Gregorian Reforms as rupture: The rising tide of papalism (Aristides Papadakis)

The rising tide of papalism

In addition to the demand for libertas and spiritual renewal, however, a determined effort had been made by the papacy to see that its claims to a universal jurisdiction throughout Christendom were everywhere acknowledged. The reformers in fact resolved to reorganize the Church along monarchical lines. From the outset it was agreed that this was to be accomplished by the systematic promotion of the pope's ancient primacy and authority everywhere. The vigorous interventionist policy initiated by Leo IX was almost certainly inspired by such sentiments. In brief, from the beginning the pioneers of the reformation were convinced that an independently powerful papacy exercising direct jurisdictional control over Christendom was an indispensable preliminary condition to renewal. The idea that the reform was to be founded on the restoration of papal authority was soon standard sentiment. Any concession or compromise on the pope's alleged constitutional status in the Church universal was conceived as a threat to the movement as a whole: Roman primatial centralism could alone guarantee ecclesial unity and renewal. Evidently, the papal reform movement was never exclusively limited or restricted to spiritual or moral renewal.

Without doubt the reign of Gregory VII is the best vantage point from which to examine this important feature of the Gregorian platform. It is of course true that Gregory's ideology owed a great deal to some of his predecessors. Many of his views were already forged during his years as a subordinate papal bureaucrat and archdeacon. His understanding of lay investiture (to say it once more) was often a faithful reflection of Humbert's own theories, while one of his more controversial texts, the Dictatus papae, contains sentiments and beliefs already present in the papal curia of Leo IX. On the whole, the conclusion that Gregory was more a resolute man of action than a man of incisive ideas is certain. It was not his deep learning but actions that were to leave the world "breathless. "64 At the same time, nevertheless, his tenure as pontiff was also the high point of the rising Roman tide of the eleventh century, when the theme of papal primacy was to achieve a degree of practical and theoretical development unknown to the first reform pioneers. The principles and foundations of Roman reform ecclesiology are best observed in his reign. 65 The mystical identification with St Peter occasionally cultivated by the popes of the early Middle Ages first acquired its more extreme and indeed bizarre interpretation under Hildebrand/Gregory. The Petrusmystik dominates his reign.

The Dictatus papae, a collection of twenty-seven short statements dealing with the Roman primacy, is without doubt one of the most synoptic manifestos in existence on the subject. To be sure, some of its notions, in terms of origin, pre-date the eleventh century. For instance, number nineteen (see below) is actually directly traceable to the sixth century Symmachian forgeries. Still the arbitrary terms in which the fullness of Roman universal power is described. is unparalleled. The fact that the original text was inserted in the official register of Gregory's correspondence does not of course tell us much about its purpose or origin. Such matters are hidden in obscurity. On the other hand, the suggestion that the list was intended as an index or a list of sorts-a table of contents or chapter headings-for a lost collection of canon law on the primacy has much in its favor. As it happens, except for five of its capitula dealing with Rome's relationship to the temporal power, the list is concerned exclusively with the divine origin and practical consequences of the pope's primatial rights and prerogatives.

1. That the Roman Church was founded by God alone.

2. That the Roman pontiff alone is rightly to be called universal.

3. That he alone can depose or reinstate bishops.

4. That his legate, even if of lower grade, takes precedence, in a council, of all bishops and may render a sentence of deposition against them.

7. That for him alone it is lawful to enact new laws according to the needs of the time, to assemble together new congregations, to make an abbey or a canonry; and, on the other hand, to divide a rich bishopric and unite the poor ones.

8. That he alone may use the imperial insignia.

9. That the pope is the only one whose feet are to be kissed by all princes.

11. That his title is unique in the world.

12. That he may depose emperors.

16. That no synod may be called a general one without his order.

17. That no chapter or book may be regarded as canonical without his authority.

19. That he himself may be judged by no one.

21. That to this see the more important cases of every Church should be submitted.

22. That the Roman Church has never erred, nor ever, by the witness of Scripture, shall err to all eternity.

23. That the Roman pontiff, if canonically ordained, is undoubtedly sanctified by the merits of St Peter.

26. That he should not be considered as Catholic who is not in conformity with the Roman Church.

Considering the shadowy status of the papacy before 1046, the forceful and outspoken character of these claims is remarkable. Despite its brevity, the document is actually a comprehensive summary statement of the reorganized Church under papal sovereignty as conceived by the Gregorian reformers of the eleventh century. The pope is throughout represented as an absolute monarch, as the supreme authority over bishops, councils, clergy, and all temporal rulers. Simultaneously, papal authority is everywhere deemed preeminent, especially in administration and legislation, as Rome's arbitrary right to review petitions, authorize canon law, convene ecumenical councils, and deliver judgments (from which there is no appeal) illustrate.

