THL303: Introduction to Church History: Eastern & Western Schisms

The greatest Christian split of all has been that between east and west, between Roman Catholic and eastern Orthodox, which is still apparent today. This book provides an account of the emergence of divisions between Rome and Constantinople.

"Aiden Nichols provides a systematic account of the origins, development and recent history of the relations between Rome and all separated Eastern Christians. ..." [from back cover]

Contents: The church at the end of the seventh century -- Iconoclasm: first phase and aftermath -- The church in the West -- Monastic reform in East and West -- Iconoclasm: second phase and the triumph of Orthodoxy -- Renaissance of learning: East and West -- Pope, patriarch and Christian mission -- Changing patterns of worship -- Monastic renewal -- Christian mission -- Approaching the end of the first Christian millennium -- Monastic developments -- Reform and the papacy -- 1054 and the "Schism" -- Spiritual and intellectual life in Byzantium -- Turks, Normans and the collapse of the Byzantine Empire

This book traces the compelling story of the transplanted papacy in Avignon, the city mainly French popes transformed into their capital. Through an engaging blend of political and social history Joelle Rollo-Koster tells the fascinating tale of a misunderstood era that brings to life the fourteenth-century capital of Christianity.

From dust jacket notes: "Take heed, take heed, give us a Roman Pope or we will turn your heads redder than your hats!" So cried the Roman mob storming through the Vatican as the embattled Cardinals sought to elect a new Pope - successor to Gregory XI who had held his court in Avignon and imprudently returned to Rome to die. Out of this tumultuous Conclave of 1378, when the Cardinals in terror created two simultaneous Popes and then a third - old Tibaldeschi (who refused), Urban (who promised to abdicate), and finally (when Urban proved intractable) Clement VII - came the Great Schism of the West. Forty disastrous years of rival Popes, rival Christian Kings and Colleges of Cardinals, rival armies on the march - years of moral chaos as the Church was split asunder, perhaps forever. Marzieh Gail recreates that turbulent age with the help of contemporary letters, memoirs and documents, superbly evoking the drama and texture of a world irrevocably divided between Urbanists, Clementines, and followers of John of Pisa. She uncovers the intricate web of intrigue running through all the courts of Europe, even to Islam. Above all, she brings to life the extraordinary men and women - saints, peasants, Kings, and the Popes themselves - who were the prime movers. We see Catherine of Siena, that 'strong Virgin' who flogged the world's rulers to Urban's obedience, and magnificent Orleans, his fortunes (and those of Avignon) tied to his brother's madness. We see Joanna of Naples - by one Pope awarded the Golden Rose, by another excommunicated - and the infamous pirate who became the first Pope John XXIII. We see Wycliffe, and Jan Huss, killed for his beliefs; Sigismund, Holy Roman Emperor, and all the great figures of the medieval world drawn to the Council of Constance to put an end to Schism - only to make the Reformation inevitable...."

The first comprehensive study of the Constance reforms since 1867, this volume offers a new edition of the Constance reform committee records and analyzes the rich conceptual basis for the reforms, arguing they were far more successful than historians have acknowledged.