Roman Empire Vs Byzantine Empire

All Roads lead to Rome

The coronation of Charlemagne as emperor of the Holy Roman empire by the catholic church must have been one of the most insulting actions ever committed against a nation and religion. In this time and period there already existed a Holy Roman Empire, and it was in the east as the Byzantine empire. While the Byzantines might have been somewhat culturally different from the Italian, Latin roots of the original Romans, they nonetheless identified themselves as the official successor state of the Roman empire. The western catholic church knew of Byzantine and their history, yet they still held their support to Charlemagne as the protectorate of Christendom in his new Holy Roman empire. This insult was not an unprovoked act, this was years of conflict through dogmatic scuffles, and cultural quarrels all hitting the fan in this symbolic middle finger from the catholic church to the Byzantines. Since before the breakdown of the Roman empire, both western Roman Catholic Christianity and eastern Byzantine Orthodox had their quarrels, but held together in the name of the larger Roman identity. Once the western half of the empire split, after being overrun by Germanic tribes, there became tension of who was the dominant church. The tension was mainly over dogmatic issues in the scripture, but there were also

cultural differences, from the religious bureaucracy that both churches could not make an agree on .There was also disputes of the power of the Papacy as the Byzantines did not approve of his final authority. The final insult was that of the Papacy support of Charlemagne and the Holy Roman Empire, as it was the Catholic church sending the message that the Byzantines were not worthy of being the successors of both the Romans legacy and the christian faith.

The Roman legacy that both of these faith sought was that of a giant empire that ruled in multiple continents, with millions of citizens all under the banner of Christendom. The roots of both roman catholicism and Greek orthodoxy as competing institutions, both stem from before the fall of the empire, as two separate eastern and western cultures under one empirical roof. The eastern half of the empire was controlled by the Roman empire, but that does not mean they acted as subjects to a superior society as proven by Lukas de Blois article “The Third Century crisis and the Greek Elite in the Roman Empire”, he states,

“In spite of assimilating, the Greeks did not regard the Empire as belonging to the Ancient Roman nation… These Greeks regarded the Empire as a commonwealth of cultured people, governed by a sovereign who had to display the characteristics of an ideal king, and who cooperated with the flower of nations within the realm.”(361)

In a modern comparison, it would how Texas regards Washington D.C and the New England area in terms of politics and cultural life. Similar to Texas as well the Greeks believed themselves to be superior, and criticized their capital and citizens of Rome, as stated in the same article, ”Greek Authors were annoyed with the superficiality and downright materialism of the Roman Drawing-Rooms.”(Bious,The Third).” This sentiment could be associated as well with the religious faith as eastern Christianity and western Christianity also came to their conflict over their cultural differences. An example of this division could be connected with the first council of Constantinople in 381, where the council ruled,”Among the council’s canon was the one giving the bishop of Constantinople precedence of honour over all other Bishops except the Bishop in Rome,”(Britannica). The issue with the council was with Constantinople's authority over the Bishops, the Catholic west did not approve of that canon. Like the Greeks the Western Romans felt themselves superior to the opposite side of the empire. This is a severe issue because of the importance of the role of Constantinople, as it was a new city and wants to define itself as both a religious and political institution on the Roman empire. Constantinople was deemed the Rome of the east, yet the Church did not share that sentiment, as any sign of equality could be seen as a sign of weakness. This tension could be seen as just a competitive nature of two separate regions with competing influence through their rich history, both the Latin west and Greek east were influential and knew of their importance. Through the unity of the Roman empire, they maintained civil, but without this sharing bond this ,”...commonwealth of cultured people...”(De Blois,361) as stated above became less civil and more abrasive in their differences.

The Fall of the western Roman empire to the Christians was not just a time of transition from Roman empire to medieval era, it was an apocalyptic event of damnation by god.

The fall of western Roman empire occurred steadily, with the signs of Germanic and other western European tribes slowly chipping at the empire one territory at a time. Once all hell broke loose, and the Germanic tribes completely dominated the western Roman empire, the Roman citizen’s reaction was amazement to say the least. As stated in R. P. C. Hanson’s,”The Reaction of the Church to the Collapse of the Western Roman Empire in the Fifth Century”, he

proclaims,
”Nobody expected its [Roman empire] demise, and certainly nobody wanted it. There were no nationalist movements, no spirit whatever of anti-Imperialism... Least of all did the Christian Church...”.(273) The fall of the Roman empire changed everything in western Europe, it was a destruction of a political entity that had be in place for a thousand years, and in its place was uncertainty. The significance to this even to the Greek Orthodox was that they know resided in their own Roman bubble separate to the catholic church, they lost political connections with the west. This division started the permanent separation, without Rome Constantinople became the dominant Religions authority of what was left as the Authentic Roman empire, in the East. The west was in turmoil in this post western-Roman period, and the Church needed to ally itself with the new force of power in the region, the Germanic tribes. From the point of view of the Byzantines this also reduced the legitimacy of the Catholic Church, the west was overridden by barbarians that now became the followers of the Catholic church.The Byzantine Orthodox Church must have felt a little elitist about their situation as being the official church of the Roman empire after the fall of Rome. After the fall of the western ties to the western empire it was inevitable that there would be conflict between this now two separate regions, with nothing but Christianity in common.