Canon Law & Easter Computus 4 part 4/5

to which all bestow such great favour, as to a mother of the Christian name, that no one dares to sever himself from her. Your Holiness therefore should fittingly declare your own consent likewise by an epistolary page: that, the tenor of the same document being made known and laid open to all to be praised and tenaciously kept by you also, the world may exist the more joyful. Given on the fifth of the Ides of September at Chalcedon, in the consulship of Rusticius; received on the day before the Kalends of December, in the consulship of the most illustrious. (In the year of Christ 520.) Copy of the petitions. II. To the God-beloved and most pious emperor, Augustus from God, and most Christian prince Justin, the entreaty and supplication of the Jerusalemites and Antiochenes, and of the clerics of Second Syria, and the abbots and possessors of the province of Syria.

Draw water with joy out of the fountains of salvation, cries the prophet Isaiah and proclaims (Isa. xii), plainly showing the fountains of salvation to be the evangelical truths and proclamations; from which the blessed apostles, and those who in due order were their disciples, and the wise teachers of the Church, drawing the saving water of faith, watered the whole holy Church of God—which, founded upon the rock of the chief of the apostles, guarding the right and inflexible confession, with full confidence cries out at all times with him to the only-begotten Son of God, saying: Thou art Christ the Son of the living God (Matt. xvi).

Receiving this saving confession from the four holy synods, which are honoured by evangelical precepts, we have never through the grace of Christ deviated from the right doctrines handed down to us, as the proof of the matter testifies and the constancy of faith demonstrates in the time of necessity. If therefore, as Christians, we are partakers in the reason of faith, we hasten with all piety both to common peace and to unity; we make our faith, which we received from the beginning, manifest to your Piety through this our satisfaction: that it may be known that we both concur in peace, and with the help of God do not turn aside from the right faith:

but we execrate every heresy equally—not only the Eutychianists and Acephali, but also the Nestorians; and detesting with all our soul those who worship a man, we anathematize them. We ourselves, however, O most Christian lord emperor, as was said above, having been from the beginning baptized into the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit, and believing, adore one essence of God in three subsistences, according to the doctrine and symbol of the holy Fathers, believing in one God the Father almighty, and in one our Lord Jesus Christ, the only-begotten, God the Word, and likewise in one Holy Spirit.

And according to this divine doctrine, we likewise understand and receive the definition promulgated by the holy Synod of Chalcedon, confessing and believing that there is one substance, or person—the very thing which that same holy synod proclaimed in two natures, that is, in deity and in humanity, indivisibly and unconfusedly—that God the Word, and our Lord Jesus Christ, is one of the holy Trinity of one essence. For if we receive one God in three subsistences, as has been said, and the Father is not incarnate, nor the Holy Spirit, but God the Word was incarnate and was made man, He is one of the holy Trinity of one essence, according to the property of sonship.

Thus therefore, believing according to the aforesaid four holy synods, we do not refuse to confess also, according to the word of God, His nativity according to the flesh. Whence the holy Virgin is properly believed to be the Mother of God; inasmuch as, by nature and in truth the Son of the Father of one essence, God the Word, she bore Him as a man made of herself through an immutable nature; and confessing the two natures in Christ to be united by essence or substance, as in one person or substance, we neither take away their diversity or property after the union, nor have we been taught to divide them into two persons and substances by the union.

And we know the same to be the only-begotten Son of God, both before His incarnation and after, the same God at once and man, passible in flesh, impassible in deity, circumscribed in body, uncircumscribed in spirit, the same earthly and heavenly, whom the world received as man and could not contain as God, mortal and immortal, the diversity of natures being nowhere taken away, nor do we divide the union according to essence.

For this is truly the great mystery of godliness, that one of the holy Trinity, and one of one essence of the Trinity, God the Word, having been incarnate and made man, is known and adored in each nature, of deity and of humanity, indivisibly and unconfusedly, sustaining no conversion or mutation, but preserving in Himself, in one person, the property of each nature.

On account of this faith, therefore, receiving and guarding the aforesaid holy synods, we anathematize all who have written anything against them at any time or in any manner, especially John surnamed Egotanus, who, like a Nestorian, vomited forth many blasphemies against the aforesaid holy Synod of Chalcedon; likewise condemning Timothy surnamed Aelurus, as a Eutychianist, barking against it with his followers. Thus therefore, with the help of God, we have always thought, and even now do think; wherefore we have offered this satisfaction to your Piety.

