The Act and the Rationale

The glorification of 1987: the Holy Synod of the Georgian Orthodox Church, under Catholicos-Patriarch Ilia II, numbered Ilia Chavchavadze among the saints as Saint Ilia the Righteous (წმინდა ილია მართალი), with his feast fixed on 20 July / 2 August — the day of the Prophet Elijah, whose Georgian name he bore. This file sets out the act, the title, the feast, and the Church’s stated rationale, presented in the Church’s own terms per METHODOLOGY §4.1.

Tradition: Georgian Orthodox

The Glorification

In 1987 the Holy Synod of the Georgian Orthodox Church glorified Ilia Chavchavadze, numbering him among the saints as Saint Ilia the Righteous — in Georgian, წმინდა ილია მართალი, “Saint Ilia the Righteous/Just” (Tsipuria, “Ilia Chavchavadze,” in Great Immortality, 2019; OrthodoxWiki, Ilia the Righteous; OCA, Martyr Ilia Chavchavadze of Georgia; Ilia Chavchavadze, Wikipedia, on the 1987 canonization and the title). The glorification was carried out under the presidency of Catholicos-Patriarch Ilia II (Ghudushauri-Shiolashvili), who had led the Georgian Church since 1977 and who remained its primate for decades afterward (Ilia II of Georgia, Wikipedia; Tsipuria, “Ilia Chavchavadze,” in Great Immortality, 2019). The coincidence of names — the primate Ilia glorifying the saint Ilia — is one the collection notes and carefully distinguishes: Catholicos-Patriarch Ilia II is a distinct, living churchman, not to be confused with the saint he canonized (see the disambiguation in the collection README).

[Disputed: the exact date of the synodal act within 1987. The year is firm (1987), and the feast is celebrated on 20 July / 2 August. Some sources give the canonization act itself as 25 June 1987, while others state only “1987”; the brief that occasioned this collection gave “20 July 1987,” which appears to conflate the feast day with the date of the act. This collection reports the canonization as of 1987, with the feast fixed on 20 July / 2 August, and treats the precise day of the synodal decree as attested variously (commonly 25 June 1987) rather than as settled.]

The Title: “the Righteous”

The title under which Ilia was glorified is significant and was carefully chosen. He was numbered not among the martyrs by formal title — though the martyric character of his death is part of the picture, and some usages (including the OCA synaxarion heading) do call him “Martyr” — but as the Righteous (martali), the designation for a holy layperson who lived a life of righteousness in the world rather than in the monastery or the episcopate (Tsipuria, “Ilia Chavchavadze,” in Great Immortality, 2019; OrthodoxWiki, Ilia the Righteous; OCA, Martyr Ilia Chavchavadze of Georgia, using “Martyr” in the heading and “the Righteous” in the body). [Disputed: whether the primary title is “the Righteous” or “Martyr.” The Georgian designation is მართალი (“the Righteous”), and this is the standard title; the OCA entry heads the life “Martyr Ilia Chavchavadze” while calling him “the Righteous” in the text, reflecting the martyric reading of his death. This collection uses “St. Ilia the Righteous” as the primary title, noting the martyric dimension.] The choice of “the Righteous” is theologically apt: it honors precisely the kind of sanctity Ilia represents — a holy layman, a righteous public servant of his people, rather than an ascetic or a hierarch — and it is the title that most naturally fits a man whose holiness was worked out in journalism, banking, education, and public leadership (see Saint and Symbol).

