Christianity And The Middle Ages

Christianity is one of the biggest religions that is still currently practiced today in society. However in the Middle Ages, it was perhaps the biggest religion in the world. So much so that they would go on crusades to either kill their enemies or converting them into Christianity. Ironically, it has been stated that Christians should love and respect everybody, including their enemies. Nonetheless, there has been works that portray Christians as battle-ready warriors and there are other works that tries to explain the understanding and purpose to Christianity. As such, depending on the books and/or poems, there can be many perspectives of Christianity. Even within 500 years from the Early Middle Ages to the Late Middle Ages, the viewpoints

In several ways, Christians and Muslims in the Middle Ages shared in their approach to dealing with the infidels living in their lands, particularly in their proclamation of legal edicts defining the level of toleration and the protection offered those nonbelievers. Yet, however similar the two society's legislative relations were in managing minority faiths, there still existed minor fundamental differences stemming from disparities in their societal structure.

During the Middle Ages, Catholicism played a huge role in supporting feudalism and the people of the feudal society. In the medieval society, the Church had a significant amount of power, allowing it to rebuild the mess of the fall of Rome and continue the society. The Church had gained its power because of the fact that it was the only thing left after the fall of Rome. It became extremely rich and powerful due to people turning to religion to get them through tough times (Havlidis, "The Life of a Villager" 1). Clearly, the Church was superior because it was the center of medieval religious life. From day one of their lives, medieval Christians were always around religion. Children confirmed their faith with the bishop, weddings took place by the Church, and funerals were exhibited there too. In addition, each week, Christians would attend Mass and they went to the Church to confess their sins to the priest (Howarth 37). The Church had significance to Christians in the Middle Ages. Churches were used for many purposes, not just being the center of religion. Most churches were built of stone so for this reason, churches were used as a safe place to store valuables. Another purpose the church served was schooling or providing a hospital where sick people could stay. Parish Priests

Religion was far more important in almost every area of medieval life than it is in most modern societies. The vast majority of people in Europe followed the Christian religion under the authority of the Roman Catholic Church. The church in that era had great wealth, political power and influence over community life, art, architecture and education. With such influence over the beliefs of the people, the church also wielded tremendous political power. The other two religions were Judaism, and Islam.

The boom of Christianity and the formation of Germanic kingdoms brought an end to the ancient world and resurrected the middle Ages. Throughout the Early Middle Ages, Christianity was the dominating religion with Rome being its largest supporter and the Latin language begin to make its way through the mouths of every household. Yet, the middle ages initiated with a deterioration of trade, culture, politics, and education. The Germans struggled adapting to the classical civilization. However, a new civilization was beginning to evolve. It consisted of Christianity, the heritage and culture of Germans, and Ancient Greek and Roman survivals.

Since the beginning of the Roman Empire, religion has always been a big influence in this state. Romans were polytheists believed in many Gods, they had the God of sun, moon, rain, etc… But it was after the third century when Christianity started to form part and get a place in the Roman Empire. Christianity made a huge impact in Rome. Also, followers of this religion suffered from emperor’s thoughts and conclusion about Christianity. Furthermore, the Christians were in persecution for many years; however, after the emperor Constantine with the constantinian dynasty, everything seems to be effective for the Christians. The long years that took the Christian people to achieve the form of their religion were very challenging. Yet, the doctrine taught by Christian professors made the roman people that followed this doctrine behaved in best way.

During the Medieval ages the religion known as christianity was expanded throughout multiple empires. Some of the most important places in the areas would be Rome, and constantinople. The mass conversion began with the fall of the empire of rome. And it consisted of different people and places and changes to the religion itself to make due for the new people involved in the religion. Christianity changed people and places in the name of the conversion.

Christianity is a major religion. It is one of the largest religions in the world. There is more than two billion believers in Christianity. The teaching of this religion is based on the life and teachings of Jesus Christ. The spread of Christianity has lead to a lot of changes throughout the history. The core principles of this religion have become the major pillars of human life in most parts of the world. Christians use the Bible as the main guide of their teachings.

