Lucaris, Cyril [key], 1572–1637, Greek churchman, b. Crete (then belonging to Venice). He studied at Venice and Padua and was elected patriarch of Alexandria (1602–20) and of Constantinople (1620–37). In Western Europe he had become imbued with Calvinistic ideas, and he attempted to synthesize them with Orthodoxy. He published a Confession of Faith (1629) to this end and sent many young priests to study in the West. He corresponded with leading Anglicans and Lutherans and sent the Codex Alexandrinus of the Bible to Charles I. His Protestant tendencies had no lasting effect in the East, and after his death a synod condemned his teachings. In Constantinople he was deposed several times. The sultan, Murad IV, had him murdered on charges that he was involved in an anti-Turkish plot. He is also called Cyril Lucar.
See G. A. Hadjiantoniou, Protestant Patriarch (1961).
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