Panodorus of Alexandria was an Egyptian Byzantine monk, historian and writer who lived around 400.
He introduced a world era calculation, which reckoned 5,904 years from Adam (in Greek "από κτίσεως κόσμου", "apo ktiseos kosmou" or "έτος κόσμου", "aetos kosmou", that is 'since world's creation' or "Anno Mundi") to the year 412 CE, about which time he lived. This era is usually termed the Antiochian , sometimes the Alexandrian era . Its new year was also transferred to September 1, in which case the eight latter months of its year 5493 are the eight former months of the year one of our chronology. More important than this is the Byzantine World Era , which long served as the standard of computation in the Eastern Empire, in Russia, among the Albanians, Servians, and Modern Greeks. It counts sixteen years in excess of the Antiochian era, though likewise beginning the year with September 1; its year 5509 began with September 1 of the year one before Christ. This era was in use in Russia until 1700; whence it originated appears not to be known. [1] By the 10th century, this dating system (its beginning fixed at 5509 BCE) became standard in the Byzantine Empire and thereby, the Orthodox countries of Eastern Europe. But as such Anno Mundi time systems became very popular, they created a huge problem: end-of-world fever, caused by a threatening Seventh Day that equated to the end of the 6000-year period and corresponded to a date 500 years after Christ's birth year. So many Chiliasm, or Millenarianism, emphasizing religious movements arose at that period. In 1492, Sir Thomas Browne supported also the belief that the world was created in 5509 BCE and that its ordained lifetime was 7,000 years.
The terms anno Domini (AD) and before Christ (BC) are used to label or number years in the Julian and Gregorian calendars. The term anno Domini is Medieval Latin and means 'in the year of the Lord', but is often presented using "our Lord" instead of "the Lord", taken from the full original phrase "anno Domini nostri Jesu Christi", which translates to 'in the year of our Lord Jesus Christ'.
Common Era (CE) and Before the Common Era (BCE) are year notations for the Gregorian calendar, the world's most widely used calendar era. Common Era and Before the Common Era are alternatives to the Anno Domini (AD) and Before Christ (BC) notations used by Dionysius Exiguus. The two notation systems are numerically equivalent: "2022 CE" and "AD 2022" each describe the current year; "400 BCE" and "400 BC" are the same year.
The Eastern Orthodox Church, also called the Orthodox Church, is the second-largest Christian church, with approximately 220 million baptized members. It operates as a communion of autocephalous congregations, each governed by its bishops and adherents in local synods. The church has no central doctrinal or governmental authority analogous to the head of the Roman Catholic Church—the Pope—but the Ecumenical Patriarch of Constantinople is recognized by them as primus inter pares and regarded as the spiritual leader of many of the eastern Christian parishes. As one of the oldest surviving religious institutions in the world, the Eastern Orthodox Church has played a prominent role in the history and culture of Eastern and Southeastern Europe, the Caucasus, and the Near East. The Eastern Orthodox Church officially calls itself the Orthodox Catholic Church.
The Julian calendar, proposed by Julius Caesar in AUC 708, was a reform of the Roman calendar. It took effect on 1 January AUC 709 , by edict. It was designed with the aid of Greek mathematicians and astronomers such as Sosigenes of Alexandria.
In chronology and periodization, an epoch or reference epoch is an instant in time chosen as the origin of a particular calendar era. The "epoch" serves as a reference point from which time is measured.
Dionysius Exiguus was a 6th-century Eastern Roman monk born in Scythia Minor. He was a member of a community of Scythian monks concentrated in Tomis, the major city of Scythia Minor. Dionysius is best known as the inventor of Anno Domini (AD) dating, which is used to number the years of both the Gregorian calendar and the (Christianised) Julian calendar. Almost all churches adopted his computus for the dates of Easter.
An exarch was the holder of any of various historical offices, some of them being political or military and others being ecclesiastical.
The Greek Orthodox Patriarchate of Antioch, also known as the Antiochian Orthodox Church and legally as the Greek Orthodox Patriarchate of Antioch and All the East, is an autocephalous Greek Orthodox church within the wider communion of Eastern Orthodox Christianity. Headed by the Greek Orthodox patriarch of Antioch, it considers itself the successor to the Christian community founded in Antioch by the Apostles Peter and Paul.
