The name of Tzankoff brings to mind a strange ecclesiastical movement.
The reader may remember how the little Macedonian town of Kuku[vs]
carried from its church the books in Greek and how it welcomed the
Bulgarian monk who sang the Mass in Slav. The bishops and the clergy
of the Greek Church had not made themselves beloved in Macedonia,
where the population was indisputably much more Slav. Greek villages
were very scarce to the north of Lake Castoria; but after the
suppression of the two Slav Patriarchates in the eighteenth century
the only Christians who lead a dignified existence were the Greek
clergy. Among the Slav upper class there was a good deal of
Hellenization; to be a Greek was of much social value. But the people
generally stayed intact, because the schools so thoughtfully provided
by the Greeks were solely for the boys. The language spoken in the
home would therefore still be Slav. And it is not likely that the
people would have cherished their Greek clergy, even if they had been
archangels, when once the national awakening had begun. But what we
hear about this clergy is too seldom of a pleasing character. The
children of the Macedonian peasants might go into ecstasies on seeing
one of these episcopal processions, with the bishop's glorious white
horse and harness such as they had never dreamed of, with his footmen
round about him and with all those other priests, the old ones and the
young ones and the monks, and then the bishop's doctor and some other
men in spectacles, and then the bishop's cook and a few more monks.
But the Macedonian villagers who had to entertain all this rapacious
brood and pay terrific fees for everything--250 piastres for a
liturgy, 500 for a whole service, 500 for marriages among relatives up
to the seventh degree, large contributions under the name of charity,
and so forth--these had only rancour for the Church. Perhaps the
saintliest among the Greeks declined to go to Macedonia. One hears of
them so little and of people like Meletios so much. This savage person
was appointed in 1859 to be Bishop of Ochrida, although the reputation
he had left there--having previously been the coadjutor--was
atrocious. Protests and entreaties were sent to Constantinople, but
from 1860 until 1869 he stayed at Ochrida and carried on an implacable
duel with his flock. He was frequently received with hisses, sometimes
he was struck by stones, sometimes he was flung out of a church. But
he was not the man to be intimidated--a large man, with broad
shoulders, an arrogant expression and a bristling beard; they say he
had the appearance of a janissary in clerical garb. He took into his
service an Albanian bandit, through whom he terrorized the diocese. At
one time he had the young wife of a man who was away in Roumania
brought into his harem. The husband returned, asked for his wife and
succeeded in obtaining her, but after two months he was assassinated,
and the widow thought she might as well allow the bishop to console
her. The outcry was enormous; no one doubted that it was Meletios who
had given orders for the crime. A deputation of thirty went to lay
this case and numerous other transgressions before the Patriarch at
Constantinople. He would only receive five delegates, who read their
document in a plenary sitting of the Holy Synod. After they had
recited the afore-mentioned episode, one of the bishops who was
present lost patience and, "Is it really worth our while to listen to
such tales?" he asked. "If Christ spoke to the Samaritan woman, why
should not a simple bishop hold converse with a woman also?" "At last
the moment has come!" said the delegates. They departed, and at the
door they shook the dust from their feet. The Patriarch himself ran
after them. "Come back, my children!" he cried. But they were deaf to
his voice.
About forty years after the reign of Meletios there was still a Greek
bishop at Ochrida, but--this was in 1912, after the first Balkan
War--the town had also a Bulgarian and also a Serbian bishop. The
Greek ecclesiastic did not profess to administer a very large
flock--it consisted of about twelve families--but he explained that
his presence was made necessary by the ancient Greek culture. He was
there to watch over it. The local church of St. Clement and the
monasteries of SS. Zaim and Naoum are dedicated to disciples of Cyril
and Methodus, the two brothers who introduced Christianity to these
parts. They may well have recruited their disciples among the Slavs,
whose language they had learned before they set out. But whether the
old stones which the Greek bishop was guarding in 1912 are Greek or
Slav, he was better employed than most of his predecessors.