The class politics of Eastern Catholicism, part 2: ‘Strange, worldly motives’ in Florence

Procession of the Magi, painting by Benozzo Gozzoli (1459)
notably depicting Lorenzo, Piero and Cosimo de’ Medici

Continued from Part 1:

The Avignon Schism and the subsequent Conciliar Controversy in the Western Church was another aggravating factor within the West that led directly up to the attempts at Uniatism. The power and prestige of the Papacy had been damaged by many decades of cæsaropapist subjection to the French Crown beginning in 1309, followed by a political schism prompted by the death of Pope Gregory XI in 1377 and the issue of his succession.

Many middle-class churchmen, particularly local bishops and parish clergy, viewing the decades-long political schism between Pope in Rome and Antipope in Avignon, came to an ecclesiastical conclusion that an Œcumenical Council was needed to finally decide the question of the Papal residence and the powers of the Pope. Several attempts by these conciliarists to bring the schism to an end and bolster – in their view – the moral legitimacy of the Church were made: in 1409 at Pisa; in 1414 at Constance; at 1423 in Pavia; at 1424 in Siena; and finally in 1431 at Basel at the end of the Hussite Wars. Tellingly, the dissidium of ‘the Bohemians’ (i.e., the largely working-class followers of Jan Hus) and the Orthodox Christian doctrine of ‘the Greeks’ were mentioned in the same breath at the Council of Basel – something which caused the envoys of the Emperor deep offence.

The Council of Florence was actually the penultimate stage in the culmination of a longer process that began with the Council of Basel in 1431. Now, I do not want to rehash any more than necessary the proceedings of the Council of Florence itself, because other authorities do that elsewhere. In terms of the doctrines discussed, including the content and theology of the Nicene Creed, the position of the Papacy and the substance of communion, I do not have anything much to add except to say that I am in full agreement with the expositions of Saint Mark Eugenikos. Though doctrine and ecclesiology are inescapable when discussing Church councils like this one, here I try to confine myself to an analysis the dynamics of class at the Councils of Basel, Ferrara and Florence.

The Council of Basel, illustration from the Nuremberg Chronicles

The impetus for Pope Eugene IV in calling for a counter-Council to Basel – first at Ferrara and then at Florence – was to shore up the political influence, prestige and moral legitimacy of the Papacy in an absolute sense, and to reinforce the very idea of Papal supremacy over the Councils. In terms of class politics, the two papal parties in Avignon and Rome represented the class interests of the feudal nobility of France and England respectively – and they behaved like it. The popes (and later antipopes) in Avignon in particular were extravagantly corrupt and lax in their personal morals. Conciliarism represented the petit bourgeois republican political dimension of disaffection with the Papacy in the cities and focussed on outward structural reform, much as they pushed for political reform within the increasingly-oligarchical city-states they lived in – though by the end the conciliarist cause had been effectively coöpted by Emperor Sigismund. The working-class laypeople in rural areas had little to do with either of these ecclesiastical parties. They did not abandon the Church, however. Instead they embraced a revitalised cultus of recent saints like Catherine of Siena. This ‘lay piety’ movement was deceptively apolitical, particularly since Catherine of Siena herself was something of a rabble-rouser and urged far more radical, pro-poor reforms of the Church than the conciliarists were prepared to countenance.

The Council of Ferrara, and then the Council of Florence which was its continuation, therefore represented a confluence of material interests between the nobility and the haute bourgeoisie on the part of the Western parties. Even at Basel there seems to have been some unseemly politicking and disputation between the cities as to where the Council would be hosted. A pro-Papal minority at Basel led by Cardinal Giuliano Cesarini opted for Florence at the vote on 7 May 1437 – and then bore off the conciliar seal and affixed it to their decision under cover of darkness. This is important to note because Eastern Orthodox sources on the Council of Florence often ascribe conspiratorial motives to the Western party at the Council, while Catholic and Anglican sources tend toward an insufferable highfalutin idealism that overlooks entirely the material interests of those who called the Council in the first place.

That the first conscious attempt at Uniatism was centred on one of the big four, therefore, should not be seen as a happy accident. Nor should it be a surprise that it aligned neatly with that city-state’s interests in financial expansion and exploitation. It seems unthinkable to discuss the so-called Council of Florence without also discussing the man who brought it there: Cosimo de’ Medici, the richest banker in Europe. It was in fact de’ Medici, through his agents Roberto Martelli at Basel in 1436 and Ambrogio Traversari at Ferrara in 1437, who introduced the idea to the Pope’s party of moving the Council to Florence.

Lithograph of Ambrogio Traversari

Although Orthodox Church historian Ivan Ostroumov explicitly mentions de’ Medici ’s rôle in arranging the robber-council’s presence at Florence, other accounts, particularly Catholic ones, fail to mention de’ Medici at all. Personally, I don’t ascribe any malice in this; it’s more likely that such elisions proceed from a profound sense of embarrassment. Even so, wounded embarrassment is a fierce thing, and I am aware as I set forth in this account that I will be accused of vulgar Marxism, of materialism, of conspiratorial thought, in exploring the ‘strange, worldly motives’ among the Latin and Greek clergy who assented to Union – so be it; the facts are what they are.

