§ 52.6.
- Justinian’s Decrees, A.D. 527-553.—During the violent conflict of parties Justinian I. entered upon his long and politically considered glorious reign, A.D. 527-565. He regarded it as his life task permanently to establish orthodoxy, and to win back heretics to the church, above all the numerous Monophysites. But the well-disposed emperor, who moreover had no deep insight into the thorny questions of theological controversy, was in various ways misled by the intrigues of court theologians, and the machinations of his crafty consort Theodora, who was herself secretly a Monophysite. The Theopaschite Controversy first called forth from him a decree. The addition made to the Trishagion by Petrus [Peter] Fullo, θεὸς ὁ σταυρωθεὶς δι’ ἡμᾶς, had been smuggled into the Constantinopolitan liturgy about A.D. 512. The Acoimetæ pronounced it heretical, and Hormisdas of Rome admitted that it was at least capable of being misunderstood and useless. But Justinian sanctioned it in A.D. 533. Encouraged by this first success, Theodora used her influence to raise the Monophysite Anthimus to the episcopal chair of the capital. But the Roman bishop Agapetus, who stayed in Constantinople as ambassador of the Goths, unmasked him, and obtained his deposition. Mennas, a friend of Agapetus, was appointed his successor in A.D. 536. All Monophysite writings were ordered to be burnt, their transcribers were punished by the loss of their hand. Two Palestinian abbots, Domitian and Theodore Ascidas, secret Monophysites and zealous friends of Origen, lived at court in high favour. To compass their overthrow, Mennas at an endemic Synod at Constantinople in A.D. 543 renewed the condemnation of the arch-heretic and his writings. The court theologians, however, subscribed without objection, and in concert with Theodora plotted their revenge. Justinian had long regarded Egypt with peculiar interest as the granary of the empire. He felt that something must be done to pacify the Monophysites who abounded in that country. Theodora persuaded him that the Monophysites would be satisfied if it were resolved, along with the writings of Theodore, the father of the Nestorian heresy, to condemn also the controversial writings of Theodoret against the venerated Cyril and the Epistle of Ibas to Maris. The supposed errors of these were collected before him in the Three Chapters. The emperor did this by an edict in A.D. 544, and demanded the consenting subscription of all the bishops. The orientals obeyed; but in the West opposition was shown on all sides, and thus broke out the violent Controversy of the Three Chapters. Vigilius of Rome, a creature of Theodora (§ [46, 9]), had secretly promised his co-operation, but, not feeling able to face the storm in the West, he broke his word. Justinian had him brought to Constantinople in A.D. 547 and forced from him a written declaration, the so-called Judicatum, in which he agreed to the condemnation of the Three Chapters. The Africans, under Reparatus of Carthage excommunicated the successor of Peter, and fought manfully for the rights and honour of the calumniated fathers. Fulgentius Farrandus [Ferrandus] wrote Pro tribus capitt., Facundus of Hermiane, Defensío III. capitt., and the deacon Liberatus of Carthage, a Breviarium causæ Nestorian. et Eutychianorum, an important source of information for the history of the Christological Controversies. Justinian finally convened the Fifth Œcumenical Council at Constantinople in A.D. 553, which confirmed all the imperial edicts. Vigilius issued a Constitum ad Imp., in which he indeed rejected the doctrines of the Three Chapters but refused to condemn the persons. Under imprisonment and exile he became pliable, and subscribed in A.D. 554. He died in A.D. 555 on his return to his bishopric. His successor Pelagius formally acknowledged the Constantinopolitan decrees, and North Africa, North Italy and Illyria renounced the dishonoured chair of Peter. At last Gregory the Great, with much difficulty, gradually brought this schism to an end.
§ 52.7.
