Xl. ve XVIII. yüzyıllar Xl. to XVIII. centuries iSLAM-TÜRK MEDENiYETi VE AVRUPA ISLAMIC-TURKISH CIVILIZATION AND EUROPE Uluslararası Sempozyum International Symposium

iSAM Konferans Salonu !SAM Conference Hall Xl. ve XVIII. yüzyıllar islam-Türk Medaniyeti ve Avrupa ULUSLARARASISEMPOZYUM 24-26 Kas1m, 2006 ·

• Felsefe - Bilim

• Siyaset- Devlet

• Dil - Edebiyat - Sanat

• Askerlik

• Sosyal Hayat

•Imge fl,cm. No:

Tas. No:

Organizasyon: Türkiye Diyanet Vakfı islam Araştırmaları Merkezi (iSAM) T.C. Diyanet işleri Başkanlığı Marmara Üniversitesi ilahiyat Fakültesi

© Kaynak göstermek için henüz hazır değildir. 1 Not for quotation.

,.1' Xl. ve XVIII. yüzyıllar

Uluslararası Sempozyum

THE ENLIGHTENMENT, THE PORTE, AND THE GREEK CHURCH: A PARADOX OF BALKAN HISTORY

Dimitris MICHALOPOULOS*

Like Western Christendom in the Middle-Ages, the Eastern one, namely the Byzantines, used Aristotle's thought as a means of philosophical meditation. Nonetheless, from the eleventh century on, it is a revival of Platonic ideas no less than that took place in Constantinople - something very strange, given that the Platonic and neo-Platonic philosophers were considered amongst the bitterest enemies of the Christian Faith. The capture of Constantinople by the Ottomans in 1453 put an end to the development of this neo-Platonic (virtually crypto-pagan) current; and Gennadius II Scholarius, the first Constantinopolitan Patriarch after the fall of the Empire, decisively redirected Christian Orthodox philosophical research towards the beacon of the Stagirite's thought. Moreover, in the seventeenth century another paradox, far more radical that the eleventh-century one, occurred: higher dignitaries of the Greek clergy endorsed and began teaching and openly propagating a materialistic interpretation of Aristotle's philosophical system; and the Porte remained practically idle ... This state of affairs proved to have far-reaching consequences in the Balkans; and it has never been so far the object of an ecclesiastical anathema. The main question is, therefore: ho w a Christian Church might adopt a materiali st W eltanschauung. In fact, this is inexplicable - unless one accepts that the İstanbul Greek Patriarchate is downright Orthodox ... but by no means limited to Christianity alone.

It is a fundamental paradox that the Greek Orthodox Patriarchate (Rum Patrikhanesi) was criticized, before the 1829 foundation of an independent Greek state, only mildly by the Left, i.e. by the scholars of the Greek Enlightenment and their followers. The pamphlet Fratemal Exhortation (written by Adamantios Korais and conceived as a response to the Patemal Exhortation, attributed to a Patriarch either of Jerusalem or of İstanbul) was the only reaction of the Greek democrats, i.e. the Left­ wing intellectuals, vis-a-vis the Church. Of course, it was just a 'paper', an anodyne at that; and for good reason. For the Greek Enlightenment, thanks to the protection of the Greek Church (and Ottoman indifference as well), anticipated the French one by several decades. In other words, materialist theories were taught in Greece, then under Ottoman rule, by Orthodox clergymen; and Enlightenment doctrines became a State ideology in the Balkans long before their prevalence in France. There are two key-personalities in this quite paradoxical evolution: Cyril Lucar (1572-1638) and Theophilus Corydaleus (1570-1646). Both had been Cesare p Cremonini's (1550-1631) disciples at the University of Padua; and both had endorsed

Dr., Academic Director, Histarical Institute for Studies on Eleutherios Yeniselos and his Era, Greece. 210 İ s l ii \m - T ü r k M e d e n i y e t i v e A v r u p a

