Orthodox
Oriental Orthodox
The oldest surviving division in Christianity, and the one most often omitted — which is why it is here even though the corpus cannot yet speak for its practice.
In its own terms
What this body is doing
The Coptic, Syriac, Armenian, Ethiopian and Malankara churches separated in the fifth century over a formula, and the separation has outlasted every other on this chart. Modern joint declarations have repeatedly found that the christological difference is one of language rather than of substance, which makes this the clearest case available of a division that survived the disappearance of its own cause.
It is carried here without positions. These churches have exorcistic material of great antiquity — the Ethiopian tradition in particular — and this corpus holds none of it. Recording the body and admitting the gap is the honest option; omitting it would let a reader believe Christianity divided first in 1054.
Where it stands in the tree
Descent
Separated from
The undivided church · 451The Chalcedonian Definition, and whether Christ is acknowledged in two natures or out of two. Six centuries older than the Great Schism, and routinely left off charts that begin at 1054.
The same questions asked of every body
What it holds
Are the gifts still given?
Not established here. Not an exorcism question, and the one that decides the rest. A body holding the gifts ceased with the apostles has no room for a deliverance ministry; a body holding they continue has no reason to license one.
Who may act?
Not established here. The first thing a rite settles, usually in its opening rubric, and the sharpest divide between an office and a gift.
What counts as evidence?
Not established here. Where a tradition decides it is dealing with a spirit rather than an illness, a grief, or nothing at all.
Where is the spirit?
Not established here. All four inherit gospel scenes in which spirits are in people. What each adds beyond that is the largest difference between them.
Whom do the words address?
Not established here. A formal difference a reader can check by counting clauses rather than by weighing tone.
What restraint is written in?
Not established here. Every one of these traditions knows the practice can harm. What each does about that is what popular accounts leave out.
What closes the matter?
Not established here. Whether the encounter ends, and who declares it, separates a rite from an ongoing practice.
This page records what a body holds and where that is written down. It takes no position on whether any of it is true, and nothing here is instruction — the rites are described by what they contain, never as something to follow.