ty from the pontifical authority." Innocent implicitly stated that all power and authority resided in the hands of the papacy, more specifically the pope. The King received his authority and power from the Pope. He did not insinuate that the King was less than the pope, but instead the pope was greater than the King, and by doing so he established that the king's power came from something greater that was above him, the pope. The pope's place therefore was above the King. How did he come to the conclusion that the pope was greater than the sun? He did this by using the rhetoric of god, examined the paragraph that follows, but also logic. Because the king had no power of his own, just as the moon had no light of its own, it had to get it from somewhere else: the pope and the sun, respectively. Therefore because the moon and the king were nothing without the pope and the sun, it is logical that the pope was in fact greater than the king because the pope had what the king lacked.
             However more importantly, Innocent makes reference to god in his metaphor. Before he even began to explain where the king's power and authority came from, Innocent stated that it was "the founder of the universe [who] established [the] two great lights," and more specifically, he established them "in the firmament of heaven." It was god who created the sun and the moon, and it was he who made it so that the moon derived its light from the sun. Therefore, in the same way, god made it so that the king received his power from the pope. Not only was the pope greater than the king, but god had made it that way.
             Innocent purposely stated the location of the two great lights as being heaven because heaven is god's kingdom. It is important to notice that he also mentioned heaven in his decretals Per Venerabilem (1202) and Novit (1204), citing the Lord's words to the Apostle Peter. "Whatsoever thou s...