History of political ideas

1
History of political ideas

• 2nd lecture. Political ideas of Medieval Europe
• Lecturer Marosán, Bence

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Constantine the Great, and the Edict of Milan

• Under Constantine the Great (272-337, 313)
  Christianity became the official religion of
  Roman Empire, though the tension between
  Christianity and pagan religions remained long
  after this event.
• The Edict of Milan (313) which was signed by
  Constantines Fellow-emperor of the Eastern parts
  of Roman Empire, Licinius (263-325), granted a
  freedom of religious practice and religious
  conscience for every citizens of the Roman
  Empire. It is a fundamental document of religious
  tolerance of the Roman Empire.

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Two periods of medieval thought

• The early period of medieval thinking or
  philosophy is called Patristics, or the period
  of early Christian writers. It begins with the
  first founders of Church, 1st century AD and
  lasts till the late 9th century, till the time of
  Johannes (John) Scotus Eriugena (cca. 815-877),
  who is considered as the last pater (founding
  father) of Church.
• So Patristics is between 1-9 Century AD.
• The second period of medieval thought is called
  scholasticism. The name comes from the latin
  scola, school scolasticus in Latin means
  that which belongs to the school.
• Scholasticism is a method of critical thought
  which dominated teaching by the academics
  (scholastics, or schoolmen) of medieval
  universities in Europe from about 11001500, and
  a program of employing that method in
  articulating and defending orthodoxy in an
  increasingly pluralistic context. It originated
  as an outgrowth of, and a departure from,
  Christian monastic schools (Source Wikipedia).
• We could date the period of scholastic philosophy
  between the late 11st and late 16th century.

4
Saint Augustine (354-430AD)

• Augustine was born in 354, and till his
  conversion in 386 he lived a libertine way of
  life. He died as the bishop of Hippo in 430.
• The state, according to Augustine, lacks the
  special moral value and rank that was attributed
  to it by the ancient Greek (and Roman)
  philosophers.
• Man could gain salvation only as the citizen of
  the City of God. The earthly, mundane
  manifestation of the City of God is the Church.
• Extra Ecclesiam nulla salus est he said.
  Outside the Church there is no salvation.
• The earthly, mundane, profane state possesses
  only a relative value it has value only in that
  respect and for that degree if it is pervaded by
  the Church, and if it is governed according to
  Christian rules and values.

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The City of God

• Augustine wrote his ideas about this question
  mainly in his last main work, The City of God,
  De civitate Dei, 413-426.
• The city of God evolves amongst the frames of the
  profane state. Thus tranforms the Roman Empire
  into a Christian one, while it is a bearer of a
  special historical mission.
• This conception is expressed with the term Holy
  Roman Empire.
• But the man, according to Augustine, is an
  originally wicked being, he is burdened by the
  original sin, and he is needed to be disciplined.
  This disciplining is practiced by the forcing
  institutions and laws of the mundane state.
• The fundament of state thus is the originally
  wicked human nature, the self-love, and the peace
  is nothing else than a cessation of arms dictated
  by the stronger one.
• In this way one must always subordinate the
  mundane state to the Christian state, to the
  state of God. This conception foreshadows the
  medieval conflicts between State and Church.

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Conflict of Church and State in the Middle Ages

• The Medieval Ages could be characterized with the
  rivalry of State and Church.
• In the beginning there were serious debates
  concerning the question who possesses the
  power? also in the Church. Many told that during
  the chaotic times of their age (early Middle Age)
  only a sovereign with a divine legitimation and
  authorization could make an order. Other tried
  to hold the Church apart from the mundane power.

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The Investiture Controversy

• The rivalry of Church and State culminated in the
  Investiture Controversy in the early Middle
  Age. The investiture controversy was about the
  question that who has the right to nominate the
  bishops in a country the king or the pope?
• Pope Gregory VII (cca. 1015/1028-1085) declared
  that he, as the head of the Church, is the only
  one who has the ultimate right to nominate a
  bishop and to call him back.
• Henry IV Holy Roman Emperor (1050-1106) tried to
  confront the Pope in this question with the
  assistance of his loyal bishops, but Gregory VII
  declared the detronization of Henry IV, who was
  forced to retreat in this confrontation and he
  must make his walk to Canossa.

