AMBIENTUM BIOETHICA BIOLOGIA CHEMIA DIGITALIA DRAMATICA EDUCATIO ARTIS GYMNAST. ENGINEERING EPHEMERIDES EUROPAEA GEOGRAPHIA GEOLOGIA HISTORIA HISTORIA ARTIUM INFORMATICA IURISPRUDENTIA MATHEMATICA MUSICA NEGOTIA OECONOMICA PHILOLOGIA PHILOSOPHIA PHYSICA POLITICA PSYCHOLOGIA-PAEDAGOGIA SOCIOLOGIA THEOLOGIA CATHOLICA THEOLOGIA CATHOLICA LATIN THEOLOGIA GR.-CATH. VARAD THEOLOGIA ORTHODOXA THEOLOGIA REF. TRANSYLVAN
The STUDIA UNIVERSITATIS BABEŞ-BOLYAI issue article summary
The summary of the selected article appears at the bottom of the page. In order to get back to the contents of the issue this article belongs to you have to access the link from the title. In order to see all the articles of the archive which have as author/co-author one of the authors mentioned below, you have to access the link from the author's name.
Authors: ZACHARY CHITWOOD.
DOI: 10.24193/subbto.2023.1.03
Published Online: 2023-06-30
Published Print: 2023-07-30
pp. 79-97
VIEW PDF
FULL PDF
Over the second half of the sixteenth century a new form of monasticism, idiorrhythmia (“living according to one’s own devices”), seemed to be spreading across the Orthodox monasteries of the Eastern Mediterranean. The communal regime practiced for centuries in the venerable monasteries of the East was gradually collapsing: first at St. Catherine’s on Sinai around 1557, then at the monasteries of Palestine, including the Monastery of the Cross in Jerusalem. When the patriarchs of Alexandria (Sylvester [1569-1590]) and Constantinople (Jeremiah II [1572-1579; 1580-1584; 1587-1595]) came together to celebrate Christmas at Thessaloniki in 1573, Sylvester was tasked with travelling to Mount Athos to investigate the state of the monastic life there. His inquest revealed a shocking state of affairs: monks moving without hindrance to and from Athos and engaging in the sale of goods to the outside world, including spirits which they drank themselves. Beardless youths and laypersons lived in monasteries; livestock were allowed to pasture on the Holy Mountain. This contribution will examine Patriarch Sylvester’s inquest and the subsequent effort to restore communal life at the major monasteries on Athos.
Keywords: Mount Athos; Orthodox Church in the Ottoman Empire; Patriarchate of Alexandria; monasticism; idiorrhythmia
