Chapter LIV: Origin And Doctrine Of The Paulicians.—Part I

Origin And Doctrine Of The Paulicians.—Their Persecution By The
Greek Emperors.—Revolt In Armenia &c.—Transplantation Into
Thrace.—Propagation In The West.—The Seeds, Character, And
Consequences Of The Reformation.

In the profession of Christianity, the variety of national
characters may be clearly distinguished. The natives of Syria and
Egypt abandoned their lives to lazy and contemplative devotion:
Rome again aspired to the dominion of the world; and the wit of
the lively and loquacious Greeks was consumed in the disputes of
metaphysical theology. The incomprehensible mysteries of the
Trinity and Incarnation, instead of commanding their silent
submission, were agitated in vehement and subtile controversies,
which enlarged their faith at the expense, perhaps, of their
charity and reason. From the council of Nice to the end of the
seventh century, the peace and unity of the church was invaded by
these spiritual wars; and so deeply did they affect the decline
and fall of the empire, that the historian has too often been
compelled to attend the synods, to explore the creeds, and to
enumerate the sects, of this busy period of ecclesiastical
annals. From the beginning of the eighth century to the last ages
of the Byzantine empire, the sound of controversy was seldom
heard: curiosity was exhausted, zeal was fatigued, and, in the
decrees of six councils, the articles of the Catholic faith had
been irrevocably defined. The spirit of dispute, however vain and
pernicious, requires some energy and exercise of the mental
faculties; and the prostrate Greeks were content to fast, to
pray, and to believe in blind obedience to the patriarch and his
clergy. During a long dream of superstition, the Virgin and the
Saints, their visions and miracles, their relics and images, were
preached by the monks, and worshipped by the people; and the
appellation of people might be extended, without injustice, to
the first ranks of civil society. At an unseasonable moment, the
Isaurian emperors attempted somewhat rudely to awaken their
subjects: under their influence reason might obtain some
proselytes, a far greater number was swayed by interest or fear;
but the Eastern world embraced or deplored their visible deities,
and the restoration of images was celebrated as the feast of
orthodoxy. In this passive and unanimous state the ecclesiastical
rulers were relieved from the toil, or deprived of the pleasure,
of persecution. The Pagans had disappeared; the Jews were silent
and obscure; the disputes with the Latins were rare and remote
hostilities against a national enemy; and the sects of Egypt and
Syria enjoyed a free toleration under the shadow of the Arabian
caliphs. About the middle of the seventh century, a branch of
Manichaeans was selected as the victims of spiritual tyranny;
their patience was at length exasperated to despair and
rebellion; and their exile has scattered over the West the seeds
of reformation. These important events will justify some inquiry
into the doctrine and story of the Paulicians; 1 and, as they
cannot plead for themselves, our candid criticism will magnify
the good, and abate or suspect the evil, that is reported by
their adversaries.

1 (return) [ The errors and virtues of the Paulicians are
weighed, with his usual judgment and candor, by the learned
Mosheim, (Hist. Ecclesiast. seculum ix. p. 311, &c.) He draws his
original intelligence from Photius (contra Manichaeos, l. i.) and
Peter Siculus, (Hist. Manichaeorum.) The first of these accounts
has not fallen into my hands; the second, which Mosheim prefers,
I have read in a Latin version inserted in the Maxima Bibliotheca
Patrum, (tom. xvi. p. 754-764,) from the edition of the Jesuit
Raderus, (Ingolstadii, 1604, in 4to.) * Note: Compare Hallam’s
Middle Ages, p. 461-471. Mr. Hallam justly observes that this
chapter “appears to be accurate as well as luminous, and is at
least far superior to any modern work on the subject.”—M.]

