At the head of the National Assembly which, in Alba Iulia on 1 December 1918, decided upon the final act of the Great Union of all Romanians, were two senior Romanian hierarchs, Miron Cristea (Bishop of Caransebeș and future Patriarch of Romania) and Iuliu Hossu (Bishop of Gherla and future Cardinal), the latter even reading out the Resolution of Union before the assembled crowd. At that time, the future Patriarch said: ‘Just as you see us today, embracing one another as brothers, so may all Romanian brothers remain united for ever!’ To understand how this came about, a brief foray into the earlier history of the Romanians is required.
Before it came to denote a place of worship or a building, the term ‘church’ referred to community and communion in the name of faith. This is quite clearly evident from the original meaning of the word ‘ecclesia’, which in ancient Greek denoted an assembly—specifically, the assembly of the people. From the very beginning, the Christian Church identified itself with the world, with society, with the entire human community. Without accepting this truth, one can understand almost nothing of the ancient history of the Romanians throughout the ages.
History has witnessed periods that sought to be rational or rationalising, prioritising the fundamental role of humankind and the power of the human mind. At the heart of these periods lay ideologies known as humanist. Yet humanity has also experienced eras of a different nature, in which the spirit was placed above cold reason. One such era, difficult for later generations to understand, was the Middle Ages. The European Middle Ages began, developed and unfolded in all their breadth over a period of about a millennium, under the influence of Christianity and the Church.
It was only the intellectuals of the Renaissance (after the Middle Ages had ‘run its course’) who became convinced that the world was awakening after an insignificant period that had cast a shadow over the splendour of Antiquity, and that their role—as those who had been reborn or reawakened— was to emulate Antiquity. Between Antiquity and the Renaissance, they saw an undesirable interlude, which they did not even endeavour to give a proper name, referring to it as ‘transitional’ or ‘intermediate’. These late humanists regarded the period following the ancient world as a painful decline, worthy of being bracketed out, in comparison with the splendours of ancient culture and those of Renaissance humanism. This is also the source of the great prejudices surrounding this European millennium, dubbed the ‘Dark Ages’. How often do we hear, in everyday life, expressions such as ‘medieval barbarism’, ‘behaviour straight out of the Middle Ages!’, or ‘medieval darkness’? It all stems from the Renaissance and certain subsequent periods, whose proponents regarded medieval people as incapable of higher creativity, as gregarious, inferior, filthy or uneducated. In all these characterisations, the point of reference was the great works of the ancients, regarded as true benchmarks and models, worthy of continuation and imitation. Relatively late, from the era of early Romanticism (the late 18th century) onwards, scholars discovered the true nature of the Middle Ages, demonstrating the genius of the great creators of that time. It was demonstrated that medieval artists created works of a different kind from those of antiquity, not because they were uneducated or incapable of imitation, but because they had different sensibilities, different tastes and different ideals. The architecture of Byzantine, Romanesque or Gothic churches differs from that of ancient temples – as theorised by Vitruvius – because the needs, the requirements and the sensibilities were different. The sculptural details featuring animals, many of them fantastical, as well as fresco painting or Eastern icons on wood, are in no way inferior to ancient art; rather, they are something else entirely, reflecting a different world from that of the ancients. Moreover, the Middle Ages are full of innovations, remarkable inventions and surprising advances compared to what the ancient world produced: universities, scholasticism, rhythm-based music, the harness, the horseshoe, the stepladder, the poetry of the troubadours, and the greater prerogatives of subjects.
During the medieval millennium, the prevailing ideas were those of faith, hierarchy, obedience, authority, communion and privilege – very different from those of the modern era, which are based on liberty, equality, democracy, revolution, competition and rivalry. The world of that time had entirely different points of reference, far removed from the ideals of human rights and the power of the individual, from liberalism and individualism. Medieval people had a clear sense of group and community, and their lives were not based on individual rights, but on life within a group, governed by privileges. Even the term ‘law’, in the sense of Roman law, is anachronistic for medieval society. At that time, people did not need laws, but rather customs, traditions and practices, sometimes recorded in privileges. That world was one of autarchies, local communities and the authority of the lord. Each community was guided, organised and judged according to its own principles of law, which were, as a rule, customary, although many had their roots in Roman law, combined with the gentile-tribal traditions of the migrants. In the Middle Ages, kings (princes) were merely first among equals, being regarded as suzerains or supreme lords. In the Middle Ages, there was no absolute rule, nor was there absolute centralised power. Absoluteness was the exclusive preserve of God, regarded as the true ‘architect’ of ‘all things seen and unseen’. Relationships between people were based on unequal mutual obligations, whereby a weaker free individual placed themselves under the protection of a stronger free individual. The world had its own stable structure, and nothing could be conceived outside the realm of faith and the Church. Medieval man had an unwavering attachment to faith and to the Church, regarded as the very essence of the true world, inherited by all genuine believers who had passed through this earthly sojourn of ‘shadow and dream’. Medieval artists felt no need to immortalise their names, for the only artist with the supreme role of creator of all nature was God, and He alone was worthy of praise.
