The English Church in the Middle Ages

by William Hunt

Literary greatness of Northumbria, 664-782.
Cædmon, d. 680.
Æddi [Eddius], fl. 710.
Bæda, 673-735.

From the time of its conversion by Aidan to its devastation by the Scandinavian pirates, Northumbria excelled the rest of England in arts and literature. Another volume of this series will deal with the famous monasteries of Lindisfarne, Jarrow, Wearmouth, Whitby, and York, with their scholar-monks, and with the splendours of Roman and Gallic art with which their churches were enriched. While Celtic culture was on the point of yielding to Roman influence, Cædmon, the herdsman, the first of our sacred poets, began to sing at Whitby. His story illustrates the love of the English for music; and this national characteristic caused the introduction of the Roman system of chanting to hold an important place in the process of bringing the Church into conformity with Rome. This part of the work of James the deacon was carried on by Æddi, a choirmaster of Canterbury, whom Wilfrith invited into Northumbria. Æddi became the bishop’s companion, and wrote a “Life of Wilfrith,” a work of considerable value. Shortly afterwards Bæda composed his “Ecclesiastical History.” Bæda was absolutely free from narrowness of mind, and though he held that the Roman tradition was authoritative, loved and venerated the memory of the holy men of the Celtic Church. As a story-teller he is unrivalled: full of piety and tenderness, he preserved through life a simplicity of heart that invests his narratives with a peculiar grace. At the same time, he did all in his power to find out the exact truth, and constantly tells his readers where he derived his information. He was well read in the best Latin authors, and in patristic divinity; he understood Greek, and had some acquaintance with Hebrew. Besides his works on the Bible and his historical and biographical books, he wrote treatises on chronology, astronomy, mathematics, and music. From boyhood he spent all his life in the monastery of Jarrow in religious exercises and in literary labours, that he undertook not for his own sake, but for the sake of others. During his last sickness he worked hard to finish his translation of the Gospel of St. John, for he knew that it would be useful to his scholars. His last day on earth was spent upon it; and when evening came, and the young scribe said, “There is yet one more sentence, dear master, to be written out,” he answered, “Write quickly.” After a while the lad said, “Now the sentence is written;” and he answered, “Good; thou hast spoken truly. It is finished.” Then he bade him raise his head, for he wished to look on the spot where he was wont to pray. And so, lying on the pavement of his cell, he sang the Gloria Patri, and as he uttered the name of the Holy Ghost he passed to the heavenly kingdom.

One of Bæda’s friends was Ecgberht, who was made bishop of York in 734, and obtained the restoration of the metropolitan dignity of his see. A year after his election Bæda sent him a letter of advice which tells us a good deal about the state of the Church. While the work of evangelization was still going on, monasteries were useful as missionary centres, and a single church served for a large district. Now, however, men no longer needed missionary preachers so much as resident priests and regular services. Parishes.Accordingly, the parochial system came into existence about this time, not by any formal enactment, but in the natural course of things. For, when the lord of a township built a church, and had a priest ordained to minister to his people, his township in most cases became an ecclesiastical district or parish. Bæda urges the bishop to forward this change. He points out that it was impossible for him to visit every place in his diocese even once a year, and exhorts him to ordain priests to preach, to consecrate the Holy Mysteries, and to baptize in each village. The parish priest mainly subsisted on land assigned to him by the lord who built the church and on the offerings of the people, such as church-scot, which was paid at Martinmas, soul-scot or mortuary dues, and the like. These payments were obligatory, and were enjoined first by the law of the Church, and then by the civil power. It is evident from Bæda’s letter that, even before the parochial system was established, a compulsory payment of some kind was made to the bishop by all the people of his diocese. Tithes.From the earliest times, also, the consecration of a tenth, or tithe, to the service of God was held to be a Christian duty, and the obligation is recognized in Theodore’s Penitential, and was therefore part of the law of the Church. It became part of the civil law in 787, for it was then enjoined by a council presided over by two legates, and the decree was accepted by the kings and the witan of the kingdoms they visited. It is probable, however, that payment was not enforced till a later period. Early in the tenth century the obligation was recognized as an established law, and a penalty was provided for its non-fulfilment. The appropriation of the payment long remained unsettled, and was generally decided by the owner of the land, who in most cases naturally assigned the tithe to the parish priest, though he sometimes gave it to the head church of the district, or to the bishop’s church, or to some monastery. And although the right of the parochial clergy to the tithe of increase was declared in 1200 by the Council of Westminster, the constitution was often evaded.

Restoration of the archbishopric of York, 734.