The Gnostics, who had distracted the infancy, were oppressed by
the greatness and authority, of the church. Instead of emulating
or surpassing the wealth, learning, and numbers of the Catholics,
their obscure remnant was driven from the capitals of the East
and West, and confined to the villages and mountains along the
borders of the Euphrates. Some vestige of the Marcionites may be
detected in the fifth century; 2 but the numerous sects were
finally lost in the odious name of the Manichaeans; and these
heretics, who presumed to reconcile the doctrines of Zoroaster
and Christ, were pursued by the two religions with equal and
unrelenting hatred. Under the grandson of Heraclius, in the
neighborhood of Samosata, more famous for the birth of Lucian
than for the title of a Syrian kingdom, a reformer arose,
esteemed by the Paulicians as the chosen messenger of truth. In
his humble dwelling of Mananalis, Constantine entertained a
deacon, who returned from Syrian captivity, and received the
inestimable gift of the New Testament, which was already
concealed from the vulgar by the prudence of the Greek, and
perhaps of the Gnostic, clergy. 3 These books became the measure
of his studies and the rule of his faith; and the Catholics, who
dispute his interpretation, acknowledge that his text was genuine
and sincere. But he attached himself with peculiar devotion to
the writings and character of St. Paul: the name of the
Paulicians is derived by their enemies from some unknown and
domestic teacher; but I am confident that they gloried in their
affinity to the apostle of the Gentiles. His disciples, Titus,
Timothy, Sylvanus, Tychicus, were represented by Constantine and
his fellow-laborers: the names of the apostolic churches were
applied to the congregations which they assembled in Armenia and
Cappadocia; and this innocent allegory revived the example and
memory of the first ages. In the Gospel, and the Epistles of St.
Paul, his faithful follower investigated the Creed of primitive
Christianity; and, whatever might be the success, a Protestant
reader will applaud the spirit, of the inquiry. But if the
Scriptures of the Paulicians were pure, they were not perfect.
Their founders rejected the two Epistles of St. Peter, 4 the
apostle of the circumcision, whose dispute with their favorite
for the observance of the law could not easily be forgiven. 5
They agreed with their Gnostic brethren in the universal contempt
for the Old Testament, the books of Moses and the prophets, which
have been consecrated by the decrees of the Catholic church. With
equal boldness, and doubtless with more reason, Constantine, the
new Sylvanus, disclaimed the visions, which, in so many bulky and
splendid volumes, had been published by the Oriental sects; 6 the
fabulous productions of the Hebrew patriarchs and the sages of
the East; the spurious gospels, epistles, and acts, which in the
first age had overwhelmed the orthodox code; the theology of
Manes, and the authors of the kindred heresies; and the thirty
generations, or aeons, which had been created by the fruitful
fancy of Valentine. The Paulicians sincerely condemned the memory
and opinions of the Manichaean sect, and complained of the
injustice which impressed that invidious name on the simple
votaries of St. Paul and of Christ.

2 (return) [ In the time of Theodoret, the diocese of Cyrrhus, in
Syria, contained eight hundred villages. Of these, two were
inhabited by Arians and Eunomians, and eight by Marcionites, whom
the laborious bishop reconciled to the Catholic church, (Dupin,
Bibliot. Ecclesiastique, tom. iv. p. 81, 82.)]

3 (return) [ Nobis profanis ista (sacra Evangelia) legere non
licet sed sacerdotibus duntaxat, was the first scruple of a
Catholic when he was advised to read the Bible, (Petr. Sicul. p.
761.)]

4 (return) [ In rejecting the second Epistle of St. Peter, the
Paulicians are justified by some of the most respectable of the
ancients and moderns, (see Wetstein ad loc., Simon, Hist.
Critique du Nouveau Testament, c. 17.) They likewise overlooked
the Apocalypse, (Petr. Sicul. p. 756;) but as such neglect is not
imputed as a crime, the Greeks of the ixth century must have been
careless of the credit and honor of the Revelations.]

5 (return) [ This contention, which has not escaped the malice of
Porphyry, supposes some error and passion in one or both of the
apostles. By Chrysostom, Jerome, and Erasmus, it is represented
as a sham quarrel a pious fraud, for the benefit of the Gentiles
and the correction of the Jews, (Middleton’s Works, vol. ii. p.
1-20.)]

