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Advanced Information Edited with Notes Gathered from the Writings of the Greatest Scholars by Henry R. Percival, M.A., D.D. Published in 1886 by Philip Schaff, New York: Christian Literature Publishing Co. The Canons of the Council in Trullo;Often Called The Quinisext Council.a.d. 692.Elenchus. Introductory Note. The Canons with the Ancient Epitome and Notes. Excursus to Canon VI., On the Marriage of the Clergy. Introductory Note.From the fact that the canons of the Council in Trullo are included in this volume of the Decrees and Canons of the Seven Ecumenical Councils it must not for an instant be supposed that it is intended thereby to affirm that these canons have any ecumenical authority, or that the council by which they were adopted can lay any claim to being ecumenical either in view of its constitution or of the subsequent treatment by the Church of its enactments.
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(Fleury. Histoire Ecclesiastique, Livre XL., Chap. xlix.)
As the two last General Councils (in 553 and in 681) had not made any Canons, the Orientals judged it suitable to supply them eleven years after the Sixth Council, that is to say, the year 692, fifth indiction. For that purpose the Emperor Justinian convoked a Council, at which 211 Bishops attended, of whom the principal were the four Patriarchs, Paul of Constantinople, Peter of Alexandria, Anastasius of Jerusalem, George of Antioch. Next in the subscriptions are named John of Justinianopolis, Cyriacus of Cesarea in Cappadocia, Basil of Gortyna in Crete, who says that he represents the whole Council of the Roman Church, as he had said in subscribing the Sixth Council. But it is certain otherwise that in this latter council there were present Legates of the Holy See. This council, like the Sixth, [340] assembled in the dome of the palace called in Latin Trullus, which name it has kept. It is also named in Latin Quinisextum, in Greek Penthecton, as one might say, the fifth-sixth, to mark that it is only the supplement of the two preceding Councils, though properly it is a distinct one.
The intention was to make a body of discipline to serve thenceforth for the whole Church, and it was distributed into 102 Canons.
To this statement by Fleury some additions must be made. First, with regard to the date of the synod. This is not so certain as would appear at first sight. At the Seventh Ecumenical Council, the patriarch Tarasius of Constantinople asserted that, "four or five years after the sixth Ecumenical Council the same bishops, in a new assembly under Justinian II. had published the [Trullan] Canons mentioned," and this assertion the Seventh Council appears to have accepted as true, if we understand the sixth session aright. Now were this statement true, the date would be probably 686, but this is impossible by the words of the council itself, where we find mention made of the fifteenth of January of the past 4th indiction, or the year of the world, 6109. To make this agree at all, scholars tell us that for iv. must be read xiv. But the rest of the statement is equally erroneous, the bishops were not the same, as can readily be seen by comparing the subscriptions to the Acts.
The year of the world 6109 is certainly wrong, and so other scholars would read 6199, but here a division takes place, for some reckon by the Constantinopolitan era, and so fix the date at 691, and others following the Alexandrian era fix it at 706. But this last is certainly wrong, for the canons were sent for signature to Pope Sergius, who died as early as 701. Hefele's conclusion is as follows:
(Hefele. Hist. of the Councils, Vol. V., p. 222.)
The year 6199 of the Constantinopolitan era coincides with the year 691 after Christ and the IVth Indiction ran from September 1, 690, to August 31, 691. If then, our Synod, in canon iii., speaks of the 15th of January in the past Indiction IV., it means January 691; but it belongs itself, to the Vth Indiction, i.e., it was opened after September 1, 691, and before September 1, 692.
As this is not a history of the Councils but a collection of their decrees and canons with illustrative notes, the only other point to be considered is the reception these canons met with.
The decrees were signed first by the Emperor, the next place was left vacant for the Pope, then followed the subscriptions of the Patriarchs of Constantinople, Alexandria, Jerusalem, and Antioch, the whole number being 211, bishops or representatives of bishops. It is not quite certain whether any of the Patriarchs were present except Paul of Constantinople; but taking it all in all the probability is in favour of their presence. [341]Blank places were left for the bishops of Thessalonica, Sardinia, Ravenna and Corinth. The Archbishop of Gortyna in Crete added to his signature the phrase "Holding the place of the holy Church of Rome in every synod." He had in the same way signed the decrees of III. Constantinople, Crete belonging to the Roman Patriarchate; as to whether his delegation on the part of the Roman Synod continued or was merely made to continue by his own volition we have no information. The ridiculous blunder of Balsamon must be noted here, who asserts that the bishops whose names are missing and for which blank places were left, had actually signed.
Pope Sergius refused to sign the decrees when they were sent to him, rejected them as "lacking authority" (invalidi) and described them as containing "novel errors." With the efforts to extort his signature we have no concern further than to state that they signally failed. Later on, in the time of Pope Constantine, a middle course seems to have been adopted, a course subsequently in the ninth century thus expressed by Pope John VIII., "he accepted all those canons which did not contradict the true faith, good morals, and the decrees of Rome," a truly notable statement! Nearly a century later Pope Hadrian I. distinctly recognizes all the Trullan decrees in his letter to Tenasius of Constantinople and attributes them to the Sixth Synod. "All the holy six synods I receive with all their canons, which rightly and divinely were promulgated by them, among which is contained that in which reference is made to a Lamb being pointed to by the Precursor as being found in certain of the venerable images." Here the reference is unmistakably to the Trullan Canon LXXXII.
Hefele's summing up of the whole matter is as follows:
(Hefele, Hist. of the Councils, Vol. V., p. 242.)
That the Seventh Ecumenical Council at Nice ascribed the Trullan canons to the Sixth Ecumenical Council, and spoke of them entirely in the Greek spirit, cannot astonish us, as it was attended almost solely by Greeks. They specially pronounced the recognition of the canons in question in their own first canon; but their own canons have never received the ratification of the Holy See.
Thus far Hefele, but it seems that Gratian's statement on the subject in the Decretum should not be omitted here. (Pars I. Dist. XVI., c. v.)
"Canon V. The Sixth Synod is confirmed by the authority of Hadrian.
"I receive the Sixth Synod with all its canons.
"Gratian. There is a doubt whether it set forth canons but this is easily removed by examining the fourth session of the VIIth [VIth by mistake, vide Roman Correctors' note] Synod.
"For Peter the Bp. of Nicomedia says:
"C. VI. The Sixth Synod wrote canons.
"I have a book containing the canons of the holy Sixth Synod. The Patriarch said: § 1. Some are scandalized through their ignorance of these canons, saying: Did the Sixth Synod make any canons? Let them know then that the Sixth Holy Synod was gathered together under Constantine against those who said there is one operation and one will in Christ, in which the holy Fathers anathematized these as heretics and explained the orthodox faith.
"II. Pars § 2. And the synod was dissolved in the XIVth year of Constantine. After four or five years the same holy Fathers met together under Justinian, the son of Constantine, and promulgated the aforementioned canons, of which let no one have any doubt. For they who under Constantine were in synod, these same bishops under Justinian subscribed to all these canons. For it was fitting that a Universal Synod should promulgate ecclesiastical canons. Item: § 3. The Holy Sixth Synod after it promulgated its definition against the Monothelites, the emperor Constantine who had summoned it, dying soon after, and Justinian his son reigning in his stead, the same holy synod divinely inspired again met at Constantinople four or five years afterwards, and promulgated one hundred and two canons for the correction of the Church.
"Gratian. From this therefore it may be gathered that the Sixth Synod was twice assembled: the first time under Constantine and then passed no canons; the second time under Justinian his son, and promulgated the aforesaid canons."
Upon this passage of Gratian's the Roman Correctors have a long and interesting note, with quotations from Anastasius, which should be read with care by the student but is too long to cite here.
I close with some eminently wise remarks by Prof. Michaud.
(E. Michaud, Discussion sur les Sept Conciles OEcuméniques, p. 272.)
Upon the canons of this council we must remark:
1. That save its acceptance of the dogmatic decisions of the six Ecumenical Councils, which is contained in the first canon, this council had an exclusively disciplinary character; and consequently if it should be admitted by the particular churches, these would always remain, on account of their autonomy, judges of the fitness or non-suitability of the practical application of these decisions.
2. That the Easterns have never pretended to impose this code upon the practice of the Western Churches, especially as they themselves do not practise everywhere the hundred and two canons mentioned. All they wished to do was to maintain the ancient discipline against the abuses and evil innovations of the Roman Church, and to make her pause upon the dangerous course in which she was already beginning to enter.
3. That if among these canons, some do not apply to the actual present state of society, e.g., the 8th, 10th, 11th, etc.; if others, framed in a spirit of transition between the then Eastern customs and those of Rome, do not appear as logical nor as wise as one might desire, e.g., the 6th, 12th, 48th, etc., nevertheless on the other hand, many of them are marked with the most profound sagacity.
Moreover the faith of the three hundred and eighteen holy and blessed fathers who were assembled at Nice under Constantine our Emperor, against the impious Arius, and the gentile diversity of deity or rather (to speak accurately) multitude of gods taught by him, who by the unanimous acknowledgment of the faithful revealed and declared to us the consubstantiality of the Three Persons comprehended in the Divine Nature, not suffering this faith to lie hidden under the bushel of ignorance, but openly teaching the faithful to adore with one worship the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost, confuting and scattering to the winds the opinion of different grades, and demolishing and overturning the puerile toyings fabricated out of sand by the heretics against orthodoxy.
Likewise also we confirm that faith which was set forth by the one hundred and fifty fathers who in the time of Theodosius the Elder, our Emperor, assembled in this imperial city, accepting their decisions with regard to the Holy Ghost in assertion of his godhead, and expelling the profane Macedonius (together with all previous enemies of the truth) as one who dared to judge Him to be a servant who is Lord, and who wished to divide, like a robber, the inseparable unity, so that there might be no perfect mystery of our faith.
And together with this odious and detestable contender against the truth, we condemn Apollinaris, priest of the same iniquity, who impiously belched forth that the Lord assumed a body unendowed with a soul, [342] thence also inferring that his salvation wrought for us was imperfect.
