Journal of Eastern Christian Studies 69(1-4), 307-321. doi: 10.2143/JECS.69.1.3214961 © 2017 by Journal of Eastern Christian Studies. All rights reserved. CONTEXTUALITY AND HOLY CANONS WIThIN ThE ChURch GRIgORIOS D. PApATHOMAS * PRELIMINARY REMARKS The question “Can Orthodox Theology be Contextual?” is directly linked to the incarnation of Christ. In order to describe more clearly some param- eters and aspects of the question regarding the relevance of the holy canons today, we distinguish two features: the truth and contextuality, or, to put it better, the revealed and eschatological truth on one hand, and historical contextuality on the other. The dialectical relationship between them is manifested through three aspects: a) the texts (liturgical, biblical, patristic, synodical, and canonical), b) the event-icon (icons, and the Church itself as icon), and c) the particular ecclesial realities. In the following lines, I shall comment on the issue of contextuality from an ‘iconic’ perspective. Then, I will examine the case of canon 39 of the Quinisext Ecumenical Council as an example of historical contextuality. In a final stage, a number of conclu- sions are drawn. STATUS QUAESTIONIS: A KEY EXAMpLE FROM THE EVENT-ICON The icon of the resurrection carries within itself its main feature – namely, its eschatological dimension. It also involves historical elements, the so-called contextual elements, which are directly related to the epoch during which this icon was originally created. In this sense, this icon could be the arche- type of a dialectical relationship between historical contextuality and the eschatological truth. Here, Christ stands on two ruptured and detached doors, which have hermetically separated the created from the uncreated for * State University of Athens. 308 GRIgORIOS D. PApATHOMAS many centuries in history – from the time of man’s fall (Gen 3) to the resur- rection of Christ (Matt 28; Mark 16; Luke 24; John 20-21; Acts 1) – and have precluded any possibility of communication between them. Therefore, the icon of the resurrection involves two components: a) the event-resurrection, which is the essence of what we look at within the icon, and b) the doors, which are elements of the falling historical world and represent in a relative, contextual and broadly elliptical manner the ontological truth associated with the event-resurrection. ARE THE CHURCH CANONS CONTEXTUAL? By mentioning the example of the icon of the resurrection, we can observe that, within the Church’s becoming, there are many cases characterized by this duality: a) the truth or core of truth, and b) the historical contextuality reflected in the vector of the core of truth, while the vector also remains contextual. These two coexist ipso jure, and any attempt to strip the one from the other would call into question the event-incarnation of Christ and gener- ate various forms of Manichaeism and Monophysitism. What holds true for a number of other cases in the Church’s becoming throughout the centuries is also true mutatis mutandis of the canonical tradition of the Church, and of the holy canons in particular, since what has been briefly described thus far with respect to the event of the resurrection represents the conditions for the correct reading of the ecclesial canons too. If there is a branch of theology most directly affected by the question of contextuality, it will certainly be the branch that includes the ecclesial canons and the canonical tradition of the Church. This is why the question of the diachronicity of the holy canons is essential. Do the canons ultimately have the power of diachronicity? If the answer is, as expected, in the affirmative, a second major question arises: is the diachronicity of the holy canons not affected by the context inherent to them? It is crucial for our subject to look thoroughly into these twin questions. 1) If it is commonly accepted and sufficiently visible that the content of the holy canons is eschatological and soteriological, and therefore ontologi- cal, it is time to note that the holy canons have told everything, everything CONTEXTUALITY ANd HOLY CANONS WITHIN THE CHURCH 309 within the perspective of diachronicity and about their future diachronicity. However, this is not to say that we cannot promulgate new canons if this proves to be necessary in the future. Additionally, this does not imply that the canons do not contain historical contextual elements, which are clearly relativized by the passing of time, occupying certainly a secondary position, which, however, does not affect the ultimate content of their truth. 