Everything that is to be said about the Church under the Carolingians is marked by Caesaropapism. Caesaropapism, which is not unique to Carolingians, is the will of the political power to arrogate itself a right of control over the affairs of the Church, up to and including dogma. Caesaropapism existed as soon as Emperor Constantine and became the characteristic of the Byzantine Empire. Caesaropapism, in general, is often a source of trouble in the Church. We have already seen that the Carolingian will, since the days of Boniface and Charles Martel, was to accept this desire to renovate the Frankish Church, which came from the popes, certainly, but also to keep control of it. They wanted to reform, they wanted a Church that remained French and, finally, Charlemagne was to want to use this better-educated Church in the service of the government of the regnum and then of the Empire. Caesaropapism was also admixed with Gallicanism, that will of Frankish clerics to maintain their particularisms and perhaps and above all, their autonomy from the pope of Rome. Gallicanism generally is also a source of unrest and is also found in other countries in other forms. The time is both to the weakening of Byzantium by the Iconoclasm' quarrels and the Carolingian effort concerning the Church was also the will to rid the West of the influence of Constantinople in the affairs of the Frankish Church. The West distinguished itself from Byzantine under the leadership of the Frankish king and the importance of the latter became such that, finally, the popes of Rome could not prevent the movement. The establishment of the Church in Germania, for example, was to take place on the basis of a purely Frankish, Western liturgy. In general, Carolingian Caesaropapism can be considered to have made the adoption of the Roman ritual an element of the unity of the kingdom
The question arose of the unity of liturgy: disorders, in fact, had brought a considerable variety (sacred texts, forms of prayer are no longer common in the Christian West and in the East, moreover, it should be noted that there are juxtaposed 'national' rites "national). As far as Mass is concerned, they moved from diversity to a effort of unity. In Rome since long, either the Gelasian Sacramentary (known as the "former Gelasian Sacramentary", which was said to be Pope Gelasia 492-496) was used for the churches of the parishes of Rome, or the Gregorian Sacramentary (for papal services; due in part to Gregory the Great, 590-604). These texts contained the 'common' (Mass' basis, the 'canon') of the Mass and not the 'proper' (texts for each day). In Ireland and part of England, Celt liturgy was peculiar (Stowe's missal and Bangor's antiphonal). For Gauls, there was a 'gallican rite' born of local customs; the Mass was brilliant (especially since the 6th century A.D. and/then with monastic influence, the Mass in Gaul borrowed from Byzantine and Oriental uses: more room was given to the dramatic element of the Eucharist and the sensibility of the faithful); albeit no longer practiced, the catechumenate, they kept that part of the Mass dedicated to it. The Mass made a extensive use of the vernacular (degraded Latin, which was no longer Latin but it was not French yet), either because the clergy no longer knew Latin or for more effective preaching. The participation of the faithful was important (for example, they recited the Pater with the priest). That form of Mass was maintained in Carolingian times; it also took up a Merovingian practice of praying for the Frankish king (but under the Merovingians, it was a matter of praying for peace between the princes; under the Carolingians, they were to pray for the spread of the reign of God -- that charge devolved to the king); that Gallican Mass, however, was never a reaction against the Roman rite but, as elsewhere, the result of local use. The Roman influence was gradually felt: first in Bavaria via St Boniface and then in Gauls, during the reign of Pippin the Short. This influence took place only in facts and without any Roman will, simply, for example, because the Franks saw that the Roman liturgy was 'the best organized.' Roman examples were spread through the monks or pilgrims who, as early as the 7th century A.D., brought back liturgical books from Rome, showing the clerics of the Frankish kingdom that Gallican usage, local customs were not the only ones but that, precisely, there was a Roman rite... Hence that some clerics borrowed from these sacramentaries - on their own initiative, and sporadically; the papacy did not even think of encouraging or imposing them because the concept had not yet developed in Rome of the necessary unity of the rites of Christendom (no doubt that that was the influence of the East where various rites coexisted); on the other hand, the pope considered it natural to impose unity upon the bishops of his region. Finally, from the middle of the 8th century, the idea of a global official loan developed in Rome: in 754 A.D., the church of Metz (very influential politically and intellectually in the Pippinids' Austrasia) officially adopted the Roman rite. Pippin the Short then conceived of extending the movement to the whole Frankish Church: a new 'Gelasian Sacramentary' (a part of the Gregorian Sacramentary was incorporated into) was developed, which, moreover, actually