Wednesday, November 25, 2020

Charles Joseph Hefele: The First Council of Constantinople was Not Convened by the Pope

In the general introduction to volume 14 of the second series of the Nicene Post-Nicene Fathers series, we read:

 

The Seven Ecumenical Councils were all called together at the commandment and will pf Princes; without any knowledge of the matter on the part of the Pope in one case at least (1st Constantinople); without any consultation with him in the case of I. Nice, so far as we know, and contrary to his expressed desire in at least the case of Chalcedon, when he only gave a reluctant consent after the Emperor Marcian had already convoked the synod. (NPNF2 14:xii)

 

Commenting on the First Council of Constantinople (AD 381) and how it was not convened by the then-bishop of Rome, Catholic historian Charles Joseph Hefele wrote:

 

2. With regard to the second Œcumenical Synod, it is commonly asserted, that the bishops who composed it themselves declared that they were assembled at Constantinople in accordance with a letter of Pope Damasus to the Emperor Theodosius the Great (Theodoret; Hist. Eccl. v. 9). But the document which has been relied upon as authority, refers not to the Synod of the year 381, the second œcumenical, but, as we shall show further on in the history of this Council, to the Synod of the year 382 .” (Cf. the notes of Valesius to Theodoret; Hist. Eccl. v. 9), which actually did meet in accordance with the wish of Pope Damasus and the Western Synod at Aquileia, but was not œcumenical. It is without effect, moreover, that Baronius appeals to the sixth Œcumenical Council to prove that Pope Damasus had a part in the calling of the second Œcumenical Synod. For what the Council says is this: “When Macedonius spread abroad a false doctrine respecting the Holy Spirit, Theodosius and Damasus immediately opposed him, and Gregory of Nazianzus and Nectarius (his successor in the See of Constantinople) assembled a synod in this royal city. (Hard. iii. p. 1419) This passage is obviously too vague and indefinite to afford grounds for concluding that Pope Damasus co-operated in the summoning of the Synod. Nay more, the words, “Gregory of Nazianzus and Nectarius assembled a synod,” rather exclude than include the co-operation of Damasus. Besides, it should not be forgotten that the Synod in question, held a.d. 381, as we have already remarked, was not originally regarded as œcumenical, and obtained this rank at a later period on its being received by the West. It was summoned as a general council of the Greek or Eastern Church; and if the Pope had no share in convoking it, no inference can be drawn from this fact unfavourable to his claim to summon œcumenical synods. (Charles Joseph Hefele, A History of the Councils of the Church, Volume 1 [trans. William R. Clark; Edinburgh: T&T Clark, 1871], 9-10)