9 August, AD 2013 – This time in history.

Genesis 1:2a King James Version – And the earth was without form, and void…

‘without form’ – tohuw – place of chaos;

“Most history is untold and unknown to most.

We look at history as a timeline of what someone has suggested has relevance to our own lives.

AD abbreviation – Anno Domini (used to indicate that a date comes the specified number of years after the traditional date of Christ’s birth). Forgotten in secular timelines.

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AD 753 – AD 1806 — The Holy Roman Empire

By the time of its end, the Holy Roman Empire was far from holy, had nothing to do with Rome and evolved slowly from powerful Empire of Charlemagne to a powerless attempt to keep title of sovereignty from Napoleon.  The sometime anarchy from power plays of royalty and church leadership was just one facet of a complex schism of the Church with political alliances divided between Rome in the West and Constantinople, Alexandria, Antioch and Jerusalem in the East.

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AD 1375– AD 1378 The War of the Eight Saints, carried on with spates of unprecedented cruelty to civilians…

9 August, in the year of our Lord 1378, French bishops declared Urban VI’s election as pope invalid. This began the great schism in which two and then three popes claimed the Holy See of Rome at once. Once in office, Urban (ca. 1318–1389) had become overbearing.

1378 A.D to 1417 A.D. – Western Schism or Papal Schism was a split within the Catholic Church.  Two men simultaneously claimed to be the true pope, driven by politics rather than any theological disagreement. The Western Schism is sometimes called the Great Schism, although this term is also applied to the East–West Schism of 1054 A.D.

“Doubt still shrouds the validity of the three rival lines of pontiffs during the four decades subsequent to the still disputed papal election of 1378. This makes suspect the credentials of the cardinals created by the Roman, Avignon, and Pisan claimants to the Apostolic See.” ^[3]

Urban was declared excommunicated by the French antipope and was called “the Antichrist“, while Catherine of Siena, defending Pope Urban, called the cardinals “devils in human form.

On the death of Charles of Naples in 1386, Urban contrived to take advantage of the anarchy which had ensued and in August 1388 Urban moved from Perugia with thousands of troops.

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AD 1432 – Mehmed II was born in this capital of the Ottoman Empire. Islamic education had a great impact in molding the mindset of Mehmed and reinforcing his Muslim beliefs. He began to praise and promote the application of Sharia law.

The influence of Ak Şemseddin in Mehmed’s life became predominant from a young age, especially in the imperative of fulfilling his Islamic duty to overthrow the Byzantine empire by conquering Constantinople.^[5]

AD 1453 – The capture of Constantinople marked the end of the last remnant of the Roman Empire, an imperial state which had lasted for nearly 1,500 years.  The Christian Church had been divided by the Great Schism of 1378 for less than 80 years and the enemy of Christ extends the political and religious power of Islam.

Edirne, in northwest Turkey located north of the Aegean Sea and south of the Black sea, was formerly known as Adrianople and borders areas of conquest between Rome and its invaders.  During the existence of the Latin Empire of Constantinople, the Crusaders were decisively defeated by the Bulgarian Emperor Kaloyan in the battle of Adrianople (1205).

To be continued…