6 (return) [ Those who are curious of this heterodox library, may
consult the researches of Beausobre, (Hist. Critique du
Manicheisme, tom. i. p. 305-437.) Even in Africa, St. Austin
could describe the Manichaean books, tam multi, tam grandes, tam
pretiosi codices, (contra Faust. xiii. 14;) but he adds, without
pity, Incendite omnes illas membranas: and his advice had been
rigorously followed.]

Of the ecclesiastical chain, many links had been broken by the
Paulician reformers; and their liberty was enlarged, as they
reduced the number of masters, at whose voice profane reason must
bow to mystery and miracle. The early separation of the Gnostics
had preceded the establishment of the Catholic worship; and
against the gradual innovations of discipline and doctrine they
were as strongly guarded by habit and aversion, as by the silence
of St. Paul and the evangelists. The objects which had been
transformed by the magic of superstition, appeared to the eyes of
the Paulicians in their genuine and naked colors. An image made
without hands was the common workmanship of a mortal artist, to
whose skill alone the wood and canvas must be indebted for their
merit or value. The miraculous relics were a heap of bones and
ashes, destitute of life or virtue, or of any relation, perhaps,
with the person to whom they were ascribed. The true and
vivifying cross was a piece of sound or rotten timber, the body
and blood of Christ, a loaf of bread and a cup of wine, the gifts
of nature and the symbols of grace. The mother of God was
degraded from her celestial honors and immaculate virginity; and
the saints and angels were no longer solicited to exercise the
laborious office of mediation in heaven, and ministry upon earth.
In the practice, or at least in the theory, of the sacraments,
the Paulicians were inclined to abolish all visible objects of
worship, and the words of the gospel were, in their judgment, the
baptism and communion of the faithful. They indulged a convenient
latitude for the interpretation of Scripture: and as often as
they were pressed by the literal sense, they could escape to the
intricate mazes of figure and allegory. Their utmost diligence
must have been employed to dissolve the connection between the
Old and the New Testament; since they adored the latter as the
oracles of God, and abhorred the former as the fabulous and
absurd invention of men or daemons. We cannot be surprised, that
they should have found in the Gospel the orthodox mystery of the
Trinity: but, instead of confessing the human nature and
substantial sufferings of Christ, they amused their fancy with a
celestial body that passed through the virgin like water through
a pipe; with a fantastic crucifixion, that eluded the vain and
important malice of the Jews. A creed thus simple and spiritual
was not adapted to the genius of the times; 7 and the rational
Christian, who might have been contented with the light yoke and
easy burden of Jesus and his apostles, was justly offended, that
the Paulicians should dare to violate the unity of God, the first
article of natural and revealed religion. Their belief and their
trust was in the Father, of Christ, of the human soul, and of the
invisible world.

But they likewise held the eternity of matter; a stubborn and
rebellious substance, the origin of a second principle of an
active being, who has created this visible world, and exercises
his temporal reign till the final consummation of death and sin.
8 The appearances of moral and physical evil had established the
two principles in the ancient philosophy and religion of the
East; from whence this doctrine was transfused to the various
swarms of the Gnostics. A thousand shades may be devised in the
nature and character of Ahriman, from a rival god to a
subordinate daemon, from passion and frailty to pure and perfect
malevolence: but, in spite of our efforts, the goodness, and the
power, of Ormusd are placed at the opposite extremities of the
line; and every step that approaches the one must recede in equal
proportion from the other. 9

7 (return) [ The six capital errors of the Paulicians are defined
by Peter (p. 756,) with much prejudice and passion.]

8 (return) [ Primum illorum axioma est, duo rerum esse principia;
Deum malum et Deum bonum, aliumque hujus mundi conditorem et
princi pem, et alium futuri aevi, (Petr. Sicul. 765.)]

9 (return) [ Two learned critics, Beausobre (Hist. Critique du
Manicheisme, l. i. iv. v. vi.) and Mosheim, (Institut. Hist.
Eccles. and de Rebus Christianis ante Constantinum, sec. i. ii.
iii.,) have labored to explore and discriminate the various
systems of the Gnostics on the subject of the two principles.]

