recognizes Silvester as Patriarch; the Synod of Constantinople[1] imposes a profession of faith on all who recognize Silvester, and all whom the Turks force so to do, explicitly denying the Filioque. Cyril flees before his rival to a monastery in the Lebanon.
Much depends on the question of Cyril VI's election. Was it valid? There is no uniform rule for the election of bishops, recognized throughout Christendom, nor even throughout the Catholic Church. All one can say is that an election is valid if it conforms to the Canon Law (either written or by custom) of the time and place. Against Cyril is the fact that no bishop took part in his election. It was conducted by priests and laymen. That certainly seems an argument against it. On the other hand, there is evidence that, since the transference of the Patriarch's seat from Antioch to Damascus, the right of the Damascenes to elect had been recognized and used repeatedly.[2] The Pope's Consistory later said expressly that Cyril had been elected "according to the custom of the Greeks."[3] More important is the fact that the considerable majority of his Metropolitans acknowledged him. This gives him a later ratification, a sanatio in radice for whatever may have been irregular in the actual election. At any rate, so many Eastern Prelates have been elected by a popular vote and under all kinds of irregular conditions, yet by the acceptance of their Suffragans have held their position undisputed, that it would be impossible for the Orthodox to lay down a general principle that only one method is valid. Patriarchs of Constantinople have been nominated by the Sultan, yet no one hesitate to count them in that line. The only possible rule, in the East especially, is that the bishop de facto becomes bishop de iure by tacit consent. Cyril was certainly Patriarch de facto, recognized by the great majority, till his rival began to persecute his adherents. Indeed, the Synod of Constantinople itself acknowledged him, since in 1724 it deposed him. In this pronouncement the only argument against his election is the nomination of Silvester by the former Patriarch.[4] Five years later, in 1729, Propaganda, having examined the whole question at leisure, declares as its first resolution that "nothing is
- ↑ Charon says a synod was then being held at Constantinople (Ech. d'Or., v, 19). I think it must have been the permanent σύνοδος ἐνδημοῦσα.
- ↑ See the witness of a contemporary, Nihmet (sic, for Ni'mah) of Aleppo, quoted by Bacel, Éch. d'Or., x, 205.
- ↑ February 3, 1744. "Bullarium Ben. XIV" (Prato, 1845), i, p. 642.
- ↑ See the acts of this synod in Mansi, xxxvii, cols. 219-226.
