A hierarchical distinction of ranks among the bishops had already made its appearance even in the previous period by the elevation of the metropolitan see and the yet more marked precedency given to the so-called Sedes apostolicæ (§ [34]). This tendency got powerful support from the political divisions of the empire made by Constantine the Great; for now the bishops of capital cities demanded an extension of their spiritual superiority corresponding to that given in secular authority to the imperial governors. The guarding of earlier privileges along with respectful consideration of more recent claims prevented the securing of a perfect correspondence between the political and hierarchical distribution of ranks. The result of giving consideration to both was the development of the Patriarchal Constitution, in which the bishops of Rome, Alexandria, Antioch, Constantinople and Jerusalem were recognised as heads of the church universal of equal rank with jurisdiction over the patriarchates assigned them. The first place in this clerical Pentarchy was claimed by the Roman see, which ever more and more decidedly strove for the primacy of the whole church.
§ 46.1. The Patriarchal Constitution.—Constantine the Great divided the whole empire into four prefectures which were subdivided into dioceses, and these again into provinces. Many bishops then of the capitals of these dioceses, especially in the East, under the title of Exarchs, assumed a rank superior to that of the metropolitans, just as these had before arrogated a rank superior to that of provincial bishops. The first œcumenical Council at Nicæa in A.D. 325 (§ [50, 1]) affirmed on behalf of the bishops of the three most prominent Sedes apostolicæ, Rome, Alexandria and Antioch, that their supremacy had been already established by old custom. The so-called second œcumenical Council at Constantinople in A.D. 381 (§ [50, 4]) exempted the bishop of Constantinople, διὰ τὸ εἶναι αὐτὴν νέαν Ῥώμην (since A.D. 330), from the jurisdiction of the metropolitan of Heraclea, and gave him the first rank after the bishop of Rome. To these distinguished prelates there was given the title of honour, Patriarch, which formerly had been given to all bishops; but the Roman bishops, declining to take common rank with the others, refused the title, and assumed instead the exclusive use of the title Papa, Πάπας, which had also been previously applied to all of episcopal rank. The fourth œcumenical Council of Chalcedon in A.D. 451, in the 28th canon, ranked the patriarch of the Eastern capital along with the bishop of Rome, granted him the right of hearing complaints against the metropolitans of all dioceses that they might be decided at an endemic Synod (§ [43, 2]), and as an equivalent to the vast dominions of his Roman colleague, gave him as an endowment in addition to his own patriarchal district, the three complete dioceses of Thrace, Pontus and Asia. The Exarchs of Heraclea in Thrace, of Neo-Cæsarea in Pontus, and of Ephesus in Asia, thus placed under him, bearing the title of Archbishops, ἀρχιεπίσκοποι, formed a hierarchical middle rank between him and the metropolitans of these dioceses, without, however, any strict definition of their status being given, so that their preferential rank remained uncertain and gradually fell back again into that of ordinary metropolitans. But even at Nicæa in A.D. 325 the bishopric of Jerusalem had been declared worthy of very special honour, without, however, its subordination under the Metropolitan of Cæsarea being disputed. Founding on this, Juvenal of Jerusalem in the 3rd œcumenical Council of Ephesus in A.D. 431 claimed the rank and privileges of a patriarch, but on the motion of Cyril of Alexandria was refused. He then applied to the Emperor Theodosius II. who by an edict named him patriarch, and assigned to him all Palestine and Arabia. Maximus, however, patriarch of Antioch, who was thereby deprived of part of his diocese, persisted in protesting until at Chalcedon in A.D. 451 at least Phœnicia and Arabia were restored to him.—Within his own official district each of these five prelates exercised supreme spiritual authority, and at the head of his patriarchal Synod decided all the affairs of the churches within the bounds. Still many metropolitans, especially those of Salamis in Cyprus, of Milan, Aquileia and Ravenna maintained a position, as Αὐτοκέφαλοι, independent of any superiority of patriarchate or exarchate.Alongside of the patriarchs in the East there were σύγκελλοι as councillors and assistants, and at the imperial court they were represented by permanent legates who were called Apocrisiarians. From the 6th century the Popes of Rome began by sending them the pallium to confer confirmation of rank upon the newly-elected metropolitans of the West, who were called in these parts Archiepiscopi, Archbishops. The patriarchs meeting as a court represented the unity of the church universal. Without their consent no œcumenical Council could be held, nor could any decision be binding on the whole church.—But first Jerusalem in A.D. 637, then Antioch in A.D. 638, and next Alexandria in A.D. 640, fell under the dominion of the Saracens.
