Ephesus, the Grave of Barnabas, and Three Privileges

The independence of the Cypriot church was settled by argument at a council. Antioch claimed jurisdiction over the island on the ground that Cyprus lay within its civil orbit; the Cypriot bishops answered that their church had been founded by an apostle, Barnabas, and had never been subject to anyone. The Council of Ephesus in 431 found for Cyprus, and the canon it issued is one of the earliest explicit recognitions of a self-governing church.

The claim was reinforced later by a discovery. In the reign of the emperor Zeno, Archbishop Anthemios reported that Barnabas had appeared to him and indicated the place of his grave, and that the body was found there with a copy of the Gospel of Matthew on the chest. The emperor is said to have confirmed the autocephaly and granted the archbishop three privileges that no other Orthodox primate holds: to sign in red ink, to carry an imperial sceptre in place of a pastoral staff, and to wear a purple mantle.

The privileges are still exercised, which makes the Church of Cyprus the one place where a piece of Byzantine imperial ceremony survives in continuous use rather than as a revival. They matter beyond ceremony too. A church that holds its independence from a fifth century council rather than from a modern grant has a different kind of standing in Orthodox disputes about who may make whom autocephalous.