A History Of Christianity Part 6

THOMAS AQUINAS: PHILOSOPHY AND FAITH.

The year 1260 did not bring the end of the world, as Joachim had predicted and so many had expected. Those middle decades of the thirteenth century did represent the culmination of the age which had started with the reforms at Cluny, because they saw the crowning years of the career of the Dominican theologian Thomas Aquinas. If Gregory was the most decisive personality of the eleventh-century Church and Bernard of Clairvaux its greatest preacher in the twelfth, then Aquinas's system of thought, Thomism, in the thirteenth represents a defining moment in the theology of the medieval West. He was the son of a n.o.bleman from Aquino in south Italy, but his career ill.u.s.trates the international flavour of the age, when a knowledge of Latin would be enough to make one understood by everyone who mattered in society from Stockholm to Seville. Having joined the Dominicans, he went on to study and work not just in Italy but also in the universities of Paris and Cologne. Aquinas's huge corpus of writings mark the height of Western Europe's enthusiasm for Aristotle (who was for him simply 'the Philosopher'), and he encouraged the translation into Latin of all Aristotle's works then known. After much opposition and misgivings from theologians especially in the later thirteenth century, the work of Aquinas had the eventual effect of ending the official Church's fears about the challenge which Aristotle's thought appeared to present to Christian faith.

Aquinas took as the ground of his work that the systems of thought and reasonable a.n.a.lysis presented by Aristotle did not deny the central place of faith, but ill.u.s.trated, perhaps even proved, its truths. Aristotle's categories and discussion of 'forms' reflected the nature of the humanity which G.o.d had created, which had its form in a rational soul and was naturally inclined to act with reason. Nothing should be proposed which is contrary to our reason; this is the path to truth which G.o.d has given us, and it is to be used combatively, in argument and counter-argument, in order to form an intellectually acceptable conclusion, in the vigorous debating method of scholasticism which was a century old by Aquinas's time. It was in the process of approaching faith through reasoned argument that Aquinas found Aristotle so useful, particularly Aristotle's newly translated works on logic and metaphysics (see pp. 33-4). Building on Aristotle's idea that everything created must have a cause from which it receives its existence, he could construct a system in which everything that is and can be described is linked back in a chain of causation to G.o.d, the first cause of all things. This G.o.d is still primarily the 'Unmoved Mover', Plato's perfect, pa.s.sionless G.o.d, so it would be a caricature to see Thomas as rejecting Plato in favour of Aristotle; he was using any intellectual resource at his disposal in order to create his system. It is seen at its fullest in Aquinas's great work the Summa Theologiae Summa Theologiae ('Sum Total of Theology' - often more commonly known as the ('Sum Total of Theology' - often more commonly known as the Summa Theologica Summa Theologica).27 The Summa Summa deals with the most abstract questions of being and the nature of G.o.d, yet it also extends to very practical discussions of the way everyday life should be viewed, and how we should live as part of G.o.d's purpose. Through its questions and distinctions pushing to conclusions, it presents a harmonious view of G.o.d's earthly and heavenly creation, a structure in which the successors of Gregory VII could see themselves as the earthly peak of G.o.d's system. Thomas put limits on the use of reason in understanding this harmony. In the opening discussion of the deals with the most abstract questions of being and the nature of G.o.d, yet it also extends to very practical discussions of the way everyday life should be viewed, and how we should live as part of G.o.d's purpose. Through its questions and distinctions pushing to conclusions, it presents a harmonious view of G.o.d's earthly and heavenly creation, a structure in which the successors of Gregory VII could see themselves as the earthly peak of G.o.d's system. Thomas put limits on the use of reason in understanding this harmony. In the opening discussion of the Summa Summa, he quickly led the reader to a conclusion which was that of the pseudonymous Dionysius the Areopagite long before, and which had become much more familiar among the theologians of Byzantium: 'It seems that we can use no words at all to refer to G.o.d'.28 That may seem strange for a work which, in its standard English edition, runs to sixty-one volumes and which remained unfinished at Aquinas's death in 1274, but what this greatest of scholastic theologians understood was that all language about G.o.d had to employ the sideways glance, the a.n.a.logy, the metaphor. So Aquinas's judgements on truth are presented as a summary of probabilities, of the balance of arguments: something which those turning to his great work for certainties have not always appreciated. That may seem strange for a work which, in its standard English edition, runs to sixty-one volumes and which remained unfinished at Aquinas's death in 1274, but what this greatest of scholastic theologians understood was that all language about G.o.d had to employ the sideways glance, the a.n.a.logy, the metaphor. So Aquinas's judgements on truth are presented as a summary of probabilities, of the balance of arguments: something which those turning to his great work for certainties have not always appreciated.

Nowhere is Thomas's balance between the specific and the wordless more apparent than in a text of his encountered by countless more Catholics than have read the Summa Summa, his great eucharistic hymn Pange Pange lingua lingua ('Sing, my tongue, the mystery of the glorious Body and precious Blood'). Aquinas wrote this as part of a devotional office for the new feast of Corpus Christi in 1264, at the request of Pope Urban IV himself. For centuries, the Catholic faithful have experienced the last two verses of ('Sing, my tongue, the mystery of the glorious Body and precious Blood'). Aquinas wrote this as part of a devotional office for the new feast of Corpus Christi in 1264, at the request of Pope Urban IV himself. For centuries, the Catholic faithful have experienced the last two verses of Pange lingua Pange lingua in one of the most dramatic moments of theatre provided by Western Latin liturgy: Benediction of the Blessed Sacrament, the ultimate though belated expression of the fourth Lateran Council of 1215. This eucharistic devotion is peculiar to the Western Latin tradition. It developed from the Corpus Christi festival, whose only disadvantage in the eyes of medieval Westerners was that it was not enough of a good thing: it only happened once every twelve months. Through the rest of the Church's year there arose a custom of 'reservation of the Blessed Sacrament': part of the eucharistic bread consecrated in the Ma.s.s was 'reserved' from the service, and housed in a safe place, a 'tabernacle', enhanced in churches by ever more magnificent decoration and canopy work. Soon the reserved bread became known in common parlance simply as 'the Sacrament'. In its tabernacle (often also called the 'Sacrament House') it was available for worshippers to use as the focus for their adoration whenever they wished, and it became a popular custom for clergy to gather the devout in front of the tabernacle, to lead them in devotional prayer. in one of the most dramatic moments of theatre provided by Western Latin liturgy: Benediction of the Blessed Sacrament, the ultimate though belated expression of the fourth Lateran Council of 1215. This eucharistic devotion is peculiar to the Western Latin tradition. It developed from the Corpus Christi festival, whose only disadvantage in the eyes of medieval Westerners was that it was not enough of a good thing: it only happened once every twelve months. Through the rest of the Church's year there arose a custom of 'reservation of the Blessed Sacrament': part of the eucharistic bread consecrated in the Ma.s.s was 'reserved' from the service, and housed in a safe place, a 'tabernacle', enhanced in churches by ever more magnificent decoration and canopy work. Soon the reserved bread became known in common parlance simply as 'the Sacrament'. In its tabernacle (often also called the 'Sacrament House') it was available for worshippers to use as the focus for their adoration whenever they wished, and it became a popular custom for clergy to gather the devout in front of the tabernacle, to lead them in devotional prayer.

