During the sixth century Christian space was very significantly expanded,
thanks above all to centralised missionary policies.5 Emperors began to
receive state visits from barbarian rulers, showering them with gifts and
baptism. In 522 Justin I (518–27) baptised Tzathus, king of Lazica, gave
him a Byzantine bride and declared him his own son. In 527, Justinian
(527–65) baptised Grod, prince of the Bosporan Huns, and Grep, ruler of a
Germanic people, the Heruli, Justinian was also active beyond the empire’s
borders, and his missionary initiatives extended in several directions. Thus,
in Abkhazia many new churches were constructed at a fair distance from the
sea. These churches were clearly intended for the barbarians; they contain
baptisteries suitable for adult baptism. The expensive building materials
and the high quality of the construction-work suggest that the empire was
footing the bill.
Justinian’s aims were purely political, as is clear from the account of the
baptism of the Abkhazians by Procopius of Caesarea. The empire began to
intervene in the internal affairs of this barbarian tribe so as to counter the
influence of Sasanian Persia. This political pressure had a mildly civilising
tinge. From an attempt to persuade the barbarians to renounce their ‘savage’
rituals it was but a short step to full-scale Christianisation. This in turn led
to the overthrow of the authorities associated with the pagan religion and
fromthere it was another small step to attempted colonisation. Such a policy
could also have unforeseen consequences: the repudiation of Christianity
because of its association with imperial expansionism.6
The Caucasian Tzani also became the targets of a state mission.7 The
principal agent of the dual policy here – combining threats and Christian
proselytism, church building and deforestation – was the Byzantine commander
Sittas. Where Byzantium had no direct political interest, it likewise
had no active interest in missions. The sincerity of the conversion was of
no concern. According to Procopius, Justinian:
persuaded all [theHeruli] to become Christians. Thus, having exchanged their way
of life for one more mild, they resolved in all things to adopt Christian customs
and on the basis of a treaty of alliance to cooperate with the Romaioi (Romans).
Yet among themselves they are fickle, and adept at doing harm to their neighbours.
And they engage in indecent intercourse even with donkeys. They are the most
disgusting of all peoples.8
For the Byzantines, barbarian ‘mildness’ and ‘Christianity’ meant only one
thing: forbearance from attacking the empire.
We should not imagine, however, that every mission in this period was
accomplished by armed force or with narrowly political aims. Missionary
activity in Abyssinia was different. Unfortunately, Greek authors say not a
word about it, and we shall encounter such silences again, many times. Yet
the local Ethiopian sources are far from reticent. They tell us that a group
of monks from Byzantium settled in the region of modern Akale Guzay.
These ‘righteous men from Baraknakh’ were murdered by locals during a
pagan uprising, and thereby became the first Abyssinian martyrs. Another
group of seven or nine ‘Roman saints’ arrived in Axum and yet another
missionary wasMichael Aragawi, whose Ethiopian Life reveals a few details
of his preaching.9 Although the chronological indicators in the ‘Roman
saints’ file are contradictory, scholars usually date them to the late fifth and
early sixth centuries.
Around the end of the 530s the southern Arabian state of Yemen broke
free of Ethiopian patronage and established close links with Byzantium. A
sign of the strengthening of Yemen’s religious contacts with the Byzantines
was the construction of a large church in Sanaa, built in red, yellowand black
marble and adorned with mosaics in the Constantinopolitan manner.10 It
is not clear exactly when or by whom the Byzantines were asked to send a
teacher of Christianity for the re-Christianised country; it may have been
the occupying Ethiopian authorities or, more logically, the local inhabitants
themselves. We have only one text, and a dubious one at that: the Life of
Gregentius, bishop of theHomerites (Himyarites). In the story ofByzantine
missions, Gregentius is as significant as he is mysterious. No reliable data
about him has survived. His extant Life is late and most likely fictitious.11
Appended to it is a text known as the Laws of the Himyarites which, even if
it is not an authentic piece of legislation, remains an example of Byzantine
missionary thinking, albeit abstract and from a later period. The striking
feature of the Laws is that their rules for the newly converted Arabs are much
stricter than the rules in force in the Christian empire itself (see also above,
pp. 186–7). The Laws turn practically every civil offence into a criminal
one, and virtually all private law becomes public law. The Romans themselves
would never have dreamed of abiding by such ferocious requirements.
12 Overall, the Laws of the Himyarites represent a totalitarian missionary
utopia. As for the Arab tribes immediately bordering Byzantium to
the east, conversions of pagan bedouin to orthodox Christianity were rare.
Here, as so often, the empire was more preoccupied with averting heresy
than with making Christian converts.13
Travelling up theNile, Justinian’s emissaries reached a multi-confessional
sanctuary on the island of Philae, at the outer limits of the imperial possessions.
The temple was converted into a church of St Stephen. The first
extant inscription left by a native is dated as early as 537: ‘I, Theodosius
the Nubian’.14 The history of the mission to Sudan is much better known
than any other, because it involved the rivalry between Justinian and his
wife Theodora, patrons of Chalcedonism and monophysitism respectively.