In this context, the Church of the medieval Romanians also served as a unifying force in society, preserving both the small communities and the larger community, which was the Romanian people. A single example speaks volumes. On 14 November 1234, Pope Gregory IX of Perugia addressed ‘King’ Bela (the future King Bela IV), son of Andrew II (1205–1235), King of Hungary, as follows: ‘As we have learnt, in the bishopric of the Cumans, there are certain peoples called Romanians who, although by name they are considered Christians, whilst embracing different rites and customs within a single faith, commit acts that are contrary to this name. For, disregarding the Roman Church, they receive all the sacraments not from our venerable brother..., the Bishop of the Cumans, who is the diocesan bishop of that region, but from certain false bishops who follow the Greek rite. And some, both Hungarians and Germans, together with other Orthodox believers from the Kingdom of Hungary, are going over to them to live there <with them, the Romanians> and thus, forming a single people with the aforementioned Romanians, disregarding him <the Latin bishop of the Cumans>, receive the aforementioned sacraments <from the bishops of the Greek rite>, to the great indignation of the Orthodox and to the grave deviation from the Christian faith”1 This ‘episcopate of the Cumans’ was situated, for the most part, in the regions outside the Carpathian arc and encompassed a vast area, stretching from the east of the Olt Valley, ran along the curve of the mountains and reached as far as the centre and north of what would become Moldavia. One corner of it also included the Bârsa region. In other words, this bishopric encompassed vast regions of the future principalities of Moldavia and Wallachia, plus the south-eastern corner of Transylvania.
Several important points emerge from this passage: 1. the bishopric known as ‘of the Cumans’ was in fact inhabited by Eastern-rite Romanians, who were politically and religiously organised; 2. these Romanians were led by their Byzantine (‘Greek’) bishops and refused to be governed or overseen by the Roman (Catholic) bishop; 3. subjects of the King of Hungary from Transylvania came to these extra-Carpathian Romanians (and those from Țara Bârsei), merged with them and adopted their faith and customs. Faced with such a troubling situation, the Pope called for decisive action. So that ‘no danger to souls’ might arise and so that the Romanians might have no reason, due to the failure to celebrate the sacraments according to their own rites, ‘to turn to schismatic bishops’, the bishop of the Cumans is ordered to appoint for the Romanians, in accordance with the rule of the ‘General Council’ (the Fourth Lateran Council of 1215), ‘a Catholic bishop suitable for that nation <the Romanians>, who shall be their vicar…’. Furthermore, ‘King’ Bela is commanded to keep the promise he made to the Apostolic Legate James (a bishop elected by Preneste) and to compel all those disobedient to the Catholic Church to submit to that Church; which meant that Bela had to compel the aforementioned Romanians to obey the Catholic bishop, to collect the customary revenues from them (the ecclesiastical tithe) intended for the bishop’s upkeep, and to no longer tolerate such ‘schismatics’ in his country, as he had promised.
What does all this show? The Catholic Church – backed by a powerful kingdom, as Hungary was at the time – was carrying out a ‘missionary’ (in fact, proselytising) campaign amongst the Romanians, who were regarded by Rome as ‘Christians’ (Catholics), but continued, to a large extent, to behave as ‘schismatics’. The campaign failed, as the Romanians continued to obey their own Byzantine (‘Greek’) bishops. What is surprising is not only this fact, but the observation that the proselytising campaign had the opposite effect: namely, that some Catholics from the kingdom were drawn to the Romanians—without any coercion—and united with them under the guidance of the Romanians’ bishops. The measures envisaged were the usual ones, namely the use of the secular (armed) arm – a euphemism for the state’s political and military authority – with a view to eradicating the ‘schism’. However, a more subtle initiative also emerges here, established at the General Council of 1215, following the fall of Constantinople to the Latins (1203–1204): the appointment of a ‘Greek’ rite vicar bishop for those Romanians, but one subject to Rome (a sort of united bishop, in other words). The General Council of 1215 (at the Lateran) had ruled that two Christian bishops could not reside in the same place, but a Latin prelate and a Byzantine hierarch acting as vicar were permitted to co-exist.
