Byzantine Art
Byzantine Art
Long before Christianity the various peoples had their own gods. There was great diversity: the gods and religion of the Egyptians differed from those in Armenia or Mesopotamia. The gods of the Greeks, and later the Romans are in fact a separate chapter and the stories around them became to a certain extent world-literature. Most of these religions were based on polytheism, except for the Jews who were the only people whose religion was based on monotheism.
As we have seen during the first centuries of Christianity the basis of Christian theology and doctrines was laid down in a number of Councils, combining the thoughts of Alexandria, Antioch, Constantinople and other important places of Christian thinking within the borders of the empire. Neo-Platonist thoughts originating from the Greek world, in particular in Alexandria, could, however, never be totally excluded. On the other hand influences from the east beyond the borders of the empire, e.g. from Mesopotamia and Persia, also found followers. These areas had not completely been influenced by the Greek way of thinking. One of the new rising religions was Manichaeism, a religion with a syncretic signature, a synthesis of the thoughts from a number of elements including Gnosticism, some Persian religions, Christianity and Buddhism, which arose in the third century.
It took its title from a man named Mani (also called Manes by the Greeks and Romans), who was born near Baghdad, circa 216, probably of Persian parents. During his wanderings as far as India he gathered and incorporated various elements from other religions into a new dualistic theology, which soon spread throughout the Roman Empire and as far as China. Manichaeism presented itself as a universal religion for the whole world. Its basis was the conflicting dualism between the realm of God, represented by light and spirit, and the realm of Satan, symbolised by darkness and the material world, which was driven by envy and lust. The Lord of the darkness, tempted by the magnificence of the realm of the light, planned an attack on it. When the world and all creatures were created, the attacking darkness was mixed with some of the divine light. Human beings, as created by God, were divine in spirit, but built from material from the bad power; they carried with them seeds of darkness, sown by Satan. The divine light in everyone needed to be released from the dark material of the body. Christ could redeem for each person that portion of light God had allotted. He appears as a prophet and is not really incarnate. The good forces had been forced to create the world as a defence of the divine realms. The bad powers could not resist the world of light. Light and dark were seen to be commingled as good and evil. They were independent from each other, but in the world they were mixed. In the last days of the world each would return to its proper, separate realm, as they had been in the beginning. Salvation could only be reached by gnosis, which can be discovered by man’s intellectual capacities. Gnosis is the insight into the process of cosmic battle and insight into how to fight envy and lust.
There were two groups in Manicheism: the class of elect or perfect and the class of laymen or hearers. The first class had only male members. They did not marry and lived in strict celibacy, neither did they eat meat, nor drink wine. They did not do physical work, but they preached and taught. The hearers lived fairly normal lives; they could marry, but it was considered good not to have many children. The hearers could hope for metempsychosis, the transmigration of souls when reborn as elect or perfect ones. All others were sinners, doomed to hell.
Manichaeism was considered to be a heretical movement by the church. Several Christian emperors, in particular Emperor Justinian I, issued edicts against Manichaeism. But in spite of the persecutions Manichaeism found many followers.
Christianity had become the state-religion in 384 during the reign of Theodosius the Great (379-395). He made Christianity not merely the most favoured, but the only recognised religion of the Empire. Christianity, like the Jewish religion, is a monotheistic religion, based on the Old Testament laws, that does not allow any other gods.[1] Usually polytheism is much more tolerant. Manichaeism lasted in the West until about the sixth century, but in the East, notably in China, it survived until about the thirteenth century. Its doctrines reappeared in other medieval dualistic tendencies. The antithesis of light and dark, good and bad, which are synonymous with a god of good and light versus a god of bad and darkness seems to live in the mind of mankind and consequently at frequent times, in one or another form, it arises again.
The principles of the Christian religion had been laid down in the Councils. The doctrine as accepted by the Councils did not allow other views. Thus, as we have seen Arianism was banned by the First Oecumenical Council in 325 and its followers were persecuted. Similarly, in 392, paganism was forbidden by Theodosius I so that in fact there was no place anymore for another way of thinking. All other teachings not in line with the official doctrine of the Church were considered heretical and since only one line of thinking based on one Christian belief was accepted, no other religions or tendencies were tolerated. On the other hand the unity of the Church could not be maintained in its long run and Constantinople and Rome gradually went their own way on doctrinal matter. The religion of the Orthodox Church became a state-religion. The religious and secular power of the Popes did not allow other powers beside their throne.