Moreover what things were set forth by the two hundred God-bearing fathers in the city of Ephesus in the days of Theodosius our Emperor, the son of Arcadius; these doctrines we assent to as the unbroken strength of piety, teaching that Christ the incarnate Son of God is one; and declaring that she who bare him without human seed was the immaculate Ever-Virgin, glorifying her as literally and in very truth the Mother of God. We condemn as foreign to the divine scheme the absurd division of Nestorius, who teaches that the one Christ consists of a man separately and of the Godhead separately and renews the Jewish impiety.
Moreover we confirm that faith which at Chalcedon, the Metropolis, was set forth in accordance with orthodoxy by the six hundred and thirty God-approved fathers in the time of Marcian, who was our Emperor, which handed down with a great and mighty voice, even unto the ends of the earth, that the one Christ, the son of God, is of two natures, and must be glorified [343] in these two natures, and which cast forth from the sacred precincts of the Church as a black pestilence to be avoided, Eutyches, babbling stupidly and inanely, and teaching that the great mystery of the incarnation (oikonomias) was perfected in thought only. And together with him also Nestorius and Dioscorus of whom the former was the defender and champion of the division, the latter of the confusion [of the two natures in the one Christ], both of whom fell away from the divergence of their impiety to a common depth of perdition and denial of God.
Also we recognize as inspired by the Spirit the pious voices of the one hundred and sixty-five God-bearing fathers who assembled in this imperial city in the time of our Emperor Justinian of blessed memory, and we teach them to those who come after us; for these synodically anathematized and execrated Theodore of Mopsuestia (the teacher of Nestorius), and Origen, and Didymus, and Evagrius, all of whom reintroduced feigned Greek myths, and brought back again the circlings of certain bodies and souls, and deranged turnings [or transmigrations] to the wanderings or dreamings of their minds, and impiously insulting the resurrection of the dead. Moreover [they condemned] what things were written by Theodoret against the right faith and against the Twelve Chapters of blessed Cyril, and that letter which is said to have been written by Ibas.
Also we agree to guard untouched the faith of the Sixth Holy Synod, which first assembled in this imperial city in the time of Constantine, our Emperor, of blessed memory, which faith received still greater confirmation from the fact that the pious Emperor ratified with his own signet that which was written for the security of future generations. This council taught that we should openly profess our faith that in the incarnation of Jesus Christ, our true God, there are two natural wills or volitions and two natural operations; and condemned by a just sentence those who adulterated the true doctrine and taught the people that in the one Lord Jesus Christ there is but one will and one operation; to wit, Theodore of Pharan, Cyrus of Alexandria, Honorius of Rome, Sergius, Pyrrhus, Paul and Peter, who were bishops of this God-preserved city; Macarius, who was bishop of Antioch; Stephen, who was his disciple, and the insane Polychronius, depriving them henceforth from the communion of the body of Christ our God.
And, to say so once for all, we decree that the faith shall stand firm and remain unsullied until the end of the world as well as the writings divinely handed down and the teachings of all those who have beautified and adorned the Church of God and were lights in the world, having embraced the word of life. And we reject and anathematize those whom they rejected and anathematized, as being enemies of the truth, and as insane ragers against God, and as lifters up of iniquity.
But if any one at all shall not observe and embrace the aforesaid pious decrees, and teach and preach in accordance therewith, but shall attempt to set himself in opposition thereto, let him be anathema, according to the decree already promulgated by the approved holy and blessed Fathers, and let him be cast out and stricken off as an alien from the number of Christians. For our decrees add nothing to the things previously defined, nor do they take anything away, nor have we any such power.
Notes.
The Synod held under Theodosius the great shall be held inviolate, which deposed Macedonius who asserted that the Holy Ghost was a servant.
The two hundred who under Theodosius the Younger assembled at Ephesus are to be revered for they expelled Nestorius who asserted that the Lord was man and God separately (idikos).
Those who assembled at Chalcedon in the time of Marcion are to be celebrated with eternal remembrance, who deposed Eutyches, who dared to say that the great mystery was accomplished only in image, as well as Nestorius and Dioscorus, observing equal things in an opposite direction.
One hundred and sixty-five were assembled in the imperial city by Justinian, who anathematized Origen, for teaching periods (periodous ) of bodies and souls, and Theodoret who dared to set himself up to oppose the Twelve Chapters of Cyril.
At Constantinople a Synod was collected under Constantine which rejected Honorius of Rome and Sergius, prelate of Constantinople, for teaching one will and one operation.
Aristenus.
The fifth was held in the time of Justinian the Great at Constantinople against the crazy (paraphrons) Origen, Evagrius and Didymus, who remodelled the Greek figments, and stupidly said that the same bodies they had joined with them would not rise again; and that Paradise was not subject to the appreciation of the sense, and that it was not from God, and that Adam was not formed in flesh, and that there would be an end of punishment, and a restitution of the devils to their pristine state, and other innumerable insane blasphemies.
Notes.
This canon defines what canons are to be understood as having received the sanction of ecumenical authority, and since these canons of the Council in Trullo were received at the Seventh Ecumenical Council in its first canon as the canons of the Sixth Ecumenical (of which the Quinisext claimed to be a legitimate continuation) there can be no doubt that all these canons enumerated in this canon are set forth for the guidance of the Church.
With regard to what councils are intended: there is difficulty only in two particulars, viz., the "Council of Constantinople under Nectarius and Theophilus," [344] and the "Council under Cyprian;" the former must be the Council of 394, and the latter is usually considered to be the III. Synod of Carthage, a.d. 257.
Fleury.
(H. E. Liv. xl., chap. xlix.)
The Council of Constantinople under Nectarius and Theophilus of Alexandria must be that held in 394, at the dedication of Ruffinus's Church; but we have not its canons...."The canon published by St. Cyprian for the African Church alone." It is difficult to understand what canon is referred to unless it is the preface to the council of St. Cyprian where he says that no one should pretend to be bishop of bishops, or to oblige his colleagues to obey him by tyrannical fear.
It will be noticed that while the canon is most careful to mention the exact number of Apostolic canons it received, thus deciding in favour of the larger code, it is equally careful not to assign them an Apostolic origin, but merely to say that they had come down to them "in the name of" the Apostles. In the face of this it is strange to find Balsamon saying, "Through this canon their mouth is stopped who say that 85 canons were not set forth by the holy Apostles;" what the council did settle, so far as its authority went, was the number not the authorship of the canons. This, I think, is all that Balsamon intended to assert, but his words might easily be quoted as having a different meaning.
This canon is found, in part, in the Corpus Juris Canonici, Gratian's Decretum, Pars I., Dist. XVI, c. VII.
Notes.
Zonaras.
What things pertain to this third canon are only adapted to the time in which the canon was passed; and afterwards are of no force at all. But what things the Fathers wished to be binding on posterity are contained in the seventeenth and eighteenth canons of the holy Apostles, which as having been neglected during the course of time this synod wished to renew.
Van Espen.
It is clear from this canon that the Emperor very especially intended that the indulgence which the Church of Constantinople extended to its presbyters and deacons in allowing them the use of marriage entered into before ordination, should not be allowed to go any further, nor to be an occasion for the violation of that truly Apostolic canon, "The bishop, the presbyter, and the deacon must be the husband of one wife." I Tim. iii. 2.
For never did the Constantinopolitan nor any other Eastern Church allow by canon a digamist (or a man successively the husband of many wives) to be advanced to the order of presbyter or deacon, or to use any second marriage.
Antonio Pereira.
(Tentativa Theologica. [Eng. trans.] III. Principle, p. 79.)
In the same manner a second marriage always, and everywhere, incapacitated the clergy for Holy Orders and the Episcopate. This appears from St. Paul, 1 Tim. Chap. iii., and Titus, Chap. i., and it was expressly enacted by the sixteenth of the Apostolical Canons, renewed by the Popes Siricius, Innocent and Leo the Great, and may be gathered from the ancient fathers and councils generally received in the Church.
Nevertheless we know from Theodoret, Bishop of Cyrus, that many bishops remarkable for their learning and sanctity, frequently dispensed with this Apostolical law; as Alexander of Antioch, Acacius of Berea, Praylius of Jerusalem, Proclus of Constantinople, and others, by whose example Theodoret defends his own conduct in the case of Irenæus, in ordaining him Archbishop of Tyre, although he had been twice married. But what is more surprising in this matter is that, notwithstanding the eleventh Decretal of Siricius, and the twelfth of Innocentius the First, that they who had either been twice married, or had married widows, were incapable of ordination, and ought to be deposed; the Council of Toledo, Canon 3, and the First Council of Orange, Canon 25, both dispensed with these Pontifical laws. The first, in order that those who had married widows might remain in holy orders; the second, that such as had twice married might be promoted to the order of subdeacon. Socrates also observes that although it was a general law not to admit catechumens to orders, the bishops of Alexandria were in the habit of promoting such to the order of readers and singers.
Fleury.
(H. E., Liv. XL., chap. 1.)
These canons of the Council of Trullo have served ever since to the Greeks and to all the Christians of the East as the universal rule with regard to clerical continence, and they have been now in full force for a thousand years. That is to say, It is not permitted to men who are clerics in Holy Orders to marry after their ordination. Bishops must keep perfect continence, whether before their consecration they are married or not. Priests, deacons, and subdeacons already married can keep their wives and live with them, except on the days they are to approach the holy mysteries.
Notes.
This canon is found in the Corpus Juris Canonici, Gratian's Decretum, Pars II., Causa XXVII., Q. I., c. vi.
A layman ravishing a nun, by secular law was punished by death. Balsamon gives the reference thus: V Cap. primi tit. iiii. lib. Basilic. or cxxiii. Novel.
Notes.
See Canon III., of First Ecumenical Council at Nice. This canon adds Eunuchs.
Notes.
Aristenus points out how this canon annuls the tenth canon of Ancyra, which allows a deacon and even a presbyter to marry after ordination and continue in his ministry, provided at the time of his ordination he had in the presence of witnesses declared his inability to remain chaste or his desire to marry. This present canon follows the XXVIth of the Apostolic canons.
The last clause of this canon, limited in its application to subdeacons, is found in the Corpus Juris Canonici, Gratian's Decretum, Pars I., Dist. XXXII., c. vi. .
