The Sign of Saint Hierarch Meletius, Archbishop of Antioch the Great explores the life, theology and impact of St. Meletius on Orthodoxy, with a special focus on the Romanian sign language used for Deaf people in the Church. The paper emphasizes the importance of his iconic blessing and his vital role in the Second Ecumenical Synod, showing how the gestures of St. Hierarch Meletius contributed to the wording and understanding of the Nicene-Constantinopolitan Creed.

St. Hierarch Meletius is also described as the “father” of the Three Hierarchs and a landmark of early Christianity, since he was a saint without whom “Orthodoxy” and nowadays liturgical sign language would not have existed. The present book invites readers to immerse themselves into the historical gestures and signs of St. Meletius’ blessing, offering a dogmatic, liturgical, and semiotic perspective on their significance.

An important part of the work analyzes the “two-fingered blessing”, an expression of the “Confession of Faith” formulated at the Niceo-Constantinopolitan Synod. The contribution of this gesture to Orthodox semiotics is noted, enriching the “Orthodox Sign” long before the development of this topic by Ferdinand de Saussure or Mikhail Bahtin. The work also approaches the translation of the Creed into Romanian liturgical sign language, emphasizing the challenges of transposing an uttered text into a visual one, while maintaining its dogmatic integrity and fully mediating the Eucharistic Christ to the Deaf people.