gave 3 sacramentaries and clerics, finally, get lost in it. This first movement, moreover, was supplemented by a desire to reform Church song, on the basis of an initiative of the bishop of Rouen (one of the brothers of Pippin) who, in 760, in Rome, was dazzled by Roman singing (he brought back with him a master of the papal schola cantorum; he wanted to familiarize the clerics of Neustria with the 'modulations of Roman psalmody' and clerics would be sent to Rome to learn more). But that kept still in the realm of desires: Roman modes were adopted by pragmatism and not by Caesaropapism, simply because Roman rites were considered the best. The adpotion of the liturgy of Rome was no doubt to bring, in the 8th century A.D., the counter-abseid, West, of Carolingian churches in the imitation of the basilicas of Rome -- including St. Peter and St. John of Latran -- whose apse was turned to the West, as well as the development of the Savior's cult in relation to the Emperor, which might also have brought the 'westwerk.' The movement lead to churches with double-chorus, thus two altars: during part of the ritual, the priest had to look at both the people and the East
The most important official effort was to be that about the texts of Church: the Carolingian Renaissance was to aim, in terms of the texts of the Church, at liturgical unification (a work that began since the reign of Pippin the Short). It was Alcuin who corrected and unified the texts, a work completed between Easter 800 and Easter 801 A.D. For the most part they came back to the Vulgate, that translation of the Bible into Latin by St Jerome. Alcuin also had to revise the Sacramentary, the book used by the celebrant at Mass; he was inspired by the Roman liturgy, which was appreciated for its simplicity. Charlemagne, in 781, had been impressed in Rome by the ceremonies he had attended and he had asked the pope to send him a official Roman Sacramentary. Alcuin used it as a base by adding as a supplement a certain number of rites in use by the Franks. Charlemagne also had a Homeliary developed by Paul Diacre, a defector from the Lombard courts of Pavia and Benevento, a collection of texts to serve as schematics of sermons to Frankish clerics. Like for the Chant, if the Carolingians adopted the Roman ritual, they were to re-export it to Rome as a 'Frenchisized' ritual. Gallic rites included in the Roman sacramentary are still present in the universal liturgy of the Church (rituals of ordination, funeral, blessing of the abbots, Easter candle). For 12 centuries, the Roman liturgy has been largely, by Alcuin, a Romano-Gallican liturgy. The 12th century Roman Pontifical and even more that of Innocent III are in fact a slight adaptation of a pontifical compiled in Mainz around 950 A.D. on the basis of Alcuin's writing, and according to the example of it by the integration of local rites into the Roman rite. Charlemagne also imposed the Gregorian chant (he had been convinced by his advisors). Alcuin revised the Vulgate which pushed the Church towards the sole use of it. The Vulgate is the Bible of the Frankish world. The Vulgate was the Latin translation of the Bible from Hebrew, made since the 2nd century A.D. and revised between 383 and 405 by St. Jerome. The old versions of the psalter disappeared due to the generalization of The Vulgate in the West. The text had been and kept being distorted from copyists to copyists during 4 centuries and Alcuin was to correct the Vulgate at Charlemagne's request. The Vulgate was to be the reference version until the rediscovery of the Bible of the Septante (Bible's Greek version) in modern times (Jerome had rejected this Greek version because it was tainted by too many errors; this version of the Old Testament had been written in Greek, between -250 and -130 B.C., for the use by Jews of the Hellenistic world; it was used by the ancient Church). All the biblist works, up to the Reformation, was based on those of Alcuin (and Charlemagne had ordered this research and made the use of corrected texts mandatory). As is often the case in the relations between carolingians and Rome, forms of quiproquos existed. The Gregorian Sacramentary was sent by Pope Hadrian to the king via John, abbot of Ravenna, in 785 A.D. -- a copy of the papal chapel; Charlemagne had him asked in Rome by Paul the Deacon (then abbot of Mont-Cassin) in order to have a 'healthy' copy, not yet reached by the 'recent interpolations' -- errors of the copyists of the time of Pippin. That copy, however, was already 50 years behind what the rites in Rome really had become and actually reflected the Mass as it was said around 740 A.D. This sacramentary was therefore a text prior to all the work carried out under Pippin, but also by the popes of the time themselves, to standardize the sacramentaries of the West. The pope might have misunderstood himself: he would not have understood that Charlemagne wanted a working paper but would have understood that it was a matter of giving a gift; and, having no quality copyists available to make a sacramental worthy of being offered to Charlemagne, he would have taken what he had best: that sacramental, dated to about 730 A.D., and which was lying in his own library. And, Charlemagne, for his part, must also have been mistaken, thinking, receiving, with this sacramentary coming from Rome, the