Dr. Tayeb Boutbagalt writes: Strengthening the position of the Catholic Church in Byzantine Morocco and the Amazigh uprising
In this series of 30 articles, Dr. Tayeb Boutbagalt addresses the most important historical stations that characterized Moroccan-Christian relations from the Roman era to the end of the twentieth century, and the goal remains only a modest contribution to enriching Moroccan historical research in order to strengthen the elements of our national identity...
The idea of restoring the Roman African provinces haunted all the Byzantine emperors, until Emperor Justinian I (482 AD - 565 AD), who had been ruler of Constantinople since the year 527 AD, was able to put a final end to the Vandal control over North Africa in the year 533 AD. This was one year after he signed a peace treaty with the Persian king Khosrau Anu Shirwan (501 AD-579 AD), which indicates the depth of his strategic thinking. Among what Justinian I did before declaring war against the Vandals, he organized a large-scale propaganda campaign among the Catholic bishops who supported him enthusiastically, to the point that his war project became as if his only goal was to help the Catholic Church. And when all the preparations were completed, Belisarius (500 AD-565 AD), the most famous and most capable of the Byzantine army leaders, led the military campaign.
The Byzantine fleet consisted of five hundred ships commanded by twenty thousand sailors and carrying ten thousand infantry and five thousand knights. They arrived on the African coast in June 533 AD, and after fierce battles they seized Carthage on September 13 of the same year. As a result, King Gilimar (530 AD-534 AD) fled, but the Byzantines chased him and he was arrested in March 534 AD in a mountainous area that seemed not far from Moroccan Nador. Thus, the Vandals were defeated in North Africa, after a period of time, when all the peoples of the Mediterranean basin had a thousand accounts for them. In fact, they were not the owners of a civilization, and for this reason they did not leave a meaningful cultural heritage, knowing that most of what is known about them was only through their enemies, who were likely to be silent about some things and exaggerated other things.
When the Byzantine soldiers set foot on African soil, the Catholics received them warmly and welcomed them and considered them liberators, while the general Amazighs remained in a state of anticipation as if this war was not a war that concerned them, especially since the commander Belisarius was able to convince them that his soldiers would abide by respecting their honor and property, and that his presence in Africa is in fact directed against The tyranny of the Vandals and their oppression, and indeed the Amazighs coordinated the Byzantine war propaganda. They were not surprised that the African Church celebrated this conquest because it was the first beneficiary, and soon the latter regained its activity and its property that was confiscated by the Vandals. Even more than that, the Byzantines issued an imperial law in the year 535 A.D. to isolate the Donati and Aryosian dissidents from public office, while completely preventing them from engaging in any religious activity that contradicts the Catholic doctrine.
The Byzantines also took the initiative to divide North Africa into seven administrative provinces, distributed in turn into four ecclesiastical provinces. Due to the weakness of the Christian population in the western side, Mauritania, Tangiers, Caesarea, and Setifia constituted only one ecclesiastical province. Note that the presence of the Byzantines in Tangier Mauritania seemed to be mainly confined to the city of Ceuta, which was taken as a western Byzantine base for security control. It became clear that Emperor Justinian I's plan was aimed, in essence, at enabling him to gather the religious and worldly powers, but new divisions within the church itself and the worsening Byzantine political situation prevented him from achieving his ambition.
The propaganda ploy based on a sham appeasement did not involve the Amazigh elements for long. After only two years of Byzantine colonization, the Amazighs moved in relentless uprisings against the new occupier, which continued until the end of the Byzantine era in Africa. During these confrontations, the Amazighs were able to defeat and kill three prominent Byzantine leaders: Theodore (569 AD), Theoctustus (570 AD), and Amabilis (571 AD). To Africa, a significant population decline was recorded, estimated at five million of Roman origins and collaborators with the Byzantines, all of whom left the African provinces towards Spain to avoid attacks by the indigenous population.
This, of course, is another direct indication from which the very limited spread of the Christian religion in Amazigh society is derived. As it is not logical that the African Church, which was considered a legitimate daughter of the Church of Rome, did not intervene in order to calm the situation and urge the Amazighs to peaceful coexistence with their brothers in religion. It is clear that her weight was light and that her presence was above all linked to foreign communities that had a relationship with colonial settlement in the region. Had the situation been otherwise, things would not have turned out as they have...
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