINE AND THE CANONICAL PREROGATIVES OF THE ECUMENICAL PATRIARCHATE

ARCHBISHOP JOB OF TELMESSOS:΄΄The Autocephaly of the Orthodox Church in Ukraine and the Canonical Prerogatives of the Ecumenical Patriarchate΄΄, in  The Ecumenical Patriarchate and Ukraine Autocephaly, Evagelos Sotiropoulos, Editor, May 2019, ORDER OF SAINT ANDREW THE APOSTLE, ARCHONS OF THE ECUMENICAL PATRIARCHATE, pp. 47-59.

On October 11, 2018, the Holy and Sacred Synod of the Ecumenical Patriarchate discussed at length the ecclesiasticalmatter of Ukraine and decreed to grant autocephaly to theOrthodox Church in Ukraine (OCU). It revoked the legal bindingof the Synodal Letter of the year 1686, issued for the circumstancesof that time. In accordance with the canonical prerogatives of theEcumenical Patriarchate, the Holy Synod also accepted andreviewed the petitions of appeal of Philaret Denisenko, MakariyMaletych and their followers, who found themselves in schism notfor dogmatic reasons. Thus, the above-mentioned hierarchy and itsclergy have been canonically reinstated to their hierarchical orpriestly rank, and with their faithful, have been restored tocommunion with the One, Holy, Catholic, and Apostolic Church.Following this decision, a unifying synod was convened by the Ecumenical Patriarchate in Kyiv on December 15, 2018, to establish the new autocephalous Church of Ukraine and elect her primate. Metropolitan Epiphanios was elected Metropolitan ofKyiv and all Ukraine. On January 5, 2019, His All-Holiness Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew signed the tomos of autocephaly, thereby officially granting autocephaly to the Orthodox Church in Ukraine and on the next day con celebrated the Divine Liturgy together with His Beatitude Metropolitan Epiphanios of Kyiv and all Ukraine, as well as with Hierarchs ofthe Throne and of the OCU, for the Great Feast of Theophany (January 6) at the Patriarchal Church of Saint George at the Phanar.In this article, I seek to both explore and explain the canonical prerogatives and responsibilities of the EcumenicalPatriarchate for granting autocephaly to the Orthodox Church inUkraine.

