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Christianity in the 8th century was much affected by the rise ofIslam in theMiddle East. By the late 8th century, theMuslim empire had conquered all ofPersia and parts of the Eastern Roman (Byzantine) territory includingEgypt,Palestine, andSyria. Suddenly parts of theChristian world were under Muslim rule. Over the coming centuries the Muslim nations became some of the most powerful in theMediterranean basin.
Though theRoman Church had claimed religious authority overChristians in Egypt and theLevant, in reality the majority of Christians in these regions weremiaphysites and other sects that had long been persecuted byConstantinople.
TheSecond Council of Nicea was called under EmpressIrene in 787. It affirmed the making and veneration oficons while also forbidding the worship of icons and the making of three-dimensional statuary. It reversed the declaration of the earlierCouncil of Hieria that had called itself the Seventh Ecumenical Council and also nullified its status.
Sometime between 726 and 730 the Byzantine EmperorLeo III the Isaurian ordered the removal of an image of Jesus prominently placed over theChalke gate, the ceremonial entrance to theGreat Palace of Constantinople, and its replacement with a cross. This was followed by orders banning the pictorial representation of the family of Christ, subsequent Christian saints, and biblical scenes. The Council of Hieria had been held under the iconoclast EmperorConstantine V. It met with more than 340 bishops at Constantinople and Hieria in 754, declaring the making of icons ofJesus or the saints an error, mainly forChristological reasons.
Iconoclasm was a movement within the Eastern Christian Byzantine church to establish that the Christian culture of portraits of the family of Christ and subsequent Christians and biblical scenes were not of a Christian origin and thereforeheretical.[1] This movement was later defined as heretical under the council. The group destroyed much of the Christian churches' art history, which is needed in addressing the traditional interruptions of the Christian faith and the artistic works that in the early church were devoted to Jesus Christ or God. Many works were destroyed during this period.[2]
Two prototypes of icons would be theChrist Pantocrator and theIcon of the Hodegetria. In the West the tradition of icons have been seen as the veneration of "graven images" or against "no graven images" as noted in Exodus 20:4. From the Orthodox point of view graven then would be engraved or carved. Thus this restriction would include many of the ornaments that Moses was commanded to create in the passages right after the commandment was given i.e. the carving of cherubim Exodus 26:1. The commandment as understood by such out of context interpretation would mean "no carved images". This would include the cross and other holy artifacts. The commandment in the East is understood that the people of God are not to create idols and then worship them. It is "right worship" to worship which is of God, which is Holy and that alone.[3]
In theRoman Catholic Church, St.John of Damascus, who lived in the 8th century, is generally considered to be the last of the Church Fathers and at the same time the first seed of the next period of church writers,scholasticism.
In the early 8th century,Byzantine iconoclasm became a major source of conflict between the Eastern and Western parts of the Church.Byzantine emperors forbade the creation and veneration of religious images. Other major religions in the East such asJudaism andIslam had similar prohibitions.Pope Gregory III vehemently disagreed.[4]
TheGermanic peoples underwent gradualChristianization in the course ofLate Antiquity and theEarly Middle Ages. By the 8th century, most ofAnglo-Saxon England and theFrankish Empire wasde jure Christian.
In the 8th century, theFranks became standard-bearers of Roman Catholic Christianity in Western Europe, waging wars on its behalf against Arian Christians,Islamic invaders, and pagan Germanic peoples such as theSaxons andFrisians. Until 1066, when theDane and theNorse had lost their foothold inBritain, theological and missionary work inGermany was largely organized byAnglo-Saxon missionaries, with mixed success. A key event was the felling ofThor's Oak nearFritzlar byBoniface, apostle of the Germans, in 723.
Eventually, the conversion was imposed by armed force and successfully completed byCharlemagne and the Franks in aseries of campaigns, starting in 772 with the destruction of theirIrminsul and culminating in the defeat and massacre of Saxon leaders at theBloody Verdict of Verden in 782 and the subjugation of this large tribe.
By the 8th century, theFrankish Kingdom, a Germanic kingdom that had originated east of theRhine, ruled much of western Europe, particularly in what is nowFrance andGermany. The first Frankish king,Clovis had joined the Roman Church in 496 and since that time the Franks had been part of the Church. In 768Charles, son of KingPepin the Short, succeeded to the Frankish throne. During the 770s Charles the Great conquered theLombards in Italy extending the Frankish realm over almost all of Italy. On Christmas Day in 800, the Roman Patriarch Leo III crowned Charles as the Roman Emperor, in essence denying the status of the Roman EmpressIrene, reigning in Constantinople. This act caused a substantial diplomatic rift between the Franks and the Eastern Romans, as well as between Rome and the other patriarchs in the East.
