THE MUZARABES.
The death of Eulogius was a signal for the cessation of the dubious martyrdoms which had for some years become so common, though the spirit, which prompted the self-deluded victims, was by no means stifled either in Spain or the adjoining countries.[1] Yet the measures taken to put down the mania for death succeeded in preventing any fresh outbreak for some time.
Under the weak government of Abdallah (888-912) the Christians, determining to lose their lives to better purpose than at the hands of the executioner, rose in revolt, as will be related hereafter, in several parts of Spain. After the battle of Aguilar, or Polei, in 891, between the Arab and Spanish factions, 1000 of the defeated Christians were given the choice of Islam or death, and all, save one, chose the latter alternative.[2]
During the long reign of Abdurrahman III. (912-961) there were a few isolated cases of martyrdom, which may as well be mentioned now. After the great battle in the Vale of Rushes,[3] where Abdurrahman defeated the kings of Navarre and Leon, one of the two fighting bishops, who were taken prisoners on that occasion, gave, as a hostage for his own release, a youth of fourteen, named Pelagius. The king, it is said, smitten with his beauty, wished to work his abominable will upon the boy, but his advances being rejected with disdain, the unhappy youth was put to death with great barbarity, refusing to save his life by apostasy.[4] A different version of the story is given by a Saxon nun of Gaudersheim, named Hroswitha, who wrote a poem on the subject fifty years later. She tells us that the king tried to kiss Pelagius, who thereupon struck him in the face, and was in consequence put to death by decapitation (June 26, 925).[5]
[1] See "Life of Argentea," secs. 3, 5.
[2] Dozy, ii. 287.
[3] Val du Junqueras, 920 A.D.
[4] Johannes Vasaeus ex Commentariis Resendi. Romey, iv. 257, disbelieves this version of the story. Perhaps Al Makk., ii. 154, is referring to the same Pelagius when he mentions the king's liking for a handsome Christian page.
[5] Sampiro, secs. 26-28.
In the death of Argentea (Ap. 28, 931) we have the last instance in Spain of a Christian seeking martyrdom. She was the daughter of the great rebel Omar ibn Hafsun,[1] and his wife Columba, and was born at that chieftain's stronghold of Bobastro. Upon her mother's death Omar wished her to take up her mother's duties in the palace, for Omar had become a sort of king on his own domain. She declined, asking only for a quiet retreat, where she might prepare her soul for martyrdom; and she wrote to a devout Christian, whose wishes inclined him in the same direction, suggesting that they should seek the crown of martyrdom together.[2] On the destruction of Bobastro by Abdurrahman in 928, she went to Cordova.[3] She there met with a Gaul named Vulfura, who had been warned in a dream that in that city he should find a virgin, with whom he was to suffer martyrdom. However, his object becoming known, Vulfura is cast into prison by the governor of the city. Argentea goes to visit him there, and is stopped by the guards, who, finding she is a Christian, take her before the judge as a renegade, and she is imprisoned with Vulfura. The alternative of Islam instead of death being refused, they are both executed, but Argentea, as being an "insolens rebellis," is first scourged with 1000 stripes, and her tongue cut out. Her body was buried at the church of the three saints.
In the year 934[4] we hear of two hundred monks of Cardena being massacred by the Berbers in Abdurrahman's army; and in some sense they can be regarded as martyrs to their faith.
[1] Who on becoming a Christian, took the name of Samuel. Florez, x. p. 564, ff.
[2] See "Life of Argentea," by an anonymous author.
[3] Ibid., sec. 4.
[4] Dozy, iii. 52. Mariana, viii. 6, gives 993, but says it may have occurred in 893.
In 953 a martyr named Eugenia is said to have perished;[1] and thirty years later, the last martyrs of whom we have any record under the Arab rule. Dominicus Sarracinus, son of John, and his companions taken prisoners at the capture of Simancas, were kept for two years and a-half in prison.[2] They were then brought out and put to death, just when Ramiro III., or his successor, had sent to ransom them.[3]
There is no evidence whatever to show that there was a persecution of the Christians under the great Abdurrahman, and the statements of those writers who intimate the contrary may be set aside as unsupported by evidence.[4]
We will now turn back and take a general view of the Christian Church and its condition under the Arabs in Spain, especially—for our information is greatest as to those periods—under the two kings Abdurrahman II. and III.