pure Roman rites of that time... This sacramentary, the "Sacramentary Hadrian", as it is called, was therefore distorted (some rites were celebrated, for example, only by the pope, especially at the stations in the basilicas; it was incomplete: not the rite of funeral, not the rite of penance because the pope never celebrated them in person - or little for penance) but Charlemagne made many copies of it immediately; he simply wanted to incorporate some elements of the Gallican or Frankish rite to please the clerics and the people. Alcuin, on that basis, worked: he added to the Sacramentary Hadrian elements of the "new Gelasian Sacramentary", elements of Frankish and Gallican rites. He corrected grammatical errors; he worked about it for almost 20 years (the definitive work was already advanced enough that in 794 A.D., at the Council of Frankfurt on the images, Charlemagne could already impose two Roman rites: the kiss of peace which, 'in the solemn Masses' was also now practiced by the people as well; reading the 'dyptics' (specially invoked lists of saints) was postponed until after the Offering). The reform continued in 809 with the addition of the 'Filioque' formula to the Creed. Were also continued the 'ordines' which had begun to be written under Pippin (a collection of liturgical rules) and which ended around 780 A.D.: they provided the churches of the Frankish world with a set of rituals (sacramental or not) where Roman, Frankish, and Gallican elements subtly mingled. Feasts were added: in 800 A.D., the 4 feasts of the Virgin (Nativity on September 8, Purification on February 02, Anunciation and Conception of Christ on March 25, Assumption on August 15), Ash Wednesday, Holy Week services. In 813 (Council of Mainz): procession of the major Litanies of St. Mark's (April 25). But at the same time were maintained great country processions of the Gallican minor litany of the Rogations (the 3 days before Ascension; prayers for the upcoming harvests. Finally, the Roman chant (the Gregorian) was definitely adopted because the efforts of Pippin had not carried. Charlemagne, in 789 A.D., made the Chant mandatory. The injunction still beared little due to habits, laziness, other, more urgent obligations of the singers -- those of the parishes). It should be noted, moreover, that that desire to explain, to apply precisely the rites, the sacraments however, had the aim of a laudable concern for theological correctness. It was -- as much as one struggled by councils against heresies triggered by the intellectual reflection of some high-level clerics -- also to avoid involuntary heresy, involuntary deviations from dogma through poorly applied, misunderstood rites, ignorance or laxity. All which was found in a response about the sacrament of baptism from Alcuin to a priest. In the introduction of penitential tariffs for parish priests -- priests no longer decided penitences themselves; influence also of the composition practiced by the courts; penitentials were introduced from Ireland by the Colomban missionaries at the end of the 6th, and especially in the 7th century A.D. in the North and East of Gauls; moreover, by their spirit of compensation, they were in fact 'naturally' adapted to Germanic mentalities; however, the less the priests were of good intellectual level, the less they used them; a reaction, moreover, in the 9th century A.D. was to be initiated against the dissemination of penitentials on the part of the bishops (the systematization went against the power to bind and untie of the descendants of the Apostles and against the sacrament itself - which was conceived as a reconciliation; penitentials however were to last long)
The coronation had made Pippin a king responsible for the salvation of his people, and Charlemagne had an even more acute conscience of that. But if territorial conquest and conversion went hand in hand, Charlemagne made a hierarchy: submission first, conversion then. Ditto inside the Frankish Kingdom: to put the Frankish Catholic people in order but for a well-governed people. The integration of foreign Churches as a result of the conquests (Germania, Lombardy) perpetuated the variety of disciplines and liturgy that was known in the time of Pippin and local Churches often serves as a screen for national revolts (Bavaria, etc.). If political unity was to be found, according to Charles, the unity of the Church was required (it was not, in the spirit of the sovereign, to impose itself in dogma but it was a matter of the Church praising a single faith). We were still at times when the papal theocracy has not yet begun; the relationship between temporal power and the pope's power was not defined -- nor were they during the tumultuous relationship between the pope and Byzantius. While this alliance between the Church and French royalty existed, the march to the Empire increased the will of the king: while remaining secular, Charlemagne was now to want to intervene in the fields of faith. Charles arrogated the right to assemble general councils -- which was only the prerogative of the only Byzantine emperor until then. The intervention of the Frankish king was increasing in the wake of the Iconoclastic crisis: it was Byzantium which had convened the ecumenical council (where the pope condemned Iconoclasm but relatively weakly). And once again a quiproquo