Christian missionaries to the Frankish Empire include:
Although theScandinavians became nominally Christian in the 8th century, it took considerably longer for actual Christian beliefs to become established among the people.[5] The old indigenous traditions that had provided security and structure since time immemorial were challenged by ideas that were unfamiliar, such asoriginal sin, theTrinity and so forth.[5] Archaeological excavations of burial sites on the island ofLovön near modern-dayStockholm have shown that the actual Christianization of the people was very slow and took at least 150–200 years,[6] and this was a very central location in the Swedish kingdom. At this time, enough knowledge ofNorse mythology remained to be preserved in sources such as theEddas inIceland.
In 698 theNorthumbrian Benedictine monk, SaintWillibrord was commissioned byPope Sergius I as bishop of the Frisians in what is now theNetherlands. Willibrord established a church inUtrecht.
Much of Willibrord's work was wiped out when the paganRadbod, king of the Frisians destroyed many Christian centres between 716 and 719. In 717, the English missionaryBoniface was sent to aid Willibrord, re-establishing churches in Frisia and continuing to preach throughout the pagan lands of Germany. Boniface was killed by pagans in 754.
TheXi'an Stele[1] was constructed in 781 as a monument to 150 years of earlyChristianity in China. It was buried in the ninth century during religious suppression and lay underground until it was discovered in 1625. The top of the monument is adorned not only with a cross but also with the Buddhist emblem of the lotus and theTaoist symbol of the cloud. The writer of the inscription wasJingjing (monk), a monk of the "Luminous Religion," as well as Buddhism and the calligraphist wasHuangbo Xiyun (these two are thought to have later collaborated on some Buddhist writing). It's unclear whether they were commentators or followers of Christianity.
Once the Christian faith had been established in the valleys of the Oxus andJaxartes Rivers, it was easily carried further east into the basin of theTarim River, then into the area north of theTien Shan Mountains, and finally down into far northwest China, aboveTibet. This was the principal caravan route, and with so many Christians engaged in the trade it was natural that the gospel was early planted in the towns and cities which were caravan centers. The Mesopotamian patriarch in the 8th century wrote that he was appointing a metropolitan for Tibet, implying that their churches were numerous enough to require bishops and lesser clergy. Thus Christians were to be found inXinjiang, and possibly inTibet, as early as the 9th century. But it was not until the beginning of the 11th century that the faith spread among the nomadic peoples of this and other central Asian regions. These Christians were chiefly Turko-Tatar peoples, including theKeraites,Onguts,Uyghurs,Naimans,Merkits, andMongols.
Between 711 and 718 theIberian Peninsula had been conquered byMuslims in theUmayyad conquest of Hispania; between722 and1492 the Christian kingdoms that later would becomeSpain andPortugal reconquered it from theMoorish states ofAl-Ándalus.TheSpanish Inquisition andPortuguese Inquisition were not installed until 1478 and 1536 when the Reconquista was already (mostly) completed.
The Arabs, under the command of theBerber GeneralTarik ibn Ziyad, first began their conquest of southern Spain or al-Andalus in 711. A raiding party led by Tarik was sent to intervene in a civil war in theVisigothic kingdom inHispania. Crossing theStrait of Gibraltar, it won a decisive victory in the summer of 711 when the Visigothic kingRoderic was defeated and killed on July 19 at theBattle of Guadalete. Tariq's commander,Musa bin Nusair quickly crossed with substantial reinforcements, and by 718 the Muslims dominated most of the peninsula. There are some later Arabic and Christian sources present an earlier raid by a certainṬārif in 710 and one, theAd Sebastianum recension of theChronicle of Alfonso III, refers to an Arab attack incited byErwig during the reign ofWamba (672–680). and two reasonably large armies may have been in the south for a year before the decisive battle was fought.[7]
The rulers of Al-Andalus were granted the rank ofEmir by theUmayyadCaliphAl-Walid I inDamascus. After theAbbasids came to power in the Middle East, someUmayyads fled toMuslim Spain to establish themselves there.
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