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A chorbishop is a rank of Christian clergy below bishop. The name chorepiscope or chorepiscopus (plural chorepiscopi) is taken from the Greek language χωρεπίσκοπος and means "rural bishop".
The first mentions of chorepiscopi in the Western church are from the 5th or 6th century, where they were found mainly in Germany (especially Bavaria) and the Franks lands. In the Western Church, they were treated as and operated like or vicars general. They gradually disappeared as an office by the 12th century in the West and were replaced by archdeacons to administer subdivisions of a diocese.
In the principality of Kakheti in medieval Georgia, the title of chorepiscopus ( k'orepiskoposi or k'orikozi) became secular and was borne by several princes of that province from the early 9th century into the 11th.Rapp, Stephen H. (2003), Studies in Medieval Georgian Historiography: Early Texts And Eurasian Contexts, p. 397. Peeters Publishers,
The Churches of the Syriac tradition — namely the Syriac Orthodox Church, the Assyrian Church of the East, the Syriac Catholic Church, the Maronite Church, the Chaldean Catholic Church, the Syro-Malankara Catholic Church, the Malankara Jacobite Syriac Orthodox Church, and the Malankara Orthodox Syrian Church — also preserve the office, calling it corepiscopa or coorepiscopa. In these churches, the chorbishop vests almost identically to the bishop and often serves as his representative to various liturgical events to add solemnity.
In the Maronite Church, a chorbishop is the highest of the three Median Orders, ranking above the orders of archdeacon and Periodeutes. Like a bishop, a chorbishop is ordained, and entitled to all vestments proper to a bishop, including the mitre (hat) and crozier (staff). Father Elia of St. Sharbel's named a chorbishop . (August 5, 2001) Catholic Post. Accessed 2006-08-20. The Synod of Mount Lebanon (1736) limited only the jurisdiction of a chorbishop, permitting him to ordain to the minor orders (cantor, reader and the subdeacon), but not the major orders of Deacon, Priest, or Bishop.Coll Lac, Vol. 2, col. 277; Mansi, Vol. 38, cole. 157ff,; R. Janin, Les Églises orientales et les rites orienteaux, pp. 459,460. The manuscript tradition of the Syriac Maronite Church demonstrates that the same text is used for the imposition of hand for both bishops and chorbishops. The title of the ordination for a chorbishop reads, in fact, "The chirotony by which are completed the chorbishops and the metropolitans and the high orders of priesthood."Vat. 309 (75c.) The role of protosyncellus (vicar general) is often filled by a chorbishop.
Present practice
Some Eastern Catholic and Oriental Orthodox churches still have chorbishops.
See also
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