Ecumenical Councils

February 13, 2001

General Councils

This subject will be treated under the following heads:

Definition

Classification

Historical Sketch

The Pope and General Councils

Composition of General Councils

Right of participation

Requisite number of members

Papal headship the formal element of Councils

Factors in the Pope's Co-operation with the Council

Convocation

Direction

Confirmation

Business Methods

The facts

The theory

Infallibility of General Councils;

Correlation of Papal and Conciliary Infallibility

Infallibility Restricted to Unanimous Findings

Promulgation

Is a Council above the Pope?

Has a General Council Power to Depose a Pope?

I. DEFINITION

Councils are legally convened assemblies of ecclesiastical dignitaries and theological experts for the purpose of discussing and regulating matters of church doctrine and discipline. The terms council and synod are synonymous, although in the oldest Christian literature the ordinary meetings for worship are also called synods, and diocesan synods are not properly councils because they are only convened for deliberation. Councils unlawfully assembled are termed conciliabula, conventicula, and even latrocinia, i.e. "robber synods". The constituent elements of an ecclesiastical council are the following:

A legally convened meeting

of members of the hierarchy,

for the purpose of carrying out their judicial and doctrinal functions,

by means of deliberation in common

resulting in regulations and decrees invested with the authority of the whole assembly.

All these elements result from an analysis of the fact that councils are a concentration of the ruling powers of the Church for decisive action.

The first condition is that such concentration conform to the constitution of the Church: it must be started by the head of the forces that are to move and to act, e.g. by the metropolitan if the action is limited to one province. The actors themselves are necessarily the leaders of the Church in their double capacity of judges and teachers, for the proper object of conciliar activity is the settling of questions of faith and discipline. When they assemble for other purposes, either at regular times or in extraordinary circumstances, in order to deliberate on current questions of administration or on concerted action in emergencies, their meetings are not called councils but simply meetings, or assemblies, of bishops. Deliberation, with free discussion and ventilation of private views, is another essential note in the notion of councils. They are the mind of the Church in action, the sensus ecclesiae taking form and shape in the mould of dogmatic definition and authoritative decrees. The contrast of conflicting opinions, their actual clash necessarily precedes the final triumph of faith. Lastly, in a council's decisions we see the highest expression of authority of which its members are capable within the sphere of their jurisdiction, with the added strength and weight resulting from the combined action of the whole body.

II. CLASSIFICATION

Councils are, then, from their nature, a common effort of the Church, or part of the Church, for self-preservation and self-defence. They appear at her very origin, in the time of the Apostles at Jerusalem, and throughout her whole history whenever faith or morals or discipline are seriously threatened. Although their object is always the same, the circumstances under which they meet impart to them a great variety, which renders a classification necessary. Taking territorial extension for a basis, seven kinds of synods are distinguished.

Ecumenical Councils are those to which the bishops, and others entitled to vote, are convoked from the whole world (oikoumene) under the presidency of the pope or his legates, and the decrees of which, having received papal confirmation, bind all Christians. A council, Ecumenical in its convocation, may fail to secure the approbation of the whole Church or of the pope, and thus not rank in authority with Ecumenical councils. Such was the case with the Robber Synod of 449 (Latrocinium Ephesinum), the Synod of Pisa in 1409, and in part with the Councils of Constance and Basle.

The second rank is held by the general synods of the East or of the West, composed of but one-half of the episcopate. The Synod Of Constantinople (381) was originally only an Eastern general synod, at which were present the four patriarchs of the East (viz. of Constantinople, Alexandria, Antioch, and Jerusalem), with many metropolitans and bishops. It ranks as Ecumenical because its decrees were ultimately received in the West also.

Patriarchal, national, and primatial councils represent a whole patriarchate, a whole nation, or the several provinces subject to a primate. Of such councils we have frequent examples in Latin Africa, where the metropolitan and ordinary bishops used to meet under the Primate of Carthage, in Spain, under the Primate of Toledo, and in earlier times in Syria, under the Metropolitan -- later Patriarch -- of Antioch.

Provincial councils bring together the suffragan bishops of the metropolitan of an ecclesiastical province and other dignitaries entitled to participate.

Diocesan synods consist of the clergy of the diocese and are presided over by the bishop or the vicar-general.

A peculiar kind of council used to be held at Constantinople, it consisted of bishops from any part of the world who happened to be at the time in that imperial city. Hence the name synodoi enoemousai "visitors' synods".

Lastly there have been mixed synods, in which both civil and ecclesiastical dignitaries met to settle secular as well as ecclesiastical matters. They were frequent at the beginning of the Middle Ages in France Germany, Spain, and Italy. In England even abbesses were occasionally present at such mixed councils. Sometimes, not always, the clergy and laity voted in separate chambers.

Although it is in the nature of councils to represent either the whole or part of the Church organism yet we find many councils simply consisting of a number of bishops brought together from different countries for some special purpose, regardless of any territorial or hierarchical connection. They were most frequent in the fourth century, when the metropolitan and patriarchal circumscriptions were still imperfect, and questions of faith and discipline manifold. Not a few of them, summoned by emperors or bishops in opposition to the lawful authorities (such as that of Antioch in 341), were positively irregular, and acted for evil rather than good. Councils of this kind may be compared to the meetings of bishops of our own times; decrees passed in them had no binding power on any but the subjects of the bishops present, they were important manifestations of the sensus ecclesiae (mind of the Church) rather than judicial or legislative bodies. But precisely as expressing the mind of the Church they often acquired a far-reaching influence due, either to their internal soundness, or to the authority of their framers, or to both.

It should be noted that the terms concilia plenaria, universalia, OR generalia are, or used to be, applied indiscriminately to all synods not confined to a single province; in the Middle Ages, even provincial synods, as compared to diocesan, received these names. Down to the late Middle Ages all papal synods to which a certain number of bishops from different countries had been summoned were regularly styled plenary, general, or universal synods. In earlier times, before the separation of East and West, councils to which several distant patriarchates or exarchates sent representatives, were described absolutely as "plenary councils of the universal church". These terms are applied by St. Augustine to the Council of Arles (314), at which only Western bishops were present. In the same way the council of Constantinople (382), in a letter to Pope Damasus, calls the council held in the same town the year before (381) "an Ecumenical synod" i.e. a synod representing the oikoumene, the whole inhabited world as known to the Greeks and Romans, because all the Eastern patriarchates, though no Western, took part in it. The synod of 381 could not, at that time, be termed Ecumenical in the strict sense now in use, because it still lacked the formal confirmation of the Apostolic See. As a matter of fact, the Greeks themselves did not put this council on a par with those of Nicaea and Ephesus until its confirmation at the Synod of Chalcedon, and the Latins acknowledged its authority only in the sixth century.

III. HISTORICAL SKETCH OF ECUMENICAL COUNCILS

The present article deals chiefly with the theological and canonical questions concerning councils which are Ecumenical in the strict sense above defined. Special articles give the history of each important synod under the head of the city or see where it was held. In order, however, to supply the reader with a basis of fact for the discussion of principles which is to follow, a list is subjoined of the twenty Ecumenical councils with a brief statement of the purpose of each.

First Ecumenical Council: Nicaea I (325)

The Council of Nicaea lasted two months and twelve days. Three hundred and eighteen bishops were present. Hosius, Bishop of Cordova, assisted as legate of Pope Sylvester. The Emperor Constantine was also present. To this council we owe The Creed (Symbolum) Of Nicaea, defining against Arius the true Divinity of the Son of God (homoousios), and the fixing of the date for keeping Easter (against the Quartodecimans).

Second Ecumenical Council: Constantinople I (381)

The First General Council of Constantinople, under Pope Damasus and the Emperor Theodosius I, was attended by 150 bishops. It was directed against the followers of Macedonius, who impugned the Divinity of the Holy Ghost. To the above-mentioned Nicene Creed it added the clauses referring to the Holy Ghost (qui simul adoratur) and all that follows to the end.

Third Ecumenical Council: Ephesus (431)

The Council of Ephesus, of more than 200 bishops, presided over by St. Cyril of Alexandria representing Pope Celestine I, defined the true personal unity of Christ, declared Mary the Mother of God (theotokos) against Nestorius, Bishop of Constantinople, and renewed the condemnation of Pelagius.

Fourth Ecumenical Council: Chalcedon (451)

The Council of Chalcedon -- 150 bishops under Pope Leo the Great and the Emperor Marcian -- defined the two natures (Divine and human) in Christ against Eutyches, who was excommunicated.

Fifth Ecumenical Council: Constantinople II (553)

The Second General Council of Constantinople, of 165 bishops under Pope Vigilius and Emperor Justinian I, condemned the errors of Origen and certain writings (The Three Chapters) of Theodoret, of Theodore, Bishop of Mopsuestia and of Ibas, Bishop of Edessa; it further confirmed the first four general councils, especially that of Chalcedon whose authority was contested by some heretics.

Sixth Ecumenical Council: Constantinople III (680-681)

The Third General Council of Constantinople, under Pope Agatho and the Emperor Constantine Pogonatus, was attended by the Patriarchs of Constantinople and of Antioch, 174 bishops, and the emperor. It put an end to Monothelitism by defining two wills in Christ, the Divine and the human, as two distinct principles of operation. It anathematized Sergius, Pyrrhus, Paul, Macarius, and all their followers.

Seventh Ecumenical Council: Nicaea II (787)

The Second Council of Nicaea was convoked by Emperor Constantine VI and his mother Irene, under Pope Adrian I, and was presided over by the legates of Pope Adrian; it regulated the veneration of holy images. Between 300 and 367 bishops assisted.

Eighth Ecumenical Council: Constantinople IV (869)

The Fourth General Council of Constantinople, under Pope Adrian II and Emperor Basil numbering 102 bishops, 3 papal legates, and 4 patriarchs, consigned to the flames the Acts of an irregular council (conciliabulum) brought together by Photius against Pope Nicholas and Ignatius the legitimate Patriarch of Constantinople; it condemned Photius who had unlawfully seized the patriarchal dignity. The Photian Schism, however, triumphed in the Greek Church, and no other general council took place in the East.

Ninth Ecumenical Council: Lateran I (1123)

The First Lateran Council, the first held at Rome, met under Pope Callistus II. About 900 bishops and abbots assisted. It abolished the right claimed by lay princes, of investiture with ring and crosier to ecclesiastical benefices and dealt with church discipline and the recovery of the Holy Land from the infidels.

Tenth Ecumenical Council: Lateran II (1139)

The Second Lateran Council was held at Rome under Pope Innocent II, with an attendance of about 1000 prelates and the Emperor Conrad. Its object was to put an end to the errors of Arnold of Brescia.

Eleventh Ecumenical Council: Lateran III (1179)

The Third Lateran Council took place under Pope Alexander III, Frederick I being emperor. There were 302 bishops present. It condemned the Albigenses and Waldenses and issued numerous decrees for the reformation of morals.

Twelfth Ecumenical Council: Lateran IV (1215)

The Fourth Lateran Council was held under Innocent III. There were present the Patriarchs of Constantinople and Jerusalem, 71 archbishops, 412 bishops, and 800 abbots the Primate of the Maronites, and St. Dominic. It issued an enlarged creed (symbol) against the Albigenses (Firmiter credimus), condemned the Trinitarian errors of Abbot Joachim, and published 70 important reformatory decrees. This is the most important council of the Middle Ages, and it marks the culminating point of ecclesiastical life and papal power.

Thirteenth Ecumenical Council: Lyons I (1245)

The First General Council of Lyons was presided over by Innocent IV; the Patriarchs of Constantinople, Antioch, and Aquileia (Venice), 140 bishops, Baldwin II, Emperor of the East, and St. Louis, King of France, assisted. It excommunicated and deposed Emperor Frederick II and directed a new crusade, under the command of St. Louis, against the Saracens and Mongols.

Fourteenth Ecumenical Council: Lyons II (1274)

The Second General Council of Lyons was held by Pope Gregory X, the Patriarchs of Antioch and Constantinople, 15 cardinals, 500 bishops, and more than 1000 other dignitaries. It effected a temporary reunion of the Greek Church with Rome. The word filioque was added to the symbol of Constantinople and means were sought for recovering Palestine from the Turks. It also laid down the rules for papal elections.

Fifteenth Ecumenical Council: Vienne (1311-1313)

The Council of Vienne was held in that town in France by order of Clement V, the first of the Avignon popes. The Patriarchs of Antioch and Alexandria, 300 bishops (114 according to some authorities), and 3 kings -- Philip IV of France, Edward II of England, and James II of Aragon -- were present. The synod dealt with the crimes and errors imputed to the Knights Templars, the Fraticelli, the Beghards, and the Beguines, with projects of a new crusade, the reformation of the clergy, and the teaching of Oriental languages in the universities.

Sixteenth Ecumenical Council: Constance (1414-1418)

The Council of Constance was held during the great Schism of the West, with the object of ending the divisions in the Church. It became legitimate only when Gregory XI had formally convoked it. Owing to this circumstance it succeeded in putting an end to the schism by the election of Pope Martin V, which the Council of Pisa (1403) had failed to accomplish on account of its illegality. The rightful pope confirmed the former decrees of the synod against Wyclif and Hus. This council is thus ecumenical only in its last sessions (XLII-XLV inclusive) and with respect to the decrees of earlier sessions approved by Martin V.

Seventeenth Ecumenical Council: Basle/Ferrara/Florence (1431-1439)

The Council of Basle met first in that town, Eugene IV being pope, and Sigismund Emperor of the Holy Roman Empire. Its object was the religious pacification of Bohemia. Quarrels with the pope having arisen, the council was transferred first to Ferrara (1438), then to Florence (1439), where a short-lived union with the Greek Church was effected, the Greeks accepting the council's definition of controverted points. The Council of Basle is only ecumenical till the end of the twenty-fifth session, and of its decrees Eugene IV approved only such as dealt with the extirpation of heresy, the peace of Christendom, and the reform of the Church, and which at the same time did not derogate from the rights of the Holy See. (See also the Council of Florence.)