The Ecumenical Patriarchate as the Mother Church of the Churchof Ukraine

From a historical point of view, there is no doubt that theChurch of Ukraine was under the Ecumenical Patriarchate since the Christianisation of Kyivan Rus’ (988), until the end of the 17th century.When Left-bank Ukraine joined the Moscow State in themiddle of the 17th century, the Church of Kyiv was divided intoparts between different rival countries (Russia, Poland andTurkey). Because of the ongoing war, it was impossible to proceedto the election of the Metropolitan of Kyiv for a long time. GedeonSvyatopolk-Chetvertinsky, a Ruthenian prince, was elected andordained Metropolitan of Kyiv by the Patriarch of Moscow in 1685with the help of Hetman of the Zaporizhian Host IvanSamoylovych. This election and ordination were anti-canonical,since the Metropolitans of Kyiv ought to be elected by the HolySynod of the Ecumenical Patriarchate. Understanding the political circum stances and wishing not to leave the Church of Kyiv without a pastor, Ecumenical Patriarch Dionysios gave in 1686 the permission that, by oikonomia, the Metropolitan of Kyiv may be ordained by the Patriarch of Moscow, although he ought to beelected by the Clergy-Laity Assembly of his eparchy and continueto commemorate the Ecumenical Patriarch as the first hierarch atevery celebration in order to proclaim and affirm his canonicaldependence to the Mother Church of Constantinople. Thus, therewas by no means any transfer of the Metropolis of Kyiv to the jurisdiction of the Patriarch of Moscow. The documentsconcerning what happened in 1686 speak only of a permissiongiven to the patriarch of Moscow to ordain the metropolitan ofKyiv in the political context when Left-bank Ukraine had beenunited to the Moscow State and while wars were opposingdifferent rival countries (Russia, Poland and Turkey). However,the condition was that the Metropolitans of Kyiv ought to continueto commemorate the name of the Ecumenical Patriarch and remainhis Exarchs, thus enjoying ecclesiastical autonomy from Moscow.It is also worth mentioning that the first UkrainianConstitution of April 5, 1710, a peculiar constitutional pact between the newly elected Hetman Pylyp Orlik speaks of thenecessity to restore the jurisdiction of the Ecumenical Patriarchateover the Metropolis of Kyiv and that the Metropolitans of Kyivcontinue to be Exarchs of the Ecumenical Patriarchate.One should remember, however, that the permissiongranted to Moscow in 1686 did not concern the other territories(Right-bank Ukraine, Belarus, Lithuania, Poland, Crimea) which remained under the direct ecclesiastical jurisdiction of the Ecumenical Patriarchate. These territories were annexed by Moscow only later, without any ecclesiastical act, due to the expansion of the Russian Empire and, ultimately, of the SovietUnion after the Second World War. Thus, even after 1686, most ofthe Ukrainian lands remained under the direct jurisdiction of theEcumenical Patriarchate.After 1686, the diocese of Lviv remained in the canonical jurisdiction of the Ecumenical Patriarchate, and when thearchbishop of Lviv entered into union with Rome after 1700, theOrthodox parishes and monasteries in Galicia were temporaryadministered by the Bukovinian metropolitans, who were also partof the Ecumenical Patriarchate. In 1791, a local council of the Orthodox clergy and laity from Western Ukraine, Belarus,Lithuania and Poland held in Pinsk decided to restore theirautonomy under the omophorion of the Ecumenical Patriarchate.The Ecumenical Patriarchate had jurisdiction not only overBukovina but also over the southern (the so- called “Khan”) part of Ukraine, which was officially then under the protectorate of theCrimean Khanate and the Ottoman Empire. After the violentliquidation of Zaporozhian Sich in 1775 by Catherine II, manyCossacks moved to the territories controlled by the OttomanEmpire, where a new Danubian Sich was founded on the banks ofthe Danube. It lasted until the middle of the 19th century andrecognized only the jurisdiction of the Ecumenical Patriarchate.The diocese of Transcarpathia who was under theEcumenical Patriarchate until 1946 was then annexed by force tothe Moscow Patriarchate.In Crimea, the ancient metropolises of Gothia and Kapharemained under the Ecumenical Patriarchate until the end of the17th century. They were liquidated by the Russian government in1788 after the annexation of the Crimean Khanate. However, theEcumenical Patriarchate has never recognized the legality of their subordination to the Russian Synod and the elimination of thesehistoric Metropolises in Crimea2.

The Ecumenical Patriarchate and the Granting of Autocephaly

 Concerning the practice of granting autocephaly, it isimportant to recall that the Ancient Patriarchates (Rome,Constantinople, Alexandria, Antioch, and Jerusalem) and theautocephalous Church of Cyprus were established by theEcumenical Councils3.

The first “new” autocephaly was the one of the Church of Russia, but it happened in an unusual way. After the council ofFlorence (1439), the Moscovites rejected their Metropolitan, Isidoreof Kyiv, who was one of the signatories of the union. After hisexpulsion, the see of Kyiv was vacant for many years. Finally, in1448, Jonas was elected as Metropolitan by a synod in Moscow.

