Letter 247

From: Unknown correspondent To: Pope Hormisdas, Rome (unknown) Date: ~515-523 AD Context: Part of the papal correspondence surrounding the Acacian Schism (484-519), the major breach between Rome and Constantinople over the condemnation of the Monophysite patriarch Acacius. Pope Hormisdas (514-523) worked tirelessly to resolve this schism, which was finally healed in 519 under Emperor Justin I. [This letter is part of the extensive diplomatic correspondence generated by the resolution of the Acacian Schism. The schism had divided the Eastern and Western churches for thirty-five years over the condemnation of Patriarch Acacius of Constantinople, who had promoted a compromise formula (the Henotikon) that Rome rejected as insufficiently orthodox. Hormisdas conducted negotiations through multiple embassies to Constantinople, exchanging letters with emperors, patriarchs, imperial officials, and powerful aristocratic women at court. The correspondence reveals the machinery of late antique ecclesiastical diplomacy: formal theological demands, careful diplomatic language, networks of lay and clerical allies, and the constant anxiety of a pope trying to manage events happening months away by letter.]

Diouysii Exigai ad Horitiisdam papani. firacvo - lalimnn coUectionem canonufn, Jussu Hormisdae susceptam, a se absoiulam y. li esse ilH nuntiat, Domino beatissimo papae Hormisdae Dionysius exiguus. Sanctorum pontificum regulas, quas ad verbum digerere vestra beatitudo de graeco me compellit eloquio, jamdudum parvitatis meae nonnuUo studio absolutas esse cognosco. Sed quorumdam superciHum, qui se graecorum ctmonum peritissimos esse jactitant, quique scisci- tati de quohbet ecclesiastico constituto respondere se velut ex occulto videntur oraculo, veneratio vestra non sustinens, imperare diguata est potestate, qua supra ceteros exceUit antistites, ut qua possum diligejitia nitar a graecis latina minime discrepare, atque in una- ([uaque pagina aequo divisa tramite utraque e regione subnectam, [)roi)ter eos maxime, qui temeritate quadam Nicaenos canoues cre- duiit se posse violare .et pro eis alia quaedam coustituta suppouere. Quapropter ajjostohitus vestri jussis obtemperans, onmem veritatem graecorum canonum prout qui fidehter expUcui, incipiens a Nicaenis ir«\sta sunt pro vostro desiilerio ac volantate, et qaanta vigilenius sollicitutline circa sanctas ecclesiat*. - Ed. sol/icHudinem. G' viyifaver. •') Kd. uf naturnlem et inferius decun-ens ... ad e/fectum nosirtim dueit et w tcntionem. Locus obscunis et intricatus sic potest clarius enuntiari: Sam or«ti&- niftus vestjac sanctitatis. (/uam naturali bonitale AwJms r« (sc. redintegrationiB ec<*l*- siarum) respicimus^ vigitantissimum haberc studium et t)eo cooperante etc. EPISTOLAE 147 — 149. 987 defuiitis ei iii Calcliedoneiisibus desinens. Canones autem, qui di- cuntur apostoloruni, et Sardicensis concilii atque Africanae provinciae, quos non admisit universitas, ego quoque in lioc opere praetermisi; quia, ut superius memini, ut hos in illa prima digessi translatione, et ut vestra paternitas, auctoritate qua tenentur ecclesiae Orientales, quaesivit agnoscere.