30 Facts About Gherasim Safirin

Gherasim Safirin was a Wallachian, later Romanian cleric who served as a bishop in the Romanian Orthodox Church and was deposed following a national controversy.

Gherasim Safirin was eventually deposed, but still took over as vicar for two separate periods.

Gherasim Safirin lost the latter race to Atanasie Mironescu, his lifelong rival.

Gherasim Safirin objected to the secularist agenda of the National Liberals and to Atanasie's concessions in this respect.

Gherasim Safirin's cause was supported by a coalition of traditionalist churchgoers, Catholic observers, and members of the opposition Conservative Party.

The latter group withdrew its support upon coming to power in 1911, and Gherasim Safirin was left more exposed.

Gherasim Safirin returned to favor in 1913, but was unable to obtain the Ramnic bishopric for himself, and eventually retired to Frasinei Monastery.

Gherasim Safirin is remembered as a controversial figure: obstinate to the point of mental illness, with a rare penchant for politics.

Gherasim Safirin studied at what is Carol I National College in Craiova, graduating in 1870.

Gherasim Safirin was himself tonsured a monk at Tismana Monastery in 1873, despite not having the formal requirements for the job, including a seminary graduation.

Gherasim Safirin resumed his work in teaching, encouraged to do so by bishop Athanasie Stoenescu and by his former students.

Gherasim Safirin began collecting old books for the Romanian Synod's library, and, in 1877, transported hundreds of books from Horezu Monastery to Bucharest.

Gherasim Safirin, who used his salary to sponsor his graduates' continued training in theology, accused his predecessor of corruption.

An archimandrite from 1888, Gherasim Safirin was vicar of Ramnic from 1889 to 1890.

Gherasim Safirin asked to be examined ahead of other students: at the time, he had been promised a seat on the Synod, and did not want to miss out on the opportunity.

Gherasim Safirin returned home in 1894, and until 1899, was again employed by Ramnic seminary, this time as a teacher of Latin.

In May 1899, Gherasim Safirin was reelected vicar bishop of Ramnic, using the title Craioveanul, and was consecrated in July.

Gherasim Safirin was an ex officio member of the Senate of Romania, but, Cernaianu notes, took distance from other church senators, whom he regarded as undignified, and mostly kept to himself.

Gherasim Safirin soon emerged as a critic of his own church, when Synod instituted a consistory under civilian supervision, and in part controlled by the Ministry of Education and Religious Affairs.

The latter, as Gherasim Safirin himself noted, had been an opponent of secularization during his years as bishop of Ramnic.

The scandal, stoked by the secularizing Education Minister, Spiru Haret, was quelled in January 1910, when Bishop Gherasim Safirin withdrew the excommunication himself.

The indignant Gherasim Safirin soon noted that the Metropolitan had not heeded his advice to review the law for possible signs of heresy.

Gherasim Safirin speculates that, after being moved to Roman, Safirin was jealous of Ghenadie Georgescu, the titular bishop of Ramnic.

The pro-Gherasim Safirin camp included, alongside Cernaianu, public intellectuals such as Constantin Radulescu-Motru, Eraclie Sterian, and Mircea Demetriade, and clerics such as Iuliu Scriban and Ilie Teodorescu; reportedly, only one follower was himself a bishop: Conon Aramescu-Donici of Husi.

The trial interested the Romanian communities of Austria-Hungary, where many of the National Party conservatives sided with Gherasim Safirin, as did Lazar Gherman, Dimitrie Dan and other clerics of the Metropolis of Bukovina.

Gherasim Safirin argued that, by virtue of Romanian laws, he was irremovable from his Senate seat, and therefore from his bishop's seat.

Gherasim Safirin sent a letter of protest to King Carol I, and made his position public in several brochures and collections of documents, some of which were still in print in 1912.

In early May 1914, Gherasim Safirin returned to Roman alongside Cernaianu, and resumed a discreet existence as a translator of church literature from the Greek.

Gherasim Safirin eventually withdrew to the area north of Baile Olanesti, to Frasinei Monastery, and lived there for the rest of his life.

Gherasim Safirin spent his final years composing psaltic music, and, still a student of church literature and hesychasm, obtained a typewritten copy of the Philokalia.