Nikodim Milaš
Encyclopedia
Nikodim Milaš was a Serbian Orthodox Church
bishop
in Dalmatia
(nowaday Croatia
). He was perhaps the greatest Serbia
n expert on church law.. As a canon lawyer in Dalmatia, he defended the Serbian Orthodox Church against the State. He was a polyglot
, fluent in German, Italian, Latin, Russian, Greek, and Old Slavonic
, and an author of numerous books.
in Dalmatia (then part of the Austro-Hungarian Empire) on the 4th of April 1845 to Trifun and Maria Milaš (Serbian father and Italian mother). He was baptized Nikola. After attending the Jesuit Gymnasium in Zadar
and graduating from the Serbian Orthodox Theological School at Sremski Karlovci
, he studied at the oldest college of the Russian Orthodox Church
, the Kievan Theological Academy and Seminary (then part of Imperial Russia), and in 1871 took a Master's degree in Canon Law
and Church History, the fruit of which, his remarkable dissertation, Nomocanon of Patriarch Photius, brought him the golden cross of the Russian Orthodox Church
. Upon his return home, Serbian Orthodox Bishop Stefan (Knežević) of Dalmatia appointed him professor of canon law at Zadar's Theological Orthodox Institute. In 1872, he published a study in which he criticized the Austro-Hungarian government for interfering in the life of the Serbian Orthodox Church
and its faithful.
Professor Nikola Milaš was tonsure
d in 1873 and given the monastic name of Nikodim. Also, he was was ordained deacon
, and two years later, presbyter
. He received the rank archimandrite
in 1880. Under his administration the theological institute in Zadar became one of the best Orthodox schools. Nikodim corresponded with the greatest Eastern Orthodox and Roman Catholic canonists (Alexis Stepanovich Pavloff (d. 1898), Alexander Theodorovich Lavroff, Vasili Vasilievich Bolotoff, Pietro Gasparri
, Emil Albert Friedberg
, Joseph Putzer
, Friedrich Heinrich Vering
) at the time. After the publication of his (hornbook
), "Principles of Jurisdiction in the Eastern Orthodox Church," in which he again levelled criticism on the Austro-Hungarian authorities, he was forced to take refuge in Belgrade in late 1885. There for the next two years, he was the rector
of the Belgrade Seminary (Bogoslovija). In early 1888 he was back in Zadar where he completed that same year two major works: "Roman Catholic Propaganda: its foundation and rules today" (1889) and his six-volume treatise on the Serbian Orthodox Church entitled "Orthodox Church and Canon Law" (1890). He liked Zadar, and the people would habe been glad to keep him; but the attraction of a Belgrade post carried him back there in the autumn of 1888. He was appointed Professor of Canon law and Church History at Belgrade's Grande École. Two years later, when Bishop Stefan Knezević of Dalmatia died, Nikodim was elected Bishop of Dalmatia on the 10th of July 1890 and consecrated on the 16th of September 1890. Throughout his tenure he was under pressure from anti-Serb Orthodox authorities and forced to endure aggresive Roman Catholic proselytism
. Bishop Nikodim collaborated with politician Sava Bjelanović
during that difficult period. He once wrote:
"Nije lak posao vladici u Dalmaciji i sa takozvanom pravoslavnom inteligencijom. Ovi i ovakvi ljudi prinudili su dalmatinske episkope Rajačića, Živkovića i Mutibarića da bježe iz Dalmacije u druge eparhije. ... Ali najteže je dalmatinskom episkopu sa Vladom, ako hoće da bude pravi pravoslavni episkop i čuvar vjere i crkve svoje. U Austriji od 1868. vlada zakon da pravoslavlje uživa jednaka prava kao i sve ostale priznate državne konfesije. Ali u samoj stvari ta je crkva u Austriji samo tolerirana."
"The bishop's job in Dalmatia is not an easy one and with a so-called Orthodox intelligentsia
(many of whom were Roman Catholic, though declared themselves as Serbs). Those and like folk have caused such Dalmatian bishops as Josif Rajačić
, Pantelejmon Živković and Jerotije Mutibarić to flee from Dalmatia and seek refuge in other diocese.... But what is really difficult for a bishop is to deal with State officials, if he wants to be a true Orthodox bishop and defender of his faith and church. In Austria there is a rule since 1868 that Orthodoxy has the same position as all other confessions in the State. But the truth of the matter is that the Church (Orthodox) is just tolerated."
In 1901 Nikodim published "Orthodoxy in Dalmatia" in answer to a papal encyclical in which Pope Leo XIII appealed for union. His book was criticized by the bishop of the Eparchy of Križevci
, who wrote:
Nobody hates Union as much as Orthodox Dalmatians (meaning Serbs).