De facto , the Church of Russia thus self-proclaimed its autocephaly, but this autocephaly was not recognized de jure . The election of Jonas by a synod in Moscow was anti-canonical, since according tothe established practice, the Metropolitans of Kyiv ought to beelected in Constantinople. This anti-canonical situation wasmaintained until 1589 when the Ecumenical Patriarch Jeremiah IIvisited Moscow. He then regularized the situation by granting tothe Metropolitan of Moscow the status of patriarch. It is interestingto underline that his patriarchal letter of May 1590 states that in 2 K. Vetochnikov, « La suppression de la métropole de Caffa au 17 e siècle », order to honor the ruler of Russia Theodore Ivanovich that the archbishop of Moscow Job was granted to be called patriarch andthat he be considered as the fifth patriarch after the patriarchs ofConstantinople, Alexandria, Antioch, and Jerusalem. Furthermore, the document underlines that thus, the patriarch of Moscow “ oughtto have as his head and keep as his authority and to respect the apostolicsee of Constantinople, as the other patriarchs do.”4

Thus, for the first time after the epoch of the Ecumenical Councils, the see of Moscow was granted the status of patriarchate by the Ecumenical Patriarchate.The next autocephaly of the newest times to be granted bythe Ecumenical Patriarchate was the Church of Greece. But once again, the history was not that easy. After the Greek War ofIndependence (1821-32), the provisional president of GreeceIoannis Kapodistrias (1776-1831) began, without any success,negotiations with the Ecumenical Patriarchate for the autocephalyof the Church of Greece. The final decision was made when Otto I(1815-1867), the new king of Greece, fearing that the Turkishgovernment might still be able to influence the politics of Greecethrough the Ecumenical Patriarchate, self-proclaimed theautocephaly of the Church of Greece in 1833. Only two decadeslater, the Ecumenical Patriarchate finally issued a tomos ofautocephaly in 1850 in order to restore the ecclesial communionwith the Mother Church of Constantinople that had been broken.The head of the new autocephalous Church of Greece ought tocommemorate the name of the Ecumenical Patriarch as well as thepatriarchs of Alexandria, Antioch and Jerusalem, which wereestablished by the Ecumenical Councils, but not the one of Moscowwho had been suppressed by Peter the Great in 1721. The Churchof Greece ought to receive the holy Myron from the EcumenicalPatriarchate and cooperate with regards pan-orthodox matters.4

The organization of the Orthodox Church worldwide hasprofoundly changed during the 20th century due to the restorationor the proclamation of several autocephalous local Churches.Indeed, some local Churches, that had in the past centuries anhonorific patriarchal status because their country had historically been an independent kingdom from the Byzantine Empire, wererestored as autocephalous and patriarchal Churches by theEcumenical Patriarchate, but always in the limits of concrete stateimplying concrete geographical borders. This was the case of theChurches of Serbia (1920), Romania (1885 for the restoration ofautocephaly, 1925 for the restoration of the patriarchate), Bulgaria(1953) and Georgia (1990). In each of these cases, the major reasonfor the restoration of their autocephaly and of their patriarchalstatus was the independence of their state either from the Ottomanempire (in the case of the first three) or from the Russian empire(for the Church of Georgia, in 1917).Besides the restoration of these four patriarchal Churches,the Orthodox Church proclaimed autocephaly to three additionallocal Churches: the Church of Poland, the Church of Albania andthe Church of Czechoslovakia. The reason for proclaiming theautocephaly of the Church of Poland was the request addressed tothe Ecumenical Patriarchate by the Polish Republic between theproclamation of its independence in 1918 and 1923 5. The PolishState, which recovered its eastern territories from the RussianEmpire, was favorable to the existence on its territory of anOrthodox Church on the condition that she would not serve andnot be controlled by the Russian Empire. For this reason, the PolishState addressed a request to the Ecumenical Patriarchate to grant autocephaly to the Orthodox Church of Poland. In response, the Ecumenical Patriarchate proclaimed autocephaly of the Church ofPoland in 1924, taking as a basis that the Church of Poland consisted of eparchies which used to belong to the Metropolis of Kyiv and were in the past under the direct canonical jurisdiction of the Ecumenical Patriarchate until 1686.The Church of Albania had been auto-declared by thein dependent Albanian State in 1922 by an ecclesiastical-national congress. The reason was a growing national consciousness,following the independence of their country, among the Orthodox Albanians, who were Albanian-speaking Greeks, which led them to search freedom from Greek influence and to use Albanian as their liturgical language. For obvious reasons, the Ecumenical Patriarchate at the beginning was reluctant to give them the status of autocephaly and accepted to grant a status of autonomy on specific conditions that were not accepted by the Albanians who,with the help of two Russian bishops from Yugoslavia, obtained the consecration of four bishops who formed their own Synod in1929. The self-proclaimed autocephalous Church was then officially recognized by the Albanian State as one of its three national religious entities. Placed in front of this accomplished fact,

