L'évêque Melchisedec Ştefănescu (1822-1892): une conscience orthodoxe face à la modernité

Abstract

This article aims to explore the conceptual relationship between political and religious identity in XIXth century Romania, according to the writings of Melchisedec Ştefănescu, bishop of the Romanian Orthodox Church. Although his works have been valued mainly as a contribution to the political union of the Romanian Principalities in 1859, we believe that it is necessary to revisit the mainstream of modern Romanian historiography. This endeavor might allow us to understand both its continuities and fractures that undermine the official image of an "organic" evolution between "Romanianess" and Orthodoxy, with important consequences on the definition of Romanian Modernity. Furthermore, we investigate the hypothesis according to which the inconsistencies of Melchisedec Ştefănescu's public discourse (liberal and progressive in the 1850's and reactionary conservative in the 1880's) have a more subtle meaning, suggesting a metamorphosis of the bishop's theological perspective, which seems to evolve from a rationalist approach to a mystical and "national" orthodoxy, preparing thus the way for the emergence of a "Theology of Nation" in interwar Romania.