Eighteenth Ecumenical Council: Lateran V (1512-1517)

The Fifth Lateran Council sat from 1512 to 1517 under Popes Julius II and Leo X, the emperor being Maximilian I. Fifteen cardinals and about eighty archbishops and bishops took part in it. Its decrees are chiefly disciplinary. A new crusade against the Turks was also planned, but came to naught, owing to the religious upheaval in Germany caused by Luther.

Nineteenth Ecumenical Council: Trent (1545-1563)

The Council of Trent lasted eighteen years (1545-1563) under five popes: Paul III, Julius III, Marcellus II, Paul IV and Pius IV, and under the Emperors Charles V and Ferdinand. There were present 5 cardinal legates of the Holy See, 3 patriarchs, 33 archbishops, 235 bishops, 7 abbots, 7 generals of monastic orders, and 160 doctors of divinity. It was convoked to examine and condemn the errors promulgated by Luther and other Reformers, and to reform the discipline of the Church. Of all councils it lasted longest, issued the largest number of dogmatic and reformatory decrees, and produced the most beneficial results.

Twentieth Ecumenical Council: Vatican I (1869-1870)

The Vatican Council was summoned by Pius IX. It met 8 December, 1869, and lasted till 18 July, 1870, when it was adjourned; it is still (1908) unfinished. There were present 6 archbishop-princes, 49 cardinals, 11 patriarchs, 680 archbishops and bishops, 28 abbots, 29 generals of orders, in all 803. Besides important canons relating to the Faith and the constitution of the Church, the council decreed the infallibility of the pope when speaking ex cathedra, i.e. when as shepherd and teacher of all Christians, he defines a doctrine concerning faith or morals to be held by the whole Church.

IV. THE POPE AND GENERAL COUNCILS

The relations between the pope and general councils must be exactly defined to arrive at a just conception of the functions of councils in the Church, of their rights and duties, and of their authority. The traditional phrase, "the council represents the Church", associated with the modern notion of representative assemblies, is apt to lead to a serious misconception of the bishops' function in general synods. The nation's deputies receive their power from their electors and are bound to protect and promote their electors' interests; in the modern democratic State they are directly created by, and out of, the people's own power. The bishops in council, on the contrary, hold no power, no commission, or delegation, from the people. All their powers, orders, jurisdiction, and membership in the council, come to them from above -- directly from the pope, ultimately from God. What the episcopate in council does represent is the Divinely instituted magisterium, the teaching and governing power of the Church; the interests it defends are those of the depositum fidei, of the revealed rules of faith and morals, i.e. the interests of God.

The council is, then, the assessor of the supreme teacher and judge sitting on the Chair of Peter by Divine appointment; its operation is essentially co-operation -- the common action of the members with their head -- and therefore necessarily rises or falls in value, according to the measure of its connection with the pope. A council in opposition to the pope is not representative of the whole Church, for it neither represents the pope who opposes it, nor the absent bishops, who cannot act beyond the limits of their dioceses except through the pope. A council not only acting independently of the Vicar of Christ, but sitting in judgment over him, is unthinkable in the constitution of the Church; in fact, such assemblies have only taken place in times of great constitutional disturbances, when either there was no pope or the rightful pope was indistinguishable from antipopes. In such abnormal times the safety of the Church becomes the supreme law, and the first duty of the abandoned flock is to find a new shepherd, under whose direction the existing evils may be remedied.

In normal times, when according to the Divine constitution of the Church, the pope rules in the fullness of his power, the function of councils is to support and strengthen his rule on occasions of extraordinary difficulties arising from heresies schisms, relaxed discipline, or external foes. General councils have no part in the ordinary normal government of the Church. This principle is confirmed by the fact that during nineteen centuries of Church life only twenty Ecumenical councils took place. It is further illustrated by the complete failure of the decree issued in the thirty-ninth session of the Council of Constance (then without a rightful head) to the effect that general councils should meet frequently and at regular intervals, the very first synod summoned at Pavia for the year 1423 could not be held for want of responses to the summons. It is thus evident that general councils are not qualified to issue independently of the pope, dogmatic or disciplinary canons binding on the whole Church. As a matter of fact, the older councils, especially those of Ephesus (431) and Chalcedon (451), were not convened to decide on questions of faith still open, but to give additional weight to, and secure the execution of, papal decisions previously issued and regarded as fully authoritative. The other consequence of the same principle is that the bishops in council assembled are not commissioned, as are our modern parliaments, to control and limit the power of the sovereign, or head of the State, although circumstances may arise in which it would be, their right and duty firmly to expostulate with the pope on certain of his acts or measures. The severe strictures of the Sixth General Council on Pope Honorius I may be cited as a case in point.

V. COMPOSITION OF GENERAL COUNCILS

(a) Right of participation

The right to be present and to act at general councils belongs in the first place and logically to the bishops actually exercising the episcopal office. In the earlier councils there appear also the chorepiscopi (country-bishops), who, according to the better opinion, were neither true bishops nor an order interposed between bishops and priests, but priests invested with a jurisdiction smaller than the episcopal but larger than the sacerdotal. They were ordained by the bishop and charged with the administration of a certain district in his diocese. They had the power of conferring minor orders, and even the subdiaconate. Titular bishops, i.e. bishops not ruling a diocese, had equal rights with other bishops at the Vatican Council (1869-70), where 117 of them were present. Their claim lies in the fact that their order, the episcopal consecration, entitles them, jure divino, to take part in the administration of the Church, and that a general council seems to afford a proper sphere for the exercise of a right which the want of a proper diocese keeps in abeyance. Dignitaries who hold episcopal or quasi-episcopal jurisdiction without being bishops -- such as cardinal-priests, cardinal-deacons, abbots nullius, mitred abbots of whole orders or congregations of monasteries, generals of clerks regular, mendicant and monastic orders -- were allowed to vote at the Vatican Council. Their title is based on positive canon law: at the early councils such votes were not admitted, but from the seventh century down to the end of the Middle Ages the contrary practice gradually prevailed, and has since become an acquired right. Priests and deacons frequently cast decisive votes in the name of absent bishops whom they represented; at the Council of Trent, however, such procurators were admitted only with great limitations,and at the Vatican Council they were even excluded from the council hall. Besides voting members, every council admits, as consultors a number of doctors in theology and canon law. In the Council of Constance the consultors were allowed to vote. Other clerics have always been admitted as notaries. Lay people may be, and have been, present at councils for various reasons, but never as voters. They gave advice, made complaints, assented to decisions, and occasionally also signed the decrees. Since the Roman emperors had accepted Christianity, they assisted either personally or through deputies (commissarii). Constantine the Great was present in person at the First General Council, Theodosius II sent his representatives to the third, and Emperor Marcian sent his to the fourth, at the sixth session of which himself and the Empress Pulcheria assisted personally. Constantine Pogonatus was present at the sixth, the Empress Irene and her son Constantine Porphyrogenitus only sent their representative to the seventh, whereas Emperor Basil, the Macedonian, assisted at the eighth, sometimes in person, sometimes through his deputies. Only the Second and the Fifth General Synods were held in the absence of the emperors or imperial commissaries, but both Theodosius the Great and Justinian were at Constantinople while the councils were sitting, and kept up constant intercourse with them. In the West the attendance of kings, even at provincial synods, was of frequent occurrence. The motive and object of the royal presence were to protect the synods, to heighten their authority, to lay before them the needs of particular Christian states and countries.

This laudable and legitimate co-operation led by degrees to interference with the pope's rights in conciliar matters. The Eastern Emperor Michael claimed the right to summon councils without obtaining the pope's consent, and to take part in them personally or by proxy. But Pope Nicholas I resisted the pretensions of Emperor Michael, pointing out to him, in a letter (865), that his imperial predecessors had only been present at general synods dealing with matters of faith, and from that fact drew the conclusion that all other synods should be held without the emperor's or his commissaries' presence. A few years later the Eighth General Synod (Can. xvii, Hefele, IV, 421) declared it false that no synod could be held without the emperor's presence the emperors had only been present at general councils -- and that it was not right for secular princes to witness the condemnation of ecclesiastics (at provincial synods). As early as the fourth century the bishops greatly complained of the action of Constantine the Great in imposing his commissary on the Synod of Tyre (335). In the West, however, secular princes were present even at national synods, e.g. Sisenand, King of the Spanish Visigoths, was at the Fourth Council of Toledo (636) and King Chintilian at the fifth (638); Charlemagne assisted at the Council of Frankfort (794) and two Anglo Saxon kings at the Synod of Whitby (Collatio Pharenes) in 664. But step by step Rome established the principle that no royal commissary may be present at any council except a general one, in which "faith, reformation, and peace" are in question.

( Requisite number of members

The number of bishops present required to constitute an Ecumenical council cannot be strictly defined, nor need it be so deigned, for ecumenicity chiefly depends on co-operation with the head of the Church, and only secondarily on the number of co-operators. It is physically impossible to bring together all the bishops of the world, nor is there any standard by which to determine even an approximate number, or proportion, of prelates necessary to secure ecumenicity. All should be invited, no one should be debarred, a somewhat considerable number of representatives of the several provinces and countries should be actually present; this may be laid down as a practicable theory. But the ancient Church did not conform to this theory. As a rule only the patriarchs and metropolitans received a direct summons to appear with a certain number of their suffragans. At Ephesus and Chalcedon the time between the convocation and the meeting of the council was too short to allow of the Western bishops being invited. As a rule, but very few Western bishops were personally present at any of the first eight general synods. Occasionally, e.g. at the sixth, their absence was remedied by sending deputies with precise instructions arrived at in a previous council held in the West. What gives those Eastern synods their Ecumenical character is the co-operation of the pope as head of the universal, and, especially, of the Western, Church. This circumstance, so remarkably prominent in the Councils of Ephesus and Chalcedon, affords the best proof that, in the sense of the Church, the essential constituent element of ecumenicity is less the proportion of bishops present to bishops absent than the organic connection of the council with the head of the Church.

It is the action of the pope that makes the councils ecumenical. That action is the exercise of his office of supreme teacher and ruler of the Church. Its necessity results from the fact that no authority is commensurate with the whole Church except that of the pope; he alone can bind all the faithful. Its sufficiency is equally manifest: when the pope has spoken ex cathedra to make his own the decisions of any council, regardless of the number of its members nothing further can be wanted to make them binding on the whole Church. The earliest enunciation of the principle is found in the letter of the Council of Sardica (313) to Pope Julius I, and was often quoted, since the beginning of the fifth century, as the (Nicaean) canon concerning the necessity of papal co-operation in all the more important conciliary Acts. The Church historian Socrates (Hist. Eccl., II, xvii) makes Pope Julius say, in reference to the Council of Antioch (341), that the law of the Church (kanon) forbids "the churches to pass laws contrary to the judgement of the Bishop of Rome" and Sozomen (III, x) likewise declares "it to be a holy law not to attribute any value to things done without the judgment of the Bishop of Rome". The letter of Julius here quoted by both Socrates and Sozomen directly refers to an existing ecclesiastical custom and, in particular, to a single important case (the deposition of a patriarch), but the underlying principle is as stated.

Papal co-operation may be of several degrees: to be effective in stamping a council as universal it must amount to taking over responsibility for its decisions by giving them formal confirmation. The Synod of Constantinople (381) in which the Nicene Creed received its present form -- the one used at Mass -- had in itself no claim to be Ecumenical. Before Pope Damasus and the Western bishops had seen its full Acts they condemned certain of its proceedings at an Italian synod, but on receiving the Acts, Damasus, so we are told by Photius, confirmed them. Photius, however, is only right with regard to the Creed, or Symbol of Faith: the canons of this council were still rejected by Leo the Great and even by Gregory the Great (about 600). A proof that the Creed of Constantinople enjoyed papal sanction may be drawn from the way in which the Roman legates at the Fourth General Synod (Chalcedon, 451) allowed, without any protest, appeals to this Creed, while at the same time they energetically protested against the canons of the council. It was on account of the papal approbation of the Creed that, in the sixth century, Popes Vigilius, Pelagius II, and Gregory the Great declared this council Ecumenical, although Gregory still refused to sanction its canons. The First Synod of Constantinople presents, then, an instance of a minimum of papal co-operation impressing on a particular council the mark of universality. The normal co-operation, however, requires on the part of the head of the Church more than a post-factum acknowledgment.

The pope's office and the council's function in the organization of the Church require that the pope should call the council together, preside over and direct its labours, and finally promulgate its decrees to the universal Church as expressing the mind of the whole teaching body guided by the Holy Ghost. Instances of such normal, natural, perfect co-operation occur in the five Lateran councils, which were presided over by the pope in person; the personal presence of the highest authority in the Church, his direction of the deliberations, and approbation of the decrees, stamp the conciliary proceedings throughout as the function of the Magisterium Ecclesiae in its most authoritative form. Councils in which the pope is represented by legates are, indeed, also representative of the whole teaching body of the Church, but the representation is not absolute or adequate, is no real concentration of its whole authority. They act in the name, but not with the whole power, of the teaching Church, and their decrees become universally binding only through an act, either antecedent or consequent, of the pope. The difference between councils presided over personally and by proxy is marked in the form in which their decrees are promulgated: when the pope has been present the decrees are published in his own name with the additional formula: sacro approbante Concilio; when papal legates have presided the decrees are attributed to the synod (S. Synodus declarat, definit, decernit)

VI. FACTORS IN THE POPE'S CO-OPERATION WITH THE COUNCIL

We have seen that no council is Ecumenical unless the pope has made it his own by co-operation, which admits of a minimum and a maximum consequently of various degrees of perfection. Catholic writers could have saved themselves much trouble if they had always based their apologetics on the simple and evident principle of a sufficient minimum of papal co- operation, instead of endeavouring to prove, at all costs, that a maximum is both required in principle and demonstrable in history. The three factors constituting the solidarity of pope and council are the convocation, direction, and confirmation of the council by the pope- but it is not essential that each and all of these factors should always be present in full perfection.

