Celibacy was a discipline practiced in the Church almost from it's outset. The split on celibacy was NOT over who got to inherit property, but what the culture and politics of a region were.
In the East, where the Bishops were more closely attuned to the politics and culture of Constantinople (and where Arianism and Iconoclasm were far more common and hung on far longer), celibecy was never very popular, and the Eastern Orthodox churches today do not follow that discipline.
In the West, celibecy was tought (if not always required) and followed (if somewhat irregularly) from the early Church. It caught on at a time being a priest or a bishop was a good way to become impoverished and a martyr, so suggesting it was about who inherited money and property is really sort of silly.
The Roman Catholic Church did abandon the requirement of celibecy for about 100 years (10th or 11th century, I can't remember which off the top of my head), but reinstated it when it saw a substantial falling away of the piety and disipline of the priesthood. In a sense, the experiance with dropping that requirement has been similiar to what has happened in the Church since Vatican II, when an awful lot of bishops began turning a blind eye to the issue of homosexuality in the seminaries.
Take a look at this article HERE regarding celibacy and the early Church:
http://www.inq7.net/opi/2003/jul/13/letter_1-1.htm
Here is a quote:
"It turns out that to speak of celibacy is not an adequate notion, since the early Church did not have an obligation for the clergy to be unmarried, as meant by the Latin word (caelebs). From this fact the conclusion is sometimes drawn that mandatory celibacy was an invention of the Papal Church in the Middle Ages. Those who pursue this line of argument often point to the Second Lateran Council in 1193, which declared marriages contracted after the reception of holy orders invalid. As a matter of fact, well into the Middle Ages no bishop, priest or deacon was required to be unmarried. The exclusive discipline of celibacy, in the strict sense of the word, according to canon law came into force only after the Council of Trent (1545-1563). In the first millennium, an unmarried clergyman was not exactly the exception, but he was not the rule either.
However, to concentrate on the question of married or unmarried clergy misses the point. Ecclesiastical legislation from as early as the fourth century was much concerned with regulating the life of the clergy, especially in matters of sexual conduct. Recent scholarship suggests that a discipline of clerical continence, more comprehensive than what we understand today as celibacy, was established from the very beginning. Not only the unmarried clergy were affected by such a rule; the married clergy (and their wives) were, too, for they were required to renounce all sexual relations after their ordination. The early Church knew of an obligation for all higher clerics, that is, bishops, deacons and priests, to abstain from sexual intercourse. Thus the present discipline of the Latin Church would appear to be in continuity with the original discipline of clerical continence. "
I am aware that the Orthodox do sometimes have wives and families.
Now, are you going to make me haul out my Durant? ;-)
Tia
You sure about that?
Look here: www.christendom-awake.org/pages/mcgovern/celhist1 for a pretty lengthy and erudite review of the history.