Under the former of these sovereigns the condition of the Christians, until the persecution, which they themselves provoked, began, was very tolerable, and the majority of the Christians were quite content with their lot. They served in the army, both free men and slaves; they held lucrative posts at Court, or in the houses of the Arab nobles, or as government officials. But though the lay community was well off, the clergy and stricter churchmen had something to complain of; for the Church[5] could not be said to be free, though the worship was, since the power of summoning councils had now passed to the Arab executive, who, as we have seen, made even Moslems and Jews sit at these councils. Sees were also put up to auction, and the scandalous spectacle was not unknown, of atheists and heretics holding the titles, and drawing the emoluments, of bishops.[6]
[1] Schott., iv. 246.
[2] Rohrbacher, xii. 192.
[3] Charter, apud Florez, xiv. 397.
[4] See above, p. 36, note 1. A letter also is mentioned of John Servus Dei, Bishop of Toledo, to the Muzarabes with regard to the late martyrdoms and apostasies, purporting to have been written in 937.
[5] Dozy, ii. 47.
[6] Alvar, "Ep.," xiii. 3. Samson, "Apol.," ii. cc. ii.-iv.
As was to be expected, Arabic soon began to displace Latin throughout the country, and even before the ninth century the Scriptures were translated into the tongue of the conquerors [1] by Odoarius, Bishop of Accita, and John of Seville. Hischem I. (788-796) forbade the use of any language but Arabic, so that his Christian subjects had to use Arabic Gospels;[2] and the Spaniards were soon not even permitted to write in Latin.[3] Even if this statement be doubtful, we know that Latin came gradually to be neglected and forgotten. Alvar utters an eloquent protest against this: "Alas, the Christians are ignorant of their own tongue, and Latins neglect their language, so that in all the College of Christ[4] there is scarcely to be found one who can write an address of welcome to his brother intelligibly in Latin, while numbers can be found competent to mouth the flowery rhetoric of the Chaldeans."[5] In the department of poetry—the peculiar boast of the Arabs—the Christians seem even to have surpassed their masters; and to the rivalry of the two nations in this art we may attribute the excellence and abundance of native ballads of which Spain can boast.
We have seen how Eulogius did his best to check this neglect of Latin, by introducing into Spain some of the masterpieces in that language; but it is doubtful whether his efforts had much result. We can see from the remains of the Spanish writers which we possess that the structure of that language had considerably degenerated in Spain.[6]
[1] Murphy, "Hist. Mahom. Empire in Spain," p. 309.
[2] Yonge, p. 60.
[3] Conde, i. 239.
[4] "Omni Christi collegio."
[5] Alvar, "Ind. Lum.," sec. 35.
[6] See Elipandus and Alvar passim. Alcuin, on the other hand, writes wonderfully good Latin.
Some sentences are so ungrammatical as to be scarcely intelligible. Moreover, we find Samson[1] directly accusing Hostegesis, Bishop of Malaga, of not being able to write Latin; and similarly Jonas of Orleans (839) accusing Claudius, Bishop of Turin, who was himself a Spaniard, of the same defect.
The neglect of Latin was accompanied by an increasing indifference to the doctrinal basis of Christianity, educated Christians being led to devote their time, which might have been more profitably spent on their own Scriptures, to becoming acquainted with the Mohammedan religion, and even to unravelling the intricacies of the controversial theology which had grown up round, and overlaid, the original simplicity of the Koran.[2] The great Fathers of the Church were laid aside unread, and even the Prophets and Apostles, and the Gospel itself, found few to study them. While the higher classes were indifferent to religion, the lower were sunk in poverty[3] and ignorance.[4] The inevitable result of this indifference, ignorance, and poverty, was a visible deterioration in the character of Spanish Christianity, of which there are only too many proofs.
[1] Samson, "Apol.," c. vii.
[2] Alvar, "Ind. Lum.," sec. 35—"Ac dum illorum sacramenta inquirimus, et philosophorum sectas scire non pro ipsorum convincendis erroribus sed pro elegantia leporis et locutione luculenter diserta. Quis rogo hodie solers in nostris fidelibus laicis invenitur, qui Scripturis sanctis intentus volumina quorumcunque Doctorum Latine conscripta respiciat? Quis Evangelico, quis Prophetico, quis Apostolico ustus tenetur amore? Nonne omnes iuvenes Christiani vultu decori, linguae diserti, habitu gestuque conspicui, Gentilicia eruditione praeclari, Arabico eloquio sublimati, volumina Chaldaeorum avidissime tractunt?"
[3] Florez, xix. 383, Charter of 993; see also "Dozy," iii. 31; and for the condition of Christians in the Free States, Buckle, "Hist. of Civiliz.," i. 443.