Invariably, in order to explain the unaccountability and supremacy of the pope, the Dictatus implicitly insists on the old proof from apostolicity. This argument was rooted in the familiar Petrine texts of Matthew 16: 18-19, Luke 22:32, and John 21:15-17 and, especially, in the peculiar "Roman" exegesis with which the reforming popes chose to invest them.68 Specifically, the promise and commission of Christ to the apostle Peter (enshrined in these texts) was thought to refer to the Roman see alone. The sweeping powers they imply were apparently bestowed by Christ exclusively on the Roman Church. The sole heir of the promises given to Peter by the Savior was indeed the Roman pontiff. This papalist reading is obviously behind the claim of the Dictatus that the see of St Peter is divinely-instituted or as "alone founded by God". In obvious contrast to all other sees and patriarchates, it is actually incapable of error and infallible. Remarkably, St Peter's trustees are even promised personally the gift of salvation. All canonically ordained papal incumbents, by virtue of their Petrine or apostolic authority, at any rate, are deemed "sanctified." The apostolicity argument was ultimately also the basis for the self-identification with St Peter found often among the reformers. Gregory VII was even willing to argue that Peter's Roman representative was the literal incarnation of the apostle. As he was to note in one of his letters, eius vicarius ... qui nunc in carne vivit.

Suffice it to say, Roman papal claims reached their pinnacle with such arguments. Reformers were actually being redundant in transforming obedience to the pope into virtual dogma, or in declaring conciliar legislation invalid, just because it contradicted papal decrees.70 Arguably, their twelfth century successors were conscious of the repetition, as their search for new formulas and titles seems to suggest. It was then for the first time in fact that the label "Vicar of Christ" (normally used of the emperor) was moved center stage as a replacement of sorts for the pope's inherited personal sanctity and mystical identification with Jesus' disciple.71 By the end of the century, Innocent III was even ready to discard the old formula "Vicar of St Peter" altogether for the more comprehensive "Vicar of Christ." As he was to emphasize, "we are the successor of the prince of the apostles, but we are not his vicar nor the vicar of any man or apostle, but the vicar of Jesus Christ himself."72 Parenthetically, in connection with this terminological evolution, it is interesting to note that the word ecclesia was also to undergo a transformation of sorts at the same period. By then the word had come to be identified almost exclusively with "churchman" or ecclesiastical government; it was quite common in fact to speak of ecclesiastical hierarchy or authority as the Church-to the exclusion of the laity. In other words, the meaning of the biblical term ecclesia, embracing as it has always done the entire body of the faithful, was obscured or forgotten. "Language like this is a sign of a very profound revolution in the way men thought about the Church. What is uppermost in their minds when they think of the Church is a juridical entity. One speaks of the 'body of the Church' as one does of any corporation. Looked at in terms of a juridical organization, the Church is seen essentially as a hierarchical, governmental structure."73 It goes without saying that the clerical separatism enshrined in this definition of ecclesia is linked not only to a rising papalism but to a rising clericalism. Everywhere in the West by the twelfth century, in contrast with the more accessible monogamous clergy of Eastern Christendom, sacerdotal celibacy had become an enduring reality.

In all essential respects, the metamorphosis of the papacy into a highly centralized monarchy was to result in the transformation of the western episcopate as well. The excessive centralization of Latin Christendom under papal authority was indeed to leave very little room for an independent hierarchy. Papal intrusion in diocesan affairs (already evident under Leo IX) was to become commonplace by the end of the century. It is by no means a surprise that the subordination of the episcopate to Rome is also a principal subtext of the Dictatus papae. Actually virtually half of its chapters deal with the proper relationship between pope and bishop; this is always described in terms of dependence. Throughout the document, at any rate, the ancient apostolic office of bishop is presented as an auxiliary adjunct agency of the papacy. 74 Direct, even unlimited, supervision of every diocese by Rome is viewed as the norm. Virtually all traditional episcopal and metropolitan primatial rights are set aside in order to make room for papatus, the new rank or order superior to episcopatus. In the end, in fact, St Peter's successor on the papal throne assumes not only the functions and powers of the episcopacy within each diocese, but the responsibilities of the provincial synod as well. The power to translate, reinstate, and depose a bishop is, in fact, characterized as a papal prerogative (whereas of course until then it had belonged to the local synod). Inevitably, all papal legates are dignified with similar powers. As duly authorized papal agents, their right of intervention is virtually identical to that of the pope; they are given precedence over all local authority. Although they may themselves be actually in inferior orders, if neccessary, they are empowered to depose and even excommunicate bishops.

