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Greek Orthodox Patriarch of Jerusalem

Primate of the Eastern Orthodox Church in Jerusalem

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The patriarchate traces its line of succession to the first Christian bishops of Jerusalem, the first being James the Just in the 1st century AD. Jerusalem was granted autocephaly in 451 by the Council of Chalcedon and in 531 became one of the initial five patriarchates.

On the importance of Jerusalem in Christianity, the Catholic Encyclopedia reads:

During the first Christian centuries the church at this place (referring to the cenacle) was the centre of Christianity in Jerusalem, "Holy and glorious Sion, mother of all churches". Certainly no spot in Christendom can be more venerable than the place of the Last Supper, which became the first Christian church.

History

In the Apostolic Age the Christian Church was organized as an indefinite number of local Churches that in the initial years looked to that at Jerusalem as its main centre and point of reference. James the Just, who was martyred around 62, is described as the first bishop of Jerusalem. Roman persecutions following the Jewish revolts against Rome in the later 1st and 2nd centuries also affected the city's Christian community, and led to Jerusalem gradually being eclipsed in prominence by other sees, particularly those of Constantinople, Antioch, Alexandria, and Rome. However, increased pilgrimage during and after the reign of Constantine the Great increased the fortunes of the see of Jerusalem, and in 325 the First Council of Nicaea attributed special honor, but not metropolitan status (then the highest rank in the Church), to the bishop of Jerusalem. Jerusalem continued to be a bishopric until 451, when the Council of Chalcedon granted Jerusalem independence from the metropolitan of Antioch and from any other higher-ranking bishop, granted what is now known as autocephaly, in the council's seventh session whose "Decree on the Jurisdiction of Jerusalem and Antioch" contains: "the bishop of Jerusalem, or rather the most holy Church which is under him, shall have under his own power the three Palestines". This led to Jerusalem becoming a patriarchate, one of the five patriarchates known as the pentarchy, when the title of "patriarch" was created in 531 by Justinian I.

When the Great Schism took place in 1054 the Patriarch of Jerusalem and the other three Eastern Patriarchs formed the Eastern Orthodox Church, and the Patriarch of Rome (i.e. the Pope) formed the Roman Catholic Church.

In 1099 the Crusaders appointed a Latin patriarch. As a result, the Eastern Orthodox patriarchs lived in exile in Constantinople until 1187.

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