For it has deigned to bid us set forth our own understanding, and in what manner we hold to the sound faith, because certain heretics, while they hasten to conceal their own evil faith, attempt to disparage our liberty in Christ and our right faith. We therefore beseech your Clemency that you ought to have solicitude for the perfect unity of the holy Churches, so that the unity, when it has been made with the help of God, may not thereafter by any occasion's tinder, reasonable or unreasonable, have its peace disturbed. And may God fulfil the pious desire of you all, unto His own glory and the discipline of the commonwealth. Hormisdas to Justin Augustus. III.

Among those things which pertain to the unity of the Church—for whose sake God chose the empire of your Clemency—which you have set down in writing, this also, O venerable emperor, the care of the faith (to which you declare that you devote yourself manifoldly) added: that the petitions of certain persons should be joined together to be conveyed to the cognizance of my humility, so that I might recognize either what question was arising, or, for removing the ambiguity of the consultation proposed, a response befitting religious knowledge might be rendered by me. I have read all things with such solicitude as was fitting; and although for the fullness of a response it could have sufficed if I rewrote only those things which were defined by the ancients:

yet, that I might requite the affection of your religious purpose, I believed that the service of my own discourse also should not be withheld—which the paternal instruction omitted concerning the emerging poisons of Nestorius and Eutyches; for nearly all impieties, together with the inventors of such nefarious dogmas, were anticipated by the agreeing synodical decrees gathered into one.

Nor, once the seeds of so dreadful a perfidy have been cut away, is there any further room left either to believe that Christ our Lord existed without the reality of flesh, or that one and the same person also came forth as man from the unstained fruitfulness of a mother's womb; for the one party, by denying the dispensation through which we have been saved, would, so far as in him lies, render it void, while the other, by a contrary opinion yet a like impiety, would cut off the divine power in that same Lord Jesus Christ from his true lowliness — the one not remembering that Christ showed his flesh to be handled (Luke 24), the other not mindful of the Gospel which says that the Word was made flesh (John 1). To such a one the voice of the Lord ought ceaselessly to have resounded, by which he spoke and taught (John 3):

No one has ascended into heaven except him who descended from heaven, the Son of man, who is in heaven. These things have often been comprehended in many statements of our predecessors; yet neither will your clemency, though they have already been said, be able to recognize them with disdain when repeated, nor is it any shame to us to roll forth again the things proclaimed by our forefathers. For it is not possible that there should be diversity of preaching where the form of truth is one; nor will it be judged out of place if we agree in doctrine also with those with whom we are united in faith. Let the synodical decrees be unrolled to the pious ears of your gentleness, and the decrees of blessed Pope Leo that accord with the sacred faith, and you will find the same things in those which you peruse in ours.

What then is there, after that fountain of the faithful's decrees, that any inquirer, however curious, might further search out, provided he keeps within the bounds of faith? There is no need either of addition for things complete or of fresh instruction, unless perhaps someone wishes to doubt rather than to believe, to dispute rather than to know, to follow uncertainties rather than to keep the decrees. For if God is a Trinity — that is, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit — and yet God is one, as the lawgiver expressly says (Deut. 6): Hear, O Israel, the Lord your God is one, then it is necessary either to divide the Godhead into many, or to fasten suffering, in a special manner, upon the very essence of the Trinity.

And this (far be it from the minds of the faithful) is either to introduce many gods after the manner of profane heathenism, or to transfer sensible pain to that nature which is alien from all suffering. The holy Trinity is one; it is not multiplied in number, it does not grow by increase, nor can it either be comprehended by understanding or, in respect of what God is, be sundered by any distinction. Who then would attempt to thrust a profane division upon that secret of the eternal and impenetrable substance — which not even the nature of any invisible creatures could investigate — and to recall the divine and hidden mysteries to the reckoning of human custom?

Let us adore the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit — the substance of the Trinity, undivided yet distinctly distinguished, incomprehensible and unutterable; wherein, if the reckoning of persons admits number, yet the unity does not admit any singularity of essence — so, however, that we preserve the properties proper to the divine nature, and preserve the properties proper to each person, in such wise that neither is singularity begotten in the persons of the Godhead, nor is that which is proper to the names transferred to the essence. Great and incomprehensible is the mystery of the holy Trinity. God the Father, God the Son, God the Holy Spirit — an undivided Trinity; and yet it is known that it is proper to the Father to beget the Son; proper to the Son of God to be born of the Father, equal to the Father:

it is known also what is proper to the Holy Spirit: that he should proceed from the Father and the Son under one substance of deity. But it is proper to the Son of God that, according to what is written, in the last times the Word should be made flesh and dwell among us (1 Pet. 1; John 1). Thus within the womb of holy Mary the Virgin, Mother of God, both natures being united without any confusion, he who was the Son of God before all ages became the son of man and was born in time:

