George the Hagiorite into a vibrant center of Georgian Orthodox culture. At some point between 1052 and 1057, George left his fellow monk George of Oltisi in charge of the Iviron monastery, and set off to Antioch to appear before the Patriarch to defend his brethren, accused by a group of the Greek clerics of heresy. The dispute quickly evolved around the canonical legality of the autocephaly of the Georgian Orthodox church, which had originally operated within the framework of the see of Antioch, but had been becoming increasingly independent since the 6th century. In defense of the Georgian autocephaly, George was referring
The Bible and homosexuality canons are included, with commentary, in the "Pedalion", the most widely used collection of canons of the Greek Orthodox Church, an English translation of which was produced by Denver Cummings and published by the Orthodox Christian Educational Society in 1957 under the title, "The Rudder". Some scholars consider that the term was not used to refer to a homosexual orientation, but argue that it referred instead to sexual activity. Other scholars have interpreted "arsenokoitai" and "malakoi" (another word that appears in ) as referring to weakness and effeminacy or to the practice of exploitative pederasty. In Matthew 19:3, Jesus is