Византийское миссионерство

Somebody can say that the initial «internationalism» and «democratism» of Christian doctrine suffocated in the iron embrace of the isolationist Empire. Somebody else can put it in a different way: active mission presupposes active attitude towards life and Christian duties; in this sense mission is the invention of the Medieval West, whereas the Orthodox East followed the initial eschatological approach of the Early Church. Whatever explanation is more accurate, it is beyond doubt that missionary zeal, distinguishable in Cyril and Methodius, in Stephen of Sugdaia, in Theognoste and some other enthusiasts, was in Byzantium overcome by cultural snobbery and messianic imperialism. This is why Christian Orthodoxy lost to its spiritual rivals the Nile valley, the Middle East, Moravia, Croatia, Abkhazia, Hungary, Lithuania, Khazaria and, for the short time, even neighboring Bulgaria. Historical consequences of this cultural specifics of Byzantine Christianity are huge and lay beyond the scope of my monograph.