Kolbaba (Tia) Byzatine Perceptions of Latin Religious Errors

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This is an extract from:

The Crusades from the Perspective

of Byzantium and the Muslim World

Trustees for Harvard University

Washington, D.C.

Printed in the United States of America

published by

Dumbarton Oaks Research Library and Collection

Washington, D.C.

www.doaks.org/etexts.html

edited by Angeliki E. Laiou and Roy Parviz Mottahedeh

Byzantine Perceptions of Latin Religious “Errors”:

Themes and Changes from 850 to 1350

Tia M. Kolbaba

In 1339 Emperor Andronikos III Palaiologos (1328–41) sent the bilingual Calabrian

monk Barlaam (ca. 1290–1348) to Avignon. There Barlaam delivered two speeches to

Pope Benedict XII (1332–42) about the necessity of a united Christian front against the

Turks and the ways in which a reunion of the churches might be achieved. To the pope’s

demand that reunion of the churches precede military aid from the West, Barlaam gave

the following reply: “It is not so much diﬀerence in dogma that alienates the hearts of

the Greeks from you, as the hatred that has entered their souls against the Latins,

because

of the many great evils that at diﬀerent times the Greeks have suﬀered at the hands of

Latins and are still suﬀering every day. Until this hatred has been removed from them,

there cannot be union. In truth, until you have done them some very great beneﬁt,

neither will that hatred be dispelled nor will anyone dare to breathe a word to them

about union....Knowthis too, that it was not the people of Greece that sent me to

seek your help and union, but the Emperor alone and secretly. Until help is sent to these

parts, he cannot let his people see that he wants union with you.”

Barlaam thus highlighted the most obvious impact of the Crusades—especially the

Fourth Crusade and the Latin occupation of Constantinople from 1204 to 1261—on

religious life and religious literature in Byzantium. Everyone agreed that the union of

the churches was, in principle, desirable, because everyone knew that Christ’s body, the

church, should not be dismembered. But the violent conﬂict of the Crusades and

attempts to force papal primacy on Greeks after 1204 meant that few Byzantine church-

men could negotiate for such a union with any measure of trust and goodwill. So, too,

it comes as no surprise that the most scurrilous, least sophisticated kinds of anti-Latin

literature increased over time. When Constantine Stilbes (ﬂ. 1182–1204) connects his

seventy-ﬁve-item list of Latin errors to a list of the atrocities committed in the sack of

1204, the connection seems natural.

Such a reaction makes sense. That the Crusades

As do most Greek writers of his time, Barlaam uses the term Latin as a general term for Westerners. I use

the term Latins throughout this paper to refer to Western Europeans who were members of the church that

used Latin as its liturgical language. This does not mean that Byzantines themselves always called Westerners

“Latins”; see Alexander Kazhdan’s contribution to this volume.

Acta Benedicti XII, 1334–1342, ed. A. L. Tau

˘tu, Fontes 3, vol. 8 (Vatican City, 1958), doc. 43. Cited and

translated in J. Gill, Byzantium and the Papacy (New Brunswick, N.J., 1979), 197–98.

J. Darrouze

`s, “Le me

´moire de Constantin Stilbe

`s contre les Latins,” REB 21 (1963): 50–100.

[ 118 ] Byzantine Perceptions of Latin Religious “Errors”

led to an increase in the number of virulently anti-Latin texts and in the number of

people who agreed with them has been recognized at least since Barlaam’s time.

This study, then, goes beyond that obvious eﬀect to investigate whether the Crusades

had an impact on more moderate religious texts written by churchmen who negotiated

or debated with the Latins. Because there are many Byzantine responses to the Crusades

in secular texts, from Anna Komnene’s Alexiad to Doukas’ chronicle of the fall of the

City, one might expect to ﬁnd direct responses to the Crusades in theological literature

as well. But a survey of religious discussions with and polemic against the Latins from

the middle of the eleventh century through the end of the empire unearthed no reasoned

refutation of the idea of holy war and no theological discourses against such Western

innovations as the crusade indulgence or monastic knights.

