How Crucifixion Took Center Stage 700 Years After the Gospels

Deconstructing Christianity: Significant doctrinal changes came long after Jesus. Crucifixion was not central to Christianity until the Middle Ages.

Perhaps no historical episode better shows what happened to Christianity during the early Middle Ages than the late eighth-century Frankish conquest and resistance of Saxony under Charlemagne (748–814). By the eighth century, the Franks controlled much of what is now France, Belgium, the Netherlands, Germany, and Switzerland. In 751, the Merovingian dynasty was undermined and finally overthrown by the Frankish noble family of Charles Martel, with the consent of the papacy and the aristocracy, and Martel’s son Pepin the Short was crowned king of the Franks at the behest of Pope Zachary.

Charlemagne succeeded his father Pepin in 768. Over the remainder of the eighth century, Charlemagne undertook multiple and sometimes simultaneous campaigns to conquer or control much of western and central Europe. Part of this process included the conquest of Saxony (what is now north-central Germany).

The series of invasions and insurrections known as the Saxon Wars involved eighteen campaigns fought over thirty-three years. This violent struggle finally resulted in the incorporation of Saxony into the Frankish empire of the Carolingian dynasty. This came via the destruction not only of its strongholds but also of its sacred places, along with the forcible conversion of the populace from Germanic religions to Roman Christianity. Charlemagne decreed death for anyone who continued to practice any religion other than Christianity, over the objection of his clergy advisor Alcuin of York, who argued that God’s word should not be spread by the sword, but by persuasion. Charlemagne issued a code of law that prescribed death to Saxons who refused to convert, and he made good on it.

In 800, with the subjugation of most of Western Europe complete, Charlemagne was crowned “Emperor of the Romans” by Pope Leo III, representing the church’s power to confer titles and temporal authority. This would make Charlemagne the first emperor of what would be the Holy Roman Empire. The papacy had supported Carolingian rule and conquest in exchange for the Frankish defeat of the Lombards in northern Italy, protection of the Papal States, and violent Christianization in parts of Europe practicing other religions. This Christianization expanded the ecclesiastical levy of tithes and fees, directing greater wealth into the church’s coffers.

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The point of the story here is that not only were new assumptions about political organization reflected in these circumstances, but a new theology as well—one that came to be seen in the liturgy and iconography of the Middle Ages. For centuries thereafter, it was understood that no stable power structure could be established or exist without the combined and complementary powers of church and monarchy. Conformity to Christian ritual and praxis became a tool of conquest, subjugation, and demonstration of allegiance to a sovereign or empire. Refusal of baptism thus became a form of treason.

The theology attendant on this development emphasizes the power of Christ, not to teach, heal, and give life, but rather to judge and condemn. (But, “Indeed, God did not send the Son into the world to condemn the world...” [John 3]). In this new view, wedded to the Augustinian doctrine of original sin, the human body becomes a source of deep and shameful iniquity. (For more on the doctrine of original sin see my post Eternal Damnation Was Invented 400 Years After Jesus.)

Christianity has never recovered. The Gallican rite of Christianity emphasized the beauty of creation, including the wondrous human body sanctified through Christ’s incarnation. In the context of Charlemagne’s violent campaign against the Saxons, the Roman rite placed ritual murder and violent torture at the center of the Eucharist, reminding the Saxons of what had been done, and what would be done again should they choose to revolt.

In ancient Christianity, the crucifixion of Jesus was rarely if ever depicted. Early church leaders likely considered crucifixion horrific and unsuitable as an artistic subject. Coming out of the Jewish tradition, they were also chary of using any images in worship.

The earliest known Christian visual symbols, some repurposed from Greco-Roman mythology, included pictographs of the ichthús (fish), peacock, lamb, or anchor. Early personified images included Jonah and the great fish, Daniel in the lion’s den, the sacrifice of Isaac, Noah praying in the ark, and the three youths in the fiery furnace. These symbolized the death and resurrection of Jesus, or his followers’ rescue from spiritual danger.

By far the most common early depiction was the Good Shepherd, a youthful representation borrowed from Hermes the kriophóros (ram-bearer), and considered symbolic rather than an image of Jesus himself. The tree of life and a restored creation were commonly depicted, as well. Also represented were people praying or leading worship, women included, with hands in the orans position.

It was only in the West in the tenth and eleventh centuries that carved or other visual representations of Jesus suffering on the cross finally became a customary fixture in churches. Extreme suffering became an important part of medieval theology. This is in sharp contrast to the practices of Eastern Christianity.

Christ’s sacrifice was converted into a powerful symbol of personal judgment, and a preventative for eternal damnation. (Again, see Eternal Damnation Was Invented 400 Years After Jesus.) Rather than abundant life in Christ, fear, guilt, and shame were emphasized, while the violence of the temporal world was projected onto spiritual experience. Baptism was no longer a sign of new life, but of avoiding death and damnation, of becoming subjugated to authority under the threat of violence. The church, with iron-fisted control of temporal power and wealth, became the sole dispenser of the means of spiritual salvation in the form of escape from eternal torment in the hereafter. All hellfire-and-damnation preaching since then has depended on this early medieval theology.

Christianity has never recovered from this. If it is to survive in the postmodern world, Christian leaders will have to remake the faith and practice of Christianity—enter it into a recovery program—by recapturing and reanimating the ancient meanings and practices by which the early followers of Jesus sought to live out his example in this world.