Church-administrative activities of Mukachevo «quasi»-bishop Ivan Joseph Godermarsky by the documents of State Archives in Transcarpathian Region
Authors: Monych Olexander 
Published: March 2023

The administrative activities of the bishop-nominee Ivan Joseph Godermarsky (1706–1716) is quite fully covered in the domestic historical literature. However, due to the lack of sources from local State Archives in Transcarpathian region presented in these publications– the topic remains open for further, scrupulous research.

The aim of the research is to reconstruct church-administrative activities of Mukachevo «quasi»-bishop Ivan Joseph Godermarsky after discovery of the materials of the State Archives in Transcarpathian region.

The methodological basis of the study are the principles of heuristics, interdisciplinary and documentary analysis, historicism, objectivity and synthesis. The principle of heuristics makes it possible to introduce the discovered documents into the scientific circulation, thanks to which the constant knowledge about the activities of the «quasi»-bishop Godermarsky is significantly expanded. The interdisciplinary approach considerably enriches the narrow framework of the bishop's church-administrative service and offers a more objective description of the bishop's activities. The principle of historicism makes it possible to reproduce the chronology and certain aspects of the bishop's rule in the context of church-political relations in the region. The objectivity of the research is expressed in unbiased coverage of the bishop's activities. Scientific analysis and synthesis allow us to determine the place and role of the bishop-nominee in the history of the development of Mukachevo Greek-Catholic Eparchy in the first quarter of the 18th century.

Scientific novelty of the research. Today, more and more often, permanent knowledge about the formation and development of both Mukachevo Greek Catholic and Máramaros Orthodox Eparchies is updated with new documents and relevant research. The proposed research primarily introduces new sources into the scientific circulation, which significantly supplement the historical past of the ecclesiastical Transcarpathia with new data. Secondly, the research presents separate documents released from the field of view of the predecessors, the introduction of which to the scientific world today corrects permanent conclusions and allows to expand the thematic range of research related to the activities of Mukachevo and Máramaros Episcopates in the first half of the 18th century. The practical significance of the obtained results will contribute to a comprehensive study of both the ecclesiastical past of the Orthodox and Greek Catholic Churches in Transcarpathia in the 18th century, as well as a comprehensive study of the ecclesiastical history of Ukraine in general.

Conclusions. The activities of the «quasi»-bishop Ivan Joseph Godermarsky vividly demonstrate another «black day» in the post-Union development of Mukachevo Greek Catholic Eparchy. During his reign, the bishop-nominee, due to personal ambitions, brought more problems to the eparchy than benefits that would contribute to the formation of an ecclesiastical unit. At the same time, his church-administrative activity contributed to the spread of the union in the eparchy and the jurisdictional incorporation of the Orthodox parishes of Ugochansky and Máramaros counties.