§ 46.2. The Rivalry between Rome and Byzantium.—From the time of the Council of Chalcedon in A.D. 451 the patriarch of Constantinople continued to claim equality in rank and authority with the bishop of Rome. But the principle upon which in either case the claims to the primacy were based were already being interpreted strongly in favour of Rome. In the East the spiritual rank of the bishoprics was determined in accordance with the political rank of the cities concerned. Constantinople was the residence of the ruler of the οἰκουμένη, consequently its bishop was œcumenical bishop. But in the eyes of the world Old Rome still ranked higher than the New Rome. All the proud memories of history clustered round the capital of the West. From Byzantium, on the other hand, dated the visible decline, the threatened overthrow of the empire. Moreover the West refused even to admit the principle itself. Not the will of the emperor, not the fortunes of the empire, ever becoming more and more deplorable, should determine the spiritual rank of the bishops, but the history of the church and the will of its Divine Founder and Head. Measured by this standard the see of Constantinople stood not only lower than those of Alexandria, Antioch and Jerusalem, but even below many other sees which though they scarcely had metropolitan rank, could yet boast of apostolic origin. Then, Rome unquestionably stood at the head of the church, for here had lived, confessed and suffered the two chief apostles, here too were their tombs and their bones; yea, still further, on the Roman chair had Peter sat as its first bishop (§ [16, 1]), whom the Lord Himself had called to the primacy of the Apostles (§ [34, 8]), and the Roman bishops were his successors and heirs of his privileges. The patriarch of Constantinople had nothing to depend upon but his nearness to the court. He was backed up and supported by the court, was only too often a tool in the hands of political parties and a defender of heresies which had the imperial favour. The case for the Roman bishop was incomparably superior. His being a member of the West-Roman empire, A.D. 395-476, with emperors for the most part weak and oppressed on all sides by the convulsions caused by the invasions of the barbarians, secured to him an incomparably greater freedom and independence of action, which was little, if at all, restricted by the Rugian and Ostrogoth invaders of Italy, A D. 476-536. And even in A.D. 536, when the Byzantine empire again obtained a footing in Italy, and held out with difficulty against the onslaught of the Longobards from A.D. 569 to A.D. 752 within ever narrowing limits, the court could only seldom exercise an influence upon his proceedings or punish him for his refusal to yield by removal, imprisonment or exile. And while the East was rent by a variety of ecclesiastical controversies, in which sometimes the one, sometimes the other party prevailed, the West under the direction of Rome almost constantly presented the picture of undisturbed unity. The controversialists sought the mediating judgment of Rome, the oppressed sought its intercession and protection, and because the Roman bishops almost invariably lent the weight of their intellectual and moral influence to the cause of truth and right, the party in whose favour decision was given, almost certainly at last prevailed. Thus Rome advanced from day to day in the eyes of the Christian world, and soon demanded as a constant right what personal confidence or pressure of circumstances had won for it in particular cases. And in the course of time Rome has never let a favourable opportunity slip, never failed to hold what once was gained or even claimed with any possibility of success. A strong feeling in favour of strict hierarchical pretensions united all parties and found its rallying point in the chair of St. Peter; even incapable and characterless popes were upborne and carried through by means of this idea. Thus Rome advanced with firm step and steady aim, and in spite of all opposition and resistance continually approached nearer and nearer to the end in view. The East could at last hold on and save its ecclesiastical independence only by a complete and incurable division (§ [67]).