Nikodim also had problems with his superiors. He refused elevation to the Holy Synod
(the executive body of the Serbian Orthodox Church) of Belgrade and later of Sarajevo because he was not elected according to canon law. Always under constant pressure from civil authorities and other enemies, Nikodim was forced to retire in early 1912. He was succeeded by Bishop Dimitrije Branković.
Bishop Nikodim died at Dubrovnik on the 12th of April 1915. The only coppy of his new book -- "The Church and the State in the Austro-Hungarian Empire" -- has since disappeared.
Serbian Orthodox Church
The Serbian Orthodox Church is one of the autocephalous Orthodox Christian churches, ranking sixth in order of seniority after Constantinople, Alexandria, Antioch, Jerusalem, and Russia...
bishop
Bishop
A bishop is an ordained or consecrated member of the Christian clergy who is generally entrusted with a position of authority and oversight. Within the Catholic Church, Eastern Orthodox, Oriental Orthodox Churches, in the Assyrian Church of the East, in the Independent Catholic Churches, and in the...
in Dalmatia
Dalmatia
Dalmatia is a historical region on the eastern coast of the Adriatic Sea. It stretches from the island of Rab in the northwest to the Bay of Kotor in the southeast. The hinterland, the Dalmatian Zagora, ranges from fifty kilometers in width in the north to just a few kilometers in the south....
(nowaday Croatia
Croatia
Croatia , officially the Republic of Croatia , is a unitary democratic parliamentary republic in Europe at the crossroads of the Mitteleuropa, the Balkans, and the Mediterranean. Its capital and largest city is Zagreb. The country is divided into 20 counties and the city of Zagreb. Croatia covers ...
). He was perhaps the greatest Serbia
Serbia
Serbia , officially the Republic of Serbia , is a landlocked country located at the crossroads of Central and Southeast Europe, covering the southern part of the Carpathian basin and the central part of the Balkans...
n expert on church law.. As a canon lawyer in Dalmatia, he defended the Serbian Orthodox Church against the State. He was a polyglot
Polyglot
Polyglot may refer to:*Polyglot , someone who uses many languages*Polyglot , a book that contains the same text in more than one language*Polyglot , a computer program that is valid in more than one programming language...
, fluent in German, Italian, Latin, Russian, Greek, and Old Slavonic
Old Slavonic
Old Slavonic may refer to:*Old Church Slavonic language*Common Slavonic language...
, and an author of numerous books.
Biography
Bishop Nikodim Milaš was born at ŠibenikŠibenik
Šibenik is a historic town in Croatia, with population of 51,553 . It is located in central Dalmatia where the river Krka flows into the Adriatic Sea...
in Dalmatia (then part of the Austro-Hungarian Empire) on the 4th of April 1845 to Trifun and Maria Milaš (Serbian father and Italian mother). He was baptized Nikola. After attending the Jesuit Gymnasium in Zadar
Zadar
Zadar is a city in Croatia on the Adriatic Sea. It is the centre of Zadar county and the wider northern Dalmatian region. Population of the city is 75,082 citizens...
and graduating from the Serbian Orthodox Theological School at Sremski Karlovci
Sremski Karlovci
Sremski Karlovci is a town and municipality in Serbia, in the autonomous province of Vojvodina, situated on the bank of the river Danube, 8 km from Novi Sad...
, he studied at the oldest college of the Russian Orthodox Church
Russian Orthodox Church
The Russian Orthodox Church or, alternatively, the Moscow Patriarchate The ROC is often said to be the largest of the Eastern Orthodox churches in the world; including all the autocephalous churches under its umbrella, its adherents number over 150 million worldwide—about half of the 300 million...
, the Kievan Theological Academy and Seminary (then part of Imperial Russia), and in 1871 took a Master's degree in Canon Law
Canon law
Canon law is the body of laws & regulations made or adopted by ecclesiastical authority, for the government of the Christian organization and its members. It is the internal ecclesiastical law governing the Catholic Church , the Eastern and Oriental Orthodox churches, and the Anglican Communion of...
and Church History, the fruit of which, his remarkable dissertation, Nomocanon of Patriarch Photius, brought him the golden cross of the Russian Orthodox Church
Russian Orthodox Church
The Russian Orthodox Church or, alternatively, the Moscow Patriarchate The ROC is often said to be the largest of the Eastern Orthodox churches in the world; including all the autocephalous churches under its umbrella, its adherents number over 150 million worldwide—about half of the 300 million...