Three centuries and more after Aquinas's time, the Sacrament was not simply reserved in this fashion, but it became the focus and main actor in its own service, known as Benediction. In the most elaborated form of Benediction, the priest or deacon, splendidly vested, brings the consecrated bread out of its tabernacle and uses it to bless the worshippers before him. Slowly and reverently lifted from the altar, generally with the officiant's hands veiled to avoid direct contact with its container, the Sacrament is moved through the cross-pattern of the blessing, a spiritual symbol made emphatically physical. There can be no more powerful embodiment of the Western doctrine of Christ's 'Real Presence' in the eucharistic elements than this service of Benediction. As the priest prepares to gather up G.o.d's blessing in this way, those present sing Aquinas's Tantum ergo Tantum ergo, the culminating verses of his Pange lingua Pange lingua: Therefore we, before him bending, this great Sacrament revere; types and shadows have their ending, for the newer rite is here; faith, our outward sense befriending, makes our inward vision clear.

Glory let us give, and blessing to the Father and the Son, honour, might and praise addressing, while eternal ages run; ever too his love confessing, who from Both with Both is One.

'Faith, our outward sense befriending, makes our inward vision clear': there is the resolution to the puzzle posed by the Summa Summa's affirmation that no words may describe G.o.d. As the blessing is done, and the moment of climax falls away, the priest leads his flock in a prayer which is also by Aquinas: .

O G.o.d, who under a wonderful sacrament has left us a remembrance of your pa.s.sion: grant, we beseech you, that we may so venerate the holy mysteries of your body and blood, that we may evermore perceive within ourselves the fruit of your redemption.29 LOVE IN A COLD CLIMATE: PERSONAL DEVOTION AFTER 1200.

Aquinas's praise of Jesus Christ in the Ma.s.s was written for a Latin Europe where the conditions of life for most people were worsening, and where the symbolism of a person who was also bread and wine, food and drink, had a bitter resonance. For nearly two centuries from around 1200, the climate of the northern hemisphere generally got colder. Europe's farming was inefficient, its food supplies unequally divided between those with power and those without. The new conditions brought misery to a population whose growth had for two centuries been pressing on the agricultural resources available. It is always risky to try and relate such background anxieties to religious belief, which can be shaped by many different considerations, but the thirteenth century saw the flowering of a distinctively Western devotional pattern which concentrated on G.o.d as person, actively intervening in his creation, and on a more personal exposition of the human reality of Christ and his Mother. It is true that this personal search for G.o.d was already perceptible in the previous century. The great eleventh-century theologian Anselm, Archbishop of Canterbury, wrote alongside his works of formal logic and dialectic pa.s.sionate meditations on the beauty of G.o.d: 'Lord Jesus Christ, my redeemer, my mercy, my salvation . . . how great is the leanness of my desire and abundant the sweetness of your love.' In fact the Latin term 'meditatio' seems first to have been used to describe such a text in the decades after his death. Anselm's meditations already circulated widely in his lifetime, and they inspired much imitation (most of it attaching his name to new texts) in the century after his death.30 Yet after 1200, within this pattern of search for the divine, there was a greater concentration on the specific details of the life and death of Christ. New themes emerged: Dominicans, culminating in Aquinas, built up their own line of thought on the sufferings of Christ, and Aquinas built up a logical case (which not all will find convincing) that Christ's physical pains in his Crucifixion were greater than any experienced by any other human being in history. There could be many motives in this particular theological development. Just as in the developing cult of Mary in the twelfth century, Dominican inquisitors facing Albigensians might have an eye on the Cathar denial of physicality in the divine. Even if that was one consideration, it has been suggested that the Dominicans might also have been trying a theological put-down of their rivals the Franciscans. Franciscans were inclined in Dominican eyes to over-stress the closeness of their founder to the suffering Christ, up to and including the reproduction in Francis's own body of Christ's stigmata stigmata, and it was useful therefore to stress just how far even a Francis could fall short of what the Lord had gone through.31 Yet such considerations can only be partial eddies within a wider phenomenon. Without the deepening worries of so many about their sheer physical survival, the varied voices which created these new perspectives on Christian worship and contemplation might not have been so readily heard: voices like Juliana of Cornillon, who spearheaded a much more physical popular devotion to Christ's body in the Eucharist (see p. 407), and besides the Dominicans, generations of Franciscan preachers and theologians, inspired by Francis himself. Yet such considerations can only be partial eddies within a wider phenomenon. Without the deepening worries of so many about their sheer physical survival, the varied voices which created these new perspectives on Christian worship and contemplation might not have been so readily heard: voices like Juliana of Cornillon, who spearheaded a much more physical popular devotion to Christ's body in the Eucharist (see p. 407), and besides the Dominicans, generations of Franciscan preachers and theologians, inspired by Francis himself.

Francis's search for G.o.d had a new perspective. Not only Anselm but Augustine of Hippo and Dionysius the Areopagite had seen G.o.d primarily as Plato's 'Unmoved Mover': so, after Francis's time, did Thomas Aquinas. But rather than perceiving G.o.d as this self-sufficient divine being, Francis saw a person: his Lord. Again and again, Francis calls G.o.d 'Lord G.o.d' (Dominus Deus). The Lord enters agreements - covenants - with his people, just as he did with the people of Israel (see pp. 60-61). As his side of the bargain in covenanting, he acts, rather than simply is.32 His greatest action is in becoming truly human in Jesus Christ through his mother, Mary. Francis called people to see the ordinariness, the humanity, in Christ, in order that they could love and worship him better as G.o.d. It was Francis who built the first Christmas crib, complete with apocryphal ox and a.s.s, as a devotional object in church. His greatest action is in becoming truly human in Jesus Christ through his mother, Mary. Francis called people to see the ordinariness, the humanity, in Christ, in order that they could love and worship him better as G.o.d. It was Francis who built the first Christmas crib, complete with apocryphal ox and a.s.s, as a devotional object in church.

