Hrynokh, Ivan

Hrynokh, Ivan [Гриньох, Іван; Hryn'ox], b 28 December 1907 in Pavliv, Radekhiv county, Galicia, d 14 September 1994 in Munich. Ukrainian Catholic priest, theologian, church and political leader; full member of the Shevchenko Scientific Society. A graduate of the Greek Catholic Theological Academy in Lviv (1930), he studied at Innsbruck University (D Th 1933), then at Munich University, and finally at l’Institut Catholique in Paris. Returning to Lviv in 1934, he lectured at the Theological Academy and served as spiritual adviser to Ukrainian students in Polish-ruled territories. After 1941 Hrynokh was active in the nationalist movement. He was a founding member and second vice-president of the Ukrainian Supreme Liberation Council in 1944, and then head of its External Representation (1946–80). In 1944–5, on behalf of the council and the Ukrainian Insurgent Army, he negotiated with Hungarian, Romanian, and Polish military officials. After emigrating he served as professor at the Ukrainian Catholic Theological Seminary in Hirschberg and Culemborg, the Ukrainian Free University in Munich, and the Ukrainian Catholic University (Rome). From 1963 he sat on the Liturgical Commission of the Ukrainian Catholic church, and from 1969 headed the Ukrainian Theological Scholarly Society. His publications include Sluha Bozhyi Andrei—Blahovisnyk iednosty (God’s Servant Andrei—The Evangelist of Unity, 1961) on Metropolitan Andrei Sheptytsky and articles in theology and church history. A close collaborator of Cardinal Yosyf Slipy, Hrynokh was appointed to the Consistory of the Lviv Archeparchy in 1978 and elevated to patriarchal archimandrite in 1982. He was an advocate of the eastern orientation assumed by the Ukrainian Catholic church and particularly the concept of a Kyiv-Halych patriarchate.

Vasyl Markus

[This article originally appeared in the Encyclopedia of Ukraine, vol. 2 (1988).]