. Upon his return home, Serbian Orthodox Bishop Stefan (Knežević) of Dalmatia appointed him professor of canon law at Zadar's Theological Orthodox Institute. In 1872, he published a study in which he criticized the Austro-Hungarian government for interfering in the life of the Serbian Orthodox Church
Serbian Orthodox Church
The Serbian Orthodox Church is one of the autocephalous Orthodox Christian churches, ranking sixth in order of seniority after Constantinople, Alexandria, Antioch, Jerusalem, and Russia...
and its faithful.
Professor Nikola Milaš was tonsure
Tonsure
Tonsure is the traditional practice of Christian churches of cutting or shaving the hair from the scalp of clerics, monastics, and, in the Eastern Orthodox Church, all baptized members...
d in 1873 and given the monastic name of Nikodim. Also, he was was ordained deacon
Deacon
Deacon is a ministry in the Christian Church that is generally associated with service of some kind, but which varies among theological and denominational traditions...
, and two years later, presbyter
Presbyter
Presbyter in the New Testament refers to a leader in local Christian congregations, then a synonym of episkopos...
. He received the rank archimandrite
Archimandrite
The title Archimandrite , primarily used in the Eastern Orthodox and the Eastern Catholic churches, originally referred to a superior abbot whom a bishop appointed to supervise...
in 1880. Under his administration the theological institute in Zadar became one of the best Orthodox schools. Nikodim corresponded with the greatest Eastern Orthodox and Roman Catholic canonists (Alexis Stepanovich Pavloff (d. 1898), Alexander Theodorovich Lavroff, Vasili Vasilievich Bolotoff, Pietro Gasparri
Pietro Gasparri
Pietro Gasparri was a Roman Catholic archbishop, diplomat and politician in the Roman Curia and signatory of the Lateran Pacts.- Biography :...
, Emil Albert Friedberg
Emil Albert Friedberg
Emil Albert Friedberg was a German canonist.Friedberg was born at Konitz, Province of Prussia. His Jewish parents had joined the Evangelical Church in Prussia before his birth, letting him baptised Protestant. Friedberg was educated at Berlin and Heidelberg...
, Joseph Putzer
Joseph Putzer
Joseph Putzer was an Austrian Redemptorist theologian and canonist.- Life :...
, Friedrich Heinrich Vering
Friedrich Heinrich Vering
Friedrich Heinrich Vering was a German canon lawyer, a defender of the Catholic Church against the State.-Life:...
) at the time. After the publication of his (hornbook
Hornbook
A hornbook is a book that serves as primer for study. The hornbook originated in England in 1450 . The term has been applied to a few different study materials in different fields...
), "Principles of Jurisdiction in the Eastern Orthodox Church," in which he again levelled criticism on the Austro-Hungarian authorities, he was forced to take refuge in Belgrade in late 1885. There for the next two years, he was the rector
Rector
The word rector has a number of different meanings; it is widely used to refer to an academic, religious or political administrator...
of the Belgrade Seminary (Bogoslovija). In early 1888 he was back in Zadar where he completed that same year two major works: "Roman Catholic Propaganda: its foundation and rules today" (1889) and his six-volume treatise on the Serbian Orthodox Church entitled "Orthodox Church and Canon Law" (1890). He liked Zadar, and the people would habe been glad to keep him; but the attraction of a Belgrade post carried him back there in the autumn of 1888. He was appointed Professor of Canon law and Church History at Belgrade's Grande École. Two years later, when Bishop Stefan Knezević of Dalmatia died, Nikodim was elected Bishop of Dalmatia on the 10th of July 1890 and consecrated on the 16th of September 1890. Throughout his tenure he was under pressure from anti-Serb Orthodox authorities and forced to endure aggresive Roman Catholic proselytism
Proselytism
Proselytizing is the act of attempting to convert people to another opinion and, particularly, another religion. The word proselytize is derived ultimately from the Greek language prefix προσ- and the verb ἔρχομαι in the form of προσήλυτος...
. Bishop Nikodim collaborated with politician Sava Bjelanović
Sava Bjelanovic
Sava Bjelanović was an Adriatic Serbian writer and politician, the leader of the coastal Serb Party and the most prominent Dalmatian Serb of the 19th century....
during that difficult period. He once wrote:
"Nije lak posao vladici u Dalmaciji i sa takozvanom pravoslavnom inteligencijom. Ovi i ovakvi ljudi prinudili su dalmatinske episkope Rajačića, Živkovića i Mutibarića da bježe iz Dalmacije u druge eparhije. ... Ali najteže je dalmatinskom episkopu sa Vladom, ako hoće da bude pravi pravoslavni episkop i čuvar vjere i crkve svoje. U Austriji od 1868. vlada zakon da pravoslavlje uživa jednaka prava kao i sve ostale priznate državne konfesije. Ali u samoj stvari ta je crkva u Austriji samo tolerirana."
