The bishops and the dissenters (original) (raw)

Religious Dissent in Late Antiquity, 350-450

Abstract

This chapter discusses the various ways in which bishops and church councils coped with religious diversity, attempting to enforce conformity of beliefs and rituals within Christianity. In their struggle to achieve religious unity, bishops enhanced the notion of religious unity, whether it was meant to exclude the option of other religions or the option of other Christian inclinations. In the relationship between imperial and ecclesiastical powers, there was both collaboration and rivalry. Emperors and bishops had shared interests as well as conflicting ones. The bishops made ample use of the means that the imperial power had at its disposal in disciplining and chastising religious dissidents through coercion, whether they were pagans outside the church or heretics within it. This does not mean that the emperors always fell neatly under the influence of bishops. The different aims frequently led to collisions of interests between the imperial government and the ecclesiastical establ...

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