(a) Convocation

The juridical convocation of a council implies something more than an invitation addressed to all the bishops of the world to meet in council, viz.: the act by which in law the bishops are bound to take part in the council, and the council itself is constituted a legitimate tribunal for dealing with Church affairs. Logically, and in the nature of the thing, the right of convocation belongs to the pope alone. Yet the convocation, in the loose sense of invitation to meet, of the first eight general synods, was regularly issued by the Christian emperors, whose dominion was coextensive with the Church, or at least with the Eastern part of it, which was then alone convened. The imperial letters of convocation to the Councils of Ephesus (Hardouin, I, 1343) and of Chalcedon (Hardouin, II, 42) show that the emperors acted as protectors of the Church, believing it their duty to further by every means in their power the welfare of their charge. Nor is it possible in every case to prove that they acted at the formal instigation of the pope; it even seems that the emperors more than once followed none but their own initiative for convening the council and fixing its place of meeting. It is, however. evident that the Christian emperors cannot have acted thus without the consent, actual or presumed of the pope. Otherwise their conduct had been neither lawful nor wise. As a matter of fact, none of the eight Eastern Ecumenical synods, with the exception, perhaps, of the fifth, was summoned by the emperor in opposition to the pope. As regards the fifth, the conduct of the emperor caused the legality of the council to be questioned -- a proof that the mind of the Church required the pope's consent for the lawfulness of councils. As regards most of these eight synods, particularly that of Ephesus, the previous consent of the pope, actual or presumed, is manifest. Regarding the convocation of the Council of Chalcedon, the Emperor Marcian did not quite fall in with the wishes of Pope Leo I as to the time and place of its meeting, but he did not claim an absolute right to have his will, nor did the pope acknowledge such a right. On the contrary, as Leo I explains in his letters (Epp. lxxxix, xc, ed. Ballerini), he only submitted to the imperial arrangements because he was unwilling to interfere with Marcian's well-meant endeavours.

It is still more evident that convocation by the emperors did not imply on their part the claim to constitute the council juridically, that is, to give it power to sit as an authorized tribunal for Church affairs. Such a claim has never been put forward. The expressions jubere and keleuein, occasionally used in the wording of the convocation, do not necessarily convey the notion of strict orders not to be resisted; they also have the meaning of exhorting, inducing, bidding. The juridical constitution of the council could only emanate, and in fact always did emanate, from the Apostolic See. As the necessity of the bishops' meeting in council was dictated rather by the distressful condition of the Church than by positive orders, the pope contented himself with authorizing the council and this he effected by sending his legates to preside over and direct the work of the assembled prelates. The Emperor Marcian in his first letter to Leo I declares that the success of the intended synod depends on his -- the pope's -- authorization, and Leo, not Marcian, is later called the auctor synodi without any restrictive qualification, especially at the time of the "Three Chapters" dispute, where the extension of the synod's authority was called in question. The law therefore, at that period was the same as it is now as far as essentials are concerned: the pope is the sole convener of the council as an authoritative juridical assembly. The difference lies in the circumstance that the pope left to the emperor the execution of the convocation and the necessary measures for rendering the meeting possible and surrounding it with the éclat due to its dignity in Church and State. The material, or business, part of the councils being thus entirely in the hands of the emperors, it was to be expected that the pope was sometimes induced -- if not forced -- by circumstances to make his authorization suit the imperial wishes and arrangements.

After studying the principles it is well to see how they worked out in fact. Hence the following historical summary of the convocation of the first eight general councils:

(1) Eusebius (Vita Constantini, III, vi) informs us that the writs of convocation to the First General Synod were issued by Emperor Constantine, but as not one of those writs has come down to us, it remains doubtful whether or not they mentioned any previous consultation with the pope. It is, however, an undeniable fact that the Sixth General Synod (680) plainly affirmed that the Council of Nicaea had been convened by the emperor and Pope Sylvester (Mansi, Coll. Conc., XI, 661). The same statement appears in the life of Sylvester found in the "Liber Pontificalis", but this evidence need not be pressed, the evidence from the council being, from the circumstances in which it was given, of sufficient strength to carry the point. For the Sixth General Council took place in Constantinople, at a time when the bishops of the imperial city already attempted to rival the bishops of Old Rome, and the vast majority of its members were Greeks; their statement is therefore entirely free from the suspicion of Western ambition or prejudice and must be accepted as a true presentment of fact. Rufinus, in his continuation of Eusebius' history (I, 1) says that the emperor summoned the synod ex sacerdotum sententia (on the advice of the clergy)- it is but fair to suppose that if he consulted several prelates he did not omit to consult with the head of all.

(2) The Second General Synod (381) was not, at first, intended to be Ecumenical; it only became so because it was accepted in the West, as has been shown above. It was not summoned by Pope Damasus as is often contended, for the assertion that the assembled bishops professed to have met in consequence of a letter of the pope to Theodosius the Great is based on a confusion. The document here brought in as evidence refers to the synod of the following year which was indeed summoned at the instigation of the pope and the Synod of Aquileia, but was not an Ecumenical synod.

(3) The Third General Council (Ephesus, 431) was convoked by Emperor Theodosius II and his Western colleague Valentinian III- this is evident from the Acts of the council. It is equally evident that Pope Celestine I gave his consent, for he wrote (15 May, 431) to Theodosius that he could not appear in person at the synod, but that he would send his representatives. And in his epistle of 8 May to the synod itself, he insists on the duty of the bishops present to hold fast to the orthodox faith, expects them to accede to the sentence he has already pronounced on Nestorius, and adds that he has sent his legates to execute that sentence at Ephesus. The members of the council acknowledge the papal directions and orders, not only the papal consent, in the wording of their solemn condemnation of Nestorius: "Urged by the Canons and conforming to the Letter of our most holy Father and fellow servant Celestine the Roman bishop, we have framed this sorrowful sentence against Nestorius." They express the same sentiment where they say that "the epistle of the Apostolic See (to Cyril, communicated to the council) already contains a judgment and a rule psepho kai typou on the case of Nestorius" and that they -- the bishops in council -- have executed that ruling. All this manifests the bishops' conviction that the pope was the moving and quickening spirit of the synod.

(4) How the Fourth General Synod (Chalcedon, 451) was brought together is set forth in several writings of Pope Leo I and Emperors Theodosius II and Marcian. Immediately after the Robber Synod, Leo asked Theodosius to prepare a council composed of bishops from all parts of the world, to meet, preferably, in Italy. He repeated the same request, first made 13 October, 449, on the following feast of Christmas, and prevailed on the Western Emperor Valentinian III together with his empress and his mother, to support it at the Byzantine Court. Once more (in July, 450) Leo renewed his request, adding, however that the council might be dispensed with if all the bishops were to make a profession of the orthodox faith without being united in council. About this time Theodosius II died and was succeeded by his sister, St. Pulcheria, and her husband Marcian. Both at once informed the pope of their willingness to summon the council, Marcian specially asking him to state in writing whether he could assist at the synod in person or through his legates, so that the necessary writs of convocation might be issued to the Eastern bishops. By that time, however, the situation had greatly improved in the Eastern Church- nearly all the bishops who had taken part in the Robber Synod had now repented of their aberration and signed, in union with their orthodox colleagues, the "Epistola dogmatica" of Leo to Flavian, by this act rendering the need of a council less urgent. Besides, the Huns were just then invading the West, preventing many Latin bishops, whose presence at the council was most desirable, from leaving their flocks to undertake the long journey to Chalcedon. Other motives induced the pope to postpone the synod, e.g. the fear that it might be made the occasion by the bishops of Constantinople to improve their hierarchical position, a fear well justified by subsequent events. But Marcian had already summoned the synod, and Leo therefore gave his instructions as to the business to be transacted. He was then entitled to say, in a letter to the bishops who had been at the council that the synod had been brought together "ex praecepto christianorum principum et ex consensu apostolicae sedis" (by order of the Christian princes and with the consent of the Apostolic See). The emperor himself wrote to Leo that the synod had been held by his authority (te auctore), and the bishops of Moesia, in a letter to the Byzantine Emperor Leo, said: "At Chalcedon many bishops assembled by order of Leo, the Roman pontiff, who is the true head of the bishops".

(5) The Fifth General Synod was planned by Justinian I with the consent of Pope Vigilius (q.v.), but on account of the emperor's dogmatic pretensions, quarrels arose and the pope refused to be present, although repeatedly invited. His Constitutum of 14 May 553, to the effect that he could not consent to anathematize Theodore of Mopsuestia and Theodoret, led to open opposition between pope and council. In the end all was righted by Vigilius approving the synodal decrees.

(6, 7, 8) These three synods were each and all called by the emperors of the time with the consent and assistance of the Apostolic See.

( DIRECTION

The direction or presidency of councils belongs to the pope by the same right as their convocation and constitution. Were a council directed in its deliberations and acts by anyone independent of the pope and acting entirely on his own responsibility, such a council could not be the pope's own in any sense: the defect could only be made good by a consequent formal act of the pope accepting responsibility for its decisions. In point of fact, papal legates presided over all the Eastern councils, which from their beginning were legally constituted. The reader will obtain a clearer insight into this point of conciliar proceedings from a concrete example, taken from Hefele's introduction to his "History of the Councils":

Pope Adrian II sent his legates to the Eighth Ecumenical Synod (787) with an express declaration to the Emperor Basil that they were to act as presidents of the council. The legates, Bishop Donatus of Ostia, Bishop Stephen of Nepesina, and the deacon Marinus of Rome, read the papal rescript to the synod. Not the slightest objection was raised. Their names took precedence in all protocols; they determined the duration of the several sessions, gave leave to make speeches and to read documents and to admit other persons, they put the leading questions, etc. In short, their presidency in the first five sessions cannot be disputed. But at the sixth session Emperor Basil was present with his two sons, Constantine and Leo, and, as the Acts relate, received the presidency. These same Acts, however, at once clearly distinguish the emperor and his sons from the synod when, after naming them they continue: conveniente sanctâ ac universali synodo (the holy and universal synod now meeting), thus disassociating the lay ruler from the council proper. The names of the papal legates continue to appear first among the members of the synod, and it is they who in those latter sessions determine the matters for discussion, subscribe the Acts before anyone else, expressly as presidents of the synod, whereas the emperor, to show clearly that he did not consider himself the president, would only subscribe after all the bishops. The papal legates begged him to put his and his son's names at the head of the list, but he stoutly refused and only consented at last, to write his name after those of the papal legates and of the Eastern patriarchs, but before those of the bishops. Consequently Pope Adrian II, in a letter to the emperor, praises him for not having assisted at the council as a judge (judex), but merely as a witness and protector (conscius et obsecundator).

The imperial commissaries present at the synod acted even less as presidents than the emperor himself. They signed the reports of the several sessions only after the representatives of the patriarchs though before the bishops; their names are absent from the signatures of the Acts. On the other hand it may be contended that the Eastern patriarchs Ignatius of Constantinople, and the representatives of the other Eastern patriarchs, in some degree participated in the presidency: their names are constantly associated with those of the Roman legates and clearly distinguished from those of the other metropolitans and bishops. They, as it were, form with the papal legates a board of directors, fix with him the order of proceedings, determine who shall be heard, subscribe, like the legates, before the emperor and are entered in the reports of the several sessions before the imperial commissaries. All this being granted, the fact still remains that the papal legates unmistakably hold the first place, for they are always named first and sign first, and -- a detail of great importance -- for the final subscription they use the formula: huic sanctae et universali synodo praesidens (presiding over this holy and universal synod), while Ignatius of Constantinople and the representatives of the other patriarchs claim no presidency but word their subscription thus: suscipiens et omnibus quae ab ea judicata et scripta sunt concordans et definiens subscripsi (receiving this holy and universal synod and agreeing with all it has judged and written, and defining I have signed). If, on the one hand, this form of subscription differs from that of the president, it differs no less, on the other, from that of the bishops. These, like the emperor, have without exception used the formula: suscipiens (synodum) subscripsi (receiving the synod I have signed), omitting the otherwise customary definiens, which was used to mark a decisive vote (votum decisivum).

Hefele gives similar documentary accounts of the first eight general synods, showing that papal legates always presided over them when occupied in their proper business of deciding questions on faith and discipline. The exclusive right of the pope in this matter was generally acknowledged. Thus, the Emperor Theodosius II says, in his edict addressed to the Council of Ephesus, that he had sent Count Candidian to represent him, but that this imperial commissary was to take no part in dogmatic disputes since "it was unlawful for one who is not enrolled in the lists of the most holy bishops to mingle in ecclesiastical inquiries". The Council of Chalcedon acknowledged that Pope Leo, by his legates, presided over it as "the head over the members". At Nicaea, Hosius, Vitus and Vincentius, as papal legates, signed before all other members of the council. The right of presiding and directing implies that the pope, if he chooses to make a full use of his powers, can determine the subject matter to be dealt with by the council, prescribe rules for conducting the debates, and generally order the whole business as seems best to him. Hence no conciliar decree is legitimate if carried under protest -- or even without the positive consent -- of the pope or his legates. The consent of the legates alone, acting without a special order from the pope, is not sufficient to make conciliar decrees at once perfect and operative; what is necessary is the pope's own consent. For this reason no decree can become legitimate and null in law on account of pressure brought to bear on the assembly by the presiding pope, or by papal legates acting on his orders. Such pressure and restriction of liberty, proceeding from the internal, natural principle of order through the use of lawful power, does not amount to external, unnatural coercion, and, therefore, does not invalidate the Acts due to its exercise.

Examples of councils working at high pressure, if the expression may be used, without spoiling their output, are of frequent occurrence. Most of the early councils were convened to execute decisions already finally fixed by the pope, no choice being left the assembled Fathers to arrive at another decision. They were forced to conform their judgment to that of Rome, with or without discussion. Should papal pressure go beyond the limits of the council's dignity and of the importance of the matters under discussion the effect would be, not the invalidation of the council's decrees, but the paralysing of its moral influence and practical usefulness. On the other hand, the fact that a synod is, or has been, acting under the leadership of its Divinely appointed head, is the best guarantee of its freedom from unnatural disturbances, such as intrigues from below or coercion from above. In the same way violent interference with the papal leadership is the grossest attack on the council's natural freedom. Thus the Robber Synod of Ephesus (449), though intended to be general and at first duly authorized by the presence of papal legates, was declared invalid and null by those same legates at Chalcedon 451), because the prejudiced Emperor Theodosius II had removed the representatives of the pope, and entrusted the direction of the council to Dioscurus of Alexandria.

