Armenia, a martyr nation / A historical sketch of the Armenian people from traditional times to the present tragic days

by Mugurdich Chojhauji Gabrielian

In the very year while the Armenians were alone fighting with the Persians in defense of Christianity, and the verdant fields of Ararat were dyed with the blood of the martyrs, the Greek and Latin theologians were holding their council at Chalcedon, engaging the influence of the Emperor to condemn Eutychus. He had gone to the other extremity of the question with regard to the person of Christ, for which Nestorius had been condemned in the previous council (at Ephesus A.D. 431). The latter was supposed to teach two personalities in Christ, on account of his emphasizing the distinctive characteristics of Christ’s divine and human nature. Eutychus was condemned because he made the divine nature of Christ to absorb his human nature, he, therefore, was called a monophysite.

The Armenians did not accept the decision of the Chalcedonian council, not because they were in sympathy with Eutychus’ doctrine, but because the question did not concern them. Moreover some other questions decided in that council were objectionable. “From the council of Chalcedon to the death of Boniface II, bishop of Rome, was a period of rivalry for sole dominion in the church between the patriarchs of Rome and Constantinople. By the council they had been recognized as entitled to higher honors than the rest. From that date it became an object of ambition with both to secure, each for his own self, the admitted title of sole superiority.”[57] Such being the case the decision of the council of Chalcedon is like the Mohammedan creed, part truth and part lie. The Armenians had already accepted the truth. They were satisfied with the orthodoxy delivered to them by the teachings of the Apostles and the three former councils, held at Nice A.D. 325; at Constantinople A.D. 381; and at Ephesus, A.D. 431. The pity of it all is that the Greek and Latin writers represented and condemned the Armenians as Monophysites and the Armenian church was cut off from the Western (Latin) and the Eastern (Greek) Churches.

The following is from the long defense and confession of the Synod of the Armenian bishops who answered the Persian grand vizier, Mihrenerseh, in A.D. 450, a year before the Council of Chalcedon: “He (Christ) was in reality God and in reality man. The Godhead was not withdrawn through the human nature, nor was the human nature destroyed by his remaining God; but he is both one and the same.”

Another writer says: “It is now evident that the Armenian church, of St. Gregory, wholly rejects the heresy of Eutychus, condemned by the council of Chalcedon; and she does so as much as the Eastern (Greek) church.”[58] Though this charge of heresy brought against the Armenian church by the Greek and Latin churches was absolutely unfounded, yet it was a fertile source of much trouble, oppression, persecution, and bloodshed, and almost the sole occasion of the overthrow of the last two Armenian dynasties.

The influence of the Greeks in the Grecian provinces of Armenia often outweighed in appointing a bishop over the Armenians, who would be favorably inclined to the acceptance of the decision of the Chalcedonian council and some other rites of the Greek Church. Such appointments often took place and furnished new sources of dissensions and contentions among the clergy and laity. The Greeks, taking advantage of such internal contentions, did their best to unite the Armenian church with the Greek church, but they invariably failed. “The more attractive the offer of the Greeks, the greater grew the hatred of them; nor have the popes met with better success. When we reflect that this obstinate people are as intelligent as any in the world in various pursuits of civilized life, our anger at such conduct, which gave away the cause of civilization, may be tempered by a different feeling. The Armenians have fought at all hazards to preserve their individuality, and the bulk of the nation have perished in the attempt. The remnant may be destined, like the son of Anak, to redress the wrongs inflicted by their ancestors upon the common Christian weal.”[59]

The Armenians have fought at all hazards not only to preserve their individuality, but especially to preserve their church from an ecclesiastical vassalage. They fought for principle, not for policy. Their descendants seem to have inherited the same spirit. On account of their adherence to principles of right and justice, they are brought to the very verge of national annihilation. It is not the Armenians of the past or the present that have inflicted wrongs upon the common Christian weal, but on the contrary, the so-called Christian nations of the past and the present are responsible for the wrongs that have been inflicted upon the defenseless Armenians.

It is the shallow and narrow-minded student of history and Christianity, who, seeing the great Christian nations at war says: Christianity has failed as a religion, or as a civilizing force. It is not the fault of Christianity, it is the lack of it. As it is now, so it was in the past. Had the Greeks the true spirit of Christianity, or even had they some far-sighted statesmen, they would have encouraged and strengthened the Armenians on the east, instead of weakening and hastening the overthrow of the Armenian independence. They could have made them like a strong stone wall against the Mongolian hordes, who not only swept over Armenia, but within a short time swept and reduced the Eastern empire. The City of Constantine the Great became for centuries the seat of the assassins.

Towards the end of the seventh century the Greeks invaded Armenia, devastated twenty-five provinces and carried away eight thousand families into captivity. Not very long after this event the Saracens invaded the country again and secured the entire subjugation of the people. The news of this event enraged the Greek emperor Justinius II again, who with an immense army attacked the Armenians and captured the prelate Isaac and five other bishops. After receiving a sufficient number of hostages, he left the prelates alone and returned to Constantinople.

It was only a few weeks after this that the Saracens, under the leadership of Abdullah, returned to Armenia and fell upon the people and plundered the churches and monasteries, and desecrated the sacred edifices and the unfortunate prelate Isaac was carried to Damascus in chains, where he ended his eventful life of martyrdom while a prisoner. Isaac was succeeded by Elias, the archbishop of Armenia, and Gashim was appointed by the Caliph governor of the country. Gashim was by no means inferior in cruelty to the previous Arab generals. In fact, all the followers of Mohammed, from the beginning well learned the behest of their lord, “To do aught good never will be your task, but to do evil ever your sole delight.” Gashim gathered all the leading men into the church of Nachichavan, on pretense of making a treaty of peace with them; he then set the church on fire and burned them alive.

The orthodoxy of the Armenian church would not have been questioned by some of the Western writers had they not drawn their information from the Greek and Latin sources only. This could not have been avoided in the early years of the middle ages on account of the scarcity of the Armenian scholars among the Western nations. Even now the Armenian language is studied by very few. Yet a careful and happy writer, like the following, is apt to avoid mistakes: “In points of doctrine and ritual the Armenian church is extremely conservative, and has been wise or fortunate enough to avoid defining her faith with the particularity which had produced so many schisms farther west. Her formulas do not commit her to Monophysite views, although, chiefly owing to a national jealousy of Constantinople, she has refused to accept the decrees of Chalcedon.... She has avoided the use of any word corresponding to the term Transubstantiation....”[60]