Zosimus
Things took a dramatic turn under
Innocent's successor, Zosimus (417-418). Almost immediately, Caelestius agreed
to follow up the appeal he had demanded back in 411 by turning up in Rome
before a gathering of Zosimus and his clergy.
We could say that Zosimus was
concerned with procedural fairness, following not only Roman law (Dalmon 2009)
but the scriptural example of Daniel examining the accusers of Susannah (Dan.
13). After all, Pelagius and Caelestius had been exonerated at the preliminary
hearing in Jerusalem and at the synod in Diospolis, and Zosimus' predecessor
had condemned them without giving them a personal hearing or chance to defend
themselves. In September 417, Caelestius appeared at San Clemente in Rome, the
details of which we know from a letter Zosimus sent to the Africans (Ep.
2 = Collectio Avellana, Ep. 45; following the CSEL numbering of
sections of this letter) and from rather forced comments later made by
Augustine, who felt the need to defend Zosimus against criticism from Julian of
Aeclanum, even though he was far more critical of Zosimus at the time (De
gr. Chr. et de p. o. 2.6.7-2.7.8; C. duas epp. Pel.
2.3-5-2.4.6; Lamberigts 1992: 312-317; 2004: 374; Carefoote 1995: 212).
The letter reveals that
Caelestius had not come to Rome to fulfil Innocent's demands that he repudiate
his views and seek forgiveness (Burns 1979 ), but to have Innocent's decision
overturned (Ep. 2.2). He was not asking for clemency or pardon; he was
appealing against the initial verdict, and Zosimus was satisfied enough to
rescind it (Dunn 2013). Zosimus pointed out to the Africans that he questioned
Caelestius extensively on his recent confession of faith (Ep. 2.3; van
Egmond 2011). I do not think that Caelestius showed how much he had emended his
views (Lamberigts 1992: 319; Carefoote 1995: 186) but explained satisfactorily
how his views in fact agreed already with what Innocent required and that he
had been condemned unfairly. This was possible because, in all likelihood, the
Roman bishops did not share the theological sensitivities about original sin
and the baptism of infants held by the Africans (Wermelinger 1975: 138-139 ).
Caelestius might not have needed to be too explicit in what he really believed
to satisfy Rome.
Zosimus was also concerned that
the Africans had not condemned Caelestius in 411 when he was present but had
done so in 416 in his absence, all too hastily and after having been persuaded
by Heros and Lazarus, individuals he found disreputable (Ep. 2.4-7; see
Dunn 2015a, 2015b, 2016a). Zosimus challenged the Africans to find fault with
Caelestius' confession of faith within the next two months (Ep. 2.8) or let it
lapse, since it did no one any good to quibble over words out of an endless
curiosity rather than follow Scripture (Ep. 2.9). He certainly saw
himself as an impartial arbitrator and not a Pelagian sympathizer. He asserted
Rome's authority quite firmly in the letter, also employing Innocent's image of
Rome as a spring (Ep. 2.1).
Pelagius too had written to
Innocent, but it was received only by Zosimus (Pelagius, Libellus fidei;
Augustine, De g. Chr. et de p. o. 30.32; van Egmond 2007, 2012) after
Caelestius' appeal was upheld. Zosimus wrote again to the Africans (Ep.
3 = Collectio Avellana, Ep. 46). Having read Pelagius' statement
of faith, he found it to be much like Caelestius' and therefore acceptable (Ep.
3.3). Much of the vitriol in the letter is directed against Heras and Lazarus (Ep.
3-4-8). The sense again is of Zosimus' concern that procedural fairness had not
been observed by the Africans (Ep. 3.10).
Further reaction from the
Africans and Zosimus, including the latter's March 418 letter (Ep. 12 = Collectio
Avellana, Ep. 50) again justifying his procedures in response to an
African synod in November 417 and the African synod of May 418, has been
analysed by Wermelinger (1975: 146-152), Ocker (1991), Carefoote (1995:
213-218), and Marcos, Chapter 6, this volume.
While Zosimus could wrangle with
the African bishops all he liked, he could not resist the full force of
imperial law, once it became involved in April 418 thanks to the savvy
manoeuvring by the Africans. It is clear that Zosimus needed to align himself with
the imperial position. This he did by the middle of the year when he issued his
Tractoria epistula, only extracts of which survive (Augustine, Ep.
190; Celestine I, Ep. 21; Prosper, C. coll. 5.3), in which it
appears that he amended his earlier acceptance of the orthodoxy of Pelagius and
Caelestius and excommunicated them and their teachings, but only to the extent
that he no longer opposed the imperial edict and was sufficiently in agreement
with the position of lnnocent that the Africans would not object, without
probably accepting that his position really had changed (Wermelinger 1975:
204-218; Carefoote 1995: 260-269 ). From the fragments, we see Zosimus affirm
the reality of original sin and the reality of its forgiveness in baptism
(Augustine, Ep. 190.23), of the need for divine grace as established in
Scripture (Celestine, Ep. 21.9 ), and of the primacy of that grace
(Prosper, C. coll. 5.3) (Floëri 1955). While the Africans rallied around
Zosimus and promoted the idea of his unwavering orthodoxy, put forward to
marginalize Julian of Aeclanum, whom together with eighteen fellow bishops
Zosimus had to excommunicate when they resisted Zosimus' change of heart, the
fact that the Tractoria epistula was not preserved probably indicates a
lingering frustration with it by the Africans.
Meanwhile, in Italy there were
now those who thought Zosimus did not go far enough and those who thought he
had gone too far. The division in the Roman clergy led to a delegation going to
Ravenna in opposition to Zosimus (Ep. 14; Dunn 2016b), although it is a
matter of conjecture which type of opponent went to Ravenna. This division
plagued the Roman Church after Zosimus' death in December 418 in an electoral
controversy over a successor, which, in part, must have been caused by
theological divisions in Rome over grace, free will, original sin, baptism, and
Zosimus' handling of the affair. (Geoffrey D. Dunn, “The Creation of
Pelagianism: Orosius, Roman Bishops, and Marius Mercator,” in The Oxford
Handbook of the Pelagian Controversy, ed. Anthony Dupont, Giulio Malavasi,
and Brian Matz [Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2025], 403-4)