Confirmation of the conciliar decrees is the third factor in the pope's necessary co-operation with the council. The council does not represent the teaching Church till the visible head of the Church has given his approval, for, unapproved, it is but a headless, soulless, impersonal body, unable to give its decisions the binding force of laws for the whole Church, or the finality of judicial sentences With the papal approval, on the contrary, the council's pronouncements represent the fullest effort of the teaching and ruling Church, a judicium plenissimum beyond which no power can go. Confirmation being the final touch of perfection, the seal of authority, and the very life of conciliar decrees, it is necessary that it should be a personal act of the highest authority, for the highest authority cannot be delegated. So much for the principle, or the question of right. When we look for its practical working throughout the history of councils, we find great diversity in the way it has been applied under the influence of varying circumstances.

Councils over which the pope presides in person require no further formal confirmation on his part, for their decisions formally include his own as the body includes the soul. The Vatican Council of 1869-70 offers an example in point.

Councils over which the pope presides through his legates are not identified with himself in the same degree as the former. They constitute separate, dependent, representative tribunals, whose findings only become final through ratification by the authority for which they act. Such is the theory. In practice, however, the papal confirmation is, or may be, presumed in the following cases:

When the council is convened for the express purpose of carrying out a papal decision previously arrived at, as was the case with most of the early synods; or when the legates give their consent in virtue of a special public instruction emanating from the pope; in these circumstances the papal ratification pre-exists, is implied in the conciliar decision, and need not be formally renewed after the council. It may, however, be superadded ad abundantiam, as, e.g. the confirmation of the Council of Chalcedon by Leo I.

The necessary consent of the Apostolic See may also be presumed when, as generally at the Council of Trent, the legates have personal instructions from the pope on each particular question coming up for decision, and act conformably, i.e. if they allow no decision to be taken unless the pope's consent has previously been obtained.

Supposing a council actually composed of the greater part of the episcopate, concurring freely in a unanimous decision and thus bearing unexceptional witness to the mind and sense of the whole Church: The pope, whose office it is to voice infallibly the mind of the Church, would be obliged by the very nature of his office, to adopt the council's decision, and consequently his confirmation, ratification, or approbation could be presumed, and a formal expression of it dispensed with. But even then his approbation, presumed or expressed, is juridically the constituent factor of the decision's perfection.

The express ratification in due form is at all times, when not absolutely necessary, at least desirable and useful in many respects:

It gives the conciliar proceedings their natural and lawful complement, the keystone which closes and crowns the arch for strength and beauty; it brings to the front the majesty and significance of the supreme head of the Church.

Presumed consent can but rarely apply with the same efficacy to each and all of the decisions of an important council. A solemn papal ratification puts them all on the same level and removes all possible doubt.

Lastly the papal ratification formally promulgates the sentence of the council as an article of faith to be known and accepted by all the faithful; it brings to light and public view the intrinsic ecumenicity of the council- it is the natural, official, indisputable criterion, or test, of the perfect legality of the conciliar transactions or conclusions. If we bear in mind the numerous disturbing elements at work in and around an Ecumenical council, the conflicting religious, political, scientific, and personal interests contending for supremacy, or at least eager to secure some advantage, we can easily realize the necessity of a papal ratification to crush the endless chicanery which otherwise would endanger the success and efficacy of the highest tribunal of the Church. Even they who refuse to see in the papal confirmation an authentic testimony and sentence, declaring infallibly the ecumenicity of the council and its decrees to be a dogmatic fact, must admit that it is a sanative act and supplies possible defects and shortcomings; the Ecumenical authority of the pope is sufficient to impart validity and infallibility to the decrees he makes his own by officially ratifying them. This was done by Pope Vigilius for the Fifth General Synod. Sufficient proof for the sanatory efficacy of the papal ratification lies in the absolute sovereignty of the pope and in the infallibility of his ex-cathedra pronouncements. Should it be argued, however, that the sentence of an Ecumenical council is the only absolute, final, and infallible sentence even then, and then more than ever, the papal ratification would be necessary. For in the transactions of an Ecumenical council the pope plays the principal part, and if any deficiency in his action, especially in the exercise of his own special prerogatives, were apparent, the labours of the council would be in vain. The faithful hesitate to accept as infallible guides of their faith documents not authenticated by the seal of the fisherman, or the Apostolic See, which now wields the authority of St. Peter and of Christ. Leo II beautifully expresses these ideas in his ratification of the Sixth General Council: "Because this great and universal synod has most fully proclaimed the definition of the right faith, which the Apostolic See of St. Peter the Apostle, whose office we, though unequal to it, are holding, also reverently receives: therefore we also, and through our office this Apostolic See, consent to, and confirm, by the authority of Blessed Peter, those things which have been defined, as being finally set by he Lord Himself on the solid rock which is Christ."

No event in the history of the Church better illustrates the necessity and the importance of papal co-operation and, in particular, confirmation, than the controversies which in the sixth century raged about the Three Chapters. The Three Chapters were the condemnation (1) of Theodore of Mopsuestia, his person, and his writings; (2) of Theodoret's writings against Cyril and the Council of Ephesus; (3) of a letter from Ibas to Maris the Persian, also against Cyril and the council. Theodore anticipated the heresy of Nestorius; Ibas and Theodoret were indeed restored at Chalcedon, but only after they had given orthodox explanations and shown that they were free from Nestorianism. The two points in debate were: (1) Did the Council of Chalcedon acknowledge the orthodoxy of the said Three Chapters? (2) How, i.e. by what test, is the point to be settled? Now the two contending parties agreed in the principle of the test: the approbation of the council stands or falls with the approbation of the pope's legates and of Pope Leo I himself. Defenders of the Chapters, e.g. Ferrandus the Deacon and Facundus of Hermiane, put forward as their chief argument (prima et immobilis ratio) the fact that Leo had approved. Their opponents never questioned the principle but denied the alleged fact, basing their denial on Leo's epistle to Maximus of Antioch in which they read: "Si quid sane ab his fratribus quos ad S. Synodum vice mea, praeter id quod ad causam fidei pertinebat gestum fuerit, nullius erit firmitatis" (If indeed anything not pertaining to the cause of faith should have been settled by the brethren I sent to the Holy Synod to hold my place, it shall be of no force). The point of doctrine (causa fidei) referred to is the heresy of Eutyches; the Three Chapters refer to that of Nestorius, or rather to certain persons and writings connected with it.

The bishops of the council, assembled at Constantinople in 533 for the purpose of putting an end to the Three Chapters controversy, addressed to Pope Vigilius two Confessions, the first with the Patriarch Mennas, the second with his successor Eutychius, in which, to establish their orthodoxy, they profess that they firmly hold to the four general synods as approved by the Apostolic See and by the popes. Thus we read in the Confessio of Mennas: "But also the letters of Pope Leo of blessed memory and the Constitution of the Apostolic See issued in support of the Faith and of the authority (firmitas) of the aforesaid four synods, we promise to follow and observe in all points and we anathematize any man, who on any occasion or altercation should attempt to nullify our promises." And in the Confessio of Eutychius: "Suscipimus autem et amplectimur epistolas praesulum Romance Sedis Apostolicae, tam aliorum quam Leonis sanctae memoriae de fide scriptas et de quattuor sanctis conciliis vel de uno eorum" (We receive and embrace the letters of the bishops of the Apostolic Roman See, those of others as well as of Leo of holy memory, concerning the Faith and the four holy synods or any of them).

VII. BUSINESS METHODS

The way in which councils transact business now demands our attention. Here as in most things, there is an ideal which is never completely realized in practice.

(a) The facts

It has been sufficiently shown in the foregoing section that the pope, either in person or by deputy, directed the transaction of conciliar business. But when we look for a fixed order or set of rules regulating the proceedings we have to come down to the Vatican Council to find an official Ordo concilii ecumenici and a Methodus servanda in prima sessione, etc. In all earlier councils the management of affairs was left to the Fathers and adjusted by them to the particular objects and circumstances of the council. The so-called Ordo celebrandi Concilii Tridentini is a compilation posterior to the council, written by the conciliar secretary, A. Massarelli; it is a record of what has been done not a rule of what should be done. Some fixed rules were, however, already established at the reform councils of the fifteenth century as a substitute for the absent directing power of the pope. The substance of these rulings is given in the "Caeremoniale Romanum" of Augustinus Patritius (d. 1496). The

February 13, 2001

The First Council of Nicaea

First Ecumenical Council of the Catholic Church, held in 325 on the occasion of the heresy of Arius (Arianism). As early as 320 or 321 St. Alexander, Bishop of Alexandria, convoked a council at Alexandria at which more than one hundred bishops from Egypt and Libya anathematized Arius. The latter continued to officiate in his church and to recruit followers. Being finally driven out, he went to Palestine and from there to Nicomedia. During this time St. Alexander published his "Epistola encyclica", to which Arius replied; but henceforth it was evident that the quarrel had gone beyond the possibility of human control. Sozomen even speaks of a Council of Bithynia which addressed an encyclical to all the bishops asking them to receive the Arians into the communion of the Church. This discord, and the war which soon broke out between Constantine and Licinius, added to the disorder and partly explains the progress of the religious conflict during the years 322-3. Finally Constantine, having conquered Licinius and become sole emperor, concerned himself with the re-establishment of religious peace as well as of civil order. He addressed letters to St. Alexander and to Arius deprecating these heated controversies regarding questions of no practical importance, and advising the adversaries to agree without delay. It was evident that the emperor did not then grasp the significance of the Arian controversy. Hosius of Cordova, his counsellor in religious matters, bore the imperial letter to Alexandria, but failed in his conciliatory mission. Seeing this, the emperor, perhaps advised by Hosius, judged no remedy more apt to restore peace in the Church than the convocation of an oecumenical council.

The emperor himself, in very respectful letters, begged the bishops of every country to come promptly to Nicaea. Several bishops from outside the Roman Empire (e.g., from Persia) came to the Council. It is not historically known whether the emperor in convoking the Council acted solely in his own name or in concert with the pope; however, it is probable that Constantine and Sylvester came to an agreement (see POPE ST. SYLVESTER I). In order to expedite the assembling of the Council, the emperor placed at the disposal of the bishops the public conveyances and posts of the empire; moreover, while the Council lasted he provided abundantly for the maintenance of the members. The choice of Nicaea was favourable to the assembling of a large number of bishops. It was easily accessible to the bishops of nearly all the provinces, but especially to those of Asia, Syria, Palestine, Egypt, Greece, and Thrace. The sessions were held in the principal church, and in the central hall of the imperial palace. A large place was indeed necessary to receive such an assembly, though the exact number is not known with certainty. Eusebius speaks of more than 250 bishops, and later Arabic manuscripts raise the figure to 2000 - an evident exaggeration in which, however, it is impossible to discover the approximate total number of bishops, as well as of the priests, deacons, and acolytes, of whom it is said that a great number were also present. St. Athanasius, a member of the council speaks of 300, and in his letter "Ad Afros" he says explicitly 318. This figure is almost universally adopted, and there seems to be no good reason for rejecting it. Most of the bishops present were Greeks; among the Latins we know only Hosius of Cordova, Cecilian of Carthage, Mark of Calabria, Nicasius of Dijon, Donnus of Stridon in Pannonia, and the two Roman priests, Victor and Vincentius, representing the pope. The assembly numbered among its most famous members St. Alexander of Alexandria, Eustathius of Antioch, Macarius of Jerusalem, Eusebius of Nicomedia, Eusebius of Caesarea, and Nicholas of Myra. Some had suffered during the last persecution; others were poorly enough acquainted with Christian theology. Among the members was a young deacon, Athanasius of Alexandria, for whom this Council was to be the prelude to a life of conflict and of glory (see ST. ATHANASIUS).

The year 325 is accepted without hesitation as that of the First Council of Nicaea. There is less agreement among our early authorities as to the month and day of the opening. In order to reconcile the indications furnished by Socrates and by the Acts of the Council of Chalcedon, this date may, perhaps, be taken as 20 May, and that of the drawing up of the symbol as 19 June. It may be assumed without too great hardihood that the synod, having been convoked for 20 May, in the absence of the emperor held meetings of a less solemn character until 14 June, when after the emperor's arrival, the sessions properly so called began, the symbol being formulated on 19 June, after which various matters - the paschal controversy, etc. - were dealt with, and the sessions came to an end 25 August. The Council was opened by Constantine with the greatest solemnity. The emperor waited until all the bishops had taken their seats before making his entry. He was clad in gold and covered with precious stones in the fashion of an Oriental sovereign. A chair of gold had been made ready for him, and when he had taken his place the bishops seated themselves. After he had been addressed in a hurried allocution, the emperor made an address in Latin, expressing his will that religious peace should be re-established. He had opened the session as honorary president, and he had assisted at the subsequent sessions, but the direction of the theological discussions was abandoned, as was fitting, to the ecclesiastical leaders of the council. The actual president seems to have been Hosius of Cordova, assisted by the pope's legates, Victor and Vincentius.

