But in the East it was difficult to carry out this harsh sentence. This was a break not with Akakii, but with the entire Eastern Church. But, of course, it was not Pope Felix who created it. He only revealed it. It was secretly created by Akakii. He united with the Monophysites, despised the Council of Chalcedon, and just as secretly despised Rome. He did not report anything to Rome and did not even respond to his direct request. And the troubles arising from this rupture were shifted to the Pope.

Acacius, of course, thought of himself as the head of the entire imperial church. Having received the formal right to rule in Pontus, Asia and Thrace, he did not hesitate to interfere in the affairs of the Illyrian diocese and even Antioch. He appointed John Codonatus as metropolitan of Tyre. The patriarchs of both Antioch and Alexandria were confirmed by his will. For Rome, this was a new system of church unity, eliminating Roman primacy. and in the East they lived without thinking about Rome. In the West, the "Easterners" contemplated a kind of eschatological picture: the establishment of a multitude of barbarian states, and heretical Arian states at that. The only Christian empire was thought to be the Eastern Empire with its center in Constantinople and did not need to be ruled from the West.

Defensor Tutus was commissioned by Rome to bring the merciless papal sentence to Constantinople. Tutus managed to secretly slip through the straits and secretly convey the sentence to the Akimites. The brave Akimites contrived to pin a copy of the sentence to the omophorion [45] of the Patriarch during his service in the Holy Synod. Sofia. Acacius punished the guilty and crossed out the name of Pope Felix from the diptychs. Thus began the 35-year rupture of the churches.

When the leaders of the rupture left the scene, a current immediately emerged in Constantinople that sought to smooth it out.

During this period, the popes and archbishops of Constantinople sometimes exchanged letters, diplomatically cold, reminding them of their mutual wrongness. Emperor Zeno died in 491, and was succeeded by the Silentiarius Anastasius (491-518), a pious man. Empress Ariadne married him and crowned him. Anastasius had sympathy for Monophysitism and hoped to resolve the imperial difficulties by compromises with it, i.e., in essence he continued the line of Zeno and Henoticon, all the while strengthening it against the Council of Chalcedon.

Growth of Monophysitism in Constantinople. Severus.

At this time, an outstanding man among the Monophysites, the monk Severus, appeared on the scene. A native of Sozopol (Pisidia), he attended a literary school in Alexandria and a law school in Virita (Beirut). He was baptized as an adult in Tripoli (488), taking the Henoticon. He took monastic vows in a monastery among the Acephalians [46] in Mayum near Gaza, where the tradition of Peter the Iberian was maintained. Severus indulged in cruel asceticism to the point of undermining his health. Then he founded his monastery and received the priesthood at the hands of Bishop Epiphanius of Pamphylia, who was deprived of his place for rejecting the Henoticon on Monophysite grounds. The monks of Mayuma, however, lived in peace with the clergy of the Church of Jerusalem, who had accepted the Henoticon. But they were essentially Monophysites. Bishop Elias of Jerusalem began to press them for this. Knowing the atmosphere of the Constantinople court, Severus and 200 of his brethren came to Constantinople with complaints. They found protection here and settled down to live for three whole years. In Constantinople a dull dissension arose between the court and Patriarch Macedonius. The Orthodox people supported the rumor that the emperor's mother was a "Manichaean" (Monophysite), and the emperor himself was of the same mind with her. Indeed, the court proposed to Macedonia to convene a council and reject the Chalcedonian oros. Macedonius replied that he agreed to the council, but under the presidency of the eldest bishop, that is, the bishop of Rome. Macedonius was a man of holy life and was very popular. His enemies even threatened to kill him. Such was the intensity of passions when Severus arrived here with his entourage. All the Monophysitism of Constantinople was concentrated around Severus, letting everyone know that the emperor's sympathies were with them. Severus, as a scholar and theologian, demonstratively multiplied his literary work, wrote against crude extremes: against the Eutyches and against the Messalians, but at the same time he developed Monophysite arguments against Nestorius and the Council of Chalcedon. and the monks of Sevirov, who had wormed their way into the court church, introduced there the famous "Trisagion" with "crucified for us." An attempt was made to do this in the Holy Synod. Sofia. But the people, offended by their insulted patriarch, rebuffed. A crowd of women and children, led by Orthodox monks, marched through the streets to the palace, shouting: "Christians! The time of martyrdom has come. Let us not abandon our father!"

Macedonia was summoned to the palace and asked to sign the Henoticon and make a statement about the silence of the councils of Ephesus and Chalcedon in order to remove the suspicion of inciting a revolt. By this he quarreled with Orthodox monasticism. Falling into this trap, Macedonius went to the monastery of Dalmatia and there solemnly testified his allegiance to Chalcedon.

Emperor Anastasius decided to remove Macedonia. A military force was prepared. The entrance to the city was blocked from the monks from outside, especially the Akimites. They prepared slanderous accusations and selected a council (!) of 511 for the deposition of Macedonius. Everything for exile was prepared in advance. The next morning, Macedonius was taken to Euchantes (the northern coast of Asia Minor). They even wanted to raise Severus himself in his place (!). But the chosen one turned out to be Timothy, who was still pleasing to the Monophysites. Timothy began by adding the name of the Patriarch of Alexandria to the diptychs...

But these whims of Anastasia's stubbornness were "the last clouds of a scattered storm." The schism with Rome is outdated, outdated!

The end of the 34-year schism with Rome (484-518).

Macedonia was honored. There was a strong current against Timothy in high society: Olivria, the wife of General Ariovindus (of the royal family from the family of Theodosius), the Empress Ariadne herself, the nephew of the emperor, his wife, and others. By his order, in St. Sofia introduced 4. 11. 512 A.D. Monophysite "Trisagion". Protests rang out. The protesters were thrown into prison by the police. Protests were also heard in other churches. Patriarch Timothy appointed a demonstrative procession with the singing of the Monophysite "Trisagion".

But the crowd was transformed and shouted: "Down with Anastasia, Ariovindus is the emperor!" The statues of Anastasius were overthrown. We gathered at the forum of Constantine. The senators expelled the parliamentarians. They were greeted with a hail of stones. They set fire to the houses. The cunning Anastasius took refuge in Blachernae and waited three days until the rebellion dissipated by various influences.

All this was taken advantage of by the officer of the Danube army Vitalian. He gathered a force of Huns and Bulgarians, and with 60,000 men approached Constantinople (513), demanding the return of Macedonia and the removal of Severus. Anastasius calmed Vitalian through negotiations, but did not keep his word, and the war began. Vitalian, already with the fleet, again approached Constantinople. It was necessary to give him the military commander in all Thrace, the title of magister militum and the promise to convene a council in Heraclia under the presidency of the Pope of Rome. Anastasius convened a council and, no matter how difficult it was for him, offered the pope reconciliation. But the irreconcilable Pope Symmachus had just died in 514, and the new pope, Hormisd, was more accommodating. He sent two bishops-legates, who stayed about a year in Constantinople. The council did not take place, because Anastasius had no fear of Vitalian. Vitalian's troops and fleet were disbanded. Ηο Anastasius feared an open break with Rome. He also wrote to the Roman Senate, explaining his position as Orthodox. Then the pope again sent legates to Constantinople. But Anastasius treated them unfavorably. He did not receive the Roman command.