Istoria Bisericii Ortodoxe din Transilvania

Monografie a orașului Mediaș din județul Sibiu, prezentând detaliat evoluția istorică, economică și culturală a orașului.
Cuvintele autorului: Lucrarea de față am scris-o cu mintea, dar și cu inima... Conținutul ei, plămădit în sufletul meu, este ofranda pe care o aduc orașului meu – o carte de învățătură pentru fiecare medieșean. Ea va ajuta pe oricine dorește să-și cunoască mai bine strămoșii și orașul și, cunoscându-l, să-l iubească, pentru că este Mediașul nostru.

The article outlines the biographical path of Bishop Vasile Flueraş, from the years of his childhood and studies, to those of his service in the Church. Both at the Orthodox cathedral in the metropolis of Transylvania, where he was ecclesiarch, as well as at the Nicula monastery and the Calvaria church, Father Vasile Flueraş found himself under the same blessed protection of the Mother of God and Ever-Virgin Mary, all these holy places being dedicated to the Dormition of the Theotokos, Father Vasile having a special veneration and affinity towards the Mother of God, sharing three of her virtues that particularly characterized him too: humility, gentleness and tenderness of soul. In 1998, at the proposal of Archbishop Bartolomeu Anania, he was appointed vicar bishop of the Archdiocese of Vad, Feleac and Cluj, for his qualities of “monk and father confessor of great dignity and influence, whose spiritual zeal was doubled by an indisputable missionary vocation.” The reason for the call to the hierarchy of Father Vasile Flueraş was the dynamization of the missionary-pastoral and social-philanthropic activity of the Archdiocese of Vad, Feleac and Cluj. He was like an embodiment of the image of gentleness, of warm smile, of humility and tenderness and of a discreet and selfless philanthropist. Bishop Vasile Flueraş Someşanul was and will remain in the memory and in the hearts of those who knew him the
man of God, the good shepherd, the father in the most authentic sense of the word.

1 Despre istoria Transilvaniei s-a scris foarte mult, dându-se naștere unor istorii paralele în funcție de originea etnică a autorilor. Aceste perspective etnice multiple au fost depășite abia în ultimul deceniu când s-a publicat o lucrare colectivă în trei volume care reunește contribuțiile unor istorici români, maghiari, sași, șvabi și evrei, care s-a bucurat de un real succes editorial fiind tradusă și în limba engleză. Vezi: Ioan-

The involvement of the Orthodox Church and priests in the Romanian national movement during the Austro-Hungarian monarchy was highlighted in the years of the First World War by the repressive measures taken by the Hungarian civil authorities against the Romanian clergy of Transylvania and Banat. These suppressions can be structured into three categories according to their hardness. Considered "subversive elements", some priests were under house arrest in their parishes, being under strict observation by local policemen. Others were arrested at certain more sensitive moments during the conflagration, and were imprisoned in various city prisons, and a third category that includes most of the priests targeted by the repression of the authorities and which were taken into custody during August and September 1916, immediately after Romania's entry into war against Austria-Hungary, and then deported and imprisoned in various camps in the county of Sopron in western Hungary until the spring of 1918. Despite these persecutions, the clergy did not recede from their national apostolate but they were actively and directly involved in organizing and leading the National Assembly in Alba Iulia on 1 December 1918, where the Union of Transylvania with Romania was decided. Our study makes a radiograph of the involvement of the Orthodox priesthood from the Bishopric of Arad in the Romanian national life in the regions of Arad, Bihor and Timiș during the First World War and in the autumn of 1918, presenting both the Orthodox priests who were arrested and imprisoned by the Hungarian authorities, as well as those who participated as elected deputies in the Great National Assembly from Alba Iulia.

