What happened at the Third Council of Constantinople?

V. Held at Constantinople in A.D. 553, against the errors of Origen.

VI. Held at Constantinople in 680, against the Monothelites.

Four popes had succeeded one another rapidly during his reign, and at last Agathon assembled a Western council, at which, however, no prelates from Spain, Britain, or Germany were present, save one on his own affairs, and three from France. However, they put themselves forward as representing the whole Latin church. In truth, save Scotland and Ireland, and the north of England, it was at this time pretty well papalised. However, as the council of the apostolic see, as they say, they condemn the Monothelites, as they were called. Legates went from the pope to Constantinople, but they were not to discuss, the pope said, nor a title to be altered in the confession. The Emperor had removed a stiff patriarch and put in a milder one, and formed an assembly at Constantinople, and ordered Macarius, the patriarch of Antioch, the Monothelite leader, to assemble as many as he could of his party. Thus, besides other prelates, the Eastern patriarchs, or their legates, were present. The West was only represented by the pope's legates. Macarius was deserted by most of his partisans who found the tide against him, for the Emperor sought peace, though they had pretty well reviled each other. Macarius, however, insisted on the authority of Honorius, of Sergius, previously patriarch of Constantinople, and of Cyrus, patriarch of Alexandria, but he was all but unanimously deposed and excommunicated.

146 But now comes the strange result. They condemn all the writings of these heretics, and their memory they anathematize — that is, deliver over to the curse of God — Theodore of Pharan, author of the mischief, Sergius, Patriarch of Constantinople, and two of his successors; Cyrus, Patriarch of Alexandria, Honorius, Pope of Rome, and Macarius of Antioch, and all following them. In the thirteenth session they are declared out of the pale of the Catholic church, that is, lost for ever; and, in the sixteenth, anathema is pronounced on the heretic Sergius, etc., etc., on the heretic Honorius, Pope of Old Rome. This council was accepted and confirmed as the Sixth General Council, when the result was notified to him by Leo, the pope who succeeded to Agatho; and he anathematizes expressly Honorius and the others.

The council condemned the Three Chapters and pronounced a curse against all who should defend them, or should pretend that they were countenanced by the council of Chalcedon. The persons of Theodoret and Ibas were spared, but Theodore was condemned as well as his writings. The four previous general councils were confirmed; and the edicts of the emperor were approved. As usual, the emperor issued an edict enforcing the decrees of the council.

I pass over John III, Benedict, Pelagius II, Gregory — a really great man, who just hints at the possibility of a purgatory for extremely small faults (for the gospel had disappeared) and who reformed or composed the Roman Liturgy — Sabinianus, and others, and come to Honorius, in the seventh century, where we meet a difficulty of another kind. Honorius, so far from keeping the faith of others, could not, it seems, keep the faith himself. He is formally condemned and anathematized by name in the third Council of Constantinople, confirmed by Pope Agathon, and anathematized again by Pope Leo II, whence it is formally taught in Canon Law that the pope can be judged for heresy.

145 The sixth General Council will furnish us with some curious elements as to papal infallibility and the progress of church history. Eastern Christendom was always discussing points, Rome pushing its power. In the East they got a new point, on which it is surely not my purpose to dwell here: — Christ had only one will, or at any rate His divine and human will coalesced, though He had two natures. The Emperor adopted, and Pope Honorius wrote a letter approving it. However, there was a change, the Roman legates opposed it at Constantinople, and one of them, Martin, became pope; he then denounced all holders of it. The then Emperor published a rescript forbidding discussions, and all men to be left in peace. The pope denounced this as sanctioning evil. The Emperor tried to get hold of him, failed the first time, but succeeded the second, and brought him prisoner and kept him so till he died. The Roman clergy less staunch than the people, gave way, and elected another pope whom the Emperor confirmed; he never had confirmed his stern predecessor, Martin. So now there were two popes. The one at Rome soon after died, his successor was on good terms with the Emperor. The Emperor, who had always maintained his rescript, died too, and his successor was a gentler prince. He proposed a conference to settle it.

