Epistolae

Pope John IV, Roman Pontiff, Letters. (Mansi, Conc. Coll., vol. X.) First Letter. Letter of Pope John IV and the Roman Clergy to the Bishops and Priests of Scotia. On celebrating Easter according to the Catholic rite, and on diligently guarding against the reviving Pelagian heresy. To the most beloved and most holy bishops Thomian, Columban, Chroman, Diman, and Bathán; to the priests Chroman, Herman, Laustran, Stellan, and Segian; to Saran and the other doctors or abbots of the Scots: Hilary the archpriest and keeper of the place of the holy apostolic see; John the deacon, elected in the name of God; likewise John the primicerius and keeper of the place of the holy apostolic see; and John the servant of God, counselor of the same apostolic see. The writings which the bearers brought to Pope Severinus of holy memory, he departing from this light, reciprocal responses to those things which had been requested remained silent. When these were unsealed, lest the darkness of so great a question remain undiscussed for long, we found that some of your province, contrary to the orthodox faith, were attempting to renew an old heresy anew, rejecting our Easter, in which Christ was sacrificed, with a cloudy obscurity, and striving to celebrate the fourteenth moon with the Hebrews. By this beginning of the letter it is clearly declared, both that this heresy had arisen among them very recently in those times, and that not their whole nation, but some among them were implicated in it.

Now, having set forth the rationale of the paschal observance, they add in the same letter concerning the Pelagians: "And we have also learned that the poison of the Pelagian heresy is reviving among you anew, which we earnestly urge to be removed from your minds, such a venomous crime of superstition. For how that accursed heresy itself was condemned ought not to be hidden from you: because not only has it been abolished for these two hundred years, but it is daily condemned by us, buried under perpetual anathema; and we urge that the ashes of those whose arms have been burned not be stirred up among you. For who would not execrate their proud and impious attempt, who say that man can exist without sin by his own will, and not by the grace of God? And indeed the first is blasphemy and foolish talk, to say that man is without sin, which is utterly impossible, except for the one mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus, who was conceived and born without sin. For all other men, being born with original sin, are known to bear the testimony of Adam's transgression (even when existing without actual sin), according to the prophet saying: 'Behold, I was conceived in iniquities, and my mother conceived me in sins' (Ps. 50).

LETTER II. POPE JOHN IV TO THE EMPEROR CONSTANTINE, SON OF HERACLIUS. An apology for Pope Honorius, concerning the one will in Christ, of which his accusers claim he made mention. The Lord, who said that light shines forth from darkness, who snatched us from the power of darkness into his admirable light, the light of truth, and the truth of light, in which it pleased him that the whole fullness of divinity should dwell, and through him to reconcile all things, pacifying in him through the blood of his cross, both those things which are in the heavens and those which are on the earth, on account of the eminent magnitude of the riches of his goodness, looking upon the face of his Church, has deigned to call your benignity, foreknown and predestined to him, now to the integrity of the faith: so that, with every deceitful darkness removed far away, through you he might make truth victorious. For as we have learned from the various suggestions which have come to us in crowds, and indeed also from hearing itself, all the Western parts are disturbed and agitated, with our brother Patriarch Pyrrhus, through his letters sent here and there, preaching certain new things and things beyond the rule of faith, and hastening to draw Pope Honorius, our predecessor of holy memory, to his own sense, as if that were entirely foreign to the mind of a catholic Father.

So that Your Grace may be able to learn the whole matter of the case, I shall relate with the utmost truth what was done a short time ago. Sergius, patriarch of reverend memory, informed the aforementioned pontiff of the Roman city of holy recollection that certain persons were speaking of two contrary wills in our Redeemer, the Lord Jesus Christ; upon learning this, the aforesaid pope wrote back to him that our Saviour, just as He is one and single, so also was He conceived and born in a most wondrous manner above the whole human race. And by His own holy incarnate economy he taught that our Redeemer, just as He is perfect God, so also is He perfect man: so that what the first man lost through transgression, He, born without any sin, might renew the noble origin of the first image. Therefore the second Adam was born, having no sin either at birth or in His dealings with men; for the Word made flesh, in the likeness of the flesh of sin, took upon Himself all our [nature], bearing no fault of guilt arising from the transmission of transgression. We understand, therefore, a likeness, not of His flesh, but of sin. For the Lord took true flesh from the undefiled and blessed Virgin Mother of God, becoming consubstantial with us.