All this demonstrates the strength of the Eastern Church within the community, through the mediation of several bishops. This Church succeeded not only in uniting the Romanian populace, but also in attracting foreigners to the Eastern faith. Thus, the proselytising effort backfired on its initiators. However, this would not have been possible without a special bond between the Church (hierarchy) and the community it shepherded, which demonstrates, in the case of the Romanians, their unwavering attachment to the Church, their inability to conceive of the world without the Church, and their turning to the Church with all the conviction of which they were capable. And this was taking place around the year 1200, when the ignorant or the ill-wishers (some of them even historians) claim that we had no organisation, no states, nor any order.
The Romanians initially regarded the ecclesia (church) not as a form (a building), but as the very fabric of life, namely the gathering of the faithful. The place of worship, in its modesty – the small wooden churches – illustrates precisely this; it was not necessary for the whole village to fit inside the church building, but rather within the spirit of the church, that of communion with God. Furthermore, standing humbly before the Lord so that one’s prayer might be accepted was simply the natural order of things. Hierarchy, as a form of organisation and order in the world, has structured our lives and our Church, and the bishop or ‘vladica’ was both a religious and a secular/political leader. The state has always protected the Church, and the Church has supported the state, beginning with the ceremony of the anointing of rulers and ending with the legitimisation of the idea of sovereignty (autocracy). Church painting, beyond its aesthetic role, had a deeper, dogmatic and liturgical purpose, bringing the Holy Scriptures to life before the eyes of the faithful. From this perspective, Voroneț Monastery was, and remains, the true Sistine Chapel of the Romanians. Indeed, the anonymous master painters at Voroneț were working at the same time as Michelangelo and his pupils in Rome.
In Transylvania, the Romanian Church played an even more important role – a major social role, one of comfort and support – in a foreign state, which was fighting not only against ‘pagans and heretics’, but also against ‘schismatics’, that is, Eastern Christians. In the 14th century, the Angevin Kingdom of Hungary waged a veritable campaign – accompanied by ‘crusades’ – directed against ‘pagans, heretics and schismatics’, all of whom were placed on the same level. For this reason, the Romanian priest from Transylvania was a ‘healer’ of both souls and bodies. The Church thus came to be identified with ethnicity, with Romanian identity. Moreover, at least from the 16th century onwards, the term ‘Vlach’ (Romanian) was equivalent (in official circles) to ‘Orthodox’ (‘schismatic’) and vice versa, whilst ‘Christian’ was considered to mean only a Catholic and, somewhat later, a Protestant as well. Thus, Transylvania – referred to by some as the ‘land of tolerance’ – became the land of three nations (Hungarians, Saxons and Székelys) and four ‘religions’ (Calvinists, Lutherans, Uniates and Catholics). The Romanians and their Orthodox faith (roughly two-thirds of Transylvania’s entire population) were sidelined, regarded as second-class citizens, good only for labour, paying taxes and serving in the army, ‘tolerated’ only for as long ‘as the good pleasure of the princes and citizens should last’ (usque ad beneplacitum principum et regnicolarum). Provisions of this kind are reiterated in the ‘constitutions’ of Transylvania, approved in the 17th century and known as the Approbatae (1653) and Compilatae (1669) Constitutiones. Under these harsh conditions, it is no wonder that the Romanians remained destitute, uneducated, humble and rebellious. Their solace lay in the Church and its ministers. The priest’s comfort, the icon—through the power of representation and imagery—the candles, alms, the veneration of the dead, fasting and festivals—viewed by some foreigners as ‘heresies’ (especially during the era of the Protestant Reformation)—the village school, led by the priest-teacher who had become an ‘apostle of the people’, and labour, from ‘breaking ground’ to the harvest, all formed a veritable universe for Romanians. The health of the individual and the community, from birth and childhood through to old age, was watched over and safeguarded by the Church and with the Church. Under the strict rules that were established, as a result of which only those granted written privileges by the king could own land and only Catholics could be nobles, the Romanians (customary landowners and Orthodox Christians) were left without a recognised socio-political elite. Consequently, from the second half of the 14th century, the Romanians in Transylvania were no longer a constituent part of the state (they were no longer admitted to the collegial governance of the country). Their only leaders, both spiritual and secular, were the priests and monks.