I cannot better express the doctrine and practice of the ancient Church in the East than by quoting the words of the Rev. John Fulton in the Introduction to the Third Edition of his Index Canonum. [345] He says: "Marriage was no impediment to ordination even as a Bishop; and Bishops, Priests, and Deacons, equally with other men, were forbidden to put away their wives under pretext of religion. The case was different when a man was unmarried at the time of his ordination. Then he was held to have given himself wholly to God in the office of the Holy Ministry, and he was forbidden to take back from his offering that measure of his cares and his affections which must necessarily be given to the maintenance and nurture of his family. In short, the married man might be ordained, but with a few exceptions no man was allowed to marry after ordination." In his "Digest" sub voce "Celibacy" he gives the earliest canon law on the subject as follows: "None of the clergy, except readers and singers may marry after ordination (Ap. Can. xxvi.); but deacons may marry, if at their ordination they have declared an intention to do so (Ancyra x.). A priest who marries is to be deposed (Neocæsarea i.). A deaconess who marries is to be anathematized (Chal. xv.); a monk or dedicated virgin who marries, is to be excommunicated (Chal. xvi.). Those who break their vows of celibacy are to fulfil the penance of digamists (Ancyra xix.)." [346]
We may then take it for a general principle that in no part of the ancient Church was a priest allowed to contract holy matrimony; and in no place was he allowed to exercise his priesthood afterwards, if he should dare to enter into such a relation with a woman. As I have so often remarked it is not my place to approve or disapprove this law of the Church, my duty is the much simpler one of tracing historically what the law was and what it is in the East and West to-day. The Reformers considered that in this, as in most other matters, these venerable churches had made a mistake, but neither the maintenance nor the disproof of this opinion in any way concerns me, so far as this volume is concerned. All that is necessary for me to do is to affirm that if a priest were at any time to attempt to marry, he would be attempting to do that which from the earliest times of which we have any record, no priest has ever been allowed to do, but which always has been punished as a gross sin of immorality.
In tracing the history of this subject, the only time during which any real difficulty presents itself is the first three centuries, after that all is much clearer, and my duty is simply to lay the undisputed facts of the case before the reader.
We begin then with the debatable ground. And first with regard to the Lord, "the great High Priest of our profession," of course there can be no doubt that he set the example, or--if any think that he was not a pattern for the priests of his Church to follow--at least lived the life, of celibacy. When we come to the question of what was the practice of his first followers in this matter, there would likewise seem to be but little if any reasonable doubt. For while of the Apostles we have it recorded only of Peter that he was a married man, we have it also expressly recorded that in his case, as in that of all the rest who had "forsaken all" to follow him, the Lord himself said, "Every one that hath forsaken houses, or brethren, or sisters, or father, or mother, or wife, or children, or lands, for my name's sake shall receive an hundred fold and shall inherit eternal life." [347]
There can be no doubt that St. Paul in his epistles allows and even contemplates the probability that those admitted to the ranks of the clergy will have been already married, but distinctly says that they must have been the "husband of one wife," [348] by which all antiquity and every commentator of gravity recognizes that digamists are cut off from the possibility of ordination, but there is nothing to imply that the marital connexion was to be continued after ordination. For a thorough treatment of this whole subject from the ancient and Patristic point of view, the reader is referred to St. Jerome. [349]
The next stage in our progress is marked by the so-called Apostolical Canons. Now for those who hold that these canons had directly or indirectly the Apostles for their author, or that as we have them now they are all of even sub-Apostolic date, the matter becomes more simple, for while indeed these canons do not expressly set forth the law subsequently formulated for the East, they certainly seem to be not inconsistent therewith, but rather to look that way, especially Canons V. and LI. But few will be found willing to support so extreme an hypothesis, and while indeed many scholars are of opinion that most of the canons of the collection we style "Apostolical," are ante-Nicene, yet they will not be recognized as of more value than as so many mirrors, displaying what was at their date considered pure discipline. It is abundantly clear that the fathers in council in Trullo thought the discipline they were setting forth to be the original discipline of the Church in the matter, and the discipline of the West an innovation, but that such was really the case seems far from certain. Thomassinus treats this point with much learning, and I shall cite some of the authorities he brings forward. Of these the most important is Epiphanius, who as a Greek would be certain to give the tradition of the East, had there been any such tradition known in his time. I give the three great passages.
"It is evident that those from the priesthood are chiefly taken from the order of virgins, or if not from virgins, at least from monks; or if not from the order of monks, then they are wont to be made priests who keep themselves from their wives, or who are widows after a single marriage. But he that has been entangled by a second marriage is not admitted to priesthood in the Church, even if he be continent from his wife, or be a widower. Anyone of this sort is rejected from the grade of bishop, presbyter, deacon, or subdeacon. The order of reader, however, can be chosen from all the orders these grades can be chosen from, that is to say from virgins, monks, the continent, widowers, and they who are bound by honest marriage. Moreover, if necessity so compel, even digamists may be lectors, for such is not a priest, etc., etc." [350]
"Christ taught us by an example that the priestly work and ornaments should be communicated to those who shall have preserved their continency after a single marriage, or shall have persevered in virginity. And this the Apostles thereafter honestly and piously decreed, through the ecclesiastical canon of the priesthood." [351]
"Nay, moreover, he that still uses marriage, and begets children, even though the husband of but one wife, is by no means admitted by the Church to the order of deacon, presbyter, bishop, or subdeacon. But for all this, he who shall have kept himself from the commerce of his one wife, or has been deprived of her, may be ordained, and this is most usually the case in those places where the ecclesiastical canons are most accurately observed." [352]
Nor is the weight of this evidence lessened, but much increased, by the acknowledgment of the same father that in some places in his days the celibate life was not observed by such priests as had wives, for he explains that such a state of things had come about "not from following the authority of the canons, but through the neglect of men, which is wont at certain periods to be the case." [353]
The witness of the Western Fathers although so absolutely and indisputably clear is not so conclusive as to the East, and yet one passage from St. Jerome should be quoted. "The Virgin Christ and the Virgin Mary dedicated the virginity of both sexes. The Apostles were chosen when either virgins or continent after marriage, and bishops, presbyters, and deacons are chosen either when virgins, or widowers, or at least continent forever after the priesthood." [354]
It would be out of place to enter into any detailed argument upon the force of these passages, but I shall lay before the reader the summing up of the whole matter by a weighty recent writer of the Ultramontane Roman School.
"Is the celibate an Apostolic ordinance? Bickel affirmed that it is, and Funk denied it in 1878. To-day [1896] canonists commonly admit that one cannot prove the existence of any formal precept, either divine or apostolic, which imposes the celibate upon the clergy, and that all the texts, whether taken out of Holy Scripture or from the Fathers, on this subject contain merely a counsel, and not a command." "In the Fourth Century a great number of councils forbade bishops, priests, and deacons to live in the use of marriage with their lawful wives....But there does not appear to have been any disposition to declare by law as invalid the marriages of clerics in Holy Orders. In the Fifth and Sixth Centuries the law of the celibate was observed by all the Churches of the West, thanks to the Councils and to the Popes." "In the Seventh and down to the end of the Tenth Century, [355] as a matter of fact the law of celibacy was little observed in a great part of the Western Church, but as a matter of law the Roman Pontiffs and the Councils were constant in their proclamation of its obligation." By the canonical practice of the unreformed West, the reception of Holy Orders is an impedimentum dirimens matrimonii, which renders any marriage subsequently contracted not only illicit but absolutely null. On this diriment impediment the same Roman Catholic writer says: "The diriment impediment of Holy Orders is of ecclesiastical obligation and not of divine, and consequently the Church can dispense it. This is the present teaching which is in opposition to that of the old schools."
"There is no question of the nullity of the marriages contracted by clerics before 1139. At the Council of the Lateran of that year, Innocent II. declared that these marriages contracted in contempt of the ecclesiastical law are not true marriages in his eyes. His successors do not seem to have insisted much upon this new diriment impediment, although it was attacked most vigorously by the offending clergymen; but the School of Bologna, the authority of which was then undisputed, openly declared for the nullity of the marriages contracted by clerics in Holy Orders. Thus it is that this point of law has been settled rather by teaching, than by any precise text, or by any law of a known date." [356]
It should not, however, be forgotten that although this is true with regard to Pope Innocent II. in 1139, it is also true that in 530 the Emperor Justinian declared null and void all marriages contracted by clerics in Holy Orders, and the children of such marriages to be spurious (spurii).
The reader will be interested in reading the answer on this point made by King Henry VIII. to the letter sent him by the German ambassadors. [357]I can here give but a part translated into English. "Although the Church from the beginning admitted married men, as priests and bishops, who were without crime, the husband of one wife, (out of the necessity of the times, as sufficient other suitable men could not be found as would suffice for the teaching of the world) yet Paul himself chose the celibate Timothy; but if anyone came unmarried to the priesthood and afterwards took a wife, he was always deposed from the priesthood, according to the canon of the Council of Neocæsarea which was before that of Nice. So, too, in the Council of Chalcedon, in the first canon of which all former canons are confirmed, it is established that a deaconess, if she give herself over to marriage, shall remain under anathema, and a virgin who had dedicated herself to God and a monk who join themselves in marriage, shall remain excommunicated....No Apostolic canon nor the Council of Nice contain anything similar to what you assert, viz.: that priests once ordained can marry afterwards. And with this statement agrees the Sixth Synod, in which it was decreed that if any of the clergy should wish to lead a wife, he should do so before receiving the Subdiaconate, since afterwards it was by no means lawful; nor was there given in the Sixth Synod any liberty to priests of leading wives after their priesting, as you assert. Therefore from the beginning of the newborn Church it is clearly seen that at no time it was permitted to a priest to lead a wife after his priesting, and nowhere, where this was attempted, was it done with impunity, but the culprit was deposed from his priesthood."
Notes.
Balsamon, Zonaras, and following them Van Espen point out that this canon is a relaxation of the XVIII. Canon of Nice which punishes presumptuous deacons not only with loss of rank in their grade, but also with expulsion from their ministry.
Van Espen well remarks that the Fathers of this synod had in mind not only the preservation of the distinction between deacons and presbyters, but also between those in ecclesiastical orders and those enjoying secular dignities with regard to ecclesiastical matters, but who were not to gain there from ecclesiastical precedence. This is what is meant by the last clause of the canon.
Beveridge gives a list of these quasi ecclesiastical dignitaries as follows: Magnus OEconomus, Magno Sacello Præpositus, Magnus Vasorum Custos, Chartophylax, Parvo Sacello Præpositus, Primus Defensor.
