Socinism.. a Christian monotheistic movement that rejected the divinity of Christ and was fought by Catholics and Protestants

European history in the late Middle Ages witnessed massive events that led to profound changes in the cultural, intellectual and political awareness of this continent.

All these Muslims, Arabs, Turks, and Berbers in the eras of wars and crusades, and in the Mamluk and Ottoman times, made a great impact on European consciousness, but the relationship between the Catholic Church and its European subjects was also witnessing the most revolutionary interactions in the history of the relationship between the clergy and the general public.

The Catholic Church in Rome has controlled humans and stones for more than thirteen centuries, and in that the historian Rev. Andrew Miller says in his book "A Brief History of the Church" that until the sixteenth century AD "there was no creature independent of the priest, but rather the priest He is the master of everything small and large, and he had absolute authority over the body and the soul, over the present and eternity. No one was able to be subject to his anger or stand before his rebuke. outside whose borders there is not the slightest hope of salvation”[1].

The Road to Martin Luther

Martin Luther (networking sites)

During the thirteenth, fourteenth, and fifteenth centuries, a number of events occurred that negatively affected the image and influence of the Church, on top of which was the old dispute between the Church of Constantinople and the Church of Rome over the nature of Christ, peace be upon him, and then the fall of Constantinople at the hands of the Ottomans and their entry into the depths of European lands.

In addition to this, the emergence of the “Sexual Albanians” movement in the Languedoc region in France, a group that promoted the absence of one God, but rather the existence of two forces of good and evil, and they established a church of their own that began to threaten the authority of the Church of Rome, and this group was soon eliminated early, and the most dangerous of all That was the move of Pope Clement V from Rome to the city of Avignon in France and the stability of the papacy there for a full seventy years until the return of Pope Gregory XI in the year 1378 AD and the emergence of the Avignon Council, which resulted in what is known in European ecclesiastical history as the "greater religious schism". (Grand Schism).

[3]

The religious division remained unchanged for a long time between Rome and Avignon, and this led to wars and conflicts to annihilate what Rome described as "heresy" in Avignon, and in the meantime, voices of theologians began to appear in Europe, led by the British and professor at Oxford University "John Wycliffe" who He criticized the transfer of the papacy to France, the competitor and traditional enemy of the English at the time, and even the exploitation of the French king of the papacy and its control over the lands, grants and gifts that the English presented to the papacy at that time, which led to the sowing of conflict between England and Rome, and its effects soon appeared later after the emergence of the German "Martin Luther" and the spread of the Lutheran movement and Protestantism in northern and northwestern Europe.

While John Wycliffe had a role in the revolution against the papacy in England, the Czech Bohemian "John Hus", a theologian, had an influential role as well.

As he was among those who called for church reform, and standing up against the sins that the clergy fell into in that era, but because of the power and control of the papacy he was convicted of heresy and the death penalty was imposed on him by burning, and the sentence was actually implemented in 1415 AD [3], in a clear indication of the continued influence of the clergy The Catholic Church on the thought and politics of that era.

An old drawing of the burning of John Hus, a theologian, after he was convicted of heresy.

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After the end of the time of the Crusades in the Middle East, the Church’s concern became collecting money and living in pleasures and bliss, and the Pope’s palace seemed like the most luxurious palace of a European secular prince and king at that time, and because of that, the conflict took place between the papacy and many European emirates and kingdoms at a time when the Ottomans were In it they began to crawl towards Constantinople and the eastern and heart of Europe.

On the other hand, the papacy was able, in the meantime, to crush all the groups calling for reform, such as the Waldensians, Albinians, Lollards, Bohemians, and the rest of the groups that were bothering it. From them, whether with gifts and tempting gifts, or with reprimands, threats, and deprivation.”[4]

Luther and his resounding influence

Present-day Germany and Poland were among the regions most yearning for religious and political reform, given the division and fragmentation, and the large number of political and economic grievances against merchants, industrialists, and peasants. In northern Germany in 1483 AD, Martin Luther was born into a poor family. The reason he joined the Faculty of Arts, University of Erfurt, where he studied philosophy and humanities, but Luther suddenly turned, following a psychological state he was going through, to prayer, asceticism, and monasticism in a monastery in the city, then he began teaching theology and preaching at the University of Wittenberg since 1508 AD, but the problem that has plagued him since joining the monastery Until that date, he was "full of terror and self-loathing, wanting salvation and forgiveness from his Lord, and looking for a satisfactory answer to this problem." In 1510 AD, when he visited Rome, he found the collapse of moral standards, and the vast discrepancy between the pleasures of the clergy in which they lived and what they preached in their sermons. and their sermons [5].

Then the problem became more complicated when Pope Leo X announced the expansion of the sale of indulgences for the establishment of St. Peter's Church in Rome, in exchange for forgiveness of sins, and as an alternative to participating in the Crusades against the Ottomans, the Mamluks and the countries of the Islamic Maghreb.

Meanwhile, Luther concluded that it is extremely unfair for people to get rid of sins through indulgences, and that getting rid of them should not be by prayer and worship only, but by giving praise to God and believing in Him, because faith is a condition of forgiveness, and the Pope does not have the right to usurp what It was one of God's attributes and his inherent right to forgive sins.

From that moment in the year 1517 A.D., the Lutheran fever spread, which was recognized by the Church in Rome for a temporary period during the Battle of Mohacs against the Ottomans, then the papacy soon withdrew its recognition.

Pope Leo X.

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Lutheranism caused an intellectual and revolutionary earthquake in Germany and the entire European continent, and even in Italy, the beating heart of the papacy, and the general public was allowed to see the interpretations of the Bible in German, Latin and others.