The emperor began by making the bishops understand that they had a greater and better business in hand than personal quarrels and interminable recriminations. Nevertheless, he had to submit to the infliction of hearing the last words of debates which had been going on previous to his arrival. Eusebius of Caesarea and his two abbreviators, Socrates and Sozomen, as well as Rufinus and Gelasius of Cyzicus, report no details of the theological discussions. Rufinus tells us only that daily sessions were held and that Arius was often summoned before the assembly; his opinions were seriously discussed and the opposing arguments attentively considered. The majority, especially those who were confessors of the Faith, energetically declared themselves against the impious doctrines of Arius. (For the part played by the Eusebian third party, see EUSEBIUS OF NICOMEDIA. For the Creed of Eusebius, see EUSEBIUS OF CAESAREA, Life.) St. Athanasius assures us that the activities of the Council were nowise hampered by Constantine's presence. The emperor had by this time escaped from the influence of Eusebius of Nicomedia, and was under that of Hosius, to whom, as well as to St. Athanasius, may be attributed a preponderant influence in the formulation of the symbol of the First Ecumenical Council, of which the following is a literal translation:

We believe in on God the Father Almighty, Maker of all things visible and invisible; and in one Lord Jesus Christ, the only begotten of the Father, that is, of the substance [ek tes ousias] of the Father, God of God, light of light, true God of true God, begotten not made, of the same substance with the Father [homoousion to patri], through whom all things were made both in heaven and on earth; who for us men and our salvation descended, was incarnate, and was made man, suffered and rose again the third day, ascended into heaven and cometh to judge the living and the dead. And in the Holy Ghost. Those who say: There was a time when He was not, and He was not before He was begotten; and that He was made our of nothing (ex ouk onton); or who maintain that He is of another hypostasis or another substance [than the Father], or that the Son of God is created, or mutable, or subject to change, [them] the Catholic Church anathematizes.

The adhesion was general and enthusiastic. All the bishops save five declared themselves ready to subscribe to this formula, convince that it contained the ancient faith of the Apostolic Church. The opponents were soon reduced to two, Theonas of Marmarica and Secundus of Ptolemais, who were exiled and anathematized. Arius and his writings were also branded with anathema, his books were cast into the fire, and he was exiled to Illyria. The lists of the signers have reached us in a mutilated condition, disfigured by faults of the copyists. Nevertheless, these lists may be regarded as authentic. Their study is a problem which has been repeatedly dealt with in modern times, in Germany and England, in the critical editions of H. Gelzer, H. Hilgenfeld, and O. Contz on the one hand, and C. H. Turner on the other. The lists thus constructed give respectively 220 and 218 names. With information derived from one source or another, a list of 232 or 237 fathers known to have been present may be constructed.

Other matters dealt with by this council were the controversy as to the time of celebrating Easter and the Meletian schism. The former of these two will be found treated under EASTER, Easter Controversy; the latter under MELETIUS OF LYCOPOLIS.

Of all the Acts of this Council, which, it has been maintained, were numerous, only three fragments have reached us: the creed, or symbol, given above (see also NICENE CREED); the canons; the synodal decree. In reality there never were any official acts besides these. But the accounts of Eusebius, Socrates, Sozomen, Theodoret, and Rufinus may be considered as very important sources of historical information, as well as some data preserved by St. Athanasius, and a history of the Council of Nicaea written in Greek in the fifth century by Gelasius of Cyzicus. There has long existed a dispute as to the number of the canons of First Nicaea. All the collections of canons, whether in Latin or Greek, composed in the fourth and fifth centuries agree in attributing to this Council only the twenty canons, which we possess today. Of these the following is a brief résumé:

Canon 1: On the admission, or support, or expulsion of clerics mutilated by choice or by violence.

Canon 2: Rules to be observed for ordination, the avoidance of undue haste, the deposition of those guilty of a grave fault.

Canon 3: All members of the clergy are forbidden to dwell with any woman, except a mother, sister, or aunt.

Canon 4: Concerning episcopal elections.

Canon 5: Concerning the excommunicate.

Canon 6: Concerning patriarchs and their jurisdiction.

Canon 7: confirms the right of the bishops of Jerusalem to enjoy certain honours.

Canon 8: concerns the Novatians.

Canon 9: Certain sins known after ordination involve invalidation.

Canon 10: Lapsi who have been ordained knowingly or surreptitiously must be excluded as soon as their irregularity is known.

Canon 11: Penance to be imposed on apostates of the persecution of Licinius.

Canon 12: Penance to be imposed on those who upheld Licinius in his war on the Christians.

Canon 13: Indulgence to be granted to excommunicated persons in danger of death.

Canon 14: Penance to be imposed on catechumens who had weakened under persecution.

Canon 15: Bishops, priests, and deacons are not to pass from one church to another.

Canon 16: All clerics are forbidden to leave their church. Formal prohibition for bishops to ordain for their diocese a cleric belonging to another diocese.

Canon 17: Clerics are forbidden to lend at interest.

Canon 18: recalls to deacons their subordinate position with regard to priests.

Canon 19: Rules to be observed with regard to adherents of Paul of Samosata who wished to return to the Church.

Canon 20: On Sundays and during the Paschal season prayers should be said standing.

The business of the Council having been finished Constantine celebrated the twentieth anniversary of his accession to the empire, and invited the bishops to a splendid repast, at the end of which each of them received rich presents. Several days later the emperor commanded that a final session should be held, at which he assisted in order to exhort the bishops to work for the maintenance of peace; he commended himself to their prayers, and authorized the fathers to return to their dioceses. The greater number hastened to take advantage of this and to bring the resolutions of the council to the knowledge of their provinces.

H. LECLERCQ

Transcribed by Anthony A. Killeen

The Catholic Encyclopedia, Volume XI

Nihil Obstat, February 1, 1911. Remy Lafort, S.T.D., Censor

Imprimatur. +John Cardinal Farley, Archbishop of New York

http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/11044a.htm

February 13, 2001

First Council of Constantinople

(SECOND GENERAL COUNCIL.)

This council was called in May, 381, by Emperor Theodosius, to provide for a Catholic succession in the patriarchal See of Constantinople, to confirm the Nicene Faith, to reconcile the semi-Arians with the Church, and to put an end to the Macedonian heresy.

Originally it was only a council of the Orient; the arguments of Baronius (ad an. 381, nos. 19, 20) to prove that it was called by Pope Damasus are invalid (Hefele-Leclercq, Hist. des Conciles, Paris, 1908, II, 4). It was attended by 150 Catholic and 36 heretical (Semi-Arian, Macedonian) bishops, and was presided over by Meletius of Antioch; after his death, by the successive Patriarchs of Constantinople, St. Gregory Nazianzen and Nectarius.

Its first measure was to confirm St. Gregory Nazianzen as Bishop of Constantinople. The Acts of the council have almost entirely disappeared, and its proceedings are known chiefly through the accounts of the ecclesiastical historians Socrates, Sozomen, and Theodoret. There is good reason to believe that it drew up a formal treatise (tomos) on the Catholic doctrine of the Trinity, also against Apollinarianism; this important document has been lost, with the exception of the first canon of the council and its famous creed (Nicaeano-Constantinopolitanum). The latter is traditionally held to be an enlargement of the Nicene Creed, with emphasis on the Divinity of the Holy Spirit. It seems, however, to be of earlier origin, and was probably composed (369-73) by St. Cyril of Jerusalem as an expression of the faith of that Church (Bois), though its adoption by this council gave it special authority, both as a baptismal creed and as a theological formula. Recently Harnack (Realencyklopadie fur prot. Theol. und Kirche, 3rd ed., XI, 12-28) has maintained, on apparently inconclusive grounds, that not till after the Council of Chalcedon (451) was this creed (a Jerusalem formula with Nicene additions) attributed to the Fathers of this council. At Chalcedon, indeed, it was twice recited and appears twice in the Acts of that council; it was also read and accepted at the Sixth General Council, held at Constantinople in 680. The very ancient Latin version of its text (Mansi, Coll. Conc., III, 567) is by Dionysius Exiguus.

The Greeks recognize seven canons, but the oldest Latin versions have only four; the other three are very probably (Hefele) later additions.

The first canon is an important dogmatic condemnation of all shades of Arianism, also of Macedonianism and Apollinarianism.

The second canon renews the Nicene legislation imposing upon the bishops the observance of diocesan and patriarchal limits.

The fourth canon declares invalid the consecration of Maximus, the Cynic philosopher and rival of St. Gregory of Nazianzus, as Bishop of Constantinople.

The famous third canon declares that because Constantinople is New Rome the bishop of that city should have a pre-eminence of honour after the Bishop of Old Rome. Baronius wrongly maintained the non-authenticity of this canon, while some medieval Greeks maintained (an equally erroneous thesis) that it declared the bishop of the royal city in all things the equal of the pope. The purely human reason of Rome's ancient authority, suggested by this canon, was never admitted by the Apostolic See, which always based its claim to supremacy on the succession of St. Peter. Nor did Rome easily acknowledge this unjustifiable reordering of rank among the ancient patriarchates of the East. It was rejected by the papal legates at Chalcedon. St. Leo the Great (Ep. cvi in P.L., LIV, 1003, 1005) declared that this canon has never been submitted to the Apostolic See and that it was a violation of the Nicene order. At the Eighth General Council in 869 the Roman legates (Mansi, XVI, 174) acknowledged Constantinople as second in patriarchal rank. In 1215, at the Fourth Lateran Council (op. cit., XXII, 991), this was formally admitted for the new Latin patriarch, and in 1439, at the Council of Florence, for the Greek patriarch (Hefele-Leclercq, Hist. des Conciles, II, 25-27). The Roman correctores of Gratian (1582), at dist. xxii, c. 3, insert the words: "canon hic ex iis est quos apostolica Romana sedes a principio et longo post tempore non recipit."

At the close of this council Emperor Theodosius issued an imperial decree (30 July) declaring that the churches should be restored to those bishops who confessed the equal Divinity of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit, and who held communion with Nectarius of Constantinople and other important Oriental prelates whom he named. The ecumenical character of this council seems to date, among the Greeks, from the Council of Chalcedon (451). According to Photius (Mansi, III, 596) Pope Damasus approved it, but if any part of the council were approved by this pope it could have been only the aforesaid creed. In the latter half of the fifth century the successors of Leo the Great are silent as to this council. Its mention in the so-called "Decretum Gelasii", towards the end of the fifth century, is not original but a later insertion in that text (Hefele). Gregory the Great, following the example of Vigilius and Pelagius II, recognized it as one of the four general councils, but only in its dogmatic utterances (P.G., LXXVII, 468, 893).

THOMAS J. SHAHAN

Transcribed by Sean Hyland

The Catholic Encyclopedia, Volume IV

Nihil Obstat. Remy Lafort, Censor

Imprimatur. +John M. Farley, Archbishop of New York

http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/04308a.htm

February 13, 2001

Council of Ephesus

The third ecumenical council, held in 431.

THE OCCASION AND PREPARATION FOR THE COUNCIL

The idea of this great council seems to have been due to Nestorius, the Bishop of Constantinople. St. Cyril, Patriarch of Alexandria, had accused him to Pope St. Celestine of heresy, and the pope had replied on 11 August, 430, by charging St. Cyril to assume his authority and give notice in his name to Nestorius that, unless he recanted within ten days of receiving this ultimatum, he was to consider himself excommunicated and deposed. The summons was served on Nestorius on a Sunday, 30 November, or 7 December, by four bishops sent by Cyril. But Nestorius was evidently well informed of what he was to expect. He regarded himself as having been calumniated to the pope, and he did not choose to be given over into the hands of Cyril. The latter was, in his opinion, not merely a personal enemy, but a dangerous theologian, who was reviving to some extent the errors of Apollinarius. Nestorius had influence over the Emperor of the East, Theodosius II, whom he induced to summon a general council to judge of the difference between the Patriarch of Alexandria and himself, and he worked so well that the letters of convocation were issued by the emperor to all metropolitans on 19 November, some days before the messengers of Cyril arrived. The emperor was able to take this course without seeming to favour Nestorius too much, because the monks of the capital, whom Nestorius had excommunicated for their opposition to his heretical teaching, had also appealed to him to call together a council. Nestorius, therefore, paid no attention to the pope's ultimatum, and refused to be guided by the advice to submit which his friend John, the Patriarch of Antioch, volunteered.

The pope was pleased that the whole East should be united to condemn the new heresy. He sent two bishops, Arcadius and Projectus, to represent himself and his Roman council, and the Roman priest, Philip, as his personal representative. Philip, therefore, takes the first place, though, not being a bishop, he could not preside. It was probably a matter of course that the Patriarch of Alexandria should be president. The legates were directed not to take part in the discussions, but to give judgment on them. It seems that Chalcedon, twenty years later, set the precedent that the papal legates should always be technically presidents at an ecumenical council, and this was henceforth looked upon as a matter of course, and Greek historians assumed that it must have been the case at Nicaea.

The emperor was anxious for the presence of the most venerated prelate of the whole world, Augustine, and sent a special messenger to that great man with a letter in honourable terms. But the saint had died during the siege of Hippo in the preceding August, though the troubles of Africa had prevented news from reaching Constantinople.

Theodosius wrote an angry letter to Cyril, and a temperate one to the council. The tone of the latter epistle and of the instructions given to the imperial commander, Count Candidian, to be absolutely impartial, are ascribed by the Coptic Acts to the influence exercised on the emperor by the Abbot Victor, who had been sent to Constantinople by Cyril to act as his agent at the Court on account of the veneration and friendship which Theodosius was known to feel for the holy man.

ARRIVAL OF THE PARTICIPANTS AT EPHESUS

Nestorius, with sixteen bishops, and Cyril, with fifty, arrived before Pentecost at Ephesus. The Coptic tells us that the two parties arrived on the same day, and that in the evening Nestorius proposed that all should join in the Vesper service together. The other bishops refused. Memnon, Bishop of Ephesus, was afraid of violence, and sent his clergy only to the church. The mention of a Flavian, who seems to be the Bishop of Philippi, casts some doubt on this story, for that bishop did not arrive till later. Memnon of Ephesus had forty suffragans present, not counting twelve from Pamphylia (whom John of Antioch calls heretics). Juvenal of Jerusalem, with the neighbouring bishops whom he looked upon as his suffragans, and Flavian of Philippi, with a contingent from the countries which looked to Thessalonica as their metropolis, arrived soon after Pentecost. The Patriarch of Antioch, John, an old friend of Nestorius, wrote to explain that his suffragans had not been able to start till after the Octave of Easter. (The Coptic Acts say that there was a famine at Antioch.) The journey of thirty days had been lengthened by the death of some horses; he would accomplish the last five or six stages at leisure. But he did not arrive, and it was said that he was loitering because he did not wish to join in condemning Nestorius. Meanwhile the heat was great. Many bishops were ill. Two or three died. Two of John's metropolitans, those of Apamea and Hierapolis, arrived and declared that John did not wish the opening of the council to be deferred on account of his delay. However, these two bishops and Theodoret of Cyrus, with sixty-five others, wrote a memorial addressed to St. Cyril and Juvenal of Jerusalem, begging that the arrival of John should be awaited. Count Candidian arrived, with the imperial decree, and he took the same view.

