WI: Monothelitism becomes the doctrine of the Church?

One problem with monothelitism is that it had some enemies that worked vigorously to see it abolished. Sts. Sophronius and Maximus the Confessor come to mind, as well as most of the Popes during the controversy. Most of them would have to be neutralized for this doctrine to take root, and that would be tricky. This might heal the Schism between Eastern Chalcedonians and Miaphysites, but it would sunder relations with the West for good. I think any significant change in the religious fabric of the Mediterranean world would butterfly away Islam, though.
 
One problem with monothelitism is that it had some enemies that worked vigorously to see it abolished. Sts. Sophronius and Maximus the Confessor come to mind, as well as most of the Popes during the controversy. Most of them would have to be neutralized for this doctrine to take root, and that would be tricky. This might heal the Schism between Eastern Chalcedonians and Miaphysites, but it would sunder relations with the West for good. I think any significant change in the religious fabric of the Mediterranean world would butterfly away Islam, though.

It does seem like getting Monothelitism to work would require a weaker Western Church/Papacy. That's not exactly impossible though; the Papacy was still in a fairly tenuous position at this time, and with the right tweaks you could certainly see the Popes being more subservient to Constantinople and/or being cut down from primacy to being equal to the Patriarchs.
 
I was under the impression that early on, the Popes were employees of the Eastern Emperor and with the waning of the Byzantines, they were threatened by the Lombards and sought the help of the Franks to deal with this.

I'm not familiar with the timeline of Monothelitism though--how strong were the Byzantines in Italy? If they were very strong, they could simply sack a recalcitrant Pope. If not, they might need more subtle means.
 
I was under the impression that early on, the Popes were employees of the Eastern Emperor and with the waning of the Byzantines, they were threatened by the Lombards and sought the help of the Franks to deal with this.

I'm not familiar with the timeline of Monothelitism though--how strong were the Byzantines in Italy? If they were very strong, they could simply sack a recalcitrant Pope. If not, they might need more subtle means.

IIRC, Monothelitism was at its peak during the reign of Heraclius, since he and the then-current Patriarch of Constantinople were staunch backers of Monothelitism.

Obviously, the timing was part of the problem, since Herclius' reign was dominated by the wars against first the Sassanids and later the Arabs. Those conflicts ate up most of the Empire's resources so their hold Italy was pretty weak and the Emperor was not in a good position to make demands of the Pope.

A faster, less-devastating ERE-Sassanid war seems like a good solution; if the Emperor's hold on Rome is still strong, then the Pope will keep toeing the party line.
 
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