AN INTRODUCTION TO CHURCH HISTORY: from THE BEGINNINGS to 1500 COURSE TEXTBOOK This textbook is based principally on: Williston Walker, A History of the Christian Church, (Charles Scribner’s Sons, New York 1918) Also included herein are selections and material adapted from the following sources: Chadwick, Henry The Early Church, Revised Edition. (Penguin, 1993) Deansly, Margaret, A History of the Medieval Church, 590-1500. (Routledge. London. 1989) Dysinger, Luke, “Early Christian Monasticism”, The Encyclopedia of Ancient History 2010. Logan, F. Donald, A History of the Church in the Middle Ages, (Routledge, London. 2002) Vauchez, Andre, The Spir’ty of the Medieval West from the 8th to the 12th Century, (Cistercian, 1993). 1 2 CONTENTS 1. JESUS and the HELLENISTIC WORLD 6. LEADERSHIP and LITURGY [1.1]. The General Situation; 5 [6.1]. The Hierarchical Development Of 47 [1.2]. The Jewish Background; 10 The Church . [6.2]. Public Worship And Sacred [1.3]. Jesus and the Disciples; 13 49 Seasons [[2.1]2. p.92 ] 1 2. THE APOSTOLIC CHURCH [6.3]. Baptism 50 [2.1]. The Palestinian Christian [6.4]. The Eucharist. 51 Communities 15 [6.5]. Forgiveness Of Sins 52 [2.2]. Paul and Gentile Christianity 17 [6.6]. Sinners in the Church 54 [2.3]. The Close of the Apostolic Age 20 [2.4]. The Interpretation of Jesus 21 7. PERSECUTION and TRANSFORMATION 3. GENTILE CHURCH and ROMAN [7.1]. Rest And Growth, 260-303 55 EMPIRE [7.2]. Rival Religious Forces 55 [3.1]. Gentile Christianity of the Second Century 25 [7.3]. The Final Struggle 56 [7.4]. The Changed Situation [3.2]. Early Clerical Orders 26 58 [3.3]. Relations of Christianity to the 8. THE ARIAN EMPIRE 28 Roman Government [8.1]. The Arian Controversy To The 59 [3.4]. The Apologists 28 Death Of Constantine 4. THE GNOSTIC CRISIS [8.2]. Controversy Under Constantine's Sons 62 [4.1]. Gnosticism 30 [8.3]. The Later Nicene Struggle 64 [4.2]. Marcion [ 31 [4.3]. Montanism 32 9. THE ORTHODOX EMPIRE [4.4]. The Catholic Church 33 [9.1]. Arian Missions and the Germanic Invasions 67 [4.5]. The Growing Importance of Rome 35 [9.2]. The Growth of the Papacy 70 [4.6]. Irenæus 36 [9.3]. Ambrose And Chrysostom 70 5. CARTHAGE and ALEXANDRIA 10. CHRISTIAN MONASTICISM [5.1]. Tertullian and Cyprian 37 [10.1]. The Ascetic Movement 72 [10.2]. Egyptian, Byzantine, and [5.2]. The Triumph of the Logos 74 Christology in the West 39 Palestinian Monasticism [5.3]. The Alexandrian School 41 [10.3]. Evagrius, Cassian, and Benedict 75 [5.4]. Church And State from 180 To 260 45 [10.4]. Summary of Early Monasticism 76 11. CHRISTOLOGY and DIVISIONS [11.1]. The Christological Controversies 81 [11.2]. The East Divided 86 [11.3]. Catastrophes And Further Controversies In The East 89 3 12. WORSHIP and PIETY 18. MEDIEVAL CHURCH and STATE [12.1]. Developing Hierarchies . 90 in CONFLICT [12.2]. Public Worship And Sacred [18.1] The Papacy Breaks with the Seasons 92 Empire 156 [12.3]. Developing Eucharistic Liturgy 93 [18.2] Hildebrand and Henry IV 158 [12.4]. The Liturgy of the Hours 100 [18.3] The Struggle Ends in Compromise 160 [12.5]. Popular Christian Piety 102 19. EXPANSION and CONFLICT 13. WESTERN THEOLOGY and ISOLATION [19.1] The Greek Church after the Iconoclastic Controversy . 161 [13.1]. Some Western Characteristics 103 [19.2] The Spread of the Church 162 [13.2]. Jerome 104 [13.3]. Augustine 105 20. NEW MOVEMENTS AND SECTS [13.4]. The Pelagian Controversy 109 [20.1] The Crusades 163 [13.5]. Semi-Pelagianism 111 [20.2] New Religious Movements 168 [13.6]. Gregory the Great 112 [20.3] Heretical Sects. Cathari And Waldenses. The Inquisition THE PATRISTIC ERA – A SUMMARY 114 169 21. FRIARS and LEARNING 14. BYZANTIUM and the RISE of ISLAM [21.1] The Dominicans and Franciscans 172 [14.1] Justinian 117 [21.2] Early Scholasticism 176 [14.2].The Lombards 120 [21.3] The Universities 179 [14.3]. The Rise of Islam 121 [21.4] High Scholasticism And Its 15. MONASTIC MISSION and the Theology 179 TRANSMISSION of LEARNING 22. MYSTICS and SPIRITUAL WRITERS [15.1]. Missions in the British Islands 128 [22.1] Medieval Mysticism 185 [15.2]. Continental Missions and Papal [22.2] From Eckhart to the Devotio Growth 130 Moderna 190 [15.3] The Transmission of Learning 132 23. PAPAL LEADERSHIP and SCHISM [15.4] Art and Iconoclasm 135 [23.1] Missions and Defeats . 16. THE CAROLINGIAN EMPIRE 192 [23.2] The Papacy at its Height and its [16.1]. The Franks and The Papacy 139 Decline . 193 [16.2]. 140 Charlemagne [23.3] The Papacy in Avignon, Criticism. [16.3]. Ecclesiastical Institutions 143 The Schism . 