The apostolic labors of Constantine Sylvanus soon multiplied the
number of his disciples, the secret recompense of spiritual
ambition. The remnant of the Gnostic sects, and especially the
Manichaeans of Armenia, were united under his standard; many
Catholics were converted or seduced by his arguments; and he
preached with success in the regions of Pontus 10 and Cappadocia,
which had long since imbibed the religion of Zoroaster. The
Paulician teachers were distinguished only by their Scriptural
names, by the modest title of Fellow-pilgrims, by the austerity
of their lives, their zeal or knowledge, and the credit of some
extraordinary gifts of the Holy Spirit. But they were incapable
of desiring, or at least of obtaining, the wealth and honors of
the Catholic prelacy; such anti-Christian pride they bitterly
censured; and even the rank of elders or presbyters was condemned
as an institution of the Jewish synagogue. The new sect was
loosely spread over the provinces of Asia Minor to the westward
of the Euphrates; six of their principal congregations
represented the churches to which St. Paul had addressed his
epistles; and their founder chose his residence in the
neighborhood of Colonia, 11 in the same district of Pontus which
had been celebrated by the altars of Bellona 12 and the miracles
of Gregory. 13 After a mission of twenty-seven years, Sylvanus,
who had retired from the tolerating government of the Arabs, fell
a sacrifice to Roman persecution. The laws of the pious emperors,
which seldom touched the lives of less odious heretics,
proscribed without mercy or disguise the tenets, the books, and
the persons of the Montanists and Manichaeans: the books were
delivered to the flames; and all who should presume to secrete
such writings, or to profess such opinions, were devoted to an
ignominious death. 14 A Greek minister, armed with legal and
military powers, appeared at Colonia to strike the shepherd, and
to reclaim, if possible, the lost sheep. By a refinement of
cruelty, Simeon placed the unfortunate Sylvanus before a line of
his disciples, who were commanded, as the price of their pardon
and the proof of their repentance, to massacre their spiritual
father. They turned aside from the impious office; the stones
dropped from their filial hands, and of the whole number, only
one executioner could be found, a new David, as he is styled by
the Catholics, who boldly overthrew the giant of heresy. This
apostate (Justin was his name) again deceived and betrayed his
unsuspecting brethren, and a new conformity to the acts of St.
Paul may be found in the conversion of Simeon: like the apostle,
he embraced the doctrine which he had been sent to persecute,
renounced his honors and fortunes, and required among the
Paulicians the fame of a missionary and a martyr. They were not
ambitious of martyrdom, 15 but in a calamitous period of one
hundred and fifty years, their patience sustained whatever zeal
could inflict; and power was insufficient to eradicate the
obstinate vegetation of fanaticism and reason. From the blood and
ashes of the first victims, a succession of teachers and
congregations repeatedly arose: amidst their foreign hostilities,
they found leisure for domestic quarrels: they preached, they
disputed, they suffered; and the virtues, the apparent virtues,
of Sergius, in a pilgrimage of thirty-three years, are
reluctantly confessed by the orthodox historians. 16 The native
cruelty of Justinian the Second was stimulated by a pious cause;
and he vainly hoped to extinguish, in a single conflagration, the
name and memory of the Paulicians. By their primitive simplicity,
their abhorrence of popular superstition, the Iconoclast princes
might have been reconciled to some erroneous doctrines; but they
themselves were exposed to the calumnies of the monks, and they
chose to be the tyrants, lest they should be accused as the
accomplices, of the Manichaeans. Such a reproach has sullied the
clemency of Nicephorus, who relaxed in their favor the severity
of the penal statutes, nor will his character sustain the honor
of a more liberal motive. The feeble Michael the First, the rigid
Leo the Armenian, were foremost in the race of persecution; but
the prize must doubtless be adjudged to the sanguinary devotion
of Theodora, who restored the images to the Oriental church. Her
inquisitors explored the cities and mountains of the Lesser Asia,
and the flatterers of the empress have affirmed that, in a short
reign, one hundred thousand Paulicians were extirpated by the
sword, the gibbet, or the flames. Her guilt or merit has perhaps
been stretched beyond the measure of truth: but if the account be
allowed, it must be presumed that many simple Iconoclasts were
punished under a more odious name; and that some who were driven
from the church, unwillingly took refuge in the bosom of heresy.