settled down. Charles took in 791 or even as early as 788 A.D. then the head of a theological movement: Franks believed that the Council strengthened the images, as it did not indeed; Franks intend to suggest the pope to modify such a council. They seemed to be sticking to that misunderstanding. The pope, moreover, did not like the decisions of the Council as the Frankish king seemed to pretend that he did not understand that he had not been sent the right text and he therefore lets his theologians argue. Charlemagne, in general, had a whole team of advisers -- high prelates -- of the Court who worked about the issues when they arose (Theodulf, Alcuin, Paulin, Smaragde, Arn, etc.) but it seemed that the debates took place then as they did not know that texts were false and Charlemagne even sent those to Anglo-Saxons. Since Frankfurt in 794 A.D., it was decided, on the basis of a Council of Nicaea falsely presented like a excessive apology of images, that images are a educational medium (which was the opinion of Theodulf and also of Rome -- the images, according to Gregory the Great, allowed at least the illiterate to 'read at least by looking at the walls'). Theodulf, for his Bible copied in Fleury-sur-Loire was personally even more careful (no representation of the characters nor even episodes of Holy History). Pope Hadrian did not inform Franks of the preliminary negotiations he had with the Byzantines for the Council of Nicaea. And we still don't know why the original texts of Nicaea, in Greek, were not sent to the Franks, who had the means to translate them. On the other hand, it seems that there was a mistake indeed in Rome because, from texts in Greek of the Council, a translation was made by a Roman cleric who could not read 'really' neither Latin nor Greek and that translation was not re-read by Roman theologians... So in Frankfurt, on the basis of the wrong translation, it was thought that the pope supported a idolatrous position and the Frankish Church was right to pose as a defender of orthodoxy. The Council of Frankfurt, for contemporaries, appeared like a ecumenical council and was, formally, published in the form of the famed 'Libri Carolini' which, moreover, had been written during 3 years by theologians in Aachen (Theodulf, then Alcuin) and even closely followed by Charlemagne himself. The Frankfurt council was thus a arbitration between two opposing councils, that of the Greeks, in Hiera and that of Nicaea) and a refusal of Nicaea on the basis of a false translation. And no one at the time was surprised that the Council of Frankfurt and its publication tokk the aspect of a ecumenical council, which canons were published by the king... It is still unknown who was responsible for the mistranslation of the Council of Nicaea. The 'Libri Carolini' (Theodulf, Alcuin and even Charlemagne), texts that present the Frankish position on the subject of the images at the Council of Frankfurt, say that the 'rudder of the Church' was entrusted to Charlemagne by Christ himself. Charlemagne, rather than formalize the Dionysio Hadriana sent in 774, he made in the kingdom, a compilation of Frankish councils (he prefered to integrate Rome in the Frankish decisions rather than to recognize the intrinsic value of the Roman collections ). He even allowed himself to publish in the form of capitulars the canons of councils held 'on the orders of the king...' The Admonition generalis of March 23, 789 A.D. in Aachen wass a royal encyclical... and even if it borrowed from the Hadriana, it still did not publish the canons of Rome. Finally, in 794, a council in Frankfurt was convened, looking like a oecumenical one, with bishops from Galicia, Italy, England and two representatives of the pope. The signal was clear: the Frankish king had summoned the Council, he had presided over its conclusion. He was acclaimed as 'rector populi christiani.' However, they didn't dare to ask the pope to come or propose to him that the Council should take place, for example, at the Latran. As the council wanted unity and a effective authority in the Church, the Council was based upon St Augustine and St. Isidore of Seville: 'temporal princes sometimes occupy the pinnacle of power within the Church, and that to guarantee by their power the ecclesiastical discipline. [that allows to impose through fear of discipline] what priests are unable to make observe by word alone.' But Isidore tempered by saying that God would hold such a prince to account. The Council of Frankfurt however was in line with the doctrine which had supported the behavior of Emperor Constantine who considered that such a power to intervene in the dogma for the prince, had been entrusted to princes by God himself. For Isidore, it was not the Church, the Pope or the bishops who allowed a prince to have such power, but God, directly: the prince had received the Church of Christ to protect it. This strong influence of Isidore - which was widely read in the kingdom - therefore justified the intervention of the king and the emperor and then of his successors in the affairs of the Church, and the Council was therefore a justification for Carolingian Caesaropapism. Frankish bishops moreover, introduced in Frankfurt the distinction between the king who lead the fight against the 'visible enemies' of Church while the bishops fought against the 'invisible enemies'. Paulin of Aquileia, for example, called Charlemagne 'lord and father, king and priest, very careful governor of all Christians.' 