What was the Holy Roman Empire?
A crown placed on a Frankish king's head in Rome on Christmas Day of the year 800 created something new: an emperor of the West made by a pope. What that arrangement actually was — a genuine continuation of ancient Rome, a partnership of church and state, or a rivalry waiting to erupt — and how it relates to what the Bible says about Rome's future, is what the writers below take up.
The coronation that started it
The empire began as a trade. The pope needed a military protector; Charlemagne, king of the Franks, needed legitimacy.
Church HistoryOverwhelmed with gratitude, and fully conscious of his own need of a permanent defender, the pope crowned Charlemagne on Christmas Eve of the year 800 with the crown of the Western empire, and proclaimed him Caesar Augustus. A Frankish prince, a Teuton, was thus declared the successor of the Caesars, and wielded all the power of the Emperor of the West.
The act also cut a political cord. Rome had belonged, at least on paper, to the emperor in Constantinople.
For the YoungCharles protested against the act, but it is doubted whether it was not all arranged beforehand and with his consent. This severed Rome from the Greek empire (to which it was nominally attached), and made it a sort of capital of the West.
The idea behind it: church and state as one
The word "Holy" in the title points to the theory that held the whole thing together. One writer traces how that theory was sold to Charlemagne, and what the priests around him actually wanted out of it.
Church HistoryOn this the pope acted, and led him to believe that a strong and wealthy church would make a strong and wealthy State; and that if he would please heaven and gain eternal life, the harmonious union of Church and State must be the basis of all his plans of government.
In practice the church did not merely stand beside the state — it climbed above it, and the same writer reads that arrangement in the picture of the woman seated on the beast in Revelation 17.
Church HistoryThe purple of the Caesars was claimed by the popes, the imperial eagles were exchanged for the cross-keys, and his Holiness was proclaimed a universal monarch... Rome imperial never inspired such terror by its arms as Rome papal by her curses.
A partnership that turned into war
Once a pope could give a crown, he could claim the right to take one away. The clash between Emperor Henry IV and Gregory VII shows how far that claim went.
Church HistoryIn a full assembly of one hundred and ten bishops, he suspended the churchmen who had voted and spoken against him. He then pronounced the excommunication of the Emperor, declaring "that he had forfeited the kingdoms of Germany and Italy, and that his subjects were released from their oath of loyalty."
Was it the empire of prophecy?
Commentators differ over how much prophetic weight this medieval empire carries. Some interpreters treated it as the continuing fourth kingdom of Daniel; one writer picks apart that reading, noting how unsteady it is even in the hands of those who hold it:
J. N. Darby"The ten kings have hardly ever ceased to own a holy Roman empire." "One might almost say it has lasted till our day." He had positively affirmed it two pages before. But elsewhere he admits there had been a gap of sixty years.
Others simply note its end date and look elsewhere for the fulfilment. Two institutions born of that alliance came to a close within living memory of these writers — the empire itself, and the pope's rule over territory.
William KellyThe "Holy Roman Empire" established by Charlemagne passed away in 1806, and the "temporal power" of the Pope in 1870; but students of prophecy look for an alliance between the powers pictured in Revelation 13 as "beasts."
What is still expected
The common thread is that Rome's story is not finished. Daniel's image, with its feet of iron mixed with clay, is read as a description of Europe now — broken up, but not gone.
W. TrotterThis is just what has happened to the once tightly united Roman empire. It has been "divided," but still "there is in it some of the strength of the iron." In this sense the Roman empire still exists: no longer as one undivided whole, but in broken and fragmentary parts. Most of the strong nations of Europe are only broken pieces of the old Roman empire.
Summary
- Crown. It began on Christmas Eve 800, when a pope crowned Charlemagne with the crown of the Western empire and named him successor of the Caesars.
- Bargain. Its founding idea was that a strong, wealthy church makes a strong, wealthy state — the union of church and state as the basis of government.
- Reversal. The junior partner became the master: popes claimed the purple of the Caesars, and Gregory VII declared an emperor stripped of his kingdoms.
- Collapse. The empire ended in 1806, and the pope's rule over territory in 1870 — neither survived as the prophetic power.
- Expectation. Rome remains "divided" yet still carrying the strength of iron in the nations of Europe, awaiting the revival Scripture describes.