Who was Photius?

[spiritmech]

Who was this Photius guy? I see the long article on newadvent.com, but can anyone break it down for me?

Is there an actual doctrinal issue he was making? Or did he just want to keep his post?

Thanks,
sm

[furay]

Hey dude.

[Laudate_Dominum]

sup dudes

[rkwright]

[quote name='spiritmech' date='Dec 28 2005, 09:34 AM']Who was this Photius guy? I see the long article on newadvent.com, but can anyone break it down for me?

Is there an actual doctrinal issue he was making? Or did he just want to keep his post?

Thanks,
sm
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[/quote]

oo I'll try, but I am by far no expert.

The new advent site breaks it down pretty well, but is almost a bit biased against him. You might try looking in a newer version, I think the one online is from the early 1900's.

Patriarch Ignatius is Patriarch of Constantinople but is deposed by the Emperor, so Photius is rushed through ordination (possibly becoming excommunicated in the process?) and is the new Patriarch of Constantinople. Some people question whether he should be rightfully in power so Rome sends some legates to look into the matter. The legates say hes legit, but the Pope is still suspicious (they were possibly bribed says new advent), so the Pope himself looks into it. He decides Photius is not legit, puts Ignatius back in power. This goes on for a while, until Ignatius dies, then Photius is put back in power. Now that he is back in power he sends out some anti-Rome statements, including 5 main reasons that will become the reasons for the schism some 200 years later. His sentaments were past down and came to a climax in the 1000's when the Church's really got into it.

Again thats just a very brief overview! Take what I wrote and go back and try to make sense of the new advent article, they go way more in depth.