Predictably, the pope's superior status vis-a-vis the episcopate was before long defined in even greater detail by western canonists. By the twelfth century Rome's interventionist-supervisory powers on the local diocesan level were routinely portrayed as expressions of the papal plenitudo potestatis. 75 St Peter's representative was apparently alone called to this fullness of jurisdictional power, whereas the bishop's authority was more confined within definite limits. As St Bernard was to insist, the plenitudo potestatis (a phrase first used in the fifth century by pope Leo I) was a unique papal privilege. "Therefore he who resists this power, resists the ordinance of God ... [The apostolic see] can degrade some [bishops] and exalt others, as its judgment dictates ... It can summon the most eminent churchmen from the ends of the earth and compel them to her presence not once or twice, but as often as it seems fit. Moreover it is quick to avenge every act of disobedience if anyone tries to resist. "76 Given the pronounced emphasis placed on the Roman primacy by the reformers of the eleventh century, it is not surprising to find that canonists were explicitly called upon to support it. How canon law became an instrument of papal absolutism will be described in a subsequent page. It will suffice at this point only to note that by the late eleventh century-thanks to Gregorian initiative-numerous new canonical manuals were available to the knowledgeable ecclesiastic. The fact that many of them began with a chapter entitled de primatu romanae ecclesiae was by no means unusual or uncommon. It had become by then almost standard practice.

Since the powers of the papal monarchy were deemed comprehensive in every way, they were obviously meant to include Orthodox Eastern Christendom. Actually the new papalism had as its goal the transformation of the pope's legitimate primacy of honor and authority within the ancient system of patriarchates into "a real power of jurisdiction, universal in scope and absolute in nature." The intention, quite simply, was to elevate Rome over and above all the other patriarchates, to make the papal throne into something more than one apostolic throne among others. It has indeed often been stressed that the aim was to reduce authority in Christendom to one. No longer would the constitutional center of the Church be based on a multiplicity of individual sees, on conciliarity and collegiality, but on Rome alone--the caput et cardo of papal decrees and pronouncements. It is worth adding that this vision of the pope's constitutional standing in the Church was also known to the author of the familiar forgery, the Donation of Constantine. "And we ordain and decree that he [the Roman pontiff] shall have rule as well over the four principal sees, Antioch, Alexandria, Constantinople, and Jerusalem, as also over the Churches of God in all the world. And the pontiff who for the time being shall preside over the most holy Roman Church shall be the highest and chief of all priests in the whole world, and according to his decision shall all matters be settled. " In its negotiations with Constantinople in 1054, Rome was to appeal inter alia to this forged donation as a prized "authority" for its claims.

Any synopsis of Rome's superior status in the Church universal (as conceived by the Gregorians) must also necessarily emphasize its relationship to the temporal power. Again, Pope Gregory's pontificate has a direct bearing on the matter. As it happens, the Dictatus contains numerous sentences on the subject. The most famous assertion undeniably concerns the pope's right to depose emperors. As we have seen, this tenet (that kingship is a removable office) was actually put into practice in 1076 during Lent, when Gregory, in addition to absolving the German aristocracy from their oaths, stripped Henry IV of his right to rule and then excommunicated and deposed him. Gregory justified his actions in a letter to Hermann of Metz by arguing that the spiritual power was essentially superior to the secular power, since it presumably alone performed a higher function in society. To support his thesis, the pope was actually even willing to suggest that Ambrose of Milan and Pope Gelasius of the early Middle Ages had said as much. But Gregory probably also relied on the Advesus simoniacos, in which Humbert of Silva Candida had argued against the sacred nature of kingship by maintaining that "just as the soul excels the body and commands it, so too the priestly dignity excels the royal."79 Whatever the case, in their attempt to transform the Roman primacy into a genuine monarchy over the Church, the reformers of the eleventh century (and in particular, Gregory VII) eventually also laid claim to a jurisdictional authority superior to the secular power. Increasingly, emancipation of the Church and its clergy from the feudal net of the lay ruler--enshrined in the cry libertas ecclesiae to mean primarily clerical domination over the laity. In time, indeed, this reaction to imperial tutelage was to result in the "imperialization of the Church" itself, to borrow the label made famous by E. Kantorowicz.80 By the twelfth century, as a recent specialist argues, the vocabulary of western canonical collections used to describe papal authority, "became virtually indistinguishable from that of imperial authority. "81 That the papal claims to the imperial purple were frequently also inspired by Constantine's forged donation goes without saying. In this connection, it bears repeating that the imperial formula "Vicar of Christ" became a papal monopoly under Innocent III.