Consequently, when the modern national emancipation movement began in Transylvania in the 18th century, the Romanians lacked a high-level political elite recognised by the state. The small number of Romanians who had retained their noble status could act only at the level of the villages where they led modest and precarious lives, lacking substantial material wealth. At that time, around the 1700s, almost 100 per cent of Romanians were peasant farmers and shepherds, of Eastern (Orthodox) faith, with a Church that was ‘tolerated’ (that is, permitted to function unofficially or semi-officially), under attack from Calvinism—the dominant faith in Transylvania at the time, as it was the faith of the majority of the Hungarian nobility. The trend towards the Calvinisation of the Romanian Church was so strong that many of the hierarchs, archpriests, priests and monks wondered how they would be able to keep the ‘flock’ united in accordance with the time-honoured tradition of the East. A section of the Romanian nobility – particularly those who had been pressured to convert (sometimes only formally) to Catholicism – as well as some Romanian villages under the authority of this noble class, had been all but severed from Orthodoxy through various deceptions, pressure and threats. And Calvinisation was undermining the very foundations of our customs, of the ‘Romanian law’, and of the specific organisation of our faith and the Church. Our customs were being declared ‘heresies’; icons, candles, periods of fasting, the veneration of the dead, festivals, the church calendar, hymns and carols were on the verge of being abolished, having been condemned as ‘non-canonical’, ‘backward’ and ‘shameful’. Yet, the separation of the Romanians from their established faith, their ecclesiastical customs, and the traditions handed down from their ancestors meant the destruction of their ethnic identity and their distinctiveness as a people. Against this discouraging and perilous backdrop, which had developed throughout the 17th century – when Transylvania was ruled almost exclusively by Hungarian Calvinist princes – the new Habsburg authorities put forward a proposal to draw the Transylvanian Romanians towards Catholicism. This move, however, was diplomatically conceived and carefully considered. It came against a backdrop of pressure to adopt Calvinism and promised two extremely important things: the preservation of the Eastern (Byzantine) character of the Romanians’ faith, on the one hand, and, on the other, the elevation of the Romanians to the status of a recognised nation in Transylvania, alongside the established nations of the Hungarians, Saxons and Székelys. In other words, the Transylvanian Romanians had, for the first time in history, the prospect of becoming the equals of the other ethnic and religious groups in their country. Through this religious union – as it was called – the Romanians retained their Byzantine rite, calendar, festivals and all the customs previously threatened by the Calvinists, whilst agreeing to recognise only four elements that would bring them closer to Catholicism. Of all these elements (‘points’), the most important was the acceptance of the supreme authority of the Pope in Rome. The new church – in fact, a hybrid – was called ‘Greek Catholic’, that is, Orthodox-Catholic, because, in this phrase, the term ‘Greek’ has a confessional rather than an ethnic meaning. For six decades (1700–1761), the Romanians of Transylvania had no other religious hierarchy than that of the Romanian Church United with Rome (Greek Catholic), although it is well known that the success of the religious union was only partial. The failure of the union has a fairly simple explanation: the House of Austria, thwarted in its actions by the traditionally recognised nations of Transylvania and their denominations (especially the Calvinist Hungarians) and by the resistance of the Romanians in certain regions, failed to fulfil its promises; that is to say, it was unable to raise the Romanians to a position of equality with the other groups mentioned in Transylvania. Consequently, the resistance of the Orthodox Church bore fruit, and in 1761 the authorities agreed to the restoration of the Orthodox hierarchy, though not to the rank of a metropolitan see (as it had previously been), but only to that of a diocese. Its seat was supposed to be in Șcheii Brașovului, but was ultimately established in Rășinari and then in Sibiu. Thus, from 1761 onwards, the Transylvanian Romanians had two national churches, which guided them in their struggle for emancipation. Indeed, even before the restoration of the Orthodox hierarchy, this path towards national unity transcending confessional differences was already taking shape, since Bishop Ioan Inochentie Micu threatened, in 1744, to break the union and return to Orthodoxy, convening a synod to which representatives of all Romanians, both united and ununited, were to attend. A genuine pan-Romanian common forum was taking shape, which the authorities could not tolerate. The Supplex movement, also initiated by Inochentie, was continued by the Transylvanian Romanians until 1848 and even beyond, with only the names of the petitions being changed. The most important petition – the Supplex Libellus Valachorum of 1791 – was signed by both bishops of the Romanians, namely Ioan Bob (Greek Catholic) and Gherasim Adamovici (Orthodox). During the Revolution of 1848–1849, the co-presidents of the Blaj Assembly (3–5/15–17 May) were the Romanian hierarchs of the same churches: Andrei Șaguna (Orthodox) and Ioan Lemeni (Greek Catholic). Quite rightly, in the poem composed at that time by Andrei Mureșanu (“An Echo”), one line expresses this reality of the clergy leading the crowds: “Priests with the cross in their hands, for the army is Christian”. The Church united the intelligentsia (the elite) with the common people (the populace) into a single stream. The same happened during the Memorandum (1892–1894), and in Alba Iulia, at the Great National Assembly of 1 December 1918, Miron Cristea and Iuliu Hossu were at the forefront; the former was to become the first Romanian patriarch, and the latter the first Romanian cardinal in history.