- The Monophysite Churches.—Justinian, however, did not thereby reach the end he had in view. The Monophysites continued their separation because the hated Chalcedonian Symbol was still acknowledged. But more injurious to them than the persecutions of the orthodox national church were the endless quarrels and divisions among themselves. First of all the two leaders in Alexandria, Julianus and Severus, became heads of rival parties. The Severians or φθαρτολάτραι taught that the body of Christ in itself had been subject to corruption (the φθορά); the Julianists denied it. This first split was followed by many others. By transferring the Monophysite confusion of οὐσία and ὑπόστασις to the doctrine of the Trinity arose the Monophysite sect of the Tritheists, who taught that in Christ there is one nature, and that in the Trinity a separate nature is to be ascribed to each of the three persons. Among them was the celebrated philosopher, Johannes Philoponus (§ [47, 11]), who supported this doctrine by the Aristotelian categories. He also vindicated the notion that the present world as to form and matter would perish at the last day, and an entirely new world with new bodies would be created. In opposition to this Conon, bishop of Tarsus, affirmed that the overthrow of the world would be in form only, and that the risen saints would again possess the same bodies though in a glorified form. His followers the so-called Cononites separated from the main stem of the Tritheists and formed an independent sect.—The Monophysites were most numerous in Egypt. Out of hatred to the Greek Catholics they forbade the use of the Greek language in their churches, and chose a Coptic patriarch for themselves. They aided the Saracens in their conquest of Egypt in A.D. 640, who out of gratitude for this drove away the Catholic patriarch. From Egypt Monophysitism spread into Abyssinia (§ [64, 1]). Already in A.D. 536 Byzantine Armenia had been conquered by the Persians, who showed favour to the previously oppressed Monophysites (§ [64, 3]). In Syria and Mesopotamia, during Justinian’s persecutions, the unwearied activity of a monk, Jacob Zanzalus, commonly called el Baradai, because he went about clad as a beggar, ordained by the Monophysites as bishop of Edessa and the whole East, saved the Monophysite church from extinction. He died in A.D. 538. After him the Monophysites were called Jacobites. They called the Catholics Melchites, Royalists. Their patriarch resided at Guba in Mesopotamia. Subordinate to him was a suffragan bishop at Tagrit with the title of Maphrian, i.e. the Fruit-bearer. At the head of the Armenian Monophysites stood the patriarch of Aschtarag with the title Catholicus.The Abyssinian church had a metropolitan with the title Abbuna[163]—Continuation § [72, 2].
§ 52.8. The Monothelite Controversy, A.D. 633-680.—The increasing political embarrassments of the emperor made a union with the Monophysites all the more desirable. The emperor Heraclius, A.D. 611-641, was advised to attempt a union of parties under the formula: that Christ accomplished His work of redemption by the exercise of one divine human will (μιᾷ θεανδρικῇ ἐνεργείᾳ). Several Catholic bishops found nothing objectionable in this formula which had already been used by the Pseudo-Dionysius (§ [47, 11]). In A.D. 633 the patriarchs Sergius of Constantinople and Cyrus of Alexandria on the basis of this concluded a treaty, in consequence of which most of the Severians attached themselves again to the national church. Honorius of Rome also was won over. But the monk Sophronius, who soon thereafter in A.D. 634 became patriarch of Jerusalem, came forward as the decided opponent Of this union, which led back to Monophysitism. The conquest of Jerusalem, however, soon after this, A.D. 637, by the Saracens put him outside of the scene of conflict. In A.D. 638 the emperor issued an edict, the Ecthesis, by which it was sought to make an end of the strife by substituting for the offensive expression ἐνέργεια the less objectionable term θέλημα, and confirming the Monothelite doctrine as alone admissible. Now the monk Maximus (§ [47, 12]) entered the lists as the champion of orthodoxy. He betook himself to Africa, where since Justinian’s time zeal for the maintenance of the Chalcedonian faith was strongest, and here secured political support in Gregorius [Gregory] the imperial governor who sought to make himself independent of Byzantium. This statesman arranged for a public disputation at Carthage in A.D. 645 between Maximus and the ex-patriarch Pyrrhus of Constantinople, the successor of Sergius, who, implicated in a palace intrigue, deposed from his office and driven from Constantinople, sought refuge in Africa. Pyrrhus willingly submitted and abjured his error. An African General Synod in A.D. 646 unanimously condemned Monothelitism, renounced church fellowship with Paulus, the new patriarch of Constantinople, and demanded of Pope Theodorus, A.D. 642-649, a fulmination against the heresy. In order to give this demand greater emphasis, Maximus and Pyrrhus travelled together to Rome. The latter was recognised by the pope as legitimate patriarch of Constantinople, but, being induced by the exarch of Ravenna to recant his recantation, he was excommunicated by the pope, with a pen dipped in the sacramental wine, returned to Constantinople and was, after the death of Paulus, reinstated in his former office. Maximus remained in Rome and there won the highest reputation as the shield of orthodoxy.