Notes.
This canon under the name of the "Sixth Synod" is referred to in Canon VI. of the Seventh Ecumenical Council (II. Nice), and the bishops of Quinisext are called "Fathers."
Van Espen.
What at first was only allowed on account of necessity, little by little passed into general law, and at last was received as law, that once a year there was to be a meeting of the provincial synod.
Notes.
Compare with this canon liv. of the Apostolic Canons; xxiv. of Laodicea; and xliii. of the Synod of Carthage. [358]
Notes.
See notes on canon XVI. of Nice, and the Excursus thereto appended.
Notes.
Van Espen.
Theodore Balsamon is of opinion that this canon does not forbid the eating of unleavened bread; but that what is intended is the keeping of feasts in a Jewish fashion, or in sacrifices to use unleavened bread (azymes), and this, says Balsamon, on account of the Latins who celebrate their feasts with azymes.
Canon lxix. [i.e., lxx.] of those commonly called Apostolic forbids the observance of festivals with the Jews; and declares it to be unlawful to receive manuscula from them, but by this canon all familiar intercourse with them is forbidden.
While there can be no doubt that in all the Trullan canons there is an undercurrent of hostility to the West, yet in this canon I can see no such spirit, and I think it has been read into it by the greater bitterness of later times. This seems the more certain from the fact that there is nothing new whatever in the provision with respect to the passover bread, vide canons of Laodicea xxxvii. and xxxviii.
This canon is found in the Corpus Juris Canonici, Gratian's Decretum, Pars II., Causa xxviii., can. xiii. [359]
Notes.
Aristenus.
The fifth Apostolic canon allows neither bishop, presbyter, nor deacon to cast forth his wife under pretext of piety; and assigns penalties for any that shall do so, and if he will not amend he is to be deposed. But this canon on the other hand does not permit a bishop even to live with his wife after his consecration. But by this change no contempt is meant to be poured out upon what had been established by Apostolic authority, but it was made through care for the people's health and for leading on to better things, and for fear that the sacerdotal estate might suffer some wrong.
Van Espen.
(In Can. vi. Apost.)
In the time of this canon [of the Apostles so called] not only presbyters and deacons, but bishops also, it is clear, were allowed by Eastern custom to have their wives; and Zonaras and Balsamon note that even until the Sixth Council, commonly called in Trullo bishops were allowed to have their wives.
(The same on this canon.)
But not only do they command [in this canon] that bishops after their consecration no longer have commerce with their own wives, but further, they prohibit them even to presume to live with them.
Zonaras.
When the faith first was born and came forth into the world, the Apostles treated with greater softness and indulgence those who embraced the truth, which as yet was not scattered far and wide, nor did they exact from them perfection in all respects, but made great allowances for their weakness and for the inveterate force of the customs with which they were surrounded, both among the heathen and among the Jews. But now, when far and wide our religion has been propagated, more strenuous efforts were made to enforce those things which pertain to a higher and holier life, as our angelical worship increased day by day, and to insist on by law a life of continence to those who were elevated to the episcopate, so that not only they should abstain from their wives, but that they should have them no longer as bed-fellows; and not only that they no longer admit them as sharers of their bed, but they do not allow them even to stop under the same roof or in the house.
If therefore anyone shall have dared, contrary to the Apostolic Canons, to deprive any of those who are in holy orders, presbyter, or deacon, or subdeacon of cohabitation and intercourse with his lawful wife, let him be deposed. In like manner also if any presbyter or deacon on pretence of piety has dismissed his wife, let him be excluded from communion; and if he persevere in this let him be deposed.
Notes.
Fleury.
(H. E., Livre XL., chap. 1.)
What is said in this canon, that the council of Carthage orders priests to abstain from their wives at prescribed periods, is a misunderstanding of the decree, caused either by malice or by ignorance. This canon is one of those adopted by the Fifth Council of Carthage held in the year 400, and it is decreed that subdeacons, deacons; priests, and bishops shall abstain from their wives, following the ancient statutes, and shall be as though they had them not. The Greek version of this canon has rendered the Latin words priora statuta by these, idious horous, which may mean "fixed times": for the translator read, following another codex, propria for priora. Be this as it may, the Fathers of the Trullan council supposed that this obliged the clergy only to continence at certain fixed times, and were not willing to see that it included bishops as well.
Van Espen.
Although the Latin Church does not disapprove, [360] as contrary to the law of the Gospel the discipline of the Greeks which allows the use of marriage to presbyters and deacons, provided it was contracted before ordination; yet never has it approved this canon which with too great zeal condemns the opposite custom, and rashly assigns great errors to the Roman Church.
This canon is found in the Corpus Juris Canonici, Gratian's Decretum, Pars I., Dist. XXXI., c. xiii.
Antonius Augustinus in his proposed emendations of Gratian says (Lib. I. dial. de emend. Grat. c. 8.): "This canon can in no way be received; for it is written in opposition to the celibacy of the Latin priests, and openly is against the Roman Church." But to me the note which Gratian appends seems much more learned and true: "This however must be understood as of local application; for the Eastern Church, to which the VI. Synod prescribed this rule, did not receive a vow of chastity from the ministers of the altar." It may be well to note here that by the opinion of most Latin casuists the obligation to chastity among the Roman clergy rests upon the vow and not upon any law of the Church binding thereto. This evidently was the opinion of Gratian.
Notes.
Compare Canon XI. of Neocæsarea.
It may be interesting to note here that by the law of the Roman Communion the canonical ages are as follows:
A subdeacon must have completed his twenty-first year, a deacon his twenty-second, a priest his twenty-fourth, and a bishop his thirtieth. None of the inferior clergy can hold a simple benefice before he has begun his fourteenth year. Ecclesiastical dignities, such as Cathedral canonries, cannot be conferred on any who have not finished the twenty-second year. A benefice to which is attached a cure of souls can be given only to one who is over twenty-four, and a diocese only to one who has completed his thirtieth year. (Vide Ferraris, Bibliotheca Prompta.)
In the Anglican Communion the ages are, in England, for a bishop "fully thirty years of age," for a priest twenty-four, and for a deacon twenty-three: [361]and in the United States, for a bishop thirty years of age, for a priest twenty-four, and for a deacon twenty-one.
Notes.
This age seems first to have been fixed by the Second Council of Toledo [362] (circa, a.d. 535) in its first canon.
John Chrysostom, a Doctor of the Church, interpreting these words, proceeds thus: "It is a remarkable fact that the multitude was not divided in its choice of the men, and that the Apostles were not rejected by them. But we must learn what sort of rank they had, and what ordination they received. Was it that of deacons? But this office did not yet exist in the churches. But was it the dispensation of a presbyter? But there was not as yet any bishop, but only Apostles, whence I think it is clear and manifest that neither of deacons nor of presbyters was there then the name." [363]
But on this account therefore we also announce that the aforesaid seven deacons are not to be understood as deacons who served at the Mysteries, according to the teaching before set forth, but that they were those to whom a dispensation was entrusted for the common benefit of those that were gathered together, who to us in this also were a type of philanthropy and zeal towards those who are in need.
Notes.
Van Espen here reminds us that this is, as Zonaras calls attention to in his scholion on this place, a correction rather than an interpretation of the XVth Canon of Neocæsarea, and Balsamon also says the same. The only interest that the matter possesses is that a canon which had been received by the Fourth Ecumenical Council (Chalcedon) should receive such treatment from such an assembly as the Synod in Trullo.
Notes.
This canon is found in the Corpus Juris Canonici, Gratian's Decretum, Pars II., Causa XXI., Quæst., ii. can. j.
Notes.
Balsamon.
The Fathers are worthy of great praise. For having regard to the honour of the ecclesiastical order and of each bishop, they have decreed that clergymen, who from just and valid causes have gone forth without letters dimissory from those who ordained them, should return to their own clergy soon as the cause which drove them forth ceases; and that they should not be enrolled on the clergy list of any other church. But whosoever cannot be persuaded to return is to be cut off, as well as the bishop who detains him. But someone will say, If a bishop who does such a thing is cut off by his Metropolitan; and likewise if a Metropolitan spurns this canon he is punished by the Patriarch. But if an autocephalous archbishop or a Patriarch other than the Patriarch of Constantinople (for he has a faculty for doing so) should be convicted of a breach of this Canon, by whom would he be cut off? I suppose by the Supreme Pontiff [364] (oiomai oun para tou meizonos archiereos).
Notes.
Van Espen.
How great an obligation of preaching rests upon bishops, the successors of the Apostles, is evident from the words of St. Paul, "Christ sent me not to baptize but to preach" (1 Cor. i. 17), and his chief adjuration to Timothy though Jesus Christ and his coming, was "Preach the Word" (2 Tim. ii. 4.). For this reason the fathers formerly called the episcopate the preaching-office (officium predicationis), as is evident from the profession of Adelbert Morinensis, and the form of profession of a future Archbishop. Both of these will be found in Labbe, appendix to Tom. VIII., of his Concilia.
Council of Trent.
(Sess. V., c. 2.)
The preaching of the Gospel is the chief work of bishops.
Convocation of Canterbury, a.d. 1571.
(Cardwell. Synodalia, Vol. I., p. 126.)
The clergy will be careful to teach nothing in their sermons to be religiously held and believed by the people except what is agreeable to the doctrine of the Old and New Testament, and what the Catholic Fathers and Ancient Bishops have collected out of the same. [366]
Council of Trent.
(Sess. IV.)
No one shall dare to interpret the Holy Scripture contrary to the unanimous consent of the fathers.
Notes.
The meaning of this canon is most obscure. Balsamon and Zonaras think that the Bishop is not to be deposed from his Episcopate, but only shorn of his right of executing the Episcopal functions, so that he will virtually be reduced to a presbyter. Aristenus, on the other hand, considers the deposition to be real and that this canon creates an exception to Canon XXIX. of Chalcedon.
Notes.
Beveridge wishes to read "who have become canonically guilty of crimes," substituting kanonikos for kanonikois, in accordance with the Bodleian and Amerbachian codices.
Notes.
Van Espen.
