Early Christian History
This is from a Master's paper I wrote for my Early Christian History class.
In what ways were women involved in the development of Christianity from the beginning of the Christian movement until the end of the fifteenth century? Why were these women influential? What might Christians today learn from their example? In your response, please highlight the contributions of at least three individual women.
In the 200s AD, Thecla's behavior of waiting by the window for Paul countered familial and social expectations by refusing her fiance's advances. In this patriarchal world, with few resources (if any) for single women, to abstain from the material security provided by marriage to a man was unheard of and arguably stupid -- it makes sense that the mother would have such an intense emotional reaction to her daughter's pursuit of Paul’s mission work and neglect of her fiancee, Thamyris. This mother watched her child turn away from the safety and expectations of society to follow this... strange man preaching counter-culture / illegal rhetoric that disturbed the patriarchal status quo and made little pragmatic sense in the eyes of the observers.
However, Paul commissioned Thecla to minister the Word of God and empowered her in a fulfilling and significant role to her values. Back home, she was tossed in the den of beasts for those same convictions. It is telling that Thecla had fans. In her suffering, her female fans were emotionally attached to Thecla's ordeal, for she represented courage and freedom from the patriarchal status quo. Though undergoing a harrowing experience in the den of beasts, she represented an alternative to a Greco-Roman woman's shadowed and sociologically pre-determined life. Paul's message was a conversion to Christ and a liberation from the Greco-Roman way.
In the 500s, Theodora played a large role in advancing Christianity within the Roman empire, alongside her emperor husband Justinian. She held influential power and established a lively monastery where any of the 500 monks and nuns could attend worship, and while she did support non-Chalcedonian positions, she did offer safe haven to Chalcedonians in her monastery. Thedora’s worship services did include the phrase ‘the immortal God who was crucified for us’ in the liturgy. She worked to advance Christian interests abroad in her foreign policy and even used her Chalcedonian allies to strengthen her interests and influence.
I was surprised to learn that Christianity empowered women in Medieval Europe in 600-700AD -- I held an orthodox view of Europe. I didn't consider how liberating Christianity would be amongst socio-economic classes.
As described by Irvin & Sunquist, Christianity not only flourished amongst women, but its evangelism and missionary strategy was carried out predominantly by women. This evangelism spread across all classes -- from queens converting their husbands to low-income women serving as missionaries and peregrini, to women owning land/estates, to finding safety from Frankish laws that did little to prosecute rape and sexual assault. Western Christianity exalted women during the Merovingian dynasty, and while that empowerment was discouraged in the later Carolingian era, that era fostered women's literacy, land ownership, and community. Examples of this include the Head of the Abbess, Burgundorfa, who was one of few women during her time who held institutional authority and oversaw men and women alike, and Queen Etheldreda, a widow who refused to remarry and who eventually left nobility for a convent where she would rise in status and for the gift of prophecy. These havens were popular, as they were calm, nurturing environments powered by devout Christian nuns that countered the dangerous patriarchy of the secular city.
I appreciate Butler's point that 'life in antiquity abounded in anxiety and misery for nearly everyone'. Though life was wrought with hardship, it was less challenging for the wealthy men who dominated society. Men did not need women to secure their livelihood, such as Thecla needed Thamyris in Iconium. Those who lived in poor conditions, opposite the comfort and glory of the wealthy patriarchy, had no power or purpose beyond their reproductive abilities. It was inevitable that this oppression would turn to an alternative faith and way of life. When mankind fails repeatedly, the Christian faith offers an emotional, spiritual, and, in the cases of Thecla, Queen of Etheldera, or Burgundorfa, a physical way out. However, Christianity is not just a tool for liberation from oppression – powerful women have used Christianity to advance their agenda while also advancing Christianity, just as Theodora did.
Women across all socio-economic sectors can find empowerment and liberation through Christianity. I see modern women using Instagram and TikTok to promote their brand or business, and many women use their faith as part of their online narrative, which both advances their interests as well as strengthens the Christian community.
I wish more women knew about women of Christian history, and not only those within the Bible. The modern-day Western image of a Christian woman is still very much subservient to her husband, and this class really taught me to push against that thinking.
How did the relationship between Christianity and governmental powers develop between the second and sixteenth centuries? What are some examples of the ways in which Christianity has interacted with empire?
The expansion of Christianity across Europe / West, North Africa, and Persia / East caused massive societal and cultural upheavals in their respective lands. As Christianity proliferated through Western and Eastern philosophies, we see a real divide starting in the 4th century with Emperor Constantine. Emperor Constantine was the first Christian Roman Emperor, reigning from 306-337 AD. He defended and incorporated Christianity into his Roman imperialist plans and strategy.
