Bishop

(overseer, guardian) — one of the necessary degrees of the priesthood, the first and highest, since the bishop not only performs the sacraments himself but has the authority to confer upon others, through ordination, the gracious gift to perform them. Of episcopal authority the Apostle Paul writes to Titus: “For this cause left I thee in Crete, that thou shouldest set in order the things that are wanting, and ordain elders in every city” (Titus 1:5), and to Timothy: “Lay hands suddenly on no man” (1 Tim. 5:22).

From church history we know that the first bishop of the church of Jerusalem was James; of Rome, Linus; of Antioch, Evodius; of Smyrna, Polycarp; of Ephesus, Timothy, and so on. In the Apocalypse, each of the seven churches of Asia Minor is assigned a bishop under the name of “angel” (chs. 2, 3, and elsewhere). The ordination of a bishop in the Orthodox Christian Church is performed by several bishops during the Liturgy, before the reading of the Epistle, with an open Gospel book laid, pages down, upon the head of the one being ordained.