THE COUNCIL ITSELF

But Cyril and the majority determined to open the council on 22 June, sixteen days having passed since John had announced his arrival in five or six. It was clear to the majority that this delay was intentional, and they were probably right. Yet it is regrettable that all possible allowance was not made, especially as no news had yet come from Rome. For Cyril had written to the pope with regard to an important question of procedure. Nestorius had not recanted within the ten days fixed by the pope, and he was consequently treated as excommunicate by the majority of the bishops. Was he to be allowed a fresh trial, although the pope had already condemned him? Or, on the other hand, was he to be merely given the opportunity of explaining or excusing his contumacy? One might have presumed that Pope Celestine, in approving of the council, intended that Nestorius should have a full trial, and in fact this was declared in his letter which was still on the way. But as no reply had come to Cyril, that saint considered that he had no right to treat the pope's sentence as a matter for further discussion, and no doubt he had not much wish to do so.

First Session (June 22)

The council assembled on 22 June, and St. Cyril assumed the presidency both as Patriarch of Alexandria and "as filling the place of the most holy and blessed Archbishop of the Roman Church, Celestine", in order to carry out his original commission, which he considered, in the absence of any reply from Rome, to be still in force.

In the morning 160 bishops were present, and by evening 198 had assembled. The session began by a justification of the decision to delay no longer. Nestorius had been on the previous day invited to attend. He had replied that he would come if he chose. To a second summons, which was now dispatched, he sent a message from his house, which was surrounded with armed men, that he would appear when all the bishops had come together. Indeed only some twenty of the sixty-eight who had demanded a delay had rallied to Cyril, and Nestorius's own suffragans had also stayed away. To a third summons he gave no answer. This attitude corresponds with his original attitude to the ultimatum sent by Cyril. He would not acknowledge Cyril as a judge, and he looked upon the opening of the council before the arrival of his friends from Antioch as a flagrant injustice.

The session proceeded. The Nicene Creed was read, and then the second letter of Cyril to Nestorius, on which the bishops at Cyril's desire, severally gave their judgment that it was in accordance with the Nicene faith, 126 speaking in turn. Next the reply of Nestorius was read. All then cried Anathema to Nestorius. Then Pope Celestine's letter to St. Cyril was read, and after it the third letter of Cyril to Nestorius, with the anathematisms which the heretic was to accept. The bishops who had served this ultimatum on Nestorius deposed that they had given him the letter. He had promised his answer on the morrow, but had not given any, and did not even admit them.

Then two friends of Nestorius, Theodotus of Ancyra and Acacius of Mitylene, were invited by Cyril to give an account of their conversations at Ephesus with Nestorius. Acacius said that Nestorius had repeatedly declared dimeniaion e trimeniaion me dein legesthai Theon. Nestorius's own account of this conversation in his "Apology" (Bethune-Baker, p. 71) shows that this phrase is to be translated thus: "We must not say that God is two or three months old." This is not so shocking as the meaning which has usually been ascribed to the words in modern as well as ancient times (e.g. by Socrates, VII, xxxiv): "A baby of two or three months old ought not to be called God." The former sense agrees with the accusation of Acacius that Nestorius declared "one must either deny the Godhead (theotes) of the Only-begotten to have become man, or else admit the same of the Father and of the Holy Ghost." (Nestorius means that the Divine Nature is numerically one; and if Nestorius really said theotes, and not hypostasis, he was right, and Acacius was wrong.)

Acacius further accused him of uttering the heresy that the Son who died is to be distinguished from the Word of God. A series of extracts from the holy Fathers was then read, Peter I and Athanasius of Alexandria, Julius and Felix of Rome (but these papal letters were Apollinarian forgeries), Theophilus, Cyril's uncle, Cyprian, Ambrose, Gregory Nazianzen, Basil, Gregory of Nyssa, Atticus, Amphilochius. After these, contrasted passages from the writings of Nestorius were read. These were of course pièces justificatives brought forward by Cyril, and necessary to inform the council as to the question at issue. Hefele has wrongly understood that the bishops were examining the doctrine of Nestorius afresh, without accepting the condemnation of the pope as necessarily correct. A fine letter from Capreolus, Bishop of Carthage, and primate of a greater number of bishops than any of the Eastern patriarchs, was next produced. He writes in the midst of the devastation of Africa by the Vandals, and naturally could neither hold any synod nor send any bishops. No discussion followed (and Hefele is wrong in suggesting an omission in the Acts, which are already of extraordinary length for a single day), but the bishops accepted with acclamation the words of Capreolus against novelty and in praise of ancient faith, and all proceeded to sign the sentence against Nestorius. As the excommunication by St. Celestine was still in force, and as Nestorius had contumaciously refused to answer the threefold summons enjoined by the canons, the sentence was worded as follows:

The holy synod said: "Since in addition to the rest the most impious Nestorius has neither been willing to obey our citation, nor to receive the most holy and god-fearing bishops whom we sent to him, we have necessarily betaken ourselves to the examination of his impieties; and, having apprehended from his letters and from his writings, and from his recent sayings in this metropolis which have been reported, that his opinions and teachings are impious, we being necessarily impelled thereto both by the canons [for his contumacy] and by the letter [to Cyril] of our most holy father and colleague Celestine, Bishop of the Roman Church, with many tears have arrived at the following grievous sentence against him: Our Lord, Jesus Christ, Who has been blasphemed by him, has defined by this holy synod that the same Nestorius is excluded from all episcopal dignity and from every assembly of bishops.

This sentence received 198 signatures, and some more were afterwards added. A brief notification addressed to "the new Judas" was sent to Nestorius. The Coptic Acts tell us that, as he would not receive it, it was affixed to his door. The whole business had been concluded in a single long session, and it was evening when the result was known. The people of Ephesus, full of rejoicing, escorted the fathers to their houses with torches and incense. Count Candidian, on the other hand, had the notices of the deposition torn down, and silenced the cries in the streets. The council wrote at once to the emperor and to the people and clergy of Constantinople, though the Acts had not yet been written out in full. In a letter to the Egyptian bishops in the same city and to the Abbot Dalmatius (the Coptic substitutes Abbot Victor), Cyril asks for their vigilance, as Candidian was sending false reports. Sermons were preached by Cyril and his friends, and the people of Ephesus were much excited. Even before this, Nestorius, writing, with ten bishops, to the emperor to complain that the council was to begin without waiting for the Antiochenes and the Westerns, had spoken of the violence of the people, egged on by their bishop Memnon who (so the heretic said) had shut the churches to him and threatened him with death.

Arrival of John of Antioch (June 27)

Five days after the first session John of Antioch arrived. The party of Cyril sent a deputation to meet him honourably, but John was surrounded by soldiers, and complained that the bishops were creating a disturbance. Before he would speak to them, he held an assembly which he designated "the holy synod". Candidian deposed that he had disapproved of the assembling of the bishops before John's arrival; he had attended the session and read the emperor's letter (of this not a word in the Acts, so Candidian was apparently lying). John accused Memnon of violence, and Cyril of Arian, Apollinarian, and Eunomian heresy. These two were deposed by forty-three bishops present; the members of the council were to be forgiven, provided they would condemn the twelve anathematisms of Cyril. This was absurd, for most of these could not be understood in anything but a Catholic sense. But John, who was not a bad man, was in a bad temper. It is noticeable that not a word was said in favour of Nestorius at this assembly. The party of Cyril was now complaining of Count Candidian and his soldiers, as the other side did of Memnon and the populace. Both parties sent their report to Rome. The emperor was much distressed at the division, and wrote that a collective session must be held, and the matter begun afresh. The official named Palladius who brought this epistle took back with him many letters from both sides. Cyril proposed that the emperor should send for him and five bishops, to render an exact account.

Second Session (10 July)

At last on 10 July the papal envoys arrived. The second session assembled in the episcopal residence. The legate Philip opened the proceedings by saying that the former letter of St. Celestine had been already read, in which he had decided the present question; the pope had now sent another letter. This was read. It contained a general exhortation to the council, and concluded by saying that the legates had instructions to carry out what the pope had formerly decided; doubtless the council would agree. The Fathers then cried:

This is a just judgment. To Celestine the new Paul! To the new Paul Cyril! To Celestine, the guardian of the Faith! To Celestine agreeing to the Synod! The Synod gives thanks to Cyril. One Celestine, one Cyril!

The legate Projectus then says that the letter enjoins on the council, though they need no instruction, to carry into effect the sentence which the pope had pronounced. Hefele wrongly interprets this: "That is, that all the bishops should accede to the Papal sentence" (vol. III, 136). Firmus, the Exarch of Caesarea in Cappadocia, replies that the pope, by the letter which he sent to the Bishops of Alexandria, Jerusalem, Thessalonica, Constantinople, and Antioch, had long since given his sentence and decision; and the synod -- the ten days having passed, and also a much longer period -- having waited beyond the day of opening fixed by the emperor, had followed the course indicated by the pope, and, as Nestorius did not appear, had executed upon him the papal sentence, having inflicted the canonical and Apostolic judgment upon him. This was a reply to Projectus, declaring that what the pope required had been done, and it is an accurate account of the work of the first session and of the sentence; canonical refers to the words of the sentence, "necessarily obliged by the canons", and Apostolic to the words "and by the letter of the bishop of Rome". The legate Arcadius expressed his regret for the late arrival of his party, on account of storms, and asked to see the decrees of the council. Philip, the pope's personal legate, then thanked the bishops for adhering by their acclamations as holy members to their holy head -- "For your blessedness is not unaware that the Apostle Peter is the head of the Faith and of the Apostles." The Metropolitan of Ancyra declared that God had shown the justice of the synod's sentence by the coming of St. Celestine's letter and of the legates. The session closed with the reading of the pope's letter to the emperor.

Third Session (July 11)

On the following day, 11 July, the third session took place. The legates had read the Acts of the first session and now demanded only that the condemnation of Nestorius should be formally read in their presence. When this had been done, the three legates severally pronounced a confirmation in the pope's name. The exordium of the speech of Philip is celebrated:

It is doubtful to none, nay it has been known to all ages, that holy and blessed Peter, the prince and head of the Apostles, the column of the Faith, the foundation of the Catholic Church, received from our Lord Jesus Christ, the Saviour and Redeemer of the human race, the keys of the Kingdom, and that to him was given the power of binding and loosing sins, who until this day and for ever lives and judges in his successors. His successor in order and his representative, our holy and most blessed Pope Celestine. . .

It was with words such as these before their eyes that Greek Fathers and councils spoke of the Council of Ephesus as celebrated "by Celestine and Cyril". A translation of these speeches was read, for Cyril then rose and said that the synod had understood them clearly; and now the Acts of all three sessions must be presented to the legates for their signature. Arcadius replied that they were of course willing. The synod ordered that the Acts should be set before them, and they signed them. A letter was sent to the emperor, telling him how St. Celestine had held a synod at Rome and had sent his legates, representing himself and the whole of the West. The whole world has therefore agreed; Theodosius should allow the bishops to go home, for many suffered from being at Ephesus, and their dioceses also must suffer. Only a few friends of Nestorius held out against the world's judgment. A new bishop must be appointed for Constantinople.

Fourth session (July 16)

On 16 July a more solemn session was held, like the first, in the cathedral of the Theotokos. Cyril and Memnon presented a written protest against the conciliabulum of John of Antioch. He was cited to appear, but would not even admit the envoys.

Fifth Session (July 17)

Next day the fifth session was held in the same church. John had set up a placard in the city accusing the synod of the Apollinarian heresy. He is again cited, and this is counted as the third canonical summons. He would pay no attention. In consequence the council suspended and excommunicated him, together with thirty-four bishops of his party, but refrained from deposing them. Some of John's party had already deserted him, and he had gained only a few. In the letters to the emperor and the pope which were then dispatched, the synod described itself as now consisting of 210 bishops. The long letter to Celestine give a full account of the council, and mentions that the pope's decrees against the Pelagians had been read and confirmed.

Sixth Session

At the end of the sixth session, which dealt only with the case of two Nestorianizing priests, was made the famous declaration that no one must produce or compose any other creed than (para, proeter, "beyond" -- "contrary to"?) the Nicene, and that anyone who should propose any such to pagans, Jews, or heretics, who wished to be converted, should be deposed if a bishop or cleric, or anathematized if a layman. This decision became later a fruitful source of objections to the decrees of later synods and to the addition of the filioque to the so-called Constantinopolitan Creed; but that creed itself would be abolished by this decree if it is taken too literally. We know of several matters connected with Pamphylia and Thrace which were treated by the council, which are not found in the Acts. St. Leo tells us that Cyril reported to the pope the intrigues by which Juvenal of Jerusalem tried at Ephesus to carve himself a patriarchate out of that of Antioch, in which his see lay. He was to succeed in this twenty years later, at Chalcedon.

Seventh Session (July 31)

In the seventh and last session on 31 July (it seems) the bishops of Cyprus persuaded the council to approve their claim of having been anciently and rightly exempt from the jurisdiction of Antioch. Six canons were also passed against the adherents and supporters of Nestorius.

