Happy Holy Hierarchs Day

January 30th is the Three Holy Hierarchs Day (or i giorti ton Trion Ierhon). This holiday refers to Basil the Great (known as Basil of Caesarea), Gregory the Theologian (known as Gregory of Nazianzus) and John Chrysostom. They were highly influential bishops of the early church who played pivotal roles in shaping Christian theology. In Eastern Christianity they are also known as the Three Great Hierarchs and Ecumenical Teachers, while in Roman Catholicism the three are honored as Doctors of the Church. The three are venerated as saints in Eastern Orthodoxy, Catholicism, Anglicanism and other Christian churches. Unforunately the Greek Ministry of Education has no reference to this holy day on its website.

All three lived in a time when the Christian Church, after almost three centuries of persecution, received freedom and was flourishing throughout the Byzantine ‘oikoumene‘. All the three were involved in contesting contemporary heresies, of which the most dangerous was Arianism, which rejected the Divinity of Jesus Christ. All the three combined serving the Church in episcopal rank with literary activity, and it is precisely their literary legacy which secured for them the paramount place that they occupy in Christian Tradition. All the three were victims of ecclesiastical intrigues, and suffered – in one way or another – from their fellow bishops: in fact, two of the three (Gregory and John) were deposed and died in exile. Their posthumous glory, however, exceeded any expectations their contemporaries might have had, and their significance for the entire Christian Church in East and West cannot be overestimated.