What happened to the Christian Majority of Turkey?

according to the current government of turkey 99.8% of their population is Muslim with most of them following the tenants of Sunni Islam the road to this near unanimity of faith is a long one beginning in the 7th Century with the early spread of Islam prior to this Asia Minor was predominantly Christian and included two of the most important centers of Christian history and practice Constantinople and Antioch within its borders the first major push of Muslims into this territory was the Battle of manzer in 1071 when the selic Turks took a huge portion of Anatolia from the byzantines a century and a half later a local leader from this Muslim dominated territory began consolidating and expanding his power when his descendants conqu at Constantinople in 1453 they forcibly ended the Byzantine Empire and began nearly 5 centuries of Ottoman rule this video is brought to you by triple 10 everyone wants to increase their income or work from anywhere in the world and travel getting into Tech and studying at triple 10 will help you get there how well triple 10 is a platform for online education it helps more than 1,000 people change their lives by offering flexible beginner-friendly online boot camps 87% of their grads get hired in 6 months or less with the aid of triple 10 people are transforming their lives and succeeding in this digital age it's well-known technology boot camps accept applicants from all backgrounds and offer flexible study schedules tailored for real world situations the greatest professional preparation and assistance in getting employment in the technology sector and even if you're trying to figure out your career Direction try taking a career consultation with a triple 10 adviser absolutely for free for example if you choose the software engineer course you can earn $75,100 after graduation get a job or get a refund guarantee if it takes more than 6 months to get the job you trained for they will refund 100% of your tuition click my link in the description to get 30% off valid on all their programs whether it is called Anatolia Asia Minor or turkey this area is and has been an important connection point between the west and the East its location on the eastern coast of the Mediterranean means that it was the home of many early Christian communities and was Central to the romanization of Christianity after its adoption by Constantine in 313 CE this Roman Emperor sought to unify Christianity by making the belief structure uniform so in 3:25 he calls together a council in NAA a city near to his new capital of Constantinople in Asia Minor the Bishops gathered there debated the various doctrines in practice throughout the Christian world and decided which ones were correct rendering the rest heretical this was an important step in making Christianity the official religion of the empire in 380 once Rome was in part defined by the ably universal practicing of Christianity all of the territory under its control including what would become turkey was now Christian despite the efforts at uniformity by Constantine and his Imperial successors irreconcilable differences developed across the East West divide by the 11th century there were two major Christian churches the Western Roman Catholic with Rome at its Center and the Eastern Orthodox with Constantinople at its Center this reflected not only religious differences but also social and economic ones the West had done its best to make sure there was religious Conformity within its States but this was also the result of geography Muslims had taken control of most of the Iberian Peninsula but there were very few Muslims who lived in Western Christian kingdoms and were part of their communities Jews were found across Europe but they were generally relegated to one part of a city or town prohibited from practicing many professions and were under constant threat of being spelled on the whim of the local leadership Byzantium on the other hand was Multicultural with Jews and Muslims living and working alongside Christians and each other this was less intentional than the way Western Europe had stayed mostly Christian but also a result of geography there were more Jewish people in the area to start with and it was physically closer to where Islam began and began to spread from in the 7th Century just like in Christian lands there were Muslim groups vying for power and resources within their territories the fatimids had come into power in the Muslim territories in the early 10th Century they did of course have conflicts with the byzantines but the two groups were on relatively good terms in comparison to how they interacted with another Muslim group the seljuk Turks the Turks have been pushing into ter territory held by their co-religionists and the Christian byzantines when they had won a major battle in Asia Minor at manaker in late August of 1071 this caused a massive demographic change on the peninsula as the Selix took control of approximately 78,000 square kilm and immediately began settling their people in the conquered territory it was also perhaps more importantly incredibly destabilizing for the byzantines and an indicator to the worlds that they were not Invincible even though it would take another 382 years this battle is marked as the beginning of the end for the Byzantine Empire by many historians as the Turks settled into their newly conquered territory which they called The Rum sultanate the byzantines fought each other for control over their empire it would be a generation before any order was restored and even then Emperor Alexis common felt he could not successfully maintain his territory without help his request to the pope for soldiers from Western Europe is what prompted the Crusades it was from the rum sultanate that the next major Muslim power arose the Ottomans this Empire began with the conquests of Osman I who extended his influence by by taking control of nearby Byzantine land within a century the Ottomans had gained control over a great deal of Byzantine territory as well as parts of the Balkans and Eastern Europe but the key to even greater success was the city of Constantinople Sultan mhmed the Conqueror took the city on the 29th of May 1453 ending the Byzantine Empire the territory was now held by a Muslim political entity but that did not mean that Christians had to stop their way of life Muslims are Duty bounds to accept their fellows of abrahamic faiths Jews and Christians because they were all people of the book The Eastern Orthodox Church continued to operate in its capital city now called Istanbul in Anatolia under the Ottoman Empire Christians and Jews had some sociopolitical limitations imposed on them they paid higher taxes could not carry weapons and could not ride on Horseback among others they were classified as members of a millet according to their professed Faith the millets were internally self-governing communities of Jews or Christians who were free to conduct their Affairs without interference from the Ottomans as long as they remained loyal they were also not requires to adhere to Islamic law Eastern Orthodox Christians were members of the rum milit which operated under the Roman laws of Justinian the legal system of the Eastern Roman and Byzantine Empires other Christian sects like the Armenians had their own milit as did Jews despite these self-governing milit non-muslims were still disadvantaged within the Empire and so many of them converted in order to have the social and legal benefits of being members of the ruling Community by the end of the 19th century less than 20% of the Empire's population was non-muslim when the Ottomans conquered Byzantium the Empire as a whole had a majority Christian population but it slowly shifted due to migration and conversions this included the system that populated the janissary forces children were recruited or conscripted from non-muslim families converted to Islam and trained from a very young age to be soldiers loyal to the sultan despite the fact that they had their sons taken from them many parents particularly in poor areas wanted their son to be brought into the janissary Corp because it would give them better opportunities in life this method of filling the Army ended in the 17th century but had a great influence on the population's religious demographics the nationalism that developed across Europe in the 19th century did not exclude the Ottoman Empire uprisings seeking Independence in places like Greece Romania and Bosnia led to Wars but were ultimately successful in gaining their independence turkey itself also came out of a nationalist movement some nationalist movements collided with each other for example the Armenians were almost completely removed by Turkish nationalists as well as Soviets between World War I and the Turkish war of independence all of this reduced the number of non-muslims in Anatolia the Ottoman Empire was dissolved at the end of World War I at the end of the Turkish war of independence in 1923 the territory of Asia Minor Anatolia became the Republic of Turkey its government was designed to be secular with no one religion being favored over another even so there was a large shift in population between Greece and Turkey meaning that turkey gained more Muslims while Greece gained more Christians

Channel: Knowledgia

Views: 85,625

Keywords: Documentary, Who was the last of the Flavian dynasty?, What was the symbol of the Flavian dynasty?, Was Constantine a Flavian?, History of the flavian dynasty, flavian dynasty, Emperor Vespasian, Titus, Domitian, History of the Roman Empire, Roman Empire, Rome, History of the Roman Republic, Roman Republic, Rome sack of Jerusalem, Roman History, Why did the Flavian Dynasty collapse, Why did the Roman Empire collapse

Id: pJZ_wVm-ZUA

Length: 12min 11sec (731 seconds)

Published: Mon May 20 2024