To Cut a Long Story Short
The history and development of what we blithely like to call "Christianity" is murky.
Very murky.
By the time of Emperor Justinian (527 - 565) the Roman Empire had long upped sticks and moved East to Constantinople (now Istanbul). Justinian set about recreating the old glory days, re-conquering lost territory and codifying Roman law. This put the Bishop of Rome aka the Pope in a panic because the Latin Christians had by that time developed such a megalomaniac power complex that, in their own minds the Pope has automatic entitlement, as Head of the Church of Rome to be Supreme Ruler of the World. Unfortunately for them the Emperor thought different. As did the Patriarchs and Greek Christians of the East.
So the Popes and the Latin church dreamt of a Cunning Plan. They needed to develop an alternative power base, outside the control of the Emperor and the Greek Christians, so the Popes looked West, and had the idea of turning the barbarian peoples of Iberia, Gaul and England to their purpose. The Roman church had already forged documents claiming that St Peter had bequeathed the "binding and loosing" powers that he had received from Jesus (Matthew 16) to the Popes in perpetuity, and despite making a muddle of supposedly giving the powers to Clement when it is otherwise recorded that Linus was the first Pope after Peter, they got away with it.
To give themselves maximum authority another crucial document was forged. Calling it 'the Donation of Constantine', the Popes claimed that Emperor Constantine (c. 272 - 337) had become a Christian and simply given away his all-important powers, both regal and sacerdotal, to the Bishop of Rome. Just like that.
Armed with these spurious powers that they had either faked or usurped or both, the Papacy was in contact with Pippin, a Frankish official under the Merovingian kings who himself wished to usurp the kingship from his master. In a very handy arrangement the Papacy backed Pippin to be king, while Pippin in turn subordinated himself and gave his fealty and support to the Papacy. Under Pippin's son, Charlemagne and his successors, the relationship between the Frankish kings and the Popes became ever deeper, each bolstering the other in their expanding power.
This process necessarily involved also the firm inversion of the Germanic tribes' native governance systems in which power came from the people and was temporarily given to leaders of the people's choice and where the people could remove leaders who weren't doing what people wanted them to do.
Instead, under the Latin Christian system, power comes only from God [sic] and it is passed directly from 'him' to the Pope, who then 'graciously' crowns kings as he likes, Deo gratias. The king in turn passes power down through a hierarchy, as conveniently expounded by Pseudo-Denys. People under this system of Theocracy were thus forbidden from any say in governance at all.
Under the Frankish ecclesiastical hierarchy the forgeries continued apace, now aimed at buttressing "the hierocratic thesis by surrounding it with the halo of antiquity".
More in "Medieval Political Thought", Walter Ullmann (Peregrine 1975).
This was only the early stages. Once this system had been set up, the Papacy in alliance with the newly Christianised Barbarians and Viking Pirates such as their strong-arm enforcers, the Normans, could move forward, terrorising and subjecting people in the West to their domination, before then expanding their Rule of Terror further to attack the Byzantines and the Middle East ...
Fascinating.
ReplyDeleteEmbarrasingly I have had my interest piqued on this issue as I watch the TV series "The Tudors". I have a few questions for you:
(1) You said:
"despite making a muddle of supposedly giving the powers to Clement when it is otherwise recorded that Linus was the first Pope after Peter, they got away with it."
Can you refer me to something discussing it?
(2) You said:
This process necessarily involved also the firm inversion of the Germanic tribes' native governance systems in which power came from the people and was temporarily given to leaders of the people's choice and where the people could remove leaders who weren't doing what people wanted them to do.
Can you refer me to a source for this? I love this sort of stuff.
This information inspires me to read further on these ages -- thank you.
Hi Sabio, thanks for commenting. As I say in the post, my source for all this is "Medieval Political Thought" by Walter Ullmann (Peregrine 1975). I just checked and there's no Google e-book available, but there are 9 real, physical, actual paper and glue books, used, from $1.05, available on Amazon:
ReplyDeletehttp://www.amazon.com/Medieval-Political-Thought-Peregrine-Books/dp/0140551026
It's well worth a read, especially if you're into the history and evolution of of Western philosophical thought.
Talking of which, did you come here from Evolving Thoughts blog by any chance?
Ahhh, when you wrote, "More in "Medieval Political Thought", Walter Ullmann (Peregrine 1975)." I did not know it meant, "all the above is from that source." My miss. Thanx. I guess I won't have a source for it then but his word at this point.
ReplyDeleteWell I'm not a medievalist I'm afraid, so like everybody else I have to "take the word" of those who are.
ReplyDeleteI had a quick look at a few of the specific points to cross-check for you though.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pope_Linus
Here it says that: "The earliest witness is Irenaeus, who in about the year 180 wrote: "The blessed apostles, then, having founded and built up the Church, committed into the hands of Linus the office of the episcopate."[2] The Oxford Dictionary of Popes interprets Irenaeus as saying that Linus was the first bishop of Rome.[3] Linus is presented by Jerome as "the first after Peter to be in charge of the Roman Church",[4] by Eusebius, as "the first to receive the episcopate of the church at Rome, after the martyrdom of Paul and Peter".[5] John Chrysostom says "This Linus, some say, was second Bishop of the Church of Rome after Peter",[6] while the Liberian Catalogue[7] presents Peter as the first Bishop of Rome and Linus as his successor in the same office. The Liber Pontificalis[8] also presents a list that makes Linus the second in the line of bishops of Rome, after Peter; but at the same time it states that Peter ordained two bishops, Linus and Cletus, for the priestly service of the community, devoting himself instead to prayer and preaching, and that it was to Clement that he entrusted the Church as a whole, appointing him as his successor. Tertullian too makes Clement the successor of Peter.[9] And while, in another of his works, Jerome gives Clement as "the fourth bishop of Rome after Peter" (i.e., fourth in a series that included Peter), he adds that "most of the Latins think that Clement was second after the apostle."
Perhaps you are more familiar with these sources than I, but I don't feel in a position to evaluate the relative merits of, say, Irenaeus v Tertullian as a reliable source, but to me Irenaeus, being the earliest, is more likely to be reliable because closer to the fact than later sources who may have developed more accretions of prejudice.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donation_of_Constantine
As Wikipedia also confirms, the Donation of Constantine is a notorious forgery, so there's not anything to quibble at there as far as I'm aware.
"a forged Roman imperial decree by which the emperor Constantine I supposedly transferred authority over Rome and the western part of the Roman Empire to the Pope."
The rest of Professor Ullmann's thesis chimes well with my own, albeit scanty, knowledge of medieval history, but, if it's any consolation, he is described by Wikipedia (if you believe them) as "a recognised authority on medieval political thought, and in particular legal theory".
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Walter_Ullmann
As I say, if you are interested in medieval thought, the book is an excellent grounding. Doubtless a lot more thoughtful than any number of mainstream TV about the Tudors!
Especially if they're anything like this piece of notorious junk:
ReplyDeletehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Tudors
I love Junk -- but I am a superficial, shallow, uneducated person.
ReplyDeleteLOL and very sarcastic too, Mr Lantz.
ReplyDeleteA bit of Junk can be fun, so long as one is conscious of that fact, which I'm sure you are ...
Like any diet, nothing wrong with enjoying some Junk now and again, but too much can end you up in hospital, being told not to poison yourself - by some sarky Doc!