—The proper end of the union, namely the saving of Syria and Egypt, was meanwhile frustrated by the Mohammedan conquest of Syria in A.D. 638, and of Egypt in A.D. 640. The court, however, for its own honour still persevered in it. Africa and Italy occupied a position of open revolt. Then emperor Constans II., A.D. 642-668, resolved to annul the Ecthesis. In its place he put another enactment about the faith, the Typus, A.D. 648, which sought to get back to the state of matters before the Monothelite movement; that neither one nor two wills should be taught. But Martin I. of Rome at the first Lateran Synod at Rome in A.D. 649 condemned in the strongest terms the Typus as well as the Ecthesis along with its original maintainers, and sent the Acts to the emperor. The exarch of Ravenna, Olympius, was now ordered to take the bold prelate prisoner, but did not obey. His successor sent the pope in chains to Constantinople. In A.D. 653 he was banished for high treason to the Chersonese, where he literally suffered hunger, and died in A.D. 655 six months after his arrival. Still more dreadful was the fate of the abbot Maximus. At the same time with Martin or soon after he too was brought to Constantinople a prisoner from Rome. Here for a whole year every effort imaginable was made, entreaties, promises, threats, imprisonment, hunger, etc., in order to induce him to acknowledge the Typus, but all in vain. The emperor then lost all patience. In a towering rage at the unparalleled obstinacy of the monk’s resistance he doomed him, A.D. 662, to dreadful scourging, to have his tongue wrenched out and his hand hewn off, and to be sent into the wildest parts of Thrace, where he died a few weeks after his arrival at the age of 82 years. Such barbaric severity was effectual for a long time. But under the next emperor Constantinus Pogonnatus, A.D. 668-685, the two parties prepared for a new conflict. The emperor resolved to make an end of it by a General Council. Pope Agatho held a brilliant Synod at Rome in A.D. 679, where it was laid down that not one iota should be abated from the decisions of the Lateran Synod. With these decisions and a missive from the pope himself, the papal legates appeared at the Sixth Œcumenical Council at Constantinople in A.D. 680, called also Concil. Trullanum I., because it was held in the mussel-shaped vaulted hall Trullus in the imperial castle, under the presidency of the emperor. As at Chalcedon the Epistle of Leo I., so also here that of Agatho lay at the basis of the Council’s doctrinal decrees: δύο φυσικὰ θελήματα ἀδιαιρέτως, ἀτρέπτως, ἀμερίστως, ἀσυγχύτως, οὐχ ὑπεναντία, ἀλλὰ ἑπόμενον τὸ ἀνθρώπινον καὶ ὑποτασσόμενον τῷ θείῳ. The Synod even condescended to grant the pope a report of the proceedings and to request his confirmation of its decisions. But the Greeks, finding a malicious pleasure in the confusion of their rivals, contrived to mix in the sweet drink a strong infusion of bitter wormwood, for the Council among the other representatives of Monothelite error ostentatiously and expressly condemned pope Honorius as an accursed heretic. Pope Leo II. in a letter to the emperor confirmed the decisions of the Council, expressly homologating the condemnation of Honorius, “qui profana proditione immaculatam fidem subvertere conatus est.”—Henceforth Dyothelitism prevailed universally. Only in one little corner of Asia, to which the arm of the state did not reach, a vestige of Monothelitism continued to exist. Its scattered adherents gathered in the monastery of St. Maro in Lebanon, and acknowledged the abbot of this cloister as their ecclesiastical head. They called themselves Maronites, and with sword in hand maintained their ecclesiastical as well as political independence against Byzantines and Saracens (§ [72, 3]).
§ 52.9. The Case of Honorius.—The two Roman Synods, A.D. 649 and 679, had simply ignored the notorious fact of the complicity of Honorius in the furtherance of Monothelite error, and Agatho might hope by the casual statement in his letter, that the Roman chair never had taken the side of heretical novelties, to beguile the approaching œcumenical Synod into the same obliviousness. But the Greeks paid no heed to the hint. His successor Leo II. could not do otherwise than homologate the Eastern leaders’ condemnation of heresy, even that of Honorius, hard though this must have been to him. On the other hand, the biographies of the popes from Honorius to Agatho in the Roman Liber pontificalis (§ [90, 6]) help themselves out of this dilemma again by preserving a dead silence about any active or passive interference of Honorius in the Monothelite controversy. In the biography of Leo II. for the first time is Honorius’ name mentioned among those of the condemned Monothelites, but without any particular remark about him as an individual. So too in the formulary of a profession of faith in the Liber diurnus of the Roman church made by every new pope and in use down to the 11th century (§ [46, 11]). From the biography of Leo in the Pontifical book was copied the simple name into the readings of the Roman Breviary for the day of this saint, and so it remained down to the 17th century. It had then been quite forgotten in the West that by this name a pope was designated. Oftentimes it had been affirmed that even Roman popes might fall and actually had fallen into error; but only such cases as those of Liberius (§ [46, 4]), Anastasius (§ [46, 8]), Vigilius (§ [52, 6]), John XXII. (§ 110, 3; 112, 2) were adduced; that of Honorius occurred to nobody. It was only in the 15th century, through more careful examination of Acts of Synods that the true state of matters was discovered, and in the 16th century when the question of the infallibility of the pope had become a burning one (§ 149, 4), the case of Honorius became the real Sisyphus rock of Roman Catholic theology. The most laborious attempts have been made by most venturesome means to get it out of the way. The condemnation of Honorius by the sixth œcumenical Council has been described as merely a spiteful invention of later Greeks, who falsified everything relating to him in the Acts of the Council; so, e.g. Baronius, Bellarmine, etc.