We are therefore stating an obvious truth when we say that the voice of the Church has resounded and continues to resound amongst us in the City, that is, on the soil of Romania. As has been seen, the Church has led the Romanians through all the major moments of the struggle for national emancipation and the building of the Romanian nation-state, from the Supplex Libellus Valachorum (18th century), through 1848–1849 and the Memorandum (1892–1894), right up to the Great National Assembly at Alba Iulia on 1 December 1918. Reflecting now on Romanian unity throughout history, we cannot understand it without the contribution of faith and the Church. That is why, more than a century after the Great Union, it is fitting that we pay tribute to the Church – that is, to our world, to the universe of our faith, and to the martyrs, fighters and confessors. The Church, beginning with the Word of God spread through the Latin language, lies at the foundation of the Romanian people, the nation and the national state known as Romania.
Bibliography
Cassirer, Ernst, The Philosophy of the Enlightenment, Princeton, 1992;
Duțu, Alexandru, Aspects of Romanian Culture in the 18th Century (1700–1821). Studies and Texts, Bucharest, 1968;
Georgescu, Vlad, Political Ideas and the Enlightenment in the Romanian Principalities (1750–1831), Bucharest, 1972;
Hazard, Paul, European Thought in the 18th Century. From Montesquieu to Lessing, translated into Romanian by Viorel Grecu, Bucharest, 1981;
Lungu, Ion, The Transylvanian School. An Ideological and National Enlightenment Movement, Bucharest, 1978;
Mârza, Iacob, School and Nation (The Schools of Blaj in the Age of National Revival), Cluj-Napoca, 1987;
Outram, Dorinda, The Enlightenment, Cambridge, 1995;
Păcurariu, Mircea, History of the Romanian Church in Transylvania, Banat, Crișana and Maramureș, Cluj-Napoca, 1992;
Pâclișanu, Zenovie, History of the Romanian United Church, edited by I. Timbuș, Târgu-Lăpuș, 2006;
Pop, Ioan-Aurel, ‘From the Hands of the Schismatic Wallachians…’. The Romanians and Power in the Medieval Kingdom of Hungary (13th–16th Centuries), 2nd edition, revised, expanded and illustrated, Cluj-Napoca, 2017;
Pop, Ioan-Aurel, Bolovan, Ioan, The History of Transylvania, 2nd edition, revised and expanded, Cluj-Napoca, 2016;
Prodan, D., Supplex Libellus Valachorum: From the History of the Formation of the Romanian Nation, new edition, with additions and clarifications, Bucharest, 1984;
Teodor, Pompiliu, The Evolution of Romanian Historical Thought, Cluj, 1970;
Teodor, Pompiliu, European Enlightenment Influences, Cluj-Napoca, 1984;
Teodor, Pompiliu, Under the Sign of the Enlightenment: Samuil Micu, Cluj-Napoca, 2000;
Sigmirean, Cornel, Corina Teodor (eds.), Petru Maior and the Central European Enlightenment, Târgu-Mureș, 2011;
Turczynski, Emanuel, From the Enlightenment to Early Liberalism. Political Voices and Their Demands in the Romanian Context, translated by Irina Cristescu, Bucharest, 2000.
- 1
Documenta Romaniae Historica, Series D. ‘Relations between the Romanian Principalities’, Vol. I (1222–1456), Bucharest, 1977, pp. 20–21.