Caesaropapism

Artaxerxes

Banned
Kingship has always been tied to religion so not really. The rise of the pope as a more independent figure was a result of special circumstances.
 
Kingship has always been tied to religion so not really. The rise of the pope as a more independent figure was a result of special circumstances.

Yes - the situation of Western Europe was very unique in dividing political and religious authority. The resulting power struggle for legitimacy also played a big role in encouraging independent thought and ultimately the Western Enlightenment.
 
Is there a way to prevent the rise of Caesaropapism in the East?
Caesaropapism, as has been sort of halfway pointed out, did not "rise" in the East; it was the default from day one. From the point when Constantine summoned the bishops to the Council of Nicaea, it was very clear that the Empire was taking an interest in Christianity, and it was a long-term interest. There were bishops and churchmen who resented Imperial influence, and attempted to establish independent powerbases, throughout the Empire. The ones who succeeded were in the West, which is where you see Aurelius Ambrosius of Milan and his successors successfully challenging the power of the Emperor and laying the foundations for the independent Church hierarchy in the West, but this movement failed to gain traction in the East, so as East and West diverged, the West ended up with an independent Church, and the East with one in a generally separate, but definitely dependent to an extent, on the Empire. The term "caesaropapism" was developed by Western scholars who treated the Western Church's development to be the default, despite it being actually being the one that split away from the original norm that was retained in the East.

This wasn't guaranteed to be the case, but, really, the question is how to cause Caesaropapism to die out in the East as well as the West; not impossible, but rather a different task.

And even that's muddied, of course, because for all that the West lacked Caesaropapism for most of its history after the division of the Empire, the secular governing powers (meaning the non-Church governments, not religiously free/tolerant governments) such as the Franks, Lombards and Visigoths, and your later France, Holy Roman Empire and Aragon to replace them, certainly maintained a fairly large thumb on the scale in Church politics even with an independent Church hierarchy.
 
This wasn't guaranteed to be the case, but, really, the question is how to cause Caesaropapism to die out in the East as well as the West; not impossible, but rather a different task.
Okay maybe this should have been my question from the start
 
Okay maybe this should have been my question from the start
In that case, your best bet is probably to have someone like Aurelius Ambrosius pop up in the East; a much weaker Imperial government could also do the trick. There had been a number of bishops and saints in the East who have challenged the Emperor the way that Aurelius Ambrosius did in the West, just that none of them were nearly as successful as he was.

A collapse of the East with the West would also do the trick, but that's actually more difficult than simply a weaker government or a stronger Church.
 
In that case, your best bet is probably to have someone like Aurelius Ambrosius pop up in the East; a much weaker Imperial government could also do the trick. There had been a number of bishops and saints in the East who have challenged the Emperor the way that Aurelius Ambrosius did in the West, just that none of them were nearly as successful as he was.

A collapse of the East with the West would also do the trick, but that's actually more difficult than simply a weaker government or a stronger Church.

A collapse of the East with the West would have seen the Muslims conquer much of Europe. And Islam is Caesaropapism on steroids.
 
A collapse of the East with the West would have seen the Muslims conquer much of Europe. And Islam is Caesaropapism on steroids.
A collapse of the East in the fifth century could completely butterfly the existence of Islam, centuries later.

Barring that, just because the East collapses doesn't mean there's not a strong power ruling Asia Minor; again, there's centuries of time for a new government to stabilize before an *Islamic conquest begins. The collapse of caesaropapism doesn't need there to be no strong states; it requires there to be no strong, Imperial Roman state; or at least, in this particular intent, you need that -- obviously caesaropapism was already dying in the West long before the Roman state there collapsed. A Hunnic, Gothic or Germanic Christian state could set itself up there, as well, and would have most of the same territorial advantages that the Romans did in defending the region against large incursions, while not having the same power over the Church.
 
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