04 — The Church Reformer
David IV as reformer of the Georgian Church: the Council of Ruisi–Urbnisi (1103), his great reforming synod, which purged simony and hereditary office-holding and bound the reformed Church to the throne; and his reordering of the ecclesiastical hierarchy, above all the fusion of the chancellorship with the bishopric of Chqondidi to create the mtsignobartukhutsesi-chqondideli, the chancellor-bishop who stood second only to the king.
Tradition: Georgian Orthodox
David’s restoration of Georgia was not only military and administrative but ecclesiastical. A Church corrupted by the sale of offices and the hereditary transmission of sees was both a spiritual scandal and a political liability — a rival network of power in noble hands. David’s answer was to reform the Church and to ally it closely with the crown: a single throne-and-altar system in which a purified Church lent the monarchy its sanction and the monarchy lent the Church its protection and reform.
The first file treats the Council of Ruisi–Urbnisi and its purge; the second treats the resulting reordering of the hierarchy and the great composite office of the chancellor-bishop. Both note the double character of the work — genuine ecclesiastical reform and a deliberate extension of royal control into the ecclesiastical sphere — and report the scholarly reading of that duality even-handedly.
Files in This Section
| File | Description |
|---|---|
| the-council-of-ruisi-urbnisi-1103.md | The reforming synod of 1103 at Ruisi and Urbnisi; the purge of simony and unworthy bishops; the deposition of corrupt clergy; the canons and the alliance of throne and altar; and the honest reading of the council as both reform and royal control. |
| king-and-catholicos.md | David’s reordering of the Georgian Church and his relation to the Catholicos-Patriarch; the creation of the mtsignobartukhutsesi-chqondideli (chancellor-bishop); his minister George of Chqondidi; and the throne-and-altar model of Georgian sacred kingship. |
See Also
- Rebuilding the State and the Army — the civil centralization paralleled in the Church
- The Monastery of Gelati — the reformed Church’s great foundation
- Orthodoxy: Holy Tradition — the frame of conciliar reform
References
- The Life of the King of Kings David (Cxovreba mepet-mepisa Davitisi), in Kartlis Tskhovreba: A History of Georgia, ed. Roin Metreveli, trans. Dmitri Gamq’relidze et al. (Tbilisi: Artanuji, 2014).
- Ronald Grigor Suny, The Making of the Georgian Nation, 2nd ed. (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1994).
- Donald Rayfield, Edge of Empires: A History of Georgia (London: Reaktion Books, 2012).
- “Council of Ruisi-Urbnisi.” Wikipedia. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Council_of_Ruisi-Urbnisi.