Therefore, the holy Apostle speaks of the likeness of the flesh of sin, which our Lord Jesus Christ, like us sinners, assumed without sin together with a rational soul; and for this reason He deigned to have one will according to the natural humanity of His first formation of Adam, not two contrary wills, as we are now known to have, who are born of sinful Adam: because the first man, having become corruptible through transgression and scorning to be subject to his Creator, felt the flesh, which was previously subject to him, now rebelling against him, and by his sin made the whole human race liable, as the Apostle says: "Death reigned from Adam to Moses, even over those who did not sin in the likeness of Adam's transgression" (Rom. V). For this reason, we who are born through his transgression and sin are known to have two contrary wills: I say two, those of the mind and the flesh, mutually opposing each other, as the same blessed Apostle teaches: "The flesh lusts against the spirit, and the spirit against the flesh. And these oppose each other, so that you do not do whatever you wish" (Gal. V). And this is suffered by the whole human race placed under sin, since no one is free from this sin of transgression, not even an infant, as it is written, whose life on earth is but a single day.

And just as the Holy Spirit says through David: "Behold, I was conceived in iniquities, and my mother bore me in sins" (Ps. 50). For just as in Adam all have sinned (1 Cor. 15), according to the Apostle, so in Christ all will be justified. And just as through one man many were constituted sinners, so also through one man many will be constituted righteous (Rom. 5). Therefore, one and only one is the sinless mediator of God and men, the man Christ Jesus, who was conceived and born free among the dead. In the dispensation of His holy flesh, therefore, He never had two contrary wills, nor did the will of His flesh oppose the will of His mind: for He who came to forgive the sin of the world had no sin whatsoever, just as He Himself said: "Which of you will convict me of sin?" (John 8); and elsewhere He spoke thus: "The prince of this world came, and found nothing in me" (John 14). Hence, knowing that there was no sin at all in Him when He was born and lived, we fittingly say and truthfully confess one will in the humanity of His holy dispensation, and we do not proclaim two contrary wills of mind and flesh, as certain heretics are known to rave, as if in a mere man.

According to this manner, then, our aforementioned predecessor is known to have written to the named Patriarch Sergius when he inquired, that in our Savior two contrary wills—that is, in his members—do not at all exist, because he drew no vice from the transgression of the first man. For in us, not in him, is what is written applied: "For I know that good does not dwell in me," that is, in my flesh (Rom. 1). And again: "Not that I do this good which I will, but that I do this evil which I do not will. But if I do that evil which I do not will, then it is no longer I who work it, but the sin which dwells in me" (Ibid.). And after these: "For I see another law in my members, warring against the law of my mind, and taking me captive in the law of sin which is in my members" (Ibid.). Hence, therefore, these two contrary wills of mind and flesh, which the Apostle teaches, were by no means in our Savior, because this stimulus of struggle took its beginning from the transgression of the first-formed man; since from our Redeemer nature was assumed, not the guilt of sin. But lest someone of lesser understanding should sometimes object why it is known to teach only about the human nature and not also about the divine nature: for Christ is known, adored, and worshipped as perfect God and perfect man in two natures united in one person. Whoever doubts this should know that the response was made to the aforementioned patriarch's inquiry.

Moreover, it is customary that where there is a wound, there medicinal aid should come. And the blessed Apostle is known to have often done this, preparing himself according to the custom of his hearers: and sometimes, when teaching about the supreme nature, he is entirely silent about the human; at other times, when discussing the human dispensation, he does not touch upon the mystery of His divinity. For he himself says in one place concerning the divine nature: "Christ, the power of God, and the wisdom of God" (1 Cor. 1); but elsewhere concerning His incarnation he spoke thus: "That which is foolish of God is wiser than men, and that which is weak of God is stronger than men" (Ibid.). Now wisdom and foolishness, power and weakness, are without doubt set forth as mutually contrary. Therefore, does the blessed Apostle teach things contrary to each other? Far from it: but he wisely configures himself to his hearers, teaching according to the time, like a prudent nurse who offers milk to little ones, but gives solid food to those who are mature. What then does he mean when he says: "That which is weak of God is stronger than men; and that which is foolish of God is wiser than men"? This entire passage seems to teach about the dispensation of Christ, not about His supernal nature: wishing to show that God, having become man, had a human soul and body, which he asserts to be foolish and weak. For human wisdom, when compared to divine wisdom, is foolishness; and the strength of the flesh, when compared with the power of God, is weakness.