Francis's personal view of G.o.d was echoed in an immensely popular and much-imitated early-fourteenth-century Franciscan work of devotion, long attributed to his disciple the Italian Franciscan theologian Bonaventure but now generally thought to have been written two generations later by another Italian Franciscan, John de Caulibus (hence the author is still often known as 'Pseudo-Bonaventure'). John wrote his Meditations on the Life of Christ Meditations on the Life of Christ to help a nun of the Franciscans' a.s.sociated Order of Poor Clares in her contemplation of Christ's earthly life, presenting it as a series of eyewitness accounts interlaced with commentary and exhortation which all imaginatively extended the Gospel narratives, so that the reader might be inspired to imitate Christ in her or his own daily life. John rejoiced in the fact that the Gospel narratives had not aspired to include everything about Jesus, and so he could fill the gaps. Here, for instance, is his augmented account of the birth of the Saviour: to help a nun of the Franciscans' a.s.sociated Order of Poor Clares in her contemplation of Christ's earthly life, presenting it as a series of eyewitness accounts interlaced with commentary and exhortation which all imaginatively extended the Gospel narratives, so that the reader might be inspired to imitate Christ in her or his own daily life. John rejoiced in the fact that the Gospel narratives had not aspired to include everything about Jesus, and so he could fill the gaps. Here, for instance, is his augmented account of the birth of the Saviour: When the hour of truth had arrived, namely, midnight Sunday, the virgin arose and placed herself at the foot of a kind of column which was there. But Joseph was seated, morose because he had not been able to provide anything more fitting. He rose, picking up some hay from the manger and scattered it by our Lady's feet. Then he turned aside. Thereupon the Son of G.o.d, leaving his mother's womb without any breach or lesion was one moment inside the womb and next outside the womb on the hay at his mother's feet. At once his mother bent over, gathered him and tenderly hugged him. She placed him on her lap and instructed by the Holy Spirit, began an overall anointing wash with heaven filled milk of her breast. Then she wrapped him in her veil and laid him in a manger.33 The Meditations Meditations were so pictorial in character (and ma.n.u.scripts of the text so frequently full of ill.u.s.trations) that they were one major stimulus to a newly individual and intimate sacred art which sought to transcribe a visual reality into painting or sculpture - very different from what had gone before in the West, let alone the carefully prescribed traditions of Orthodox art. were so pictorial in character (and ma.n.u.scripts of the text so frequently full of ill.u.s.trations) that they were one major stimulus to a newly individual and intimate sacred art which sought to transcribe a visual reality into painting or sculpture - very different from what had gone before in the West, let alone the carefully prescribed traditions of Orthodox art.

The Franciscan devotional style - the celebration of the everyday proclaimed in Francis's Christmas crib - was an inspiration for one of the first artists in the Western tradition to be remembered as an individual personality and to project a personal vision in his artistic achievement: Giotto. One of Giotto's earliest commissions, in the last years of the thirteenth century, was to oversee and take the leading role in painting a sequence of frescoes in the basilica in a.s.sisi dedicated to Francis and his shrine. When in the Arena Chapel in Padua slightly later Giotto painted the Nativity scene which de Caulibus would soon paint in words, his vision was equally a projection beyond scripture: it has a realism which at the time was revolutionary, but it also went beyond a snapshot of the everyday (see Plate 25). Giotto's Nativity provides a scene for our meditation as un.o.bserved external observers and worshippers, just like the Poor Clare nun reading her text. He portrays the intense gaze of a young mother on her son, but the son fixes her with a gaze equally intensely focused and beyond that of a newly born baby. The ox's eye is also firmly fixed on the Virgin as it strains forward up to the manger with the a.s.s. This is a study of relationships which are familiar to us from our daily lives, but in which the haloes of Mother and Son, and our knowledge of the sacred story, pull us beyond our own experience, to the relationships of love which form the heart of Christianity's story of salvation.34 If we read John de Caulibus's Meditations on the Life of Christ Meditations on the Life of Christ, what is immediately apparent is the concentration of their narrative particularly on the extremes of Christ's earthly life: his infancy and Pa.s.sion. In this set of choices, de Caulibus was simply echoing much contemporary preaching of his contemporaries in the Franciscan Order. Infancy and Pa.s.sion privilege the role of Mary, both in Christ's birth and in her agony at his final sufferings. Once more, this Marian devotion was a development from popular twelfth-century devotional themes (see pp. 393-4) - but with a new element: it was in the later thirteenth century that Mary too became not a benevolent but distant monarch, a model for queen dowagers and empresses everywhere, but a wretchedly mourning mother (see Plate 30). Indeed from the early fourteenth century she was commonly depicted throughout Europe as 'Our Lady of Pity' or Pieta Pieta, cradling her dead son in her arms after he had been taken down from the Cross.35 Christ too was now first depicted in art not as a King in Majesty or serene Good Shepherd, but as the 'Man of Sorrows', with the wounds of his crucifixion exposed and his face twisted in pain. The emphasis continued through the Reformation into sixteenth-century Protestantism, which centred on the death of Christ and his atoning work for humanity by his suffering. Christ too was now first depicted in art not as a King in Majesty or serene Good Shepherd, but as the 'Man of Sorrows', with the wounds of his crucifixion exposed and his face twisted in pain. The emphasis continued through the Reformation into sixteenth-century Protestantism, which centred on the death of Christ and his atoning work for humanity by his suffering.