Notwithstanding the firm hold of the official Christian religion other spiritual views arose, most of them originating from the east. In the seventh century members of an Armenian sect were followers of the range of thoughts derived from the ideas of the Apostle Paul, in particular that of justification by believing. The movement is called Paulicianism. Its essence is also represented by a dualism: a god of good and a god of evil. The good god of Heaven and the bad god of darkness, the visible world and our bodies. It incorporated Gnostic ideas into their doctrine. It is not certain whether this new movement was influenced by Manichaeism. The Paulicians were striving for ecclesiastical and social reform. After revolting against the Byzantine emperors they tried to get support from Arab rulers. The military power of the Byzantines, however, was too strong. They were defeated and finally expelled to Thrace in 872. From there they had great influence on Gnostic movements which arose during that and in later periods. Propaganda was their natural weapon. But the propaganda at first was not successful. By the time St. Clement, the first Slavonic bishop of the Bulgarian church, died in Macedonia in 916, Paulicianism had made no headway. But as the tenth century advanced conditions favoured the spread of heresy.[2]
At the beginning of the tenth century the continuous wars of the military campaigns during the reign of Symeon I (893-927) against the Byzantine Empire were of importance for Bulgaria. Large parts of the Balkan Peninsula were conquered, but the conquest brought ruin to a large part of the ordinary population. The army was exhausted, agriculture had deteriorated and its production was reduced by lack of manpower that had to serve the armies.
Somewhere in the middle of the tenth century, most likely during the reign of Peter I (927-969) a new form of religion appeared in the land of Bulgaria/Macedonia. It was given the name Bogomilism.[3] It was based partly on Christianity and partly on other thoughts which could be related to Christianity but had no religious basis in the two testaments or in other religious writings. Like in many other countries most of the population, especially the peasantry, was nominally Christian. In their homes many continued to practise old rites after the official conversion to Christianity. The religion of the nobles was the religion of the population. The new religion was a combination of religious and ideological thoughts and brought about social change. Most probably it had been partly influenced by the thoughts of Paulicianism. All the contemporary evidence, the bulk of which comes from their enemies, shows that the Bogomils preached a cosmological dualism akin to that of the Paulicians.[4] The new movement derived its name from a village-priest Bogomil. The name “Bogomil” should mean “loved by God”, but according to the Church he was not loved by God (Bogu ni mil).[5] Hardly anything is known about him, not where he was born, where he had been educated, if at all, or who his teachers were. But his name has survived in his initial preaching. It was a movement of dissent, the most powerful in the medieval history of Eastern Christendom.[6] The new religion in fact was a liberation movement, in the same way as early Christianity, offering a release from feudal slavery and oppression and it therefore readily was accepted by peasants and the poor, oppressed ordinary people. It is to be understood that Bogomilism found fertile ground among them. His teaching was based on the subjection of the world to the devil. The world was the creation of the elder son of God the Father, named Satanael (the suffix “el” indicates divinity). Satanael was expelled from heaven after a revolt against his Father and afterwards he created earth and ruled over it. This was the earthy power of Satanael. The Bogomils based their belief in particular on the words of Isaiah:[7] “How art thou fallen from heaven, O Lucifer, son of the morning! How art thou cut down to the ground, which didst weaken the nations! For thou hast said in thine heart, I will ascend into heaven, I will exalt my throne above the stars of God: I will sit also upon the mount of the congregation, in the sides of the north: I will ascend above the heights of the clouds; I will be like the most High.” To people his dominion, Satanael made Adam out of earth and water. But some of the water trickled from Adam’s foot and forefinger and made the serpent. Satanael then breathed his spirit into Adam, but this too trickled out by the same way into the serpent. So Satanael sent an embassy to the Father to ask for a little life for Adam, promising that man, thus vivified, should be held in common between them. God breathed a little life into Adam, and the process was repeated later for Eve.[8] So the human being by his corporeality was under the power of Satanael, while the human mind came from the spirit of the Father – evil against good, a dualistic belief. Briefly then they believed in two gods: one is the supreme good who is spiritual and bodiless and the other is supreme evil, bodily and visible. The god of evil had not only created humans, but all the material world, and it was by his will that all things existed, not only the sun, stars, air and mankind, but also churches and crosses. The only prayer that Bogomils accepted was “Our Father”. They had no temples and praying was done at home. They did not accept the Old Testament but only the Gospels. Thanks to the work of Jesus, the second son of the Father, mankind could be redeemed. This redemption is for the spiritual human attainable by an apostolic life, by praying, fasting and refraining from all ostentation of the Byzantine and Roman Church, by rejecting to strive to obtain material benefits or living in luxury. They refused marriage, did not eat meat, nor drink wine. They were against the existence of the church as an established organisation. They advocated disobedience to rulers and masters. In fact, they were against all kinds of authority, ecclesiastical and political, against oppression and slavery. Most information about them came from the Bulgarian priest Cosmas, who wrote in about 970 a detailed, vivid and first-hand account of the movement.