the Ecumenical Patriarchate gave its benediction (εὐλογία) for the

autocephaly of the Church of Albania a few years later, in 1937, butimposed its canonical conditions for that6.After the formation of Czechoslovakia as an independentstate, the Church of Czechoslovakia was proclaimed autonomous by the Ecumenical Patriarchate in 1923, but in parallel, someparishes depended from the Church of Serbia. One of thecharacteristics of the Orthodox churches in Czechoslovakia was theusage of the Czech vernacular language in worship. After the Second World War, Czechoslovakia was liberated from theGerman occupation, and subsequently to the access of the communists to the government in 1946, came into close contacts with the USSR and found herself behind the Iron Curtain. The different existing Orthodox groups in Czechoslovakia, which haddefinitely a particular national flavor, asked at that time to bereceived into the jurisdiction of the Church of Russia. They finall ywere integrated into an autonomous exarchate of the Church of Russia in 1946. In 1948, the communist party took the power and the Church became then completely controlled in a very strict way by the communist regime. The Church of Russia decided at thattime to proclaim the autocephaly of the Church of Czechoslovakiain 1951, a canonical act which was not recognized by theEcumenical Patriarchate and other local Churches. After thePrague Spring (1968) and the dissolution of the communist regimein 1989 which led to the establishment of two independent states(the Czech Republic and Slovakia), there was on the one hand arevival of uniatism, which had been suppressed during the communist regime, and on the other hand, links with Russia were not well perceived by the local population. This is the reason that brought the Church of Czechoslovakia to seek support from the Ecumenical Patriarchate, which about half of a century later,officially proclaimed autocephaly of the Church of the Czech Lands and Slovakia in 1998, 7.As one can see, the new autocephalies that were proclaimedfrom the 16th century onwards were all exclusively proclaimed bythe Ecumenical Patriarchate. Each of these proclamations waslinked to a political factor and autocephaly was proclaimed as away of ensuring the unity of the Church, within the interior of each of these states, as well as the unity between the Local Churches.Throughout the history of the Orthodox Church, no other localchurch, except the Ecumenical Patriarchate, has proclaimedautocephaly because it is regarded as the exclusive privilege of thefirst see of Orthodoxy.

The Right of Appeal

Among its various prerogatives (pronomia) that it hasreceived from the Ecumenical Councils, the EcumenicalPatriarchate enjoys the right to receive appeals not only fromclergy and bishops of its own jurisdiction, but also from othersecclesiastical sees in order to re-examine them and to make thefinal judgement over these cases.This right of final appeal takes its origin in the right of thesee of Rome, as to the first see of the Pentarchy, to receive appealsfrom bishops from other provinces, as formulated by the Synod of Sardica (343) in its canons 3, 4 and 5. This ecclesiastical practice was fixed by the Fourth Ecumenical Council (Chalcedon, 451) in its canons 9 and 17. Canon 9 recalls the canonical principal that theone who ordain is the one empowered to judge. Therefore, acler gyman ought to be judged by his bishop, and a bishop ought to be judged by his synod. Provincial synods are also the place to receive the first appeal for a clergyman. Canon 9 mentions the “exarchs of the diocese” that were the predecessors of the patriarchs of the regional Churches. But canon 9 continues by adding that when a conflict arises between the metropolitan who chairs the provincial synod and a clergymen or bishop, the see of Constantinople has the right to receive the recourse and make thefinal judgement.

