Andrew of Crete

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Andrew of Crete (left) on a Russian icon
The saint on the oldest dated fresco in Crete (1225)

Andrew of Crete (* around 660 in Damascus , † around 740 on Lesbos ) was an important hymn poet and metropolitan of Gortyn on Crete . He is venerated as a saint by the Catholic and Orthodox churches . His feast day is July 4th .

Life

Andreas was initially a monk in Jerusalem , where he entered the monastery of the Holy Sepulcher there at the age of 15. Patriarch Theodore of Jerusalem sent Andreas, who was then a deacon, to Emperor Constantine IV. Pogonatus in 685 with the task of persuading him to hold a general council ( Third Council of Constantinople and sixth Ecumenical Council). After a successful mission, Andreas stayed in Constantinople , was appointed as a deacon head of an orphan asylum and in 692 as archbishop (metropolitan) of Gortyn on Crete.

meaning

Andrew of Crete campaigned for the worship of images (see also Byzantine Iconoclasm ) and was the author of many homilies and hymns in new forms. As a poet, he founded a new genre of liturgical hymns, the so-called canons , which broadened contact . These are chants from mostly nine different odes. His most important work is the great canon in 250 stanzas, a penitential song that is still used in the service before Easter on the Thursday of the fifth week of fasting. The hymn poem of Andrew was exemplary for Cosmas the singer, John of Damascus and others.

Andreas is also considered an excellent representative of Byzantine rhetoric. 45 sermons and panegyries have been preserved under his name, the authenticity of which is in part controversial. They deal thematically with certain Sundays, feasts or saints.

Theologically, Andreas vacillated between monotheletism and the orthodox majority opinion within the church about the divine and human nature of Christ. In 712 he agreed to the monotheletic synod of Constantinople under Emperor Philippikos Bardanes , but returned to orthodoxy after his overthrow in 713. This was expressed in his poem Iambi in Agathonem , a poem in 128 verses on the deacon Agatho.

Representation as a saint

On icons and other pictorial representations of the saint he appears in bishop's robes with a book or scroll and his right hand raised in blessing, as well as with gray hair and a long gray beard.

Published works

In Migne: Patrologiae Graeca 97, 805–1444, were published in Latin:

  • Orationes 1–17. 19-21
  • Homiliae variae
  • De sanctarum imaginum veneratione (On the worship of sacred images)
  • Canon in Annae conceptionem
  • Canon in Beate Mariae Virginis nativitatem
  • Canon in Lazarum
  • Canon magnus
  • Canon in medium pentecosten
  • Idiomela varia

A German translation of the Canon magnus (Great Canon) is available in: Aleksej Maltzew: Devotional Book of the Orthodox Catholic Church of the Orient , 1895 (Russian and German); and in: P. Kilian Kirchhoff : The Eastern Church prays 3 . Leipzig 1936, 161–197

Further text outputs:

  • Iambi in Agathonem ; in: A. Heisenberg: ByZ 10 (1901) 508 ff.
  • Laudatio martyrum Cretensium ; in: Basil Laourdas : Kretikà ​​Chroniká 3 (1949), 101–117

literature

Web links

Commons : Andrew of Crete  - collection of pictures, videos and audio files
personal data
SURNAME Andrew of Crete
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Andrew of Jerusalem
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Byzantine hymn poet, theologian and Archbishop of Gortyn
DATE OF BIRTH around 660
PLACE OF BIRTH Damascus
DATE OF DEATH at 740
Place of death Lesbos