Errand/Wandering Bishops

In the History and Catechism of the Moorish Orthodox Church of America there is this odd reference to the early stages of the MOCA:

At that early stage, the M.O.C. was seen as partly Moorish and partly Eastern Orthodox, and there existed certain ties with "Errant Bishops" of the Old Catholic Church, Syrian Orthodoxy, etc.

This same quote is recasted in Ong's Hat: Gateway to the Dimensions as:

In the 1950s some white jazz musicians and poets who held "passports" in the M.S.T. founded the Moorish Orthodox Church, which also traced its spiritual ancestry to various "Wandering Bishops" loosely affiliated with the Old Catholic Church and schisms of Syrian Orthodoxy.

I've wondered for some time about these "Wandering Bishops." It's been some time since I've actively investigated them at all, but I remember finding out that there was a book written about them. Unfortunately, the book was out of print and searches for it came up with nothing.

Actually, I just looked around found this message that I posted to the MOCA list I'm on in response to someone else asking about the Bishops:

Actually, this goes along my own interests. Can anyone recommend any good books? I've been looking for a copy of Bishops At Large, by Peter F. Anson, which Peter Wilson sites in his essay on MST in Sacred Drift, but I'm assuming the book's now out of print (even the publisher, Faber and Faber, doesn't have a listing for the book). If anyone can recommend another book, or knows of some place where I could get a copy of Bishops At Large, I'd be grateful.

A response to this question recommends checking out Advance Book Exchange. I did then and just did again. Same result both times, nothing.

I did see this when I was looking through the MOCA list:

also, the Wandering Bishops and the autocephalous churches movement, which played a major role in the original formation of the M.O.C. (hence the term "orthodox" and our title of "Metropolitan", for example)

Not sure where this is going, but it gives me a few more things to search. I'll have to email the guy that posted the above (who also posted the original message that I was responding to).

Crap! I just went looking for my book on Orthodox Christianity, and I couldn't find it. Where the hell did I put that thing? I checked Mircia Eliade's A History of Religious Ideas, but it isn't listed in the index of the two volumes I have. Could be in volume three. Let me get bills paid and we'll see if I can afford the third volume. Till then, I've got to track down that Orthodoxy book.

Before I post this. I looked again and found my book on Orthodox Christianity. (The Orthodox Church, by Timothy Ware) He mentions autocephalous, but only in as much as this term means self governing, and is how orthodox churches are run. There are two references to Syrian Churches. One is part of the "Church of the East" and is labeled as the "East Syrian Church." The other reference is to the Non-Chalcedonian Churches and here we have the Syrian Church of Antioch and the Syrian Church of India. Both of these groups are part of the "Oriental Churches" which split from the main body of Christianity in the fifth and sixth century.

I probably need to look into what "Syrian Orthodoxy" is. I assumed the reference was to the country, but I'm guessing now it's more an idea. By the way, Antioch appears to be on the border of modern day Turkey and Syria. Though it's not listed on the atlas I have. It's not a great atlas for these kind of things though.

So the questions for now are:

1) Who were the Wondering Bishops?

2) What was the the autocephalous churches movement?

3) What is Syrian Orthodoxy?

Posted by Matt at April 1, 2003 11:49 PM