The Sacraments in the Orthodox Church

Byzantine theology ignores the Western distinction between "sacraments" and "sacramentals," and never formally committed itself to any strict limitation of the number of sacraments. In the patristic period there was no technical term to designate "sacraments" as a specific category of church acts: the term mysterion was used primarily in the wider and general sense of "mystery of salvation," and only in a subsidiary manner to designate the particular actions which bestow salvation. In this second sense, it was used concurrently with such terms as "rites" or "sanctifica-tions." Theodore the Studite in the ninth century gives a list of six sacraments: the holy "illumination" (baptism), the "synaxis" (Eucharist), the holy chrism, ordination, monastic tonsure, and the service of burial.* The doctrine of the "seven sacraments" appears for the first time - very characteristically - in the Profession of Faith required from Emperor Michael Paleologus by Pope Clement iv in 1267. The Profession had been prepared, of course, by Latin theologians.

The obviously Western origin of this strict numbering of the sacraments did not prevent it from being widely accepted among Eastern Christians after the thirteenth century, even among those who fiercely rejected union with Rome. It seems that this acceptance resulted not so much from the influence of Latin theology as from the peculiarly medieval and Byzantine fascination with symbolic numbers: the number seven, in particular, evoked an association with the seven gifts of the Spirit in Isaiah 11:2-4. But among Byzantine authors who accept the "seven sacraments," we find different competing lists. The monk Job (thirteenth century), author of a dissertation on the sacraments, includes monastic tonsure in the list, as  did Theodore the Studite, but combines as one sacrament penance and the anointing of the sick. Symeon of Thessalonica (fifteenth century) also admits the sacramental character of the monastic tonsure, but classifies it together with penance, considering the anointing as a separate sacrament. Meanwhile, Joasaph, Metropolitan of Ephesus, a contemporary of Symeon's, declares: "I believe that the sacraments of the Church are not seven, but more," and he gives a list of ten, which includes the consecration of a church, the funeral service, and the monastic tonsure.

Obviously, the Byzantine Church never committed itself formally to any specific list; many authors accept the standard series of seven sacraments - baptism, confirmation, Eucharist, holy orders, matrimony, penance, and the anointing of the sick - while others give a longer list, and still others emphasize the exclusive and prominent importance of baptism and the Eucharist, the basic Christian initiation into "new life." Thus, Gregory Palamas proclaims that "in these two [sacraments], our whole salvation is rooted, since the entire economy of the God-man is recapitulated in them." And Nicholas Cabasilas composes his famous book on The Life in Christ as a commentary on baptism, chrismation, and the Eucharist.

BAPTISM AND CHRISMATION

In the Eastern Church, baptism and confirmation (the latter being effected through anointment with "holy chrism" blessed by the bishop) are normally celebrated together. Immediately after receiving baptism and confirmation, the child is admitted to Eucharistic communion. There is, therefore, no practical difference between admitting a child or an adult to membership in the Church; in both cases, a human being who belonged to the "old Adam" through his natural birth is introduced to "new life" by partaking of baptism, chrismation, and holy communion. Christian initiation is one single and indivisible act: "If one does not receive the chrism one is not perfectly baptized," writes Symeon of Thessalonica.

As we have seen, the patristic doctrine of salvation is based, not on the idea of guilt inherited from Adam and from which man is relieved in Christ, but on a more existential understanding of both "fallen" and "redeemed" humanity. From the "old Adam," through his natural birth, man inherits a defective form of life—bound by mortality, inevitably sinful, lacking fundamental freedom from the "prince of this world." The alternative to this "fallen" state is "life in Christ," which is true and "natural" human life, the gift of God bestowed in the mystery of the Church. "Baptism," writes Nicholas Cabasilas, "is nothing else but to be born according to Christ and to receive our very being and nature."

The Byzantine tradition has retained the ancient Christian practice of baptism through triple immersion. Actually, immersion was sometimes considered essential to the validity of the sacrament, and some extreme anti-Latin polemicists questioned the effectiveness of Western baptism on the grounds that it was performed by sprinkling. Immersion is indeed the very sign of what baptism means: "The water destroys the one life, but shows forth the other; it drowns the old man and raises the new," writes Cabasilas. "Drowning" cannot be meaningfully signified other than through immersion.

PENANCE

Sacramental penance - i.e., reconciliation to the Church after sins committed after baptism - has had a parallel development in East and West. Originally a public act, required from sinners who either had been olli cially excommunicated or had performed acts liable to excommunication, penance, gradually and especially after the fourth century, took the form of private confession, followed by a prayer of absolution pronounced by a priest. It then identified itself almost completely with the practice of private spiritual direction, especially widespread in monastic communities.

The development of penitential practice and theology in the Byzantine world was distinct from its Western counterpart in that it never knew the influence of legalistic interpretations of salvation, such as the Anselmian doctrine of "satisfaction," and never faced a crisis comparable to the West ern Reformation and Counter-Reformation, with the latter's stress on clerical authority.