§ 46B. History of the Roman Chair and its Claims to the Primacy.[127]
The history of the Roman bishopric during the first three centuries is almost wholly enveloped in a cloud of legend which is only occasionally broken by a gleam of historical light (see § [33, 3], [4], [5], [7]; § [35, 5]; § [37, 2]; § [40, 2]; § [41, 1], [3]). Only after the martyr church became in the 4th century the powerful state church does it really enter into the field of regular and continuous history. And now also first begins that striving after primacy, present from the earliest times among its bishops and inherited from the political supremacy of “eternal Rome,” to be prosecuted with success in political and ecclesiastical quarters. Its history, for which biographies of the popes down to the end of the 9th century in the so-called Liber pontificalis (§ [90, 6]) are most instructive sources, certainly always in need of critical sifting in a high degree, permits therefore and demands for our purposes at this point earnest and close consideration.
§ 46.3. From Melchiades to Julius I., A.D. 310 to A.D. 352.—At the time when Constantine’s conversion so completely changed the aspect of things Melchiades occupied the bishopric of Rome, A.D. 310 to A.D. 314. Even in A.D. 313 Constantine conferred on him as the chief bishop of the West the presidency of a clerical commission for inquiry into the Donatist schism (§ [63, 1]). Under Sylvester I., A.D. 314 to A.D. 335, the Arian controversy broke out (§ [50]), in which, however, he laid no claim to be an authority on either side. That by his legates, Vitus and Vincentius [Vincent], he presided at the first œcumenical Synod at Nicæa in A.D. 325 is a purely Romish fabrication; no contemporary and none of the older historians know anything of it. On account of the rise in Egypt of the Meletian schism (§ [41, 4]) the 6th canon of the Council prescribes that the bishop of Alexandria “in accordance with the old customs shall have jurisdiction over Egypt, in Libya and in Pentapolis, since it is also according to old custom for the bishop of Rome to have such jurisdiction, as also the churches in Antioch and in the other provinces.” The Council, therefore, as Rufinus also and the oldest Latin collection of canons, the so-called Prisca, understand this canon, maintains that the ecclesiastical supremacy of the Roman chair extended not over all the West but only over the ten suburbicarian provinces belonging to the diocese of Rome according to Constantine’s division, i.e. over Middle and Southern Italy, with the islands of Sardinia, Corsica and Sicily. The bishop of Rome, however, was and continued by the wider development of the patriarchal constitution the sole patriarch in all the West. What more natural than that he should regard himself as the one patriarch over all the West? But, even as the only sedes apostolica of the West, Rome had already for a long time obtained a rank far beyond the limits of the Nicene canon. In doubtful cases application was made from all quarters of the West to Rome for instruction as to the genuine apostolic tradition, and the epistolary replies to such questions assumed even in the 4th century the tone of authoritative statements of the truth, epistolæ decretales. But down to A.D. 344 it was never attempted to claim the authority of Rome over the East in giving validity to any matter.In this year, however, the pressure of circumstances obliged the Council of Sardica (§ [50, 2]), after most of the Eastern bishops had already withdrawn, to agree to hand over to the bishop of Rome, Julius I., A.D. 337-352, as a steadfast and consistent confessor of the orthodox faith in this age of ecclesiastical wavering, the right of receiving appeals from condemned bishops throughout the empire, and if he found them well supported, of appointing a new investigation by the bishops of the neighbouring province. But this decree affected only the person of Julius and was only the momentary makeshift of a hard-pressed minority. It therefore attracted no attention and was soon forgotten,—only Rome forgot it not.
