The Roman Empire, one of the largest, most influential, dominant empires for over 500 years was suddenly deteriorating, becoming vulnerable and susceptible to barbaric invasion when its capital gets relocated to Constantinople. The rise of the Roman Catholic church and their orthodox theocratic rule, drive this already vulnerable empire into the dark ages, with their oppressive power, hindering innovation and progress while also becoming responsible of holding the warring states together under one religion. In giving evidence for the languish of this great empire, I will also establish how a very strong Bedouin tribe in Arabia unites, in the name of Islam, to become a strong political force, patronizing medicine and innovations, encouraging …show more content…
This was a disastrous move for Rome because without the power of the central government being in Rome they also lost the protection of the Roman legions from threats of barbaric invasions from the Germanic tribes like the Visigoths, considerably deteriorating the Western Roman Empire.
In addition to this, what further weakened the empire was the patronage given to the church by Constantine because of his victory when crossing the Milvian Bridge where in a vision he saw the symbol of the cross on the sun and the words, “By this conquer”. He converted to Christianity and decided to unite the empire under one religion by canonizing the doctrine of the church and standardizing Christianity throughout the empire. This was a great blow to the diversity of religious freedom favored by Roman rule up to that point.
The “Nicene Creed” was a doctrinal statement of key elements of Christian theology, established by the bishops of the church and Constantine to regulate Christianity. Those who did not adhere to the “Nicene Creed” were considered heretics. They became more obsessed with doctrine rather than rituals. The Gnostics, Marcionites and other subgroups of Christianity were persecuted as a result of not adhering to the Orthodox movement as determined by the