In short, if the Crusades

altered religious literature, they did so indirectly. This study attempts to identify such

indirect inﬂuence by analyzing some characteristics of Byzantine theological material

contemporary with the Crusades. The conclusion will return to the question of whether

and how these traits are related to the Crusades.

My primary thesis is that Byzantine religious texts that discuss Western Europeans

emphasize diﬀerent issues at diﬀerent times. To many historians, such a claim may seem

obvious, even trite. After all, the cultural gap between Byzantine East and Latin West;

the kinds and degree of contact Byzantines had with Latins; the relative wealth, poverty,

military power, and sophistication of the two cultures—all of these things changed im-

measurably in a millennium or so. Yet an assumption of eternal verities pervades the

history of Byzantine religious disagreements with the Western church. For example,

many studies assume that the Filioque

is always the central issue for moderate, reason-

able men. But it was not. Concerns changed as the times changed.

Furthermore, when placed in their historical context, the issues raised are often related

less to the explicit targets of the polemic, the Latins, than to the polemicists themselves

and their world. An issue becomes one of the crucial issues in the Greek theological

literature only when it becomes a matter for debate within the Orthodox world. This

connection removes the Latins from the center of the picture and reveals the extent to

which debates explicitly about Latins were implicitly about Byzantines. In other words,

adiﬀerence between Greeks and Latins became a source of anxiety and the subject of

numerous treatises and debates only when Byzantine opinion was divided. Debates

about Latin practices and beliefs grew ﬁerce and polarized less because of the intrinsic

importance of the issue being debated than because of fundamental doubts about what

Such issues do arise rarely in the unreasonable polemic. See, e.g., Darrouze

`s, “Me

´moire,” para. 27, 38,

60, 61.

Starting in Spain in the 6th century, various Western churches added a phrase to the Nicene Creed. Where

the creed originally stated, “We believe in the Holy Spirit...whoproceeds from the Father,” these churches

added “and the Son” (Latin: Filioque). This addition was accepted in Frankish areas by the 8th century and in

Rome in the early 11th century. Eastern theologians objected both to the unilateral addition to the creed

(which could not, they maintained, be amended without an ecumenical council) and to the theological implica-

tions of that addition. Discussions of the theology, including theological polemic from both East and West, can

be found easily. Good introductions: J. Pelikan, The Spirit of Eastern Christendom (600–1700): The Christian Tradi-

tion 2 (Chicago, 1974), 183–98, and J. Meyendorﬀ,Byzantine Theology: Historical Trends and Doctrinal Themes

(New York, 1974), 91–94, 180–90.

Tia M. Kolbaba [ 119 ]

it meant to be an orthodox, imperial Christian—what it meant to be, as they would

have put it, a pious Roman.

Negotiations and debates within the Empire of the Romans

about how to distinguish “us” from “them” were not new in the tenth, or even the

eighth, century. From the beginning, Christians were deﬁning themselves against other

groups, distinguishing “followers of Christ” from “Jews”; “Orthodox” from Arians,

Nestorians, and Monophysites; righteous and orthodox venerators of icons from hereti-

cal iconoclasts. None of these distinctions between “us” and “them” was established in

a day or even in a decade. All of them took some time and caused some casualties. Some

people who considered themselves orthodox Christians had to be thrown out of the

church; the tares could not, after all, be allowed to grow with the wheat. In the period

of the Crusades, it became important to distinguish “us” Christians of the empire from

“them” Latins from the West. But that distinction did not come easily, either. People

argued about it for centuries, and their arguments can be partially reconstructed from

the materials studied here.

The second part of this study discusses the tone of anti-Latin texts. This, too, changes

over time, but the change is not a simple descent from moderate, intelligent discussion

to hateful, radical polemic. Moderate works exist and exert some inﬂuence down to the

end, revealing a growing ambivalence about Latin culture and the western world.

What this study presents as a matter-of-fact outline still has gaps, and other scholars

who study these texts will correct and reﬁne it on points of detail and interpretation.

Still, it is time to attempt a survey of the theological literature from these centuries

precisely because a great body of work makes it possible to do so with some assurance.

We need to draw together what we already know before we can make further progress.