§ 46.4. From Liberius to Anastasius, A.D. 352 to A.D. 402.—Julius’ successor Liberius,[128] A.D. 352 to A.D. 366, maintained with equal steadfastness as his predecessor the confession of the orthodox Nicene faith, and was therefore banished by the Emperor Constantius in A.D. 355, who appointed as his successor the accommodating deacon Felix. But the members of the church would have nothing to do with the contemptible intruder, who moreover on the very day of the deportation of Liberius had solemnly sworn with the whole clergy of Rome to remain faithful to the exiled bishop. He succeeded indeed in drawing over to himself a considerable number of the clergy. The people, however, continued unfalteringly true to their banished bishop, and even after he had in A.D. 358 by signing a heretical creed (§ [50, 3]) obtained permission to return, they received him again with unfeigned joy. It was the emperor’s wish that Liberius and Felix should jointly preside over the Roman church. But Felix was driven away by the people and could not again secure a footing among them. Liberius, who henceforth held his position in Rome as a Nicæan, amnestied those of the clergy who had fallen away. But the schism occasioned thereby in the church of Rome broke out with great violence after his death. A rigorist minority repudiated Damasus I., A.D. 366 to A.D. 384, who had been chosen as his successor by the majority, because he too at an earlier date had belonged to the oath-breaking party of Felix. This minority elected Ursinus as anti-bishop. Over this there were contentions that led to bloodshed. The party of Damasus attacked the church of Ursinus and one hundred and thirty-seven corpses were carried out. Valentinian III. now exiled Ursinus, and Gratian in A.D. 378 by an edict conferred upon Damasus the right of giving decision without appeal as party and judge in one person against all bishops and clergy involved in the schism. In consequence of this victory of Damasus as partisan of Felix there was now formed in Rome a tradition which has passed over into the lists of the popes and the martyrologies, in which Liberius figures as the adherent of a heretical emperor and a bloody persecutor of the true Nicene faith and Felix II. as the legitimate pope.He is also confounded with the martyr Felix who suffered under Maximian and was celebrated in song by Paulinus Nolanus, and is thus represented as a holy martyr.[129] To the pontificate of Siricius, A.D. 384 to A.D. 398, the western church is indebted for the oldest extant papal decretals dating from A.D. 385 which contain a reply to various questions of the Spanish bishop couched quite in the hierarchical form and insisting in strong terms upon the binding obligation of clerical celibacy. Subsequently the same pope, burdened with “the care of all the churches,” feels himself obliged to issue an encyclical to all the churches of the West, denouncing the frequent neglect of existing ecclesiastical laws. In the Origenist controversy between Jerome and Rufinus (§ [51, 2]) he favoured the latter;—whereas his successor, Anastasius, A.D. 398 to A.D. 402, took the side of Jerome.
§ 46.5. From Innocent I. to Zosimus, A.D. 402 to A.D. 418.—In consequence of the partition of the empire into an eastern and a western division in A.D. 364 (comp. § [42, 4]), the claims of the Roman chair to ecclesiastical supremacy over the whole of the West were not only confirmed but also very considerably extended. For by this partition the western half of the empire included not only those countries which had previously been reckoned western, namely, Africa, Spain, Britain, Gaul and Italy, but also the prefecture of Illyricum (Greece, Thessaly, Macedonia, Dalmatia, Pannonia, Mœsia, Dacia) with its capital Thessalonica, and thus events played into the hands of those who pressed the patriarchal claims of Rome. Even when in A.D. 379 Eastern Illyria (Macedonia, Mœsia and Dacia) was attached to the Eastern empire, the Roman bishops continued still to regard it as belonging to their patriarchal domain. These claims were advanced with special emphasis and with corresponding success by Innocent I., A.D. 402 to A.D. 417. When in A.D. 402 he intimated to the archbishop of Thessalonica his elevation to the chair, he at the same time transferred to him as his representative the oversight of all the Illyrian provinces, and to his successor, in A.D. 412, he sent a formal document of installation as Roman vicar. Not only did he apply to the Roman chair that canon of the Council of Sardica which had referred only to the person of Julius, but in a decretal to a Gallic bishop he extended also the clearly circumscribed right of appeal on the part of condemned bishops into an obligation to submit all “causæ majores” to the decision of the apostolic see. From Africa a Carthaginian Synod in A.D. 404 sent messengers to Rome in order to secure its intercession with the emperor to put down the Donatists. From the East Theophilus of