being born as a child of man, opening his mother's womb after the manner of a mother, yet by the power of his Godhead not undoing his mother's virginity. A mystery plainly worthy of a God being born, that he should preserve the birth without corruption, who caused the conception to be without seed, keeping what was his from the Father, and presenting what he took from the mother. For whence was it that he who was seen lying in a manger was adored in heaven; that, wrapped in swaddling-clothes, he was worshipped by the Magi; brought forth among the beasts, announced by angels; scarce gone out of infancy, proclaiming mystic doctrines with none to teach him; amid the rudiments of his boyhood's years, putting forth the signs of heavenly powers?

For he is the same God and man — not, as is said by the unbelieving, under a fourth introduction of a person, but he himself, the Son of God, God and man; the same is strength and weakness, lowliness and majesty, the Redeemer and the one sold, set upon the cross and bestowing the kingdoms of heaven. So far of our weakness that he could be put to death; yet by the inborn quality of his power, that he could not be consumed by death, he was buried — according to that whereby as man he willed to be born, and according to that whereby he was like the Father, he rose again — suffering wounds and Saviour of the sick, one of the dead and giver of life to the dying, descending into the lower regions and not departing from the Father's bosom. Whence too he soon took up again, by his singular virtue and admirable power, the soul which he had laid down by the common condition.

That these things are so, and that no doubt ought to be admitted concerning them — namely, that our Lord Jesus Christ should not be believed to be no God amid the sufferings of the body, nor again to be God only and not also man amid the astounding works of his marvellous powers — he taught us by the set example of two apostles, declaring that Christ our Lord is God by the faith of Peter, and man by the doubt of Thomas. For why else should he have wished to ask his disciples whom men said that he was, unless that, with Peter answering, You are the Christ, the Son of the living God, he might make known that this was revealed not by flesh and blood, but by the inspiration of God the Father, and that through the testimony of the praised answer the faith of the truth might be laid open?

And what difference did it make that, when the Lord appeared after the resurrection, Thomas alone either was absent from the rest or alone doubted — except that the world might believe what the doubting disciple had verified, so that, while he allowed himself to be touched by the hands of one, it might be possible to be recognized by the whole company of the faithful what he was? Therefore the doubt was interposed not to reprove the disciple, but to seek the instruction of posterity. Or does it look for anything else, that the same Lord (Luke 24) joined himself to Cleophas and another disciple, as they were going toward Emmaus and speaking of him?

And although they had learned of the Lord's resurrection through the women who had first come to the tomb, yet, in order that through their doubt he might give firmness to those who should believe in ages to come, beginning from Moses and all the prophets, he interpreted and showed that it behoved Christ thus to suffer and so to enter into his glory, and that there was in him both human nature through his passion and divine through his glory. These things are conveyed by manifold examples of the holy Scriptures, nor are they spoken as things unknown to your religious conscience, venerable emperor;

for the faith itself, which is steadfastly asserted by you, renders you this gift: that it both inserts into your senses an attachment to itself, and pours in the knowledge by which it may be the more diligently maintained. And yet it pertains to the dispensation entrusted to me, that I too should not keep silent about what is known even among those who know, so that, with the preaching of catholic men succeeding itself through the changes of the times, what is unfailingly affirmed may, little by little, be believed without end.

I could have discoursed more fully, according to the definitions of the ancients, on these matters that pertain to the deity and humanity of our Lord Jesus Christ, and to the unity in him of two natures without confusion, if there were need to dispute against those who dissent from them; but since both the synodical statutes and the doctrines of blessed Pope Leo are in everyone's hands, I have thought it more fitting to have touched on a few things rather than to unfold them all. But now it is enough to acknowledge and to take care so to think of the property and the essence, that it may be known what we ought to render to the person, and what to the substance. They who unbecomingly are ignorant of these things, or by crafty impiety dissemble them, while they omit what is proper to the Son in the Trinity, lay snares against the unity.

