Note 116 — Chapter XVI · EDGMIATSIN AND THE ARMENIAN CHURCH

The national character of the Armenian Church is mainly derived from the institutions of St. Gregory; but it was this Nerses, his direct descendant, who brought it into line with the Church of the Empire in the important sphere of internal development and discipline. The family likeness which it still presents to the neighbouring Greek Church is largely due to this prelate. The monastery is still the pivot of the ecclesiastical organisation; and it was this contemporary, perhaps this disciple of St. Basil of Cæsarea, who spread broadcast cloisters and convents over the land. A single rule was established for the several orders of monks; and the laity were bidden to observe certain wholesome regulations, among which was included abstention from animal food. The poor and the sick were lodged in hospices, and were not allowed to beg; a humane enactment provided that their neighbours should bring them food to their public or private dwellings. In each district was founded a school for the instruction of the people in the Greek and Syriac languages. Every action of the great katholikos bears the imprint of a high purpose, and overwelling zeal. That purpose was to conquer the lusts of a full-blooded and intemperate people by subduing their unruly bodies and fanning into life the spark of the soul. But just in the execution of this lofty project he was brought into conflict with the king, and the fate of his grandfather stared him in the face. The son of Tiran was indeed the son of that obstinate sinner, nor was Nerses less inflexible than Yusik. Perhaps the monarch acted with design, and wished to divide his people into separate communities of the black and the white sheep. The saints might be handed over to the sway of their prince-prelate; over the sinners his own prerogative would remain supreme. He proclaimed an edict which enacted that every debtor or accused person, those who had shed the blood or taken the property of their neighbours, should assemble in an appointed place, where no law would be allowed to touch them and each man might lead his life after his own guise.116 To that haven beyond their dreams flocked the company of the unrighteous—women with the husbands of other women, and men with the wives of other men. The brigands and the assassins and the unjust judges and the perjured witnesses, all collected at the given tryst. The place was at first a village; but it soon prospered, and became a town, which again extended until it filled an entire valley. Then the king built a palace in the midst of his congenial subjects and called the city by his own name (Arshakavan). Upon the return of the katholikos—he is said to have been exiled by a Roman emperor; but his vicar during his absence had not betrayed his trust—this truly original and royal solution of the problem of joint government was vigorously arraigned. The pontiff taxed the monarch with having founded a second Sodom; but, relenting to a mood of greater amiability, he suggested that the sovereign might continue to reside in his city if he would entrust its management into the hands of the katholikos. The rejection of this kind proposal was shortly followed by the outbreak of a malady, which decimated the inhabitants. The king was constrained to sue for pardon from the saint and to disband his colony. The quarrel broke out anew when the inveterate profligate shed the blood of a subject and espoused his beautiful wife. Nerses left the court and did not return. Arshak, in open defiance, appointed a katholikos in his stead—a certain Chunak, who was nothing better than one of his minions. He could not hope that his action might be endorsed at Cæsarea; so he summoned all the bishops of his own country and bade them consecrate the object of his choice. Only two could be persuaded to perform the ceremony; and these were perhaps pensioners of the king.117