Page 168 - Orthodoxy Zizioulas

O r t h o d o x y
united with him “as the strings are to the musical instrument,”
and above all apart from the community. There is nothing
“monarchical” about an office that can function only in har-
mony with the other ministries.
In the face of the danger of Gnosticism, it is again the min-
istry of ἐπισκοπὴ that the Church uses to prove its apostolic
character—always in connection with the local community
and the head of its eucharistic assembly. The Churches did not
appeal to lists of presbyters or teachers, but to bishops, that is,
to the heads of the eucharistic assemblies. This shows that the
ministry of ἐπισκοπὴ was closely related to the ecclesiology of
the local Church and its eucharistic character.
A comparison of early sources shows that originally the
offering of the Eucharist was referred only to the bishop and
not to the presbyters. Later texts introduce the presbyter as
offering the Eucharist and even call him ἱερεύς. What stands
behind this change is the emergence of the parish as a eucha-
ristic gathering presided over by presbyters without the pres-
ence of the bishop.
In the first place, the fact that the presbyters started offering
the Eucharist more or less ipso jure gradually meant that the
essence of episcopacy was no longer found in the presidency
of the Eucharist but in other functions—mainly administra-
tion and teaching. This led to an exchange of roles between
presbyters and bishops: the bishop ceased to preside regularly
over the Eucharist, while the presbyter was expected to do
little else. Thus, the bishop gave up the Christological aspect
of ἐπισκοπὴ and retained primarily the right to ordain, now
understood as potestas delegated through apostolic succes-
sion.
When apostolic succession itself was challenged by the Ref-
ormation, this prerogative was also weakened, and the conclu-
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