Metropolitan Andrei Șaguna’s life and activity have been the subject of numerous researches, to him being dedicated five rich bibliographies written by Romanian theologians and historians. The purpose of this study is to underline a side which is less known to the academic historical research and to the orthodox ecclesial environment, namely the cultural dimension of the great bishop’s personality, on one side, through the presentation of his library – based on the manuscript of the inventory carried out by the archimandrite Ilarion Puşcariu between 1871-1873–, and on the other side, by recalling his vast linguistic knowledge and by reconfiguring the itinerary of his voyages in the Romanian and Central-Eastern European geographical space. Seen from the perspective of the scholar, the polyglot, the restless traveler, the personality of the Saint Hierarch Andrei Şaguna the Metropolitan of Transylvania reveals itself in a different light than the one used by historians and theologians to present him. The hierarch, theologian, leader of the country and church, the politician or astute diplomat embodied all these aspects, without being included in only one of them, his cultural profile presenting him as a real “homo europaeus”, with a horizon which is both ecumenical and imperial, as only few of his Transylvanian contemporaries had.

În timpul revoluţiei paşoptiste elita politică a românilor din Imperiul austriac şi din Principatele Române a nutrit un plan măreţ de emancipare naţională, socială, politică, economică şi bisericească a întregii "Românimi", cu alte cuvinte a tuturor românilor. Nicolae Bălcescu a exprimat cel mai limpede acest deziderat naţionalpolitic într-o lucrare programatică dedicată "stării de faţă, trecutului și viitorului patriei noastre" în care stipula: Ținta noastră, domnilor, socotesc că nu poate fi alta decât Unitatea Naţională a Românilor. Unitate mai întâi în idei și în simţăminte, care să aducă apoi cu vremea Unitatea politică, care să facă din munteni, din moldoveni, din basarabeni, din bucovineni, din transilvăneni, din bănăţeni, din cuţovlahi, să facă un trup politic, o naţie românească, un stat de șapte milioane de români. La crearea acestei naţionalităţi, la o reformare socială a românilor, bazată pe sfintele principuri ale dreptăţii și ale egalităţii, trebuie să ţintească toate silinţele noastre. Românismul dar e steagul nostru, supt dânsul trebuie să chemăm pe toţi românii" 1 .

This study illustrates the itinerary of the official and particular name of the Orthodox Church in the Habsburg Monarchy in general and the Diocese of Transylvania, in particular in the period between the 1848 Revolution and World War I, namely the union of Transylvania, Banat and Maramures with Romania. To this end we have been analyzed and interpreted a series of published and unpublished documents issued by both the Court of Vienna and the ecclesiastical authorities of the Catholic Church, as well as those by the hierarchy of the Orthodox Church, Serbian and Romanian, the jurisdiction of Metropolitan of Carlowitz, later of the Romanian Orthodox Metropolitan of Transylvania and Hungary. After a series of petitions, memoranda and requests addressed to the
Cabinet in Vienna and to the monarch personally, Emperor Franz Joseph decreed on November 29, 1864 to change the negative title of the Orthodox Church from “Ununited” in “Greek-Oriental” therefore fulfilling only partially the Orthodox episcopate wishes. This designation remained officially in effect until the dissolution of the Austro-Hungarian Monarchy in the fall of 1918.

Istoria Bisericii Ortodoxe Române din Transilvania se confundă până spre mijlocul secolului XX cu istoria poporului român de pe aceste meleaguri. Or, dacă imaginea prin excelență a Bisericii, înțeleasă în cheie exegetică paulină, este reprezentată de întreaga obște, de întregul popor dreptcredincios botezat în numele lui Iisus Hristos (Coloseni I; Efeseni IV), tabloul ei ca instituție se contopește de cele mai multe ori cu portretul istoric al întâistătătorilor ei. În Transilvania datorită circumstanțelor politice vitrege pentru români, arhiereii noștri au jucat un rol hotărâtor nu numai în devenirea istorică a Bisericii ca instituție, ci și a organismului social și a corpului național al neamului. Astfel, aceștia au fost în același timp capi ai Bisericii și lideri ai națiunii, fiind percepuți și tratați în acest fel de către autoritățile politice și mai ales de către Curtea de la Viena în secolele XVIII-XIX. În cursul veacului al XIX-lea, cel ce a întruchipat în modul cel mai elocvent această dublă calitate a fost și rămâne fără-ndoială mitropolitul cel sfânt al Transilvaniei, Andrei Baron de Șaguna, de departe cea mai complexă personalitate a românilor ardeleni din vremea sa. Lucrarea noastră are drept scop prezentarea contribuției lui Andrei Șaguna la întemeierea "Asociațiunii transilvane pentru literatura și cultura poporului român" și a activității sale în timpul mandatului de președinte al acesteia.