This constant exposition of the Pa.s.sion had an unfortunate side effect. To dwell on Christ's sufferings was liable to make worshippers turn their attention to those whom the Bible narrative princ.i.p.ally blamed for causing the pain: the Jews. Franciscans were not slow to make the connection explicit, and in doing so, they complicated and darkened the already tense relationships between Jews and Christians. Augustine of Hippo had declared that G.o.d had allowed the Jews to survive all the disasters in their history to act as a sign and a warning to Christians. They should therefore be allowed to continue their community life within the Christian world, although without the full privileges of citizenship which Christians enjoyed: G.o.d only intended them to be converted en ma.s.se when he chose to bring the world to an end. So Jews continued to be the only non-Christian community formally tolerated in the Christian West, but their position was always fragile, and they were excluded from positions of power or mainstream wealth-creating activities. One result was that a significant number turned to moneylending at interest (usury), an activity which, thanks to half-understood prohibitions in the Tanakh, the Church prohibited to Christians. That trade could bring wealth to Jews, but certainly not popularity.36 It is true that the Franciscans had not pioneered or single-handedly invented the link between Jews and the Pa.s.sion. The Western liturgy of Holy Week had been elaborating and intensifying the drama of Good Friday, the day of Jesus's death, for at least a century before their first appearance, and others had drawn their conclusions from the emotion of that liturgical experience.37 Yet the tragedy remains: the heirs of the apostle of love, Francis, were among the chief sustainers of the growing hatred of Jews in medieval Western Europe. It was in this atmosphere that England pioneered Western Europe's first ma.s.s expulsion of Jews when, in 1289, Edward I's Parliament refused to help the King out of his war debts unless he rid the realm of all Jews; other rulers followed suit later. Such anti-Semitic ill-will continued to be balanced, in the untidy fashion of human affairs and with Augustine's lukewarm encouragement, by perfectly cordial or straightforward relations between Jews and Christians, but the impulse to hara.s.s or persecute Jews became a persistent feature of Western Christianity which it has only now properly confronted in the wake of terrible events in the twentieth century. Yet the tragedy remains: the heirs of the apostle of love, Francis, were among the chief sustainers of the growing hatred of Jews in medieval Western Europe. It was in this atmosphere that England pioneered Western Europe's first ma.s.s expulsion of Jews when, in 1289, Edward I's Parliament refused to help the King out of his war debts unless he rid the realm of all Jews; other rulers followed suit later. Such anti-Semitic ill-will continued to be balanced, in the untidy fashion of human affairs and with Augustine's lukewarm encouragement, by perfectly cordial or straightforward relations between Jews and Christians, but the impulse to hara.s.s or persecute Jews became a persistent feature of Western Christianity which it has only now properly confronted in the wake of terrible events in the twentieth century.38 Jews were not the only group to be scapegoated: we have already noted (see pp. 400-401) the way that in bad times, lepers and h.o.m.os.e.xuals could also be seen as conspiring against Christian society. Jews were not the only group to be scapegoated: we have already noted (see pp. 400-401) the way that in bad times, lepers and h.o.m.os.e.xuals could also be seen as conspiring against Christian society.

The early fourteenth century added a new set of conspirators: Satan and his agents on earth, witches. Pope John XXII, a man much exercised by enemies and disruptors of the Church like the Spiritual Franciscans, crystallized a good deal of academic debate about magic and witchcraft which had been building up during the previous half-century. In 1320 he commissioned a team of theological experts to consider whether certain specific cases of malicious conjuring could be considered heresy, a controversial proposition generally previously denied by theologians, who had tended to treat magic, spells and meetings with the Devil as devilish illusions without substance. In the wake of the Pope's commission, six or seven years later he issued a bull, Super illus specula, Super illus specula, which now proclaimed that any magical practices or contacts with demons were by their nature heretical and therefore came within the competence of inquisitions. This was one of those ideas which bide their time; for the moment witches were not much troubled by the Church's discipline, but more than a century later, with the aid of new publicists fired by their own obsessions, the Western Church and its Protestant successors were to initiate more than two centuries of active witch persecution (see pp. 686-8). which now proclaimed that any magical practices or contacts with demons were by their nature heretical and therefore came within the competence of inquisitions. This was one of those ideas which bide their time; for the moment witches were not much troubled by the Church's discipline, but more than a century later, with the aid of new publicists fired by their own obsessions, the Western Church and its Protestant successors were to initiate more than two centuries of active witch persecution (see pp. 686-8).39 It is pleasant to turn back from this aspect of medieval Western devotion to something very different: an intensification of personal mysticism, particularly among women recluses and religious. As with the emergence of a more personalized view of the Christian story among Western Christians generally, there were previous precedents. The most famous twelfth-century female mystic was Hildegard of Bingen, Abbess of Rupertsberg, who a generation before Joachim of Fiore recorded her visions and prophesied about the end of time, and whose writings cover a range of interests unusual at the time in male scholars let alone abbesses: cosmology, medicine, musical composition as well as theology. Hildegard was speaking and writing at the end of the age when women in monasteries were likely to have as good an access to scholarship as men. In her lifetime, the first universities were taking shape, all-male inst.i.tutions which were to gather to them most of the intellectual activity of Western Latin culture. Perhaps that is why women were now so attracted to a mode of spirituality which was independent of formal intellectual training, but in which mind and imagination sought out the hiddenness of G.o.d, beyond doctrinal propositions or the argumentative clashes of scholasticism. Such mystics reversed the normal priorities of Western spirituality, which privileges the positive knowledge of G.o.d and affirms what Christian teaching positively says about him, to join Easterners in privileging silence and otherness. One of the best-known works to emerge from this tradition, an anonymous English fourteenth-century meditation probably by a country priest and called The Cloud of Unknowing The Cloud of Unknowing, goes beyond Aquinas in quoting that mysterious and subversive fount of Eastern spirituality, Dionysius the Areopagite, when he says that 'the most G.o.dlike knowledge of G.o.d is that which is known by unknowing'.40 Other dimensions of mysticism freed the mystic from the centralizing impulse of the Church. Much of the writings which conveyed mystical experience was in various European vernaculars - the Cloud of Unknowing Cloud of Unknowing being one example - and so was directed towards those whose command of Latin, the international language of culture, was shaky or non-existent. Perhaps that was why mystics. .h.i.t on themes which were familiar in Orthodox spirituality, but which had not been given nearly as much official encouragement by the Western Church. The mystic met G.o.d beyond the mediation of the male Church hierarchy, and in ways which can be remarkable metaphorical or imaginative appropriations of physical contact with the divine. Characteristic in mystical writings of the period are expressions which emphasize the human vulnerability, frailty, virginity of the subject, but which also celebrate the capacity of this frailty to unite with the divine. Not only women were attracted to these themes. One of the most remarkable mystical writings of the period is a Latin text by a Franciscan friar who was a spiritual adviser and scribe to a probably illiterate woman beguine in Vienna, Agnes Blannbekin (d. 1315); the work may be regarded as a joint venture in spiritual conversation between the two. The two hundred or so visions of Agnes which the friar recorded during the early 1290s make a good deal of use of the metaphor of clothing and unclothing to signify her contact with G.o.d (there are naked dancing nuns and friars in her Heaven). Her relish in the Feast of the Circ.u.mcision, which led her to imagine swallowing the foreskin of Christ, was one of the issues which raised a good deal of worry when the ma.n.u.script was first put into print in the eighteenth century. Agnes's visions were infused with everyday perceptions transformed into symbol; in one of them, Christ appeared to her in quick succession as a bishop, a chef, a pharmacist and the keeper of a general store. being one example - and so was directed towards those whose command of Latin, the international language of culture, was shaky or non-existent. Perhaps that was why mystics. .h.i.t on themes which were familiar in Orthodox spirituality, but which had not been given nearly as much official encouragement by the Western Church. The mystic met G.o.d beyond the mediation of the male Church hierarchy, and in ways which can be remarkable metaphorical or imaginative appropriations of physical contact with the divine. Characteristic in mystical writings of the period are expressions which emphasize the human vulnerability, frailty, virginity of the subject, but which also celebrate the capacity of this frailty to unite with the divine. Not only women were attracted to these themes. One of the most remarkable mystical writings of the period is a Latin text by a Franciscan friar who was a spiritual adviser and scribe to a probably illiterate woman beguine in Vienna, Agnes Blannbekin (d. 1315); the work may be regarded as a joint venture in spiritual conversation between the two. The two hundred or so visions of Agnes which the friar recorded during the early 1290s make a good deal of use of the metaphor of clothing and unclothing to signify her contact with G.o.d (there are naked dancing nuns and friars in her Heaven). Her relish in the Feast of the Circ.u.mcision, which led her to imagine swallowing the foreskin of Christ, was one of the issues which raised a good deal of worry when the ma.n.u.script was first put into print in the eighteenth century. Agnes's visions were infused with everyday perceptions transformed into symbol; in one of them, Christ appeared to her in quick succession as a bishop, a chef, a pharmacist and the keeper of a general store.41 It is not surprising that in the age when official Christianity clashed with the Spiritual Franciscans, such mysticism, springing from free choices by individuals which might owe little to the priorities of the Church authorities, attracted hostile attention from inquisitors. One of the most well-known beguine mystics, Marguerite Porete, who wrote of her experiences in a work in French ent.i.tled The Mirror of Simple Souls, The Mirror of Simple Souls, was burned in France as a 'Free Spirit' heretic in 1310: there was a fine line between such a fate and eventual honour in the Church. The German Dominican Meister Eckhart, an a.s.sociate of Marguerite during his years in France, was similarly accused of heresy and died while inquisition proceedings against him were proceeding; yet because his works eventually escaped full condemnation, they remained widely influential. Eckhart, writing in vigorous and multi-layered German, introduced the idea that after abstracting the particular 'this' or 'that' and achieving 'detachment', was burned in France as a 'Free Spirit' heretic in 1310: there was a fine line between such a fate and eventual honour in the Church. The German Dominican Meister Eckhart, an a.s.sociate of Marguerite during his years in France, was similarly accused of heresy and died while inquisition proceedings against him were proceeding; yet because his works eventually escaped full condemnation, they remained widely influential. Eckhart, writing in vigorous and multi-layered German, introduced the idea that after abstracting the particular 'this' or 'that' and achieving 'detachment', Gela.s.senheit, Gela.s.senheit, the soul can meet G.o.d in the 'ground', the soul can meet G.o.d in the 'ground', Grunt Grunt, of all reality. There she can achieve an inseparable union with the divine, 'the unplumbed depth of G.o.d [which] has no name': 'Life can never be perfected till it returns to its productive source where life is one being that the soul receives when she dies right down to the "ground", that we may live in that life where there is one being.' It could be said (and Eckhart did say) that 'G.o.d begets His only begotten Son in the highest part of the soul.'42 At the other end of the scale of acceptance from Porete was Bridget of Sweden, a fourteenth-century Swedish n.o.blewoman, who founded the monastic order for women and attendant priests which came to take her name; she derived the considerable detail of her foundation from a single vision of Christ, who had considerately spoken to her in Swedish. The Bridgettine Order became much favoured by Bridget's fellow n.o.bility and monarchs all over northern Europe and came to represent late medieval piety at its most lavishly funded, intense and sophisticated. It is nevertheless noticeable that despite all this rich flowering of female spirituality, hardly any women were canonized (officially declared to be saints) in the two centuries after 1300. One of them was indeed Bridget, and the other her Italian contemporary and fellow visionary Catherine of Siena. Both canonizations were deeply controversial - in fact in the case of Bridget, the process had to be repeated three times.

