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Lesser Known Byzantine Empire Facts

Khalid Elhassan September 11, 2020 35 min

Byzantine Empire - Constantinople — Procession of Emperor Manuel I Komenos in Constantinople. Imgur

15. The Birth of Iconoclasm

Ninth-century Byzantine Iconoclasm. Wikimedia

Sinner are punished in the Bible. So when Islam suddenly erupted out of nowhere to sweep the Byzantines out of the Middle East and Africa, and reduce their empire to a reeling rump, many assumed that they were being punished for their sins. However, which sins? Some pinned the blame on Christians violating the Second Commandment – the one about graven images. Churches were full of religious paintings, leading Christians, so the argument went, to worship idols. How was making offerings to saints or revering their images different from worshiping Ba’al?

That line of reasoning led to a backlash against icons, known as iconoclasm, that kicked off decades of religious turmoil. Icons’ opponents, known as Iconoclasts, reasoned that Muslims had been successful because they strictly obeyed the Second Commandment’s prohibition of graven images.

Written by

Khalid Elhassan

A lifelong history buff, I developed a particular passion for WW2 history as a child, when I spent hours listening to my grandfather, enraptured, as he recounted his wartime experiences in the British East African Campaign and with the British 8th Army in North Africa.

I graduated with a history BA from George Mason University, then went on to get a JD from the University of Virginia School of Law. After lawyering for a decade, I moved to sunny Rio de Janeiro and a less demanding career, opening a tourism agency in Copacabana.

A big chunk of my free time is spent blogging (you can follow me on Quora https://www.quora.com/profile/Khalid-Elhassan ) or freelance writing, mostly about my favorite subject, history.