But if the things foretold are held fixed by firm roots, then there is no departure from the paternal tradition, and questions are steadfastly met. Given on the eighth day before the Kalends of April, in the consulship of Valerius Victorius (in the year of Christ 521). Hormisdas to the presbyters, deacons, and archimandrites of second Syria. IV. Having read the letters of your beloved charity, by which the madness of the enemies of God has been laid bare, and the obstinate fury of the unbelievers grievously set forth — who, while with reviving spirit they hate God, impiously persecute his members;

as far as concerns the recognition of your steadfastness, I have blessed God, who keeps the faith of his soldiers amid adversities; but again, considering the shaking of the Churches and the troubles and toils of the servants of God, the prophet... THE DECREES OF GREGORY THE YOUNGER, POPE. In the name of the Lord God and our Saviour Jesus Christ, in the reign of our lord, the most pious Augustus Leo, crowned by God, the great emperor, in the sixth year after his consulship, in the sixth year of his reign, and also of Constantine, the new emperor, his son, in the second year, in the month of April, in the fourth indiction.

With the most holy and thrice-blessed Gregory, the apostolic pope, presiding in the basilica of blessed Peter, prince of the apostles, before the confession, with the most holy bishops also seated — Agnellus of Ferentinum, Vitalis of Alatri, Martianus of Gabii, Tiberius of Silva Candida, Georgius of Nepi, Andreas of Albano, Tribunatius of Falerii, Joannes of Bleda, Sergius of Praeneste, Synderedus archbishop of Spain, Sedulius bishop of Britain, Fergustus bishop of Scotia (Ireland), Majorinus of Bomarzo, Joannes of Velletri, Opportunus of Matera, Georgius of Porto, Gregorius of Anagni, Joannes of Segni, Agnellus of Sutri, Anastasius of Tivoli, Wilarit of Narni, Petrus of Ameria — and with venerable presbyters, and deacons also standing — Petrus the archdeacon, Gregorius Macoseu, Benedictus, deacons, and all the clergy — Gregory, the most holy and most blessed pope, said:

Since we are, by mercy from on high, rulers of the Lord's people, it more zealously befits us, with God's protection, often to take thought for their salvation, lest, on account of souls entrusted to us and (which God forbid) defrauded, by the snares of the ancient foe, we be compelled to render a strict account before the Shepherd of all, unless correction come to forestall the offences. And while I weigh, and call to mind, with how great circumspection it behoves us, in keeping watch, to oppose the wickedness of each man's particular sin, and, if ever he should leap forth to disturb the minds of the faithful, to resist his blow with help from on high, I am greatly shaken and waste away exceedingly, lest by serpentine cunning (which God forbid) he should deceive also the more frivolous;

with God truly favouring us, by an exceeding solicitude and with a more tranquil mind, relying on divine help, we ought to strive for the salvation of all, so that with unconfounded countenance, not stricken by anyone's fraud, we may deserve to stand before the Judge who requites each in turn, and to hear the voice that says: Well done, good and faithful servant; because you have been faithful over a few things, I will set you over many; enter into the joy of your Lord (Matt. 25; Luke 19).

For hence it is that, groaning, I say: I hear that some of the Christian people dwelling throughout this province of Italy hold against the catholic faith and the statutes of the Fathers, so far as to presume to marry women consecrated to God, and to join kinswomen to themselves in wedlock — which it is fitting should be cut away with the spiritual sword, and, if it please your holiness, be plucked up by the roots: lest the crop of the good husbandman, mingled with tares, grow foul with bristling fruits (Matt. 13). The most holy bishops and venerable presbyters answered:

We truly recognize that the heart of your apostolate has been kindled by the grace of the Holy Spirit, that the squalors of so great a misery may be wiped away from the minds of the faithful, and that, as a wound fixed in the body, the access of such a misery being barred, it may be cured with a saving antidote — even as it has been well foreseen by the interdiction of anathema, that no Roman, Lombard, or of whatever nation he be, washed in the water of holy baptism, should henceforth attempt this anew; so that, not pressed down by the weight of so great a crime, he may not fall headlong, or be plunged into the abyss of iniquity; this ought to be shunned and rooted out utterly. After this response, agreed upon by all, Gregory the apostolic pope, before the aforesaid body of the venerable prince of the apostles of Christ, pronounced sentence and said: I.

If anyone takes a presbyteress (a presbyter's widow) in marriage, let him be anathema; and all answered three times: Let him be anathema. II. If anyone takes a deaconess in marriage, let him be anathema; and all answered three times: Let him be anathema. III. If anyone takes a nun, whom they call a handmaid of God, in marriage, let him be anathema; and all answered three times: Let him be anathema. IV. If anyone takes a spiritual co-mother (godmother) in marriage, let him be anathema; and all answered three times: Let him be anathema. V. If anyone takes a brother's wife in marriage, let him be anathema; and all answered three times: Let him be anathema. VI. If anyone takes a niece in marriage, let him be anathema; and all answered three times: Let him be anathema. VII.