One compelling motive for Catherine and Bridget achieving such exceptional promotion was that it suited the Vicar of Christ in the generations after their deaths. Prominent among the prophecies of both women was their insistence that the popes who had relocated from Rome to Avignon in the early fourteenth century (see pp. 558-9) were destined to return to the city of St Peter: predictions whose fulfilment did not harm their chances of long-term favour from the papacy.43 There was good reason for the popes who had returned to Rome to be grateful for such affirmations. Their claims in the Church were seriously challenged in this period, and were to be given more serious challenges still in the sixteenth-century Reformation. The consequences were profound for all Christianity, and take the story of the Western Church into new territory. Before exploring it, there is another story to tell. We will return to the East: to the Orthodox Churches, which never experienced any reformations like the two which convulsed the Western Church in the twelfth and sixteenth centuries, and which, in contrast to the project of papal monarchy, preserved and promoted the Roman imperial ideal in new forms, in new settings. There was good reason for the popes who had returned to Rome to be grateful for such affirmations. Their claims in the Church were seriously challenged in this period, and were to be given more serious challenges still in the sixteenth-century Reformation. The consequences were profound for all Christianity, and take the story of the Western Church into new territory. Before exploring it, there is another story to tell. We will return to the East: to the Orthodox Churches, which never experienced any reformations like the two which convulsed the Western Church in the twelfth and sixteenth centuries, and which, in contrast to the project of papal monarchy, preserved and promoted the Roman imperial ideal in new forms, in new settings.

PART V.

Orthodoxy: The Imperial Faith (451-1800)

13.

Faith in a New Rome (451-900) A CHURCH TO SHAPE ORTHODOXY: HAGIA SOPHIA.

The charisma of the Bishops of Rome is twofold, springing from the tomb of St Peter and from Europe's equally long-standing fascination with Roman power and civilization. Gradually, in the series of accidents which we have followed from the first century to the thirteenth, Peter's successors revived the aspirations of Roman emperors to rule the world, and they managed to prevent the successors of the Emperor Charlemagne from gaining a monopoly on this monarchical role in the Christianity of the West. In Constantinople the balance was different. The newly promoted bishop of the city took advantage of a favourable conjunction of politics at the first Council of Constantinople in 381 (see pp. 218-20) to get himself 'the primacy of honour after the Bishop of Rome, because Constantinople is the new Rome',1 while his Church did its best to trump Rome in apostolicity by declaring that it had been founded by the first-recruited among Christ's Apostles, Andrew. Even by early Christian standards, this was an implausible shot, and Andrew never really achieved much for his putative episcopal successors, the Patriarchs of Constantinople. Instead, the Byzantine emperors and the ideal of Christian governance which they represented became the vital distinguishing force in the Churches later known as Orthodox, long after the last emperor had died defending Constantinople in 1453. while his Church did its best to trump Rome in apostolicity by declaring that it had been founded by the first-recruited among Christ's Apostles, Andrew. Even by early Christian standards, this was an implausible shot, and Andrew never really achieved much for his putative episcopal successors, the Patriarchs of Constantinople. Instead, the Byzantine emperors and the ideal of Christian governance which they represented became the vital distinguishing force in the Churches later known as Orthodox, long after the last emperor had died defending Constantinople in 1453.