In the last analysis, needless to say, pope Gregory's theories and logic were seriously flawed and equivocal. And of course both his actions and arguments lacked historical precedent. Even his contemporaries were surprised at his radical reinterpretation of the historical facts as described in the sources. Neither Gelasius nor Ambrose had of course actually ever made the claims that Gregory repeatedly made on their behalf. In particular, they never implied by their actions or writings that a pope had the right to depose kings and emperors, or absolve subjects from their oaths, merely because priestly responsibility was supposedly greater. 82 And of course no pope had ever actually deposed an emperor. Even Theodosius was never deposed by St Ambrose. Ironically, historical precedent exists only for the opposite process (as the depositions of 1046 by Henry III illustrate). On the other hand, it seems certain that Gregory and the reformers in general were unmoved by such counter-arguments, however scrupulously argued. It was apparently much easier to regard their assertions and actions as a simple practical exercise of the papacy's Petrine power of binding and loosing-the so-called potestas ligandi et solvendi entrusted to St Peter and all his successors. 83 For their part, extending this power directly to the secular sphere was altogether legitimate.

To summarize, the western concept of papal primacy over the Church in toto orbe had achieved an astonishing degree of theoretical practical development by 1100. The Dictatus papae was entered into Gregory's Register perhaps a mere twenty years after the death of Pope Leo IX. In terms "of ecclesiological doctrines in general and of the notion of authority in particular,"84 the new juridical understanding of primacy as supremacy was, arguably; the most decisive chapter in the entire history of the Roman patriarchate. Sadly, the fact that it was also a threat to Church unity and Christian tradition was not appreciated by the Gregorian reformers. It is at any rate safe to assume that the ancient practice of conciliarity, in which the Church was conceived as koinonia regulated by episcopal collegiality or a synodal structure, was for them no longer important. For the high papalist, at any rate, the historical Church had always been ruled by the inspired judgment of the Roman pontiff and not by bishops or councils.85 Scripture itself was on this point all too clear: as a result of his Petrine powers, the pope had direct authority to dispense and to modify both Christian tradition and institutions. As Peter's successor he could act unencumbered without the consent or approval of his brother bishops and the Church's councils.

Remarkably, any suggestion that these claims were at best exaggerated was hidden from the reformers. Most of them were in actual fact content to accept the promotion of the Roman primacy as an authentic restoration of the past. The new legal authority in the Church advanced with such breath-taking speed did not, for their part, constitute a serious breach in Christian historical continuity and tradition. As a modern apologist explains, "tel sera precisement le but de la reforme gregorienne qui apparaitra du meme coup non pas comme une revolution, mais oomme une restauration des usages anciens. La tradition sauvera l'Eglise."86 Although this scholarly interpretation is unambiguously sincere, it is also strictly speaking unconvincing. Ecclesiologically, at any rate, the rapid transformation of the Western Church in the eleventh century was a revolutionary development. Fundamentally, the term reform is "a serious understatement, reflecting in part the desire of the papal party itself-and of later Roman Catholic historians-to play down the magnitude of the discontinuity between what had gone before and what came latter. " 87 To an unusual degree, to put it otherwise, the idea that the Gregorians were rigorous traditionalists is a serious oversimplification. Its historical basis is slight. It is quite possible to argue, for instance, chat the high papalist exegesis of Matthew 16: 18 was ancient. On the other hand, it was by no means ever universal. St Augustine himself preferred a non-papalist reading. The "rock" for him was not Peter but Christ. Actually, it has even been suggested by one of the most learned scholars of the period that the Dictatus was itself composed because Rome could not justify its actions in the traditional law books. "The Dictatus papae can be understood simply as proof that it was impossible to defend Gregory VII's legal demands by means of received law: the canonists could not follow the pope and his 'guiding principles' with a compilation of papal rights. "88 

