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Edited from a variety of translations (mentioned in the preface) by H. R. Percival
THE ECUMENICAL COUNCILS Resources Online and in Print
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37 Pages
Page 34
[After Canon XX.]
Canon XII. (Of the Latin Texts.)
Bishop Hosius said: But some discretion is here requisite, brethren dearly beloved, in case some should come to those cities which are on the highway still ignorant of what has been decreed in the council. The bishop of such a city ought therefore to admonish him [a bishop so arriving], and instruct him to send his deacon from that place. Upon this admonition he must, however, himself return to his diocese.
Notes.
Van Espen.
This proposition of Hosius in the Roman Codex is joined as an appendix to the preceding canon. The Greeks omit it altogether, very likely either because it seemed to be a proposition of Hosius's rather than a synodal canon, for no adoption by the synod is recorded: or else because, even if it were a decree, it was only of temporary character, that is to say, until the canons had been sufficiently promulgated, and therefore some on the ground of ignorance might be exempt from the threatened penalties.
Excursus on the Other Acts of the Council.
As only the Canons have any real connexion with the Ecumenical Synods, they alone have properly a place in this volume, and yet it may not be amiss to give a brief account of the other acts of the council, so far as we know them.
(a) The Rule for Keeping Easter.--The Anglican Scholar, the Rev. William Cureton, of the British Museum, first edited the then recently discovered Preface to the Paschal Letters of St. Athanasius, together with the Letters themselves. The ms. which he then published was in Syriac and was discovered in Egypt. In the preface just referred to, it is expressly stated that "a plan was agreed upon at Sardica with regard to the feast of Easter." But this new plan, which was only expected to hold good for fifty years, failed, and although in a.d. 346 Easter should have fallen on March 23d, yet the Council (so says St. Athanasius) agreed to observe it on March 30th. Another divergence fell in a.d. 349. Easter, by the Alexandrian calculation, would have been April 23d. But by Roman count, the origin of which was attributed to St. Peter, Easter was never to be later than April 21st, and for the sake of peace the Alexandrians yielded to the Romans and kept Easter on March 26th; but in 350, 360, and 368 the Alexandrian and Roman methods again disagreed, and even the fifty years which Sardica had thought to ensure uniformity were marked by diverse usages.
Reference address : https://www.elpenor.org/ecumenical-councils/sardica-343.asp?pg=34