A calendar era is the period of time elapsed since one epoch of a calendar and, if it exists, before the next one. For example, it is the year 2022 as per the Gregorian calendar, which numbers its years in the Western Christian era.
The Era of the Martyrs, also known as the Diocletian era, is a method of numbering years used by the Church of Alexandria beginning in the 4th century AD/CE and by the Coptic Orthodox Church of Alexandria from the 5th century to the present. Western Christians were aware of it but did not use it. It was named for the Roman Emperor Diocletian who instigated the last major persecution against Christians in the Empire. Diocletian began his reign on 20 November 284, during the Alexandrian year that began on 1 Thoth, the Egyptian New Year, or 29 August 284, so that date was used as the epoch: year one of the Diocletian era began on that date. This era was used to number the year in Easter tables produced by the Church of Alexandria.
Anno Mundi, abbreviated as AM or A.M., or Year After Creation, is a calendar era based on the biblical accounts of the creation of the world and subsequent history. Two such calendar eras have seen notable use historically:
The Holocene calendar, also known as the Holocene Era or Human Era (HE), is a year numbering system that adds exactly 10,000 years to the currently dominant numbering scheme, placing its first year near the beginning of the Holocene geological epoch and the Neolithic Revolution, when humans shifted from a hunter-gatherer lifestyle to agriculture and fixed settlements. The current year by the Gregorian calendar, AD 2022, is 12022 HE in the Holocene calendar. The HE scheme was first proposed by Cesare Emiliani in 1993, though similar proposals to start a new calendar at the same date have been put forward decades earlier.
Antiochian Greek Christians are a Levantine Arabic-speaking ethnoreligious Eastern Christian group residing in the Levant region. They are either members of the Greek Orthodox Church of Antioch or the Melkite Greek Catholic Church, and they have ancient roots in the Levant, more specifically, the territories of western Syria, northern and central Lebanon, western Jordan, and the southern Turkish province of Hatay, which includes the city of Antakya —one of the holiest cities in Eastern Christianity. Many of their descendants now live in the global Near Eastern Christian diaspora. With Arabic becoming the lingua franca in the Levant, they primarily speak Levantine.
The Byzantine calendar, also called Roman calendar, Creation Era of Constantinople or Era of the World, was the calendar used by the Eastern Orthodox Church from c. 691 to 1728 in the Ecumenical Patriarchate. It was also the official calendar of the Byzantine Empire from 988 to 1453 and of Kievan Rus' and Russia from c. 988 to 1700. This calendar was used also in other areas of the Byzantine commonwealth such as in Serbia, where it is found in old Serbian legal documents such as Dušan's Code, thus being referred to as the Serbian Calendar as well. Since Byzantine is a historiographical term, the original name uses the adjective "Roman" as it was what the Eastern Roman Empire continued calling itself.
Periodized human history is commonly divided into three main eras – Ancient, Post-classical, and Modern.
The History of the Eastern Orthodox Church is the formation, events, and transformation of the Eastern Orthodox Church through time.
Hellenistic Judaism was a form of Judaism in classical antiquity that combined Jewish religious tradition with elements of Greek culture. Until the fall of the Western Roman Empire and the early Muslim conquests of the eastern Mediterranean, the main centers of Hellenistic Judaism were Alexandria in Egypt and Antioch in Syria, the two main Greek urban settlements of the Middle East and North Africa region, both founded at the end of the fourth century BCE in the wake of the conquests of Alexander the Great. Hellenistic Judaism also existed in Jerusalem during the Second Temple Period, where there was conflict between Hellenizers and traditionalists.
The Greeks in Syria arrived in the 7th century BC and became more prominent during the Hellenistic period and when the Seleucid Empire was centered there. Today, there is a Greek community of about 4,500 in Syria, most of whom have Syrian nationality and who live mainly in Aleppo, Baniyas, Tartous, and Damascus, the capital. There are also about 8,000 Greek-speaking Muslims of Cretan origin in Al-Hamidiyah.
A particular church is an ecclesiastical community of faithful headed by a bishop, as defined by Catholic canon law and ecclesiology. A liturgical rite depends on the particular church the bishop belongs to. Thus "particular church" refers to an institution, and "liturgical rite" to its ritual practices.
The following outline is provided as an overview of and topical guide to the Catholic Church:
