East-West Schism

Examples of East-West Schism in the following topics:

• The Great Schism of 1054

  • The centuries-long gradual religious separation between the Eastern and Western Roman Empires culminated in the institutional separation known as the East-West Schism.
  • The East–West Schism, also called the Great Schism and the Schism of 1054, was the break of communion between what are now the Eastern Orthodox and Catholic churches, which has lasted since the 11th century.
  • The ecclesiastical differences and theological disputes between the Greek East and Latin West pre-existed the formal rupture that occurred in 1054.
  • This was known as the East-West Schism.
  • The religious distribution after the East-West Schism between the churches of the Byzantine Empire and the Holy Roman Empire in 1054 CE.

• The Crusades

  • Christianity had spread throughout Europe, Africa, and the Middle East in Late Antiquity, but by the early 8th century Christian rule had become limited to Europe and Anatolia after the Muslim conquests.
  • To the east of Europe lay the Byzantine Empire, composed of Christians who had long followed a separate Orthodox rite; the Eastern Orthodox and Roman Catholic churches had been in schism since 1054.
  • By the mid-1090s, the Byzantine Empire was largely confined to Balkan Europe and the northwestern fringe of Anatolia, and faced Norman enemies in the west as well as Turks in the east.
  • Alexios was worried about the advances of the Seljuqs, who had reached as far west as Nicaea, not far from Constantinople.
  • Urban responded favorably, perhaps hoping to heal the Great Schism of forty years earlier, and to reunite the Church under papal primacy by helping the eastern churches in their time of need.

• The Fourth Crusade

  • The Fourth Crusade is considered to be one of the final acts in the Great Schism between the Eastern Orthodox Church and Roman Catholic Church, and a key turning point in the decline of the Byzantine Empire and Christianity in the Near East.
  • Andrew II of Hungary waged the Bosnian Crusade against the Bosnian church, which was theologically Catholic but in long-term schism with the Roman Catholic Church.
  • The collapse of the papacy's moral authority and the rise of nationalism rang the death knell for crusading, ultimately leading to the Avignon Papacy and the Western Schism.
  • The attempt failed, however, as the vast majority of Greek civilians and a growing part of their clergy refused to recognize and accept the short-lived near-union of the churches of East and West signed at the Council of Florence and Ferrara by the Ecumenical patriarch Joseph II of Constantinople.
  • These were not the traditional expeditions aimed at the recovery of Jerusalem but rather defensive campaigns intended to prevent further expansion to the west by the Ottoman Empire.

• The Last Byzantine Dynasty

  • In the west, the Latins were unable to expand into Anatolia; consolidating Thrace against Bulgaria was a challenge that kept the Latins occupied for the duration of the Latin Empire.
  • In order to protect his empire from further attacks by Western knights, he attempted to end the schism between the Catholic and Orthodox churches.
  • The loss of land in the east to the Turks and in the west to the Bulgarians was complemented by two disastrous civil wars, the Black Death and the 1354 earthquake at Gallipoli, whose destruction and evacuation allowed the Turks to occupy it.

• Emperor Heracluis

  • Temporary success in the West was achieved at the cost of Persian dominance in the East, where the Byzantines were forced to pay tribute to avert war.
  • However, the religion he left behind would transform the Middle East.
  • This approach seemed to be an acceptable compromise, and it secured widespread support throughout the East.
  • The two remaining patriarchs in the East also gave their approval to the doctrine now referred to as Monothelitism, and so it looked as if Heraclius would finally heal the divisions in the imperial church.
  • His successor Pope John IV (640-42) also rejected the doctrine completely, leading to a major schism between the eastern and western halves of the Chalcedonian Church.

• The Development of Papal Supremacy

  • Decisions made at the Council of Nicea (325) about the divinity of Christ led to a schism; the new religion, Arianism, flourished outside the Roman Empire.
  • This led to further schisms.
  • From the late-6th to the late-8th century there was a turning of the papacy to the West and an escape from subordination to the authority of the Byzantine emperors of Constantinople.
  • The popes finally sought support from the Frankish rulers of the West and received from the Frankish king Pepin The Short the first part of the Italian territories later known as the Papal States.

• FK Grade 6 Reading Level

  • His campaigns greatly increased contacts and trade between East and West.
  • Vast areas to the east were exposed to Greek culture.
  • Alexander founded some twenty cities that bore his name, most of them east of the Tigris.
  • After the assassination of Perdiccas in 321 BCE, Macedonian unity collapsed, and 40 years of war between "The Successors" (Diadochi) ensued before the Hellenistic world settled into four new empires: the Ptolemaic Kingdom of Egypt, the Seleucid Empire in the east, the Kingdom of Pergamon in Asia Minor, and Macedon.

• Overview of the Mongol Empire

  • The Mongol Empire expanded through brutal raids and invasions, but also established routes of trade and technology between East and West.
  • The vast transcontinental empire connected the east with the west with an enforced Pax Mongolica, or Mongol Peace, allowing trade, technologies, commodities, and ideologies to be disseminated and exchanged across Eurasia.
  • Famous explorers, such as Marco Polo, also enjoyed the freedom and stability the Pax Mongolica provided, and were able to bring back valuable information about the East and the Mongol Empire to Europe.

• The End of the Carolingians

  • The dynasty reached its peak with the crowning of Charlemagne as the first emperor in the west in over three centuries.
  • They ruled on in East Francia until 911 and held the throne of West Francia intermittently until 987.
  • Thus West Francia of the Carolingian dynasty became France.
  • The territory initially known as East Francia stretched from the Rhine in the west to the Elbe River in the east, and from the North Sea to the Alps.

• Trade Under the Tang Dynasty

  • From the Middle East, India, Persia, and Central Asia the Tang were able to acquire new ideas in fashion, new types of ceramics, and improved silver-smithing.
  • In the Middle East, the Islamic world coveted and purchased in bulk Chinese goods such as silks, lacquerwares, and porcelain wares.
  • Although the Silk Road from China to the West was initially formulated during the reign of Emperor Wu (141–87 BCE) during the Han dynasty, it was reopened by the Tang in 639 CE when Hou Junji (d. 643) conquered the West, and remained open for almost four decades.
  • The Tang dynasty established a second Pax Sinica and the Silk Road reached its golden age, whereby Persian and Sogdian merchants benefited from the commerce between East and West.
  • Beginning in 785, the Chinese began to call regularly at Sufala on the East African coast in order to cut out Arab middlemen, with various contemporary Chinese sources giving detailed descriptions of trade in Africa.