The Church and the Barbarians | Page 7

as an envoy of a Gothic king, and he demanded that Anthimus should make formal profession of orthodoxy. The result was not satisfactory: the new patriarch was condemned by the emperor with the sanction of the pope and the approval of a synod. Justinian then issued a decree condemning Monophysitism, which he ordered the new patriarch to send to the Eastern Churches. Mennas, the successor of Anthimus, in his local synod, had condemned and deposed the Monophysite bishops. The controversy was at an end.
More important in its results was the dispute with the so-called Origenists. S. Sabas came from {16} Palestine in 531 to lay before the emperor the sad tale of the spread of their evil doctrines, but he died in the next year, and the Holy Land remained the scene of strife between the two famous monasteries of the Old and the New Laura. [Sidenote: The Origenists.] In 541 or 542 a synod at Antioch condemned the doctrines of Origen, but the only result was that Jerusalem refused communion with the other Eastern patriarchate. Justinian himself,--at a time when there was at Constantinople an envoy from Rome, Pelagius,--issued a long declaration condemning Origen. A synod was summoned, which formally condemned Origen in person--a precedent for the later anathemas of the Fifth General Council--and fifteen propositions from his writings, ten of them being those which Justinian's edict had denounced. The decisions were sent for subscription to the patriarchs of Alexandria, Antioch, and Jerusalem, as well as to Rome. This sanction gave something of an universal condemnation of Origenism; but, since no general council confirmed it, it cannot be asserted that Origen lies under anathema as a heretic. The opinion of the legalists of the age was utterly out of sympathy with one who was rather the cause of heresy in others than himself heretical.
[Sidenote: The "Three Chapters."]
But the most important controversy of the reign was that which was concerned with the "Three Chapters." Justinian, who had himself written against the Monophysites, was led aside by an ingenious monk into an attack upon the writings of Theodore of Mopsuestia, Theodoret of Cyrrhus, and Ibas of Edessa. The Emperor issued an edict (544) in which "Three Chapters" asserted the heresy of the incriminated writings. Within a short {17} time the phrase "The Three Chapters" was applied to the subjects of the condemnation; and the Fifth General Council, followed by later usage, describes as the "Three Chapters" the "impious Theodore of Mopsuestia with his wicked writings, and those things which Theodoret impiously wrote, and the impious letter which is said to be by Ibas." [2]
Justinian's edict was not favourably received: even the patriarch Mennas hesitated, and the papal envoy and some African bishops broke off communion. The Latin bishops rejected it; but the patriarchs of Alexandria, Antioch, and Jerusalem gave their adhesion. Justinian summoned Pope Vigilius; and a pitiable example of irresolution he presented when he came. He accepted, rejected, censured, was complacent and hostile in turns. [Sidenote: The Fifth General Council, 553.] At last he agreed to the summoning of a General Council, and Justinian ordered it to meet in May, 553. Vigilius, almost at the last moment, would have nothing to do with it. The patriarch of Constantinople presided, and the patriarchs of Antioch and Alexandria appeared in person, the patriarch of Jerusalem by three bishops. The acts of the Council were signed by 164 prelates. The Council, like its predecessors, was predominantly Eastern; but its decisions were afterwards accepted by the West. The precedents of the earlier Councils were strictly followed in regard to Rome: no supremacy was allowed though the honourable primacy was not contested.[3] Justinian's letter, sketching the history of the controversy of the Three Chapters, {18} was read, but he did not interfere with the deliberations. It was summoned to deal with matters concerning the faith, and these were always left to the decision of the Episcopate. The discussion was long; and after an exhaustive examination of the writings of Theodore, the Council proceeded to endorse the first "chapter," by the condemnation of the Mopsuestian and his writings. The case of Theodoret was less clear: indeed, a very eminent authority has regarded the action of the Council in his case as "not quite equitable." [4] But the grounds of the condemnation were such statements of his as that "God the Word is not incarnate," "we do not acknowledge an hypostatic union," and his description of S. Cyril as impius, impugnator Christi, novus haereticus, with a denial of the communicatio idiomatum, which left little if any doubt as to his own position.[5] When the letter of Ibas came to be considered, it was plainly shown that its statements were directly contrary to the affirmations of Chalcedon. It denied the Incarnation of the Word, refused the title of