A Saxon bishop and priest.
(From Cotton MS., Claudius, B. iv.)
The omissions, compared with the canons of the German Council, are the most important part of the document. The first canon decreed that every bishop should be careful to support his character (i.e. his status as a bishop), execute every part of his office, and maintain the canons and constitutions of the Church against encroachment; and the second that the bishops and clergy should be careful to keep a good correspondence with each other, without any flattering applications to any person, considering that they are the servants of one master, and entrusted with the same commission; and, therefore, though they are divided by distance of place and country, they ought to be united by affection and pray for each other that every one may discharge his office with integrity and conscience. Then there follow disciplinary canons: (3) that the clergy should call together the people of all ranks and degrees in each place, preach to them the word of God, and forbid them to follow the heathen customs; (2) that the bishops should visit their dioceses every year; (4, 5, and 7) relate to monasteries; (6) bishops not to ordain priests without examination as to learning and morals; (8) priests to abstract themselves from worldly affairs and give themselves to reading, prayer, etc.; (9) to preach, baptize, and inspect the morals of the people in those precincts and districts assigned to them by their bishops—which implies the existence of subdivisions of dioceses into various jurisdictions, and the existence of parishes; (10) priests to be thoroughly acquainted with the doctrines and services of the church, to teach the Creed and Lord’s Prayer, and explain the sacraments; (11) to be uniform in their preaching and ministration; (12) regulates church music and ceremonies, canons not to intrude upon things which belong to the bishop; (13, 14, 15, 16, 18) on the observance of Sundays, holy days, the seven hours of prayer, rogations, and ember days; (17) appoints that the days on which St. Gregory and St. Augustine died shall be kept as holy days, and their names be included in the litanies.
Canons (21) and (22) enjoin on the clergy sobriety and propriety of conduct, and ever-fitness for celebration and reception of Holy Communion. (26) enjoins the bishops to convene their clergy and abbots, and communicate to them the decisions of the council, and command their observance; and if there is any disorder too strong for the bishop’s correction, he is to report it to the archbishop at the next meeting of the synod—but not a word of a reference beyond him to the Pope. (27) is on the singing of the psalms with recollection and pious dispositions and posture of respect, and of prayers—and among them of prayers for the departed;[50] and those who do not understand Latin are to pray in the vulgar tongue.
(26) and (27) are specially notable as directed against what seem to have been growing errors; they explain that alms are not to be given to commute penance and dispense with the discipline of the Church, and so procure a liberty of sinning; that those who think that God can be bribed thus, make their alms useless to them, and add to their guilt. Also that it is folly and presumption to think that a man condemned to penance may procure others to fast, say psalms, and distribute charity on his behalf; that if a man may thus buy his punishment and get others to repent for him, a rich man would be sure of salvation, and only the poor be in danger. The last canon enjoins that kings and princes and the whole body of the people be publicly prayed for in church.[51]
It is to be observed that the Northumbrian king was not present with his nobles and bishops at this synod; for eleven years previously (in 736) the Bishop of York had obtained the dignity of an archbishop with the Northumbrian churches as his province. The Papal legates visited the north, but we have no account of their doings there.
The laws of King Alfred are prefaced by a recapitulation of the early history of the Church, and recite the decree of the apostles at the Synod of Jerusalem. Then the king goes on to say that many synods were assembled in the old times, among the English race, after they had received the Faith of Christ, and ordained a “tort” for many misdeeds. Out of those laws which he had met with, either of the days of Ine his kinsman, of Offa, King of the Mercians, or of Ethelbryht who first among the English race received baptism, the things which seemed to him most right he had gathered together and rejected others. He had then showed them to the witan, and they declared that it seemed good to them all that they should be observed. We conclude that the codes of Ethelbert, Ine, and Offa (which last has not come down to us) were the principal codes then known. We select several of the laws of Alfred which deal with new matter.
1. If a man pledge himself and break his pledge, he is to surrender his weapons and goods to the keeping of his friends, and be in prison forty days in a bishop’s town, and suffer there whatever the bishop may prescribe; his friends to find him food; if he have none, then the king’s reeve to do it; if he escape, to be excommunicated of all Christ’s churches. If a man seek a church and confess an offence not before known, let it be half forgiven—i.e. let him pay half the penalty.
One of the laws agreed upon between King Alfred and Guthrum was, if any man wrong an ecclesiastic or a foreigner as to money or life, the king or earl and the bishop shall be to the injured in the place of kinsman and protector.