It cannot be disputed that material considerations prompted the transition of the Council from Ferrara to Florence. After all, de’ Medici offered to advance the Pope 40,000 gold ducats on living arrangements for the Imperial household and the Greek bishops in his city. It should be noted that the Greek bishops themselves were far from insensitive to the material compulsions that induced them to agree to the results of the Council. Bribery and other forms of soft coercion were used by the advocates of the Union to win over truculent Greek bishops. Bishop Syropoulos, who attended the Council, was at pains to point out that he had never accepted money for his signature – a firm indication that financial gain was indeed a ready inducement to some of the signatories. Indeed, when the Council was sitting at Ferrara, the Pope withheld the Greek bishops’ promised stipends when they failed to agree with him, and made allowances when they agreed… but at Ferrara they only got as far as discussing the right of the Western Church to make insertions to the Symbol of Faith (not the substance of the filioque clause). After the council moved to Florence, the bribes and threats became more blatant still. Here is Church historian Ivan Ostroumov on the subject, in the translation by Fr Basil Popoff:

At the same time, the Emperor with great difficulty persuaded the Pope to allow the Greeks money for their maintenance, instead of the daily rations of food they were receiving like beggars, quite contrary to the agreements made in the treaty. Generally speaking, the Greeks made constant complaints about this during the whole time of the Counicl session in Ferrara and Florence. The Pope found this the best way of making the Greeks obedient. For whenever the Greeks refused to comply with any of his wishes, he immediately stopped their pay, so that many of the Bishops were obliged to sell their clothes. But as soon as the Greeks agreed to his proposals, their wages were immediately given out as a sort of reward for their obedience. As long as the Greeks disputed about the Council seats, no money was given them. But when the disputes were ended, their monthly allowance was paid out.

As we can see, from the start, the Council of Florence was not by any means a selfless noble-minded project to reunite Christendom. The motives on the Eastern side were, unfortunately, crystal-clear, and their ‘pitiable state’ is laid out and well attested across multiple primary sources, including the writings of the Eastern Roman Emperors themselves. Military and political weakness through protracted warfare with the Ottomans, as well as substantial public debt to the Venetians (!), forced Emperors Manouēl II and Iōannēs VIII Palaiologos to seek aid from the better-armed states of the West – though the Western Empire, which was at that time concluding its crusade against the Hussites, could not oblige the Eastern Empire.

The motives on the Western side have always been cast in a bit muddier terms. It’s clear, however, that the placement of the Council in the northern mercantile states of Italy, rather than in Constantinople, was no accident but instead a central and ideologically-motivated demand of the Western Church under Eugene. So the fact that de’ Medici figured so prominently in the last stage of the proceedings is worth exploring. Cosimo de’ Medici always had an eye on how an East-West reconciliation could be exploited for gain, which is why he had the entire council moved from Ferrara to Florence at his own expense. The financial prospects which would accrue to his coffers from trade concessions from Constantinople for Florence were high on the list of motivating factors. As GF Young, the largely-sympathetic historian of the de’ Medici family, points out:

The Emperor John Paleologus, following the example of his father and grandfather, proposed making a personal visit to the West to solicit help against the Turks to save Constantinople, which must otherwise fall. The Pope invited him, together with the Patriarch and bishops of the Eastern Church, to a conference, holding out hopes of such aid if the breach between the Churches of the East and West could be healed…

The Emperor John Paleologus and his retinue, together with the Patriarch of Constantinople, Joseph, and a numerous body of bishops and theologians, sailed from Constantinople, and in due time arrived at Venice. The Emperor was received with great pomp by Doge Francesco Foscari, and entertained at Venice for a month; after which he proceeded to Ferrara, where Pope Eugenius having also arrived, the Council began its sittings (5^th January 1438).

Cosimo, in that task which had been mentioned of gradually bringing foreign nations to recognise in him the motive power of the Florentine state, and also gradually convincing his countrymen that their interests were best served by leaving foreign affairs to him, had had to exercise much patience. He had a matter to effect which necessarily moved but slowly, and during the first few years he had been forced to be content with a very partial control, and often been obliged to acquiesce in action which he was as yet without the power to direct as he would wish. But by the end of the year 1438 he was beginning to have this power, foreign affairs being more and more left to him to manage in his own way. And now he took the first independent step, one which had very important results to Florence. He proceeded to Ferrara, where the Council between the Eastern and Western Churches had been sitting for nearly a year, and so used his influence with Pope Eugenius IV that he got the Council transferred to Florence; whereby he obtained for his city increased political influence, and brought to it much added trade. [emphasis mine]

Cosimo de’ Medici

This passage has the benefit of highlighting some of the political contours, at least among the Western cohort, within which the Council of Florence took place. Once this is established, then the proceedings of the Council begin to make much more sense. On the face of it, as the power struggle between the conciliarists at Basel and the Papal party at Ferrara and Florence makes clear, a lot of the internal struggle of the Catholic clergy had to do with attacking or protecting the sovereign authority of the Pope. But finical considerations overshadowed even these ideological-ecclesiological ones. Thus, the class dynamics become bitterly ironic. Despite their sympathy with bourgeois republicanism, the conciliarists’ biggest supporter at Basel was in fact the Western Emperor Sigismund of Luxembourg. And despite his insistence on royal grandeur and previous support from the Kings of England, Pope Eugene found the most material support in Ferrara and Florence from de’ Medici, who represented one of the ‘Big Four’ Italian merchant republics. Both Sigismund and de’ Medici had political agendas of their own.