IMPERIAL AND PAPAL CONFIRMATION OF THE COUNCIL

The history of the intrigues by which both parties tried to get the emperor on their side need not be detailed here. The orthodox were triumphant at Ephesus by their numbers and by the agreement of the papal legates. The population of Ephesus was on their side. The people of Constantinople rejoiced at the deposition of their heretical bishop. But Count Candidian and his troops were on the side of Nestorius, whose friend, Count Irenaeus, was also at Ephesus, working for him. The emperor had always championed Nestorius, but had been somewhat shaken by the reports of the council. Communication with Constantinople was impeded both by the friends of Nestorius there and by Candidian at Ephesus. A letter was taken to Constantinople at last in a hollow cane, by a messenger disguised as a beggar, in which the miserable condition of the bishops at Ephesus was described, scarce a day passing without a funeral, and entreaty was made that they might be allowed to send representatives to the emperor. The holy abbot, St. Dalmatius, to whom the letter was addressed, as well as to the emperor, clergy, and people of Constantinople, left his monastery in obedience to a Divine voice and, at the head of the many thousand monks of the city, all chanting and carrying tapers, made his way through enthusiastic crowds to the palace. They passed back right through the city, after the abbot Dalmatius had interviewed the emperor, and the letter was read to the people in the church of St. Mocius. All shouted "Anathema to Nestorius!"

Eventually the pious and well-meaning emperor arrived at the extraordinary decision that he should ratify the depositions decreed by both councils. He therefore declared that Cyril, Memnon, and John were all deposed. Memnon and Cyril were kept in close confinement. But in spite of all the exertions of the Antiochan party, the representatives of the envoys whom the council was eventually allowed to send, with the legate Philip, to the Court, persuaded the emperor to accept the great council as the true one. Nestorius anticipated his fate by requesting permission to retire to his former monastery. The synod was dissolved about the beginning of October, and Cyril arrived amid much joy at Alexandria on 30 October. St. Celestine was now dead, but his successor, St. Sixtus III, confirmed the council.

JOHN CHAPMAN

Transcribed by Sean Hyland

The Catholic Encyclopedia, Volume V

Nihil Obstat, May 1, 1909. Remy Lafort, Censor

Imprimatur. +John M. Farley, Archbishop of New York

http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/05491a.htm

February 13, 2001

Council of Chalcedon

The Fourth Ecumenical Council, held in 451, from 8 October until 1 November inclusive, at Chalcedon, a city of Bithynia in Asia Minor. Its principal purpose was to assert the orthodox Catholic doctrine against the heresy of Eutyches and the Monophysites, although ecclesiastical discipline and jurisdiction also occupied the council's attention. Scarcely had the heresy of Nestorius concerning the two persons in Christ been condemned by the Council of Ephesus, in 431, when the opposite error of the Nestorian heresy arose. Since Nestorius so fully divided the Divine and the human in Christ that he taught a double personality or a twofold being in Christ, it became incumbent on his opponents to emphasize the unity in Christ and to exhibit the God-man, not as two beings but as one. Some of these opponents in their efforts to maintain a physical unity in Christ held that the two natures in Christ, the Divine and the human, were so intimately united that they became physically one, inasmuch as the human nature was completely absorbed by the Divine. Thus resulted one Christ not only with one personality but also with one nature. After the Incarnation, they said, no distinction could be made in Christ between the Divine and the human. The principal representatives of this teaching were Dioscurus, Patriarch of Alexandria, and Eutyches, an archimandrite or president of a monastery outside Constantinople. The Monophysitic error, as the new error was called (Gr. mone physis, one nature), claimed the authority of St. Cyril, but only through a misinterpretation of some expressions of the great Alexandrine teacher.

The error of Eutyches was first detected by Domnus, Patriarch of Antioch. a formal accusation was preferred against the former by Eusebius, Bishop of Dorylaeum (Phrygia), at a synod of Constantinople in November of that year. This synod declared it a matter of faith that after the Incarnation, Christ consisted of two natures (united) in one hypostasis or person; hence there was one Christ, one Son, one Lord. Eutyches, who appeared before this synod, protested, on the contrary, that before the Incarnation there were two natures, but after the union there was only one nature in Christ; and the humanity of Christ was not of the same essence as ours. These statements were found contrary to Christian orthodoxy; Eutyches was deposed, excommunicated, and deprived of his station in the monastery. He protested, and appealed for redress to Pope Leo I (440-61), to other distinguished bishops, and also to Theodosius II. Bishop Flavian of Constantinople informed Pope Leo and other bishops of what had occurred in his city. Eutyches won the sympathy of the emperor; through the monk's representations and those of Dioscurus, Patriarch of Alexandria, the emperor was induced to invoke a new council, to be held at Ephesus. Pope Leo, Dioscurus, and a number of bishops and monks were invited to attend and investigate anew the orthodoxy of Eutyches. The pope was unable to go, but sent three delegates as his representatives and bearers of letters to prominent personages of the East and to the impending synod. Among these letters, all of which bear the date of 13 June, 449, is one known as the "Epistola Dogmatica", or dogmatic letter, of Leo I, in which the pope explains the mystery of the Incarnation with special reference to the questions raised by Eutyches. Thus, he declares that after the Incarnation what was proper to each nature and substance in Christ remained intact and both were united in one person, but so that each nature acted according to its own qualities and characteristics. As to Eutyches himself, the pope did not hesitate to condemn him. The council was held at Ephesus, in August, 449. Only the friends and partisans of Dioscurus and Eutyches were allowed to have a voice. The Alexandrine patriarch presided; he ignored the papal delegates, would not permit the letters of Pope Leo, including the "Epistola Dogmatica", to be read in the assembly. Eutyches was declared orthodox and reinstated in his priestly and monastic office. On the other hand, Flavian of Constantinople and Eusebius of Dorylaeum were deposed. The former was banished, and died shortly afterwards in consequence of ill-treatment; he was succeeded by the deacon Anatolius, a partisan of Dioscurus. Owing to the gross violence of Dioscurus and his partisans, this assembly was called by Leo I the "Latrocinium", or Robber Council, of Ephesus, a name that has since clung to it.

Theodosius II, who sympathized with Eutyches, approved these violent deeds; Leo I, on the other hand, when fully informed of the occurrences at Ephesus, condemned, in a Roman synod and in several letters, all the Acts of the so-called council. He refused also to recognize Anatolius as lawful Bishop of Constantinople, at least until the latter would give satisfaction concerning his belief. At the same time he requested the emperor to order the holding of a new council in Italy, to right the wrongs committed at Ephesus. As a special reason for the opportuneness, and even necessity, of the new council, he alleged the appeal of the deposed Flavian of Constantinople. Theodosius, however, positively declined to meet the wishes of the pope. At this stage the sudden death of the emperor (28 July, 450) changed at once the religious situation in the East. Theodosius was succeeded by his sister, Pulcheria, who offered her hand, and with it the imperial throne, to a brave general named Marcian (450-57). Both Marcian and Pulcheria were opposed to the new teaching of Dioscurus and Eutyches; and Marcian at once informed Leo I of his willingness to call a new council according to the previous desire of the pope. In the meantime conditions had changed. Anatolius of Constantinople, and with him many other bishops, condemned the teaching of Eutyches and accepted the dogmatic epistle of Pope Leo. Any new discussions concerning the Christian Faith seemed therefore superfluous. Western Europe, moreover, was in a state of turmoil owing to the invasion of the Huns under Attila, for which reason most of the Western bishops could not attend a council to be held in the East. Leo I therefore protested repeatedly against a council and wrote in this sense to the Emperor Marcian, the Empress Pulcheria, Anatolius of Constantinople, and Julian of Cos; all these letters bear the date of 9 June, 451. Meanwhile, 17 May, 451, a decree was issued by Marcian -- in the name also of the Western Emperor Valentinian III (425-55) -- ordering all metropolitan bishops with a number of their suffragan bishops to assemble the following September at Nicaea in Bithynia, there to hold a general council for the purpose of settling the questions of faith recently called in doubt.

Though displeased with this action, the pope nevertheless agreed to send his representatives to Nicaea. He appointed as legates Paschasinus, Bishop of Lilybaeum (Marsala) in Sicily, Lucentius, also a bishop, Julian, Bishop of Cos, and two priests, comma, Boniface and Basil; Paschasinus was to preside over the coming council in the pope's place. On 24 and 26 June, 451, Leo I wrote letters to the Emperor Marcian, to his legate Paschasinus, to Anatolius of Constantinople, to Julian of Cos, and to the synod itself, in which he expressed the desire that the decrees of the synod should be in conformity with his teaching as contained in the aforesaid dogmatic epistle. A detailed instruction was also given to the papal legates, which contained directions for their guidance in the council; this document, however, has perished, with the exception of two fragments preserved in the Acts of the council. In July the papal legates departed for their destination. Many bishops arrived at Nicaea during the summer, but the opening of the council was postponed owing to the emperor's inability to be present. Finally, at the complaint of the bishops, who grew weary of waiting, Marcian requested them to come to Chalcedon, in the near vicinity of Constantinople. This was done, and the council opened at Chalcedon on 8 October.

In all likelihood an official record of the proceedings was made either during the council itself or shortly afterwards. The assembled bishops informed the pope that a copy of all the "Acta" would be transmitted to him; in March, 453, Pope Leo commissioned Julian of Cos, then at Constantinople, to make a collection of all the Acts and translate them into Latin. Very ancient versions of the Acts, both in Greek and Latin, are still extant. Most of the documents, chiefly the minutes of the sessions, were written in Greek; others, e.g. the imperial letters, were issued in both languages; others, again, e.g. the papal letters, were written in Latin. Eventually nearly all of them were translated into both languages. The Latin version, known as the "versio antiqua", was probably made about 500, perhaps by Dionysius Exiguus. About the middle of the sixth century the Roman deacon Rusticus then in Constantinople with Pope Vigilius (537-55), made numerous corrections in the "versio antiqua", after comparison with Greek manuscripts of the Acts, chiefly with those of the "Acoemetae" monastery either at Constantinople or at Chalcedon. As to the number of sessions held by the Council of Chalcedon there is a great discrepancy in the various texts of the Acts, also in the ancient historians of the council. Either the respective manuscripts must have been incomplete; or the historians passed over in silence several sessions held for secondary purposes. According to the deacon Rusticus, there were in all sixteen sessions; this division is commonly accepted by scholars, including Bishop Hefele, the learned historian of the councils. If all the separate meetings were counted, there would be twenty-one sessions; several of these meetings, however, are considered as supplementary to preceding sessions. all the sessions were held in the church of St. Euphemia, Martyr, outside the city and directly opposite Constantinople. The exact number of bishops present is not known. The synod itself, in a letter to Pope Leo, speaks of 520, while Pope Leo says there were 600; according to the general estimate there were 630, including the representatives of absent bishops. No previous council could boast of so large a gathering of bishops, while the attendance at later councils seldom surpassed or even equalled that number. The council, however, was not equally representative as to the countries whence came so many bishops. Apart from the papal legates and two African bishops, practically all the bishops belonged to the Eastern Church. This, however, was well represented; the two great civil divisions (prefectures), of the Orient and of Illyricum, comprising Egypt, the Orient (including Palestine), Pontus, Asia, Thrace, Dacia, and Macedonia, sent their contingents. The more prominent among the Eastern bishops were Anatolius of Constantinople, Maximus of Antioch, Dioscurus of Alexandria, Juvenal of Jerusalem, Thalassius of Caesarea in Cappadocia, Stephen of Ephesus, Quintillus of Heraclea, and Peter of Corinth. The honour of presiding over this venerable assembly was reserved to Paschasinus, Bishop of Lilybaeum, the first of the papal legates, according to the intention of Pope Leo I, expressed in his letter to Emperor Marcian (24 June, 451). Shortly after the council, writing to the bishops of Gaul, he mentions that his legates presided in his stead over the Eastern synod. Moreover, Paschasinus proclaimed openly in presence of the council that he was presiding over it in the name and in the place of pope Leo. The members of the council recognized this prerogative of the papal legates. When writing to the pope they professed that, through his representatives, he presided over them in the council. In the interest of order and a regular procedure the Emperor Marcian appointed a number of commissioners, men of high rank, who received the place of honour in the council. Their jurisdiction, however, did not cover the ecclesiastical or religious questions under discussion. The commissioners simply directed the order of business during the sessions; they opened the meetings, laid before the council the matters to be discussed, demanded the votes of the bishops on the various subjects, and closed the sessions. Besides these there were present several members of the Senate, who shared the place of honour with the imperial commissioners.

At the very beginning of the first session, the papal legates, Paschasinus at their head, protested against the presence of Dioscurus of Alexandria. Formal accusations of heresy and of unjust actions committed in the Robber Council of Ephesus were preferred against him by Eusebius of Dorylaeum; and at the suggestion of the imperial commissioners he was removed from his seat among the bishops and deprived of his vote. In order to make a full investigation of his case the Acts of the Robber Council, with those of the synod held in 448 by Flavian of Constantinople, were read in full; this occupied the whole first session. At the end the imperial commissioners declared that since Flavian of Constantinople and other bishops had been unjustly deposed by the Robber Council it would be just that Dioscurus and the leaders in that synod should now suffer the same punishment. A number of bishops agreed, but finally all declared themselves satisfied with the deposition of Dioscurus alone.

The second session (10 October) was occupied with the reading of testimonia bearing on questions of faith, chiefly those under discussion. Among them were the symbols or creeds of the Councils of Nicaea (325) and of Constantinople (381); two letters of St. Cyril of Alexandria, viz. his second letter to Nestorius and the letter written to the Antiochene bishops in 433 after his reconciliation with them; finally the dogmatic epistle of Pope Leo I. All these documents were approved by the council. When the pope's famous epistle was read the members of the council exclaimed that the faith contained therein was the faith of the Fathers and of the Apostles; that through Leo, Peter had spoken.

The third session was held 13 October; the imperial commissioners and a number of bishops were absent. Eusebius of Dorylaeum presented a new accusation against Dioscurus of Alexandria in which the charges of heresy and of injustice committed in the Robber Council of Ephesus were repeated. Three ecclesiastics and a layman from Alexandria likewise presented accusations against their bishop; he was declared guilty of many acts of injustice and of personal misconduct. At the end of the session the papal legates declared that Dioscurus should be deprived of his bishopric and of all ecclesiastical dignities for having supported the heretic Eutyches, for having excommunicated Pope Leo, and for having refused to answer the charges made against him. All the members present agreed to this proposition; and the decree of deposition was communicated to Dioscurus himself, to the Alexandrine ecclesiastics with him at Chalcedon, to the Emperors Marcian and Valentinian III, and to the Empress Pulcheria.