"The bishop's job in Dalmatia is not an easy one and with a so-called Orthodox intelligentsia
Intelligentsia
The intelligentsia is a social class of people engaged in complex, mental and creative labor directed to the development and dissemination of culture, encompassing intellectuals and social groups close to them...
(many of whom were Roman Catholic, though declared themselves as Serbs). Those and like folk have caused such Dalmatian bishops as Josif Rajačić
Josif Rajacic
Josif Rajačić was a metropolitan of Sremski Karlovci, Serbian patriarch, administrator of Serbian Vojvodina and baron.-Life:...
, Pantelejmon Živković and Jerotije Mutibarić to flee from Dalmatia and seek refuge in other diocese.... But what is really difficult for a bishop is to deal with State officials, if he wants to be a true Orthodox bishop and defender of his faith and church. In Austria there is a rule since 1868 that Orthodoxy has the same position as all other confessions in the State. But the truth of the matter is that the Church (Orthodox) is just tolerated."
In 1901 Nikodim published "Orthodoxy in Dalmatia" in answer to a papal encyclical in which Pope Leo XIII appealed for union. His book was criticized by the bishop of the Eparchy of Križevci
Eparchy of Križevci
The Eparchy of Križevci, sometimes referred to as the Croatian Greek Catholic Church or the Croatian Byzantine Catholic Church, is a recognized sui iuris Catholic Church listed in the Annuario Pontificio among the Eastern Catholic Churches of Constantinopolitan or Byzantine tradition as the Church...
, who wrote:
Nobody hates Union as much as Orthodox Dalmatians (meaning Serbs).
Nikodim also had problems with his superiors. He refused elevation to the Holy Synod
Holy Synod
In several of the autocephalous Eastern Orthodox churches and Eastern Catholic Churches, the patriarch or head bishop is elected by a group of bishops called the Holy Synod...
(the executive body of the Serbian Orthodox Church) of Belgrade and later of Sarajevo because he was not elected according to canon law. Always under constant pressure from civil authorities and other enemies, Nikodim was forced to retire in early 1912. He was succeeded by Bishop Dimitrije Branković.
Bishop Nikodim died at Dubrovnik on the 12th of April 1915. The only coppy of his new book -- "The Church and the State in the Austro-Hungarian Empire" -- has since disappeared.
Legacy
Nikodim's extensive and exact legal erudition, and the skill he wrote the complex canonical laws, soon brought him a reputation never before equalled, and caused him to be universally recognized as the greatest Eastern Orthodox canon lawyer of his day. Most of his work was translated into Russian, German, Romanian, Bulgarian and Greek, and has greatly influenced modern Orthodox canonists. He produced a number of collections of canonical texts, and was particularly interested in the churches of North Africa in the Roman period. Nikodim translated The Constitution (Syntagma) of the Divine and Sacred Canons by Rallis and Potlis, and placed his commentaries in the context of previous Biblical hermeneutic works. He had a good deal to say about Church-State relations, a subject which preoccupied most of his life.His Work
- Historical-Canonical view on establishmant of Serbo-Romanian Metropolis of Bukovina and Dalmatia (1873);
- Clerical dignities in the Orthodox Church (1879);
- Codex canonum ecclesiae africane (1881);
- St. Sava's Kormchya Book (1884);
- Das Synodal-Statut der orth. Oriental Metropolie der Bukowina i Dalmatien mit Erläuterungen (1885);
- Orthodox Church and Canon Law in six volumes (first edition 1890; second revised edition 1890, translated in Russian 1897, in German 1897, in Bulgarian 1903);
- Roman Catholic Propaganda, it's foundation and rules today (1889; translated in Russian 1889, and in Bulgarian 1890);
- Orthodoxy in Dalmatia, a historical perspective (1901);
- Question of Eastern Church and task of Austria in it (1889; 1890 translated in Romanian and German);
- Principles of jurisdiction in Orthodox Church"
- Orthodox Monasticism (Mostar 1902);
- Slavic Apostles Ss. Cyril and Methodius
- Rules (Κανόνες) of Orthodox Church with coments (I 1895, II 1896)
- Documenta spectantia historiam orthodoxae dioeceseos Dalmatiae et Istriae a XV usque ad XIX saeculum (I, 1899),
See also
- Serbian Orthodox ChurchSerbian Orthodox ChurchThe Serbian Orthodox Church is one of the autocephalous Orthodox Christian churches, ranking sixth in order of seniority after Constantinople, Alexandria, Antioch, Jerusalem, and Russia...
- History of the Serbian Orthodox Church