SECTION VI.
THE
BULGARIAN EMPIRE AND ITS BOGOMIL CZARS.
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HE doctrine had during the tenth
century taken deep root in Bulgaria and Servia. The czar Samuel, the most
illustrious ruler of the Bulgarian Empire, was himself a convert to the faith,
while of one of the early Serbian princes, St. Vladimir, it is recorded that he
was the zealous enemy of the Bogomils, though his son Gabriel and his wife were
members of that sect. From its first introduction into these countries the
professors of the Bogomilian faith, under whatever names they were
known, had been active propagandists and missionaries, and their success was
the more remarkable from the extreme simplicity of their ritual and their
absolute avoidance of all appeals to the sensuous element in human nature.
Though Bulgaria and Servia were at this time independent states, at least so
far as the Byzantine Empire was concerned, the state churches were in accord
with the Church of Constantinople, and acknowledged their allegiance to
the Greek Patriarch. Whatever we may think now of Byzantine architecture, the
gorgeous ornamentation of the churches within and without, their chimes of
bells, their pillars, porticoes, naves, transepts, and chancels of the most
costly marbles and syenites[1],
their altars resplendent with jewels, the sacred paintings and sculptures
glowing with color which adorned the walls, the air heavy with the odor of
precious incense, and the richly-robed priests and bishops who chanted and
intoned the service,—were all it would have seemed, so attractive to the
Oriental taste, with its love of beauty and of sensuous delights, that no
simpler and ruder service would have commanded their attention for a moment.
[1] Syenites - any of a class of intrusive igneous rocks essentially composed of an alkali feldspar and a ferromagnesian mineral. Encyclopædia Britannica 2007 Ultimate Reference Suite . Chicago: Encyclopædia Britannica, 2014. - lk