Commenting the previous canon 9, the Byzantine canonistAlexis Aristenos (12thc.) affirms that although each patriarch hasthe right to receive appeals from hierarchs within his own jurisdiction, the patriarch of Constantinople is the only one amongthe patriarchs to have the prerogative (pronomion) according to thecanons and to the laws to receive appeals coming from hierarchs aswell from other sees than his own jurisdiction, 8.The canon 17 of the Fourth Ecumenical Council adds thatthe throne of Constantinople has the right to judge cases ofwhoever may have been wronged by his own metropolitan. Thecanon 28 of the Fourth Ecumenical Council also states that the seeof Constantinople, as the capital and New Rome, has the equal dignities (τὰ ἴσα πρεσβεῖα) as the Ancient Rome, 9. The QuinisextEcumenical Council (in Trullo, 692) confirmed this ancient usage by confirming the canons of the council of Sardica and of theFourth Ecumenical Council in its second canon. Furthermore, it stated in its canon 36 that “the see of Constantinople shall have equal privileges with the see of the ancient Rome, and shall be highly regardedin ecclesiastical matters as that is, and shall be second after it.”10. 

Among these privileges is the right of appeal.The major council held in Constantinople in Saint Sophia in the year 879 reaffirmed in its first canon that the see of Constantinople has the equal rights to the see of Rome to receive appeals. Therefore, those who were subjected to canonical sanctions by the bishop of Rome ought to be also regarded as sanctioned by the see of Constantinople, and vice versa.

At the same epoch, the Epanagoge of Emperor Basil theMacedonian, a Byzantine law book promulgated in 886 andpublished as an introduction to the byzantine legislation, whichlater found its way in Slavonic translation into the Russian Kormchaya Kniga , reaffirmed this ecclesiastical practice formulated by the canons of the regional and ecumenical councils andreiterated clearly that the see of Constantinople has as itsprerogative the right to receive appeals not only from clergy and bishops of its own ecclesiastical see, but from all ecclesiastical seesas well and to judge them in last recourse.11

In the 14th century, the Byzantine canonist Matthew Blastares in his famous Syntagma reiterates that “ the primate of Constantinople … possesses the right to observe the disagreements arising within the limits of others sees, to correct them and to pronounce the final judgment over them (πέρας ἐπιτιθέναι ταίς κρίσεσιν)”.12

As one can see, there is a well-established canonical practice, confirmed by the decisions of the Ecumenical Councilsand by the Byzantine canonists, that since its foundation, th eEcumenical Patriarchate, among its various privileges (pronomia)has the right of ekkleton , that is to receive, as a remedy of canonlaw, the appeals of clergy and bishops that have received acanonical punishment, either having been deposited,anathematized or excommunicated by their respective synod, toreview these decisions and to pronounce a final judgement overthem in last recourse. Thus, the canonical right of ekkleton ,conferred to the see of Constantinople according to the decisions ofthe Ecumenical Councils and to the Byzantine ecclesiastical law,makes of the Ecumenical Patriarchate the supreme ecclesiastical, 11 Epanagoge, court of all the local autocephalous Orthodox Churches. Therefore,until today, the Ecumenical Patriarchate enjoys the right ofreceiving appeals from bishops and clergy from all localautocephalous Orthodox Churches, who consider themselveshaving been wrongly condemned—deposed, anathematized ofexcommunicated—by their local synod.

