The Society for Orthodox Christian History in the Americas
Posts tagged Joseph Zuk
This week in American Orthodox history (February 20-26)
01 year ago
by Matthew Namee
in Uncategorized
February 20, 1874: The future hieromartyr Vasily Martysz was born in Poland. He served in America — first in Alaska, and then in Pennsylvania, Connecticut, New York, and Canada — from 1901 to 1912. He died in 1945 and was canonized by the the Orthodox Church of Poland in 2003. To read a biography of St. Vasily, click here.
February 20, 1900: At the behest of Bishop Tikhon, the Russian Holy Synod officially changed the name of its North American missionary diocese, from “Diocese of the Aleutians and Alaska” to “Diocese of the Aleutians and North America.”
February 21, 1923: Serbian clergy held a meeting in Gary, Indiana, where they formally declared their independence from the Russian Church and their affiliation with the Serbian Church.
February 23, 1934: The Ukrainian Bishop Joseph Zuk died.
February 23, 1984: Archimandrite Serafim Surrency died in New York, at the age of 58. He was a historian, best known for his important work The Quest for Orthodox Church Unity in America (published in 1973). Until recently, Surrency’s book was the source for information on many American Orthodox historical subjects, including the American Orthodox Catholic Church, the Federation, and the early years of SCOBA. And, despite its limitations, the book remains an essential resource. One mystery which Fr. Oliver and I have been trying to solve for years is what became of Surrency’s personal files — we think they’re full of important material, but we don’t know what happened to them after he died.
February 24, 1904: The newly-consecrated Bishop Innocent Pustynsky arrived in America to take up his post as auxiliary bishop of Alaska. As Scott Kenworthy recounted in an interview with me last year, Bishop Tikhon had been trying for years to get an auxiliary to help govern his immense diocese. Eventually, Tikhon just went to Russia and refused to leave until he had a duly consecrated bishop in hand for his return voyage to America. Very soon after Bishop Innocent’s arrival, he and Tikhon consecrated Fr. Raphael Hawaweeny to the episcopate — the first Orthodox consecration in the New World.
February 24, 1931: The newly-elected Archbishop Athenagoras Spyrou arrived in America to take charge of the Greek Archdiocese.
February 25, 1896: The future hieromartyr Alexander Hotovitzky was ordained to the priesthood by Bishop Nicholas Ziorov. Fr. Alexander was assigned as rector of the fledgling St. Nicholas Russian Orthodox Church in New York.
February 26, 1895: Fr. Sebastian Dabovich celebrated the first Orthodox services in the newly established multiethnic chapel in Portland, Oregon. (To read more, check out my 2009 article on early Orthodoxy in Portland.)
On blogging history: a response to some critics
2 years ago
by Matthew Namee
in Historiography
On March 15, I published a short article entitled, “Bishop Joseph Zuk: A brief biographical overview.” I opened the article with this paragraph:
Joseph A. Zuk was the first Ukrainian Orthodox bishop in America, but little has been written about his life. I don’t know a lot, but from the sources I’ve collected, we can piece together a brief biographical sketch. This isn’t much, but I thought it might be worthwhile to get the very basics out there, so we can begin filling in the gaps.
For sources, I relied on several contemporary secular newspapers, Fr. Serafim Surrency’s generally reliable The Quest for Orthodox Church Unity in America, and the history on the official website of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church in the USA. I knew at the outset that I had produced an extremely limited and flawed article, but since Bishop Joseph Zuk is virtually unknown to most American Orthodox Christians, I thought I might at least introduce him and perhaps inspire others to do further research into his life. I must say, I have been rather shocked at the response I’ve received.
One commenter, “Jake,” offered the following:
Why invent the wheel. Get in touch with some scholars and get the real information before you put something up here. If I remember from my history class, he was born in Pidkamin or a village near Pidkamin and was influenced by trips across the border to Pochaijiv. Also he reacted against the campaign of the Polish monastery in Pidkamin that was in competition for local people’s souls. Right out of Ivan Franko!
I confess that I was not aware of earlier scholarship on Bishop Joseph Zuk. Jake, and others, went on to list various scholars for me to contact, archives for me to visit, and works for me to consult. I’m afraid I haven’t the time to engage in a full-blown scholarly study of Bishop Joseph; my aim, as I said, was merely to present the sources I had and let others dig deeper if they were interested.
On our Facebook page, a reader named Petro Melnyk offered numerous critiques, correcting certain details regarding Bishop Joseph’s educational background and commenting:
You could have checked other contemporary newspapers of Zuk’s day to verify the facts you presented, especially the church newspapers which would have his obituary. That is what a good researcher does. Also consult secondary sources such as history books to confirm facts and check bibliographies to look for more pirmary sources and other secondary sources.