Many monasteries had in Bæda’s time fallen into an evil condition, and as the Church needed an efficient diocesan organization, he advised Ecgberht to strive for the fulfilment of Pope Gregory’s scheme as regards the Church in the north, which provided that the see of York should be metropolitan, and that the province should be divided into twelve bishoprics. The new bishops should, he proposed, be supported out of the funds of monasteries, which were in some cases to be placed under episcopal rule. In the same year that this letter was written, Ecgberht received the pall from Gregory III., and this grant, which had not been made to any of his predecessors since the time of Paulinus, restored the see to metropolitan dignity. Thus one part of Theodore’s work was frustrated, and Northumbria was withdrawn from the jurisdiction of the see of Canterbury. The kingdom itself was withdrawing from the contests between the other English states, and the restoration of the archbishopric may be regarded as a kind of declaration of its separate national life. Under Ecgberht and his successor, Æthelberht (Albert), the Northumbrian Church was famous for learning, and the archbishop’s school at York became the most notable place of education in Western Christendom. Æthelberht’s schoolmaster was Alcuin, who after the archbishop’s death resided at the court of Charles the Great, and helped him to carry out his plans for the advancement of learning. Alcuin had himself been a scholar at York, and so the school there became a source of light to other lands. In York itself, however, the light was quenched before Alcuin’s death. Civil disturbances were followed by the Scandinavian invasions, and the Northumbrian Church for a long period almost disappears amidst anarchy and ruin.

Ealdhelm, bishop of Sherborne, died 709.

In Wessex the work of Theodore was carried on by Ealdhelm, abbot of Malmesbury, one of his most distinguished scholars. Ini, the West Saxon king, had conquered the western part of Somerset, and ruled over a mixed population. The bitter feelings engendered by the schism were an hindrance to the Church in the west, and Ealdhelm wrote a treatise on the subject in the form of a letter to Gerent, king of Dyfnaint, which brought a number of the Welsh within the West Saxon border to conform to the customs of the Roman Church. This put an end to the schism in the west. In our present Wales the Roman Easter was universally accepted about a century later. Ealdhelm, who was a kinsman of Ini, was much honoured by the king, and used his influence to further the spread of the Gospel. Churches rose rapidly in Wessex, and he journeyed to Rome to obtain privileges for the monasteries he had founded, and was received with much kindness by Pope Sergius. The division of the West Saxon diocese which had been contemplated by Theodore took place in Ini’s reign, and was settled by the king and an ecclesiastical council. All to the west of Selwood Forest, the western part of Wiltshire, Dorset, and Somerset formed the new diocese of Sherborne, and over this Ealdhelm was chosen bishop. The rest of Wessex remained in the diocese of Winchester, which had now taken the place of Dorchester as an episcopal see. The labours of Ealdhelm, and the help he received from his wise and powerful kinsman, brought about the extension and organization of the Church in the west. After raising Wessex to the foremost place among the kingdoms south of the Humber, Ini laid down his crown, made a pilgrimage to Rome, and died there.

The archbishopric of Lichfield, 786-802.

In the latter half of the eighth century Offa, king of Mercia, was the most powerful monarch in England, and, among other conquests, subdued Kent and added it to his dominions. The course of political events tended to a threefold division of England into the Northumbrian, Mercian, and West Saxon kingdoms, and the twofold system of ecclesiastical administration by the metropolitans of Canterbury and York thwarted the ambition of the Mercian king. Northumbria had already sealed its policy of separation by the restoration of the archbishopric of York, and Offa now adopted a similar course, by persuading Pope Hadrian I. to grant the see of Lichfield metropolitan dignity. He had a special reason for weakening the power of Canterbury, for after the extinction of Kentish royalty the archbishop gained increased political importance, and became the representative of the national life of the kingdom, which Offa vainly endeavoured to crush. Accordingly two legates of Hadrian held a synod at Chelsea in 787, in which Higberht, bishop of Lichfield, was declared an archbishop. Jaenberht, archbishop of Canterbury, was forced to submit to the partition of his province, the obedience of the Mercian and East Anglian bishops being apparently transferred to the new metropolitan.

This arrangement was subversive of a part of Theodore’s work that was specially valuable as regards the development both of the Church and the nation. Theodore had made ecclesiastical jurisdictions independent of the fluctuations of political boundaries, and had freed the Church from provincial influences and from a merely local character. The national character of the Church was to become a powerful factor in forming the English nation. In spite of civil divisions, the oneness of the Church was a strong element of union. Although no lay assembly, no witenagemót, of the whole nation was as yet possible, the Church met in national councils; its head, the archbishop of Canterbury, might be a native of any kingdom, and every one of its clergy, of whatever race he might be, was equally at home in whatever part of the land he was called to minister. This national character of the Church and the influence it exercised on national unity were endangered by creating metropolitan jurisdiction and dignity as mere appendages to a political division. Happily there was no second archbishop of Lichfield. Offa’s successor, Cenwulf, found Æthelheard, the archbishop of Canterbury, a useful ally in a revolt of the Kentish nobles, and joined him in obtaining the restoration of the rights of his see from Leo III. While the see of York was overwhelmed by political disasters, the archbishop of Canterbury gained increased importance. Wessex entered on a career of conquest under Ecgberht, who, in 827, defeated the Mercian king at Ellandun. This victory led to the conquest of Kent, and in 838 Archbishop Ceolnoth, in a council held at Kingston, made a treaty of perpetual alliance between his Church and Ecgberht and his son Æthelwulf, the under-king of Kent. By this alliance the Church pledged itself to support the line of kings under which the English at last became a united nation.