Orthodox Christianity prides itself on its faithfulness to tradition: its majestic round of worship, woven into a texture of ancient music, sustained with carefully considered gesture and ch.o.r.eography amid a setting of painting following prescribed artistic convention, can be seen as reflecting the timelessness of Heaven. Its history has customarily been written with that self-image in mind, and in telling the Orthodox story there is a real problem in recovering the reality of personalities or events which at particular moments provided alternative routes to the future, and who have accordingly won a negative presentation from later Orthodox historians. It is a peculiarity of the Orthodox tradition of public worship that it contains hymns of hate, directed towards named individuals who are defined as heretical, all the way from Arius through Miaphysites, Dyophysites and Iconoclasts.2 Take, for instance, these lines from the fifth sticheron (hymn) for Great Vespers on the Sunday after the Feast of the Ascension. In celebration of the first Council of Nicaea, the liturgy describes with relish (and one malevolent theological pun) the wretched end of Nicaea's arch-villain in fatal diarrhoea on the privy: Take, for instance, these lines from the fifth sticheron (hymn) for Great Vespers on the Sunday after the Feast of the Ascension. In celebration of the first Council of Nicaea, the liturgy describes with relish (and one malevolent theological pun) the wretched end of Nicaea's arch-villain in fatal diarrhoea on the privy: Arius fell into the precipice of sin, Having shut his eyes so as not to see the light, And he was ripped asunder by a divine hook so that along with his entrails he forcibly emptied out all his essence [ousia!] and his soul, and was named another Judas both for his ideas and the manner of his death.

Such liturgical performance of hatred is embarra.s.sing for modern ec.u.menical discussions among Eastern Christians when it is directed at cherished saints of one of the Churches partic.i.p.ating, but it is probably to be preferred to the Western practice of burning heretics. There were very few burnings in the Byzantine Empire and they ceased soon after the West resumed burnings in the eleventh century, although in later centuries burnings resumed in Orthodox Muscovy - apparently first thanks to prompting from envoys of the Holy Roman Emperor in 1490.3 In fact there was a long tradition in the Orthodox Church of leading churchmen criticizing burnings at the stake, which has little or no parallel in medieval Western Catholicism. In fact there was a long tradition in the Orthodox Church of leading churchmen criticizing burnings at the stake, which has little or no parallel in medieval Western Catholicism.4 Once the Orthodox Churches of the East and the Balkans were in the hands of the Ottoman Turks, persecuting Christian heretics was in any case no longer a practical proposition for Orthodox Christians - but the hymns of hate remained, liturgical affirmations that there was one truth in Orthodoxy which had fought its way past a series of satanic temptations to error. Once the Orthodox Churches of the East and the Balkans were in the hands of the Ottoman Turks, persecuting Christian heretics was in any case no longer a practical proposition for Orthodox Christians - but the hymns of hate remained, liturgical affirmations that there was one truth in Orthodoxy which had fought its way past a series of satanic temptations to error.

Continuity is not the same as changelessness. The Church of Constantinople and the Churches which sprang from it were wedded to imperial politics and the politics of the empire's successor-states: their spirituality has moved in rhythms set by these chances of history. The destruction of the empire in 1453 did not merely encourage the Church to cling fiercely to its evolved theological ident.i.ty, denying that any other could be or had been possible; it also led Churches which escaped the catastrophe to reaffirm the role of sacred monarchy in the mould of Byzantium, and it was only at the end of the twentieth century that the last monarch of an Orthodox country was sent packing from his throne - the King of Greece, who happened to bear the name of both the first 'Orthodox' monarch and the last Byzantine monarch, Constantine. In post-Communist Orthodox cultures there are still rulers who aspire to something of the same role.

Orthodoxy has to a remarkable extent been moulded round one single church building, far more influential than even those crucial Western sacred places, the Basilica of St Peter in Rome and the Abbey Church of Cluny. This is the Cathedral of the Holy Wisdom (Hagia Sophia) in Constantinople, whose fabric has fared better than Cluny's, but whose fate as a church converted to a mosque encapsulates the traumas of Orthodox history (see Plate 5). It owes its present form to the partnership of a Latin-speaking boy from the Balkans and a former circus artist of dauntingly gymnastic s.e.xual prowess: the Emperor Justinian I and his consort, Theodora.5 We have already encountered this heroic if unlikely imperial couple as we have visited the stories both of the Western Church and of the Churches which rejected the Christological formula of Chalcedon after 451. Even before Justinian succeeded his Balkan-born soldier-uncle Justin in 527, they were contemplating the reuniting of the old empire through a twofold strategy of theological negotiation with Miaphysite enemies of Chalcedon and military conquests in East and West. We have already encountered this heroic if unlikely imperial couple as we have visited the stories both of the Western Church and of the Churches which rejected the Christological formula of Chalcedon after 451. Even before Justinian succeeded his Balkan-born soldier-uncle Justin in 527, they were contemplating the reuniting of the old empire through a twofold strategy of theological negotiation with Miaphysite enemies of Chalcedon and military conquests in East and West.

Justinian and Theodora were the last Christian monarchs before the nineteenth-century British Queen Victoria to wield an influence throughout all sections of the Christian world in their age, and their influence was far more personal and less purely symbolic than hers. It was Justinian who presided over the fifth Council of Constantinople in 553 when it condemned the theological tradition of Origen, sought to intensify the Church's rejection of the Dyophysites and in the process humiliated Pope Vigilius (see pp. 209-10 and 326-7); it was Theodora who provided patronage for those who secretly built up a Miaphysite Church hierarchy to challenge the Chalcedonians (see pp. 235-6). One would not realize how colourful their lives had been from the mosaic portraits of the pair as majestic and universal rulers, breaking iconographical convention to stand in pious harmony with their clergy and attendants in the very sanctuary of the imperial church of San Vitale in Ravenna (see Plate 27). The colour is revealed through the unusually triangulated writings of the Court historian Procopius (or Procopios). To balance his eloquent celebration of the Emperor's public achievements and buildings, Procopius vented his frustrations at his own courtliness by furtively penning a poisonous denunciation of Justinian and Theodora in a gossipy account of the same events, The Secret History The Secret History, whose rediscovery by the pope's Vatican librarian in the seventeenth century much enhanced historical enjoyment of the period.6 Justinian's rebuilding of Hagia Sophia resulted from a political upheaval which nearly ended his rule only five years after his accession. His lavish expenditure and his vigorous pursuit of frontier wars, and the attendant taxation to pay for them, had united the active citizens of Constantinople in fury against him. In 532 the sporting factions of Greens and Blues, who played a leading part in city politics because they organized public entertainment in the capital's stadium, the Hippodrome, suspended their normal rivalry in an effort to overthrow Justinian, pushing one of his nephews into claiming imperial power. The crowds' shouts of 'Victory' (Nika) filled the city as they set fire to major buildings. Procopius maintained that, amid the blaze and panic, it was only Theodora's steely declaration to her husband that 'Royalty is a fine burial shroud' that steadied his nerve, pulled him back from flight and dispatched troops to slaughter the Nika rebels and hack their way to the submission of the city.7 Around the shaken Emperor, much of the city lay in ruins, not least the two-centuries-old basilica of Hagia Sophia next to the Hippodrome and the palace. Around the shaken Emperor, much of the city lay in ruins, not least the two-centuries-old basilica of Hagia Sophia next to the Hippodrome and the palace.