The current level of knowledge owes much to the works of Jean Darrouze

`s, Joseph Gill,

and a long list of other scholars. The sources cited below should indicate my debt to

their erudition and painstaking labor. Darrouze

`s noted thirty-two years ago that “the

history of dogma can only proﬁt from a more exact knowledge of historical context.”

He spent most of his life establishing that context, and his work especially has taught us

a great deal about which issues dividing East and West were important in which period.

Without it, this study would be impossible.

Changing Issues

The Ninth Century

Photios (patriarch of Constantinople, 858–867 and 877–886) introduces this study,

but not because anyone accepts that the “Photian Schism” was permanent and irrevoca-

ble; Francis Dvornik refuted that idea ﬁfty years ago. Rather, Photios’ era can reveal the

Vocabulary is a problem here—these were debates about what it meant to be Byzantine and Orthodox.

Still, we need to keep in mind that these are modern terms; people at the time called themselves “Romans,”

“Orthodox,” “pious” (eujsebh

´")—never “Byzantine,” unless they were distinguishing residents of the capital

from other “Romans.”

J. Darrouze

`s, “Les documents byzantins du XIIe sie

`cle sur la primaute

´romaine,” REB 23 (1965): 43.

[ 120 ] Byzantine Perceptions of Latin Religious “Errors”

possibilities for a relationship between Rome and Constantinople which was, if not ex-

actly peaceful, certainly diﬀerent in kind from the relationship of the later Middle Ages.

Most importantly, diﬀerences with the Western church were not the crucial canonical

or theological issues during Photios’ patriarchate. The burning issue was still iconoclasm.

From our perspective, a kind of foreshortening makes it obvious that iconoclasm was

dead and not to be resurrected. But Photios and his contemporaries knew how the ﬁrst

“restoration of Orthodoxy” had been followed by a revival of iconoclasm. Most had

personal memories of that revival. All were still being dragged into arguments about

how to punish iconoclasts—some advocating severe sanctions, while others called for

oikonomia and forgiveness.

The quarrels over this issue aﬀect every other quarrel of the

period, including the “Photian Schism” with Rome. Beyond iconoclasm, Photios him-

self joined many other men in writing about other “heretics”: Paulicians, Armenians,

Muslims, Bogomils, Monophysites, and others.

So the quarrel with Rome is only one

issue among many in ninth-century Byzantium.

Moreover, the Photian Schism did not arise from diﬀerences over dogma. Nobody

claimed that the pope was not qualiﬁed to render a judgment because he was a heretic.

Instead, the issue was the canonical authority of the pope within the Eastern church—

a question that neither began nor ended with Photios. His predecessor, Ignatios, had

had similar problems during his ﬁrst patriarchate (847–858).

In the controversy over

the legitimacy of Ignatios’ deposition (or resignation) and Photios’ elevation to the patri-

archate, both sides appealed to the pope. Photios’ refusal to accept the pope’s judgment

was based not on some challenge to the pope’s legal authority, but rather on the pope’s

failure to hear any representative of Photios’ side of the case before he made his deci-

sion.

This recognition of Rome’s jurisdiction, with its assumption of Rome’s ortho-

doxy, is more like the church of the iconoclast period or even of John Chrysostom’s

time, than like the church of Michael VIII Palaiologos. In the later period, Rome’s juris-

diction will be challenged on the grounds that the popes, who used to have the authority

of a ﬁrst among equals, lost that authority when they fell into heresy.

Nevertheless, Photios and some of his contemporaries did object to the Filioque (and

other Latin “errors”). Those who maintain that the Filioque has always been the most

important issue for thoughtful, moderate men begin with Photios, for he did explicitly

state that the Filioque was a heresy and the weightiest issue outstanding between Con-

stantinople and some Westerners: “Moreover, they have not only been discovered trans-

gressing the law in all the above, but they have progressed to the crown of all evils, if

there is such a thing.... Theyhavealsotried, with spurious reasoning, interpolated

argument, and an excess of impudence, to adulterate the divine and holy creed which

has its impregnable strength from all the synodical and ecumenical decrees (Oh, the

subtle deceptions of the Evil One!), for they have added new words, that the Holy Spirit

F. Dvornik, The Photian Schism: History and Legend (Cambridge, 1948; repr. 1970), 6 ﬀ.

H.-G. Beck, Kirche und theologische Literatur im byzantinischen Reich (Munich, 1959), 520–30.