'King and Priest' was a Old Testament formula (Melchisedek). And the preamble of the capitular from the Council was to go even further, with a however ambiguous formula: '[the bishops being] brought together by apostolic authority and order of our very pious Lord King Charles [etc.]' From there, supported by his clerics, including Alcuin, Charlemagne accepted a kind of march to the Empire: he compared himself to King Josias and wanted to merge temporal and spiritual government into one policy. He claimed the example of the saints. He claimed to be invested by God with the power to bring about harmony. Alcuin said: the king is 'rector and defender of the Church.' Paulin of Aquileia (friend of Alcuin), a renowned theologian, said: the king can, in the interest of concord, enter into the management of the Church's own affairs. Alcuin urged a form of cynicism to recommend that the other 'princes' respect the Church and obey the priests, but, therefore, not the Frankish king because he waq beyond the common destiny of temporal leaders. With the Admonitio generalis (789 A.D.; definition of the Carolingian renaissance and Christianization enterprise), Charlemagne, moreover, entered the inner world, the domain of dogma (obligation of prayer, piety, charity or even the sacraments; forbade vox populi canonizations that brought false names of martyrs and uncertain memories of saints; general put back into order). Ditto in 794 A.D. and then, after the imperial coronation, in 805 A.D. (Thionville; authenticity of the relics: Alcuin attacked the fact that these bones are considered amulets when it is better to carry the example of the saints in his heart; checking a bulb containing Christ's blood in Mantua in 803 A.D.; regional councils in 813 against the use of relics by abbots who wanted to draw people around their new basilicas and have faithfuls giving their property, walk bones, bodies, seeking to persuade the bishops that they, abbots, had earned merits there). The Council of Mainz in 813 A.D. set the conditions for the elevation of saints (king and bishop or even a diocesan synod) and the emperor also intervened on the question of angels (Adalbert's list triggered the condemnation of Pope Zacharias and a Roman council of 745; the Council appointed three angels 'approved' (Michel, Gabriel, Raphael) but Charlemagne legislated by confirming the list of Zacharias and the use makes de of the three of the archangels, with the addition of the name 'holy'. The official title of emperor imposed upon Charlemagne, did he think, a new responsibility, similar to that of Emperor Constantine, the responsibility to be the protector of the Church (and probably more...): that was reflected in the text of the 'capitular' general' of 802 A.D. (the 'Admonitio generalis?'); the text, which was normally intended only for the missi, was transformed into a precise of ecclesiastical law (it specified what the missi must look out for in terms of clerics, churches, the Church, etc.); the very tone of the capitular was that of a homily... and the political order and the moral order were mixed (the text here is quoted: 'Listen, beloved brothers, the admonition that our master, Emperor Charles addresses to you. We are sent here for your salvation and to teach you how you must live in righteousness and truth according to God and behave according to secular with justice and mercy. We teach you first that you must believe in one Almighty God, Father, Son and Holy Spirit. He is a unique and true God, perfect Trinity and one in truth... Love your neighbor as yourself and give alms to the poor within your means. Receive the travelers in your homes, visit the sick, have mercy on the prisoners. Do not harm anyone or be complicit with those who do; the culprits, in fact, are not only those who do evil, but those who consent to it... Don't stay angry for long. Escape drunkenness and planty meals... Let women be subject to their husbands. Let husbands love their wives and never say offensive words to them... May the clerics obey their bishop... May the monks faithfully observe their vows... May dukes, counts and other public officials do justice to the people and be merciful to the poor. Let money not divert them from fairness, let hatred not make them condemn innocent people... Brief is life and uncertain the time of death. Is there anything else to do but always be ready? Let us think how terrible it is to fall into God's hand. With confession, penance and alms, God is merciful and lenient.' Immediately after 800 A.D., all the capitulars mixed the temporal and spiritual domains and the same in 5 councils of May-June 813 (these councils seem to be councils of vast provincial ensembles, bringing together bishops and abbots; Austrasia and Germania met in Mainz; the former Belgium was reunited in Reims; Neustria and Aquitaine in Tours; Northern Burgundy met in Chalon-sur-Saône. The South, from Provence to Septimania, met in Arles). They then wanted to reform the Church because it seemed that there had been a certain return to disorder. Missi and clerics were again present. These councils, the clerics knew, were to only endorse the decisions of the Church which were now took