Presently, the notion that literary work resembles the cultural background of the author is evidently available as the image of the Jew was evil during the Elizabethan era. At this point, what is historically known of European Christianity was that most Jews documented where anti-Christ, therefore, deemed as a threat to the social order and were given the stereotypical attributes of the devil. Furthermore, in Elizabethan phraseology, Jews were an undesirable populous in society as they were represented as a disturbance to the natural order for their separate views, while Christianity was the ruling religion from the middle ages to the Renaissance and through to the age of Enlightenment. (Ganyi, 2013, p. 3) Yet, anti-Semitism first began to

The spread of Christianity began in a rural part of Rome. Bishops and popes of Rome began to gain authority, and dealt in politics as well as religion. Since there was no separation of church and state, those in power at the time had a great influence over peoples “decision” in faith. Although there was an obvious bias in religion, people took to Christianity, they were attracted to the idea that there was a real person, with teachings, as opposed to other religious which had more obvious fiction and mythical stories. Rapid spread of Christianity in Europe was also partly due to advance Roman road system, helping the missionaries travel fast. During the Middle Ages missionaries established outpost far from cities, providing refuge for people.

Government and religion are two major institutions of every civilization. Throughout history, they have coexisted, often intertwining at different points. When the two are brought fully together, humanity’s tendency toward corruption can be seen at full effect. For Christianity, the height of this intertwining between government and religion, and the corruption through power that goes with it, occurred in the thirteenth century. The Church was using and abusing its substantial influence, resulting in division and corruption that led to the emergence of reformers like Thomas Aquinas. In the thirteenth century, Christianity was at the height of its political power, but through the crusades, inquisitions, the Second Council of Lyon, and the conflict of scholasticism, the religion as a whole became as divided and corrupt as ever.

The time period lasting from approximately 800-1500 A.D. was known as the Middle Ages. The most important component of the Middle Ages was feudalism, a system of social hierarchy. In the European feudal pyramid, the uppermost ranking was the king, followed by nobles and church officials, knights, and peasants. One’s social ranking determined their place in society as well as their amount of power. The manor system was the economic system associated with feudalism. In the manorial system, a landowner, or lord, would grant a piece of their land to someone in exchange for their service and loyalty. The person who receives the land is known as a vassal. People who worked on the lord’s manor were serfs, people who were forbidden to leave their place of birth. The medieval church played a very important role in feudal society and in the Middle Ages. The Medieval Church unified people among different classes with a similar set of beliefs in the teachings of the church. A few hundred years after the rise of feudalism, it slowly began to decline. A series of events such as the Bubonic Plague, corruption in the Medieval Church and the Crusades took place, which weakened the feudal system. Eventually, the feudal system collapsed. The Middle Ages came to an end because the feudal system, which was the basic structure of medieval society, crumbled.

The spread of Christianity in Western Europe was both similar and different to the spread of Islam. The rise of Islam starts with the Prophet Muhammad, believed by Muslims (followers of Islam) to be the last in a line of prophets that includes Moses and Jesus. Because Muhammad was the chosen one to be the messenger of the word of God, Muslims from all around the world work to follow the example he set. For Muslims after the Qur 'an (their bible), the sayings and teachings of Muhammad and the descriptions of his way of life are the most important Muslim texts. On the other hand, Christianity developed out of Judaism in the 1st century C.E. “It is founded on the life, teachings, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ, and those who follow him are called Christians.” “Christianity has many different branches that accompany a variety of beliefs and practices.” The three major branches of Christianity are Roman Catholicism, Eastern Orthodoxy, and Protestantism, all of which have several smaller categories within each of these branches. Both of these religions share several views and ideas, but they also have their differences.

Throughout the history of Europe, the Middle ages or also known as the Medieval period was considered to be between the 5th and the 15th century. The middle ages began as a result of the falling of the Roman empire and went onto the Renaissance. At the basis of just about every European culture, especially in the western section was Christianity. During the middle ages, Christianity, specifically Catholicism, was the only religion recognized and dominated the lives of people from all social classes from peasants to the nobility. Christianity is a monotheistic religion that bases their followings off of one god and his son, Jesus Christ. Throughout history, the beliefs of who is chosen for the afterlife has changed, however, During the middle ages the people of the church believed that there was no pre-determined faith, and your actions determined your eternal life in heaven, which opposed many other beliefs which allowed the church to gain a large following. The church was a hierarchy not only within the church, but also throughout society. They essentially controlled the government, Imposing taxes to the churches from the people, implementing laws, both religious based, and non-religious, and required people to follow the Christian faith, although most people did regardless due to the opportunity that arose from it, and the fear of what would happen to them if they did

The Roman Catholic Church is undoubtedly the most influential institute of all time. If you ever have ever paid attention to within your own town you may notice that some of the largest buildings are churches. Why is this exactly? It’s the exact influence that I mentioned taking its form. Let’s dig deeper into this by going straight to the where Catholicism took its role as a dominant force, the Middle Ages.