Justinian now revealed his pa.s.sion for building. With extraordinary speed he commissioned his architect to obliterate the remains of the old church. Its replacement would serve as cathedral of the city and symbol of unity in his empire, as well as a perpetual warning to future unruly crowds as it loomed over the Hippodrome. The overall design, completed and dedicated after only five years, outdid all previous precedents. It abandoned the basilican plan of its predecessor church and showcased a feature of imperial architecture which previously had rarely been more than a subsidiary theme in Christian building: the dome, a recreation of the canopy of Heaven. From the time of Constantine, domes had been used to roof circular or centrally planned Christian buildings which spoke primarily of the route to Heaven in death - mausoleum-churches for the burial of prominent people or baptisteries which witnessed Christians' death to sin (see p. 293). Here, the aim was different, creating a congregational s.p.a.ce for emperor, patriarch and people which felt as if it encompa.s.sed the long east-west axis of a conventional basilica. This was achieved by building a dome of breathtaking width and height, pierced around its base by a row of windows through which shafts of light transfixed the church interior below; the dome seemed to float on two half-domes to east and west. They climaxed at the east in the altar, housed beyond them in a central semicircular (apsidal) sanctuary; that apse was topped by yet another half-dome. One sixth-century poet, Paul the Silentiary, tried to capture the effect: it 'is a great helmet, bending over on every side, like the radiant heavens . . . like the firmament that rests upon air'.8 Paul's verse was actually commemorating an early restoration of Hagia Sophia after earthquake damage; the dome partially collapsed again in 1346. Few churches could risk trying to match its daring and complicated architectural form; none of Justinian's many foundations or rebuildings of other churches followed its model in full. What Hagia Sophia did do was decisively to promote the central dome as the leading motif of architecture in the imperial Church of the East and in those Churches which later sought to identify with that tradition. Moreover, following the precedent of Hagia Sophia, the dome became a major Islamic feature in mosques, once mosques became covered s.p.a.ces rather than open courtyards. When the dome was used in other Eastern church buildings, it generally once more appeared as in earlier Christian buildings in the midst of a central plan, and now most commonly it rode over the centre of a cross with equal arms - a Greek cross. This plan could be adapted to the use of quite small communities like rural parishes or minor monasteries and still convey the impression of celestial splendour. In a much later development, a screen called an iconostasis iconostasis customarily shut off the altar (see pp. 484-5), but this was not how such church interiors were originally conceived for five centuries or more after Justinian's time. customarily shut off the altar (see pp. 484-5), but this was not how such church interiors were originally conceived for five centuries or more after Justinian's time.

Nowhere was the Orthodox combination of architecture, art and liturgy seen more splendidly than in Hagia Sophia, often simply known as the 'Great Church', although its present rather dismal internal state does credit neither to its original incarnation nor to the care lavished on it in its subsequent life as a mosque. There was a moment in 612 when Patriarch Sergios decreed a reduction in what he regarded as an excessive staff and ceremony in the cathedral: the trimmed establishment which he allowed amounted to eighty priests, 150 deacons, forty deaconesses, seventy subdeacons, 160 readers, twenty-five cantors and a hundred doorkeepers.9 Worshippers beyond this monstrous array of sacred courtiers could see Heaven above them in the dome and semi-domes. The images, still relatively simple in the original decoration of Hagia Sophia, became more and more elaborate. Those who looked up into the dome above a congregation would normally see the image of Christ the Ruler of All (the 'Pantocrator'), in glory and in judgement. They could also gaze east, to the table where bread and wine were made holy, normally presided over by the images of Christ's Mother, usually with her baby son, G.o.d made flesh. All around these representations of divinity enthroned and incarnate was more figural representation in mosaic or wall painting, in schemes which grew fixed throughout Orthodoxy not merely in arrangement but in content, all conceived as reflecting their archetypes, just as a particular object might reflect its Platonic form. The tiers representing rulers, saints, clergy, all in hierarchical but intimate relationship to G.o.d and Mary the Worshippers beyond this monstrous array of sacred courtiers could see Heaven above them in the dome and semi-domes. The images, still relatively simple in the original decoration of Hagia Sophia, became more and more elaborate. Those who looked up into the dome above a congregation would normally see the image of Christ the Ruler of All (the 'Pantocrator'), in glory and in judgement. They could also gaze east, to the table where bread and wine were made holy, normally presided over by the images of Christ's Mother, usually with her baby son, G.o.d made flesh. All around these representations of divinity enthroned and incarnate was more figural representation in mosaic or wall painting, in schemes which grew fixed throughout Orthodoxy not merely in arrangement but in content, all conceived as reflecting their archetypes, just as a particular object might reflect its Platonic form. The tiers representing rulers, saints, clergy, all in hierarchical but intimate relationship to G.o.d and Mary the Theotokos Theotokos, were a constant a.s.surance to the congregations who viewed them that G.o.d in his mercy allowed such intimacy to human beings.