1 his materialistic interpretation of Aristotelian thought and teaching • In fact, though Aristotle was the most widely read classical author of the Renaissance, it is generally believed that his interpretation had followed, in early Modern Times, two separate 2 currents, namely Scholasticism and the Humallistic one ; and one of the most no tab le of Aristotle's admirers was Pietro Pomponazzi (1462-1525), the virtual founder of the so­ called Paduan school. He had taught at Padua until1509 and at Bologna from 1512 on; and it was the publication of his bookDe immartalitate animae3 in 1516 that triggered a real revolution in Christian thought (and paved the way for the Enlightenment as well). In his book, Pomponazzi openly disagreed with St Thomas Aquinas (1225-1274), who had followed the Stagirite in defining the rational soul as the "form" of man, believing, at the same time, that the soul could survive separation from the body. Pomponazzi's idea was clear-cut in this matter: the immortality of the soul was incompatible with Aristotle's concept of entelech/. In point offact, Pomponazzi's solution to the afterlife enigma was that the human soul was tied to the body; and so he opened the door to materialism, panegyrically trumpeted later by C. Cremonini, professor at the University ofPadua from 1591, and regarded by his disciples and admirers as Aristatefes redivivus, 5 Princeps philasapharum, Genius Aristate/is and so on . The result? When the latter's disciple, Cyril Lucar, became Patriarch of Constantinople, he appointed Th. Corydaleus as director ofthe Patriarchal Academ~6 • Avowedly or not, materialism came to be under 7 the aegis of the Greek Patriarchate , and this Academy soon began to develop into the 8 avant-garde of the Left in Europe . It is with good reason, therefore, that the progressive min d of the Patriarch Cyril I Lucar is, even today, enthusiastically acclaimed in Greece and in the Western countries as well. Nonetheless, the point is that, thanks to his admirers and followers (the famous Phanariots in other words), the materialistic interpretation of the Stagirite's thought became a kind of state ideology in the Danubian Principalities, i.e. today's Romania. And Th. Corydaleus, on the other hand, towards the end of his life, founded a school in

Thanks are due to Professor Michael Lumley, for having read the manuscript and making many valuable suggestions. Ariadna Camariano-Cioran, Les academies princieres de Bucarest et Jassy et leurs professeurs (Salonika: Institute for Balkan Studies, 1974), p. 181. 2 J. R. Hale (ed.) Encyclopaedia of the Italian Renaissance (London: Thames and Hudson, 1989), entry "Aristotle", p. 36. De immortalitate animae =On. the immortality of the soul. 4 Entelechy=actualizing form. See Cleobule Tsourkas, Les debuts de l'enseignement philosophique et delalibre pensee dans fes Balkans. La vie et l'amvre de Theophile Coryda/ee (1570-1646}, Salonika: Institute for Balkan 2 Studies, 1967 , p. 192. 6 Ca. 1625. See Steven Runciman, The Great Church in captivity. Translated into Greek by N. K. Paparrhodou (Athens: Bergadis, 1979), p. 489; Cl. Tsourkas, op.cit., p. 22. 7 Cl. Tsourkas, op.cit., p. 204: ... on peut deduire ... que si sa philosophie est traversee d'un soujjle puissant, ce soujjle n 'est pas la religiosite, mais le materialisme et le positivisme. S. Runciman, op. cit., p. 489; Cleobule Tsourkas, op. cit., p. 195. See also Ariadna Camariano­ Cioran, op. cit., p. 181: ... I' historiographie marxiste considere Aristote comme le plus grand penseur de l'antiquite, comme un « titan de la pensee », qui amantre que fes vrais « substances » sont les choses materiel/es concretes, perçues par fes sens. Le point essentiel de .Ja-philosophie aristotelicienne est le postufat de la primaute de la nature par rapport ala connaissance ... D i m i .t r i s Michalopoulos 211

Athens, his native city, where, under the benevolent eye of the Ottoman authorities, continued teaching his own views on Aristotle's works. It was therethat he died as ... an 9 archbishop of the Greek Church • As a matter of fact, the materialism he persisted in propagating practically al'l his life not only did not give him problems, but, on the contrary, proved to be beneficial to him: albeit he became a monk in 1622 before renouncing his vows as early as 1625, this apostasy was never stigmatised by the Greek 10 Church ; and although he created havoc in his Naupactus and Arta archbishopric in merely one year11 and was forced to abandon his diocese, he never gave up his 12 ecclesiastical dignity . Moreover, the books he wrote were very popular in Greece and in Graecized Balkan countries as well right up to the Iate eighteenth century - which 13 was mainly due to the approbation they received by the Greek clergy . There is only one reasonable conclusion to be drawn from the Cyril Lucar/ Theophilus Corydaleus story: the higher-ups among the Greek clergymen concurred - 14 openly or not- with their ideas .

