Christianity, which had been established as an official religion in the former Roman Empire as early as the 4th century A. D., had become firmly rooted in it by the end of the 9th century and was the ideological foundation of the early feudal civilization. The Bulgarians could by no means join this civilization unless they adopted Christianity as their official religion. In spite of the brilliant military victories of the Bulgarian Khans and Bulgaria’s having become one of the most powerful European states, two centuries after its foundation the country was still belonging to the pagan, ‘barbarian’ world.
Christianity became a vital necessity
The adoption of Christianity became a vital necessity, not only for settling the country’s international situation, but also for its internal consolidation. Both Slavs and Bulgarians were heathens but they believed in different gods, had different ways of life and customs and this drew them apart, in spite of their belonging to one and the same state. The measures taken by Kroum and his successors for the legal and political equalizing of the two : ethnical groups and for building up a centralized state apparatus were insufficient to create the indispensable internal ethnical link. Besides, the heathen belief in more than one god did not assist the establishment of the autocratic rule of the head of state.
Khan Boris (852-889) was a statesman who was acutely aware of these historical tasks and who daringly undertook to solve them. He had good reasons to feel ap-prehensive of the growing Byzantine influence in the country and sought the help of the German Emperor (in 843 the Frankish Empire was divided into three parts) asking him to serve as intermediary in Bulgaria’s adoption of Christianity from Rome. Byzantium reacted without delay by organizing an impressive military campaign against Bulgaria. The condition for signing peace was that the Bulgarians should be converted to Christianity by the Byzantine Church.
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