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Social and political developments. Church affairs
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Page 6
Emperor Nicephorus Phocas was a very interesting personality from the ecclesiastical point of view. This most capable warrior, whose name is closely bound up with the brilliant pages of Byzantine military history, had devoted much of his time and attention, especially before he ascended the throne, to monastic ideals. He had even worn the hair shirt, and he kept up intimate relations with St. Athanasius of Athos, the famous founder of the large monastery on Mount Athos. The Life of Saint Athanasius even relates that once in a transport of religious zeal Nicephorus supposedly confided to Athanasius his sacred dream of forsaking all worldly vanity in order to devote himself to the service of God. The Byzantine historian, Leo the Deacon, wrote that Nicephorus was indomitably firm in his prayers to God and his nocturnal devotions; he maintained a very high spirit in his church hymns, and had no leanings toward anything vain. Nicephorus Phocas was semi soldier, semi recluse. Many Byzantine people were greatly exercised when the ascetically inclined Emperor married the young and beautiful Theophano, the widow of Emperor Romanus II, who had a very dubious reputation. Traces of this feeling are found in the inscription on the sarcophagus of Nicephorus, which says that this emperor vanquished all but woman.
The most important ecclesiastic measure of Nicephorus was his famous Novel of the year 964 with regard to monasteries and the philanthropic institutions connected with them. In the time of the Macedonian dynasty monastic landownership had assumed unusual proportions and frequently expanded at the expense of the free peasant holdings defended by several emperors of this dynasty. Even before the iconoclastic period, i.e., at the end of the seventh and the beginning of the eighth centuries, the eastern church had already been in possession of enormous landed estates. This led some scholars to compare the possessions of the eastern church with the similar landed wealth of the western church in the time of the Frankish kings, who complained of the emptiness of their treasury caused by the transfer of their lands into the hands of the clergy. The iconoclastic emperors of the eighth century waged a campaign against monasteries. Some were closed and their possessions confiscated by the treasury. This reform was simultaneous with the analogous secularization of church property in the western Frankish kingdom under the famous major-domo, Charles Martel. With the failure of iconoclasm and the rise of the Macedonian dynasty, the number of monasteries and the extent of their landed property began to increase very rapidly. Already the Novel of Romanus I Lecapenus had expressed the intention of limiting somewhat the growth of monasterial landed estates. A more decisive step in this direction was taken by Nicephorus Phocas in 964, when he published his Novel.
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=6