I It is well known that the Phanariots were Graecized wealthy people who lived in Phanar (Fener), i.e. the İstanbul area where the Greek Patriarchate's headquarters were set up from 1599/1601 on. The Phanariots' origin was obscure; asa matter offact, they 15 came from all over the Balkans . Nonetheless, they proved astute enough to grasp at once the enormous benefits to be derived from establishing their houses near the Patriarch's headquarters. The Patriarch in fact was the head not only of the Greeks but of the whole of the Orthodox population living within the borders of the Ottoman Empire; and given that the Porte was in need of personuel fluent in European tongues, they used the Patriarchate as a vehicle for their ascendancy over the Ottoman bureaucracy. The Greek Patriarchate,' on the other hand, was quite satisfied with their intrusion into the Ottoman dignitary system, for it was thus able to 'pry' into the Sublime Porte's apparatus. Those who were not satisfied with this state of things initially were the Christian peasants of the Balkans and, later, the Moslem Ottomans themselves. But the peasants' feelings di d not count very much during the early stages of the Ottoman domination in the ·Balkan countries; and the larter did not realize the absurdity of the situation until it was too Iate ...

9 CL Tsourkas, op. cit., pp. 78-80. 10 Ibidem, p. 76. 11 Ibidem, p. 77. 12 Ibidem, p. 78. 13 lbidem, p. 103: 14 Cf. ibidem, p.8lff. 15 Anastasios N. Goudas, "Iakovos Rhizos Neroulos" in Paral/el Lives of Men who distinguished themselves in the Regeneration ofGreece (in Greek), vol. II (Athens: Ch. N. Philadelpheus, 1870), p. 339. 212 İsliif!l-Türk Medeniyeti ve Avrupa

Be that as it may; in 1711 'the Porte nominated Nicholas Mavrocordatos, a member of a very influential Phanariot family, the voivode ofMoldavia; and in 1715 the same was placed on the throne of Wallachia. Thus began the Phanariot regime in the 16 Danubian Principalities; it was to last till 1821 . Nevertheless, the Mavrocordatos family had managed, long before Nicholas' appointment as Moldavia's voivode, namely 17 in 1689, to appoint its protege , Sevastos Kyminitis, at the head of the Bucharest 18 Princely Academy ; and Kyminitis maintained this post until his death in 1702. Then "Academy" meant simply an institution of higher education. N evertheless, given that the "Academies" ofthe Danubian Principalities as well as that of the Greek Patriarchate in İstanbul were the only higher-education establishments in the Balkans, the Kyminitis' appointment was a symbolic act of far-reaching consequences; for the new head of the Bucharest Princely Academy was one of Th. Corydaleus' followers, who had endorsed the materialism rootedin Aristotle's interpretation (as this materialism was propagated 19 in Padua) • Although he was thoroughly disliked by his students, he enjoyed the protection of influential Phanariots - and, as a corollary, the favour of the Patriarch's Court and the indifference of the Ottoman Porte no less; so, thanks to him, materialism 20 soon became a form of state ideology in Romanian Lands • This remarkable occurrence took place at the turn of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, i.e. decades before the turmoil into which Europe in general and France in particular was thrown (all thanks to the atheistic Philosophers). The result? First, and foremost, the moral degeneration of the Romanians who, under the Phanariots, no longer were a proud, brave people and all but became a mass of servile 1 onesf . That is why the most radical of the 1848 'uprisings' took place in Wallachia; and also why thanks mainly to joint Ottoman and Russian military intervention, this 1848 "political cancer" was destroyed before in its turn destroyed the whole of 22 Europe •

n This situation had given rise to controversy of course; and it is with good reason that the famous Jesuit!Cyril Lucar dispute is regarded as its beginning. The Patriarch had stated in 1627, ina pamphlet, that certain Islamic dogmas could not be accepted by