Philanthropy is an attribute of the Church since the apostolic period, its philanthropic work varying throughout history depending on the political evolution, social, cultural and religious transformations of society, but especially on the charism of the church servants, from all hierarchical levels, and members of the laity. Public and private charitable foundations, as institutionalized expression of philanthropy and Christian charity appeared in medieval Europe, but went through a crisis during the Reformation, experiencing a revitalization in the late eighteenth century and a remarkable flourishing in the nineteenth
century. The first philanthropic foundations appeared in the Transylvanian Orthodox Church in the first half of the 19th century. Until the Great Union of 1918, most Romanian charitable foundations were created, patronized and administered by the two Romanian Churches, all Romanian philanthropists being more or less connected to parishes, dioceses and metropolises. This study presents the development of
Orthodox foundations and the great Orthodox philanthropists in Transylvania, listing the funds and charitable foundations that functioned within the Archdiocese of Transylvania until 1918.

Î n anul 2005, o echipă de istorici clujeni, coordonaţi de profesorul universitar Nicolae Bocşan, au demarat, sub egida Institutului de Istorie Ecleziastică din cadrul Universităţii "Babeş-Bolyai" din Cluj-Napoca, un şantier arhivistic amplu, care are drept scop recuperarea istoriografi că a corespondenţei mitropolitului Andrei Baron de Şaguna, văzând în acest demers o datorie faţă de cel care a reprezentat o adevărată epocă în istoria românilor transilvăneni şi a Bisericii Ortodoxe Române 1 . Autorii au sesizat că acest corpus epistolar, risipit prin diferite fonduri arhivistice de pe cuprinsul Transilvaniei, şi nu numai, îl înfăţişează pe ierarhul, omul politic, teologul, administratorul, editorul, dar şi multe alte ipostaze ale vieţii sale, incluzând şi relaţiile cu personalităţile timpului şi lumea care l-a înconjurat. După ce a fost restituită corespondenţa şaguniană cu ierarhia românească şi sârbească din Transilvania, Banat, Principatele Române şi Monarhia Austriacă 2 , autorii şi-au focalizat atenţia asupra schimbului epistolar cu structurile organizatorice interne ale Bisericii Ortodoxe din Transilvania: protopopiatele, până în momentul actual fi ind restituită corespondenţa şaguniană cu protopopiatele Târgu Mureş 3 , Românaşi şi Reghin (Turda Superioară) 4 , Bistriţa 5 şi Solnoc II 6 .

Although Metropolitan Andrei Şaguna enjoyed a special attention from lay and clergy researchers, Romanians and foreigners as well, researches on Şaguna recording no less than five monographs and hundreds of studies and articles, we can not say that all of the facets of great bishop's life and activity were discovered. In this study I intend to present one side, almost unknown, of Şaguna's activity, namely the ties that the bishop has maintained and cultivated with the teachers from the Academy of Law in Sibiu:

The year 2019 was dedicated by the Holy Synod of the Romanian Orthodox Church to the solemn commemoration, through church, cultural and academic actions, of the scholar patriarchs Nicodim
Munteanu and Justin Moisescu and of all the translators of church books. This study presents the portrait of Patriarch Nicodim Munteanu made by the three Transylvanian hierarchs bearers of the name of Saint Nicholas, Metropolitan Nicolae Bălan of Transylvania, Bishop Nicolae Popoviciu of Oradea and Nicolae Colan of Vad, Feleac and Cluj in 1946 on the patriarch’s anniversary. Those three highlighted his qualities as friend, scholar and talented teller.