[4] Dozy (l.l.).
We find the abbot Samson distinctly accusing Hostegesis, Bishop of Malaga, of simony, asserting that he sold the priesthood to low and unworthy people;[1] while Alvar charges Saul, Bishop of Cordova, with obtaining his bishopric by bribery.[2] Other irregularities imputed to Hostegesis were that he held his see from his twentieth year, contrary to the canons of the church, and that he beat priests, in order to extort money from them, till they died under his hands.
Besides the election to the priesthood, by unworthy means, of unworthy men, whose ignorance and impudence the congregation had to endure in silence,[3] many were informally ordained without vouchers for character being given, or the assent of their fellow-clergy and flocks being obtained.[4] Many churches presented the unseemly spectacle of two rival pastors, contrary to the ordinances received from the Fathers.[5]
Changes, too, were made in doctrine and ritual, for which no authority could be alleged, in contravention of established custom and the teaching of the Church. So far was this carried that Samson was accused by his opponents of being a heretic and an idolator because he permitted the marriage of cousins; dissented from the view that God was ever enclosed in the chambers of the Virgin's heart;[6] asserted the omnipresence of God, even in idols and the Devil, and this in an actual, not a metaphysical, sense;[7] and denied that God sat upon an exalted throne above his creatures. From this it is clear that Hostegesis and those who thought with him[8] were infected with the anthropomorphite heresy.
[1] Samson, "Apol.," Bk. ii., Pref. sec. 2.
[2] See "Letter to Saul," sec. 3—"Poterant enim quovis asserente canonice incohationis vestrae primordia comprobari, si quadringenti solidi non fuissent palam eunuchis vel aliis exsoluti." Dozy, ii. 140, adds that the money was guaranteed on the episcopal revenues, but this is a conjecture.
[3] Samson, "Apol.," ii. Pref. sec 5; Dozy, ii. 268.
[4] Alvar ad Saulum, sec. 3—"Sine testimonis, sine connibentia clericorum."
[5] Ibid.
[6] Samson, "Apol.," ii. Pref. sec. 7 and iii.—"Cubiculum cordis Virginei." This appears to be a quotation from the Gothic liturgy.
[7] "Per substantiam, non per subtilitatem."—Ibid.
[8] Romanus and Sebastianus, Samson, Pref, sec. 6.
Not only did many of the clergy hold heretical views, but their depravity was notorious. Hostegesis did not blush to spend the produce of the church tithes and offerings, which he had with difficulty extorted from his flock,[1] in bribing the court officials and the king's sons, giving them feasts at which open and flagrant vice was indulged in.[2] The clergy were not above pretending illness in order to avoid paying the monthly tax to their Moslem rulers.[3] Some, even in the highest positions in the Church, denied their Saviour and apostatized to the Moslems; one of these renegades being Samuel, Bishop of Elvira, the uncle of Hostegesis' mother, who, with a pervert's zeal, persecuted the Church he had deserted, imprisoning the clergy, taxing his former flock, and even forcing some to embrace Islam.[4]
It is not surprising, therefore, that bishops and clergy were sometimes deposed. Samson, indeed, underwent this disgrace at the hands of a hostile faction under Hostegesis, on the ground of his pretended heresy; and, similarly, Valentius,[5] Bishop of Cordova, was deprived of his see because he was a supporter of Samson. But these instances reflect more discredit on the deposers than on their victims. Instances of deposition are not wanting, in the free states the North. Sisenandus, seventh Bishop of Compostella (940), was deposed by King Sancho for dissolute living, and malversation of Church moneys.[6] On the king's death he recovered his see, driving out his successor. Pelayo, another bishop of Compostella, suffered the same punishment.[7]
[1] The offering of one-third for the Church was refused to Hostegesis as being sacrilegious; so he proceeded to extort it, "suis codicibus institutis."—Samson "Apol.," ii. Pref. sec. 2
[2] Ibid. The state of the Church in the North was not much better. See Yonge, p. 86.
[3] Leovigild de habitu Clericorum. Dozy, ii. 110.
[4] Samson, Pref. ii. 4.
[5] Succeeded Saul in 861, and was deposed in 864.
[6] Mariana, viii. 5. He went over to the Moslems. Southey, "Chronicle of the Cid," p. 228. Yonge, p. 86.
[7] Mariana (1.1.).