16 Constantin C. Giurescu (ed.), Chronological History of Romania (Bucharest: Editura Enciclopedica Romil.na, 19742 ),p.141. 17 Cf. N. Iorga, Byzance apres Byzance (Bucharest: Association Intemationale d'Etudes du sud-est europeen. Comite national rournain, 1971), p. 213; Ariadna Camariano-Cioran, ap. cit., pp. 363-364. 18 Formally. he was invited by the ruler ofWallachia Constantine Brancoveanu (ibidem, p. 36). 19 Cl. Tsourkas, ap. cit., p. 173; cf. N. Iorga, ap. cit., pp. 212-213. 20 See mainly Ariadna Camariano-Cioran, ap. cit., pp. 363-373, 667. 21 See mainly N. Balcescu, Question economique des Principautes Danubiennes, Paris: Librairie de Charpentier, 1850; cf. Kurt W. Treptow (ed.), A History ofRomania (Iaşi : The Center for Romanian Studies. The Romanian Cultural Foundation, 1996), p. 167. 22 In the words of Apostol Arsachi, a Romanian statesman. See Dimitris Michalopoulos, "Apostol Arsachi", Revue roumaine d'histoire (Bucarest), tomes XL-XLI (2001-2002), p. 145ff. D i m i.t ri s Michalopoulos 213

Christiaris; the Jesuits exposed the case to the Grand Vizier; and the Grand Vizier turned the pamphlet over to the Şeyhülisliim, who bravely declared that Christians did have the right to declare their eredos even if they ran counter to Islam.

~ No one can gainsay that this very fact provides evidence of the Sublime Porte's tolerance in religious matters. It is well known that Cyril Lucar was put to deathin 1638 simply because the Ottoman authorities were tired of the serious trouble in which he was constantly involved; but, on the other hand, they openly favoured the teaching and, generally speaking, the activity of Corydaleus. It is said, moreover, that he had some Moslem disciples, who tried to have the materialistic doctrines of their teacher endorsed 3 by other Moslems as welf . And last but no least, a book written by Corydaleus was translated into Turkish in 1750, and the translator was granted a pension for life by the 24 Sublime Porte . Nonetheless, beyond the undoubted tolerance of the Porte, the main point is the attitude as well as the legal standing of the Greek Patriarchate. For, if Cyril Lucar was used to declaring that, as a Christian, he rejected certain Moslem dogmas, how might he have had his dignity bestowed upon himselfby the Sultan and Caliph, i.e. the very head of the people some of whose dogmas he could not accept? Here is the nub to the Greek Patriarchate's problem throughout the centuries. In point of fact, the J esuits were right, because as Iate as the Iate nineteenth century many Christians in Europe were of the opinion that Islam represented merely a'·Christian curren~ 5 • It is noteworthy, moreover, that this conception of Islam being somehow a current very close to Christianity was well-founded. Mohammed in person had provided the Sinai monks with the famous document, according to the terms of which perpetual protection was granted to the whole of the race [not the religion] of the Nazarenes ... 6 until the end of the centuriei ; and the monks, by the same token, obviously felt entitled to address themselves to Mohammed because they and Mohammed the Prophet 7 worshipped the same Gotf . Only the Calvinists have always had a truly hostile attitude towards Islam; and it is well-known that Cyril Lucarwas a crypto-Calvinis~ 8 .

m Thus this Patriarch managed to break the bonds between the Greek Orthodox Church and both Islam and traditional Christendom; and it is noteworthy that it was only the beginning of a long process which culminated in the early eighteenth century in

