Shoushdag (Շուշտակ)

By Armenag Yeghiayan

Translated by Vahe H Apelian

 

“ To begin, let me state that it would not have crossed my mind that one day I may end writing about this word. But that is what is happening. Therefore everything is possible under this moon.

It happened because an inquisitive friend wanted to know the meaning of the word shoushdag(շուշտակ).

I was getting ready to answer him by letting him know that he can open a dictionary and find out the meaning. But I wanted to assure myself if the word is indeed included in the dictionary. So, I opened the very first dictionary I came across in my library.  It was Father Granian’s explanatory dictionary where I read that shoushdag is a word used to describe a celibate priest who was married before he became one. A dictionary would not have understandably elaborated further. But,I always maintain that my friends need to know a bit more. That is what I attempt to do with this article without going further into the details.

Instead of Granian’s dictionary, had I opened Hrachia Acharian’s (Ajarian) Armenian ethymological dictionary, I would have read the following: shoushdag means handkerchief(թաշկինակ). No more and no less, just one word, handkerchief (թաշկինակ).

I guess the matter started getting complicated. Is it not so? One dictionary says, “celibate priest” while the other, no less and no more, a “handkerchief”. Still, you will be bewildered more should you resort to Stepan Malkhashian’s dictionary. There you will find that shoushdag means a woman’s scarf in the shape of a crescent, in a half-moon shape.

Now, try to find a common thread among these three meanings for the same word stated in three dictionaries in order to make some sense of the word shoushdag. 

That is what I will attempt to do.

***

Shoushdag is a word borrowed from Persian that in all likelihood came onto the Armenian lexicon some 2000 years ago when we had no church or clergyman. The word conveyed ordinary scarf women wore. In the time the word got likened to a half-moon as it covered half of a woman’s forehead.

Centuries went by and Christianity made in-roads in Armenia. Celibate priests who were married once, much like Father Granian, covered their head with a shoushdag but not necessarily after the death of their wives, as I will elaborate further. Such celibate priest wore a shoushdag below his hood, covering half of his forehead, as a visible distinction of his  former marital state among the celibate priests.

What makes it interesting is that the celibate priests who wore shoushdag were called the same.  Such things are nuances of a language that should not astonish us, nor should we dwell too much on it.

Consequently, the state of having to wear a shoushdag, although not something to be encouraged, has existed in the norms of the Armenian church since old times.

Just to begin, it’s noteworthy to note that Gregory the Illuminator (Գրիգոր Լուսաւորիչ) was a shoushdag.

After being exiled to Caesarea (Kayseri), he lived his first few decades there where he married a lady by the name Mariam and had two sons from her  Vrtanes (Վրթանէս) and Aristakes (Aristaces) (Արիստակէս). One day he experienced a spiritual awakening and severed his marital relations from her. Mariam secluded herself in a monastery with her son Aristakes, who was still in his youth. Vrtanes was already a young adult who conscripted in the local armed forces. Gregory having unburdened himself from parental responsibility became a lay preacher.

It so happened that the Armenian King Drtag was passing through Casarea (Kayseri) as he was returning from Rome with his 3000 strong army.  Gregory mingled with the pagan army, as it offered him an inexhaustible venue for preaching and arrived in Armenia with them.  Readers know the rest of the history. Having refused to take part in heathen rituals, Gregory was imprisoned in the deep dungeon (Խոր վիրապ). He was freed from the dungeon and became the first Catholicos of All Armenians when his wife and his two children were still alive. Later on, he summoned his two sons. Both of them became catholicos in their times. First Aristakes and after his martyrdom, his brother Vrtanes who was already married and had a wife and two children.

Nothing else is mentioned about Gregory’s wife.

Catholicos Sahag Bartev was a shoushdag as well.

 He was married and had a daughter named Sahaganoush.  After his wife’s death – although it is not conclusively known whether she was dead – he became a celibate priest. He grandfathered when he was a catholicos because Sahaganoush got married and had three sons, the firstborn was Vartan Mamigonian. There came a time when Sahag Bartev was the Catholicos of All Armenians and his grandson Vartan Mamigonian was the commander-in-chief of the Armenian army. 

A shoushdag was Khosrof Antsevatsi (Խոսրով  Անձեւացի), the father of Gregory of Nareg (Krikor Naregatsi). Khorof Antsevatsi became a celibate priest after the death of his wife from whom he had fathered three sons, Gregory and Hovhannes, in turn, became celibate priests but his son Sahag remained a layperson.

A shoushdag was also Khrimian Hayrig.

He was married and had a child. It happened that both his wife and his child died. Distraught at their death – although he bore some responsibility because of his lengthy absence from his family – he gave up on his life as a lay person and became a celibate priest and became Catholicos of All Armenians.

Should we take into consideration that the Catholicos Sahag,  was the son of Catholicos Nerses the Great (Ներսէս Մեծին) who was a grandson to Catholicos Houseg (Housik) who, in turn, was the son Catholicos Vrtanes and consequently the grandson Gregory the Illuminator, we realize that a rather unique situation prevailed among the ecclesiastical and the temporal rulers of Armenia in those centuries.

In year 62 the Armenian royalty passed to the Arshagouny (Arshakuni or Arsacid dynasty) who were Bartevs (a royal dynasty of Perthia). Their descendants ruled Armenia until 428. 

The ecclesiastical rule in Armenia started with the enthronement of Gregory the Illuminator, who also hailed from the royal family of Bartev, and the ecclesiastical throne remained hereditary pertaining to the royal Arshagouny dynasty  until the death of his descendent Catholicos Sahag in 439. It ended with Catholicos St Sahak as he did not have children.

Can we attribute the start of the ecclesiastical hereditary succession in those years because the founding ecclesiestical father was, as well as his children and some of their descendants, were shoushdag ? Some ascribe the herditary  succession at the helm of the early Armenian Church to that. However, it's more logical to ascribe the hereditary succession to the right of the clergy to get married in those (early) years when the Christian Church had not instituted celibacy,

The right of the priest to marry may be a fruit for thought for another article."