For indeed, human wisdom, when compared with its creator, wisdom itself, is foolishness. Therefore, joining both together, we confess Christ as the power of God and the wisdom of God according to his divinity, the nature of his divinity; and according to the dispensation of his holy flesh, we truly proclaim that which is the foolish and the weak of God as the nature of his humanity, because this weak and foolish thing is stronger and wiser than all men. For all men, as has also been said above, are born under the sin of transgression: but our Lord Jesus Christ, existing without sin and bearing with him no defect of oldness, is not only stronger but also wiser than all men, although he deigned to take up our weakness and foolishness solely out of mercy. But those who were born from the sin of the first man are called sons of wrath and of darkness by the teaching of Holy Scripture. But Christ, since he is the true light, deigned to illuminate those sitting in darkness and the shadow of death.

For what does the Apostle teach, writing to the Ephesians? Let us hear: "And you," he says, "when you were dead in your faults and sins, in which you once walked according to the world of this age, according to the prince of the power of the air, the spirit who now works in the sons of unbelief, in whom we also were when we lived in the desires of the flesh, doing the wills of the flesh and of thoughts, and we were by nature sons of wrath, like the rest" (Eph. 2). Behold, these are the two contrary wills, namely of the mind and of the flesh, which were in no way present in our Savior. We are known to have these from the sin of the progenitor Adam, who made both himself and the whole human race liable, so that sometimes indeed the sting of the flesh appears to resist the mind, and sometimes the will of the mind strives to contradict the will of the flesh; so that, groaning with the Apostle, we confess: "With the mind I serve the law of God, but with the flesh the law of sin" (Rom. 7). Our Lord, however, deigned to assume one natural will of his humanity, which he, as Lord of all, bore authoritatively in his own flesh, because all things serve God; indeed, he had or brought no sin from transgression, since he alone was born without sin and without the guilt of transgression.

My aforementioned predecessor, teaching concerning the mystery of the incarnation of Christ, said that there were not in him, as in us sinners, contrary wills of mind and flesh. Some, twisting this to their own understanding, suspected that he had taught a single will of his divinity and humanity, which is entirely contrary to the truth. Nevertheless, I would wish that, when questioned, they would answer according to which nature they say there is one will of Christ God. If only according to the divine nature, what will they answer concerning his humanity? For he is also a perfect man, so that he not be condemned with Manichaeus. But if they say that this will is according to the humanity of Christ, that this will was a perfect God, let them take care lest they be judged with Photinus and Ebion. But if they say that there is one will from both natures, they will confuse not only the natural wills but also the natures themselves, so that neither this nor that, that is, the divine and the human, can be understood. For just as we do not divide both natures in the union of the one Christ, as the impious Nestorius did, so we do not utterly deny the difference of the natures, nor do we confuse them, since we confess both natures with the ineffable harmony of the union of the one person of Christ God. For if they say there is one will of the divinity and humanity of Christ, and one operation at the same time, what else are they known to do but to work according to the Eutychian and Severian division, that there is one nature of Christ God?

Finally, the orthodox Fathers who have shone throughout the whole world are shown to have taught, with harmonious preaching, both the two natures and also the wills and operations of Christ. We have discovered, however, that a certain document has been issued, in which priests have been compelled to subscribe against the tome of blessed memory Pope Leo and the Council of Chalcedon: in which document certain things have been composed by novelty, which are altogether recognized to refute ecclesiastical dogma. Therefore, may divine clemency inspire your most Christian piety, and since you are the guardians of our immaculate faith, may it incite you to compunction, so that you may restrain by imperial sanctions those who are corrupting [the faith] with new inventions, and may you order the aforementioned document, which hastens to the scandal of the faith and has been suspended in public places, to be taken down and torn up: for all who have heard of this in the Western parts, and also the peoples who are of your royal city, having learned of the composition of the aforementioned document, have been stricken in heart. For by your authority and apostolic perfection, the aforementioned document, which was composed against the Council of Chalcedon, will be idle now and for all time, and void of all force. But the perfection of the faith, just as it has shone forth up to the present, we pray that it may also remain in its strength through you, as also through Constantine of pious memory, with divine aid.