Alexandria and Chrysostom of Constantinople solicited the weighty influence of Rome in the Origenist controversy (§ [51, 3]); and Alexander of Antioch (§ [50, 8]) expresses the proud satisfaction he had, as only Western bishops had done before, in asking the Roman bishop’s advice on various constitutional and disciplinary matters. During the Pelagian controversy (§ [53, 4]) the Palestinian Synod at Diospolis in A.D. 415 interceded with the Pope in favour of Pelagius accused of heresy in Africa; on the other hand the African Synods of Mileve and Carthage in A.D. 416 besieged him with the demand to give the sanction of his authority to their condemnation of the heretic. He took the side of the Anti-Pelagians, and Augustine could shower upon the heretics the pregnant words: Roma locuta ... causa finita.—The higher the authority of the Roman chair rose under Innocent, all the more painful to Rome must the humiliation have been, which his successor Zosimus, A.D. 417-418, called down upon it, when he, in opposition to his predecessor, took the part of Pelagius and his companion Cœlestius, and addressed bitter reproaches to the Africans for their treatment of him, but afterwards in consequence of their vigorous remonstrances and the interference of the emperor Honorius was obliged to withdraw his previous judgment and formally to condemn his quondam protegé. And when a deposed presbyter of Africa, Apiarius, sought refuge in Rome, the Council of Carthage in A.D. 418, in which Augustine also took part, made this an excuse for forbidding under threat of excommunication any appeal ad transmarina judicia.Zosimus indeed appealed to the canon of the Sardican Synod, which he quoted as Nicene; but the Africans, to whom that canon was quite unknown, only said that on this matter they must make inquiries among the Eastern churches.[130]
§ 46.6. From Boniface I. to Sixtus III., A.D. 419 to A.D. 440.—After the death of Zosimus, 26th Dec., 418, a minority of the clergy and the people, by the hasty election and ordination of the deacon Eulalius, anticipated the action of the majority who chose the presbyter Boniface. The recommendation of the city prefect Symmachus secured for the former the recognition of the Emperor Honorius; but the determined remonstrance of the majority moved him to convene a Synod at Ravenna in A.D. 419 for a final settlement of the dispute. When the bishops there assembled could not agree, he called a new Synod to meet at Spoleto at the approaching Easter festival, and ordered, so as to make an end of disturbances and tumults in the city, that both rivals should quit Rome until a decision had been reached. Eulalius, however, did not regard the injunction but pushed his way by force of arms into the city. The Emperor now banished him from Rome on pain of death, and at Spoleto the bishops decided in consequence of the moderation he had shown, to recognise Boniface I., A.D. 419 to A.D. 422, as bishop of Rome. His successor was Cœlestine I., A.D. 422 to A.D. 432. Apiarius, who meanwhile, because he professed repentance and besought forgiveness, had been restored, began anew to offend, was again deposed, and again obtained protection and encouragement at Rome. But an African Synod at Carthage energetically protested against Cœlestine’s interference, charging him with having often referred to a Nicene canon warranting the right of appeal to Rome which the most diligent inquiries among the churches of Constantinople, Alexandria and Antioch, had failed to discover. On the outbreak of the Nestorian controversy (§ [52, 3]) two opponents again sued for the favour of the Roman league; first of all, Nestorius of Constantinople, because he professed to have given particular information about the Pelagian-minded bishops driven from Italy who sought refuge in Constantinople (§ [53, 4]) and had immediately made a communication about the error of confounding the two natures of Christ which had recently sprung up in the East. The brotherly tone of this writing, free from any idea of subordination, found no response at Rome. The letters of Cyril of Alexandria proved more acceptable, filled as they were with cringing flatteries of the Roman chair and venomous invectives against the Constantinopolitan see and its occupier. Cœlestine unreservedly took the side of Cyril, commanded Nestorius under threat of deposition and excommunication within ten days to present to a Roman Synod, A.D. 420, a written retractation, and remitted to Cyril the carrying out of this judgment.To his legates at the Council of Ephesus, A.D. 431, he gave the instructions: Auctoritatem sedis apostolicæ custodire debere mandamus.... Ad disceptationem si fuerit ventum, vos de eorum sententiis judicare debetis, non subire certamen. The Council decided precisely according to Cœlestine’s wish. The proud Alexandrian patriarch had recognised Rome as the highest court of appeal; a Western educated at Rome, named Maximian, thoroughly submissive to Cœlestine, was, with the pope’s hearty approval, raised to the patriarchal see of Constantinople as successor of the deposed Nestorius; only John of Antioch opposed the decision.Cœlestine’s successor Sixtus III., A.D. 432 to A.D. 440, could already boast in A.D. 433 that he had put himself superior to the decrees of the Council, and in commemoration of the victory dedicated a beautiful church newly built to the mother of God, now called S. Maria Maggiore.[131]