The present canon orders to be deposed not only the one simoniacally ordained, but also his ordainer, ordering that ordinations should take place on account, not of money, but of the excellence of the examination stood by the candidate and on account of his uprightness of life. And it evidently takes it for granted that, where money has been used, examination, excellence of life, and consideration of merit enter but little into the matter, or at least are paid no attention to.
Notes.
This canon is found in the Corpus Juris Canonici, Gratian's Decretum, Pars. II., Causa I., Quæst. I., can. 100, attributed to the VI. Synod. Ivo reads, "From the Sixth Synod, III. Constantinople."
Notes.
Van Espen.
Scarcely ever were these plays exhibited without the introduction of something contrary to honesty and chastity. As Lupus here notes, the word "obscene" has its derivation from these "scenic" representations.
Rightly therefore has it been forbidden by the sacred canons that the clergy should witness any such plays.
In the second part of this canon by the words "ordered by the doctrine of our fathers," the Synod understands the doctrine of the fathers of the synod of Laodicea, which in its canon liv. condemned the same abuse.
Compare the canon given in the Corpus Juris Canonici, Gratian's Decretum, Pars I., Dist. XXXIV. can. xix.
Notes.
Compare notes on canon XVII. of Chalcedon.
Notes.
Aristenus.
If any presbyter before his ordination had married a widow, or a harlot, or an actress, or any other woman such as are forbidden, in ignorance, he shall cease from his priesthood but shall still have his place among the presbyters. But such an illegitimate marriage, on account of which he was deprived of the Sacred Ministry, must be dissolved.
Van Espen.
The sacred canon to which the Synod here refers is number xxvii. of St. Basil in his Canonical Epistle to Amphilochius.
Notes.
Van Espen.
Similar blessings of fruit, and particularly of grapes, are found in more recent rituals as well as in the ancient Greek Euchologions and the Latin Rituales. In the Sacramentary of St. Gregory will be found a benediction of grapes on the feast of St. Sixtus.
Cardinal Bona says (De Rob. Liturg., Lib. II., cap. xiv.), that immediately before the words Semper bona creas, sanctificas, etc., if new fruits or any other things adapted to human use were to be blessed, they were wont in former times to be placed before the altar, and there to be blessed by the priest; and when the benediction was ended with the accustomed words "Through Christ our Lord," there was added the following prayer: "Perquem hæc omnia, etc.," which words are not so much to be referred to the body and blood of Christ, as to the things to be blessed, which God continually creates by renewing, and we ask that they may be sanctified by his benediction to our use.
But in after ages when the fervour of the faithful had grown cold, that the mass might not be too long, they were separated and yet the prayer remained which, as said to-day over the consecrated species alone, can hardly be understood.
This canon is found in a shortened form in the Corpus Juris Canonici, Pars. III. De Consecrat., Dist. II., can. vi.
Compare Canon of the Apostles number iv.
Notes.
Zonaras remarks that the "Apostolic and Patristic tradition" is a reference to canon lxix. of the Apostolic Canons and to canon l. of Laodicea. See notes on this last canon.
Notes.
Fleury.
(Hist. Eccl., Liv. XL., chap. l.)
"Priests who are among the barbarians," that is to say, it would seem, in Italy and in the other countries of the Latin rite. "Their narrowness and foreign and unsettled manners," that is to say that according to them it is an imperfection to aspire after perfect continence.
I do not think that this explanation of Fleury's can be sustained, and it would seem that Van Espen is more near the truth when he says: "Some priests in barbarous countries thought they should abstain after the Latin custom even from wives taken before ordination. And although this was contrary to the discipline of the Greeks, and also to Canon V. of the Apostles, nevertheless the Fathers thought it might be tolerated, provided such priests should also not live any longer with their wives." There seems no reason to introduce anti-Roman bitterness where it is not already found.
Notes.
On this whole subject the reader is referred to the curious and most interesting volume published by Venantius Monaldini of Venice, in 1765. I cannot better give its scope than by copying out its title in full.
Commentarius Theologico-canonico-criticus De ecclesiis, earum reverentia, et asylo atque concordia sacerdotii, et imperii, auctore Josepho Aloysio Assemani. Accesserunt tractatus cl. virorum D. Josephi de Bonis, De Oratoriis Publicis; ac. R.P. Fortunati a Brixia De Oratoriis Domesticis, in supplementum celeberrimi operis Joannis Baptistæ Gattico De Oratoriis Domesticis, et usu altaris portatilis.
"And wherefore did he not drink water after he was risen again, but wine? To pluck up by the roots another wicked heresy. For since there are certain who use water in the Mysteries to shew that both when he delivered the mysteries he had given wine and that when he had risen and was setting before them a mere meal without mysteries, he used wine, `of the fruit,' saith he, `of the vine.' But a vine produces wine, not water." [369]And from this they think the doctor overthrows the admixture of water in the holy sacrifice. Now, lest on the point from this time forward they be held in ignorance, we open out the orthodox opinion of the Father. For since there was an ancient and wicked heresy of the Hydroparastatæ (i.e., of those who offered water), who instead of wine used water in their sacrifice, this divine, confuting the detestable teaching of such a heresy, and showing that it is directly opposed to Apostolic tradition, asserted that which has just been quoted. For to his own church, where the pastoral administration had been given him, he ordered that water mixed with wine should be used at the unbloody sacrifice, so as to shew forth the mingling of the blood and water which for the life of the whole world and for the redemption of its sins, was poured forth from the precious side of Christ our Redeemer; and moreover in every church where spiritual light has shined this divinely given order is observed.
For also James, the brother, according to the flesh, of Christ our God, to whom the throne of the church of Jerusalem first was entrusted, and Basil, the Archbishop of the Church of Cæsarea, whose glory has spread through all the world, when they delivered to us directions for the mystical sacrifice in writing, declared that the holy chalice is consecrated in the Divine Liturgy with water and wine. And the holy Fathers who assembled at Carthage provided in these express terms: "That in the holy Mysteries nothing besides the body and blood of the Lord be offered, as the Lord himself laid down, that is bread and wine mixed with water." Therefore if any bishop or presbyter shall not perform the holy action according to what has been handed down by the Apostles, and shall not offer the sacrifice with wine mixed with water, let him be deposed, as imperfectly shewing forth the mystery and innovating on the things which have been handed down.
Notes.
Van Espen.
Justin Martyr in his Second Apology, Ambrose, or whoever was the author of the books on the Sacraments (Lib. v., cap. i.), Augustine and many others make mention of this rite, and above all St. Cyprian, who wrote a long epistle on the subject to Cecilius, and seeking the reason of the ceremony as a setting forth of the union of the people, represented by the water, with Christ, figured by the wine.
Another signification of this rite St. Augustine indicates in his sermon to Neophytes, saying: "Take this in bread, which hung upon the Cross: Take this in the cup which poured forth from the side," that is to say blood and water.
Cardinal Bona (De Rebus Liturgicis, Lib. II., cap. ix., n. 3 and 4) refers to many ancient rituals in which a similar prayer is used to that found in the Ambrosian rite, which says as the water is poured in: "Out of the side of Christ there flowed forth blood and water together. In the name of the Father, etc." Bona further notes that "The Greeks twice mingle water with the wine, once cold water, when in the prothesis they are preparing the Holy Gifts, and the Priest pierces the bread with the holy spear, and says, "One of the soldiers with a lance opened his side, and immediately there flowed forth blood and water," and the deacon pours in wine and water. From this it is evident that the Greeks agree with St. Augustine's explanation.
For the second time the Greeks mix "hot water after consecration and immediately before communion, the deacon begging from the priest a blessing upon the warm water; and he blesses it in these words: `Blessed be the fervour of thy Saints, now and ever and to the ages of ages. Amen.' Then the deacon pours the water into the chalice, saying: `The fervour of faith, full of the Holy Spirit.'" So Cardinal Bona as above.
The third reason of this rite is assumed by some from the fact that Christ is believed thus to have instituted this sacrament at the last supper; and this the synod seems to intimate in the present canon when it says "as the Lord himself delivered."
In this case the Greeks suppose that this rite was also handed down by the Apostles, and this is evident from their citing the Liturgy of St. James, which they believed to be a genuine work of his.
Notes.
Van Espen.
Here not obscurely does the canon join the clerical tonsure received from the bishop with the office of Reader, so much so that he that has been tonsured by the bishop is thought to have received at the same time the tonsure and the order of lector.
Notes.
This is but a renewal of Canon xviii. of Chalcedon, which see with the notes.
Notes.
Compare Canon xxii. of Chalcedon. This canon extends the prohibition to Metropolitans as well.
Aristenus.
Neither the clergy nor metropolitan after the death of the bishop are allowed to carry off his goods, but all should be guarded by the clergy themselves, until another bishop is chosen. But if by chance no clergyman is left in that church, the metropolitan is to keep all the possessions undiminished and to return them to the future bishop.
Notes.
Balsamon.
The Fathers here speak of the Second and Third canons of the Second Synod [i.e. I. Constantinople] and of canon xxviii. of the Fourth Synod [i.e. Chalcedon]. And read what we have said on these canons.
Aristenus.
We have explained the third canon of the Synod of Constantinople and the twenty-eighth canon of the Synod of Chalcedon as meaning, when asserting that the bishop of Constantinople should enjoy equal privileges after the Roman bishop, that he should be placed second from the Roman in point of time. So here too this preposition "after" denotes time but not honour. For after many years this throne of Constantinople obtained equal privileges with the Roman Church; because it was honoured by the presence of the Emperor and of the Senate.
On this opinion of Aristenus's the reader is referred to the notes on Canon iii. of I. Constantinople.
Justinian.
(Novella CXXXI., Cap. ii.)
We command that according to the definitions of the Four Councils the most holy Pope of Old Rome shall be first of all the priests. But the most blessed Archbishop of Constantinople, which is New Rome, shall have the second place after the Holy Apostolic See of Old Rome.
This canon, in a mutilated form, is found in the Corpus Juris Canonici, Gratian's Decretum, Pars I., Dist. XXII., c. vi.
Notes.
By Canon XVIII. of Antioch the principle of this canon was enunciated, that when a bishop did not take possession of his see because he could not do so, he was not to be held responsible or to lose any of his episcopal rights and powers, in that case the impossibility arose from the insubordination of the people, in this from the diocese being in the hands of the barbarians.
It has been commonly thought that the Bishops in partibus infidelium had their origin in the state of things calling for this canon.