23 Cl. Tsourkas, op. cit., p. 214. 24 Ibidem. 25 See Eugene Asse, La France aux Craisades (Paris: Firmin-Didot,1888), pp. 5, 14; Deno John Geanakoplos, The Emperor Michael VIJ1 Palaeologus and the West (in Greek), Athens: A. Karavias, 1969, p. 158. 26 See the Greeı! translation of the farnous document in Constantine N. Paparnichalopoulos, The Sinai Monastery (in Greek), Athens-Cairo, 1932, p. 203ff. 27 Ibidem, p. 197. Moreover, according to a tradition, Mohammed, while stili young, had spent several years in the Sinai monastery, where he was taught the Christian Faith (ibidem, p. 194). 28 Steven Runciman, op.cit., p. 475ff. 214 İsliim-Türk Medeniyeti ve Avrupa the composition of that dogmatic treatise which made a dead set at Islam (and W estern Christendom as well). It was namely a book by Anastasios Gordios (1654/5-1729) in 29 which the personality ofMohammed was roundly insulted . Now everything was clear: 30 the latter was no more no less than Antichrist in person . The evidence? His stock was not so noble as the one of "both Christians and Jews"31 (sic). And renewing the arguments set forth by Cyril Lucar, he declared :finally that, in fact, there was just one Antichrist but with two faces, namely Malıarnmed in the East and the Roman Pope in 2 the Wese • In doing so, nonetheless, he levelled the brunt of his bellicosity at the Muscovites, i.e. the Russians, who must continue to be subjugated to the Patriarchate of 33 34 Constantinople ; and the latter's natural allies were, of course, the "pious Jews" , for it 35 was inconceivable that the Antichrist should be bom among the "Hebrews" •

IV The Gordios' book36 was practically the crowning glory of Cyril Lucar' s work: under the guidance of the Patriarchate of Constantinople, the Greek Orthodox clergy once more declared spiritual war against East and West in order to keep their spiritual sovereignty over the Slavic part of Eprope; and their allies were both the Jews and the European atheists, i. e. the enemies par exeellence ofboth Christendom and Islam. It was wrong of the Porte to remain (initially) smug about the rôle of the Phanar in this imbroglio. It is quite absurd to suppose, for instance, that Gregory V did not suspect what was going on with the famous Philiki Hetaireia in the early nineteenth century. Legally speaking, the Porte was right to blame Gregory V for the 1821 Revolution: the Sultan being the source of the Patriarch's power, the latter had to be loyal to the forrner. The Patriarchate nonetheless persisted throughout the centuries in playing a double game: it remained the main pillar of Ottoman sovereignty in the Balkans37 but at the same time it was forever trying to; sap this very sovereignty. So the major outsize lacuna, the main desideralum of both European and Near Eastern History is the very aim pursued throughout the centuries by the Constantinopolitan Patriarchate. Thanks to a conclusive investigation, conducted by Greek scholars, we are now in a position to provide an answer to this critical question: the Patriarchate' s issue has to be seen pari passu with the apparatus roling the Byzantine Empire; in other words, it is now clear that, due to latent, occult forces, the imperial jurisdiction in Byzantium was in

29 Anastasios Gordios, Sur Mahomet et cantre !es Latins. Edition critique accompagnee d'une introduction et de notes par Asterios Argyriou, Athens: Association scientifique d'etudes sur la Grece centrale, 1983. 30 Ibidem, pp. 47-48. 31 Ibidem, p. 47. 32 Ibidem, pp. 40, 47-48. 33 Ibidem, p. 113. 34 Ibidem, p. 118. 35 Ibidem, p. 47. 36 It was initially published in manuscript form. 37 Cf. Kurt W. Treptow (ed.), A History ofRomania, op. cit., p. 167. D m .t r i s Michalopoulos 215 practice limited. And of course one of those forces was the senate, i.e. the aristocracy, whose core was made up of descendants or -more often- alleged descendants of the ancient Roman nobility. The other was the higher clergy who, being brought up after the severrtlı-century Mosiem conquests under (practically) the sole authority of the Patriarch of Constantinople, had a continuously increasing rôle to play.

