Archbishopric of Ohrid

The Archdiocese of Ohrid called the one hand, an Orthodox archdiocese who worked in the area between the Danube and Thessaly from the 11th to the 18th century. It included dioceses of Macedonia, Thessaly, Epirus, Albania, Duklja, Travunien, Zachlumien, Raszien, Bosnia, Syrmia and Moesia. Founded during the First Bulgarian Empire in the 9th century, it was II in 1018 recognized by the Byzantine Emperor Basil as autokephales archbishopric. In 1767 it lost its nearly 700 -year-long autocephaly and was dissolved. 1958 was re-established and non-canonical since 1967 Metropolitan Diocese of the Macedonian Orthodox Church.

The term Ohrid Archbishopric also an autonomous archdiocese of the Serbian Orthodox Church is called to the area of Macedonia. It was established in 2002 as a canonically recognized autonomous archbishopric of Ohrid. The competent Metroplit Ohrid resides in Skopje.

History

Even in ancient times, there were at Lake Ohrid, a bishopric. The bishop resided in Lychnidos, the predecessor town of Ohrid. This bishopric has set latest with the conquest of the Slavs in the Balkans in the 6th century.

For the first time Ohrid is 879/880 mentioned in the Acts of the Fourth Council of Constantinople Opel as a bishop's seat of a Bulgarian church. At that time belonged to the area for the Bulgarian Empire. Towards the end of the 9th century had Kliment of Ohrid and Naum of Ohrid in the region. They made Ohrid an ecclesiastical and cultural center of the Orthodox Slavs. The School of Ohrid has spawned a large part of Old Church Slavonic literature.

971 Byzantium conquered the eastern part of the Bulgarian Empire. What remained was a West Bulgarian State was essentially limited to Macedonia and large parts of present-day Albania. The center of this empire was around 1000 in the area of the Ohrid and Prespa. The seat of the Bulgarian patriarch was moved from the old capital Preslav to Ohrid. To Tsar Samuil 976 raised the Archbishopric of Ohrid to patriarchy.

1018 conquered the Byzantine Emperor Basil II the rest of Samui Lischen Empire. He organized it as the theme of Bulgaria, which had its headquarters in Skopje. The Bulgarian Patriarchate was abolished, it was replaced by the autocephalous " Archbishopric of Ohrid and all of Bulgaria ", also called large -scale Western Eparchy Eparchy or whose jurisdiction area was determined in a total of three privilege certificates of Basil II on 31 eparchies. The Archdiocese remained independent of the Byzantine Church, but the archbishops were appointed by the Byzantine Emperor. The first archbishop appointed by the Emperor John I Debranin (1018-1037) was a slave, and then the Byzantine emperor appointed always Greek priest of the clergy of Hagia Sofia to archbishops. The leadership of the archdiocese was Hellenized, while the Slavic character of the Archdiocese was further maintained by the lower clergy.

Nearly 200 years remained a significant Ohrid Archbishopric. Archbishop Leo was in 1054 co-authored a circular Michael I. Kerullarios ', which served as a reason for the separation of the Latin Church. Theophylact of Ohrid in 1078 defended the autocephaly of the Archbishopric successfully against the claims of the Patriarchate of Constantinople Opel. 1157 used the Archbishop John Adrian IV Komnenos the title of Archbishop of Justiniana Prima and Bulgaria. After changes in the jurisdiction area in the Komnenenzeit the archdiocese had 25 dioceses. After 1185 it lost four dioceses of the Second Bulgarian Empire.

When the Byzantine Empire fell apart in 1204 as a result of the Fourth Crusade, Ohrid came under the rule of the Bulgarian Tsar Kaloyan. In 1215 it fell to Despotate of Epirus, 1259 at Empire Nikaia. As of 1219 three bishoprics were transferred to the Sava Serbian Archbishopric was founded under the Serbian and primo generic countries. In the Second Bulgarian Empire, the Patriarchate of Tarnovo was constituted in 1235. In the wake of the decline of the Byzantine Empire, the archdiocese declined greatly over the following centuries, the end of the 13th century, it comprised only 11 dioceses. After the Serbian conquest of Macedonia Stefan Dušan respected the autocephalous status of the Archdiocese, under the Patriarchate of Peć. In this period, the archbishops were appointed by the Serbian emperors.

Because of their initial loyalty to the Ottoman rulers of the Archbishops of Ohrid were able to expand their jurisdiction in the 16th century. Around 1520 the Patriarchate of Peć was dissolved and its dioceses connected to the Archbishopric of Ohrid; the Patriarchate of Peć in 1557 but was renewed under Sokollu Mehmed Pasha. Until its dissolution in 1767, the Archbishopric of Ohrid included now 9 Metropolitanates and 5 dioceses. The next centuries were marked by sale of offices, alone from 1650-1700 were 19 archbishops in office. The data required for the sale of offices, funds were collected by the faithful. In the 16th and 17th century the archbishopric campaigned strengthened by support from Vienna and Rome, in the first half of the 17th century were four archbishops a union with the Roman Catholic Church. In the 18th century the archbishopric was temporarily responsible for the Orthodox communities of southern Italy, Venice and Dalmatia. In retaliation for the support of insurgents during the Turkish wars the Archbishopric of Ohrid and the Patriarchate of Peć in 1767 and 1776 were dissolved, leaving their dioceses to the Patriarchate of Constantinople Opel. To wipe out every trace of the Archdiocese, the region was assigned to the Diocese of Prespa to Ohrid.

1870 Ohrid was subordinated to the Bulgarian Exarchate newly formed. After the First World War, the Eparchy of the Serbian Church. The Archdiocese of Ohrid in 1958 was re-established, embodied by the Metropolitan of Skopje, who stood in canonical unity with the Serbian Patriarch. The Metropolitan is known as " Archbishop of Ohrid and Macedonia, " head of the Macedonian Orthodox Church, whose 1967 unilaterally proclaimed autocephaly is currently not recognized by any other Orthodox church. From the Serbian Orthodox Church in 2002 as an autonomous canonically recognized Ohrid Archbishopric was established.