Notes.
Van Espen.
The canon of the Fathers which the Synod wishes observed is XVII of Chalcedon, the notes on which see.
Here it must be noted that by "civil and public models" is signified the "pragmatic" or imperial letters, by which the emperors granted to newly raised up or re-edified towns the privilege of other cities, or else annexed them to some Province.
Notes.
Hefele.
Hitherto the bishop of Cyzicus was metropolitan of the province of the Hellespont. Now he too is to be subject to the bishop of New-Justinianopolis. What, however, is meant by "the right of Constantinople"? It was impossible that the Synod should place the bishop of Justinianopolis in equal dignity with the patriarch of Constantinople. But they probably meant to say: "The rights which the bishop of Constantinople has hitherto exercised over the province of the Hellespont, as chief metropolitan, fall now to the bishop of New-Justinianopolis." Or perhaps we should read, instead of Constantinople Konstantineon poleos, as the Amerbachian ms. has it, and translate: "The same rights which Constantia (the metropolis of Cyprus) possessed, New Justinianopolis shall henceforth have." The latter is the more probable.
Van Espen.
To understand this canon it must be remembered that the Metropolis of Cyprus, which was formerly called Constantia, when restored by the Emperor Justinian was called by his name, New Justinianopolis.
Notes.
Aristenus.
The eighteenth canon of Basil the Great orders that she who offers herself to the Lord and renounces marriage, ought to be over sixteen or even seventeen years of age: so that her promise may be firm and that if she violates it she may suffer the due penalties. For, says he, children's voices are not to be thought of any value in such matters. But the present canon admits him who is not less than ten years and desires to be a monk, but entrusts the determination of the exact time to the judgment of the hegumenos, whether he thinks it more advantageous to increase the age-requirement for the entering and being established in the married life. But the canon lessens the time defined by Basil the Great, because the Fathers thought that the Church by divine grace had grown stronger since then, and was going on more and more, and that the faithful seemed firmer and more stable for the observance of the divine commandments. And for the same reason, viz., that the Church was growing better, the sacred canons had lessened the age of deaconesses, and fixed it at forty years, although the Apostle himself orders that no widow is to be chosen into the Church under sixty years of age.
And those who, without the above-mentioned causes, venture forth of their convents, are first of all to be shut up in the said convent even against their wills, and then are to cure themselves with fasting and other afflictions, knowing how it is written that "no one who has put his hand to the plough and has looked back, is fit for the kingdom of heaven."
Notes.
Van Espen.
This canon, so far as it sets forth the necessity of probation before admission to the Anchorite life, synods in after-years frequently approved, taught as they were by experience how perilous a matter it is to admit without sufficient probation to this solitary life and state of separation from the common intercourse with his fellow men. Vide the Synod of Vannes (about a.d. 465) canon vii., of Agde chap. lxxviii., of Orleans the First can. xxii., of Frankfort can. xii., of Toledo the Seventh can. v., and the Capitular of Charlemagne To monks, Chap. ii.
Notes.
It may not be irreverent to remark that this species of impostors always has been common in the East, and many examples will be found of the dervishes in the Arabian Nights and other Eastern tales. The "vagabond" monks of the West also became a great nuisance as well as a scandal in the Middle Ages. The reader will find interesting instances of Spanish deceivers of the same sort in "Gil Blas" and other Spanish romances.
As therefore the monastic method of life engraves upon us as on a tablet the life of penitence, we receive [371] whoever approaches it [372] sincerely; nor is any custom to be allowed to hinder him from fulfilling his intention.
Notes.
Zonaras.
The greatness or the number of a man's sins ought not to make him lose hope of propitiating the divinity by his penitence, if he turns his eyes to the divine mercy. This is what the canon asserts, and affirms that everyone, no matter how wicked and nefarious his life may have been, may embrace monastic discipline, which inscribes, as on a tablet, [373] to us a life of penitence. For as a tablet describes to us what is inscribed upon it, so the monastic profession writes and inscribes upon us penitence, so that it remains for ever.
Notes.
The punishment here seems too light, so that Balsamon thinks that this canon only refers to such monks as freely confess their sin and desist from it, remaining in their monasteries; and that the sterner penalties assigned to unchaste religious by other synods (notably Chalcedon, can. xvi., and Ancyra, can. xix.) are for such as do not confess their faults but are after some time convicted of them.
Aristenus.
The monk will receive the same punishment whether he be a fornicator or has joined himself with a woman for the communion of marriage.
Van Espen.
It is very likely from this canon that the Monastic vow at the time of this Synod was not yet an impedimentum dirimens of matrimony, for nothing is said about the dissolution of the marriage contracted by a monk although he had gravely sinned in violating his faith pledged to God.
Notes.
This canon is at the present day constantly broken at the profession of Carmelites.
And men also who follow the monastic life let them on urgent necessity go forth with the blessing of him to whom the rule is entrusted.
Wherefore, those who transgress that which is now decreed by us, whether they be men or women, are to be subjected to suitable punishments.
Notes.
Notes.
The ground covered by this canon is also found in Justinian's Code, Book xliv., Of Bishops and Clergy. Vide also Novella cxxxiii., chap. v.
Van Espen.
From the whole context of Justinian's law it is manifest that Justinian here is condemning "double monasteries," in which both men and women dwelt. And he wishes such to be separated, the men from the women, and e contra the women from the men, and that each should dwell in separate monasteries.
The reader may be reminded of some curious double religious houses in England for men and women, of which sometimes a woman was the superior of both.
Notes.
Notes.
Van Espen.
This canon renews canon xxiv. of Chalcedon. And here it may be observed that the canons even of Ecumenical Synods fall into desuetude little by little, unless the care of bishops and pastors keeps them alive, and from the example of this synod it may be seen how often they need calling back again into observance.
Nor can there be any doubt that frequently it would be more advantageous to renew the canons already set forth by the Fathers, rather than to frame new ones.
Notes.
This renews canons xlii. and xliii. of the Apostolic canons.
Notes.
Balsamon.
Some one will enquire why canon xxiiii. decrees that those in holy orders and monks, who are constantly attending horse-races, and scenic plays, are to cease or be deposed: but the present canon says without discrimination, that those who give themselves over to such things if clergymen are to be deposed, and if laymen to be cut off. The solution is this. It is one thing and more easily to be endured, that a man should be present at a horse-race, or be convicted of going to see a play; and another thing, and one that cannot be pardoned, that he should give himself over to such things, and to exercise this continually as his business. Wherefore those who have once sinned deliberately, are admonished to cease. If they are not willing to obey, they are to be deposed. But those who are constantly engaged in this wickedness, if they are clerics, they must be deposed from their clerical place, if laymen they must be cut off.
Notes.
Balsamon.
We do not call the service of the Presanctified the unbloody sacrifice, but the offering of the previously offered, and of the perfected sacrifice, and of the completed priestly act.
Van Espen.
The Greeks therefore confess that the bread once offered and consecrated, is not to be consecrated anew on another day; but a new offering is made of what was before consecrated and presanctified: just as in the Latin Church the consecrated or presanctified bread of Maundy Thursday is offered on Good Friday.
The Patriarch Michael of Constantinople is quoted by Leo Allatius as saying that "none of the mystic consecratory prayers are said over the presanctified gifts, but the priest only recites the prayer that he may be a worthy communicant."
Some among the later Greeks have been of opinion that the unconsecrated wine was consecrated by the commixture with the consecrated bread, and (without any words of consecration) was transmuted into the sacred blood, [374] and with this seems to agree the already quoted Michael, Patriarch of Constantinople, who is cited by Leo Allatius in his treatise on the rite of the presanctified. "The presanctified is put into the mystic chalice, and so the wine which was then in it, is changed into the holy blood of the Lord." And with this agrees Simeon, Archbishop of Thessalonica, in his answer to Gabriel of Pentapolis, when he writes: "In the mass of the Presanctified no consecration of what is in the chalice is made by the invocation of the Holy Spirit and of his sign, but by the participation and union of the life-giving bread, which is truly the body of Christ."
From this opinion, which was held by some of the Greeks, it gradually became the practice at Constantinople not to dip the bread in the Sacred Blood, as Michael the patriarch of this very church testifies. But in the ordinary Euchologion of the Greeks it is expressly set forth that the presanctified bread before it is reserved, should be dipped in the sacred blood, and for this a rite is provided.
Leo Allatius's Dissertatio de Missa Præsanctificatorum should be read; an outline of the service as found in the Euchologion, and as reprinted by Renaudotius is as follows.
First of all vespers is said. After some lessons and prayers, including the "Great Ectenia" and that for the Catechumens, these are dismissed.
After the Catechumens have departed there follows the Ectenia of the Faithful. After which, "Now the heavenly Powers invisibly minister with us; for, behold, the King of Glory is borne in. Behold the mystic sacrifice having been perfected is borne aloft by angels.
"Let us draw near with faith and love, that we may become partakers of life eternal. Alleluia, Alleluia, Alleluia.
"Deacon. Let us accomplish our evening prayer to the Lord.
"For the precious and presanctified gifts that are offered, let us pray to the Lord. "That our man-loving God, etc." as in the ordinary liturgy past the Lord's prayer, and down to the Sancta Sanctis, which reads as follows:
Priest. Holy things presanctified for holy persons.
Choir. One holy, one Lord Jesus Christ, to the Glory of God the Father--Amen.
Then the Communion Hymn and the Communion, and the rest as in the ordinary liturgy, except "this whole evening," is said for "this whole day," and another prayer is provided in the room of that beginning "Lord, who blessest them, etc." [375]
It is curious to note that on Good Friday, the only day on which the Mass of the Presanctified is celebrated in the West, its use has died out in the East, and now it is used "on the Wednesdays and Fridays of the first six weeks of the Great Quadragesima, on the Thursday of the fifth week, and on the Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday of Holy Passion Week. It may also be said, excepting on Saturdays and Sundays, and on the Festival of the Annunciation, on other days during the Fast, to wit, on those of festivals and their Vigils, and on the Commemoration of the Dedication of the Church."
Symeon, who was bishop of Thessalonica, and flourished in the early part of the XVth Century, complains of the general neglect of the Mass of the Presanctified on Good Friday in his time, and says that his church was the only one in the Exarchate that then retained it. He ascribes the disuse to the example of the Church of Jerusalem. See the matter treated at length in his Quæstiones, lv.-lix. Migne's Pat. Græc.