It is worth repeating again that the men responsible for this fundamental "discontinuity" were initially almost all members of the German episcopate. The aggressive self-confidence which inspired them, as we have seen, was rooted in the northern monastic reform movement. They were the heirs to Carolingian theology and civilization. As "ultramontane" churchmen, they were often at the same time uninformed of the papacy's ancient Mediterranean orientation. This inexperience automatically meant ignorance of Eastern Christendom. To cite the late Francis Dvornik, such regrettable innocence explains their determination "to extend everywhere the direct right of intervention of the papacy-even in the East where the Churches had enjoyed a good deal of autonomy in running their internal affairs according to their own custom. In wishing to extend celibacy of the clergy which they were enforcing in the West, they forgot the practice of the East that priests were married. They also forgot that there were no churches under lay ownership in the East and that no reform was necessary in this matter. In preaching obedience to Rome and in enforcing observance of Roman customs they took no account whatever of the fact that the East had different customs and different rites." Typically, their predecessors in the eighth century, despite the opposition of both Rome and Constantinople, had adopted a similar attitude towards the medieval Christian East. Like their Carolingian forerunners, certainly, the Gregorians were for the most part unaffected by ancient ecclesiology or by the Greek patristic tradition. In geopolitical terms, when they thought of the Church, they thought of Rome-centered Latin, Western, Christendom. As the Dictatus papae (c.26) neatly emphasized, whoever disagreed with the Roman Church was not to be regarded as a catholic--quod catholicus non habeatur, qui non concordat Romanae ecclesiae. Obedience to Rome, in the last analysis, was the ultimate test of orthodoxy.

Strictly speaking, a detailed summary of the schism of 1054 lies outside the chronological limits of this survey. Still, failure to mention it in the context of the papal reform movement would be indefensible. A true appreciation of the schism, broadly considered, has actually always been dependent on a precise knowledge of the Gregorian reform. It is surely not pure accident that this "extraordinary powerful movement from which, without exaggeration, may be dated the definite formation of Latin Christianity, was [also] the very moment of the final separation between the Eastern and Western Churches. Indeed, as has been argued, reform ideology was meant to be comprehensive and, as such, Eastern Christendom was seldom omitted from papal designs. The tension that this was to generate in the Byzantine world will be discussed in its proper context. It is sufficient here only to note that Rome was denounce with cool certainty by Constantinople for assuming a monarchy which did not belong to its office (to cite the sober assessment of one Byzantine theologian). The Orthodox were by no means found "asleep at the switch" once the papal claims became known. In point of fact the reform intensified the already existing East-West rivalry and this in the end brought permanent schism. As for the more precise coup de theatre of 1054, the blame has at times been place much too squarely upon Humbert's shoulders. Granted he was an important architect of the reform movement, and as one of its bolder players was certainly familiar with arm-twisting. Besides, the papal letters he had brought with him to the Byzantine capital were partly his own compositions. Still, in a very real sense, placing all responsibility for what occurred on his radicalism or combativeness is a mistake, precisely because his posture cannot be isolated. The unconditional obedience he demanded of Orthodox Christendom would have been insisted on by the papacy as well. Then again, it is unthinkable that his actions or letters would have been disowned by any of the reformers. (They were not in fact rejected until 1965.) To put it otherwise, the history of the Roman primacy and the ecclesiology his posture implied was Gregorian, not Humbertian.91 If his intransigence and hostility were the result of his own temperament, the universal episcopacy and expansionist ecclesiology he tried to advance were not. 

Although a great deal is known individually about the so-called schism of 1054 and the Dictatus of Gregory VII, the fact that the two are occasionally linked together is not common knowledge. Presumably many of the prepositions of the Dictatus were also written with the Eastern Church in mind. The argument has actually been made that the Dictatus papae was a draft of the preliminary conditions for union, which Rome wished to impose on Constantinople after 1054. Apparently some twenty years later, when the text was composed, the papal embassy to Constantinople was still a live issue for its author. Thus, it has been suggested that the emphasis on the pope's title "universal" was a reference to the Byzantine formula "ecumenical patriarch" used by the see of Constantinople since the sixth century. That the reformers disliked the Orthodox usage is well known. Humbert even saw it as a usurpation of a papal title and was accordingly scandalized; not surprising, he also (mistakenly) thought that it had been created in the eleventh century by patriarch Michael Cerularius. Predictably, it has also been proposed that the assertions regarding Rome's right to convoke ecumenical councils and confirm their decisions (tasks traditionally undertaken by the Byzantine emperor) were aimed primarily at Byzantium. Then, too, the text's redefinition of Church-state relations (the papal right to depose emperors and wear the imperial insignia, inter alia) may have had as its target both the German and Byzantine sovereigns.92 Admittedly the evidence for associating Humbert's embassy with the later Dictatus is not always convincing or conclusive. Western circumstances it would seem were the text's main concern. On the other hand, the suggestion that there is a connection and that the text may be a list of conditions for union is intriguing.

From the book 'The Christian East and the Rise of the Papacy' by Aristides Papadakis