COUNCILS

COUNCILS. In contemporary Orthodox use synodos, a synod or council, might indicate either the regular assembly of the bishops of a local church, for example, the “Holy Synod” of Greece or Serbia, as that community’s highest governing authority, or it might signify those extraordinary gatherings of bishops that, from time to time in the Church’s history, have been convoked to reply to theological questions. The pattern of the council, in both forms, as the highest authority (q.v.) is typically seen as having been established in Acts 15. James, who presides over the assembly of the Church in St. Luke’s account, pronounces the verdict of the whole with the formula: “It has seemed good to the Holy Spirit (q.v.) and to us. . . .” In this phrase the Orthodox Church sees an affirmation and a denial. On the one hand, the guidance of the Spirit will never leave the Church; and, on the other hand, no one person or office can without fail faithfully represent the Church’s mind. This mind is instead preserved and maintained by the whole body of the Church, of which the council is normally-though not inevitably-the highest expression.

Orthodox ecclesiology (q.v.) has in recent years held that this conciliar idea is rooted in the notion of “catholicity” (q.v.) itself and, more particularly, that the conciliar idea and catholicity discover their meaning and justification in the Eucharist (q.v.). As the Eucharist, through the Holy Spirit, makes present the body of Christ in whom all division is overcome and broken humanity remade, so it too provides the model for the council as the assembly of Christians gathered in one mind for a common purpose. One finds in consequence that councils have punctuated the Church’s history from the earliest times. Eusebius (q.v.) tells of several councils in the 2nd c., and there is direct evidence of various African councils held at Carthage and Antioch (q.v.) in the 3rd c. One must add to these the Seven Ecumenical Councils, the Reunion Councils, the three councils held at Constantinople to decide on the teaching of Gregory Palamas (qq.v.), and the Council of Jassy in the 17th c.-which condemned the teachings of Cyril Lukaris and published a confession of faith. All, save the Reunion Councils, were accorded an authority seen as applying to the universal Church.