When the kings of Castile gradually drove back the Moors, and when Alfonso took Toledo in 1085, his wife, Constance of Burgundy, and her spiritual adviser, a monk named Bernard, were horrified at the laxity in morals and doctrine of the Muzarabic Christians. Their addiction to poetry and natural science was regarded with suspicious aversion, and the pork-eating, circumcision, and, not least, the cleanly habits,[1] contracted from an intercourse with Moslems, were looked upon as so many marks of the beast. In 1209 the Crusaders, who had swarmed to the wars in Spain, even wished to turn their pious arms against these poor Muzarabes, so scandalised were they at the un-Romish rites. Yet we are told that Alfonso the Great, when building and restoring churches in the territory newly wrested from the Moors, set up again the ordinances of the Goths, as formerly observed at Toledo.[2]
The free church in the North had itself been in great danger of extinction, when the armies of the great Almanzer (977-1002) swept yearly through the Christian kingdoms like some devastating tempest.[3] Fifty-two victorious campaigns did that irresistible warrior lead against the infidels.[4] Barcelona, Pampluna, and Leon fell before his arms, and the sacred city of Compostella was sacked, and for a time left desolate, the bells of St James' shrine being carried off to Cordova to serve as lamps in the grand mosque. We are not, therefore, surprised to find that there were many bishops in the North who had lost their sees; and this was the case even before the tenth century, for a bishop named Sabaricus, being driven from his own see by the Arabs, was given that of Mindumetum by Alfonso III. in 867,[5] and twenty years later a bishop named Sebastian received the see of Auria in the same way.[6]
It is natural enough that the Moslems and the clergy of the Christian Church should be hostile to one another, but it is surprising to find—as we do find in some cases—the latter making common cause with the Arabs in ill-treating their fellow-countrymen and coreligionists. Thus, as we have seen, Hostegesis, relying on the support of the secular arm,[7] beat and imprisoned the clergy for withholding from him the Church tithes, dragging them through the city naked, with a crier crying before them:—"Such is the punishment of those who will not pay their tithes to their bishop."[8] Bishops were even found to make episcopal visitations, getting the names of all their flock, as if with the intention of praying for them individually, and then to hand in their names to the civil power for the purpose of taxation.[9] Others obtained from the Arabs the privilege of farming the revenues derived from Christian taxation, and cruelly oppressed their coreligionists.[10]
[1] The Christians in the North were vulgarly supposed by the Arabs not to wash. See Conde, i. 203—"It is related of these people of Galicia ... that they live like savages or wild beasts, and never wash either their persons or their garments."
[2] "Chron. Albeld.," sec. 58—"Ordinem Gothorum sicuti Toleto fuerat statuit."
[3] "Chron. Silense," sec. 72—"Eadem tempestate in Hispania omnis divinus cultus periit."
[4] He was not defeated in his last battle, as is generally stated in histories.—See Al Makkari, ii. 197.
[5] Florez, "Esp. Sagr.," xviii. 312.
[6] Ibid., xvii. 244.
[7] "Praesidali manu fultus." Samson, ii. Pref. sec. 2.
[8] Ibid.
[9] Ibid., and Eulog., "Mem. Sanct.," iii. c. iv. sec. 5.
[10] Eul., 1.1.
These nefarious measures were backed up, even if they were not instigated, by Servandus, the Christian Count of Cordova. He was the son of a serf of the Church,[1] and married a cousin of Hostegesis.[2] Instead of championing the cause of the Christians, as his position should have impelled him to do, he went so far in the opposite direction as to call them up before him, and try to shake their attachment to Christianity—a religion, nominally at least, his own also. Those who held firm he forced to pay increased taxes, and even levied blackmail on the churches. He did not scruple to drag forth the bodies of martyrs from under the altars of churches, and, showing them to the king, to remind him that it had been forbidden to Christians to bury their martyrs.[3]
Following up the hostile measures instituted by Hostegesis against Samson and Valentius, he proceeded to accuse them of inciting the fanatics to revile Mohammed, urging that they should be tested with this dilemma. They should be asked whether what the revilers said were true or not. "If they answer, 'true,' let them be punished as well as the reviler; if 'false,' bid them slay the man themselves; refusing which, you will know that they have aided and abetted him to abuse your Prophet. In that case, give me permission, and I will slay the three myself."[4]
[1] Dozy, ii. 268.
[2] Samson, "Apol.," ii. Pref. sec. 5.
[3] Samson, 1.1.
[4] Ibid., sec. 9. This same Servandus, the meanest of timeservers, seeing the Sultan's (Abdallah's) cause failing, deserted to the rebel Omar and his Christian following, and was killed at Polei(?)—Ibn Hayyan., apud Dozy, ii. 270. His Arab name was Sherbil, and he was beheaded at Cordova by the Arabs.—See De Gayangos' note on Al Mak., ii. 451, 2.