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Relationship of ecclesiastic and profane power.
The two approaches

• Pope Gregory VII referred to the brief of Pope
  Gelasius (V. century, AD), denying that the king
  would be the supreme leader of human community,
  and arguing for that the kings gain all their
  power from God through the Church.
• On the opposite, a contemporary anonymous author
  (XI. century, AD) defended the absolute rights of
  king against the ecclesiastic power of pope,
  saying that the king has a twofold personality
  one is due to his human nature and the other is
  due to his divine mission.
• The king is the immediate servant of God,
  minister Dei, and as such he is the mundane
  regent of Christ, vicarius Christi on Earth,
  consequently the sovereign is a king and a
  priest, rex et sacerdos in one person.
• In the end the majority who participated in this
  debate saw a counter-balance in the ecclesiastic
  power of the Church and of the pope in
  particular, against the possibly tyrannic power
  of the king.

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Conflict between Henri IV and Thomas Becket,
(1170-1174)

• The archbishop of Canterbury, Thomas Becket,
  would not be here. He was in the throes of a
  quarrel with his old friend, King Henry a
  quarrel so bitter and fierce that the archbishop
  had been forced to flee the country, and had
  taken refuge in France. They were in conflict
  over a whole list of legal issues, but the heart
  of the dispute was simple Could the king do as
  he pleased, or was he constrained? It was the
  dispute William himself had had with Prior
  Philip. William took the view that the earl could
  do anything-- that was what it meant to be earl.
  Henry felt the same about kingship. Prior Philip
  and Thomas Becket were both bent on restricting
  the power of rulers.
• Ken Follett, The Pillars of the Earth, 1990 614

10
John of Salisbury. The right of Tyrranicide

• The experience of conflict of mundane (profane)
  and ecclesiastic power motivated Salisbury to
  write his work Policraticus, (On Tyrranicide,
  1159).
• John of Salisbury made a difference between
  tyrant and monarch. The king is not bounded by
  the positive laws of the states, but he must act
  in accordance with the divine laws. If the king
  strives to realize the laws of divine justice on
  Earth, then his dominance is legitimate, and he
  is a monarch. But if he follows only the laws of
  his own selfish desires, and breaks the divine
  law of heavenly justice, then he is a tyrant, and
  it is just to kill him.

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The assasination of Thomas Becket, mentor of John
of Salisbury

• His mentor was Thomas Becket, the archbishop of
  Canterbury. John of Salisbury worked as Beckets
  secretary from 1161. He followed his master to
  exile to France, when the conflict between
  Beckett and Henri became very tough, (1170-1174).
• Thomas Becket returned with John to England in
  1174, but at the commands (or explicit
  suggestion) of Henrik II of England he was
  murdered, before the very eyes of his discipline,
  right at the altar of the Church.
• This experience made John even more convinced
  that the mundane, profane political power must be
  subordinated to the ecclesiastic power, and
  controlled by it.

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The special importance of the conflict between
State and Church

• These conflicts had a special role in the
  evolution of division of power and in the
  emergence of modern institutions of public
  administration.
• Several factors made successful the modern
  Europe. One of them was the idea of autonomous
  institutions in the society, which enjoyed a
  complete sovereignty over and against the state.
  In this way e.g. the medieval Universities had a
  special autonomy and sovereignty.
• The conflict between Church and State made the
  kings aware for the first time that they cannot
  do everything they want, and even their power is
  restricted by other branches of power.

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The divine source of political legitimacy

• In the Medieval Ages appeared a third modell of
  political order and legitimacy over and above the
  afore mentioned two the divine source of
  political power.
• With the spread and rise of Christianity emerged
  the discipline of political theology.
• According to this modell God is the ultimate
  source of every power, no matter it is mundane or
  transcendent, physical or political.
• Saint Paul There is no sword nor power but
  through God.

