Slavic Orthodoxy

TheChristianization of the Slavs, which essentially began with the work of the Thessaloniki brothers Constantine – Cyril and Methodius, essentially determined their entire subsequent historical course and shaped their spiritual and cultural identity.

The choice of Constantinople to transmit the Christian faith in the Slavic language in accordance with the established principle of the Eastern Church, which it follows strictly to this day, was the starting point for the creation of the first Slavic alphabet and the formation of the written Slavic language. This strategic choice by Constantinople made a decisive contribution to the spiritual and cultural formation of the Slavic world and linked most of it to the city with ties that remain unbreakable to this day.

Over the centuries, the Slavs have formed their own particular tradition within the Orthodox Church, which, without deviating from the boundaries of Orthodoxy, is a particular expression of the experience of the Slavic soul. To describe this tradition, its scholars have used the term SlaviaOrthodoxa[1] (Slavic Orthodoxy) as an indicator of the spiritual and cultural identity of the Slavs associated with the Eastern Orthodox Church, as opposed to the term Slavia Romana[2], which denotes the identity of the rest of the Slavic world associated with the Roman Catholic Western Church.

[1]R. Pikio, “”Pravoslavno Slavjanstvo” i “Rimsko Slavjanstvo” (Literaturno – istoriografski văprosi”, Pravoslavnoto slavjanstvo i starobălgarskata kulturna tradicija, Sofia 1993, 35 et seq. See also A. A. A. Tahiaou, Cyril and Methodius. The founders of ancient Slavic literature , Thessaloniki 1992, 198-199.

[2]R. Pikio, “PravoslavnoSlavjanstvo”, 35.