The relics of St. Nicephoros, Patriarch of Constantinople, were translated on this day in 846. I often say that the Orthodox Church operates through a system of checks and balances represented by monks (who want to follow Tradition in its exactness – akribeia) and bishops (who have to make adjustments required by circumstances – oikonomia). However, reality, as life itself, is more complex and only allows this dichotomy to be used as a generalization. The life of St. Patriarch Nicephoros illustrates the last point. In 802, General Logothete Nicephoros (Minister of Finances) led a successful conspiracy against Empress Irene and became an emperor. St. Patriarch Tarasios supported St. Irene, and when he passed away in 806, Nicephoros selected not a monk but a learned layman, a bureaucrat (imperial secretary), the head of a shelter for the needy, and a namesake. Patriarch Nicephoros found himself entangled in an ecclesiastical conflict, which he inherited from the previous rule. Empress Theodore and her son Constantine VI bitterly competed with each other for control over the empire. In 788, Irene married 17-year-old Constantine to Maria of Amnia (a granddaughter of St. Philaret the Almsgiver). Two years later, Constantine deposed Irene, and in 795, he married his “sweetheart” Theodote, sending Maria to a convent under the false pretext. To make this marriage legitimate, Patriarch Tarasios blessed Joseph, the Abbot of Kathara monastery in the capital, to perform the ceremony. Although Theodote was a relative of St. Theodore, the Abbot of Stoudion Monastery, he and his uncle Abbot Plato opposed this act. They stopped participating in services with Patriarch Tarasios. When Irene toppled Constantine in 797, she removed Abbot Joseph from public view. Now, “under new management” of Emperor Nicephoros, Joseph was restored to his priestly dignity. To defend the right of bishops to make independent decisions Patriarch Nicephoros assembled the Council in 809, which defended oikonomia in Abbot Joseph’s case applied by Patriarchs Tarasios and Nicephoros. St. Theodore Studite believed that all Christians had to defend holy canons. The monastery in Stoudion was named after St. John the Forerunner and his renunciation of Herod, who had illegitimate cohabitation with the wife of his brother Philip, served for St. Theodore as a canon. Exposing the first imperial divorce in Byzantine history the Stoudites called the 809 Council – the council of adulterous (moikhosynodos). In 811, Emperor Nicephoros died fighting Bulgarians. The new emperor, Michael Rhangave, deposed Joseph, and Patriarch Nicephoros apologized before the Stoudites. Two years later, Strategus Leo (the supreme military and administrative office of the Anatolikon theme) took over the throne from Michael and restored iconoclasm. Now is my initial point: oikonomists can become akribeists. St. Patriarch Nicephoros refused to comply with this imperial course and, through the defense of Orthodoxy, happened to be “on the same page” with the Stoudite monks. In 815 St. Nicephoros abdicated. He died in 828. St. Theodore died two years earlier. In 843, Empress St. Theodore restored the veneration of icons, an event we had just celebrated. Patriarch St. Methodios demanded the Stoudites to renounce all writings against St. Patriarchs Tarasios and Nicephoros. As part of this restoration of the authority of the Archbishop of Constantinople, the relics of St. Nicephors were returned to the Queen City from the place of his exile in Prokonnesos (Marmara Island), but this is another story. Source: A Chronology of Byzantine Empire, Timothy Venning, ed. (New York, 2006). | 