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Saint Augustine (354-430). De Civitate Dei, City
of God

• Saint Augustine, the bishop of Hyppo
  (North-Africa), was the first one who articulated
  a systematic theory of political theology in his
  lenghty (ten volumes long) book The City of
  God, (De Civitate Dei).
• Saint Augustine divided the universe to two
  regions Civitate Dei (City or Domain of God) and
  Civitate Diaboli (City or Domain of the Devil).
  Every region of the world which is under the
  reign of the Catholic Church is under the
  sovereignty of God. Every part of the world
  outside the sovereignty of Church is under the
  influence of the Devil, is the City of Devil.
• Extra ecclesiam nulla salus est he said.
  Outside the Church there is no salvation.
• The borders between the City of God and City of
  Devil are invisible. If one lives according to
  the rules and laws of the Catholic religion, then
  s/he is a citizen of the City of God. If one does
  not follow the rules of the only true religion,
  then s/he is a citizen of the City of Devil.
• A form of state is legitimate if and only the
  state serves the goals of salvation and is under
  the reign and sovereignty of the Church. If a
  state does not serve the aims and goals of Church
  and through it the matter of salvation, then its
  rulership is illegitimate.
• The source of political power is the Church and
  ultimately God himself.

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The double power in the world. Letter of Pope
Gelasius I.

• According to Gelasius there could be found two
  powers in the world the power of Monarch and the
  power of the Church.
• According to Gelasius the secular, mundane power
  is subordinated to the power of Church, because
  salvation could be hoped only through the latter.
  
• This was a main problem in the political thinking
  of Medieval Ages. To whom is responsible the
  king? To the Church or only to God himself
  immediately?
• The Church as a matter of course officially
  taught the first view-point. Political legitimacy
  everywhere every time subordinated to the Church.
  The kings over and over again through the
  Medieval Ages tried to grasp the ultimate and
  exclusive power to themselves.
• In this way the Church functioned many occasions
  as the control of the power of king. Thus the
  conflict between Church and State was an
  important source and forerunner of modern
  division of powers.

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The medieval view of society. Saint Thomas of
Acquinas (1225-1274)

• According to medieval autors (among others Saint
  Thomas of Acquinas) the structure of human and
  non-human society was organic and hierarchic.
• The human society was the mirror image of the
  entire universe. The universe was a hierarchy
  with God on the top of it. (Then Archangels,
  Angels, humans, animals, plants and unanimate
  things).
• The human world is just like a hierarchy with the
  king, with the Monarch on the top. (Then the
  nobles, their vassals, bondmen, etc.).
• But just as the created world is subordinated to
  the transcendent divine world, the secular,
  non-ecclesiastic, mundane world must be
  subordinated to the Church. Otherwise it would be
  a violence against the divine laws of the
  Universe.

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The idea of tyrannycide. John of Salisbury

• Salisbury witnessed that his mentor and master,
  Thomas Beckett (Archbishop of Canterbury) was
  slaughtered at the orders of king (Henry II.), at
  the alter of the Cathedral.
• This happened after he wrote his book
  Policraticus (On Tyrranycide, 1159) but
  this event convinced him even deeper concerning
  the truth of his ideas.
• According to Salisbury one must make a difference
  between the monarch and the tyrant. The monarch
  subordinates himself to the rules and laws of
  Church, seeks to fulfill the divine justice, and
  strives after the happiness of his people in this
  world and the next.
• The tyrant follows only his desires, violates the
  laws and rules of the Church, and does not deal
  with the happiness and well-being of his people.
• The monarch regards the political power as a mean
  to make a just and happy society. Does not follow
  his own selfish interest on the first hand. The
  tyrant regards the political power as a goal in
  itself, or as something which has the only
  function to fulfill the selfish desires of the
  tyrant himself.
• The monarch creates the City of God. The tyrant
  brings the City of Devil. According to Salisbury
  it is just revolt against the tyrant, even to
  kill him.