by the Emperor and the advisers he chose, and even more by general councils, a new sign of the evolution of Caesaropapism. The acts of the councils were to be formalized in a general text, by the 'assembly of Aachen" of September 813 A.D. -- the one where Charles had Louis crowned, moreover. Again, there was a real church legislation and, at the same time, a 'councilar commission' met in the St. Alban's church in Mainz to deal with special issues for monks. The tone, moreover, was to that the assembled clerics proposed only their answers, leaving to the 'wisdom' of the emperor to add what was missing, to correct what was against reason and to promulgate what it deemed good... The 'Concordia episcoporum' was to finally emerge, the 'Concord of bishops,' a synthesis and revision by Charlemagne himself and 'a few faithful' gathered in Aachen. However, the bishops were then allowed to apply with the possibility of adding personal comments or prescriptions of local interest. That text of 813 marked a Frankish Church where the Emperor relied on his bishops but no longer refered to the pope. Alcuin even wrote that the Church was the wife of God and the wife of Charlemagne. Charlemagne was to defend the pope, but the latter must stick to being nothing but the chaplain of Christendom... Apogee thus, of Caesaropapism! And the position of the Frankish Church was ambiguous: it prefered, finally, doctrinal positions defined by the emperor and his advisers, and clear ones to decisions of the pope who listened only to his Roman advisers, a additional degree since the Rome-Aachen relations were complicated by the Frankish clans of Rome. The Frankish -- secular and regular -- clergy felt that they were better able to make their voices heard in Aachen than in Rome. Since 789 A.D. and that year's 'Admonitio generalis,' Charlemamgne turned the 'boss' of the French Church
Another direction of Carolingian Caesaropapism is to distinguish itself from the East: the Church of the West, represented by the Frankish Church, declared at the Council of Frankfurt of 794 A.D. that the acts of the 'Eastern Councils' were not applicable to it. That was the announcement of the schism of 1054 which was, in the end, to make only the Councils of the West ecumenical, whereas until the Council of Nicaea, all the ecumenical councils were held in the East. And of course, the relationship between Carolingian Caesaropapism and Byzantium, was exemplified by the famous case of the filioque: while the Constantinople creed of 381 (which repeated and specified that of Nicaea of 325) sayd that the Spirit proceeded from the Father, they teached -- on what basis? -- in the West that it originated from the Father and the Son ('qui ex Patre Filioque procedit'). That was not translated into any official formula, except in Visigothic Spain (Toledo Council of 589 A.D., which took place as part of the end of Arianism and which was quickly limited to visigothic elites only). The concept that the Spirit derives from the Father and the Son has never been condemned by any council, but has never been approved by any council neither. That was essentially an accepted practice (and perhaps based on a just idea, but which no council ever formally endorsed). Thus in Spain, and then in Merovingian Gaul, the Creed was sung at Mass, with the addition 'and of the Son.' On the other hand, in Rome and Italy, this formula was not added but one did not want to add it as a heretic (moreover, even the original Creed of Nicaea had not even yet been added to the Creed of the Roman rite: one pronounced the formula "qui ex Patre procedit" only for the mass of the baptism of catechumens). In Rome and the East, however, the choice of the Frankish Church tended to be questioned by some; and the Franks, to these some, found a smell of Nestorianism. Leo III, for example, himself hesitated to assert that, on the question of the Spirit, the Father and the Son must be put on an equal footing, without, therefore, a special relationship within the Trinity between the Father and the Spirit. In the East, Taraise, the then Patriarch of Constantinople, declared that the Spirit only proceeded from the Father through the Son... That Eastern condemnation, on the other hand, did not formalize Frankish clerics; the Council of Aquileia, however, in 796 A.D, convened by Paulin in Cividale -- Paulin was a man of confidence of Charlemagne -- formalized the integration of the Filioque into the Creed of the Mass and, thus, the practice began to spread in Italy. Thus, little by little, this question of the Filioque would tend to become more serious, and thus worsened through the Caesaropapism of Charlemagne, who cannot accept that the words of the Creed of Mass being pronounced differently in the various parts of the Frankish regnum. He sent Adalard, the abbot of Corbie and Bernard, bishop of Worms, to Rome, and he ordered that in the Palatine chapel in Aachen, the creed was sung with the Filioque (in the Credo of Nicaea). But the affair continued to swell: two Latin monks from the convent of the Mount of Olives in Jerusalem, who came to Aachen in 806 A.D., considered the addition judicious and they began to sing the Creed with the filioque in the Holy Land. In this microcosm, where Roman and Eastern rites coexisted, the affair grew: the Greek monks were indignant, complaining to