Un patriarh de Constantinopol în lupta contra iconoclasmului: Sf. Nichifor Mărturisitorul (758-829)
A patriarch of Constantinople in the fi ght against iconoclasm: St. Nichifor the Confessor (758-829)

Summary/Abstract: This study aims to describe the biography and the fight against the iconoclast heresy of one of the most influential figures of the Patriarchate of Constantinople and, at the same time, one of the most important theologians of the icon that the Orthodox Church has – Saint Nicephorus the Confessor, who deployed his work in Byzantium in eighth-ninth centuries. There are reviewed the main sources that present his life, the relocation of his relics, his activity as a patriarch and his struggle against iconoclasm and specialty literature reference books on the personality of the Saint. Then are presented chronologically the main stages of his biography: his birth and childhood in Constantinople, in the family of an imperial secretary, himself a worshiper of holy images; the activity of the young Nicephore in the Imperial Chancellery, followed by a solitary retirement period to an almost monastic existence. His activity as head of the Orphanotrophon of Constantinople, followed in 806 by his ascension to the patriarchal throne of Constantinople. Particular attention is paid to the tireless struggle Saint Nicephore led as patriarch against the iconoclastic heresy in the time of Emperor Leo V the Armenian and Michael II Amorium, or during his long exile, while he wrote an extensive dogmatical and polemical work to combat this heresy. His fight and his confession, dramatic example of courage and unshakable faith, received posthumous recognition through his canonization, the relocation of his relics to Constantinople, the inclusion of his name in the Orthodox Synaxarion and Synodikon and especially by his place of honor within the Orthodox Church, which considers him one of the most significant theologians of the icon, next to Saint John of Damascus and Saint Theodore the Studite.

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