197 [16.4].. Collapsing Empire and Rising 24. NATIONALISM and CONCILIARISM Papacy 143 [24.1] Wyclif and Huss 200 17. INVASION, DECAY, and REFORM [24.2] The Reforming Councils 204 [17.1] 139 Viking Invasions [24.3]. The Italian Renaissance and Its [17.2] Papal Decline and Renewal by the Popes 207 Revived Empire . 151 [24.4] The New National Powers 211 [17.3] 153 Reform Movements [24.5]. Renaissance and Other Influences [17.4] The Reform Party Secures the North Of The Alps 214 Papacy 155 4 1. JESUS and the HELLENISTIC WORLD Walker, “Period I. From the Beginnings to the Gnostic Crisis” . 1.1-1.3, pp. 1-18: [1].1. THE GENERAL SITUATION THE birth of Christ saw the lands which surrounded the Mediterranean in the possession of Rome. To a degree never before equalled, and unapproached in modern times, these vast territories, which embraced all that common men knew of civilized life, were under the sway of a single type of culture. The civilizations of India or of China did not come within the vision of the ordinary inhabitant of the Roman Empire. Outside its borders he knew only savage or semicivilized tribes. The Roman Empire and the world of civilized men were coextensive. All was held together by allegiance to a single Emperor, and by a common military system subject to him. The Roman army, small in comparison with that of a modern military state, was adequate to preserve the Roman peace. Under that peace commerce flourished, communication was made easy by excellent roads and by sea, and among educated men, at least in the larger towns, a common language, that of Greece, facilitated the interchange of thought. It was an empire that, in spite of many evil rulers and corrupt lower officials, secured a rough justice such as the world had never before seen; and its citizens were proud of it and of its achievements. Yet with all its unity of imperial authority and military control, Rome was far from crushing local institutions. In domestic matters the inhabitants of the provinces were largely self-governing. Their local religious observances were generally respected. Among the masses the ancient languages and customs persisted. Even native rulers were allowed a limited sway in portions of the empire, as native states still persist under British rule in India. Such a land was Palestine at the time of Christ’s birth. Not a little of the success of Rome as mistress of its diverse subject population was due to this considerate treatment of local rights and prejudices. The diversity in the empire was scarcely less remarkable than its unity. This variety was nowhere more apparent than in the realm of religious thought. Christianity entered no empty world. Its advent found men’s minds filled with conceptions of the universe, of religion, of sin, and of rewards and punishments, with which it had to reckon and to which it had to adjust itself. Christianity could not build on virgin soil. The conceptions which it found already existing formed much of the material with which it must erect its structure. Many of these ideas are no longer those of the modern world. The fact of this inevitable intermixture compels the student to distinguish the permanent from the transitory in Christian thought, though the process is one of exceeding difficulty, and the solutions given by various scholars are diverse. Certain factors in the world of thought into which Christianity came belong to universal ancient religion and are of great antiquity. All men, except a few representatives of philosophical sophistication, believed in the existence of a power, or of powers, invisible, superhuman, and eternal, controlling human destiny, and to be worshipped or placated by prayer, ritual, or sacrifice. The earth was viewed as the center of the universe. Around it the sun, planets, and stars ran their courses. Above it was the heaven; below the abode of departed spirits or of the wicked. No conception of science or the laws of nature had penetrated the popular mind. All the ongoings of nature were the work of invisible powers of good and evil, who ruled arbitrarily. Miracles were, therefore, to be regarded not merely as possible; they were to be expected whenever the higher forces would impress men with the important or the unusual. The world was the abode of innumerable spirits, righteous or malevolent, who touched human life in all its phases, and who even entered into such possession of men as to control their actions for good or ill. A profound sense of unworthiness, of ill desert, and of dissatisfaction with the existing conditions of life characterized the mass of mankind. The varied forms of religious manifestation were evidences of the universal need of better relations with the spiritual and unseen, and of men’s longing for help greater than any they could give one another.