the Patriarch of Constantinople (who consulted the pope); Latin monks wrote to the pope (who transmitted to Charlemagne, whom the pope considered responsible for the filioque's innovation). Not to mention that with pilgrims, that could develop throughout the West. Charlemagne, this time without having wanted to, was again in the position of arbiter in matters of dogma, and in the face of a conflict that tended to become very important. Charles, again, put his clerics to work: Theodulf wrote a treatise about the Holy Spirit on the basis of Patristics (he concluded that the formula "Filioque", finally, merely put in formula what was always accepted by Christians); for Theodulf, the absence of the words "Filioque" in the Creed of Nicaea was due only to a lack of writing of those who had participated in the Council (which had been held against the Arian heresy to affirm the true divinity of Jesus; Emperor Constantine and the the pope's legate were present). The abbot of St. Mihiel, Smaragde, as far as he was concerned, made a similar study but based upon the text of the Bible alone and he drew from it that the Spirit derived well from the Father and the Son and not from the Father by the Son. In November 809 A.D., Charlemagne convened a council in Aachen, which approved the introduction of the Filioque into the Creed and asked Charlemagne to formally amend the text of the Nicaea Creed. The pope walked between the Byzantines who stood on the border of Benevento and the Caesaropapism of Charlemagne; he convened a council in Rome in 810 A.D.: in terms of dogma, the Spirit proceeded from the Father and the Son; this was a principle of dogma; but one did not have to insert the formula officially, into the Credo of Nicaea; the pope, diplomatically, would even allow that the Creed would no longer be sung at the Mass in Aachen (the emperor thus, would keep face, since the Filioque formula would no longer be pronounced in Aachen, but the Creed would no longer be sung there...) Charlemagne, then did not wanted any concessions to Byzantium as we were at 10 years after the restoration of the Empire to the West. Thus, the churches of the reigning regnum continued to sing the Creed with the Filioque and this practice would simply become customary, including Rome. Another case, that of Adoptionist heresy, was to allow Frankish clerics to intervene even further in dogma because, in the end, the case of the Council of Nicaea touched a lot about the forms of worship and relatively little dogma. The background of the case was a opposition of the 'Church of the West' against the Church of Spain: contrary to what the Adoptianist heresis advocated, Christ is not the adopted son of God but he is indeed the Consubstantial Son to the Father. The Adoptionist heresy was the avatar of the time of the difficulties of the Church of the West to fully understand the question of the Trinity, God one in three people. In the 4th century A.D., the East had poured, on this issue, into Arianism, a monotheism somehow, thus more easily understandable for minds who were not adept at theology. For Arius, and through Wulfila, down to among the Burgundians and Visigoths, Trinity was analysed in terms of parentage (the Father was the only eternal and uncreated; the Son, since he proceeded from the Father, was therefore not equal of He; and the Spirit the same since he proceeded from the Father only by The Son); the question was decided by the 1st Council of Nicaea (325 A.D.): the Son was consubstantial to the Father and the Catholic 'Credo' was defined. A council in Rimini in 359 and the Council of Constantinople in 381 A.D. condemned again as the latter added to the Creed the passages concerning the Holy Spirit. The Arian heresy was perpetuated among most Germans of the Great Invasions, because it was easier to understand than the Trinity, and it would be one of the causes of the opposition of the peoples and their bishops to Germanic peoples. Traces of Arianism are seen by some, until today, in the Roman Church by the fact that one would often address God through the intercession of the Son, thus seeming reserving divinity to God alone. Arianism, at the time when it was born -- during the great crisis of the 4th century A.D. -- was much linked to a primary form of Caesaropapism (Emperor Constantine I himself was to die a Arian): Catholicism, in the context of a Roman empire that was based on imperial worship, could, in its heretical form of Arianism, represent a continuity of imperial pre-eminence: the idea of hierarchy between God, Christ and the Holy Spirit allowed the emperor to find a place in that hierarchy and perpetuate the idea -- the emperor located in the divine hierarchy, a idea found in all Caesaropapist or Gallicanist heresies, including with Charlemagne who attended the services in front of the office of Christ, while on the ground floor faithful celebrated in front of the altar of The Virgin... In the West too, the question of the Trinity gave rise to heresies: that of Nestorius (condemned by the Council of Ephesus of 431 A.D.); that of Dacian Bonose in the 7th century A.D.. Those heresies simply tended to "humanize" the Son, the second person of the Trinity. Those views were condemned, in the Frankish dominions, by the Council of Clichy of 626 A.D. The heresy of 'Adoptionism' was formulated around 780 