Dvornik, Photian Schism, 19–32.

Ibid., part 1, chaps. 2–8.

E.g., see the polemicists cited by F. Dvornik, Byzantium and the Roman Primacy, trans. E. A. Quain (New

York, 1966), 159–62.

Tia M. Kolbaba [ 121 ]

proceeds not from the Father alone, but also from the Son.”

But before we portray this

statement as the earliest example of Byzantine awareness of Roman heresy, we need to

look carefully at its context. Photios discussed the Filioque in an encyclical letter to the

Eastern patriarchs (quoted above) and in his Mystagogy of the Holy Spirit. These texts were

not attacks on the whole Western church, but refutations of the teaching of Frankish

missionaries in Bulgaria. The latter had taught the Bulgars the addition to the creed and

quarreled with Byzantine missionaries about it. In fact, the Filioque was not yet being

chanted in Rome. When Photios wrote his treatises against the double procession of the

Holy Spirit, he had good reason to think that the popes did not accept the doctrine.

Nor did he challenge the pope’s authority on the grounds that he was a heretic. Both of

these things diﬀerentiate his position from later opinions.

Finally, anti-Latin arguments do not develop sequentially from Photios to 1453. An

examination of the transmission of texts shows that Photios’ writings against the Frankish

missionaries had little impact. Nobody adopts his arguments on these issues, and few

people even refer to his opinions, until late in the thirteenth century. At that time, the

Filioque is central to Byzantine polemic for other reasons, to be discussed below.

The Eleventh Century

Anti-Latin arguments do, however, have a continuous life from 1054 on. In the

middle of the eleventh century, Byzantine polemicists raised many issues, some of which

already had a history. Photios had complained, for example, about Latin Lenten obser-

vances and the Latin rite of conﬁrmation, and Michael Keroularios (patriarch of Con-

stantinople, 1043–58) raised these same issues.

But the most prominent complaint of

the middle of the eleventh century had not surfaced in Photios’ period. Among the

“Roman” errors Keroularios mentioned is the use of unleavened bread (azymes) in the

eucharist. Other texts of the period echoed the theme. In terms of number of words

written, or number of treatises written, azymes far outstrip the procession of the Holy

Spirit.

Some who mentioned the Filioque—Peter III of Antioch (1052–56), for ex-

ample—maintained that the addition was more important than unleavened bread, but

their actions belied these words. Peter wrote far more about azymes than about the

Filioque.

To explain this emphasis, one needs to look behind Byzantine relations with the West-

ern church to stresses within the empire. In general, the eleventh century saw a number

of challenges to the deﬁnitions of “orthodox” and “Roman.” These were not purely

external challenges—enemy attacks on the outer boundaries of Byzantium—but civil

wars, causing disagreements among the powerful even at the heart of the empire. In

Photius, Epistulae et Amphilochia, ed. B. Laourdas and L. G. Westerink (Leipzig, 1988), 1:43.

Dvornik, Photian Schism, 122.

This is one of the themes of Dvornik, Photian Schism; see esp. part 2, chaps. 5–6.

Details of the complaints about Lenten observance, conﬁrmation, and other issues can be found in T. M.

Kolbaba, “Meletios Homologetes ‘On the Customs of the Italians,’” REB 55 (1997): 137–68.

J. H. Erickson, “Leavened and Unleavened: Some Theological Implications of the Schism of 1054,”

SVThQ 14.3 (1970): 156–58. The best introductions to the azyme controversy are ibid., 155–76, and M. H.

Smith III, And Taking Bread . . . Cerularius and the Azyme Controversy of 1054 (Paris, 1978).

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Thisisanextractfrom:TheCrusadesfromthePerspectiveofByzantiumandtheMuslimWorld©2001DumbartonOaksTrusteesforHarvardUniversityWashington,D.C.PrintedintheUnitedStatesofAmericapublishedbyDumbartonOaksResearchLibraryandCollectionWashington,D.C.www.doaks.org/etexts.htmleditedbyAngelikiE.LaiouandRoyParvizMo...

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