The Synod of Qarqafe was a council of the

Melkite Greek Catholic Church The Melkite Greek Catholic Church (, ''Kanīsat ar-Rūm al-Malakiyyīn al-Kāṯūlīk''; ; ), also known as the Melkite Byzantine Catholic Church, is an Eastern Catholic church in full communion with the Holy See as part of the worldwide Catho ...

held in 1806. The synod adapted and ratified propositions of the 1786

Synod of Pistoia The Synod of Pistoia was a 1786 diocesan synod in the Catholic diocese of Pistoia, then part of the territory of the Grand Duchy of Tuscany. It was convoked by its bishop Scipione de' Ricci under the patronage and active support of the Habsburg-L ...

. It would be formally condemned in 1835 by

Pope Gregory XVI Pope Gregory XVI (; ; born Bartolomeo Alberto Cappellari; 18 September 1765 – 1 June 1846) was head of the Catholic Church and ruler of the Papal States from 2 February 1831 to his death in June 1846. He had adopted the name Mauro upon enteri ...

in the bull ''Melchitarum Catholicorum Synodus''.

History

The Synod of Qarqafe was convoked by

Germanos Adam Germanos Adam (born in 1725 in Aleppo, Syria – died on 10 November 1809 in Zouk Mikael, Lebanon) was the Melkite Catholic bishop of the Archeparchy of Aleppo during the late 18th century and a Christian theologian. Life Germanos Adam was ...

, the Melkite Archbishop of Aleppo. Adam was educated at the College of the Propaganda in Rome and a friend of Scipione de' Ricci, by whom he was introduced to Gallican and

Jansenist Jansenism was a 17th- and 18th-century theological movement within Roman Catholicism, primarily active in France, which arose as an attempt to reconcile the theological concepts of free will and divine grace in response to certain development ...

ideas. As archbishop, Adam began issuing pamphlets affirming Gallican propositions on the authority of the Pope and

conciliarism Conciliarism was a movement in the 14th-, 15th- and 16th-century Catholic Church which held that supreme authority in the Church resided with an ecumenical council, apart from, or even against, the pope. The movement emerged in response to the We ...

. Despite being criticized by

Pope Pius VII Pope Pius VII (; born Barnaba Niccolò Maria Luigi Chiaramonti; 14 August 1742 – 20 August 1823) was head of the Catholic Church from 14 March 1800 to his death in August 1823. He ruled the Papal States from June 1800 to 17 May 1809 and again ...

and

Maronite Maronites (; ) are a Syriac Christianity, Syriac Christian ethnoreligious group native to the Eastern Mediterranean and the Levant (particularly Lebanon) whose members belong to the Maronite Church. The largest concentration has traditionally re ...

patriarch

Joseph Tyan Joseph VII Peter Tyan (born on March 15, 1760, in Beirut, Lebanon – died on February 20, 1820, in Qannubin, Lebanon) (or Youssef Tyan, ''Youssef Tiyen'', ''Thian'', ''Tian'', ''Tyen'', ''Al-Tiyyan'', ) was the 66th Maronite Patriarch of Antioch ...

, he was defended by his own patriarch,

Agapius II Matar Agapius II Matar, (sometime also known as ''Agapios III'', 1736–1812) was Patriarch of the Melkite Greek Catholic Church from 1796 to 1812. Life Agapius Matar was born in 1736 in Damascus. He entered young in the Basilian Salvatorian Order ...

. Adam would ultimately be forced to recant these propositions and accept the bull '' Auctorem fidei'' before his death in 1809. The Synod of Qarqafe began on 23 July 1806 at the Monastery of Saint Anthony in Qarqafe, in the Diocese of Beirut. It was attended by bishops Basil of Tyre, Athanasius Matar of Sidon (the brother of the patriarch), Makarios of Acre, Agapios Kanyar of Diyarbakir (Amid), Basil Jabali of Ferzol (Beqaa Valley), Joseph of Homs, and Benediktos of Baalbek. Two priests, George Nassar of Egypt and Michael Mazloum were present, and the acts were signed by Macarios Tawil and Ignatius Arkache, superior generals of local religious orders. The acts of the synod were formally approved by Joseph Tyan and the Roman apostolic visitor Luigi Gandolfi. Roman interventions between 1812 and 1835 led to the condemnation of the works of Germanos Adam, the recanting of the propositions of the synod by most of the synod fathers, and the final condemnation of the synod by Pope Gregory XVI.

Decrees

The Acts of the Synod of Qarqafe are divided into three sections and issued over one hundred canons dealing with the topics of ecclesial discipline, sacraments, and the ecclesial hierarchy.

Legacy

Pope Pius IX Pope Pius IX (; born Giovanni Maria Battista Pietro Pellegrino Isidoro Mastai-Ferretti; 13 May 1792 – 7 February 1878) was head of the Catholic Church from 1846 to 1878. His reign of nearly 32 years is the longest verified of any pope in hist ...

issued the encyclical ''Quartus Supra'' in 1873 to the

Armenian Catholic Church The Armenian Catholic Church is an Eastern Catholic Churches, Eastern Catholic particular church ''sui iuris'' of the Catholic Church. It accepts the papal supremacy, leadership of the bishop of Rome, and is therefore in full communion with ...

, accusing the Armenian Catholic bishops who opposed his intervention in their hierarchy of adhering to the Synod of Qarqafe. Melkite patriarch

Gregory II Youssef Patriarch Gregory II Youssef, also known as Gregory II Hanna Youssef-Sayour (October 17, 1823 – July 13, 1897), was Patriarch of the Melkite Greek Catholic Church from 1864 to 1897. Gregory expanded and modernized the church and its institu ...

, an opponent of Pius IX at the

First Vatican Council The First Ecumenical Council of the Vatican, commonly known as the First Vatican Council or Vatican I, was the 20th ecumenical council of the Catholic Church, held three centuries after the preceding Council of Trent which was adjourned in 156 ...

, issued a negative response to the encyclical. Serge Descy argues that despite the influence of the Synod of Pistoia, the Synod of Qarqafe is essentially a retrieval of traditional Eastern Christian ecclesiology.

References

{{Reflist

External links

Arabic manuscript of the Acts of the Synod of Qarqafe
19th-century Catholic Church councils Catholic Church in Lebanon Catholic Church in Syria Catholic Church in the Ottoman Empire Jansenism Melkite Greek Catholic Church