Thus, when the Greek Revolution broke out, classical Greece had become the model for every European bourgeois society. The younger Greeks, therefore, did not, like other peoples, have to invent or reinvent their own historical past.
Despite the fact that the time of the Revolution did not allow the European orientation of the Greeks to be questioned, the creation of the state, however, will be an important intersection in their relations with the "protector" Europe. In the new context, the Greek national idea no longer has the same content for Europeans as it did during the Struggle, while Philhellenism had also begun to disappear with the end of the Revolution. Not so much because the Europeans realized that the Neo-Greeks did not resemble the ancient statues nor did they possess the wisdom of Socrates and the honesty of Aristides, but mainly because they could not accept what for the inhabitants of the young kingdom was self-evident:that the creation of the state it was the beginning of its expansion process. For European governments, Greek independence was an element of Greece's disobedience towards them.
For their part, the Greeks, having adopted for the three guarantor Powers (England, France, Russia) the term "protectors" -without it appearing in any official text-, made clear the way they themselves perceived the European guarantees for the creation of their state; their given dependence on the "powerful", to whom they recognized that they owed their existence, meant at the same time the support they expected in their subsequent course. Thus any deviation from this "given" was perceived as a "breach" of their "obligation". After all, the three parties that were created during the Revolution testify to the great importance that the revolutionary Greeks attached to the support of Europe and their preference for the Force, whose intervention they favored or expected the most. However, this "obligation" of the Europeans had much deeper roots than the "responsibilities" assumed by the Powers towards the newly established state after the naval battle of Navarino:it meant that they had to politically redeem their spiritual debt towards ancient Greece.
The philhellenic attitude of Europe during the Revolution had convinced the Greeks that as the "nation par excellence" they were the chosen ones of the Europeans. However, they will soon be disappointed by the attitude of the guarantors of their independence towards the Great Idea. Unable to understand the causes of the change, they tried to convince their "benefactors" of the rightness of the Greek claims, when, on the occasion of the crises of the Eastern Question, they rose up against the Ottoman Empire.
The Crimean War, in 1853, will dispel the illusions of the Greeks about a strictly pro-Hellenic Europe and will cause the greatest test in Greece's relations with its "benefactors", while offering the conditions so that, in the minds of most Greeks, Russia would be separated from the other guarantor Powers. After all, by cultural criteria, the Orthodox Power did not belong, at least for the Western-oriented Greeks, in Europe, while the "Easterners" and the Russian party considered that Russia represented the most important element of their identity:their religion, which differentiated and protected them from the "western spirit". This Eastern crisis, therefore, which led to the common front of England and France with the Ottoman Empire, against Russia, highlighted religion as the preeminent argument of the Greeks against the two Christian Powers who preferred the crescent and the Koran to the cross and of the gospel.
But if Europe disappointed the Greeks as a "protecting" Power that did not support "its beloved child" in its first efforts for national integration, in the question of institutions and the Constitution it will become their absolute model and support against the Bavarian autocracy .
The progressive Constitutions of the Revolution and the promises of the Powers, and especially of England, for constitutional government, had created expectations among the Greeks for the immediate granting of a Constitution, which were denied by the establishment of an absolute monarchy. For their part, the Bavarians argued that this regime was the necessary transitional stage, in order for the Greeks to learn modern institutions in order to develop into a Western-style state. On the other hand, the Western European Powers, disturbed by the policy of the Bavarians and Otto, supported, albeit with variations and fluctuations, the constitutional demands of the Greeks, but without being convinced of their constitutional maturity. Their even indirect involvement in the Revolution of September 3, 1843, excited the revolutionaries, who considered the "enlightened" Europeans as saviors of Greece from Bavarian authoritarianism, thus confirming their role as "protectors" and guarantors of their independence. On the other hand, in the consciousness of a large portion of Greeks, the Constitution recommended, among other things, the necessary "passport" for Greece to enter "the European world" and meet the expectations of "enlightened nations".
The image of Europe, however, will be shaken when it is held responsible for the restrictions placed on the new Constitution; the cooperation of England and France with Louis I of Bavaria, with the aim of keeping the monarch's powers strong, which he brought along the leaders of the parties, including the Russian one, provoked the reaction of those who opposed this partnership, but also of the press. For this newly minted opposition, the "enlightened" West will no longer be the antithesis of the absolutist Bavarians, but will be identified with them, creating a new division between the supporters of the nation and the "foreigners"; more likely, the latter will be considered responsible for the establishment of the "foreign body" of the Senate and the life of its members.
"Enlightened" Europe, however, may have been a model and guide for the Greek kingdom in its first steps in matters of institutions and the Constitution, but in matters of religion, the "Westerners" were considered dangerous by a large portion of Greeks.
The initiative of the "heterodox" Catholic Bavarians to create an autocephalous, independent from the Patriarchate Greek Church (1833), caused lively confrontations in Greek society, dividing the Greeks into "Eastern" and "Western". For the pro-Russian pro-Orthodox section, Western Europe will once again become the "land of the Latins" and the "hated West" that was responsible for the ills of Hellenism, and the Autocephalous was held responsible for the severance of the Kingdom from its national roots, and consequently detrimental to national integration. The supporters of the independent Greek Church will be identified by their opponents with the "dangerous" Catholics and Protestants. For its part, the pro-Western section, consistent with the spirit of Korais and Farmakides, will defend the Church independent of the Sultan's rule.
At the same time, the presence of the Protestant missionaries will trigger intense disagreements between the two sides of Orthodoxy; "foreign morals", "foreign religions", "foreign ideas" in the education of young people will be considered by the "easterners" as a major threat to the "nationalism" of the Greeks, in contrast to the "Westerners", who considered the education provided by the missionaries as a contribution to the "enlightenment" of the Greeks. The confrontations will become more and more intense, especially in the late 1830s, while the activity of the Catholic Church in the Aegean islands will also cause concern. There, however, her policy will be considered dangerous by both sides of Orthodoxy; Catholicism and the "satanic" Pope, burdened by the trauma inflicted on Hellenism by the Fourth Crusade, are perceived as a threat and a negative religious model by the Western-oriented part as well of the Greeks.
The compromise reached between Athens and the Ecumenical Patriarchate, in 1850, ensured the predominance of the Caesaropapism, although in the long run the "western" side will not emerge victorious. The surveillance of the Church by the state simply gave it the possibility to identify with the policy of the Greek kingdom and, from now on, to support it against any "dangerous" Western threat.
During the long 19th century the Greeks would continue to be disillusioned with Europe which was seen as responsible for nullifying every Greek attempt at national integration. Anti-Westernism is constantly increasing with a peak in the period after the defeat of 1897. But now anti-Europeanism will not only target the politics of Europe, but mainly European ideas and Western standards. In the deepest political divisions that surfaced during the National Schism, Europe, in its conservative or progressive form, undoubtedly played a leading role. As a symbol of the Enlightenment, it was used as an intimidation by both sides to remove liberal democracy and preserve national unity, while the authoritarian face of Europe, which Germany represented at the time, was used by opponents as a threat to culture, democracy and universal values. However, the adherence of one side of the Greeks to "enlightened Europe" remained constant. The other camp remained steadfast in its rejection; starting with Russia, the self-styled guardian of its Eastern identity, it will always find support in the ever-present adversary of the "Western spirit".
- Lina Louvi is a Professor of Modern History
Department of Political Science and History
"Newer History:Political History of the Greek State (19th-20th Century)"
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