By Fr. George Dorbarakis
This wondrous Father of ours, Leo, because of his exceptional chastity and purity of soul and the sincerity of his life, was ordained by the Holy Spirit as President (Bishop) of elder Rome. He demonstrated a life pleasing to God and genuine, and shepherded his flock in a holy manner; and furthermore: he completely wiped out the blasphemies of the heretics at the time of the Holy and Ecumenical Fourth Synod of the six hundred and thirty Fathers, which was convened in Chalcedon in the year 451 A.D., which expounded many things concerning the Orthodox faith and overturned the dogmas of the heretics, who were speaking nonsense about the one nature and energy and will of Christ our God.
And because those fighters against God were warring against the truth and were attempting to refute the divinely-inspired dogmas of the divine Fathers, this blessed one, being persuaded by the supplication of the entire Synod, after many days of fasting and vigil and intense prayer, was inspired by the life-giving Spirit and set forth in writing on these matters, clearly proclaiming a double energy and two wills in Christ our God. He then sent these by letter to the Synod. This letter the multitude of Holy Fathers received with the conviction that the writing had come forth as if from the mouth of God; thus, as though the Fathers had found rest in it, they opposed with greater boldness the host of the heretics and defeated their complex intrigues. And with these things the most sacred Assembly was dissolved.
And the divinely inspired Leo, after living still many years and shining like the sun with his virtues, departed to the Lord in deep old age.
Of one mind and zeal for the faith with the foremost Apostle Peter, upon whose throne he sat in Rome (“You became heir of the throne of the foremost Peter, having his mind and the zeal of the faith” - Ode 1); presided over the dogmas of the Church and was a guide of Orthodoxy (“Father, you presided over the dogmas of the Church” - Ode 3); was a dawn rising from the West (“A morning star rose from the West” - Ode 4); and was a “second Moses” (Ode 8): these are some brushstrokes from the portrait which Saint Theophanes paints today of the celebrated Saint, Pope Leo of Rome.
And rightly so: at the time of the Fourth Ecumenical Synod, when our Church was confronting the heretical absurdities and philosophical contrivances of the Monophysites, who denied the reality of the human nature of our Lord — thus calling into question the salvation of man by the Lord, that is, his relationship with God — Saint Leo was, according to the hymnology of our Church, the spiritual sun which shone forth the rays of Orthodoxy and guided the ship of the Church to the truth of the Lord’s revelation.
And the rays of his Orthodoxy were precisely what the Lord revealed by His earthly presence: that He was the Son and Word of God who became a real man in order to incorporate fallen man into Himself and make him also by grace a son of God. And this means: the Lord has one hypostasis in two essences — that is, He is perfect God and perfect man, therefore with divine and human will — but one hypostasis, that of the Son and Word of God.
“Confessing Christ as one hypostasis in two essences, with two energies and wills” (Ode 7).
What was it that made him a star of Orthodoxy in that particular era?
Saint Theophanes the Hymnographer answers: his special illumination by the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit was that which acted in his heart and revealed the truth to him — and this because he struggled to master his passions and make his mind master of himself, a true emperor.
Thus illumined by the Spirit of God because of his pure heart, and possessing sufficient human education to give verbal expression to his divine visions, and conscious of his high responsibility from his position as first in rank Patriarch of Rome — a responsibility strengthened also by the expectation of the other bishops toward him — he theologized for the Church. That is, he showed what our Church had lived until then as its Tradition, based on the life and teaching of Christ, the preaching of the Apostles, and the preaching of the Fathers.
“You made your mind emperor over the passions, all-blessed Leo” (Vespers sticheron).
“Filled with heavenly and divine grace, you became leader of the Church’s dogmas, Father” (Ode 3).
“Having been illumined by the most radiant light of God, O holy one, you proclaimed the dogma of the ineffable and divine Incarnation, declaring the double essence and the double energy of the incarnate God” (Ode 3).
The fact that, under the pressure of the Synod, he pronounced on these issues in the manner described and wrote them in a tome — a text so that this tome might constitute an authoritative writing for the other Fathers — leads Saint Theophanes to compare him with Moses:
“Moved by God, you engraved the teachings of the true pious faith as on God-inscribed tablets, appearing to the divine people and the assembly of the venerable teachers as a second Moses” (Ode 8).
With these δεδομένα the hymnographer Theophanes again makes use of the saint’s name: not only did Saint Leo demonstrate the truth, but like a lion he terrified the heretics and even the devil himself.
“Holy Leo, you appeared as a true lion, driving away the confusion-causing foxes and frightening the thoughts of the impious with a royal roar” (Ode 4).
“You were shown to be a lion both in word and deed, royally terrifying by the roar of dogmas the impious plots like those of a fox, and dreadfully cunning schemes” (Matins exapostilarion).
“The soul of the divine Leo roars, and it casts fear into the ranks of the demons” (Synaxarion verses).
Source: Translated by John Sanidopoulos.
