The Christian church has never been united. It is very important to remember, so as not to go to the extremes that often took place in the history of this religion. It can be seen from the New Testament that the disciples of Jesus Christ, even during his lifetime, had debates about which of them is the most important and important in the nascent community. Two of them - John and James - even asked for thrones on the right and left hands of Christ in the coming kingdom. After the death of the founder, the first thing that Christians began to do was to divide into various warring groups. The book of Acts and the epistles of the apostles report on numerous false apostles, heretics, who came out from among the first Christians and founded their own community. Of course, they looked at the authors of the New Testament texts and their communities in exactly the same way - at heretical and schismatic communities. Why did this happen and what was the main reason for the separation of churches?
Donikey Church period
Extremely little is known about what Christianity was before the year 325. We only know that this is a messianic current within Judaism, which was initiated by a wandering preacher named Jesus. His teaching was rejected by most Jews, and Jesus himself was crucified. A few followers, however, stated that he had risen from the dead and declared him the messiah promised by the prophets of Tanah and come to save the world. Faced with total rejection among their compatriots, they spread their sermon among the Gentiles, from among whom they found many adherents.
The first divisions among Christians
In the process of this mission, the first split of the Christian church happened. When leaving for a sermon, the apostles did not have a codified, registered creed, or general principles of preaching. Therefore, they preached a different Christ, different theories and concepts of salvation, and imposed different ethical and religious obligations on the converts. Some of them forced Gentile Christians to be circumcised, observe the rules of kashrut, observe the Sabbath, and comply with other decrees of the Mosaic Law. Others, on the contrary, canceled all the requirements of the Old Testament not only with regard to pagan converts, but also with regard to themselves. In addition, someone considered Christ to be the Messiah, a prophet, but at the same time a man, and someone began to endow him with divine qualities. Soon a layer of dubious traditions appeared, such as the Immaculate Conception, stories about events from childhood and other things. Plus, the saving role of Christ was evaluated differently. All this led to significant contradictions and conflicts within the early Christians and initiated a split in the Christian church.
From the New Testament , such differences in views (up to mutual rejection by each other) between the apostles Peter, James and Paul are clearly visible. Modern scholars who study the separation of churches distinguish four main branches of Christianity at this stage. In addition to the three leaders mentioned above, they add the branch of John - also a separate and independent alliance of local communities. All this is natural, given that Christ did not leave either the governor or the successor, and generally did not give any practical instructions on the organization of the church of believers. The new communities were completely independent, subject only to the authority of the preacher who founded them and to the elected leaders within themselves. Theology, practice and liturgy in each community had an independent formation. Therefore, episodes of separation were present in the Christian milieu from the very beginning, and they often had a doctrinal character.
Post-Kei period
After the emperor Constantine legalized Christianity, and especially after 325, when the first ecumenical council was held in the city of Nicaea, the orthodox party that he benefited actually absorbed most of the other areas of early Christianity. Those that remained were declared heretics and were outlawed. Christian leaders represented by bishops received the status of government officials with all the legal consequences of their new position. As a result, with all seriousness, the question arose of the administrative structure and management of the Church. If in the previous period the reasons for the separation of churches were doctrinal and ethical in nature, then in Christianity a new important motive was added - political. So, an Orthodox catholic who refused to obey his bishop, or the bishop himself, who did not recognize the legal authority over himself, for example, the neighboring metropolitan, could be left over the church fence.
Divisions of the Post-Mica period
We have already figured out what was the main reason for the separation of churches during this period. However, clergy often tried to color political motives in creed. Therefore, this period gives examples of several very complex in nature splits - Arian (by the name of its leader, priest Arius), Nestorian (by the name of the founder - Patriarch Nestorius), Monophysite (from the name of the doctrine of a single nature in Christ) and many others.
Great schism
The most significant schism in the history of Christianity occurred at the turn of the first and second millennia. Hitherto the only orthodox catholic church in 1054 was divided into two independent parts - the eastern, now called the Orthodox Church, and the western, known as the Roman Catholic Church.
The reasons for the split in 1054
In short, the main reason for the separation of the church in 1054 is political. The fact is that the Roman Empire at that time was two independent parts. The eastern part of the empire - Byzantium - was ruled by Caesar, whose throne and administrative center was located in Constantinople. The emperor was also the head of the church. In fact, the bishop of Rome ruled the Western Empire, concentrating both secular and spiritual power in his hands, and, moreover, claiming power in Byzantine churches. On this basis, of course, disputes and conflicts soon arose, expressed in a number of church claims to each other. Minor, essentially nit-picking, triggered a serious confrontation.
In the end, in 1053 in Constantinople, on the orders of the patriarch Mikhail Kerularius, all the churches of the Latin rite were closed. In response, Pope Leo IX sent an embassy to the capital of Byzantium, headed by Cardinal Humbert, who excommunicated Michael from the church. In response, the patriarch gathered the cathedral and mutually anathematized the papal legates. They did not pay much attention to this right away, and inter-church relations continued in the usual way. But twenty years later, an initially minor conflict began to be recognized as a fundamental division of the Christian church.
Reformation
The next important schism in Christianity is the rise of Protestantism. This happened in the 30s of the XVI century, when a German monk of the Augustinian order rebelled against the authority of the Roman bishop and dared to criticize a number of dogmatic, disciplinary, ethical and other provisions of the Catholic Church. What was the main reason for the separation of churches at this moment is difficult to answer unequivocally. Luther was a convinced Christian, and for him the main motive was the struggle for purity of faith.
Of course, his movement also became a political force for the liberation of the German churches from the authority of the Pope. And this, in turn, untied the hands of secular authorities, no longer constrained by the demands of Rome. For the same reasons, the Protestants continued to divide among themselves. Very quickly, in many European countries, their own ideologists of Protestantism began to appear. The Catholic Church began to burst at the seams - many countries fell out of the orbit of the influence of Rome, others were on the verge of this. At the same time, the Protestants themselves had neither a single spiritual authority, nor a single administrative center, and this partly resembled the organizational chaos of early Christianity. A similar situation in their environment is observed today.
Modern schisms
What was the main reason for the separation of churches in previous eras, we found out. What is happening to Christianity in this regard today? First of all, it must be said that significant schism has not arisen since the Reformation. Existing churches continue to be divided into similar small groups. Among the Orthodox, there were Old Believer, old-style and catacomb divisions, several groups also separated from the Catholic Church, and Protestants tirelessly split up, starting from their very appearance. Today, the number of Protestant denominations is more than twenty thousand. However, nothing fundamentally new has ever appeared, apart from a few semi-Christian organizations like the Mormon Church and Jehovah's Witnesses.
It is important to note that, firstly, today most churches are not connected with the political regime and are separate from the state. And secondly, there is an ecumenical movement that seeks to bring together, if not different churches. Under these conditions, the main reason for the separation of churches is ideological. Today, few seriously revise the dogma, but the movement for the ordination of women, marriage of same-sex marriages, etc. In response to this, each group is isolated from the others, taking its principled position, while maintaining the dogmatic content of Christianity as a whole untouchable.