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Bull. Shit. Tom Send a noteboard - 11/03/2012 01:54:07 AM
Iconoclasm had nothing to do with the schism whatsoever. Of all the ignorant statements you have made, this ranks among your statements in my language post in terms of the grossness of the errors.

The absolute hands-down leading element of the Schism was the assertion of papal supremacy. The Eastern Churches always held to the position (and still do so hold) that matters of theology could only be resolved by Ecumenical Councils at which the Pope was, at best, primus inter pares. The refusal of the Popes to submit the Western Church to such councils led to a string of disputes.

The first of these disputes was during the papacy of Sergius I over the divergence of Latin usages from those approved by a series of ecumenical councils. None of the usages in question had to do with the veneration of icons, but rather, with matters of the clergy (celibacy vs. the Orthodox mandate that priests with parishes be married), the observation of Lent (Latin Lent was already relaxed from the strictures of the Eastern Great Lent) and the depiction of Christ as the Lamb of God, something that the Eastern Churches found repulsive.

The only dispute that was even remotely related to iconoclasm was the support by Pope Nicolas I of Patriarch Ignatius, who was anti-iconoclast. However, the acts of the Pope were likely encouraged by the Holy Roman Emperor, as the Pope and Patriarch reflected the temporal dispositions of power at the time. When Emperor Basil I assumed the purple, he reinstated Ignatius to improve relations with the West. The position of the Pope was not the deciding factor, and in any event the episode ended with relatively good terms. The only tangential effect that iconoclasm might be said to have on the Schism is that it set a precedent of papal interference in internal affairs of the Eastern Church. However, the reason for the interference had nothing to do with iconoclasm and everything to do with growing pretensions on the part of the Popes to plenary authority over all of the Church, including over the Patriarch and the Eastern Church.

Furthermore, after the iconoclasts were soundly defeated, Rome fell into the decadence of the pornocracy and the cadaver trial after that, and it wasn't until hundreds of years later that Leo IX decided to declare papal primacy and declare that the filioque was an official point of theology, in contradiction of the Great Ecumenical Council of Nicaea.

Even then, the issue was less about the filioque itself (even the present Pope, Benedict XVI, admits that the relationship between the Son and Holy Spirit is a "divine mystery" and it is difficult to argue with certainty about matters so far removed from human understanding) and far more about papal power. In particular, the Eastern and Western Churches disputed authority over dioceses in Southern Italy and the Balkans, and the divergence of usages was becoming very great (the calculation of Easter, choice of liturgical language, type of communion administered to laymen, type of communion bread used, means of making the sign of the cross, facial hair for priests, clerical celibacy in the West opposed to mandatory marriage of parish priests in the East, order of church services, etc.). The failure of the Western Church to understand Greek, and of the Eastern Church to understand Latin, made communication even more difficult and led to misunderstandings that the Pope capitalized on to drive home his position.

In short, iconoclasm had no direct bearing on the Schism and only a tangential influence by accident.
Political correctness is the pettiest form of casuistry.

ἡ δὲ κἀκ τριῶν τρυπημάτων ἐργαζομένη ἐνεκάλει τῇ φύσει, δυσφορουμένη, ὅτι δὴ μὴ καὶ τοὺς τιτθοὺς αὐτῇ εὐρύτερον ἢ νῦν εἰσι τρυπώη, ὅπως καὶ ἄλλην ἐνταῦθα μίξιν ἐπιτεχνᾶσθαι δυνατὴ εἴη. – Procopius

Ummaka qinnassa nīk!

*MySmiley*
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Atheism: The Iconoclasm of the West? - 10/03/2012 05:42:56 AM 1293 Views
I think about as highly of athiesm as I do of christianity. *NM* - 10/03/2012 05:54:20 AM 356 Views
I would chide you on that basis for having a love/hate relationship with God, but who does not? - 10/03/2012 06:05:11 AM 523 Views
If the divine made men... - 10/03/2012 06:27:42 AM 517 Views
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Thanks? It is all Dans fault, really. - 10/03/2012 07:21:19 AM 821 Views
But you do comparable things all the time! - 10/03/2012 08:35:31 AM 745 Views
You've made this analogy before and it's still a bad one, those aren't comparable - 10/03/2012 03:43:08 PM 632 Views
You said what I was thinking far more respectfully than I probably would have. - 11/03/2012 12:14:55 AM 598 Views
... and apparently it was a waste of time - 11/03/2012 03:27:04 AM 539 Views
Perhaps he just missed it in all my spam? - 11/03/2012 04:59:31 AM 609 Views
Basically what Isaac said. *NM* - 10/03/2012 07:22:07 PM 307 Views
who? *NM* - 11/03/2012 12:00:13 AM 287 Views
Me - 11/03/2012 03:31:51 AM 565 Views
You're right and wrong. - 10/03/2012 05:09:32 PM 942 Views
Re: You're right and wrong. - 11/03/2012 12:28:25 AM 850 Views
Nope, Buddhists are explicitly atheist and also explicitly Ontologically engaged - 11/03/2012 01:39:20 AM 852 Views
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Yeah, that's very true. - 11/03/2012 03:27:09 PM 744 Views
My Buddhist readings are definitely Tibet-focused. - 11/03/2012 04:00:17 PM 795 Views
Duplicate post *NM* - 11/03/2012 03:28:58 PM 374 Views
What exactly do you mean by "The irreparable damage it inflicted in the Great Schism"? - 10/03/2012 07:57:59 PM 721 Views
That Byzantiums iconoclasm was one of the many wedges between it and Rome that led to the Schism. - 11/03/2012 12:27:05 AM 644 Views
Bull. Shit. - 11/03/2012 01:54:07 AM 715 Views
I did not say it was decisive, but that it did irreparable damage to the relationship. - 11/03/2012 04:23:43 AM 732 Views
Bull. Shit. - 11/03/2012 04:30:08 AM 595 Views
It is not like I just pulled it out of my rear, any more than my HS history text or Wikipedia did. - 11/03/2012 04:57:31 AM 674 Views
Bull. Shit. - 11/03/2012 05:14:01 AM 747 Views
Irreparable damage is damage that cannot be repaired, not necessarily serious or fatal. - 11/03/2012 10:34:57 AM 819 Views
ο κοπρος. του ταυρου. - 11/03/2012 02:19:11 PM 779 Views
Very edifying; can you do Mandarin or Swahili next? - 12/03/2012 05:47:23 PM 685 Views
No. Even English seems to be beyond your grasp. - 12/03/2012 06:29:50 PM 594 Views
Citing scripture does not justify telling me to kill myself. - 13/03/2012 12:08:02 AM 728 Views
I'm not telling you to; God is. - 13/03/2012 12:35:45 AM 510 Views
Or can only you use that sort of specious logic? *NM* - 13/03/2012 03:50:20 PM 262 Views
And re: particular bullshit - 11/03/2012 02:33:15 PM 703 Views
Re: And re: particular bullshit - 13/03/2012 12:07:42 AM 610 Views
Give it up already. You are wrong. - 12/03/2012 12:53:37 AM 897 Views

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