Paulicianism

The Paulicians called themselves "Good Christians" or "True Believers", The name 'Paulician' was used by outsiders to refer to the sect and literally means 'the followers of Paul'. The identity of the Paul for whom the movement was named is disputed. Certain medieval Byzantine and Muslim sources associate the sect with the 3rd century Bishop of Antioch, Paul of Samosata. This may be a conflation with the separate Paulianist sect, however, and the earliest Byzantine source to describe the movement explicitly distinguishes the "Paul of Samosata" supposed to have given the movement its name from the more famous heresiarch. Another possible source is Paul the Armenian, an otherwise obscure Paulician figure said to have led the sect in its migration to Episparis following its persecution by Justinian II at the close of the 7th century. ==History==

Origins and growth The sources indicate that most Paulician leaders were Armenians and the founder of the sect is said to have been an Armenian by the name of Constantine, Despite deportations and continued persecution the sect continued to grow, receiving additions from some of the iconoclasts. Sergius succeeded in supplanting Baanes, the leader of the old party, by 801 and was active for the next thirty-four years. His activity was the occasion of renewed persecutions on the part of Leo the Armenian. Upon the death of Sergius, the control of the sect was divided between several leaders. Formation of Paulician state In 843, the Empress Theodora, as regent to her son Michael III, instituted a major persecution against the Paulicians throughout Asia Minor in which 100,000 adherents in Byzantine Armenia alone were said to have lost their lives or property. In response to the renewed persecution many Paulicians, under their new leader Karbeas, fled across the border to the areas of Armenia under Arab control. Under the protection of Umar al-Aqta, the Emir of Melitene, the sect was permitted by the Arabs to build two fortress cities, Amara and Tephrike, and establish an independent state. Karbeas died in 863 during Michael III's campaign against the Arabs and possibly was with Umar at Malakopea before the Battle of Lalakaon. Karbeas's successor, Chrysocheres ('the goldenhand'), devastated many cities in the continued wars with the Byzantines; in 867, he advanced as far as Ephesus, where he took many priests as prisoners. In 868, Emperor Basil I dispatched Petrus Siculus to arrange for their exchange. His sojourn of nine months among the Paulicians gave him an opportunity to collect many facts, which he preserved in his History of the empty and vain heresy of the Manichæans, otherwise called Paulicians. The propositions of peace were not accepted, the war was renewed, and Chrysocheres was killed at Battle of Bathys Ryax in 872 or 878. Destruction of Paulician state and displacement By 878, the emperor Basil I had conquered the Paulician strongholds in Asia Minor (including Tephrike) and the survivors from the destruction of the Paulician state were largely displaced. One group migrated east further into Armenia, where they were assimilated into the emerging Tondrakian sect throughout the 10th century. At the end of the 17th century, these Roman Catholic descendants of Paulicians were living around Nikopol, Bulgaria, and suffered religious persecution by the Ottomans. After the uprising of Chiprovtsi in 1688, a large number of this group fled across the Danube, settled in the Banat region and became known as Banat Bulgarians. After Bulgaria's liberation from Ottoman rule in 1878, a number of these Banat Bulgarians resettled in the northern part of Bulgaria. In Armenia, after the Russo-Turkish War of 1828–1829, communities whose practices were believed to be influenced by the Paulicians or Tondrakians could still be found in the part of Armenia controlled by Russia. Documents of their professions of faith and disputations with the Gregorian bishop about 1837 were later published by Frederick Cornwallis Conybeare. ==Beliefs==

The Paulicians self-identified as Christians, but much about the nature of their beliefs is disputed. Their beliefs prompted Christian critics to brand them as Jews, Muslims, and Manichaeans but it is likely that their opponents employed these as pejorative appellations meant as terms of abuse, rather than as an accurate reflection of their beliefs. Examples of the disputed doctrines of the Paulicians include debate as to how they perceived the nature of God, the nature of Christ, and debate surrounding their worship rituals. Sources There are few sources for the beliefs of the Paulicians except for the reports of opponents and some Paulician material preserved in the History of the Paulician Heresy by Petrus Siculus, comprising certain letters ascribed to Sergius-Tychicus and, seemingly, a reworking of an account of their history composed by the Paulicians themselves. For some scholars, another major source is The Key of Truth, a text claimed to be a manual of the medieval Paulician or Tondrakian church in Armenia. This text was first identified by Armenian ecclesiastical authorities in 1837 while tracing a group of dissidents led by Hovhannes Vartabedian; British Orientalist Frederick Conybeare published a translation and edition of it in 1898. The manuscript transmission of the Key is traced to the late 18th century, leading historians to raise doubts over its background, with some suggesting that its composition was influenced by Protestant missionary activity in Armenia at that time. Dualism Some scholars argue that the Paulician belief system was dualistic, a cosmological system of twin, opposing deities; an Evil demiurge who is author and lord of the present visible world; and a Good Spirit who is the God of the future world. Eighteenth century scholar Johann Lorenz von Mosheim criticised the identification of Paulicians as Manichaeans, and although he agreed both sects were dualistic, he argued that the Paulicians differed on several points and undoubtedly rejected the doctrine of the prophet Mani. The reports of Catholic missionaries working among the remaining Paulicians in the Balkans during the 16th–18th centuries do not reference dualist beliefs. Christology Paulicians may have held several unorthodox beliefs about Jesus, including nontrinitarianism (the belief that Jesus was not coeternal, coequal and indivisibly united in one being with God the Father and the Holy Spirit) and docetism (the belief that Jesus only seemed to be human, and that his human form was an illusion). Nontrinitarian beliefs were held by Arian Christians and many early Christian sects such as the Adoptionists. The identification with nontrinitarianism sometimes led the Paulicians to be labeled as Arians by critics Conybeare also asserted that the movement were survivors of early Adoptionist Christianity in Armenia rather than dualist or Gnostic sects. Conybeare's theory, part of a broader argument that Adoptionism represented the original form of Christianity that had subsequently been suppressed by the Catholic Church, met a skeptical reception at the time. In the 1960s, however, Nina Garsoïan, in a comprehensive study of both Greek and Armenian sources, argued in support of a link to Adoptionism, and asserted that Paulicianism independently developed features of docetism and dualism. In a paper presented to the Unitarian Christian Alliance Conference in 2022, Atlanta Bible College adjunct professor Sean Finnegan argued that the Armenian sect which produced The Key of Truth, while nontrinitarian, did not hold an Adoptionist Christology. Evidence against an Adoptionist Christology includes an affirmation of the virgin birth in chapter 23 of The Key of Truth, as well as the use of the phrase "only-born" in The Key of Truth chapters 2, 17, 21, and 22. Rituals, practices and views of scripture The Paulicians were said to have used a different canon of sacred texts from the orthodox Christian bible. Byzantine scholars claimed that the sect accepted the four Gospels (especially of Luke); In the putatively Paulician or Tondrakian work The Key of Truth, copied in the 18th century, the Old Testament, Baptism, Penance, and the Eucharist are all accepted. Early modern Catholic reports of the Paulicians remaining in the Balkans claimed that they were iconoclasts, rejecting the veneration of images and the Cross, that they used fire rather than water in baptism, and that they had a relatively simple conception of priesthood. The practice of baptism by fire by Paulicians in the region before their conversion to Catholicism is corroborated by the contemporary English diplomat Paul Rycaut. ==Historiography==

In the 1940s, Soviet scholars saw the sect primarily as a product of proletarian revolt which found expression through a theological movement. Garsoïan agreed that this assertion is supported by both Greek and Armenian sources, but held it only a limited description of the sect. == See also ==