Quickly, Christianity evolved from a source of enlightenment and salvation for its people to being used as a tool of imperialism. Christianity gained sufficient power and status within Rome / Western Europe. Strategic politicians either identified openly as Christians or understood the political power of serving as a public defender of Christianity in the global domain. This series of actions effectively claimed that Christianity was now part of the Roman State's agenda. Since Rome sat as the West's major economic and political power, this claim would ultimately lead to more cultural/religious conflicts, notably between Rome and Persia.
Persian Christianity was expanding in the 4th century, but not to the delight of the political leaders. Persia and Rome had very different cultures, identities, values, and geographies. Persia's state religion, Zoroastrianism, dominated the political and cultural landscape, and this new Christianity from the Mediterranean / Rome was exceedingly threatening. Persia would launch a full-scale persecution of Christians, initially starting with a heavy tax penalty and followed by mass executions, particularly on those who converted from Zoroastrianism to Christianity.
In Milan, after Constantine's reign ended, key bishop Ambrose of Milan directly corresponded with Roman Emperor Theodosius 1. Ambrose was upset that Rome wanted to rebuild a Jewish synagogue after its destruction, and Ambrose felt it was a slight against Christianity in Rome.
I imagine myself as a Roman Christian in the 300s. In that case, I might agree with Ambrose, I may feel validated by Constantine's support, and I may feel motivated to engage in international warfare when I learn my Persian Christian brothers and sisters are being killed for exactly what my country now represents (Christian motives backed by powerful State). But what if I was a Roman Christian, but Emperor Constantine's interpretation didn't align with mine? What if I was one of the other sects and felt Constantine bastardized and exploited my faith for political power?
Christianity was then at a jumping-off point in the 300s and 400s -- it could no longer be a simple social community and set of beliefs to alleviate the daily discomforts of life and bring together those in fellowship and ritual. It had now become like a knife, which could be used to cut bread for a neighbor or as a weapon against an enemy -- and the more influential the user, the more dangerous the knife would be.
In the 11th through 13th centuries, we see papal authority bridge political authority to the point of international war in the form of the Crusades. The “…spiritual and political reasons for crusading combined to create one of the most powerful and effective ideologies the Christian movement has ever seen.” “They conceived of that society instead as a single whole, united under the spiritual authority of the pope…. Accordingly, war waged at the pope’s bidding acquired a sacred meaning that significantly transcended immediate material and political ends.” Under formal Christian rule, international conflict and war could now be justified for religious reasons.
In the 13th and 14th centuries, papal authority clashed with political governance. The benefit of clergy aligning themselves with governments is the benefit of their purses and armies, especially considering the ongoing conflict in the Middle East.
The birth of the printing press, gunpowder, and magnetic iron compasses changed warfare and print media, lending to a growing sense of national identity and military in Western Europe. French, English, German, and Spanish were fully used national languages. These countries could mass-print literature about politics and religion in their vernacular and distribute it to citizens. These countries were all Christian, but they had differences in their cultures and politics. Eventually, France and England found themselves in The Hundred Years War, with Joan of Arc as the celebrity Christian warrior martyr. Additionally, the Renaissance was in full swing following the plague and all these regional conflicts, and the birth of Humanism brushed against the values of Christianity.
King Phillip IV attempted to tax and arrest clergy and Christians in France, a move that demonstrated the French king believed that Christians were under his authority. Pope Boniface issued a papal bull called the Unam Sanctum, which argued the Church did not fall under temporal powers and wields its spiritual sword.
Eventually, the papal power became up for contention when Gregory passed, and Urban VI was elected pope. This vote was questioned and then attempted to be overruled by the establishment of Clement VII. Now, the 2 popes' leadership was questioned, and both popes found loyalty and support in various Western kings. This now brought kings into the discussion of clerical power and was demonstrated more clearly when The Council of Constance was held jointly by Pope John XXIII and the future emperor of Germany, King Sigismund from 1414-1418.
Compare and contrast two historical instances in which Christians were at odds with other Christians (e.g., the Donatist controversy and the Albigensian crusade, the Chalcedonian Schism of 451 and the Great Schism of 1054, etc.). Describe the point (or points) at issue in each case, and how each crisis unfolded. Identify the similarities and differences in the ways in which each situation developed, and what its effect has been on Christianity in the present.
