1. The second ecumenical council, 381, which was in reality only a synod of bishops from Thrace, Asia and Syria, convened by Theodosius with a view to uniting the church upon the basis of the Orthodox faith. No Western bishop was present, nor any Roman legate; from Egypt came only a few bishops, and these tardily. The first president was Meletius of Antioch, whom Rome regarded as schismatic. Yet, despite its sectional character, the council came in time to be regarded as ecumenical alike in the West and in the East.
The council reaffirmed the Nicene faith and denounced all opposing doctrines. The so-called “Niceno-Constantinopolitan Creed,” which has almost universally been ascribed to this council, is certainly not the Nicene creed nor even a recension of it, but most likely a Jerusalem baptismal formula revised by the interpolation of a few Nicene test-words. More recently its claim to be called “Constantinopolitan” has been challenged. It is not found in the earliest records of the acts of the council, nor was it referred to by the council of Ephesus (431), nor by the “Robber Synod” (449), although these both confirmed the Nicene faith. It also lacks the definiteness one would expect in a creed composed by an anti-Arian, anti-Pneumatomachian council. Harnack (Herzog-Hauck, Realencyklopädie, 3rd ed., s.v. “Konstantinopolit. Symbol.”) conjectures that it was ascribed to the council of Constantinople just before the council of Chalcedon in order to prove the orthodoxy of the Fathers of the second ecumenical council. At all events, it became the creed of the universal church, and has been retained without change. Save for the addition of filioque.
Of the seven reputed canons of the council only the first four are unquestionably genuine. The fifth and the sixth probably belong to a synod of 382, and the seventh is properly not a canon. The most important enactments of the council were the granting of metropolitan rights to the bishops of Alexandria, Antioch, Thrace, Pontus and Ephesus; and according to Constantinople the place of honour after Rome, against which Rome protested. Not until 150 years later, and then only under compulsion of the emperor Justinian, did Rome acknowledge the ecumenicity of the council, and that merely as regarded its doctrinal decrees.
See Mansi iii. pp. 521-599; Hardouin i. pp. 807-826; Hefele, 2nd ed., ii. pp. 1 sqq. (English translation, ii. pp. 340 sqq.); Hort, Two Dissertations (Cambridge, 1876); and the article [Creeds].
2. The council of 553, the fifth ecumenical, grew out of the controversy of the “Three Chapters,” an adequate account of which, up to the time of the council, may be found in the articles Justinian and Vigilius. The council convened, in response to the imperial summons, on the 4th of May 553. Of the 165 bishops who subscribed the acts all but the five or six from Egypt were Oriental; the pope, Vigilius, refused to attend (he had made his escape from Constantinople, and from his retreat in Chalcedon sent forth a vain protest against the council). The synod was utterly subservient to the emperor. The “Three Chapters” were condemned, and their authors, long dead, anathematized, without, however, derogating from the authority of the council of Chalcedon, which had given them a clean bill of orthodoxy. Vigilius was excommunicated, and his name erased from the diptychs. The Orthodox faith was set forth in fourteen anathemas. Opinion is divided as to whether Origen was condemned. His name occurs in the eleventh anathema, but some consider it an interpolation; Hefele defends the genuineness of the text, but finds no evidence for a special session against Origen, as some have conjectured.
The council was confirmed by the emperor, and was generally received in the East. Vigilius was soon coerced into submission, but the West repudiated his pusillanimous surrender, and rejected the council. A schism ensued which lasted half a century and was not fully healed until the synod of Aquileia, about 700. But the ecumenicity of the council was generally acknowledged by 680.
See Mansi ix. pp. 24-106, 149-658, 712-730; Hardouin iii. pp. 1-328, 331, 414, 524; Hefele, 2nd ed., ii. pp. 798-924 (English translation, iv. pp. 229-365).
3. The sixth ecumenical council, 680-681, which was convened by the emperor Constantine Pogonatus to terminate the Monothelitic controversy (see [Monothelites]). All the patriarchates were represented, Constantinople and Antioch by their bishops in person, the others by legates. The number of bishops present varied from 150 to 300. The council approved the first five ecumenical councils and reaffirmed the Nicene and “Niceno-Constantinopolitan” creeds. Monothelitism was unequivocally condemned; Christ was declared to have had “two natural wills and two natural operations, without division, conversion, separation or confusion.” Prominent Monothelites, living or dead, were anathematized, in particular Sergius and his successors in the see of Constantinople, the former pope, Honorius, and Macarius, the patriarch of Antioch. An imperial decree confirmed the council, and commanded the acceptance of its doctrines under pain of severe punishment. The Monothelites took fright and fled to Syria, where they gradually formed the sect of the [Maronites] (q.v.).
The anathematizing of Honorius as heterodox has occasioned no slight embarrassment to the supporters of the doctrine of papal infallibility. It is not within the scope of this article to pass judgment upon the various proposed solutions of the difficulty, e.g. that Honorius was not really a Monothelite; that in acknowledging one will he was not speaking ex cathedra; that, at the time of condemning him, the council was no longer ecumenical; &c. One thing is certain, however, he was anathematized; and the notion of interpolation in the acts of the council (Baronius) may be dismissed as groundless.
See Mansi xi. pp. 190-922; Hardouin iii. pp. 1043-1644; Hefele, 2nd ed. iii. pp. 121-313.