—The condemnation actually took place but not at the œcumenical first, but at the schismatical second, Trullan Council of A.D. 692 (§ [63, 2]), and the record of procedure has been by the malice of later Greeks transferred from the record of the second to that of the first.—Forged epistles of Honorius were laid before the sixth œcumenical Council, by means of which it was misled into passing sentence upon him.—The condemnation of the pope did not turn upon his doctrine but upon his unseasonable love of peace.—The pope meant well, but expressed himself so as to be misunderstood; so e.g. the Jesuit Garnier in his ed. of the Liber diurnus, the Vatican Council, and Hefele in the 2nd ed. of his Hist. of the Councils.—In the epistles referred to he spoke as a private individual and not officially, ex cathedra.—It is, however, fatal to all such explanations that the infallible pope Leo II. solemnly denounced ex cathedra his infallible predecessor Honorius as a heretic.Besides the only other possible escape by distinguishing the question du fait and the question du droit has been formally condemned ex cathedra in connection with another case (§ 156, 5).[164]
§ 53. The Soteriological Controversies, A.D. 412-529.[165]
While the Trinitarian and Christological controversies had their origin in the East and there gave rise to the most violent conflicts, the West taking indeed a lively interest in the discussion and by the decisive voice of Rome giving the victory to orthodoxy at almost every stage of the struggle, it was in the West that a controversy broke out, which for a full century proceeded alongside of the Christological controversy, without awakening in the East more than a passing and even then only a secondary interest. It dealt with the fundamental questions of sin and grace. In opposition to the Pelagian Monergism of human freedom, as well as the semi-Pelagian Synergism of divine grace and human freedom, the Augustinian Monergism of divine grace finally obtained the victory.
§ 53.1. Preliminary History.—From the earliest times the actual universality of sin and the need of divine grace in Christ for redemption from sin received universal acknowledgment throughout the whole church. But as to whether and how far the moral freedom of men was weakened or lost by sin, and in what relation human conduct stood to divine grace, great uncertainty prevailed. Opposition to Gnosticism and Manichæism led the older fathers to emphasise as strongly as possible the moral freedom of men, and induced them to deny inborn sinfulness as well as the doctrine that sin was imprinted in men in creation, and to account for man’s present condition by bad training, evil example, the agency of evil spirits, etc. This tendency was most vigorously expressed by the Alexandrians. The new Alexandrian school showed an unmistakable inclination to connect the universality of sin with Adam’s sin, without going the length of affirming the doctrine of inherited sinfulness. In Soteriology it remained faithful to its traditional synergism (comp., however, § [47, 7k], [l].) The Antiochean school sought to give due place to the co-operation of the human will alongside of the necessity of divine grace, and reduced the idea of inherited sin to that of inherited evil. So especially Chrysostom, who was indeed able to conceive that Adam by his actual sin become mortal could beget only mortal children, but not that the sinner could beget only sinners. The first man brought death into the world, we confirm and renew the doom by our own sin. Man by his moral will does his part, the divine grace does its part. The whole East is unanimous in most distinctly repudiating all predestinational wilfulness in God. In the West, on the other hand, by Traducianism or Generationism introduced by Tertullian, which regards the soul as begotten with the body, the way was prepared for recognising the doctrine of inherited sin (Tradux animæ, tradux peccati) and consequently also of monergism. Tertullian, himself, proceeding from the experience, that in every man from birth there is present an unconquerable tendency to sin, spoke with great decidedness of a Vitium originis. In this he was followed by Cyprian, Ambrose and Hilary. Yet even these teachers of the church had not altogether been emancipated from synergism, and alongside of expressions which breathe the hardest predestinationism, are found others which seem to give equal weight to the opposite doctrine of human co-operation in conversion. Augustine was the first to state with the utmost consistency the doctrine of the divine monergism; while Pelagius carried out the synergism of the earlier fathers until it became scarcely less than human monergism.—Meanwhile Traducianism did not succeed in obtaining universal recognition even in the West. Augustine vacillates; Jerome and Leo the Great prefer Creationism, which represents God as creating a new soul for each human being begotten. Most of the later church fathers, too, are creationists, without, however, prejudicing the doctrine of inherited sin. Those of them who supported the trichotomic theory (§ [52, 1]) held that it was the cobegotten ψυχὴ ἄλογος, anima sensitiva as opposed to the anima intellectualis, while those who supported the dichotomic theory, which posits merely body and soul, held that it was the soul created good by God, which was infected on its passing into the body begotten by human parents with its inherited sin.The theory of Pre existence, which Origen had brought forward (§ [31, 5]) had, even in the East, only occasional representatives (§ [47, 7m], [n], [o]).[166]
