I 70. THE PATRIARCH AND THE POPE. 313
of the ablest representatives of the rival churches, came into collision. Photius is one of the greatest of patriarchs, as Nicolas is one of the greatest of popes. The former was super ior in learning, the latter in statesmanship ; while in moral inte grity, official pride and obstinacy both were fairly matched, except that the papal ambition towered above the patriarchal dignity. Photius would tolerate no superior, Nicolas no equal; the one stood on the Council of Chalcedou, the other on Pseudo-Isidor.
The contest between them was at first personal. The deposi tion of Ignatius as patriarch of Constantinople, for rebuking the immorality of Caesar Bardas, and the election of Photius, then a mere layman, in his place (858), were arbitrary and uncauonical acts which created a temporary schism in the East, and prepared the way for a permanent schism between the East and the West. Nicolas, being appealed to as mediator by both parties (first by Photius), assumed the haughty air of supreme judge on the basis of the Pseudo-Isidorian Decretals, but was at first deceived by his own legates. The controversy was complicated by the Bulgarian quarrel. King Bogoris had been converted to Christianity by missionaries from Constantinople (861), but soon after applied to Rome for teachers, and the pope eagerly seized this opportunity to extend his jurisdiction (866).
Nicolas, in a Roman Synod (863), decided in favor of the innocent Ignatius, and pronounced sentence of deposition against Photius with a threat of excommunication in case of disobe dience.1 Photius, enraged by this conduct and the Bulgarian
1 The Synod, claiming to be the infallible organ of the Holy Spirit, com pared Photius with a robber and adulterer for obtruding himself into the see of Constantinople during the lifetime of Ignatius, deprived him of all priestly honors and functions " by authority of Almighty God, St. Peter and St. Paul, the princes of the apostles, of all saints, of the six [why not seven ?] oecumenical councils, as also by the judgment of the Holy Ghost," and threatened him and all his adherents with the anathema and excommunication from the eucharist till the moment of death, "that no one may dare hereafter from the state of the laity to break into the camp of the Lord, as has often been the case in the church of Constantinople." See on this Synod Hergenrother, Phot. I. 519 sqq., and Hefele IV. 269 sqq.
314 FOURTH PERIOD. A. D. 590-1049.
interference, held a counter-synod, and deposed in turn the successor of St. Peter (867). In his famous Encyclical Letter of invitation to the Eastern patriarchs, he charged the whole "Western church with heresy and schism for interfering with the jurisdiction over the Bulgarians, for fasting on Saturday, for abridging the time of Lent by a week, for taking milkfood (milk, cheese, and butter) during the quadragesimal fast, for enforcing clerical celibacy, and despising priests who lived in virtuous matrimony, and, most of all, for corrupting the Nicene Creed by the insertion of the Filioque, and thereby introducing two principles into the Holy Trinity.1
This letter clearly indicates all the doctrinal and ritual differences which caused and perpetuated the schism to this day. The subsequent history is only a renewal of the same charges aggravated by the misfortunes of the Greek church, and the arrogance and intolerance of old Rome.
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Photius fell with the murder of his imperial patron, Michael III. (Sept. 23, 867). He was imprisoned in a convent, and deprived of society, even of books. He bore his misfortune with great dignity, and nearly all the Greek bishops remained faithful to him. Ignatius was restored after ten years of exile by the emperor Basil, the Macedonian (867-886), and entered into communication with Pope Hadrian II. (Dec. 867). He convened a general council in the church of St. Sophia (October, 869), which is numbered by the Latins as the Eighth (Ecumeni cal Council. The pontifical legates presided and presented a formula of union which every bishop was required to sign before taking part in the proceedings, and which contained an anathema against all heresies, and against Photius and his adherents. But the council was poorly attended (the number of bishops being at first only eighteen). Photius was forced to appear in the fifth session (Oct. 20), but on being questioned
1 See the Encyclica ad Patriarchas Orientales in the original Greek in Photius, Opera II. 722-742 (ed. Migne), also in Gieseler II. 216 sq. Baronius (ad ann. 863 no. 34 sq.) gives it in Latin.