We have had occasion to mention one or two cases of Church, and national, Councils held in Spain under the Arabs, and it will be worth while to enumerate all the instances which are recorded, that we may contrast them with those held under the Goths. It was one of the most characteristic features of the Old Church in Spain that it was united so closely with the civil power as almost to render the Government of Spain a theocracy. This intimate connection of Church and State was naturally overthrown by the Arab conquest; but the Moslem rulers, seeing how useful such institutions as general councils were likely to be in adjusting the relations between Mussulmans and Christians, both allowed purely ecclesiastical councils to be called under their jurisdiction, and also summoned others in which they took part themselves, together with Jews, to the great scandal of the stricter Christians.[1]
To the purely ecclesiastical kind belong a council held at Seville by Elipandus[2] to condemn the errors of Migetius; and another, held by Cixila at Toledo in 776, against the errors of Egila, bishop of Elvira.[3] Whether Egila abjured his error is not known, but it is certain that he remained bishop.
Elipandus is also said, but on very doubtful authority, to have held a council, whereat he renounced his own error of Adoptionism.[4]
[1] We even find in 962 that the bishops of Toledo and Cordova had Moslem names, viz., Obeidollah ibn Kasim (Al Makkari, ii. 162), and Akbar ibn Abdallah. Dozy, iii. 99.
[2] The exact date is unknown. Fleury, ii. p. 235.
[3] "Pseudo Luitprand," sec. 236, says—"Ad concilium ex omnibus Hispaniae partibus concurrunt." See also Pope Adrian I.'s Letter to the bishops of Spain in 785. Very little is known of this Egila, nor is it certain of what see he was the bishop.
[4] See below, p. 131 ad fin. and 166 ff.
But the other class of councils, partly ecclesiastical and partly political, seem to have been commoner, and we have already seen how Reccafredus, Bishop of Seville, in conjunction with the Moslem authorities, held such a council, in order to coerce the fanatical party among the Christians; and we have a more particular account of another, which was held by Hostegesis, Bishop of Malaga, and Servandus, Count of Cordova.[1] This council seems to have had some connection with the preceding one under Reccafredus, for Servandus was a strong and unscrupulous opponent of the party led by Eulogius, while Samson was their devoted supporter, though he did not carry his opinions so far as to suffer martyrdom in his own person. Samson was now accused of heresy[2] and sacrilege, as has been already mentioned. Hostegesis forced his views on the assembled bishops by the help of the secular arm, and a sentence of anathema and deposition was accordingly pronounced against the unfortunate Abbot.[3] One of the apparently consenting bishops was Valentius, Bishop of Cordova, but his judgement had evidently been coerced, for after the close of the council he sounded the other consenting bishops, and some who had not attended, as to their opinions, and found that most of them were ready to affirm Samson's orthodoxy, and a memorial was drawn up to that effect This action of Valentius' brought upon him also a sentence of deposition, and he was succeeded by Stephanus Flaccus,[4]—the election of the latter being quite informal, as no metropolitan assisted thereat,[5] and neither the clergy nor laymen of his diocese made a petition in his favour.
[1] Samson, "Apol.," ii. Pref.
[2] On the ground, among others, that he recognised "nescio quam similitudines (besides the Trinity) non creaturas sed creatores." These appear (chap, ix.) to have been merely qualities, such as wisdom, etc. See Samson, chap. iii.
[3] "Indiscreta simplicitate et metu impiorum in superbiae fascibus sedentium."—Ibid. Samson was rendered incapable of holding office, or even of belonging to the Church.—Ibid.
[4] In 864.
[5] See above, p. 8.
This fresh deposition was formally sanctioned by a new council, held at the church of St Acislus; Flaccus, and some of those who had sided with Valentius, but were now terrified into submission, being in attendance; while the places of those who refused to come were taken by Jews and Moslems.[1] These high-handed proceedings nearly led to an open rupture in the Church.[2]
In 914 a council is said to have been held (but on doubtful authority) by Orontius of Toledo,[3] and twenty years later by Basilius of Cordova. These would fall under the reign of the greatest of the Umeyyade Khalifs of Spain.[4]
[1] Sayones (?) in the Latin. Samson, chap. iii.
[2] Ibid., sec. 10.
[3] "Pseudo Luit," sec. 328.
[4] Ibid. sec. 341.