6.6 The Means of Accomplishing part 6

Otto Holy Roman Emperor

The Holy Roman Empire (962-1806 CE) created a complicated Church’s legacy. “The Donation of Constantine” document¹ granting its ruler control of Western Europe is acknowledged to be forged document. The “Donation” is importance because it legitimated Papal authority over secular monarchs. The right to rule came by being anointed by God, not necessarily following royal blood.2 This unification of “Church and State” was new to Western Europe. Despite peaking with Monarchy in the thirteenth century, the church-state link, which the Constitution rejected, is a potent political issue in contemporary America

Fights over Popes and the Holy See shaped what would become the Holy Roman Empire. Following Charlemagne’s (768-814 CE) death his vast, but loosely held, empire fragmented. Its remnants were centered in Germany and France with a reduced presence in Italy. German King Otto, restored the empire by rescuing Queen Adelaide of Italy in 915 CE. Acting in self-interest Pope John XII crowned him “Otto the Great Emperor.” Creating an Ottonian Renaissance the King supported active leadership by women in government and religious leadership. It was largely as advisors, but was a clear rejection of the pseudepigraphic Biblical texts.³

Divine authority, exercised through a King or Noble class, stripped autonomy from the rest of the community: free men, peasants, serfs, slaves. Whatever protections survived for each class of men, religion stripped their female counterparts.

Paul, an apocalyptic rabbi, praised women as leaders of the early church. He believed Jesus would return during his, certainly his followers lifetime. So Paul told couples not to marry and women not to bear children, but instead prepare for the resurrection. When Jesus didn’t return, the Church the disciples had founded had problems.⁴ To survive the small, fragmented sects of Nazarenes, Believers, and Brethren needed new members. Every convert was a victory, but conversion was too slow. Contradicting Paul’s caution against marriage and having babies, the foundling Church needed more babies. That required a new authoritative message, whose primary audiences were slaves and marginalized people who had reason to resent sexual exploitation. That added an additional anti-sexual quality to their new message. The solution came in pseudepigraphic texts written in Paul’s name that included language differences and references to issues of structure and events that did not exist during his life.⁵ Those are the texts still used to tell women that are saved only through silence and childbirth.

Women’s roles in the early Church is a complicated story. Changes happened over time and inconsistently. The Ottonian Renaissance shows that at different points women roles did expand only to be retracted. This variation reflects two challenges in developing doctrine. One is creating a coherent doctrine. Authentic versus pseudepigraphic texts demonstrates that. The second is the challenge of translating the cultural meaning from one society to merge with the already existing meaning and values in another society. An early doctrine fight questioned whether a person had to be a Jew before becoming a Christian: Jesus was a Jew.

Rather than directly adopt Jewish traditions the Church created a Greco-Roman doctrine rewriting Jewish law through the lens of Koine Greek neoplatonism. That introduced a Greek asceticism and contempt of the body that appealed to Roman slaves whose owners had sexually abused. Augustine of Hippo questioned (rejected the idea) that the female body could reflect the divine. Inadequate as humans, only when woman were united with their male counterparts did they exist in the image of God. He believed Eve brought sin into the world. While Eve simply offered the forbidden fruit, magically that became sexual transgression, and every birth became tainted by original sin.⁶ The Ecclesiastical Hierarchy made the priesthood exclusively male.

Gradually Church doctrine removed women from Christian history and leadership. The disappearance of the women at the crucification is particularly onerous. The Church cast Mary Magdalene – who funded Jesus’ travels, stayed through the crucification, and witnessed the resurrection – as a prostitute.⁷ It was not universal, but women were systematically debased and removed from the story.

It is wrong to argue that Catholicism is uniquely responsible for diminishing women. There were extended periods of political corruption in the Church. Sexual exploitation (from the doctrine) known as the pornocracy. These problems mixed with plagues and famines. Inquisitions defended doctrine. The Reformation and counter-Reformation led to more than a century of wars. The new protestant denominations were equally dismissive of women. These create a rhythm to life that is both shaped and ignored by religion. Shaped, in that, religion set the rules and limits. Ignored, in that, the lives of most people were ignored. The contrast between those practices and the surrounding societies highlights how Christian doctrine was a deliberate choice, not the invariable law of nature.

Separate Realms

There are two places to view the influence of the Church on women’s lives: nobility and the commoner. The wives of kings and nobles were political pawns and hostages. Often arranged as matters of state, their marriages were about wealth, power, and succession. These were coordinated by the king and Church. Religious marriage that banned divorce protected those alliance.

Marriage for commoners, especially serfs, was largely outside the Church. Free persons might marry. Until the 12th century marriages were common law declarations of marriage without Church involvement. It was the sixteenth century before marriage was an official rite in the Church. For these couples marriage was some combination of mutual benefit and desire.

Marriage for serf was at the whim of the lord of the estate. Serfs belonged to the land and the lord could demand payment if a serf married someone outside the estate. That was if the lard allowed the serf to marry. More common was a not legally binding common law “marriage.”

The point for the moment is that Christianity has a complicated history of diminishing women’s autonomy.

Next: a contrast to Northern Europe and the trail to America.

Appendix A: timeline of Roman Empire history.

Imperial Rome founded 27 BCE

Apostle Paul (Saul of Tarsus) circa 5-65 CE

Julius Caesar is emperor 44-49 CE

The empire is at its largest 117 CE

Constantine becomes emperor 306-377

Constantine’s Edict of Milan making Christianity legal 313 CE

First Council of Nicaea set Jesus’ divine nature ( rejected the Arian Heresy) 325 CE

Constantine’s Edict of Thessalonica making Christianity the state religion 380 CE

Council of Rome selected the 73 books that set the old and new Testaments 382 CE

Pressed by the Huns, Germanic people flood into Rome 370s-400s CE

Fall of Rome 476 CE

Appendix A: timeline of Roman Empire history.

Imperial Rome founded 27 BCE

Apostle Paul (Saul of Tarsus) circa 5-65 CE

Julius Caesar is emperor 44-49 CE

The empire is at its largest 117 CE

Constantine becomes emperor 306-377

Constantine’s Edict of Milan making Christianity legal 313 CE

First Council of Nicaea set Jesus’ divine nature ( rejected the Arian Heresy) 325 CE

Constantine’s Edict of Thessalonica making Christianity the state religion 380 CE

Council of Rome selected the 73 books that set the old and new Testaments 382 CE

Pressed by the Huns, Germanic people flood into Rome 370s-400s CE

1 Fall of Rome 476 CE

 2 Strength to rule, that is enforce the law, held priority over bloodline.

3 The easy Google search includes Matilda off Ringelhelm, Eadgyth of England, Adelaide of Italy, Theophanu of Italy, and Matilda of Quedlinburg.

 4 Resurrection to Paul was the dead rising on the earth, their bodies whole and immortal. Church doctrine redefined resurrection as the soul rising to heaven.

5 The text critical Biblical scholars believe are pseudepigraphic are. Ephesians, Colossians, II Thessalonians, I Timothy, II Timothy, and Titus. Also material added to later portions of I Corinthians, including the restrictions on women’s role in the Church.

6 Eve did not seduce Adam to eat the fruit. They did not even understand nakedness until after eating the fruit. God told them to be fruitful and multiply. The same method, same act, but now it spreads sin?

7 In 1969 Pope Paul VI, in the revised General Roman Calendar, admitted that Mary Magdalene was not a prostitute.

8 The Council of Nicaea set doctrine including the divinity of Christ, but did not set the Bible.