38 Emphasis on this rôle was placed by Photius I (820-891 ?) , a member of the Constantinopolitan aristocracy and a layman who, in 858, in merely ... three days ascended the Patriarchal throne. He was allegedly the fırst to declare himself to be an ecumenical Patriarch39 and, inevitably, thanks to his social connections, he openly 40 usurped an important slice of the Emperor's jurisdictions . The main points ofPhotius' policy, both ecclesiastical and secular, were the following two:

41 a) He entered into a bitter conflict with W estem Christendom •

42 b) He expressed doubts about the superhuman nature of Jesus Christ - the 43 latter's superhuman nature being clearly recognized in the Koran . The aim conjoined with the method (an absurdity, namely the filioque dispute, considered to be an important matter) clearly indicated that Photius, striving for ecumenical (=world) domination, was aided by non-Christian factors. Thus, it is now possible to piece together the parts of the Constantinopolitan Patriarchate puzzle.

V

44 It was in 1966 that a Greek historian, Dionysios Zak:ythinos , introduced a new 45 term into Greek: historiography: la grande breche (= the big gap ) ; and it was in the early 1990s that a disciple of Zak:ythinos, Telemachos Lounghis, revealed the real meaning of this "big gap": imperial censorship of the histarical texts - mainly in the

38 See BL J. Pheidas, "Photius the Great", in The Papyros-Larousse-Britannica Encyclopaedia (in Greek), vol. LX (Athens: Papyros, 1994), p. 281. 39 It seems that the first Patriarch to assume the title of "ecumenical" (bestowed on him by a local synod) was one in 587, i.e. after the re-conquest of the West by Justinian; nonetheless he and his successors as well declined to use this provocative title. (See Ecumenical Patriarchate, The 2004 Calendar [in Greek], p. 30.) Photius alone tried to establish as of right this absurdity - for obvious political reasons. 40 Telemachos Lounghis, The ideology of the Byzantine Historiography (in Greek), Athens: Herodotus, 1993, p. 95. 41 Karl Krumbacher, Geschichte der byzantinischen Literatur. Translated into Greek by G. Soteriadis, vol. I (Athens: Papyros, 1964), p. 103. 42 It was the famous dispute over thefilioque, an issue resolved as early as the fifth century. See Yves Congar, «Le Pere, source absolue de la divinite», Jstina (Paris), vol. XXV (1980), p. 239. This question was revived thanks to Photius. 43 Le Koran. Traduction nouvelle faite sur le texte arabe par M. Kasim.irski (Paris: Charpentier, 1865), m. 40-43; V. f55-156; XIX. 21-22. 44 Then professor ofByzantine History at the University of Athens and later a member of the Academy of Athens. 45 D. A. Zakythinos, «La grande breche dans la tradition historique de l'hellenisme du septieme au neuvieme siecle », Miscellanies offered to A. K. Orlandos, vol. m (Athens, 1966), p. 300ff. 216 İ s l a\m - T ü r k M e d e n i y e t i V e A V r u p a

ninth century; for the meaning of the famous term "ecumenicity':ı4 6 was currently in process of changing. As a matter of fact, instead of the unlimited ecumenicity claimed until that time by Byzantine Emperors (heirs of the Roman ones) as their legal domain, a limited ecumenicity prevailed as the main aim of Byzantine policy. In other words, Constantinople left Westem Europe in the hands of the Roman Papacy; and the Byzantine monarchy tried henceforth to affirm its domination in both Eastem Europe and the Middle East. The corollary was that Justinian' s sixth-century re-conquest of the 47 West either fell into oblivion or was systematically undervalued • Nonetheless, this conception, endorsed mainly by Emperors of the Macedonian and the Comneni dynasties, was by no means shared by the Constantinopolitan aristocracy, crystallized in the Senate and among the "higher clergy'', i.e. the Patriarchate. Suffıcient evidence is provided by the very term "ecumenical" used 1 ostentatiously by the Constantinopolitan Patriarchs after the 1204 seizure of the 48 Byzantine capital by the Franks . The corollaries are fırst that the Byzantine Emperor's 49 power was not absolute as has been believed ; and second that the aristocracy, jointly with the Church, constituted throughout the centuries an "occult govemment". In brief, the binomial "Patriarchate/Phanariots", which in modem times fearfully harassed both the Porte and the Greeks, is far older than is generally believed. The last point of interest is to know by wh om the Constantinopolitan Patriarchate was helped in its pursuit of ecumenical doruination - obviously a futile endeavour, given the continuous ravaging of Byzantine territories and, eventually, the 1453 capture of Constantinople by the Ottomans. One cannot provide a fully satisfactory answer so far. Nonetheless, some evidence may be found in the story of the Crusades in which world public opinion has recently taken a renewed interest. The Crusaders were invited by Byzantine Emperors to help them against the 50 Turks • Nonetheless, the Byzantine;Emperors found a strong argument intheir favour in something very strange that occurred in W estem Europe as early as the eleventh century: as far as sinners were concemed, the Roman Papacy suddenly substituted the pilgrimage to Jerusalem for public penitence; and so the number of Europeans 51 embarking on Palestinian adventures increased unbelievably . Be that as it may; the fact is that the Emperors of the Comneni House managed to have a kind of suzerainty over the various feudal states created in the Near East after the 52 First Crusade . In this very suzerainty may be fo und the key to the mystery of the

