Zacharias privilege

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Archbishop Bonifatius obtained the so-called Zacharias privilege of 751 from Pope Zacharias for the Fulda monastery, which he founded and is still under construction, to protect it from uninvited interference by church officials.

reasons

Boniface found himself in a problematic situation in view of his dwindling influence on the Frankish imperial church after the failure of his plan to establish the system of the metropolitan constitution and to create a Mainz church province . The situation was exacerbated by his old age and the unsuccessfulness of his efforts to clarify the question of succession in the diocese of Mainz before he set out on the Frisian mission in favor of his pupil Lullus . Therefore Bonifatius apparently tried to protect at least the Fulda monastery , which was chosen as his burial place and which was directed by his student Sturmius . He evidently endeavored to remove it from the threatening grip of Frankish bishops who - like his predecessor Gewiliobus in Mainz  - did not meet the canonical requirements and threatened to destroy the monastic life established on a Benedictine basis in the Anglo-Saxon tradition .

Legal consequences

The legal consequences of the Zacharias privilege are controversial in research.

One theory says that it was a matter of an exemption privilege by which the monastery or the abbot was freed from any influence by church officials, including the responsible diocesan bishop , by the fact that the pope directly did it on his own, but in fact on the basis of the had hardly exercised power of disposal over a large distance. It would have been free in the choice of the bishops to be called upon for ordinations and judicial measures and thus would have been able to separate from the diocesan association.

However, it is more probable and consistent with the actual practice that can be observed that the responsibility of the respective diocesan bishop for the episcopal official acts on the Fulda properties, which are distributed over several dioceses (especially the diocese of Mainz and the diocese of Würzburg ), remained. Their perception, however, was linked to the previous invitatio (invitation) by the abbot and the convent. Otherwise, every donation would have had to lead to an outsourcing of the area in question from diocesan authority or the arbitrary assumption that the Zacharias privilege only related to the founding equipment, which would have made it largely worthless. In this way, however, by leaving its possessions in the respective diocesan association, it gave the monastery a limited, but by no means insignificant strengthening of its independence due to the reservation of invitation. It was nevertheless reinterpreted as an exemption privilege, but only at a later time.

interpretation

After Boniface's death in 754, his disciples Lul and Sturmi had a bitter dispute over the interpretation of the Zacharias privilege. As the responsible diocesan bishop, Lul claimed control of the monastery (the view that the main monastery also belonged to the diocese of Würzburg and that Lul had therefore relied on a monastery right inherited from Boniface) and successor to the initiator of the founding of the monastery, Boniface, and Sturmi insisted on appeal on the Zacharias privilege on his independence. This led to the intervention of Pippin , who deposed Sturmi in 763 after defamation, but already pardoned and restituted it again in 765, whereby the rule of Lul, to whom he had given the monastery and whose presbyter Markus, appointed provost, had already failed due to the passive resistance of the Fulda monks and a conventual named Prezzold had to give way, ended. The monastery was reimbursed the Zacharias privilege previously confiscated by Pippin, but has now been included in the protection of the king , giving it the status, but also the duties of an imperial monastery . On the one hand, due to the extensive secular tasks associated with it, including the provision of troops and the frequent absence of the abbot, who was used by the imperial service, this was in complete contradiction to the original intentions of Boniface and in the subsequent period was to lead to significant interventions by the ruler in several times the internal affairs of the monastery and, despite the guaranteed free election of abbots, lead to influence on the occupation of the Abbatiat. On the other hand, it meant the highest degree of independence that a monastery could attain in Carolingian times.

Later episodes

The Zacharias privilege later, in a distorted form, became the basis for the gradual acquisition of a wealth of rights by the Fulda abbots, such as tithe rights, the primacy among the abbots of Gaul and Germania, the right to wear pontificals at mass, abbot ordination and jurisdiction about the abbot by the Pope, the right of appeal to the Holy See (all already in the 9th or 10th century) and the exercise of episcopal jurisdiction rights (since the early 16th century), a development that after a long time, in the age of Mabillon established diplomacy also with scientific methods led disputes (especially between Johann Friedrich Schannat and Johann Georg von Eckhart ) in the 18th century finally to the appointment of an auxiliary and titular bishop (one after the other Stephan von Clodh and Amand von Buseck 1727) and on October 5th 1752 found its conclusion in the elevation to the prince-bishopric.

literature

Edition
  • Edmund E. Stengel : Document book of the Fulda monastery = publications of the historical commission for Hesse and Waldeck 10, vol. 1, 1, no. 15, pp. 25–32.
Secondary literature
  • Gereon Becht-Jördens: New information on the legal status of the Fulda Abbey from the Vita Aegil of Brun Candidus . In: Hessisches Jahrbuch für Landesgeschichte 41, 1991, pp. 11–29.
  • Gereon Becht-Jördens: The murder of the Archbishop Bonifatius by the Frisians. Searching for and shaping a martyrdom out of ecclesiastical necessity? In: Archive for Middle Rhine Church History 57, 2005, pp. 95–132, here pp. 101–108, esp. Note 21f., P. 101ff.
  • Ulrich Hussong : Studies on the history of the imperial abbey of Fulda up to the turn of the millennium , part I – II. In: Archive bes. Part I, pp. 47–95, v. a. P. 61ff., For further legal developments p. 167–225.
  • Ulrich Hussong: The imperial abbey of Fulda in the early and high Middle Ages. With a view of the late Middle Ages . In: Walter Heinemeyer, Berthold Jäger (Hrsg.): Fulda in his story. Landscape, Imperial Abbey, City (publications of the Historical Commission Hesse 57). Parzeller, Fulda, Elwert, Marburg 1995, pp. 89-179, here pp. 89-102.
  • Berthold Jäger: On the economic and legal development of the Fulda monastery in its early days. In: Marc-Aeilko Aris, Susanna Bullido del Barrio (ed.): Hrabanus Maurus in Fulda. With a Hrabanus Maurus bibliography (1979-2009) (Fuldaer Studien 13). Josef Knecht, Frankfurt am Main 2010, pp. 81–120, here pp. 109–111. ISBN 978-3-7820-0919-5
  • Lotte Kéry: Abbey exodus in the wilderness? Boniface and the privilege of Zacharias for Fulda (751) . In: Archive for Middle Rhine Church History 60, 2008, pp. 75–110.
  • Theo Kölzer: Bonifatius and Fulda. Legal, diplomatic and cultural aspects . In: Archive for Middle Rhine Church History 57, 2005, pp. 25–53.
  • Josef Leinweber: The Fulda abbots and bishops . Josef Knecht, Frankfurt am Main 1989, p. 13.
  • Mogens Rathsack: The Fulda forgeries . A legal historical analysis of the papal privileges of the Fulda Monastery from 751 - approx. 1158 (Popes and Papacy 24), Stuttgart 1989.