Patristic and Byzantine literature on repentance is almost entirely av cetical and moral. Very few authors of ascetical treatises on repentance specifically mention sacramental absolution as a formal requirement. This silence does not imply that sacramental repentance did not exist; except in cases of formal excommunication, which had to be followed by an equally formal reconciliation, it was only encouraged, but not required. In his innumerable calls to repentance, Chrysostom frequently mentions "confession," i.e., an opening of one's conscience before a witness or "the Church"; but regular sacramental confession does not seem to be meant. In his nine sermons specifically dealing widi "repentance," only once does he refer to the Church as a direct recourse: "Did you commit sin? Enter the Churrli and repent for your sin. . . . You are an old man, and still you com in it sin? Enter [the Church], repent; for here is the physician, not the judge; here one is not investigated, one receives remission of sins."

MARRIAGE

The Byzantine theological, liturgical, and canonical tradition unanimously stresses the absolute uniqueness of Christian marriage, and bases this emphasis upon the teaching of Ephesians 5. As a sacrament, or mysterion, marriage reflects the union between Christ and the Church, between Yahweh and Israel, and as such can be only one—an eternal bond, which death itself does not destroy. In its sacramental nature, marriage transfigures and transcends both fleshly union and contractual legal association: human love is being projected into the eternal Kingdom of God.

Only this basic understanding of Christian marriage can explain the fact that until the tenth century no second marriage, whether of those widowed or of those divorced, was blessed in church. Referring to the custom of "crowning" the bridal pair - a feature of the Byzantine rite of marriage - a canon attributed to Nicephorus the Confessor (806-815) specifies: "Those who enter a second marriage are not crowned and are not admitted to receive the most pure mysteries for two years; those who enter a third marriage are excommunicated for five years." This text, which merely repeats the earlier prescriptions of the canons of Basil, presupposes that second and third marriages of those widowed or divorced can be concluded as civil contracts only. Actually, since the marriage blessing was normally given at a Eucharist, where the bridal pair received communion, the required temporary excommunication excluded the Church's participation or blessing in cases when marriage was repeated.

Absolute uniqueness, as the norm of Christian marriage, is also affirmed in the fact that in Byzantine canon law it is strictly required from clergy; a man who was married twice, or was married to a widow or a divorcee, is not eligible for- ordination to the diaconate or to the priesthood.28 But laymen, after a period of penitence and abstention from the sacraments, are re-admitted to full communion with the Church, even after a second or third marriage; understanding and toleration is extended to them, when they cannot agree to remaining single, or would like to have a second chance to build up a true Christian marriage. Obviously, Byzantine tradition approaches the problem of remarriage—after widowhood or divorce —in terms of penitential discipline. Marriage, as a sacrament, implies the bestowing of God's grace; but this grace, to be effective, requires human cooperation ("synergy"). This is true of all the sacraments, but particularly of baptism, whose fruits can be dispersed through sin and then restored through repentance. In the case of marriage, which presupposes personal understanding and psychological adjustment, Byzantine tradition accepts the possibility of an initial mistake, as well as the fact that single life, in cases of death or the simple absence of the partner, is a greater evil than remarriage for those who cannot "bear" it. The possibility of divorce remained an integral part of Byzantine civil legislation at all times. In the framework of the "symphony" between Church and state, it was never challenged, a fact which cannot be explained simply by reference to caesaropapism.

HEALING AND DEATH

Frequently associated with penance as a single sacrament, die office of "holy unction" did not evolve - except in some areas of the Christian East after die sixteenth century - into "extreme unction," a sacrament reserved for the dying. In Byzantium it involved the concelebration of several priests, usually seven, in accordance with James 5:14, a text considered to be the scriptural foundation of the sacrament. It was composed of scriptural readings and prayers of healing, the texts of which definitely exclude the possibility of giving a magic interpretation to the rite; healing is requested only in a framework of repentance and spiritual salvation, and not as an end in itself. Whatever the outcome of the disease, the anointing symbolized divine pardon and liberation from the vicious cycle of sin, suffering, and death, in which fallen humanity is held captive. Compassionate to human suffering, assembled together to pray for its suffering member, the Church through its presbyters asks for relief, forgiveness, and eternal freedom. This is the meaning of holy unction.

The funeral service, also considered a "sacrament" by some Byzantine authors, has no different significance. Even in death the Christian remains a member of the living and resurrected Body of Christ, into which he has been incorporated dirough baptism and the Eucharist. Through the funeral service, the Church gathers to bear witness to this fact, visible only to the eyes of faith, but already experienced by every Christian who possesses the awesome privilege of living, by anticipation, in the future Kingdom.

From: Byzantine Theology by John Meyendorff, Fordham University Press, New York, NY, 1979