If anyone takes his stepmother or his daughter-in-law in marriage, let him be anathema; and all answered three times: Let him be anathema. VIII. If anyone takes his female cousin in marriage, let him be anathema; and all answered three times: Let him be anathema. IX. If anyone takes in marriage a woman of his own kindred, or one whom a kinsman has had, let him be anathema; and all answered three times: Let him be anathema. X. If anyone abducts a widow into marriage, or with those consenting to him, let him be anathema; and all answered three times: Let him be anathema. XI. If anyone abducts a virgin into marriage, unless he has betrothed her, or with those consenting to him, let him be anathema; and all answered three times: Let him be anathema. XII.

If anyone gives heed to soothsayers, augurs, or enchanters, or uses an amulet, let him be anathema; and all answered three times: Let him be anathema. XIII. If anyone in any part should violate the precepts formerly issued by the apostolic Church concerning the olive-groves and various places, and does not observe them in all things, let him be anathema; and all answered three times: Let him be anathema. XIV. To Hadrian, son of Exhilaratus, who, after taking an oath in the apostolic confession, by unlawful daring keeps Epiphania the deaconess as wife, let him be anathema; and all answered three times: Let him be anathema. XV. Epiphania the deaconess, who, after taking an oath, fled in flight to become the wife of Hadrian, son of Exhilaratus, let her be anathema;

and all answered three times: Let her be anathema. XVI. If anyone gives consent to them in so cruel a deed, let him be anathema; and all answered three times: Let him be anathema. XVII. If any of the clergy let his hair grow loose, let him be anathema; and all answered three times: Let him be anathema. I, Gregory, bishop of the holy catholic and apostolic Roman Church, have subscribed to this statute promulgated by us. I, Agnellus, bishop of the holy Church of Ferentinum, have subscribed to this statute promulgated by us. I, Joannes, humble bishop of the holy Church of Velletri, have subscribed to this statute promulgated by us. I, Vitalis, bishop of the holy Church of Alatri, have subscribed to this statute promulgated by us.

I, Opportunus, by the grace of God bishop of the holy Church of Matera, have subscribed to this statute promulgated by us. I, Martinianus, bishop of the holy Church of Gabii, have subscribed to this statute promulgated by us. I, Georgius, bishop of the holy Church of Porto, have subscribed to this statute promulgated by us. I, Tiberius, bishop of the holy Church of Silva Candida, have subscribed to this statute promulgated by us. I, Gregorius, bishop of the holy Church of Anagni, have subscribed to this statute promulgated by us. I, Georgius, bishop of the holy Church of Nepi, have subscribed to this statute promulgated by us.

I, Joannes, unworthy bishop of the holy Church of Segni, have subscribed to this statute promulgated by us. I, Andreas, bishop of the holy Church of Albano, have subscribed to this statute promulgated by us. I, Agnellus, a sinner, bishop of the holy Church of Sutri, have subscribed to this statute promulgated by us. I, Tribunatius, unworthy bishop of the holy Church of Falerii, have subscribed to this statute promulgated by us. I, Anastasius, bishop of the holy Church of Tivoli, have subscribed to this statute promulgated by us. I, Joannes, bishop of the holy Church of Bleda, have subscribed to this statute promulgated by us. I, Wilarit, bishop of the holy Church of Narni, have subscribed to this statute promulgated by us.

I, Sergius, by the grace of God bishop of the holy Church of Praeneste, have subscribed to this statute promulgated by us. I, Petrus, humble bishop of the holy Church of Ameria, have subscribed to this statute promulgated by us. I, Majorinus, bishop of the holy Church of Bomarzo, have subscribed to this statute promulgated by us. I, Synderedus, bishop from Spain, have subscribed to this statute promulgated by us. I, Sedulius, bishop of the race of the Scots (Irish), have subscribed to this statute promulgated by us. I, Fergustus, a Pictish bishop, have subscribed to this statute promulgated by us. Likewise the subscription of the presbyters.

I, Sisinnius, humble presbyter of the holy Roman Church, of the title of Saint Lawrence which is called of Lucina, have subscribed to this statute promulgated by us. I, Joannes, presbyter of the holy Roman Church, of the title of Saint Cecilia, have subscribed to this statute promulgated by us. I, Sisinnius, presbyter of the holy Roman Church, of the title of Saint Xystus, have subscribed to this statute promulgated by us. I, Joannes, presbyter of the title of Saint Marcellus, have subscribed to this statute promulgated by us. I, Joannes, humble presbyter of the holy Roman Church, of the title of Saint Susanna, have subscribed to this statute promulgated by us. I, Eustratius, humble presbyter of the holy Roman Church,