Therefore, most Christian lords and guardians of the faith in Christ, grant this gift to your mother Church in the beginnings of your reign, whose supporters you are after God, so that the serpentine cunning may not dare to violate the faith of her spouse. Offer this salutary sacrifice to our Lord God in these beginnings, and with the ray of your piety disperse every cloud of novelty from His Church, so that our Lord God, by your vicarious aid, may crush all the nations that are against you and that reject peace and the invincible God. So that, while you attend to the things of God, God may kindly deign to accomplish your affairs. For this reason, the whole Church with me, with bended knee of the mind, also supplicates that you deign to remove the whirlwind of new confusion from the integrity of our immaculate faith, which the holy apostles handed down to us and the most holy Fathers sealed with the most lucid teachings. So that our Lord and God, whose immaculate faith is preserved, may justly and most abundantly bestow His mercies upon you, who is almighty and the eternal lord. May the Creator of all benignly look upon your rule, and may He prostrate with His invincible power the nations that trust in their own truth.

LETTER III. POPE JOHN IV TO BULCRED, KING OF THE SAXONS. (Fragment from Ivo, Part VII, Chapter 130.) Since, as we have heard, the sin of fornication especially prevails among you—because men of your kingdom presume to take as wives nuns and women already vowed to God, as well as women of their own blood relation, contrary to the statute of blessed Gregory, which was a necessary command for a then newly converted people—this is indeed a crime and a grave offense. By our apostolic letters, we admonish, exhort, and command that all who exist under your authority, both laity and clergy, from now on and henceforth, beware of this, perform fitting penance for their deeds, and never again commit such acts. But if it perhaps seems difficult to you to correct this impious practice, on account of which you suffer such adversities, make it known to our paternity by your letters, so that we of the apostolic see may rebuke those who are weakly subject to such a nefarious work, and burden them in every way with decrees.

LETTER IV. POPE JOHN IV TO ISAAC, BISHOP OF SYRACUSE. That it be permitted to institute priests of their own churches for monks. Pope John to Isaac, Bishop of Syracuse. Having seen the letter of your charity, by which it is sufficiently understood with how great zeal you show reverence to this holy see, we have rejoiced not a little. Now, therefore, concerning those matters which you have consulted, we give counsel kindly to you as a most dear brother. For your pious gentleness has delegated to us whether churches, handed over to monks by holy and catholic bishops for the peace of the monks, ought to be instituted through priests ordained and invested by them. Your fraternity also added that a dispute and sedition between clerics and monks has arisen from this cause, not a small one, which no one doubts has happened by the instigation of the crafty enemy, for he has a thousand ways of doing harm, nor are we ignorant of his wiles. For from the beginning of his fall he strives to tear apart the unity of the Church, to wound charity, to infect the sweetness of holy works with the gall of envy. For he grieves and blushes enough that charity, which he was unable to have in heaven, men made from clay hold on earth. Whence it is necessary, as far as our frailty allows, that we most diligently fortify all approaches of his craftiness for doing harm, lest death enter our gates. Therefore, with the counsel of many brothers most diligently sought out, we have decreed that from now on churches handed over to monks be instituted through their own priests.

Divine laws, moreover, have both sacred and secular provisions, that to whom the possession belongs, to him the institution pertains. And if in giving what is greater, charity was easy, let holy generosity be easier in conceding what is lesser. For it was a greater thing to give the possession than it is to grant the investiture. But how are the rights of the possessor recognized, and his own tributes rendered to him, when what is his is given through another and taken away whenever he wishes? It is human nature to fear the one by whose judgment and will one is now raised up, now cast down. Hence it happens that a priest becomes more inclined to serve those bishops who are in a position to do so; and thus the bishop who had given piously and religiously, by a certain feigned authority, draws back to himself. And so he is deprived of the reward he was about to receive: both because with feigned charity he takes away what he had given, and because, too credulous of the words of wicked priests who love discord and schisms, and who sow quarrels and dissensions among bishops, he strives first by deceit to gain what he was plotting, and later, after the fraud is detected, he attempts by a certain usurpation to take it away entirely. Noting their cunning and the persuasive wiles of the enemy, we henceforth grant to monks full license to become the investitors of their own churches: yet in such a way that, if they presume to act against the priesthood, they shall be punished by the judgment of a synod, and the sins of the priests shall be cut off by the happy sword of the bishop.