Days of Latin Christendom and Islam - Essay Example

178222 The Aryan forces that were extremely powerful earlier did not remain so in the seventh and eight century with the far reaching power of the Mongols. Other than the shrunk Byzantine Empire in Asia Minor, Aryan dominance was only concentrated on Constantinople. There was lack of political and social leadership and a necessity of establishing new social order with motivation to regain the power. To this utter confusion, arrived Charlemagne, the grandson of Charles Martel in the year 768 and after conquering Italy, he revived the title of Latin emperor. “When Charlemagne sought to revive the empire, it was merely the Latin end of the empire he revived. It was natural that a sense of rivalry between Latin Empire and Greek Empire should develop very readily. And still more readily did the rivalry of Greek-speaking Christianity and the newer Latin-speaking version develop” says Wells (1922, p.45). His rule was the time when State had the utmost supremacy and after his death, State power receded to the background and papacy became more important during years of Latin Christendom. It was a Latin speaking world and the States resented the enormous power wielded by the Church. By then, the Romans have become Christians and they could not abide with the papal power. Christianity started with the high principles of brotherhood and tolerance, but with the high individuality cherished by Romans, Church found it necessary to have effective control. “… Christianity did cherish the principle of toleration and abandoned it only reluctantly as the need of maintaining social, and even political cohesion among Romans made centralization and authority unavoidable,” Pickman (1937, p.17\). On the other hand Byzantine Empire was the Greek speaking Roman Empire and under emperors like Constantine, it was a raw political power. Even though the emperors were totally in control, this did not rule out acute rivalry and existence of contenders to power. Rebelling against the state or defying it would have brought severe punishment. People were well protected, but had very few individual liberties. Rulers like Justinian were more focussed on empire expansion and control. Emperors did not look at the religious authority for succession, approval and guidance in ruling. No doubt the Christian power was ascending, but it did not control the political power. Byzantine rulers never accepted the superiority of the Church. The Emperor remained supreme and every other authority was defied. Byzantine were more autocratic than the States that came under Latin Christendom. By 867 wars against Islam and Turks dominated the Byzantine rulers and also inner struggles kept them totally occupied. For a long time, the struggle continued and Byzantine could not defeat the Muslims; instead got defeated in Crete in the year 911. Byzantine Empire perhaps faced more external problems, but managed to be more progressive, while Latin Christendom remained locked in many struggles between papacy and States. “The eastern empire and the Eastern Church performed two services to Europe: they helped civilize and teach the newly-settled barbarians in the west, and they struggled with and eventually converted the barbarians who settled in the Balkans,” Deanesly (2005. p.67). Emperors like Constantine did not even get converted into Christianity and retained enormous political clout. Constantine could encourage his people and army without calling for a Christian martyrdom in support of religion. “There has been extensive debate about the exact form of Constantine’s device, but the evidence which we have reviewed so often – plus the very existence of the debate – indicate that whatever it was, it was not the simple and unmistakable cross of Christ,” p.18, Key, 1982. In Latin Christendom, those were the days when there was hardly any division between the church and state and people like Dante decried this integration and slowly emperors and intellectuals tried to separate both the functions and powers. In the beginning of 10th century, secular kingdoms attained more power and the competition for supremacy between the State and the Church was inevitable. In Byzantine Empire, church remained a poor secondary to the State power, whereas Islamic world started with the religion as its ultimate power to which the political authority was vassal. Even though Rome remained the most important city on earth till 5th century, the Roman Empire collapsed gradually while European powers slowly started stepping into the limelight, which challenged the authority of Roman Church that had inherited much of its power from the Roman Empire. Medieval papacy did not encourage the balance of power and demanded supremacy. From a small bishopric, it has grown into an ultimate power in Europe to which the emperors are secondary. “Through the determined efforts of various popes and their lay and ecclesiastical supporters over the course of several centuries, the papacy was a position that came to wield unique and substantial political power as an office that required its holder to straddle two worlds: the spiritual and the secular” says John Gilbert (2001). Pope was also the Bishop of Rome and wielded enormous powers even though for sometime initially, this office depended upon the support of political powers. But during the Latin Christendom, Rome attained spiritual and political powers with the exalted background of claiming Peter and Paul. Until the 5th century, Roman Emperor controlled the church, but with the weakening of Roman Empire, Papacy became the most powerful institution. While for strong emperors like Charlemagne Pope remained a vassal, the existence of weaker emperors like Charlemagne’s successors provided the papacy the much awaited opportunity. After Innocent III, popes attained real political power that could excommunicate or depose any Christian kings if they wereare non-cooperative and this literally brought the kingship under the control of Princes of the Church. Foreign policy and affairs came under the papacy and the Church appointed diplomats to form military, political and foreign policy alliances. Their power remained unchecked and to some extent, unbridled, and sometimes this interfered with the internal affairs of the States, because the Papacy had an international face of its own and controlled every move of the States. In Islam from the beginning very little individual freedom has been established as the religion ruled every sphere of life. There was no secular freedom amongst the Muslim emperors and Islam surrendered political power and individual rights to the religion. Religious heads remained the supreme authorities. Islam was and to some extent, is an all-pervading religion that puts down citizen liberties and State power to the barest minimum. In the days of Latin Christendom, Islam was still an invading force, a terribly fanatic entity that challenged all the religions and rights. It invaded all the neighbours sometimes successfully and sometimes got defeated. This did not decrease the zeal of Muslims and they were fighting a religious war to which all other rights and powers were slaves. They never deviated from their aggressive path and the goal of religious leaders as well as the States was identical and there was no scope for internal rivalry. Islam considered every demand for power either by the State or by the individual as blasphemy and there was absolutely no scope for a conflict between the religion and political power. The papal power at times became corrupt, controlled by the illegitimate children of the popes and the Kings could not rule without interference from Rome. A time came when almost all their decisions were questioned by the Church. People started defying the royal decisions being well aware that there was a court of appeal in the form of the Church. Struggle between the Church and States became inevitable and after many conflicts, the power of the Pope was curtailed and Royal supremacy of secularism was established. BIBLIOGRAPHY: 1. Wells, H.G. (1922), A Short History of the World, Macmillan New York. 2. Kee, Alistair (1982), Constantine versus Christ, SCm PRESS Limited, London. 3. Deanesly, Margaret (2005), a history of the medieval Church 590 – 1500, Rotledge, London. 4. Gilbert, John, Church and State: The Medieval Papacy and the Balance of Power, http://faculty.cua.edu/Pennington/Medieval%20Papacy/GilbertPaperOne.html 5. Pickman, Edward Motley (1937), The Mind of Latin Christendom, Oxford University Press. Read More