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Instabilitas loci: the Wanderlust of late Byzantine Monks

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  21 March 2016

Donald M. Nicol
Donald M. Nicol*
Affiliation:
King’s College, London
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Extract

The Byzantines took more kindly than the westerners of the middle ages to their eccentrics of the spiritual life. They never lost sight of the true meaning of the word monachos — a solitary, a man who lives alone with God. The ultimate and deepest purpose of the monastic life was, as Saint Basil himself had declared, the ‘salvation of one’s own soul’. The way of the monachos was a lonely one. For the many who were called it was perhaps only bearable in the gregarious circumstance of a community, a koinobion or coenobitic monastery; and Saint Basil believed that they were right. But in the Byzantine world it was always accepted that there would be a chosen few for whom even the koinobion was too gregarious. For them the communal monastery would be the primary school of askesis from which they would one day graduate to the harder and more rarefied discipline of an asketerion, a small group of monks living in a lavra or a skete under the supervision of a spiritual father.

Type
Research Article
Information
Studies in Church History , Volume 22: Monks, Hermits and the Ascetic Tradition , 1985 , pp. 193 - 202
Copyright
Copyright © Ecclesiastical History Society 1985

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References

1 Justinian, Nov 5, cap 3, ed G. Schoell and G. Kroll, Corpus Iuris Civilis 3 (Berlin 1928) pp. 31–2.

2 Typikon of Athanasios, ed Ph. Meyer, Die Haupturkunden jur die Geschichte der Athoskloster (Leipzig 1894) p. 115.

3 Ibid pp. 116–17.

4 Can. 4. Hefele, C.J., Histoire des Conciles, ed H. Leclercq, II, 2 (Paris 1910) pp. 779–82 Google Scholar

5 Justinian, Nov. 5, cap 7: p. 33. See Hermann, E., ‘La “stabilitas loci” nel monachismo Bizantino’, OCP 21 (1955) pp. 125–42 Google Scholar.

6 See, e.g., The Correspondence of Athanasius I Patriarch of Constantinople, ed Alice-Mary Maffry Talbot (= Corpus Fontium Historiae Byzantinae 7: Dumbarton Oaks, Washington D.C. 1975) nos 36, 83. Joannou, P., ‘Vie de S. Germain l’Hagiorite par son contemporain le patriarche Philothée de Constantinople’, An Bol 70 (1952) ce 15–17, pp. 77–85 Google Scholar.

7 D. Obolensky, The Byzantine Commonwealth. Eastern Europe, SOO-14S3 (London 1971) pp. 301–2. Two recent studies have drawn attention to the place of holy men in late Byzantine society: Ruth Macrides, ‘Saints and Sainthood in the Early Palaiologan Period’, The Byzantine Saint, ed Hackel, S. (Studies Supplementary to Sobomost 5: London 1981) pp. 67–87 Google Scholar; E. Laiou-Thomadakis, Angeliki, ‘Saints and Society in the Late Byzantine Empire’, Charanis Studies. Essays in Honor of Peter Charanis, ed Laiou-Thomadakis, Angeliki (New Brunswick, N.J. 1980) pp. 84–114 Google Scholar. See also McDonnell, E.W., ‘Monastic Stability: Some Socioeconomic Considerations’, ibid pp. 115–50 Google Scholar.

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11 Gregory Palamas himself so described him. See Meyendorff, J., Introduction [à l’étude de Grégoire Palamas] (Patristica Sorbonensia 3 Paris 1959) p. 34 Google Scholar.

12 Encomia of Palamas by the Patriarchs Philotheos and Neilos are published in PG 151, cols 551–656, 655–78. Cf. Meyendorff, Introduction. Anna Philippides-Braat, ‘La captivité de Palamas chez les Turcs: dossier et commentaire’, Travaux et Mémoires 7 (1979) pp. 109–22.

13 Life of Gregory of Sinai by his pupil and later Patriarch Kallistos, ed I. Pomjalovskij, ‘Zitie ize vo svjatych otsa nasego Grigorija Sinaita’, Zapiski 35 (St Petersburg 1894) pp. 1–64. The Life is paraphrased with a valuable commentary by Balfour, D., Saint Gregory the Sinaite, Discourse on the Transfiguration (Athens 1983) pp. 59–91 Google Scholar, reprinted from Theologia 52–54 (Athens 1981–83).

14 The Greek version of the Life of St Romylos is edited by Halkin, F. ‘Un ermite des Balkans au XIV siècle: La vie grecque inédite de St Romylos’, B 31 (1961) pp. 111–47 Google Scholar. The Slav version was edited by Syrku, P.A., ‘Monacha Grigorija Zitie prepodobnago Romila’, Pamjatniki dreunejpismennosti i Iskusstva 136 Google Scholar (St Petersburg 1900).

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16 [D.M.] Nicol, Meteora. [The Rock Monasteries of Thessaly, 2 ed (London 1975)] pp. 81–2.

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19 Life of Sabas, ed Papadopoulos-Kerameus, p. 211.

20 Life of Athanasios of the Meteoron, ed N.A. Bees, BvÇavríç 1 (1909) 237–60, especially 244. Nicol, Meteora, pp. 91–2.

21 Halkin, F., ‘Deux Vies de S. Maxime le Kausokalybe ermite au Mont Athos (XIVeS.)’, An Bol 54 (1936) pp. 38–112 Google Scholar.

22 Life of Meletios, ed Lavriotes, pp. 612, 615.

23 Life of Romil, ed Halkin, pp. 131–2, 142.

24 Life of Sabas, ed Papadopoulos-Kerameus, p. 258.

25 Ibid pp. 235–6, 242–3.

26 Ibid pp. 344–7. The substance of this story is repeated by Philotheos in his Life of Isidore, ed A. Papadopoulos-Kerameus, Zapiski 76 (St Petersburg 1905) pp. 116–17.

27 Life of Isidore, ed Papadopoulos-Kerameus, pp. 62–3, 76–7.