As far as the Greeks were concerned, even those who signed the treaty that concluded the Council at Florence, Ostroumov laconically puts it: ‘The conclusion of peace was a joyful event for one party only—the victors.’ The various material carrots and sticks that had been used on them by the Papal party had evidently left a bad taste in many Greek mouths, including many of them whose signatures were ultimately found on the concluding document. That of Saint Mark Eugenikos was not among them. Ostroumov goes on: ‘The Latins acceded to nothing; the Greeks were more or less obliged to accede to them in everything. The victorious party did not even try to soothe the sad feelings of their new brethren. The pride of the self-willed conqueror evinced itself in all his intercourse with the newly reconciled party.’

On the Greek side: the most notable personalities among the Greek deputies to Florence were Mark Eugenikos, the saintly Bishop of Ephesus; Basil Bēssariōn of Trebizond, the Metropolitan of Nicæa; and Joseph II, the Patriarch of Constantinople. Mark became famous within Orthodoxy for being the only member of the Greek delegation to reject the conclusions of the Council of Florence, and he is as such regarded as a ‘Pillar of Orthodoxy’ in our Church. Both Mark and Basil were highly-educated and belonged to senatorial families. Both of them were monks based in Constantinople. Both of them studied under the great Platonic philosopher George Gemistos, who was also at the Council of Florence. Both of them deeply valued certain strands in Western Scholastic thought. Although their upbringings were similar, though, Mark and Basil still represented two very different styles of thought, two very different intellectual tendencies, and ultimately two very different class interests within the Eastern Empire.

Even though Basil was tonsured as a monk, he spent only one year as a monk and later an abbot in Constantinople prior to his elevation to the metropolis of Nicæa. It becomes clear from his subsequent career in both Greece and Italy that he is far more comfortable hobnobbing with the esteemed, the wealthy and the great among the lords spiritual and temporal, than he is with keeping the monastic disciplines. He was a key figure in ‘Renaissance humanism’, which is to say, that he carefully cultivated the patronage of people like de’ Medici and Louis XI of France. Thus, although he was originally sceptical of the Council of Florence, as he began to understand the opportunities for fame and career advancement that the Council provided him, he turned into the biggest supporter of Union between the Churches on the Latins’ terms. As Ostroumov put it: ‘No! it was no love of truth, but other objects in view, that prevailed upon [Bēssariōn] to side with the Latins; and most likely a wish to afford [the Emperor] John pleasure, and a hope of honours from the Roman court.’

Saint Mark (Eugenikos) of Ephesos

Mark, on the other hand, was practically raised in the Church and was a monk through-and-through, long before he became a bishop. His concerns are almost entirely monastic. The personality that comes through in the accounts of his activity at Florence show a man who is deeply invested in the exploration of theological questions to the point that he doesn’t care if he trod on the toes of Popes or Cardinals, or Dominican friars like Giovanni di Montenero, or even his own fellow Greek bishops! He was actually originally in favour of the Union, but running up against the egos of Montenero and others in the sittings at Florence, he came to the realisation that a common truth was not to be found there. When he returned home, also, his polemical works could be considered almost ‘populist’ in flavour, as pointed out by his contemporary Andrew of Rhodes. He had no objections, on the whole, to speaking with and directing his writings to the ‘common man’ in Constantinople or Ephesos. As Ostroumov puts it: ‘Mark’s words and influence had a great effect both on the plain, and on the learned, inclining them to the defence of Orthodoxy.’

In the end, I have to wonder what might have been, if the effort to unite the Churches had been based, not on the diplomatic proceedings of the proud and the mighty, but instead building on the lay piety of the Catholic devotees of the Dominican Saint Catherine of Siena on one side, and the parallel quasi-monastic religious expressions of the common folk of Byzantium on the other. If anything, the enthusiasm of Saint Mark Eugenikos for certain Western saints going into the Council – particularly the Benedictines – shows that there could well have been some grounds for discourse on a higher common denominator between the Orthodox monastics and the lay piety movement in Spain and elsewhere. As Berdyaev would say, perhaps there is still common ground. But if the Council of Florence is any indication, the technique of forcing a top-down Unia quickly displays a haute bourgeois class character which is inimical to the religious expressions and aspirations of the masses, in both East and West.

Continued in Part 3.