"Rugăciunea credinţei va mântui pe cel bolnav, şi Domnul îl va ridica, şi de va fi făcut păcate, se vor ierta lui". (Iacov 5, 15) C u nostalgie îmi aduc aminte că, din tinereţea mea, la praznicul Adormirii Maicii Domnului făceam pelerinaj pe jos, dimpreună cu mulţi credincioşi, la o mănăstire închinată Născătoarei de Dumnezeu. Pe vremea aceea erau potrivnici de natură ideologică, cum şi astăzi sunt potrivnicii de natură secularistă, dar ce importanţă avea? Pelerinajul, şi participarea la slujbe ne făcea bine, iar când plecam acasă, sufl etul ne era plin de bucurie, şi cântam cu toată convingerea: "În sufl et ducem credinţă, / Dragoste şi pocăinţă, / În sufl et ducem tărie, / Şi cerească bucurie. / Niciodată n-om uita, / Marie dragostea ta, / Ci ne vom ruga mereu, la Maica lui Dumnezeu".

The diocese of Vad, Feleac and Cluj was founded in the summer of 1921 and its first bishop was Archimandrite Nicolae Ivan (September 26th, 1921), ordained in the metropolitan cathedral of Sibiu (November 21, 1921), invested by King Ferdinand I of Romania (December 8th 1821) and installed in the Holy Trinity church in Cluj (December 6/19th, 1921), on the feast of the Holy Hierarch Nicolae. The project of establishing an Orthodox diocese with residence in Cluj was launched by Bishop Andrei Şaguna, in July 1863, in the context of negotiations with the government in Vienna on the re-establishment and organization of the Romanian Orthodox Metropolitan Church in Transylvania, Banat and Hungary. Vienna did not approve the project, but Metropolitan Şaguna left its realization in the care of the national church congresses, making available to the future diocese, by will, the amount of 25,000 florins. In the following decades, the issue was discussed and postponed several times, in 1909 it was finally decided to establish the Diocese of Cluj, which would include the Transylvanian Orthodox believers who lived north of the Mureş River. The decision was materialized only after the end of the First World War and the union of Transylvania with Romania, in September 1919 the nucleus of the new diocese was organized in Cluj. The founders wanted to show that although it is a new diocese, it actually renews the medieval tradition of the diocese of Vad (XVI-XVII centuries) and the metropolia of Feleac (XV-XVI centuries), so they named it the Diocese of Vad, Feleac and Cluj. The text of the historical priest and publicist Sebastian Stanca, originally published in 1923, is the first historiographic synthesis that presents the itinerary of the modern history of the Diocese of Cluj.

Te study presents in detail two issues, little or not at all discussed in Romanian historiography: the official title of the hierarchy and of the Episcopal institution in Transylvania durin the time between the installation of Dionysius Novacovici (4 September 1761) an the appointment of Andrei Șaguna as the orthodox hierarch of Transylvania (5 February 1848); and also the extension of jurisdiction an the order in the diptyches of the Orthodox Diocese of Transylvania in the Austrian Empire between 1783 and the Revolution of 1848.

The Church on the Hill, dedicated to the Holy Trinity (1796) is the oldest Orthodox place of worship in Cluj. However, the parish of this church is not the oldest Romanian Orthodox ecclesial community documented on today’s surface of the city. Administratively incorporated in the city of Cluj in 1894, the village of Cluj-Manastur has a thousand-year history, including the Romanian wooden church here, existing in 1656 and rectified in the last three decades of the seventeenth century by two Greeks merchants from Macedonia. In this study we insisted on the history of this church, also called monastery, translating into Romanian and commenting on an original document, preserved in the State Archives of Cluj, issued by Metropolitan Teofil Seremi, on June 17, 1696, by which the Transylvanian hierarch recognized the Greek merchants from Macedonia, Paul and Gheorghe Christoph, as the founders of the Cluj-Mănăştur monastery.