2) When it comes to the question of whether or not the diachronicity of the holy canons is refuted by changing historical contextuality, one may say that this issue is related to the question of the priority of truth. Here, we have at least two visible difficulties: a) we sometimes fail to see diachronicity in our modern age because things have radically changed since the promulga- tion of the canons, so that they seem outdated both in wording and in how they approach issues, and b) we focus on the contextual aspect of the canons, actually a surface phenomenon, and miss the deeper meaning of their diachronicity. Let me try to illustrate this by using an example. It is known in the life of the countryside that there is a major difference between how a dog looks and how a cat looks when they look at the same reality. When we try to show a given direction to a dog by extending our index finger, the dog immediately moves and runs in the direction indicated even if it does not at first see anything at the indicated point. Thus, the indication and the orien- tation prevail and are prioritized over any other subjective perception. Yet if we attempt to make the same suggestion to a cat using the same sign, it shows no interest in the point indicated, peers instead at the index finger, and exhausts its attention only on that. Hence, the dog’s behavior symbolizes an ability to see beyond the sensible things while the cat’s look focuses on visible things without being able to see beyond them. The first way of seeing things displays the dialectical relationship between the signifier (sensible) and the signified (noetic), while the second cannot contemplate the signified (noetic) reality and looks only at the signifying (sensible) reality, losing essen- tially the core of truth. In this simple example, both animals have in front of them the same reality, but they choose to confront it differently. Conse- quently, it is extremely difficult to penetrate behind the historical context and see the overall dimension of the truth. 310 GRIgORIOS D. PApATHOMAS A CONTEXTUAL CANONICAL EXAMpLE: THE AUTOCEpHALOUS CHURCH OF CYpRUS (CANON 39/QUINISEXT-691)1 In 688, the Εastern part of the Roman Empire was again at war with the Arabs. At the outbreak of hostilities, the emperor Justinian II Rhinotmetes (685-694, 705-711) realized that he could not protect Cyprus and its Greek Christian population from Arab vengeance and, in 690/691, decided to transfer – manu militari – the Cypriot inhabitants temporarily to the prov- ince of the Hellespont.2 At his command, archbishop John of Cyprus, along with a number of bishops and the majority of the population, left the island en masse to settle on the Asiatic side of the Hellespont (at the little maritime town of Artaki), founding by this act a new city called Nea Justinianopolis (Nova Justiniana). But this forced emigration proved merely temporary; as a debellatio, it was to last only about a decade.3 Nevertheless, it fell to the Quinisext Ecumenical Council, which was held in Constantinople in autumn 691,4 to examine the new arrangements for ecclesiastical affairs in this province. The event created an incentive for determining the autocephalous status of the Church of Cyprus and constituted a supplementary stage in its formation. This stage conferred a canonical right in a confirmative sense. It confirmed 1 Grigorios D. Papathomas, L’Église autocéphale de Chypre dans l’Europe unie: Approche nomocanonique, Bibliothèque nomocanonique, 2 (Thessalonique-Katérini, 1998), pp. 81-94. 2 See Theophanis, Chronographia, in PG 108:741-742AB; G. Cedrenus, Compendium Historiarum, in PG 121:843-844C. See also Phoibos Georgiou, Informations historiques concernant l’Église de Chypre (Athens, 1975), pp. 29-37 (et Paulus Diaconus, lib. XIX); Benedict Egglezakis, Cyprus: New Justinianopolis (Nicosia, 1990), pp. 7-11; Andreas Ioannou Dikigoropoulos, ‘The Church of Cyprus during the period of the Arab Wars, A. D 649-965’, Greek Orthodox Theological Review, 11 (1965-1966), pp. 237-279. 3 See Jules Pargoire, L’Église byzantine de 527 à 847, 2nd ed. (Paris, 1905), pp. 156-157; John Hackett, Charilaos I. Papaïoannou, History of the Orthodox Church of Cyprus (Athens, 1923), pp. 56ff. The Church of Cyprus, Statuary Charter of the Very Holy Church of Cyprus of 1980 (Nicosia, 1980), article 32. 4 See Pavlos Menevisoglou, Ἱστορικὴ εἰσαγωγὴ εἰς τοὺς κανόνας τῆς Ὀρθοδόξου Ἐκκλησίας (Stockholm, 1991), pp. 289-290; Vitalien Laurent, ‘L’œuvre canonique du concile in Trullo (691/692): source primaire du droit de l’Église orientale’, Revue des Études Byzantines, 23 (1965), pp. 7-41, here 9-13, 20-21; Charilaos Jean Papaioannou, ‘The Autocephaly of the Church of Cyprus’, Orthodoxia, 23 (1948), pp. 69-73 and 134- 142, here 139-141. CONTEXTUALITY ANd HOLY CANONS WITHIN THE CHURCH 311 both the formation of the apostolic Church of Cyprus (first century) and the constitution of its conciliar autocephaly