Contextul închinării mănăstirii Mărgineni la Muntele Sinai
The Particular Circumstances of the Dedication of the Mărgineni Monastery to Mount Sinai

Summary/Abstract: The dedication of Romanian monasteries to the Holy Places was generally made by founders or by their successors, in demonstration of their Christian faith, and with the purpose to offer moral and material support to Orthodox communities. There were cases, such as the one of the Monastery of Mărgineni, when dedication was performed abusively by the ruling prince. The monastery was founded by the boyars of Mărgineni and rebuilt in the seventeenth century by their successors, the boyars Cantacuzino and Filipescu. Through the efforts of the latter, who had inherited the quality of founders, the monastery acceded to the statute of stavropighia, which entailed direct canonical subordination to the Patriarch of Constantinople and excluded any interference by the lay or ecclesiastic Romanian authorities. However, the first Phanariot prince Nicolae Mavrocordat dedicated the Monastery of Mărgineni to Mount Sinai, without the prior approval of the founders or of the Patriarch. Notwithstanding its religious significance, the fact can be attributed to the persistent action taken by the Prince against the Cantacuzino family – confiscation of property, removal from public office, etc. Restored to power after Mavrocordat’s death, the successors of the founders did not disavow the dedication, but assumed it, out of the same religious considerations. However, they undertook to present it as a personal act of faith and will, deliberately ignoring thus the late prince’s act. It was a conditioned dedication, as the founders preserved the right of supervision and of assistance in case of degradation in their social status. Subsequently, being one of the wealthiest religious establishments in the principality, the monastery of Mărgineni succeeded in achieving its goal and sustaining the Mount Sinai community. It kept its statute of dedicated monastery until the secularization of church property in 1863, when it became subordinated to the Romanian ecclesiastic authorities.

• Details
• Contents