There have been many books written about the sins of the Romans. The Christians were well known for emphasizing the sacrifice that many Christians made to maintain their beliefs and prevent the emperor from making them be subservient to his empire. It is important to remember that the Romans were Pagan Empire and that their morals were not the same as ours. However, this is not to say that Christians were saints when they were ruling the empire. Some of the Christian Roman Emperors were quite chaotic reigns that would influence the Roman state. However, we must take a look at the idea of the Empire being decadent according to Western views of the Byzantine Empire that were taking hold after the Renaissance and the transmission of the great knowledge of Antiquity that Europe had been unable to grasp after the Muslim Caliphate basically took control of entire sections of the Levant and North Africa, altering the entire trajectory of history and the understanding of what the Romans were giving to Western civilization.
As the Renaissance was underway, many were seeing a change in how the Byzantines were seen by Western Europeans. While there already was animosity that was underlying relations, the idea of the Byzantines being an immoral and autocratic empire was not the heir to Rome. While the empire in the Middle Ages may have seen as an heir to Rome, to Europeans wanting to get away from what they say as a stodgy order that was being run by the Catholic Church. As the Byzantines had politics and the clergy that were intertwined with each other, there was a sense that the Byzantines were not inheritors to Rome but an example of Christianity going astray and being part of an oppressive system that stalling man’s ability to innovate.
Byzantine was not even the original name of the Empire. It made up by a historian in the Renaissance era in Germany when it was under control of the Holy Roman Empire. For some reason, this name was what was being used to describe the Eastern Roman Empire. Byzantine was then used to attack a civilization that had been contributing so much to the preservation of Western knowledge and understanding of Classical Antiquity and the states in the empire.
Why was this view able to take hold on such a great civilization. Intellectuals have arguments that often are not made to the public.
It is really about religion and how the Western Christians were viewing the Orthodox. Empress Irene and Charlemagne marrying in the 800s would have helped to bring the Western Christians with the Orthodox; however, due to the church have a disapproval of women rulers, the two churches were continuing to grow further and further apart. The Catholic Church was continuing to consolidate in Western Europe and the Orthodox East began spreading to the Balkans and East. However, the Catholic Church ended up being able to consolidate its power and expand its reputation as a stalwart solider battling for Christianity. The Orthodox Church was instead having itself under threat by the Seijuks. The Orthodox were no longer able to maintain their system of cultural exchange.
By the time that the Ottomans began their conquests of the Orthodox realms, these Christians were unable to gain the sympathy of the Latins to help them.
As soon as the Byzantine Empire fell to the Ottomans, the narrative was that the Byzantines were a corruption of Ancient Rome and were not worthy of the name that their own people gave to the empire. It is unfortunate that this has occurred and has had affect on how people perceive Christianity and the culture that brought so much social change to the Romans. Instead of appreciating the accomplishments of the Byzantine Christian Civilization, we instead are spending time talking about whether Byzantine was an actual heir to the Roman Empire.
This is an issue that I seen with many ways that the Byzantine Empire is being portrayed in media. The immoral empire trope is something that we see often with how the West shows the Muslims in the Medieval era but it is common to see this being applied to the Byzantine Empire as well. It is needs to change and I think that we need to see way to incorporate another vision of Christian Civilization.
Instead of just focusing on Classical Antiquity, it would nice to see some effort being made to show how Christian Civilization brought so much innovation to humanity. This is essentially why I started writing on this site, to enlighten people on the virtues of Christian Civilization.
Byzantine-Empire.com 