Medieval Christianity: The Photian Schism

"Ever since I began to study the many problems arising from the checkered history of the ninth century in East and West, especially the lives and works of the Slavonic apostles SS. Constantine-Cyril and Methodius, I gradually realized that the history of the unfortunate Patriarch required to be rewritten and that the documents on which his condemnation was based demanded thorough revision. As soon as I had completed my study of the two Greeks founders of Slavonic letters I proceeded to examine the Collection of anti-Photian documents and pamphlets. Being the work of contemporary writers, and undoubtedly authentic, they had been used as an incontrovertible dossier against Photius. The first result of my researches was the discovery that the sources on which the history of the second schism was based were valueless, and that whatever had been written about a second rupture between Photius and Rome was not only inaccurate, but pure mystification (Byzantion, vol. vii, 1933). This finding was confirmed to a certain extent by V. Grumel, who, in a study published in the Revue des Sciences Philosophiques et Theologiques (vol. xii, 1933), came independently to a similar conclusion. But other problems remained unsolved, one of them being the oecumenicity of the Ignatian synod (869-70) in Western medieval tradition. Moreover, it would have been impossible to reassess Photius' character and career unless it were first made clear how the primitive Photian tradition came to be forgotten in the West and obscured in the East. This tradition was easily reconstructed when once the trustworthiness of the Photian Collection had been seriously challenged. I accordingly began to trace in detail the development of what may be called the Photian Legend in the Middle Ages. As the results of my researches clashed with conventional opinion, I made a point of communicating them to the specialists in Byzantine history at the last two international congresses of Byzantine studies at Sofia in 1934 and at Rome in 1936. In 1938 I summarized some of my researches in a lecture at the Royal Academy of Brussels, who had been kept informed of the progress of my work, did the same at the Academy of Athens. Furthermore, in order to afford experts and Church authorities every opportunity to check my arguments I published the main results of my inquiry in various periodicals. The present work embodies those studies, with the addition of more evidence and the necessary historical setting." -Preface