N*. Well, I should not be indisposed to accept your excuse. There is certainly something to be said for him, though he went very far. But if you are right, what becomes of the authority of the general council and another pope's condemnation of him and his doctrine? No; great as their influence was become — quite paramount in the West at this epoch — no one dreamt then of the popes being infallible. As to general councils, it is rather hard to tell what they were. No Western bishops were in this; only the pope assured them that what he wrote was the judgment of all the West. But that did not make their assembling in the Holy Ghost. Agatho's Roman council was composed of Italian and Sicilian bishops. Only two bishops signed as deputies of all France and England; a queer way, too, of assembling in the Holy Ghost. At any rate the Emperor gathered and presided in the Sixth General Council, and the pope was condemned as a heretic by the council and by his successor. In this Sixth General Council there were at first some thirty or forty bishops, at the end one hundred and sixty.

N*. Not only is the historical fact admitted by all, even by Bellarmine and Baronius, that the Emperor did call the council, but it is impossible that the pope could have anything to say to it, because he had held a council at Rome and condemned Nestorius, and written to Cyril that he was to publish his deposition if he did not retract in ten days after notification. Cyril assembled a local council at Alexandria, on November 3rd, to carry this into effect, and on the 19th the Emperor issues his order for the council to meet, writing to the pope as to others; and the pope in answer recognizes that the Emperor had convoked the council, and that it was his business to care for the peace of the church (Hard., 1473). You will find the facts I have alleged as to councils in this book, Socrates, Sozomen, Baronius (consulting Bellarmine), Dupin, and Tillemont. Baronius, it is true, tries to call in question the canons of the Council of Constantinople, but his well-known annotator, Pagi, shews it is impossible to do so. It only shews he felt how it pinched. I pursue my history.

As to the Council of Chalcedon, the Fourth General Council, the pope wanted to get one in Italy to condemn Eutychus. The Emperor Theodosius refused, saying all was settled at Ephesus, that is, at a second in that town, of which hereafter: so little did popes call general councils then. His successor was well disposed, but refused peremptorily to have it in Italy, called it at Nice, and then, in order to manage it better, brought it to Chalcedon, close to Constantinople. His commissioners sat in the council save one day, suppressed the violence of the prelates at the beginning, saying they ought to shew a better example, and made propositions, gave their consent, in fact presided actively all the time in the council, save one day. On that day, on which they left the prelates to settle about the creed, the council deposed Dioscorus, also patriarch of Alexandria for his crimes at the previous Council of Ephesus. On their return the next day the commissioners said they must answer for it, they had not been there. In truth their consciences need not have been much burdened. But even as to the creed to be signed, one was proposed. The papal legates opposed, and said they would go if Leo's letter was not assented to as it was, along with the creeds of Nice and Constantinople. The letter was in point of fact in many respects an admirable one. But what was done? It was referred to the Emperor, who decided what was to be done, and the council stated their views in detail for themselves, though approving Leo's letter, but would give their own definition of faith. Afterwards Constantinople was put on an equality with Rome. The legates craftily keeping away, they protested on their return; but the bishops maintained it, and the commissioners declared it had passed, and the council said, We remain in this judgment. In this council Ibas and Theodoret, favourers of Nestorius' views, were declared orthodox. They publicly recognized the Empress Pulcheria as the person who had put down Nestorius.