Interestingly, the ordering of saints in Byzantine church interiors does not much reflect the pa.s.sing of the seasons of Christian worship; they tend instead to be grouped in categories, such as martyrs or virgins.10 The Church's year - Christmas, Easter, Ascension - tells a story which progresses in linear fashion through the months, centring on the life of Christ, and it is also punctuated by days commemorating particular historic events in the lives of saints. The Eucharist, by contrast, is timeless, reflecting the eternity of Heaven. It is that timelessness that the artistic schemes of the Orthodox Churches characteristically invoke - the only moment to which they point above the altar is the end of time, when Christ reigns in glory, the moment in which every Eucharist partic.i.p.ates. Eastern congregations did not develop the att.i.tude of the Carolingian West that the Eucharist was something to privatize, directing its power to particular ends and intentions, and therefore capable of being shortened into a said form (see pp. 356-7). In the East, the celebration was done because it needed to be done - at the worst times in Orthodox history, it has been just about all that the Church has been able to do. Moreover, from an early date, Eastern Christians seem to have concluded that it was enough for worshippers to be present at the Eucharist without receiving bread and wine. This seems to have been a measure of the awe which attached to the experience of eating the body and blood of Christ, which is how the Eucharist was now perceived. Laypeople's reception of these elements became a very occasional, perhaps once-yearly, experience, much earlier than the same development in the West. Indeed, in the late fourth century, Ambrose of Milan recorded his disapproval of this Eastern custom. The Church's year - Christmas, Easter, Ascension - tells a story which progresses in linear fashion through the months, centring on the life of Christ, and it is also punctuated by days commemorating particular historic events in the lives of saints. The Eucharist, by contrast, is timeless, reflecting the eternity of Heaven. It is that timelessness that the artistic schemes of the Orthodox Churches characteristically invoke - the only moment to which they point above the altar is the end of time, when Christ reigns in glory, the moment in which every Eucharist partic.i.p.ates. Eastern congregations did not develop the att.i.tude of the Carolingian West that the Eucharist was something to privatize, directing its power to particular ends and intentions, and therefore capable of being shortened into a said form (see pp. 356-7). In the East, the celebration was done because it needed to be done - at the worst times in Orthodox history, it has been just about all that the Church has been able to do. Moreover, from an early date, Eastern Christians seem to have concluded that it was enough for worshippers to be present at the Eucharist without receiving bread and wine. This seems to have been a measure of the awe which attached to the experience of eating the body and blood of Christ, which is how the Eucharist was now perceived. Laypeople's reception of these elements became a very occasional, perhaps once-yearly, experience, much earlier than the same development in the West. Indeed, in the late fourth century, Ambrose of Milan recorded his disapproval of this Eastern custom.11 The ordered worship of G.o.d was the means by which holiness could enfold everyone, under the protection of the great helmet of the dome above. The singing of the liturgy imitated the music of Heaven, with angels in the same choir alongside the worshippers, and much of that music was intended for processions, for all to sing. The tradition allowed for voices alone, without instruments, in contrast to the gradual medieval acceptance in the Latin West of musical instruments, as also far away in the Church of Ethiopia. The singing congregations were travelling towards holiness, protected in the fixed shape of the liturgy, bound into the processions which dominated not merely the drama of the Church but everyday life in the streets of Constantinople. Moments of entry and reception into the sacred precincts were of especial importance, not least to the emperor himself, and the goal was the drama of the Eucharist at G.o.d's altar. Music which began life in processions might end up having other uses. For instance, that most popular of Eastern musical acclamations the Trisagion Trisagion (see pp. 239-40) was said to have been devised by a boy in the mid-fifth century as a comment on the penitential psalm that he was singing in procession, to pray for deliverance from a sequence of violent earth tremors. The chant's success in stilling the earthquakes embedded it in the liturgy and in the consciousness of Eastern Christians far beyond Byzantium. (see pp. 239-40) was said to have been devised by a boy in the mid-fifth century as a comment on the penitential psalm that he was singing in procession, to pray for deliverance from a sequence of violent earth tremors. The chant's success in stilling the earthquakes embedded it in the liturgy and in the consciousness of Eastern Christians far beyond Byzantium.12 Worship in the Orthodox fashion came to propel first monks, then laypeople beyond the monasteries, towards an idea which over centuries became basic to Christian Orthodox spirituality: union with the divine, or theosis theosis - dizzyingly for humanity, and alarmingly for many Western Christians, the word can be translated as 'deification'. The concept was likely to take the Christian believer in a very different direction from Augustine's Western emphasis on the great gulf between G.o.d and humanity created by original sin. It a.s.serted that human society could be sanctified through the ministry and liturgy of the Church, and by the meditations of those who were prepared to enter such difficult and testing labour. What Justinian was doing in his major programme of building in the capital and the creation of a constant round of sacred ceremony around Hagia Sophia was to make himself and the imperial Court the focus of a society where every public activity which formerly had been part of the non-Christian structure of the empire was now made holy and consecrated to the service of G.o.d. - dizzyingly for humanity, and alarmingly for many Western Christians, the word can be translated as 'deification'. The concept was likely to take the Christian believer in a very different direction from Augustine's Western emphasis on the great gulf between G.o.d and humanity created by original sin. It a.s.serted that human society could be sanctified through the ministry and liturgy of the Church, and by the meditations of those who were prepared to enter such difficult and testing labour. What Justinian was doing in his major programme of building in the capital and the creation of a constant round of sacred ceremony around Hagia Sophia was to make himself and the imperial Court the focus of a society where every public activity which formerly had been part of the non-Christian structure of the empire was now made holy and consecrated to the service of G.o.d.

The first major project of Justinian's reign, the codification of half a millennium of imperial legal decisions, might at first seem remote from the agenda of sacralizing Byzantine society, but Justinian's collections and abridgements were a deliberately Christian reshaping of the heritage of law from the empire, much more conscious in that objective than the previous harmonization of Roman law by an earlier Christian emperor of the fourth century, Theodosius II. This codification was one of Justinian's most lasting legacies. In the West it disappeared for centuries along with the empire itself, but its rediscovery in the eleventh century played a significant part both in the Gregorian remoulding of society and the creation of the first Christian universities (see pp. 377-8 and 398), and it provided the basis for most Western legal systems devised thereafter. It also remained the foundation for Eastern imperial justice until the Byzantine Empire disappeared in 1453, but the price of its survival was its rapid translation into Greek.

There was no future for Latin in the empire of Justinian's successors, for in the eastern Mediterranean it had only ever been an interloping language imposed by colonial administrators from the West. The people of Byzantium continued to call themselves 'Romans' (and that is also what the Arabs called them and their homeland of Asia Minor - Rhum Rhum), but they did so in Greek: they were Rhomaioi Rhomaioi. They also lost the inclination to enjoy literature in Latin, until much later, at a time of renewed cultural contacts in the thirteenth century, they found new Greek translations of Latin poetry and philosophy to read.13 The draining of what was Roman or non-Christian from New Rome was one of the irreversible effects of Justinian's reign and its aftermath: in the century and a half from his death in 565, a new ident.i.ty was created for society in the Eastern Empire which can be described as Byzantine. The draining of what was Roman or non-Christian from New Rome was one of the irreversible effects of Justinian's reign and its aftermath: in the century and a half from his death in 565, a new ident.i.ty was created for society in the Eastern Empire which can be described as Byzantine.

It was not merely that Justinian's military campaigns brought ruin to traditional Roman society in his new conquests in Italy and North Africa (see p. 320); he also undermined much of what remained from the past in the East.