The main source – virtually our only source – is John of Ephesus, himself
a monophysite. In John’s account, the idea of a mission to Sudan was conceived
in the circle of the monophysite patriarch of Alexandria, who lived
in exile in Constantinople under the patronage of Theodora. Theodora
turned to her husband for support, but he had his own plans to dispatch a
Chalcedonian embassy to Sudan from Egypt. John’s subsequent narrative
unfolds like a thriller. The imperial couple sent two missions, racing each
other, but Theodora’s cunning ensured that her own mission, headed by
Julian, arrived first:
[Julian] handed over the empress’ letters . . . And [the Nubians] also received magnificent
gifts, many baptismal garments and all in abundance. And they immediately
. . . believed in the Christian God . . . Then he taught them . . . and also
intimated to them the following: ‘Be forewarned that among Christians there are
disputes concerning the faith . . . for this reason the empress has sent us to you.’15
Julian then explained to the Nubians how they should respond to the
emperor’s mission. On arrival, Justinian’s envoy immediately handed over
the emperor’s letter and gifts to the Nubians, and then his missionaries
‘began to teach them as they had been ordered, and they said, “Our Roman
emperor has instructed us to propose that, if you become Christians, you
should join the church and those who adhere to it, and not those who have
been cast out.”’16 However, according to John of Ephesus, the barbarians
firmly rebuffed him. The intrigue here revolved less around conversion than
around the rivalry between monophysitism and Chalcedonism. Yet after
the expulsion of Justinian’s embassy, Julian stayed in Sudan for two more
years, showing great zeal and instructing the barbarians in Christianity
daily: from nine in the morning until four in the afternoon he would
conduct his lessons naked, sitting up to his neck in water in a cave, because
of the unbearable heat: ‘Yet he endured this, and instructed and baptised
the king, his magnates, and many people with them.’17
The initial baptism of Sudan took place between 537 and 539, whereupon
Julian returned to Byzantium. In 565 Theodosius, Patriarch of Alexandria,
had his prot´eg´e Longinus ordained as the new bishop of Nubia. Longinus
was immediately arrested by Justinian and imprisoned for three years;
but eventually he managed to escape to Sudan, where he spent some six
years. According to John of Ephesus, Longinus ‘taught, enlightened and
instructed them anew, and he built a church there, and appointed clergy,
and taught them the entire order of the services and all the rules of Christianity.’
18 It would appear that Longinus’ major achievement was the training
of local clergy. This enabled the new religion to put down roots in Sudan,
where it survived for many centuries.19
The fashion for the new religion spread further still, and Longinus was
invited to a tribe further south, the Alodians. It is curious, however, that
John of Ephesus says nothing about any mission to the Makurrah, though
their land lay between Sudan and Alodia. Only the Latin chronicle of John
of Biclaro mentions the conversion of theMakurrah, which he dates to the
year 569;20 we can surmise that they were converted by the Chalcedonian
patriarch of Alexandria, with the aim of annoying his monophysite rivals. In
the ruins ofDongola, capital ofMakurria, the remains of several ‘Byzantine’
churches have been identified. We do not know how long the Makurrah
remained Chalcedonian. At some time in the late sixth or early seventh
century they joined up with Sudan and accepted monophysitism.NoGreek
source contains even a single word about this rich and dramatic story
of the Byzantine mission to the middle Nile: again we come up against
silence.
Justinian’s successors could be as ambitious as he was. According to
John of Biclaro the Garamantes, Berbers living in the Libyan desert, were
baptised under Justin II (565–78),21 while Maurice (582–602) is associated
with an attempt to Christianise Byzantium’s great eastern rival, Persia.
Christianity had been known in Persia from a very early period. After
Christianity became the Roman empire’s state religion, any deterioration
in the relations between the two superpowers would lead to persecution of
Persian Christians. As divisions within Christianity deepened, the Persian
authorities began to encourage Nestorianism, and this gradually expanded
to become the second religion of Iran (see above, p. 144). The Persian
ruler Hormizd IV (579–90) was notably tolerant of all Christians in Persia,
including Chalcedonians, and this gave rise to a legend about the Persians’
own conversion.22 This legend, preserved only in Latin tradition, probably
reflects hopes generated in the empire by developments in Persia.
In 590 the shah was deposed and his son, Khusro II (590, 591–628),
fled to Byzantium. The prince regained the throne with the aid of troops
provided by Maurice. According to the Shahnama (Book of kings), in this
new spirit of friendship the emperor sent Khusro ‘a cross ornamented with
jewels’ and garments embroidered with crosses.23 During this period, the
Chalcedonians were in favour. Here too, we learn of Byzantine activities
from all kinds of sources, but with one conspicuous exception – the
Byzantines themselves. Why does Theophylact Simocatta, who recounts
Maurice’s dealings with the Persians in great detail, not say a word about
his Christianising activities?However, these achievements were short-lived:
in 602, as soon as Maurice was murdered, Khusro launched an attack on
Byzantium, and ‘from the Euphrates to the east, the memory of the Council
of Chalcedon was obliterated utterly’.24
The sixth century was an age of grandiose missionary undertakings, but
there were also smaller-scale ones. The ‘Legend of seven bishops of Cherson’,
for example, reflects local hagiographical tradition.One version of this
legend, which probably originated in the sixth century, includes a certain
Ephraim among the Christian missionaries in Cherson. According to this
variant, Ephraim had been sent to convert ‘the land of the Tauroscythians
which borders on Cherson’. It is noteworthy that in later centuries this
mythical Ephraim was recast as having converted a number of barbaric
tribes: Turks, Huns and Hungarians.25
The sixth century was also the age of the parting of ways between
Chalcedonian and ‘heretical’ Christianity (see above, pp. 116–18, 212–13).
The subsequent large-scale missions of the Nestorian and monophysite
churches, involving conversions in Central Asia and China, had nothing
to do with Byzantium. Henceforth only a ‘heretic’ could allow himself an
elevated, ‘pan-Christian’ attitude towards missions. One such champion of
unalloyed apostolic evangelism was the sixth-century Alexandrian traveller
Cosmas Indicopleustes. In his Christian topography, Cosmas presents a kind
of bird’s eye view of world-wide evangelisation.26 This sense of universality
was all but lost by the imperial church.
World History