10 (return) [ The countries between the Euphrates and the Halys
were possessed above 350 years by the Medes (Herodot. l. i. c.
103) and Persians; and the kings of Pontus were of the royal race
of the Achaemenides, (Sallust. Fragment. l. iii. with the French
supplement and notes of the president de Brosses.)]

11 (return) [ Most probably founded by Pompey after the conquest
of Pontus. This Colonia, on the Lycus, above Neo-Caesarea, is
named by the Turks Coulei-hisar, or Chonac, a populous town in a
strong country, (D’Anville, Geographie Ancienne, tom. ii. p. 34.
Tournefort, Voyage du Levant, tom. iii. lettre xxi. p. 293.)]

12 (return) [ The temple of Bellona, at Comana in Pontus was a
powerful and wealthy foundation, and the high priest was
respected as the second person in the kingdom. As the sacerdotal
office had been occupied by his mother’s family, Strabo (l. xii.
p. 809, 835, 836, 837) dwells with peculiar complacency on the
temple, the worship, and festival, which was twice celebrated
every year. But the Bellona of Pontus had the features and
character of the goddess, not of war, but of love.]

13 (return) [ Gregory, bishop of Neo-Caesarea, (A.D. 240-265,)
surnamed Thaumaturgus, or the Wonder-worker. An hundred years
afterwards, the history or romance of his life was composed by
Gregory of Nyssa, his namesake and countryman, the brother of the
great St. Basil.]

14 (return) [ Hoc caeterum ad sua egregia facinora, divini atque
orthodoxi Imperatores addiderunt, ut Manichaeos Montanosque
capitali puniri sententia juberent, eorumque libros, quocunque in
loco inventi essent, flammis tradi; quod siquis uspiam eosdem
occultasse deprehenderetur, hunc eundem mortis poenae addici,
ejusque bona in fiscum inferri, (Petr. Sicul. p. 759.) What more
could bigotry and persecution desire?]

15 (return) [ It should seem, that the Paulicians allowed
themselves some latitude of equivocation and mental reservation;
till the Catholics discovered the pressing questions, which
reduced them to the alternative of apostasy or martyrdom, (Petr.
Sicul. p. 760.)]

16 (return) [ The persecution is told by Petrus Siculus (p.
579-763) with satisfaction and pleasantry. Justus justa
persolvit. See likewise Cedrenus, (p. 432-435.)]