The Feast: The Day of the Prophet Elijah

Ilia’s feast is celebrated on 20 July / 2 August (Old Style / New Style) — which is not the date of his death (30 August O.S.) but the feast of the Prophet Elijah (Georgian Ilia, ილია), the Old Testament prophet whose name the saint bore (OrthodoxWiki, Ilia the Righteous; orthochristian.com, Saint Ilia the Righteous (†1907), “Commemorated July 20/August 2”; OCA, Martyr Ilia Chavchavadze of Georgia, feast 20 July). To fix a saint’s commemoration on the feast of his name-patron is an ancient and natural practice; it binds the modern righteous man to the great prophet of zeal for the Lord whose name he carried, and it gives the Georgian Church’s newest righteous one the fiery prophet Elijah as his heavenly companion in the calendar. The troparion sung for him captures the double note of nation and martyrdom: “Son of the Georgian people and martyr for thy nation, most glorious Ilia the Righteous, pray to Christ God to have mercy on our souls” (OrthodoxWiki, Ilia the Righteous, giving the troparion).

The Church’s Stated Rationale

The rationale the Georgian Church gave for the glorification is reported here in the Church’s own terms, per METHODOLOGY §4.1. In the standard formulation, “the Holy Synod of the Georgian Orthodox Church considered the deeds of Ilia Chavchavadze before God and his country and decreed him worthy to be numbered among the saints” (OrthodoxWiki, Ilia the Righteous; OCA, Martyr Ilia Chavchavadze of Georgia, on the recognition of his deeds “before God and his country”). The grounds gathered under that formula are several, and each corresponds to something documented in his life:

  • His lifelong labor for the Georgian language and literacy — the Society for the Spreading of Literacy, the schools, the defense of Georgian against russification — understood as the preservation of a Christian people’s God-given tongue (OCA, Martyr Ilia Chavchavadze of Georgia; see The Society for Literacy and the Bank).
  • His public defense of the Georgian Church and its autocephaly, suppressed in 1811 — service rendered by a layman to the Church’s freedom (OrthodoxWiki, Ilia the Righteous; CNEWA, The Orthodox Church of Georgia; see The Defense of Autocephaly).
  • His articulation of faith as one of the three constitutive treasures of the nation — the triad of Fatherland, Language, and Faith — which fused national and religious identity (Tsipuria, “Ilia Chavchavadze,” in Great Immortality, 2019; see The Ideas and the Triad).
  • The righteous and forgiving character of his life, and the martyric character of his death — killed near Mtskheta, the holy city, and remembered as one who would have forgiven his killers (OCA, Martyr Ilia Chavchavadze of Georgia; see The Assassination).

From within the Church that glorified him, the act is intelligible and coherent: it recognizes a layman whose righteousness took the form of a life spent for the language, the faith, and the freedom of an Orthodox people, sealed by a violent death. Whether that recognition also raised questions — about the canonization of so public and secular a figure, and about the relation of national to ecclesial sanctity — is the subject of the companion file, where those questions are held open per §4.2 (see The Reception and the Debate).

See Also

References

  • Tsipuria, Bela. “Ilia Chavchavadze: Georgia’s Cultural Saint and a Saint of the Georgian Orthodox Church.” In Great Immortality, ed. Marijan Dović and Jón Karl Helgason. Leiden: Brill, 2019. (The 1987 glorification; the title “the Righteous”; Catholicos-Patriarch Ilia II; the fusion of national and ecclesial sanctity.)
  • OrthodoxWiki, Ilia the Righteous. (The glorification of 1987; the title მართალი “the Righteous”; the feast 20 July; the troparion; the Church’s rationale “before God and his country.”)
  • OCA, Martyr Ilia Chavchavadze of Georgia (oca.org). (The feast 20 July; the martyric heading and “the Righteous” title; the deeds “before God and his country”; the rationale of language, faith, and death.)
  • Saint Ilia the Righteous (†1907), orthochristian.com / pravoslavie.ru. (“Commemorated July 20/August 2”; the Church’s account of his life and canonization.)
  • Ilia II of Georgia, Wikipedia; Ilia Chavchavadze, Wikipedia. (Catholicos-Patriarch Ilia II’s primacy from 1977; the 1987 canonization and the Georgian title — used to locate dates, cross-checked against Tsipuria.)
  • CNEWA, The Orthodox Church of Georgia. (The autocephaly cause “under the leadership of St. Ilia (Chavchavadze) the Righteous.”)