[9] For the Church the Bogomil teaching was difficult to refute, because it was more human than Christian teaching. Consequently, the Bogomils were fought by force instead of by arguments. There should only be one Christian belief, that of the Church. Any other way of thinking was impossible and was considered as a heresy. A great problem was that there were no written sources of the Bogomil doctrine which made it more difficult for the Church to combat it. In fact all that became known about their doctrine could only be learned from the ecclesiastical writings of their adversaries. Orthodox opponents left literature about the Bogomils showing some understanding. The church teaches that God is the source of all perfection and that the whole world, visible and invisible, is His creation. Must He then be held responsible for wars, epidemics, the oppression of the poor by the rich. How can God, the Supreme Good, be the cause of suffering and evil?[10] The few parish priests of that time could not give a satisfactory answer to that question. For the ordinary people the Bogomil answer was quite clear, because the world is the creation of Satanael. To escape from his grasp and to be united with God, man must avoid as far as possible every contact with the world of flesh, through which the devil seeks to gain mastery of his soul.[11] They preached evangelical poverty, purity and asceticism and consequently abstinence from sexual intercourse, meat and wine, rules that seems to have been fairly strictly obeyed. Their teaching was simple: how can one adore the cross? If the Jews crucified the Son of God on it, then the cross is the enemy of God. How could that wood be dear to Him? The Bogomils did not believe that the words of priests were sanctified by God: if priests are sanctified, then why do they not live as they should?[12]
In the eleventh century the Bogomils also took up residence in Constantinople. Emperor Alexius Comnenus opposed them by taking severe measures. The Bogomil movement was not only opposed by the Church of Constantinople, but also by the Church of Rome, as well as by representatives of the secular government. The heresy movement was rapidly spreading in other parts inhabited by South Slavs. They were persecuted among others by the Grand Zupan Stefan Nemanja of the state of Raška, now Serbia, who sent his army against the Bogomils, punishing them and expelling them. Nevertheless the number of believers increased steadily. It was only during the twelfth century that they were expelled from the Byzantine Empire, but their religion remained alive for a considerable time, only disappearing after the Turks had conquered the Balkan Peninsula. A large number of their followers settled in the lands of what is at present Bosnia, where Bogomilism had an enormous influence and where it even became, for a short period an independent official religion around the year 1200. It was absorbed after the Turks conquered the area. The dualistic heretical movement lasted some hundred years and spread over a large area: from Armenia in the east to the south of France. Its various forms were known by its names of the followers like the Patarenes, Babuni, Cathari and Albigenses. It gained in importance in northern Italy, in particular in the cities of Lombardy and in the south of France, where the Cathari had a number of bishoprics including those of Albi, Toulouse and Carcassone. The Cathar heresy was an offshoot of Bogomilism, which had its deepest roots around Toulouse. In western countries such heretical doctrines attacked the foundations of the Catholic and Papal power. Consequently both Church and State united to attack them. In the south of France they are better known as the Albigenses. In particular they became known because of the cruelties they had to endure. The Dominican Order was founded to combat the heresy. Pope Innocent III declared a crusade against the Albigenses in 1209. An army from the north of France marched against Toulouse and the Provence and massacred the inhabitants, sparing neither Cathar nor Catholic. The movement, however, though somewhat subdued, remained alive. But persecution such as by the Inquisition was more successful. The great fortress of Montségur, a stronghold to which they had withdrawn, was captured and destroyed in 1244. The few followers that remained were forced to go underground. The movement lingered on through the fourteenth century, but disappeared soon thereafter.
Exodus 20: 3 “Thou shalt have no other gods before me” ↑
Runciman, Steven, The Medieval Manichee, a study of the Christian Dualist Heresy, Cambridge, 1947, p. 66 ↑
Fine, Early Medieval Balkans, p. 171-179, s.v. The Bogomil Heresy; Angold, Michael, Church and Society under the Comneni 1081-1261, Cambridge, 1995, p. 468-501, s.v. The Bogomils ↑
Obolensky, p. 121 ↑
Runciman, p. 67 (with note) ↑
Obolensky, p. 121 ↑
Isaiah 14:12-14 ↑
Runciman, p. 75 op.cit ↑
Obolensky, p. 122-123 (with note 22) ↑
ibid, p. 122 ↑
ibid, p. 123 ↑
Fine, Early Medieval Balkans, p. 174 ↑