46 Ecumene

53 Knights Templar: haughty and arrogant bullies, greedy and hypocritical despots , they were never popular in Europe. Moreover, their very name, Templars, was an open insult to both Christendom and Islam; for Jesus Christ had prophesied that, as far as the 54 Jewish temple was concerfı.ed, thereshall not he left one stone upon another ; and this very prophecy of Jesus Christ paved the way for the co~struction of a major Moslem mosque on the very site on which had stood the Jewish temple. This construction was undertaken by the Caliph Umar I with the blessing and the instruction of the Greek Patriarch of Jerusalem, who had surrendered the city to the Moslems in 638.

VI The Order of the Poor Knights of Christ and the Temple of Solomon was created in 1118, i.e. nineteen years after the seizure of Jerusalem by the Crusaders. They built their quarters on the foundations of the Jewish temple; and from this the Order derived i ts name. The Templars nonetheless were neither poor nor knights of Christ; that is why the Order was eventually suppressed in 1312. Thus, given the thunderous siZence about their activities during the early days ofthe ir existence55 the point is, therefore, who gave them their initial help and support - in other words who advised the Frankish King of Jerusalem to allow them to establish themselves on the temple foundations, then a wing of the royal palace. There is only one reasonable explanation: the Patriarchate of Constantinople did - given that the ecclesiastical authorities in W estem Europe virtually ignored them. Should this hypothesis be proved correct, one might more easily understand the peculiar protection the Patriarchate of Constantinople was afforded throughout the centuries (as for instance at the Lausanne Conference in 1923). It was clear then that Eleutherios Veniselos, head of the Greek delegation, was by no means willing to allow that the Greek Patriarchate remain in İstanbul56 ; and he changed his mind only after a 57 drastic British intervention • Moreover it would henceforth be easier. to understand its policy - and politics. A law has been recently promulgated in Greece according to which no one is allowed to have access to another's personal data. That means that anybody may become anything he chooses: a criminal, an unbeliever may forward his candidacy for a vacant bishopric, a metropolitanate, an archbishopric. In other words, this insane law heraids the demise of Christian statehood in Greece. One might expect that the initiator of this law, would be the object ofPatriarchal opprobrium or wrath. On

53 See the -shock.ing- book The Holy Blood and the Holy Grail by Michael Baigent, Richard Leigh, and Henry Lincoln (London: Arrow Books, 1996), p. 59. 54 The Gospel according to Saint Luke, 21. 6. 55 M. Baigent, R. Leigh, and H. Lincoln, The Holy Blood... , ap. cit., p. 62. 56 Phaedon Bouboulidis (ed.), Eleutherios Veniselos and the political situation in Greece. Unknown and unpublish;d 1920-1922 and 1934-1936 documents (in Greek), Athens: Liberal Club-Eleutherios Yeniselos Museum, 2000, No 86, EL Yeniselos to Callinicus, metropolitan of Cyzicus, Lausanne, 2/15 December, 1922, pp. 163-164. 57 D. Mavropoulos, Pagesfrom the Patriarchate's History (in Greek), Athens, 1960, p. 193. It seems that the Serbs were then fervent advocates of the Patriarchate's staying at İstanbul. 218 İ s I ii \m - T ü r k M e d e n i y e t i v e A v r u p a the contrary! The man in question had an honorific title bestewed upon him by His Holiness the Patriarch Bartholomew and, furthermore, was elected to the ... vice­ chairmanship of the Patriarchal Dignitaries' Association (sic) in Greece58!