A.D. by Elipand, archbishop of Toledo and Felix, bishop of Urgel. That heresy still was getting further away from dogma! The Son, 'Word of God,' was begotten by God. As a man, Christ was the son of God but also the son of David and, as such, adopted. The adopted, partial aspect however made that Christ was therefore not of a divine nature. They had there in fact, in Spain, a continued influence of the ancient Arianism of the Visigoths -- and probably in the context of the Arab occupation. Pope Hadrian I protested as early as 785 A.D. and the Kingdom of Asturias in Spain also reacted, through its king, Alphonse II, and his bishop, Osma, who spoke out against Arianism. The prestige of Elipand, on the other hand, in Toledo, was great: as the bishop of a city occupied by Arabs and elderly, he was bishop before the Arab invasion and therefore owed nothing to them... The 'mozarabes' moreover, these Christians of Arab occupation, were as 'nationalist' as other Churches of the West and intended to maintain a independence from Rome. Felix, finally, had a reputation as a excellent theologian. Under the influence of Alcuin, bearer of the orthodoxy via the Anglo-Saxons, Charlemagne intervened in the debate: the Council of Regensburg of 792 A.D. and the Council of Frankfurt of 794 A.D. -- that of the images. Charlemagne was concerned that Aquitaine tended to rely, by its clergy, on that heresy to continue its independence and that a part of Christian Spain, by its clergy, was threatened by heresy. Written by Alcuin from Tours, after 796 A.D. and Benedict of Aniane finally led to the resolution of the case in 800, in Aachen, after perhaps a week of debates between Alcuin and Felix in the presence of the king and many bishops. Again all that was taking place amidst the march to the Empire and a Charlemagne perhaps, finally, already warned that he would soon be made emperor, felt encouraged to intervene in dogma, not to mention the clan struggles that began in Rome. Félix was relegated to Lyon and Elipand remained isolated. He died in 808 A.D., around 90 years of age, and the clerics of Toledo remained attached, out of nostalgia for a independent Spain and having their doctors of Church, to heresy more than by dogma. In the whole Adoptionist affair, according to some authors, the pope was to have only approved (Alcuin's struggle was based upon the Council of 431; it was therefore possible that Adoptionism be of Nestorian influence as well). Under the influence of Bonose that time, a sporadic heresy appeared in Aquitaine: Mary would be the natural mother of many children, including Christ (thus also that was questioning the divine nature of Christ). Aquitaine, no doubt for the sake of independence, was the home of other heresies: direct confession to God and not auricular (Alcuin's reasoning was that the superiority of a direct confession to God over a priest was the very negation of the Church and its supernatural role; God, of course, knows the faults, even committed in secret and he knows them even before they are committed, but confession is a means of penance and it is not to confess that confessing directly to God in secret, since God ignores nothing and therefore knows the mistake
While under Charlemagne, the Church was only the beneficiary and protector of the Frankish Empire, some point out that, under Louis the Pious, the Church re-emerged and definitively took on the role of protector. That however, took place among the disorders of Louis' reign and clan struggles. Caesaropapism then was succeeded by Gallicanism. Adopting the theory of political Augustinism laid out by the Council of Paris in 829 A.D. and analyzed in 831 by the Bishop of Orleans Jonas in the 'De institutione regia,' clerics made the king a servant of God charged with ensuring the salvation of his faithful. They returned much to a government by the bishops as it had already been known under the Merovingians. The submission of Louis and his sons to the bishops seemed to owe much to the Gallicanism of the latter (Attigny's penance of 822, forced abdication of 833 and the restoration of Louis by the bishops in 835, demise of Lothaire of 842, acceptance by Charles the Bald of the subordination of royal authority to the moral judgment of bishops at the assembly of Coulaines in 843, advice given to the three sons of Louis the Pious by the assembly of Yutz in 844, finally and above all the role played between 843 and 882 A.D. by Hincmar, Archbishop of Reims). As well as the emancipation of the papacy, -as early as 816 A.D., Pope Stephen IV avoided imperial confirmation - seemed to owe above all to the Frankish clans present in Rome. It is also these Gallican bishops, cultivated, who were to finally apply the cultural renaissance initiated in the time of Charlemagne: Agobard, archbishop of Lyon, Wala, abbot of Corbie, Hilduin, abbot of Saint-Denis, also advisors of Louis le Pious and supporters of the unitary theory of the Empire; Jonas of Orleans, theoretician of political Augustinism, and Hincmar, archbishop of Reims who applied this political Augustinism to the Frankish regnum
Website Manager: G. Guichard, site Learning and Knowledge In the Carolingian Times / Erudition et savoir à l'époque carolingienne, http://schoolsempire.6te.net. Page Editor: G. Guichard. last edited: 10/30/2019. contact us at ggwebsites@outlook.com