The fourth session, which comprised two meetings, was held on 17 and 20 October. At the request of the imperial commissioners the bishops again approved the dogmatic epistle of Pope Leo I; Juvenal of Jerusalem, Thalassius of Caesarea in Cappadocia, Eusebius of Ancyra, Eustathius of Berytus, and Basil of Seleucia in Cicilia, former partisans of Dioscurus in the Robber Council of Ephesus, were pardoned and admitted to the sessions; an investigation was made into the orthodoxy of a number of bishops from Egypt, and of a number of monks and archimandrites suspected of Eutychianism; finally a dispute between Photius of Tyre and Eustathius of Berytus concerning the territorial extent of their respective jurisdiction was adjudicated.

The most important of all the sessions was the fifth, held 22 October; in this the bishops published a decree concerning the Christian Faith, which must be considered as the specific dogmatic decree of the Fourth General Council. A special commission, consisting of the papal legates, of Anatolius of Constantinople, Maximus of Antioch, Juvenal of Jerusalem, and several others, was appointed to draw up this creed or symbol. After again approving the decrees and symbols of the Councils of Nicaea (325), Constantinople (381), and Ephesus (431), as well as the teaching of St. Cyril against Nestorius and the dogmatic epistle of Pope Leo I, the document in question declares:

We teach . . . one and the same Christ, Son, Lord, Only-begotten, known in two natures, without confusion, without change, without division, without separation.

After the recitation of the decree all the bishops exclaimed that such was the true faith, and that all should at once sign their names to it. The imperial commissioners announced that they would communicate to the emperor the decree as approved by all the bishops.

The sixth session (25 October) was celebrated with special solemnities; Marcian and Pulcheria were present with a great attendance, with all the imperial commissioners and the Senate. The emperor made an appropriate address; the decree of faith made in the preceding session was read again and approved by the emperor; and with joyful acclamations to the emperor and to the empress, in which they were compared to Constantine and Helena, the proceedings were closed.

The object of the council was attained in the sixth session, and only secondary matters were transacted in the remaining sessions. the seventh and eighth sessions were both held 26 October.

In the seventh an agreement between Maximus of Antioch and Juvenal of Jerusalem was approved, according to which the territory of the Patriarchate of Jerusalem was restricted to the three provinces of Palestine.

In the eighth session Theodoret of Cyrus, a former partisan of Nestorius, was compelled to condemn the name of his friend under threats of expulsion from the council. He was then reinstated in his bishopric.

The ninth and tenth sessions (27 and 28 October) dealt with the case of Ibas, Bishop of Edessa, who had been deposed on charges made by some of his ecclesiastics. The accusation proved to be unfounded and Ibas was reinstated in his office. A decision was also given to the effect that a pension should be paid by Maximus of Antioch to his deposed predecessor Domnus.

The eleventh and twelfth sessions (29 and 30 October) dealt with a conflict between Bassianus and Stephen, both raised successively but irregularly to the See of Ephesus. The council declared that a new bishop should be chosen for Ephesus, but the two aforesaid should retain their episcopal dignity and receive a pension from the church revenues of Ephesus.

The thirteenth session (30 October) decided a case of conflicting jurisdiction. Eunomius of Nicomedia and Anastasius of Nicaea both claimed metropolitan rights, at least for a part of Bithynia. The council decreed that in a province there could be only one metropolitan bishop, and in favour of the Bishop of Nicomedia.

The fourteenth session (31 October) decided the rival claims of Sabinian and Athanasius to the See of Perrha in Syria. Sabinian had been chosen in place of Athanasius deposed by an Antiochene synod in 445; later Athanasius was reinstated by the Robber Council of Ephesus. The council decreed that further investigation should be made into the charges against Athanasius, Sabinian meanwhile holding the see. If the charges should prove untrue, Athanasius should be reinstated and Sabinian receive a pension from the diocese. In the same session a letter of Pope Leo was read, and the council approved the decisions in regard to Maximus of Antioch in his conflict with Juvenal of Jerusalem, and his obligation of providing for his predecessor Domnus.

In the fifteenth session (31 October) the council adopted and approved twenty-eight disciplinary canons. The papal legates, however, as well as the imperial commissioners departed at the beginning of the session, probably foreseeing that the hierarchical status of the Bishop of Constantinople would be defined, as really occurred in canon 28.

The first canon approved the canons passed in previous synods.

The second established severe penalties against those who conferred ecclesiastical orders or positions for money, or received such orders or positions for money, and acted as intermediaries in such transactions.

The third forbade secular traffic to all ecclesiastics, except in the interest of minors, orphans, or other needy persons.

The fourth forbade the erection of a monastery or an oratory without the permission of the proper bishop; recommended to the monks a life of retirement, mortification, and prayer; and forbade the reception of a slave in a monastery without the permission of his master.

The fifth inculcated the canons of previous synods concerning the transfer of bishops and clerics from one city to another.

The sixth recommended that no one should be ordained except he were assigned to some ecclesiastical office. Those ordained contrary to this provision were not to exercise their order.

The seventh forbade ecclesiastics to exercise the military art or to hold a secular office.

The eighth decreed that the clerics of charitable homes, monasteries, or oratories of martyrs should be subject to the bishop of the territory.

The ninth ordained that ecclesiastics should conduct their lawsuits only before the bishop, the synod of the province, the exarch, or the Bishop of Constantinople.

The tenth forbade ecclesiastics to be enrolled in the church-registers of different cities.

The eleventh ordained that the poor and needy, when travelling, should be provided with letters of recommendation (litterae pacificae) from the churches.

The twelfth forbade the bishops to obtain from the emperors the title of metropolitans to the prejudice of the real metropolitan of their province.

The thirteenth forbade to strange clerics the exercise of their office unless provided with letters of recommendation from their bishop.

The fourteenth forbade minor clerics to marry heretical women, or to give their children in marriage to heretics.

The fifteenth decreed that no deaconess should be ordained below the age of forty; and no person once ordained a deaconess was allowed to leave that state and marry.

The sixteenth forbade the marriage of virgins or monks consecrated to God.

The seventeenth ordained that the parishes in rural districts should remain under the jurisdiction of their respective bishops; but if a new city were built by the emperor, its ecclesiastical organization should be modelled on that of the State.

The eighteenth forbade secret organizations in the Church, chiefly among clerics and monks.

The nineteenth ordained that the bishops of the province should assemble twice a year for the regular synod.

The twentieth forbade again the transfer of an ecclesiastic from one city to another, except in the case of grave necessity.

The twenty-first ordained that complaints against bishops or clerics should not be heard except after an investigation into the character of the accuser.

The twenty-second forbade ecclesiastics to appropriate the goods of their deceased bishop.

The twenty-third forbade clerics or monks to sojourn in Constantinople without the permission of their bishop.

The twenty-fourth ordained that monasteries once established, together with the property assigned to them, should not be converted to other purposes.

The twenty-fifth ordained that the metropolitan should ordain the bishops of his province within three months (from election).

The twenty-sixth ordained that ecclesiastical property should not be administered by the bishop alone, but by a special procurator.

The twenty-seventh decreed severe penalties against the abduction of women.

The twenty-eighth ratified the third canon of the Council of Constantinople (381), and decreed that since the city of Constantinople was honoured with the privilege of having the emperor and the Senate within its walls, its bishop should also have special prerogatives and be second in rank, after the Bishop of Rome. In consequence thereof he should consecrate the metropolitan bishops of the three civil Dioceses of Pontus, Asia, and Cappadocia.

This last canon provoked another session of the council, the sixteenth, held on 1 November. The papal legates protested therein against this canon, alleging that they had special instructions from Pope Leo on that subject, that the canon violated the prerogatives of the Patriarchs of Alexandria, Antioch, and Jerusalem, and was contrary to the canons (vi, vii) of the Council of Nicaea. Their protests, however, were not listened to; and the council persisted in retaining this canon in its Acts. With this incident the Council of Chalcedon was closed.

At the closing of the sessions the council wrote a letter to Pope Leo I, in which the Fathers informed him of what had been done; thanked him for the exposition of Christian Faith contained in his dogmatic epistle; spoke of his legates as having presided over them in his name; and asked for the ratification of the disciplinary matters enacted, particularly canon 28. This letter was handed to the papal legates, who departed for Rome soon after the last session of the council. Similar letters were written to Pope Leo in December by Emperor Marcian and Anatolius of Constantinople. In reply Pope Leo protested most energetically against canon xxviii and declared it null and void as being against the prerogatives of Bishops of Alexandria and Antioch, and against the decrees of the Council of Nicaea. Like protests were contained in the letters written 22 May, 452, to Emperor Marcian, Empress Pulcheria, and Anatolius of Constantinople. Otherwise the pope ratified the Acts of the Council of Chalcedon, but only inasmuch as they referred to matters of faith. This approval was contained in letters written 21 March, 453, to the bishops who took part in the council; hence the Council of Chalcedon, at least as to the first six sessions, became an ecumenical synod, and was considered as such by all Christians, both in the time of Poe Leo and after him. The Emperor Marcian issued several edicts (7 February, 13 March, and 28 July, 452) in which he approved the decrees of the Council of Chalcedon, forbade all discussions on questions of faith, forbade the Eutychians to have priests, to live in monasteries, to hold meetings, to inherit anything, to bequeath anything to their partisans, or to join the army. The clerics among the followers of Eutyches, hitherto orthodox, and the monks of his monastery, were to be expelled from Roman territory, as once the Manichaeans were. The writings of the Eutychians were to be burned; their authors, or those who spread them, were to be punished with confiscation and banishment. Finally Eutyches and Dioscurus were both banished. The former died about that time, while the latter lived to the year 454 in Gangra in Paphlagonia.

The Council of Chalcedon with its dogmatic definition did not put an end to the controversy concerning the natures of Christ and their relation to each other. Many people in the East disliked the term person used by the council to signify the union of, or the means of uniting, the two natures in Christ. They believed that Nestorianism was thereby renewed; or at least they thought the definition less satisfactory than St. Cyril's concept of the union of the two natures in Christ (Bardenhewer, Patrologie, 2nd ed., 321-22). In Palestine, Syria, Armenia, Egypt, and other countries, many monks and ecclesiastics refused to accept the definition of Chalcedon; and Monophysites are found there to this day. (See DIOSCURUS; JACOBITES; EUTYCHIANISM; MONOPHYSITISM.)

FRANCIS J. SCHAEFER

Transcribed by Sean Hyland

The Catholic Encyclopedia, Volume III

Nihil Obstat, November 1, 1908. Remy Lafort, S.T.D., Censor

Imprimatur. +John Cardinal Farley, Archbishop of New York

http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/03555a.htm

February 13, 2001

Fifth Lateran Council (1512-17)

When elected pope, Julius II promised under oath that he would soon convoke a general council. Time passed, however, and this promise was not fulfilled. Consequently, certain dissatisfied cardinals, urged, also, by Emperor Maximilian and Louis XII, convoked a council at Pisa and fixed 1 September, 1511, for its opening This event was delayed until 1 October. Four cardinals then met at Pisa provided with proxies from three absent cardinals. Several bishops and abbots were also there, as well as ambassadors from the King of France. Seven or eight sessions were held, in the last of which Pope Julius II was suspended, whereupon the prelates withdrew to Lyons. The pope hastened to oppose to this conciliabulum a more numerously attended council, which he convoked, by the Bull of 18 July, 1511, to assemble 19 April, 1512, in the church of St. John Lateran. The Bull was at once a canonical and a polemical document. In it the pope refuted in detail the reasons alleged by the cardinals for their Pisa conciliabulum. He declared that his conduct before his elevation to the pontificate was a pledge of his sincere desire for the celebration of the council; that since his elevation he had always sought opportunities for assembling it; that for this reason he had sought to reestablish peace among Christian princes; that the wars which had arisen against his will had no other object than the reestablishment of pontifical authority in the States of the Church. He then reproached the rebel cardinals with the irregularity of their onduct and the unseemliness of convoking the Universal Church independently of its head. He pointed out to them that the three months accorded by them for the assembly of all bishops at Pisa was too short, and that said city presented none of the advantages requisite for an assembly of such importance. Finally, he declared that no one should attach any significance to the act of the cardinals. The Bull was signed by twenty-one cardinals. The French victory of Ravenna (11 April, 1512) hindered the opening of the council before 3 May, on which day the fathers met in the Lateran Basilica. There were present fifteen cardinals, the Latin Patriarchs of Alexandria and Antioch, ten archbishops, fifty-six bishops, some abbots and gererals of religious orders, the ambassadors of Kings Ferdinand, and those of Venice and of Florence. Convoked by Julius II, the assembly survived him, was continued by Leo X, and held its twelfth, and last, session on 16 March, 1417. In the third session Matthew Lang, who had represented Maximilian at the Council of Tours, read an act by which that emperor repudiated all that had been done at Tours and at Pisa. In the fourth session the advocate of the council demanded the revocation of the Pragmatic Sanction of Bourges. In the eighth (17 December, 1513), an act of King Louis XII was read, disavowing the Council of Pisa and adhering to the Lateran Council. In the next session (5 March, 1514) the pope published four decrees:

the first of these sanctions the institution of ontes pietatis, or pawn shops, under strict ecclesiastical supervision, for the purpose of aiding the necessitous poor on the most favourable terms;

the second relates to ecclesiastical liberty and the episcopal dignity, and condemns certain abusive exemptions;

the third forbids, under pain of excommunication, the printing of books without the permission of the ordinary of the diocese;

the fourth orders a peremptory citation against the French in regard to the Pragmatic Sanction. The latter was solemnly revoked and condemned, and the concordat with Francis I approved, in the eleventh session (19 December, 1516).

Finally, the council promulgated a decree prescribing war against the Turks and ordered the levying of tithes of all the benefices in Christendom for three years.

H. LECLERCQ

Transcribed by Tomas Hancil

The Catholic Encyclopedia, Volume IX

Nihil Obstat, October 1, 1910. Remy Lafort, Censor

Imprimatur. +John M. Farley, Archbishop of New York

http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/09018b.htm

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