The -inescapable- corollary is now clear: the İstanbul Patriarchate serves the interests neither of Christendom nor of Greece, and not even those of Turkey. It serves its own ends (as the various Patriarchs are prone to conceive them); and it seems that it 59 seeks (insanely) a kind ofworldwide spiritual domination .

VII Nothing of the above should be overlooked. Although we Greeks insist on calling the İstanbul Patriarchate ecumenical,: we know very well it is neither ecumenical nor a Patriarchate; it is nothing but a minor bishopric which nonetheless may exercise a most pernicious infinence on the whole of the Near Eastem region because of the interests which it serves - in order to achieve its own purposes. The history of the Patriarchate's relationship with the Greek State isa typical one. During the nineteenth century opeı;ı hostility was the main feature of the climate 60 between Athens and the Phanar . Only in the early twentieth century, when there began in Macedonia the 'silent struggle' between the Greek and the Slav-Bulgarian bands, did Phanar and Athens coordinate their political activity. For if the former lost its spiritual demination over the Slavs, it would lose even that limited ecumenicity pursued by the Byzantine Emperors of the Macedonian and the Comneni dynasties; and the Athens govemment was forced to cooperate with the Phanar Patriarchate, because the recognition by the Macedonian peasants of the Phanar' s sp iritual supremacy would mean clearly: hellenization.

N onetheless, in order to have a global idea of the İstanbul Patriarchate issue, it is necessary to approach another - that of the Third Rome. Actually Moscow was raised to the Patriarchate after the 1453 capture of Constantinople. This event was the elimax of a long process: in fact, it was only in the sixteenth century that the metropolitan of Moscow became a Patriarch allegedly in succession to the Roman Pope, the Papacy having been 'suppressed' because of the Schism. Nonetheless, among the populace it was always clear that Moscow was the Third Rome: the first Rome, the 'real' one, eclipsed because of the Schism; the Second one, namely Constantinople, fell in 1453;

58 See the pamphlet written by Nicholas Polychronidis, Towards a new national divide? (in Greek), Athens:The Center for the Coordination of the Hellenes, 2001. 59 In Greece, there is no evidence for the veracity of the famous allegations of Mustafa Kemal about the 'Mavri Mira' - shortly after the end of WW I. (See Gasi Mustafa Kemal Pascha, Der Weg zur Freiheit, 1919-1920 [Leipzig: K. F. Koehler, 1928], p. 2.) Nonetheless, given the ambiguity of patriarchal policies, such activities cannot be excluded. 60 See for instance Dirnitris Michalopoulos, « Le sentiment favorable a I 'union avec la Grece des habitants de Thessalie pendant les annees 1878-1880 et la reaction des autorites ottomanes», Actes du symposium historique international « La demiere phase de la crise orientale et 1-'Hellenisme (1878-1880) », Volos :· 27-30 septembre 1981 (Athens, 1983), pp. 375-376. D mitris Michalopoulos 219 and the Third, i.e. Moscow, became the centre of the Orthodox Ecumene (if such an ecumene still exists). It is beyond any doubt that the ecumenicity of the İstanbul Greek Patriarchate relies on the sole fact that in the early fourth century the capital of the Roman Empire, then an ecumenical state, i.e. a "universal" one, was transferred from 61 Rome to Constantinople . Today what does this very Patriarchal ecumenicity mean? Nothing ... unless it be trumpeted for obvious political reasons.

61 Arına Comnena, The Alexiad (Papyros [Athens]), I. XIII.4. Nonetheless, till the tenth century the Pope of Rome was regarded by the Byzantine monarchy as the head of the international hierarchy - literally above the Emperor himself. (T. C. Lounghis, Les ambassades byzantines en Occident depuis lafondation des Etats barbaresjusqu'aux Craisades [Athens, 1980], p. 453.)