142 The Fifth General Council is too plain in its history to need more than the plain statement of facts. There had been a great contest about the merits of Origen, and the monks had been breaking into each other's monasteries, and in the course of the disputes which followed, blood had been shed in the churches, indeed it was far from being the first time. However, they got the Emperor to condemn Origen's doctrine. As to the merits of the case, there was reason enough. He was a powerful prince, and recovered Italy and Africa from the barbarians, and liked his own way. A certain Theodore of Caesarea, a great favourite with the Emperor, was fond of Origen and of Eutychianism, and determined to have his revenge, and he engaged Justinian to condemn three persons' writings, Theodore of Mopsuestia, Ibas, and Theodoret, all three opposed to Cyril, who had his way in the Council of Ephesus. These three persons had been pronounced to be in full communion in the Council of Chalcedon, which had rather tended to set up Nestorius' reputation again, whom Cyril and Ephesus had condemned. Justinian published a long decree condemning the three chapters, as the writings of the three prelates above-named were called. He had a kind of council, and the Oriental patriarchs and prelates were obliged to condemn them too. Pope Vigilius condemned them and excommunicated the patriarch of Constantinople and all who had condemned the three chapters. However Justinian thought he would be more tractable at Constantinople, and made him come. There, in fact, he joined in communion again with the excommunicated ones, and condemned the three chapters. But then all the prelates of Illyria and Africa, in fact of all the West in general separated from his communion as unfaithful — a bad business according to modern Romanist notions. To get out of the scrape he acceded to the proposal by some of these prelates of a general council, and withdrew his condemnation of the chapters, and forbade any resolution till there was a council. The Emperor persecuted him (indeed he had exiled him and afterwards brought him to Constantinople); he fled to Chalcedon, and the Emperor compromised, and he came back He then pressed for a council in Italy. That did not suit the Emperor, and he refused, but called one at Constantinople. Vigilius would not go there, and he signed his private judgment with eighteen other Western prelates, while one- hundred and sixty or one hundred and seventy sat in the council under the Emperor's authority. This letter of his, called Constitutive, was given to the Emperor, but is taken no notice of in the council. To say the truth, it was on the whole the most sensible paper in the whole miserable business, and he forbade by the authority of the apostolic see in any way to contravene what he then pronounced. However, the Emperor went on with his council, when, save a very few renegades, there were no Western prelates. The council condemned altogether the three chapters, which was quite different from Vigilius' constitutive; and Vigilius refused to sign as he had refused to be present. Justinian banished him again, and he gave way, and signed; and it became thereby, say Baronius and the Romanists, a general council. If that does not make a sure foundation for faith, what will? Yet universal confusion was the result.

N*. Well, I should have thought it wrong every way to worship idols. A worshipper of idols is a strange security for faith. But we will turn to some other instances equally notorious: Pope Vigilius in the dispute about what are called the three chapters, two of which were sanctioned by the great General Council of Chalcedon. In truth Vigilius was elevated to the See of Rome on purpose to favour Monophysite heresy, and restore Anthinus, the heretic, to the See of Constantinople, the Empress putting him in by force, by means of Belisarius, and banishing Silverius. When once in, he turned right round, but quailed before the Emperor as soon as he got to Constantinople, and intrigued in vain. Then he condemned the three chapters as the Emperor had done. Then, when the fifth General Council was called, though at Constantinople, he defended the three chapters. The Council of Constantinople broke communion with him, and approved the Emperor's condemnation of the three chapters, and Vigilius, the following year, assented to the decrees of the council, and his successor, Pelagius I, acknowledged the orthodoxy of the council. Where is the security for faith here anywhere? The Council of Constantinople condemned the Council of Chalcedon, both being accounted ecumenical, nominally saving its credit, and the pope, ex cathedra, condemned, approved, and then condemned the same doctrine, what all held to be a vital question as to the Person of the Lord! You cannot deny this.

He at first refused to sign the condemnation of the Three Chapters. Then he attempted to draw up a compromise, called the Judicatum, namely, to condemn the Three Chapters, but without touching the decisions of the council of Chalcedon. His own clergy compelled him to withdraw his compromise. He asked for a general council.

And note, the giving then, which is what they do in honour of Peter, a title to Rome to require a re-examination on the spot in case of an appeal, or to take other measures, proves that he did not possess the right before. It was very convenient to Athanasius, as he had been thus acquitted by Pope Julius, and condemned in the East, to set up this power in Rome. This Council of Sardica and its canons were, however, no way recognised in the church; for three general councils, Constantinople, 381 (34 years after), Chalcedon, 451, Constantinople, 681, all decree what is entirely in opposition to the Sardican, namely — that causes should be heard by the provincial synods, with appeal to the patriarch to whose jurisdiction they belonged. It was Julius' successor, Liberius, who signed the Arian or semi-Arian creed, when Constantius, the Eastern emperor, had all his own way, and so did Hosius, one of the alleged presidents of the Sardican Council.