Cf. J. M. Neale Essays on Liturgiology, p. 109.
Notes.
Johnson. (Clergyman's Vade Mecum.) The imperial law forbade the adopter parent to marry his or her adopted son or daughter; for the godchild was thought a sort of an adopted child. See Justin., Institut., Lib. I., Tit. x.
Van Espen however refers, and to my mind with greater truth, to Justinian's law (xxvi of the Cod. de Nuptiis) which forbids the marriage of a man with his nurse or with whoever received him from the font, "because," says the law, "nothing can so incite to parental affection, and therefore induce a just prohibition of marriage, than a bond of this sort by which, through God's meditation, their souls are bound together."
Notes.
The canon quoted is LXVI. of the Apostolic Canons.
Van Espen.
The Fathers of this Synod thought that this canon of the Apostles was edited by the Apostles themselves, and therefore they seem to have reprobated the custom of the Roman Church of fasting on the Sabbath more bitterly than was right. Whence it happens this is one of those canons which the Roman Church never received.
Zonaras.
The synod took in hand to correct this failing (sphalma) of the Latins; but until this time they have arrogantly remained in their pertinacity, and so remain to-day. Nor do they heed the ancient canons which forbid fasting on the Sabbath except that one, to wit the great Sabbath, nor are they affected by the authority of this canon. Moreover the clerics have no regard for the threatened deposition, nor the laymen for their being cut off.
Notes.
Van Espen.
This canon shows that the ancient Greeks, although they did not fast on the Sabbaths and Lord's days of Lent, nevertheless they abstained on them from flesh food; and it was believed by them that abstinence from flesh food involved also necessarily abstinence from all those things which have their origin from flesh. This also formerly was observed by the Latins in Lent, and in certain regions is known still to be the usage.
Notes.
See canon iii. of the Apostles, canon xxviii. of the African code, also canon xxviii. of this synod. The Greeks apparently do not recognize the exception specified in the canon of the African Code.
Notes.
Van Espen.
It is well known that in the first centuries it was customary that the Holy Eucharist should be taken back by the faithful to their houses; and that at home they received it at their own hands. It is evident that this was what was done by the Anchorites and monks who lived in the deserts, as may be seen proved by Cardinal Bona. (De Rebus Liturg., Lib. II., cap. xvii.). From this domestic communion it is easily seen how the abuse arose which is condemned in this canon.
Notes.
Zonaras says in his scholion that even in his day people made the same claim to diabolical possession.
And those who persist in these things, and do not turn away and flee from pernicious and Greek pursuits of this kind, we declare are to be thrust out of the Church, as also the sacred canons say. "For what fellowship hath light with darkness?" as saith the Apostle, "or what agreement is there between the temple of God and idols? or what part hath he that believeth with an infidel? And what concord hath Christ with Belial?"
Notes.
Hefele.
According to Balsamon (in Beveridge, Synod., Tom. I., p. 228) old people who had the reputation of special knowledge [were called "hecatontarchs"]. They sold the hair [of these she bears and other animals] as medicine or for an amulet. Cf. Balsamon and Zonaras ut supra.
St. Chrysostom in his Homilies on the Statutes explains, in answer to certain who defended them on this ground, that if these incantations are made in the name of Christ they are so much the worse. The Saint says, "Moreover I think that she is to be hated all the more who abuses the name of God for this purpose, because while professing to be a Christian, she shows by her actions that she is a heathen."
Notes.
On the Calends see Du Cange (Glossarium in loc.). The Bota were feasts in honour of Pan, the Brumalia feasts in honour of Bacchus. Many particulars with regard to these superstitions will be found in Balsamon's scholion, to which the curious reader is referred. Van Espen also has some valuable notes on the Kalends of January.
Notes.
What is condemned is false histories of true martyrs, not (as Johnson erroneously supposes) "false legends of pretended martyrs." There have been martyrs, both royal and plebeian, in much later times whose lives have been made ridiculous and whose memory has been rendered hateful to the ignorant people by so-called "histories" which might well have received the treatment ordered by the canon.
Notes.
Zonaras points out that this canon refers only to public instruction and not to private. Van Espen further notes that in the West this restriction is limited to the solemn and public preaching and announcing of the Word of God, which is restricted to bishops, and only by special and express license given to the other clergy, and refers to his own treatment of the subject In jure Eccles., Tom I., part 1, tit. xvi., cap. viii.
Notes.
Lupin remarks that the fires kindled on certain Saints' days are almost certainly remains of this heathen practice. These fires are often accompanied with leaping, drinking, and the wrestling of young men.
Notes.
Van Espen.
It is certain that the whole of Easter week was kept as a feast by the whole Church both East and West; and this Synod did not introduce this custom by its canon, but adopted this canon to ensure its continuance.
Here we have clearly set forth the Christian manner of passing a feast-day, viz., that the faithful on those days did give themselves up to "Psalms and Hymns and Spiritual Songs," from which the divine office which we call today canonical [i.e., chiefly Mattins and Vespers] are made up; and hence we understand that all the faithful ought to attend the choir-offices, which was indeed observed for many centuries, as I have shewn in my Dissertation on the Canonical Hours, cap. III., § 1, and therefore it was called "public" [or common] prayer.
Notes.
Van Espen.
The apostolic precept of abstaining "from blood and from things strangled" for some ages, not only among the Greeks but also among the Latins, was observed in many churches, but little by little and step by step it died out in the whole Church, at least in the Latin Church, altogether.
In this the Latin Church followed the opinion of St. Augustine, Contra Faustum Manichæum, Lib. XXXII., cap. xiii., where he teaches at great length that the precept was given to Christians only while the Gentile Church was not yet settled. This passage of Augustine also proves that at that time Africa did not observe this precept of the Apostles.
Notes.
Van Espen.
(Foot-note.)
I think that this canon was directed against certain Nestorian and Eutychian heretics, who, that they might find some patronage of their errors from the Holy Scriptures, dared in the sixth century most infamously to corrupt certain passages of the New Testament.
Notes.
Van Espen.
That in the Latin Church as well as in the Greek for many centuries it was the constant custom, ratified by various councils, that lay-men are to be excluded from the sanctuary and from the place marked off for the priests who are celebrating the divine mysteries, is so notorious as to need no proof, and the present canon shows that among the Greeks the laity were not admitted to the sacrarium even to make offerings.
The Synod makes but one exception, to wit, the Emperor, who can enter the rails of the holy altar by its permission "when he wishes to offer his gifts to the Creator, according to ancient custom."
Not without foundation does the Synod claim "ancient custom" for this; for long before, it is evident, it was the case from the words of the Emperor Theodosius the Younger. See also Theodoret (H. E., lib. v., cap. xvii.).
In the Latin Church, not only to emperors, kings, and great princes but also to patrons of churches, to toparchs of places, and even to magistrates, seats have been wont to be assigned honoris causâ within the sanctuary or choir, and it has been contended that these are properly due to such persons.
It is evident from Balsamon's note that the later Greeks at least looked upon the Emperor as being (like the kings of England and France) a persona mixta, sharing in some degree the sacerdotal character, as being anointed not merely with oil, but with the sacred chrism. Vide in this connexion J. Wickham Legg, The Sacring of the English Kings, in "The Archæological Journal," March, 1894.
Notes.
"Let your women keep silence in the churches; for it is not permitted unto them to speak," is the passage referred to. 1 Cor. xiv. 34.
Notes.
Liddell and Scott identify kalistra with kalindethra ,which they define as "a place for horses to roll after exercise," and note that it is a synonym of alindethra. But it is interesting to note that alinesis is "a rolling in the dust, an exercise in which wrestlers rolled on the ground."
Hefele says that Balsamon and Zonaras have not been able rightly to explain what we are to understand by the forbidden "Cylestras," but I think Johnson is not far out of the way when he translates "nor to meddle with athletic exercises."
Notes.
Perhaps none of the canons of this synod present greater and more insolvable difficulties than the present. It has been for long centuries the tradition of the Church that the marriage of a baptized Christian with an unbaptized person is null, but this canon seems to say that the same is the case if the one party be a heretic even though baptized. If this is what the canon means it elevates heresy into an impedimentum dirimens. Such is not and never has been the law of the West, and such is not to-day the practice of the Eastern church, which allows the marriage of its people with Lutherans and with Roman Catholics and never questions the validity of their marriages. Van Espen thinks "the Greek commentators seem" to think that the heretics referred to are unbaptized; I do not know exactly why he thinks so.
Notes.
This canon defines that to the image of the cross is to be "given veneration (proskunesis) of the intellect, of the words, and of the sense," i.e., the cross is to be venerated with the interior cultus of the soul, is to be venerated with the exterior culture of praise, and also with sensible acts, such as kissings, bowings, etc.
Notes.
This is a renewal of canon xxviii., of Laodicea, on which canon see the notes.
Notes.
This question of the character of church-music was one early discussed among Christians, and (long before the time of this synod), St. Augustine, in debating as to whether the chanting or the reading of the psalter was the more edifying, concludes, "when the psalms are chanted with a voice and most suitable modulation (liquida voce et convenientissima modulatione), I recognize that there is great utility in the practice," and further on he adds that singing is to be the rather approved, because "by the delight given to the ears the infirm soul is worked up to pious aspirations." (Confess. Lib. x., cap. xxxiii.).
Notes.
Both Balsamon and Zonaras remark that this canon refers to the vestibule of the church and to the rest of the sacred inclosure, and not to the interior of the church proper, for there no one would ever think of having a shop.
Notes.
This is a renewal of the XXXth canon of Laodicea. It will be noted, as Zonaras remarks, that the monks must be counted among the laymen who are to be cut off, since they have no clerical character or tonsure.
Notes.
This is a renewal of canon xlvi. of Laodicea.
Notes.
As the Catholic Church has always taught the Virgin-birth as well as the Virgin-conception of our Blessed Lord, and has affirmed that Mary was ever-virgin, even after she had brought forth the incarnate Son, so it follows necessarily that there could be no childbed nor puerperal flux. It need hardly be remarked here that besides other texts that of the prophet is considered as teaching thus much, "Behold the Virgin (ha alma) shall conceive and bear a son," she that "bare" as well as she that "conceived" being a virgin. Some commentators have taken epilocheia for the afterbirth, but Christian Lupus, as Van Espen notes, has pointed out that the early fathers seem to have recognized that the Virgin did have the "afterbirth," and this St. Jerome expressly teaches in his book, Contra Helvidium.