The most furious and desperate of rebels are the sectaries of a
religion long persecuted, and at length provoked. In a holy cause
they are no longer susceptible of fear or remorse: the justice of
their arms hardens them against the feelings of humanity; and
they revenge their fathers’ wrongs on the children of their
tyrants. Such have been the Hussites of Bohemia and the
Calvinists of France, and such, in the ninth century, were the
Paulicians of Armenia and the adjacent provinces. 17 They were
first awakened to the massacre of a governor and bishop, who
exercised the Imperial mandate of converting or destroying the
heretics; and the deepest recesses of Mount Argaeus protected
their independence and revenge. A more dangerous and consuming
flame was kindled by the persecution of Theodora, and the revolt
of Carbeas, a valiant Paulician, who commanded the guards of the
general of the East. His father had been impaled by the Catholic
inquisitors; and religion, or at least nature, might justify his
desertion and revenge. Five thousand of his brethren were united
by the same motives; they renounced the allegiance of
anti-Christian Rome; a Saracen emir introduced Carbeas to the
caliph; and the commander of the faithful extended his sceptre to
the implacable enemy of the Greeks. In the mountains between
Siwas and Trebizond he founded or fortified the city of Tephrice,
18 which is still occupied by a fierce or licentious people, and
the neighboring hills were covered with the Paulician fugitives,
who now reconciled the use of the Bible and the sword. During
more than thirty years, Asia was afflicted by the calamities of
foreign and domestic war; in their hostile inroads, the disciples
of St. Paul were joined with those of Mahomet; and the peaceful
Christians, the aged parent and tender virgin, who were delivered
into barbarous servitude, might justly accuse the intolerant
spirit of their sovereign. So urgent was the mischief, so
intolerable the shame, that even the dissolute Michael, the son
of Theodora, was compelled to march in person against the
Paulicians: he was defeated under the walls of Samosata; and the
Roman emperor fled before the heretics whom his mother had
condemned to the flames. The Saracens fought under the same
banners, but the victory was ascribed to Carbeas; and the captive
generals, with more than a hundred tribunes, were either released
by his avarice, or tortured by his fanaticism. The valor and
ambition of Chrysocheir, 19 his successor, embraced a wider
circle of rapine and revenge. In alliance with his faithful
Moslems, he boldly penetrated into the heart of Asia; the troops
of the frontier and the palace were repeatedly overthrown; the
edicts of persecution were answered by the pillage of Nice and
Nicomedia, of Ancyra and Ephesus; nor could the apostle St. John
protect from violation his city and sepulchre. The cathedral of
Ephesus was turned into a stable for mules and horses; and the
Paulicians vied with the Saracens in their contempt and
abhorrence of images and relics. It is not unpleasing to observe
the triumph of rebellion over the same despotism which had
disdained the prayers of an injured people. The emperor Basil,
the Macedonian, was reduced to sue for peace, to offer a ransom
for the captives, and to request, in the language of moderation
and charity, that Chrysocheir would spare his fellow-Christians,
and content himself with a royal donative of gold and silver and
silk garments. “If the emperor,” replied the insolent fanatic,
“be desirous of peace, let him abdicate the East, and reign
without molestation in the West. If he refuse, the servants of
the Lord will precipitate him from the throne.” The reluctant
Basil suspended the treaty, accepted the defiance, and led his
army into the land of heresy, which he wasted with fire and
sword. The open country of the Paulicians was exposed to the same
calamities which they had inflicted; but when he had explored the
strength of Tephrice, the multitude of the Barbarians, and the
ample magazines of arms and provisions, he desisted with a sigh
from the hopeless siege. On his return to Constantinople, he
labored, by the foundation of convents and churches, to secure
the aid of his celestial patrons, of Michael the archangel and
the prophet Elijah; and it was his daily prayer that he might
live to transpierce, with three arrows, the head of his impious
adversary. Beyond his expectations, the wish was accomplished:
after a successful inroad, Chrysocheir was surprised and slain in
his retreat; and the rebel’s head was triumphantly presented at
the foot of the throne. On the reception of this welcome trophy,
Basil instantly called for his bow, discharged three arrows with
unerring aim, and accepted the applause of the court, who hailed
the victory of the royal archer. With Chrysocheir, the glory of
the Paulicians faded and withered: 20 on the second expedition of
the emperor, the impregnable Tephrice, was deserted by the
heretics, who sued for mercy or escaped to the borders. The city
was ruined, but the spirit of independence survived in the
mountains: the Paulicians defended, above a century, their
religion and liberty, infested the Roman limits, and maintained
their perpetual alliance with the enemies of the empire and the
gospel.

17 (return) [ Petrus Siculus, (p. 763, 764,) the continuator of
Theophanes, (l. iv. c. 4, p. 103, 104,) Cedrenus, (p. 541, 542,
545,) and Zonaras, (tom. ii. l. xvi. p. 156,) describe the revolt
and exploits of Carbeas and his Paulicians.]

18 (return) [ Otter (Voyage en Turquie et en Perse, tom. ii.) is
probably the only Frank who has visited the independent
Barbarians of Tephrice now Divrigni, from whom he fortunately
escaped in the train of a Turkish officer.]

19 (return) [ In the history of Chrysocheir, Genesius (Chron. p.
67-70, edit. Venet.) has exposed the nakedness of the empire.
Constantine Porphyrogenitus (in Vit. Basil. c. 37-43, p. 166-171)
has displayed the glory of his grandfather. Cedrenus (p. 570-573)
is without their passions or their knowledge.]

20 (return) [ How elegant is the Greek tongue, even in the mouth
of Cedrenus!]