Why is it that Eastern Orthodox is often referred to as "Greek Orthodox"?

Answer 1

For an answer to your question please follow the link below about half way down the page.

http://www.troparia.com/QA.htm

Regarding other posts above:

The Russians were not second. It took them 1000 years to find the faith. The ancient Churches of Antioch, Alexandria, Jerusalem were all there before the Russians.

The Orthodox Church is not a "version of the see of Rome" and the Patriarchs (more than one!) of the Orthodox Churches have little in common with the Pope. Rome broke from the 5 Original Churches of Christianity because of it's Pope. It was a Pope who sent the bull of excommunication to Constantinople and had it set on the altar of Agia Sophia thereby breaking from the rest of the Churches of that time which are now referred to as the Orthodox Churches.

The Greeks are not the largest Orthodox ethnicity, the Russians are by far.

The "Original" Orthodox Church did not divide over time resulting in Greeks, Russians etc. The Orthodox Church has always been regional and ethnic to the region it was in. They have always taught in the language of the region they were in and each Orthodox Church is autonomous from the other but are united in the following of the ancient faith. The Russian Church is a direct result of Greeks from Constantinople bringing the Russians the faith in a new language created just for this purpose, Slavonic.

Answer 2

"Orthodoxy" as a religious group can mean one of many things. It can mean a "correct belief" group - one that holds to stricter beliefs, such as Orthodox Jews. Or it may refer to a group of Christian churches. Two such groupings stand out:

1.) Oriental Orthodox: these churches, currently the modern Armenian Apostolic Church and the Coptic and Ethiopian Orthodox Churches, broke away from what became Eastern Orthodox/Roman Catholic Christianity in 325 A.D.

2.) Eastern or Greek Orthodox.

In Western usage, frequently Eastern Orthodox or any other "ethnic" Orthodox is replaced with "Greek Orthodox." I don't know why this is so, because Greeks were no more the first Orthodox than Jews, Egyptians, Syrians, Lebanese, etc. There are Orthodox Patriarchates in Jerusalem, Alexandria, and Antioch, just as in Constantinople. Most likely, Western usage of the term "Greek Orthodox" can be traced to the fact that the Eastern Roman empire/Byzantine empire centered in Constantinople was a largely Greek-speaking empire whose religion was Orthodox Christianity, and it was from this empire that Orthodoxy spread to the rest of Europe, in particular Russia, Serbia, Bosnia, Montenegro, Bulgaria, Romania, Albania, and the Czech lands. The alphabet used by the Orthodox Christians of Europe was either Greek or Greek-derived (Cyrillic or Glagolithic). Thus, to the Western mindset, Orthodox Christianity was primarily a Greek version of Christianity that had spread to other parts of Eastern Europe.

However, Greeks were neither the uniquely first Christians (Jews, Romans, Syrians, Ethiopians, Egyptians, and other converted in roughly the same period), neither were they the first political state to convert to Christianity (Armenia was), nor are they currently the largest Orthodox Christian nation by territory or population (Russians are on both counts). However, at the time of the Eastern Roman/Byzantine empire and its height, ethnic Greeks may have indeed been the largest ethnic group to embrace Orthodox Christianity, although that is not the case today, as noted above. Also, other Orthodox Christian peoples/churches are in no way subject to the Greek Orthodox church or the Greek patriarchate in Constantinople - they worship in their own language, whether it is Old Church Slavonic, Romanian, Georgian, Arabic, English, or any other language of that native country.

Answer 3

Because the Greeks are the largest ethnicity who follow Eastern Orthodox, then their are russian orthodox, a few middle eastern countries..

Answer 4

There are several different forms of Eastern Orthodoxy ... Greek is one, but so is Russian, and there is actually a much 'smaller' group of Orthodox known as 'Coptic' Christians, in Africa. READ more, and you'll learn about how and why the Catholic church 'split' into Roman and Orthodox, and then each of those split into several other churches.

Answer 5

Because in the UNITED STATES, the Greek Orthodox is the largest group of Orthodox Christians.

This is not the case in other countries such as Russia or Ethiopia.....

Answer 6

It's the other way around;-} that is a mistake.
Greek Orthodox is one Eastern Orthodox Church.

Answer 7

The Byzantine Empire was the 1st to accept it and was generally referred to as the "Greeks" in literature.

The Russians were the second to join, but the name "Greek Orthodox" stuck.

Answer 8

It's not. Not in any Orthodox parish or diocese BESIDES the Greeks, anyway.

Answer 9

The original Orthodox church has divided over time. Their is the russian, greek, armenian - you name it.

Answer 10

because its version of the holy see in Rome was established in Constantinople. the patriarch (the EO/GO version of the pope) was based there as well.