§ 46.7. From Leo the Great to Simplicius, A.D. 440 to A.D. 483.—Leo I., A.D. 440 to A.D. 461 (comp. § [47, 22]), unquestionably up to that date the greatest of all the occupants of the Roman chair, was also the most powerful, the worthiest and most successful vindicator of its authority in the East as well as in the West; indeed he may be regarded as properly the founder of the Roman papacy as a universal episcopate with the full sanction of the civil power. Even the Western Fathers of the 4th and 5th centuries, such as Hilary, Ambrose, Jerome and Augustine, as also Innocent I., had still interpreted the πέτρα of Matt. xvi. 18 partly of the confession of Peter, partly of the Person of Christ. First in the time of Cœlestine an attempt was made to refer it to the person of Peter. The legates of Cœlestine at the Council of Ephesus in A.D. 431 had said: ὅστις, ἕως τοῦ νῦν καὶ ἀεὶ ἐν τοῖς αὐτοῦ διαδόχοις καὶ ζῇ καὶ δικάζει. Thus they claimed universal primacy as of immediately Divine authority. Leo I. adopted this view with all his soul. In the most determined and persistent way he carried it out in the West; then next in proconsular Africa which had so energetically protested in the times of Innocent and Cœlestine against Romish pretensions. When news came to him of various improprieties spreading there, he sent a legate to investigate, and in consequence of his report addressed severe censures which were submitted to without opposition. The right of African clerics to appeal to Rome was also henceforth unchallenged. In Gaul, however, Leo had still to maintain a hard struggle with Hilary, archbishop of Arles, who, arrogating to himself the right of a primacy of Gaul, had deposed Celedonius, bishop of Besontio, Besançon. But Leo took up his case and had him vindicated and restored by a Roman Synod. Hilary, who came himself to Rome, defied the Pope, escaped threatened imprisonment by secret flight, and was then deprived of his metropolitan rights. At the same time, in A.D. 445, Leo obtained from the young Emperor of the West, Valentinian III., a civil enactment which made every sort of resistance to the divinely established universal primacy of the Roman see an act of high treason.—In the East, too, Leo gained a higher position than had ever before been accorded to Rome on account of his moderation in the Eutychian controversy (§ [52, 4]). Once again was Rome called in to mediate between the two conflicting parties. At the Robber-Synod of Ephesus in A.D. 449, under the presidency of the tyrannical Dioscurus of Alexandria, the legates of Leo were not, indeed, allowed to speak. But at the next œcumenical Council at Chalcedon in A.D. 451 his doctrine won a brilliant victory; even here, however, much objection was raised to his hierarchical pretensions. He demanded from the first the presidency for his legates, which, however, was assigned not to them, but to the imperial commissioners. The demand, too, for the expulsion of Dioscurus from the Synod, because he dared Synodum facere sine auctoritate sedis apostolicæ, quod mumquam licuit, numquem factum est, did not, at first at least, receive the answer required. When, notwithstanding the opposition of the legates the question of the relative ranks of the patriarchs was dealt with, they withdrew from the session and subsequently protested against the 28th canon agreed upon at that session with a reference to the 6th Nicene canon which in the Roman translation, i.e. forgery, began with the words: Ecclesia Romana semper habuit primatum. But the Council sent the Acts with a dutiful report to Rome for confirmation, whereupon Leo strictly repudiated the 28th canon, threatening the church of Constantinople with excommunication, and so finally gained his point. The emperor annulled it in A.D. 454, and Anatolius, patriarch of Constantinople, was obliged to write a humble letter to Leo acquiescing in its erasure; but this did not prevent his successor from always maintaining its validity (§ [63, 2]).—When the wild hordes of Attila, king of the Huns, spread terror and consternation by their approach, Leo’s priestly form appeared before him as a messenger of God, and saved Rome and Italy from destruction. Less successful was his priestly intercession with the Arian Vandal chief Genseric, whose army in A.D. 455 plundered, burnt and murdered throughout Rome for fourteen days; but all the more strikingly after his withdrawal did the pope’s ability display itself in restoring comfort and order amid scenes of unutterable destitution and confusion.