A common thread in these various criticisms seems to be that I should either go all-in in researching Bishop Joseph, or ignore him altogether. What I did — publishing a brief biographical overview based on some initial sources and opening the floor to others — is, apparently, not acceptable. It’s what I do all the time, though. My writing, on this website, tends to represent a work in progress. I like to share the process of learning and discovery with all of our readers. I am not an expert who purports to teach everyone else; I’m merely a student of history trying to learn more, and excited to share my findings — however incomplete — with my readers. When I write peer-reviewed papers and so forth, of course I have to be more thorough and confident in my conclusions. But here, I wasn’t offering conclusions — merely sharing the material I’d found.
Most recently, on our Facebook page, Linda Marie Labelle gave me this advice:
I am a grad student in sociology, not history but even in my area of study we have to use proper research methods. In this case you didn’t. I think it speaks to the credibility of the web site as a whole. What is the aim? if you want to attrack other scholars to post their material then you have to set a good example of using reasonable methodology not just an article from a secular newspaper. Consult a good secondary source first as was suggested.
At this point, I’m at a loss. As I said earlier, at the beginning of my disputed article, I wrote, “I don’t know a lot, but from the sources I’ve collected, we can piece together a brief biographical sketch. This isn’t much, but I thought it might be worthwhile to get the very basics out there, so we can begin filling in the gaps.” From all the criticism I’ve received, it sounds like the information I presented was off in a couple of areas, was missing some important stories, and wasn’t based on the very best Ukrainian sources. I actually figured that that would be the result. I mean, I knew that there had to be good Ukrainian sources out there, but I didn’t have them. I knew that there must be great stories (for instance, the story of Bishop Joseph’s conversion to Orthodoxy), but I didn’t know them. And I suspected that at least something in the materials I had might have included some errors.
Does it make me an irresponsible historian for posting an article (with a disclaimer) that featured so many inherent weaknesses? I don’t know. I’m not a great historian, I don’t know everything about everything, and even what I know is imperfect and incomplete. I would submit that any historian worth his or her salt would say the same thing. If a historian doesn’t admit that he’s not all-knowing, you’re best off running in the other direction. There’s no place for know-it-alls in Orthodoxy. And when we do history, all we can do is try to be as accurate and complete as possible, while acknowleding that we will never, ever, ever be perfectly accurate or perfectly complete.
And if anyone out there actually does know a thing or two about Ukrainian Orthodox history in America, and would like to educate the rest of us, please submit an article. My email address is mfnamee [at] gmail [dot] com. I look forward to hearing from you.
Sincerely,
Matthew Namee
Bishop Joseph Zuk: A brief biographical overview
2 years ago
Bishop Joseph Zuk
Joseph A. Zuk was the first Ukrainian Orthodox bishop in America, but little has been written about his life. I don’t know a lot, but from the sources I’ve collected, we can piece together a brief biographical sketch. This isn’t much, but I thought it might be worthwhile to get the very basics out there, so we can begin filling in the gaps.
Zuk was born in Eastern Galicia in the early 1870s. He graduated from the University of Lemberg, and then earned a Doctorate of Divinity at the Theological Seminary at Innesbruck. At 33, he became the seminary rector. Later, he was elevated to the rank of mitred prelate, and Pope Pius X appointed him a papal delegate and administrator in Bosnia.
In 1922, Zuk came to America. Six years later, in 1928, he and other Ukrainian Catholic clergy left Rome to join the Orthodox Church. As a priest, Zuk served in Syracuse, NY; Passaic, NJ; Allentown, PA; and McAdoo, PA. He became affiliated with the American Orthodox Catholic Church of Archbishop Aftimios Ofiesh, and in 1932 Zuk was consecrated a bishop by Ofiesh and Bishop Sophronios Bishara in New York City. According to Fr. Seraphim Surrency in The Quest for Orthodox Unity in America, Zuk had about half a dozen parishes in his jurisdiction.
Zuk presided over the first Ukrainian diocese in America for just 17 months. On February 23, 1934, Zuk died in St. Petersburg, Florida, “after an illness since the time he was consecrated bishop” (Syracuse Herald, 2/28/1934). He was reported to be about 60 years old.
By 1934, Ofiesh had married a young girl and the AOCC was functionally dead. Archbishop Athenagoras Spyrou of the Greek Archdiocese presided at Zuk’s funeral, which took place in Carteret, NJ. Zuk was buried in Perth Amboy, NJ. Two years later, the Ukrainian diocese formally joined the Ecumenical Patriarchate — an affiliation which continues to this day.
This article was written by Matthew Namee.