§ 53.2. The Doctrine of Augustine.—During the first period of his Christian life, when the conflict with Manichæism still stood in the forefront of his thinking and controversial activity, Augustine, looking at faith as a self-determining of the human will, had thought a certain measure of free co-operation on the part of man in his conversion to be necessary and had therefore refused to maintain his absolute want of merit. But by his whole life’s experience he was irresistibly led to acknowledge man’s natural inability for any positive co-operation and to make faith together with conversion depend solely upon the grace of God. The perfect and full development of this doctrine was brought about by means of his controversy with the Pelagians. Augustine’s doctrinal system in its most characteristic features is as follows: Man was created free and in the image of God, destined to and capable of attaining immortality, holiness and blessedness, but also with the possibility of sinning and dying. By the exercise of his freedom he must determine his own career. Had he determined himself for God, the being able not to sin and not to die, would have become an impossibility of sinning and dying, the Posse non peccare et mori would have become a Non posse peccare et mori. But tempted by Satan he fell, and thus it became for him impossible that he should not sin and die, non posse non peccare et non mori. All prerogatives of the Divine image were lost; he retained only the capacity for outward civil righteousness, Justitia civilis, and a capacity for redemption. In Adam, moreover, all mankind sinned, for he was all mankind. By generation Adam’s nature as it was after sin, with sin and guilt, death and condemnation, but also the capacity for redemption, passed over to all his posterity. Divine grace, which alone can redeem and save man, attached itself to the remnant of the divine image which expressed itself in the need of redemption and the capacity for redemption. Grace is therefore absolutely necessary, in the beginning, middle and end of the Christian life. It is granted man, not because he believes, but that he may believe; for faith too is the work of God’s grace. First of all grace awakens through the law the consciousness of sin and the desire for redemption, and leads by the gospel to faith in the Redeemer (gratia præveniens). By means of faith it thus secures the forgiveness of sin as primum beneficium through appropriating the merits of Christ and in part the powers of the divine life through the implanting of living fellowship with Christ (in baptism). Thus is free will restored to the good (Gratia operans) and evidences itself in a holy life in love. But even in the regenerate the old man with his sinful lusts is still present. In the struggle of the new with the old he is continually supported by Divine grace (Gratia co-operans) unto his justification (Justificatio) which is completed in the making righteous of his whole life and being through the Divine impartation (Infusio) of new powers of will. The final act of grace, which, however, according to the educative wisdom of God is not attained in this life, is the absolute removal of evil desire (Concupiscentia) and transfiguration into the perfect likeness of Christ through resurrection and eternal life (Non posse peccare et mori). Apart from the inconsistent theory of justification proposed, this view of nature and grace is thoroughly Pauline. Augustine, however, connects with it the doctrine of an absolute predestination. Experience shows that not all men attain to conversion and redemption. Since man himself can contribute nothing to his conversion, the ground of this must be sought not in the conduct of the man but only in an eternal unconditional decree of God, Decretum absolutum, according to which He has determined out of the whole fallen race of man, Massa perditionis, to save some to the glory of His grace and to leave others to their deserved doom to the glory of His penal righteousness. The ground of this election is only the wise and mysterious good pleasure of the divine will without reference to man’s faith, which is indeed only a gift of God. If it is said: “God wills that all men should be saved,” that can only mean, “all who are predestinated.” As the outcasts (Reprobati) can in no way appropriate grace unto themselves, the elect (Electi) cannot in any way resist it (Gratia irresistibilis). The one sure sign that one is elected is, therefore, undisturbed perseverance in the possession of grace (Donum perseverantiæ). To the heathens, even the noblest of them, he refused salvation, but made a distinction in the degrees of their penal tortures. So too unbaptized children were all regarded as lost.Although over against this he also set down the proposition: Contemtus, non defectus sacramenti damnat, the resolution of this contradiction lay in the special divine election of grace, which secures to the elect the dispensation of the sacrament.[167]