For more than twenty years, Luther's followers were allowed to publicly publish their opinions, and as soon as the year 1542 CE came, four years before Martin Luther's death, the papacy brought Luther's doctrine forward and spread even in Italy, because it made salvation and forgiveness a matter between the servant and his Lord, in which the church and its men have no right. 6].

The Christian Unitarian Movement

Martin Luther revolutionized the history of the Church and the history of Europe in the sixteenth century and what followed, and threw a stone in the stagnant lake in which the papacy dominated the public and politicians, and the popes and clergymen were like kings in wealth and wealth, especially the men of Rome, and if this led to the emergence of Lutheranism And Protestantism, it was accompanied by the emergence of "Christian monotheism", which is the doctrine that Catholics and Protestants gathered to describe its followers as heretical and infidel, and then deserve confrontation and crushing.

This Christian monotheistic movement began with the denial of the Trinity, for Christ, peace be upon him, was a prophet sent or a noble man of high rank, and at the head of the believers in these ideas was the theologian of Spanish origin "Miguel Servetus", who was strangely burned by the "Protestants" in 1553 AD by order of "John Calvin" One of the most famous pastors and theologians in the Christian reform movement of Protestants at the time.

Despite the burning of "Miguel Servetus", the monotheistic call that God is one, and that Christ is a "son" or that he is a prophet sent by him differs among them;

It reached its climax in the sixteenth century A.D. with the Italian origin "Fausto Sozzini", whose doctrine was famous in Europe for the "Suzinian" or "Socinian" doctrine or movement.

Fausto Sozzini.

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Sozzini tried to reconcile the conflicting factions within the "anti-Trinitarian movement", and he proved this attempt in his book "The Racovian Catechism" in relation to the Polish city of Rakov, which they took as a center for their movement and activity. Sozzini and his followers were able to Preaching and spreading their call away from politics and its methods, as Catholics and Protestants used to do on the European continent, but rather through the establishment of schools, church institutions and printing presses, and this movement spread until it reached Transylvania - in present-day Romania - and within the seventeenth century AD the movement had supporters in Germany, those lands From which Lutheranism erupted, and Altdrof University was the center of their scientific and theological activity [8].

The Socinian movement reached the borders of England, and their call was adopted by the famous English poet and writer "John Moulton", the author of the poem "Paradise Lost", and considered it one of the reformist movements.

But two years after Moulton's call, and his approval of publishing the book "Sozini", the English Parliament voted to confiscate and burn all circulating copies of the book "Racovian Christianity" known as "Racovian".

Despite the confiscation of the book in Britain, a revised Latin edition was found in 1680 AD in Amsterdam, which was revised by Andre, the grandson of Susini, and was the basis for the English translation that was later issued in 1818 AD[9].

With the burning of Socini's books, the Sucinians were subjected to organized brutal persecution in Europe in 1638 AD, and many of them were burned alive, and in the year 1658 CE they were given the choice between accepting Catholicism or going into exile, so the Unitarian Socinians were distributed in the outskirts of Europe.

And while the Socinian movement spread from Poland to Germany and from there to Britain and the Netherlands, the Catholics in Poland were able to have the upper hand after a short period of time, especially after King John Casimir came to power in 1648 AD, a Jesuit Catholic, and a cardinal at the same time.

It was for this reason that Casimir crushed the Socinians out of religious and then political motives.

This trio took upon itself the veto of the Trinitarianism in England. For example, the British priest and chemist Joseph Priestley focused on the deviations that afflicted Christianity, and wrote in that his book “The History of the Distortions of Christianity,” which came in two volumes.

This book provoked the followers of the English Church because it nullified the divinity of Christ, peace be upon him.

Priestley was also interested in chemistry with his theological activity, as he discovered oxygen in the year 1774 AD, and this gained him fame in the scientific community, and for this he was granted immunity from prosecution regarding his Christian monotheistic doctrine, then he decided to emigrate from Britain to the United States in his later life, and there he founded the “Unitarian Church.” (Unitarian Church).

In the same way was the American pastor, William Ellery Channing.

Thus, the Socinian monotheistic doctrine took advantage of the religious reform movement that began with Martin Luther during the sixteenth century AD, and revived the ancient Christian opinions that said the humanity of Christ, peace be upon him, from those who were persecuted and followed throughout the ages, such as "Paul Al-Shmeishati" Bishop of Antioch, and Bishop "Lucian" Antioch is a professor of Arius, and Arius is the founder of “Arianism” and the bishop of the Bukalis Church in Alexandria, who was mentioned by the Prophet Muhammad, may God’s prayers and peace be upon him, in his famous message to Heraclius, the Great of the Romans, where he said: “Be safe, and you will be safe; [12].

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Sources

[1] Miller: Brief History of the Church, p. 426.

[2] Modern European History from the Renaissance to the End of World War I, pp. 111, 112.

[3] John Lawrence: History of the Ancient and Modern Christian Church, p. 495 et seq.

[4] Miller: Ibid, p. 426.

[5] Jonathan Hale: History of Christian Thought, pp. 192-196.

[6] Brief History of the Church, p. 602.

[7] Will Durant: The Story of Civilization, Introduction to the Appendix, p. 17.

[8] Ibid, p. 17.

[9] William Bridges Hunter, The Milton Encyclopedia, Vol.

VIII, p.

13.

[10] Will Durant: Ibid, p. 18.

[11] Ahmed Al-Farak: Muslims, the West, and the Qur’anic Foundation for the Human Common, pp. 96-98.

[12] Narrated by Al-Bukhari (7) and Muslim (1773).