Conclusion

The decision of the Holy Synod of the Ecumenical Patriarchate togrant autocephaly to the Orthodox Church in Ukraine on October11, 2018, was based on fundamental facts. First, that theEcumenical Patriarchate has been since the very beginning theMother Church of the Church of Ukraine and that the Church ofUkraine has never been canonically transferred to the Church ofRussia. Second, that the Ecumenical Patriarchate has been the onlylocal Orthodox Church to proclaim autocephaly since the period ofthe Ecumenical Councils and regard it as its exclusive privilege being the first see of Orthodoxy. Third, that among its otherprivileges, the Ecumenical Patriarchate has the right to receive, as are medy of canon law, the appeals of clergy and bishops that have received a canonical punishment, either having been deposited,anathematized or excommunicated by their respective synod, to review these decisions and to pronounce a final judgement over them in last recourse.

1. K. Vetochnikov, « La ‘concession’ de la métropole de Kyiv au patriarche de Moscou en 1686 : Analyse canonique», in B. Krsmanović & L. Milanović (Ed.), Proceedings of the 23rd International Congress of Byzantine Studies, Belgrade, 22 – 27 August 2016 : Round Tables, Belgrade, 2016, p. 780-784. ; V. Tchentsova, «Синодальное решение 1686 г. о Киевской митрополии », Древняя Русь.  Вопросы медиевистики 2 [68] (2017), p. 89-11.

2. K. Vetochnikov, « La suppression de la métropole de Caffa au 17 e

 siècle », Orientalia Christiana Periodica  76 (2010), p. 433-457 ; Id., «Οι 

πατριαρχικές  

εξαρχίες 

και 

σταυροπήγια 

στην 

Κριμαία

 »,

 Κληρονομία

 34 (2002), p. 23-28 ; Id., « La politique religieuse des autorités génoises vis-à-vis de la métropole de Caffa (Crimée, 15 

e 

 siècle) », in M.-H. Blanchet et F. Gabriel (Ed.), 

 Réduire le schisme ? : ecclésiologies et politiques de l

’ 

Union entre Orient et Occident (XIII  

e

-XVII  

e 

 siècle)

, Paris, 2013, p. 261-276

3. 

 Cf. Fourth Ecumenical Council, canon 28; Quinisext Ecumenical Council, canon 36; and third Ecumenical Council, canon 8.

4.

 http://doc.histrf.ru/10-16/gramota-ob-utverzhdenii-moskovskogo-patriarkhata/ .

5.

A. Mironowicz, “L’Église orthodoxe en Pologne au XX 

e

siècle”, C. Chaillot 

(Ed.), 

 L’Égl  

ise orthodoxe en Europe orientale au XX  

e 

siècle

, Paris : Cerf, 2009,  p. 234 [in English : 

The Orthodox Church in Eastern Europe in the Twentieth Century 

, Bern : Peter Lang, 2011, p. 247-267] ; V. Phidas, 

Ἐκκλησιαστική Ἰστορία 

, III, Athens, 2014, p. 617.

6. A. Lotocki,  Autokefalia , II, Warsaw, p. 502-503 ; V. Phidas, Op. cit. , p. 630-639.

7. C. Pulec and G. Stransky, “L’Église orthodoxe en République Tchèque et en Slovaquie au XX e siècle”, C. Chaillot (Ed.), Op. cit., p. 218-225 [in English : Op.cit., p. 229-245] ; V. Phidas, Op. cit., p. 648-655.

8. Rhalle-Potle, vol. 2, Athens, 1852, p. 240.

9. Fourth Ecumenical Council, Canon 28. Cf. Rhalle-Potle, vol. 2, Athens, 1852,  p. 281.

10.  Quinisext Ecumenical Council (in Trullo), Canons 2 and 36. Cf. Rhalle-Potle, vol. 2, Athens, 1852, p. 308-310 and 387.

11.  Epanagoge, Title 3, About the patriarch, 9-10. Collectio librorum juris Graeco-romani ineditorum  (Ed. Z. von Lingenthal), Lipzig, 1852, p. 68. Cf. A. Vasiliev,  Histoire de l’Empire byzantin , vol. 1, Paris, 1932, p. 451. 12 Matthew Blastares, Syntagma Π, 8. Cf. Rhalle-Potle, vol. 6, Athens, 1859,  p. 429