Section 09: Legacy and Reception
The afterlife of St. Basil the Great in the Church’s worship, calendar, canon law, art, and Western memory. By the testimony of his own generation he was already “the Great,” and the centuries that followed gave that judgment liturgical and legal form: a Divine Liturgy under his name, a feast on January 1, a shared feast of the Three Hierarchs on January 30, and ninety-two canons that made him the most extensively cited Father in the Orthodox canonical corpus.
Tradition: Pan-Orthodox (Church Father)
Contents
| File | Topic |
|---|---|
| The Three Hierarchs and Liturgical Legacy | “The Great” in his own generation; the Three Hierarchs feast (Jan 30) and its eleventh-century origin under John Mauropous; his own feast (Jan 1, with the Circumcision) and the Vasilopita custom; the Liturgy of St. Basil, the kneeling prayers and exorcism prayers under his name; his iconography; and his Western reception — Benedict’s homage in Rule 73 and the Basilian orders |
| The Canonical Legacy | How three private canonical letters to Amphilochius of Iconium became Canons 1–92 of the Orthodox corpus; Quinisext Canon 2’s ratification; the content classes — penance durations, marriage law, the reception of heretics under Canon 1’s three-mode taxonomy; the therapeutic philosophy of penance in Canon 84; Basil’s canons in the Pedalion with St. Nikodemos’ commentary; and their modern application |
How to Use
- Read The Three Hierarchs for Basil’s place in the calendar, the Liturgy, and the imagination of both East and West — the dimension of his legacy that ordinary worshippers meet first.
- Read The Canonical Legacy for the legal afterlife: the route by which his pastoral letters became binding canon law, and the therapeutic understanding of penance that has shaped Orthodox discipline ever since.
- Both files presuppose the doctrinal and pastoral work treated earlier in the collection — above all his Trinitarian theology, his Liturgy, his monastic rules, and his letters and church politics.
Cross-References
- For the canonical corpus in its broader setting, see Sources of Orthodox Canon Law
- For Canon 1’s taxonomy as it governs reception of converts, see Reception of Converts
- For the eucharistic theology of his anaphora, see Anaphora Theology
- For his place among the Fathers, see Church Fathers
References
- See the collection README for the principal sources; each content file carries its own full reference list.