Author: Abu Raef
secularism (8th part)
Political uprising of the church:
Another area where the church turned to rebellion was the political fields. It is natural for scholars and religious people to have political control over the nation they believe in, but it isn’t even possible to imagine that people who are believers and religious. They are according to the divine law and its establishment; they shouldn’t have any influence and role in the affairs of the country and its politics.
But what will never be correct is that the men of religion become tyrants and distortionary politicians who discard the divine law and don’t consider it as anything, and instead, the unbridled lust for domination over others and the endless desire for tyranny.
There is no doubt that the main goal of the church was to correct and accurate the deviations of kings to determine the pressure on them when they violated divine orders and religious teachings, and it should never have shied away from this duty, but the fact that the church itself in the field of distortion and Change of religion takes a role and then puts himself above and the spiritual leader of kings and princes and forces them to bow before him, and the measure of their goodness depends on the amount of service they do for the church and not on the amount of observance of divine limits and adherence to them. , this will be a very bad and scandalous issue.
The kings of Europe were tired of the interference of the church in all matters, especially political matters. They didn’t find any reason for this intervention, even from the eyes of the kings of Europe, the men of the church and believers had no superiority over them except the “holiness” they claimed. “Herbert Fisher” European historian and author of the book “History of Europe” writes: “The ruling families in Europe extended their survival from the association they had with one of the saints. They inherited their sanctity from this path, and after that, ordinary people didn’t criticize them for their actions; Because they were holy.”
European kings made countless attempts to free themselves from the domination of the church, but they never succeeded, “Edward I”, King of England and “Philip IV” known as “Philip the Fair” of France declared that in order to reach heaven The king doesn’t have to strain against the pope.
They tried to prevent the church from overseeing the affairs of the state and the kingdom, but they failed in this task; Because the church believed that the obedience of the kings from the church is not recommended, but obligatory, and this is a requirement of the religious centrality of the church and its spiritual dominance.
The same issue was expressed by Pope “Nicola I” as follows: “Indeed, the son of God (Naouzballah) created the church; In such a way that he made the “Apostle of Peter” its first head and the bishops of Rome have inherited this dominion of Peter from generation to generation, for this reason, the Pope is the representative of God on earth, and it is necessary that the high leadership and great kingship over all Christians from him. It is him, whether those Christians are rulers or condemned.
The rebellious Pope, “Gregory VII”, had declared that the Church, because it is a divine system, deserves to have universal dominion, and that one of the rights and duties of the Pope, as God’s successor on earth, is to depose unrighteous kings and approve or reject the election of rulers and their titles by the people.
With these claims, they had dominion over the kings and even mocked them and accused them of all kinds of crimes and deception. The church always had spiritual authority and determined systems and absolute tyranny in the Middle Ages, and the popes were the only ones who crowned princes and kings and deposed corrupt and disobedient kings, and no one had the ability to disobey their orders, and everyone He rebelled, it was permissible for the popes to declare a crusade against him and to embargo him and his nation.
Countless stories have been told of the king’s opposition to the pope and then his boycott and rejection by the church and the king’s taking all kinds of hardships. In Britain, there was a conflict between King Henry II and Thomas Becket, the head of the Bishops of Canterbury.
The reason for this was the order that the king issued to cancel the immunities enjoyed by religious leaders. Then the archbishop was assassinated, and the Christians were greatly alarmed by this, and they took their revenge on Henry, and excommunicated him from everything.
As a result, the king secluded himself in his cell for three days and didn’t eat any food. Then he ordered the arrest of the murderers and exempted the Pope from the fine and promised to perform the expiation of his sins in any way the Pope wants. He also canceled his previous order and returned all the rights and properties of the church to it, but despite all these works, he still couldn’t get the forgiveness of the church, until he came to Canterbury on foot and for pilgrimage and made the last three wishes.
He walked a path on flint stones with bare feet and while blood was flowing from them. Then he lay on his stomach in front of his enemy’s grave and asked the monks to beat him with whips. He suffered their blows and took all these insults in order to gain the approval of the Pope and his followers.
But the greatest king who fought against the dominance of the church and resisted it for a long time was “Frederich II”. The main reason for his strength was the influence of Islamic culture and thought on his personality. He spoke Arabic well and was influenced by Islamic civilization, in such a way that the church accused him of converting to Islam and called him “the great heretic”. But today’s writers have considered him “the wonder of the world” and some have considered him “the first of the modernists”.
He rejected the invasion of the eastern territories issued by the Church, thereby defying the orders of the Church, and for the first time tried to create a separation between the Church and the secular rulers who were thinking.
This type of political rebellion of the church against the European countries and the kings of those lands opened up the space for the expansion of secularism and the separation of religion from politics day by day.