The Greeks, however, understood it as I have translated, and the witness of Zonaras will be sufficient. The words lochos, lochaios and the like all signify "lying in," "a place of lying in," and Liddell and Scott say that the latter word is used of "bearing down like heavy ears of corn," which would well express the labour pains.
Zonaras.
This canon teaches that the parturition of the holy Virgin was without any childbed. For childbed (puerperium) is the emission of the foetus accompanied by pain and a flux of blood: but none of us ever believed that the Mother of God was subjected to sufferings of this sort, for these are the consequents of natural conception, but her conception was supernatural; and by the Holy Spirit it was brought to pass that she was not subjected to those evils which rightly are attached to natural parturition.
On this canon should be read the extensive treatment of Asseman (Bib. Juris Orient., Tom. v., pp. 193 et seqq.)
Notes.
This is a renewal of canon xi. of Sardica (xiv. according to the numbering of Dionysius Exiguus.)
Notes.
The addition of the phrase condemned by this canon was probably made first by Peter Fullo, and although indeed it was capable of a good meaning, if the whole hymn was understood as being addressed to Christ, and although this was admitted by very many of the orthodox, yet as it was chiefly used by the Monophysites and with an undoubtedly heretical intention, it was finally ousted from this position and its adherents were styled Theopaschites. From all this it came about that by 518 it was a source of disagreement among the Catholics, some affirming the expression, as looked at by itself, to be a touchstone of orthodoxy. The Emperor Justinian tried to have it approved by Pope Hormisdas, but unsuccessfully, the pontiff only declaring that it was unnecessary, and even dangerous. Fulgentius of Ruspe and Dionysius Exiguus had declared it orthodox. Pope John II. almost came to the point of approving the phrase "one of the Trinity suffered," nor did his successor Agapetus I. speak any more definitely on the point, but the Fifth Ecumenical Council directly approved the formula.
But this, of course, did not touch the point of its introduction into the Trisagion or, more accurately, of the introduction of the words "who was crucified for us."
It should have been noted that at a Home Synod in 478, Peter Fullo had been deposed for the insertion of this clause, because he intended to imply that the true God had suffered death upon the cross. This sentence was a confirmation of one already pronounced against him by a synod held at Antioch which had raised a man, Stephen by name, to its episcopal throne.
Such is the history of a matter which, while it seemed at first as of little moment, yet for many years was a source of trouble in the Church. (Vide Hefele, History of the Councils, Vol. III., pp. 454, 457; Vol. IV., p. 26.)
Notes.
As from this canon, a century earlier than the iconoclastic controversy, the prevalence of pictures is evident, so from the canon of the same synod with regard to the veneration due to the image of the cross (number lxxiii.), we learn that the teaching of the Church with regard to relative worship was the same as was subsequently set forth, so that the charge of innovating, sometimes rashly brought against the Seventh Ecumenical Council, has no foundation in fact whatever.
This canon is further interesting as being the one cited by more than one Pope and Western Authority as belonging to "the Sixth Synod."
Notes.
This is canon iv. of the Council of Hippo, in the year 393. (Vide Hefele, Vol. II., p. 397.) The earlier canon includes baptism also, in its prohibition. This is canons xviii. and xx. of the African code, according to the Greek numbering.
Notes.
This is canon VII., of the Sixth Council of Carthage, (Vide Hefele, Hist. of the Councils, Vol. II., p. 424); and Canon lxxv., of the African code (to which Balsam on attributes this canon), by the Greek numbering, (lxxii. by the Latin).
Notes.
The brackets enclose the reading of Hervetus. But Zonaras had this same text, and therefore it may be safely followed instead of that of Balsamon, as edited by Beveridge.
Notes.
Compare with this canon lviii. of St. Basil.
The words in brackets are found in Beveridge, but were lacking in Hervetus's text.
Johnson.
Here discipline is relaxed; formerly an adulteress did fifteen years' penance. See Can. Bas., 58. No wonder if in 200 years' time from St. Basil, the severity of discipline was abated.
Notes.
Van Espen.
No doubt the synod by the words "we have received from the divine Fathers," referred to canon xx. of the Council of Nice.
For many centuries this custom was preserved even in the Latin Church; and the custom of keeping feasts and whole days generally from evening to evening is believed to have been an Apostolic tradition, received by them from the Jews. At the end of the VIIIth Century the Synod of Frankfort declared in its xxi. canon, that "the Lord's day should be kept from evening to evening." [385]
Notes.
See Canon XXI. of Ancyra, and Canon II. of St. Basil; to wit, "She who purposely destroys the foetus, shall suffer the punishment of murder. And we pay no attention to the subtile distinction as to whether the foetus was formed or unformed. And by this not only is justice satisfied for the child that should have been born, but also for her who prepared for herself the snares, since the women very often die who make such experiments."
Notes.
Van Espen.
This canon simply renews and confirms Canon xxvii of Chalcedon.
Notes.
Compare in the Corpus Juris Canonici, Gratian's Decretum, Pars II., Causa xxxiv., Quæst. I. and II. Epistle of St. Leo to Nicetas. Also compare of St. Basil's canon's xxxi., xxxvi., and xlvi.
Notes.
The reference is to canon lxxxi. of St. Basil's canons.
Van Espen.
Tertullian (De Idolatria, cap. xx.) supposes that to swear by the false gods of the Gentiles, contains in itself some idolatry, an opinion shared by St. Basil, comparing those using such oaths with them who betrayed Christ, and who are partakers of the talk of devils.
But concerning the Paulianists it has been determined by the Catholic Church that they shall by all means be rebaptized. The Eunomeans also, who baptize with one immersion; and the Montanists, who here are called Phrygians; and the Sabellians, who consider the Son to be the same as the Father, and are guilty in certain other grave matters, and all the other heresies--for there are many heretics here, especially those who come from the region of the Galatians--all of their number who are desirous of coming to the Orthodox faith, we receive as Gentiles. And on the first day we make them Christians, on the second Catechumens, then on the third day we exorcise them, at the same time also breathing thrice upon their faces and ears; and thus we initiate them, and we make them spend time in church and hear the Scriptures; and then we baptize them.
And the Manichæans, and Valentinians and Marcionites and all of similar heresies must give certificates and anathematize each his own heresy, and also Nestorius, Eutyches, Dioscorus, Severus, and the other chiefs of such heresies, and those who think with them, and all the aforesaid heresies; and so they become partakers of the holy Communion.
Notes.
Compare with this Canon vii. of Laodicea, and the so-called viith. canon of the First Council of Constantinople.
The text I have translated is that ordinarily given, I now present to the reader Hefele's argument for its worthlessness.
Hefele.
This text is undoubtedly false, for (a) the baptism of the Gnostics was, according to the recognized ecclesiastical principle, invalid, and a Gnostic coming into the Church was required to be baptized anew; (b) besides, it would have us first to require of a Gnostic an anathema on Nestorius, Eutyches, etc. More accurate, therefore, is the text, as it is given by Beveridge, and as Balsamon had it, to the effect that: "In the same way (as the preceding) are the Manichæans, Valentinians, Marcionites, and similar heretics to be treated (i.e., to be baptized anew); but the Nestorians must (merely) present certificates, and anathematize their heresy, Nestorius, Eutyches, etc." Here we have only this mistake, that the Nestorians must anathematize, among others, also Eutyches, which they would certainly have done very willingly. At the best, we must suppose that there is a gap in the text, and that after, "all of similar heresies," we must add "the later heretics must present certificates and anathematize Nestorius, Eutyches, etc."
There seems but little doubt that whatever may be the truth in the matter, the early theologians and fathers held that even though the external rite of Holy Baptism might be validly performed by schismatics and heretics, yet that by it the person so baptized did not receive the Holy Ghost, and this opinion was not confined to the East, but was also prevalent in the West. Vide Rupertus, De Divinis Officiis, Lib. X., Cap. xxv.
Notes.
For the intricate manner of dressing the hair used in the East, and for a description of the golden dye, see the scholion of Zonaras. Van Espen remarks that the curious care for somebody else's hair in the form of wigs, so prevalent with many laymen and ecclesiastics of his day, is the same vice condemned by the canon in another shape. [387]
Notes.
Zonaras.
In the name of holy places, not the church itself but the adjoining and dependent buildings are intended such as those which are called the "Catechumena." For no one would be audacious enough to wish to cohabit with his wife in the very temple itself.
Notes.
Aristenus's commentary on this canon is Saphes. A more extraordinary estimate of it could hardly be made. So far from the meaning being "perspicuous," as the Latin translation has it, the meaning seems to be past finding out; for, as Van Espen remarks, a man who sins with a betrothed woman is certainly not an "adulterer." He tries therefore to introduce the idea that though he is not an adulterer, yet he is to be punished as if he were. But the Greek hardly seems patient of this meaning, and the Ancient Epitome says in so many words that he is an adulterer.
On account of this difficulty some have supposed that the espousals here mentioned were not de futuro but de proesenti, and that therefore it was the case of stealing a real wife of another man. But this explanation also is involved in many difficulties.
Notes.
A similar Judaizing superstitious custom was also found in the West, of which Walafrid Strabo gives an account in the IX. Century (De Rebus Ecclesiasticis, cap. xviii.).
Notes.
Balsamon.
At first, perchance, this was invented from pious feelings, because the hand which came in contact with base and unworthy things was not worthy to receive the Lord's body, but, as time went on, piety was turned to the injury of the soul, so that those who did this when they came to receive with an arrogant and insolent bearing, were preferred to the poor.
St. Cyril of Jerusalem.
(Cateches. Mystagog. v. [388] )
When thou goest to receive communion go not with thy wrists extended, nor with thy fingers separated, but placing thy left hand as a throne for thy right, which is to receive so great a King, and in the hollow of the palm receive the body of Christ, saying, Amen.
Vide also St. John Damascene, De Fide Orthodoxa, lib. iv., cap. xiv. On the whole matter cf. Card. Bona, De Rebus Lit., lib. ii., cap. xvii., n. 3.
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