Council of Nicea 325
One of the most impactful, lasting effects on Christianity is the Nicene Creed,
established at the Council of Nicea in Asia Minor in 325AD. The Nicene Creed is considered ‘the closest thing the Christian movement has to offer in the way of a universal confession of faith’, and ‘the touchstone of the Orthodox Christian doctrine of God’. The issued creed was probably a modified version of a baptismal confession they used in Palestine. To this day, the Nicene Creed is recited by millions of Western Christians, from the Catholic Church on down to Protestant churches. But why was this important?
Christianity had spread like wildfire along trade routes and across countries and regions from England to China. Alexandria, Egypt, was a hotbed for Christianity. Egyptians weren’t friendly with Rome, and Rome rejected Christianity. Christianity became something of a nationalist/cultural phenomenon against Rome. Concurrently, trade and commerce gave Alexandria the finances to build schools, libraries, and churches that promoted Christianity. Two leading Alexandrian theologians – Senior Bishop Alexander and his subordinate, Priest Arius – got into a heated controversy over Jesus. Is Jesus the Son of God separate from God the Father, or are Jesus and God the same?
Priest Arius held the position that Jesus was not the same as God – that ‘God the Father alone was unbegotten and eternal; thus there was a time when Jesus (the Son) was not.’
Senior Bishop Alexander argued that God and Jesus were the same – that Jesus was of the Father’s essence – and that Christianity was fundamentally monotheistic. ‘For the divine teacher in foresight shows that the Father and the Son are inseparable from one another.’ Eventually, this argument would lead to Arius’s banishment at the hands of Alexander.
Both of these positions, while argued by these two aforementioned men, were shared widely across the Christian nations and Arius found himself at the center of it.
Before the banishment, Arius took off to Nicomedia, where he found refuge and support from fellow theologians and clergy allies. He continued to campaign his position until the controversy reached a boiling point. Fearful his empire would become fractured and lose its Christian unity, Constantine called a Council in Nicea in 325, a resort location near Constantine’s court in Nicomedia. It is estimated that 250-318 bishops attended this dispute resolution. Roman and Western leaders – including Constantine who is credited for introducing the phrase ‘homoousis’, or ‘same substance’ – all leaned decidedly pro-Nicene, whereas the East leaned pro-Arianism. Sr. Bishop Alexander sent his assistant, Athanasius, in his sted. Athanasius would argue and champion the Nicene Creed over a two-month period, deposing Arian and ultimately starting the split between Eastern and Western orthodox Christianity.
The Nicene Creed, therefore, states: ‘begotten, not made, being of one substance with the Father’.
Council of Ferrerra-Florence 1433-1439.
The Council of Florence was called by Pope Martin V from the Council of Basel in 1433 and carried out by Pope Eugene IV after Martin passed. The council was called to unite the Greek and Latin churches amidst the ongoing controversy with papal supremacy, the conciliar movement, and the looming threat of the Ottoman Turkish Muslims.
The formal council began in 1438, and it was clear this council would not be brief. The issues called into question were significant theologically controversial topics that hadn’t been formally debated or resolved by Eastern and Western theologians. Topics included the ‘doctrine of purgatory, leavened vs. unleavened bread, eucharist, the filioque, and the primacy of the pope among the churches of the world’. The Byzantine Christian East was also in hot water – the Turks were at the door and Eastern Christian countries needed financial and military support.
Latin doctrine won out, and the ‘Decree of Union’ was signed. The Greeks were forced to include the pope in their liturgy. They could choose between unleavened or leavened bread and accepted the validity of the filioque but were not required to add it to their version of the Nicene Creed. In short, Eastern Christian theology lost.
Though there was a ‘Decree of Union’, there was no true union. The Latin churches used the Byzantine’s need for military aid as an opportunity to steamroll Western interests, giving more power to the pope and going against the cultures, traditions, and rituals of the Byzantine Christians. For Western Christians, they saw the Byzantine Christians as ‘others’, and the Ottoman Turks as distant enemies. The Eastern Christians were resistant to the Western implementation of their culture, even taking a decade for the pope to be named at Hagia Sophia. Byzantine Christianity was isolated, and dying.
What could have been an excellent moment of international Christian union was an apparent power maneuver by the West, exploiting, ignoring, and abandoning Eastern Christians, who would fall in 1453 to the Ottoman Turks.
Bibliography:
Diana Butler Bass, A People’s History of Christianity: The Other Side of the Story (New York, NY: HarperCollins Publishers, 2009)
Dale T. Irvin and Scott W. Sunquist, History of the World Christian Movement: Volume 1: Earliest Christianity to 1453 (Maryknoll, NY: Orbis Books, 2010).
John Wayland Coakley and Andrea Sterk, eds., Readings in World Christian History (Maryknoll, N.Y: Orbis Books, 2004).
