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Social and political developments. Church affairs
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Page 5
The council did not bring harmony to the Empire. Two parties were formed among the Byzantine clergy. The first, which sided with Nicholas Mysticus, was against the confirmation of the Emperor's fourth marriage and denounced the new patriarch, Euthymius. The other, a minority party, was in agreement with the decision of the council concerning Leo's marriage, and recognized Euthymius as the chosen leader of the church. The dissension between these two parties spread from the capital into the provinces, and an obstinate struggle developed everywhere between the Nicholaites and the Euthymites. Some scholars view this struggle as a continuation of the former animosity between the Photinians (or Photians) and the Ignatians, which had subsided only for a short while. In the end the Emperor saw that only the energetic and experienced Nicholas Mysticus could remedy the situation, and shortly before his death (912) Leo VI recalled Nicholas from confinement, deposed Euthymius, and reinstated the former on the patriarchal throne. In the interests of religious peace in the Empire Nicholas Mysticus strove to restore the friendly relations with Rome which had been severed because of the pope's approval of Leo's fourth marriage.
During the regency of Zoe, who ruled during the minority of her son, Constantine VII Porphyrogemtus, Nicholas Mysticus was deprived of influence. But in the year 919, when the government was transferred to Constantine's father-in-law, Romanus I Lecapenus, and Zoe was forced to embrace monastic life, Nicholas Mysticus again rose to his former influential position. The main event in the last years of his patriarchate was the convocation in 920 of a council in Constantinople, which consisted of Nicholaites and Euthymites. They composed the Tome of Union (Τόμος τῆς Ἑνώσεως), approved by the general assembly. This act proclaimed that marriage for the fourth time was unquestionably illicit and void, because it was prohibited by the church and intolerable in a Christian land. No direct reference was made in the Tome to the fourth marriage of Leo the Wise. Both parties remained satisfied by the decision of the council. It is probable, as Drinov supposed, that the reconciliation between the Nicholaites and the Euthymites was prompted also by the terror aroused in the Byzantine population by the success of Bulgarian arms. After the council several letters were exchanged with the pope, and he agreed to send to the capital two bishops, who were to condemn the conflicts aroused by Leo's fourth marriage. Direct communications were thus re-established between the churches of Rome and Constantinople. The Russian church historian, A. P. Lebedev, summed up the outcome of this period: Patriarch Nicholas emerged as full victor in this new clash between the churches of Constantinople and Rome. The Roman church has to yield to the church of Constantinople and condemn its own acts. After the death of Nicholas Mysticus in 925, Romanus Lecapenus gained complete control over the church, and, as Runciman said, Caesaropapism once more emerged victorious.
A History of the Byzantine Empire - Table of Contents
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Reference address : https://www.ellopos.net/elpenor/vasilief/social-political-developments.asp?pg=5
