The Council of Sardica - A.D. 343/344

Edited from a variety of translations (mentioned in the preface) by H. R. Percival

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Natalis Alexander [412] is indeed of opinion that because Pope Zosimus, in the year 417 or 418, cited the fifth canon of Sardica as Nicene, and a synod held at Constantinople in 382 cited the sixth as Nicene, the synod must evidently have been considered as an appendix to that of Nicea, and therefore its equal, that is, must have been honoured as ecumenical. But we have already shown how Zosimus and the bishops of Constantinople had been led into this confusion from the defects of their manuscript collections of the canons. Athanasius, Sulpicius Severus, Socrates, and the Emperor Justinian were cited in later times for the ecumenical character of this synod. Athanasius calls it a megale sunodos; Sulpicius Severus says it was ex toto orbe convocata; and Socrates relates that "Athanasius and other bishops had demanded an Ecumenical Synod, and that of Sardica had been then summoned. [413] It is clear at the first glance that the two last authorities only prove that the Synod had been intended to be a general one, and the expression "Great Synod," used by Athanasius, cannot be taken as simply identical with ecumenical. While, however, the Emperor Justinian, in his edict of 346, on the Three Chapters, calls the Synod of Sardica ecumenical, he yet, in the same edict, as well as in other places, does not reckon it among the General Councils, of which he counts four. To this must be added, first, that the Emperor is not the authority entitled to decide as to the character of an Ecumenical Synod; and secondly, that the expression Universale Concilium was employed in a wider sense in speaking of those synods which, without being general, represented a whole patriarchate.

The Trullan Synod and Pope Nicholas I. are further appealed to. The former in its second canon approved of the Sardican canons, and Pope Nicholas said of them: "omnis Ecclesia recepit eos." But this in no way contains a declaration that the Synod of Sardica was ecumenical, for the canons of many other councils also--for instance, Ancyra, Neocaesarea, and others--were generally received without those synods themselves being therefore esteemed ecumenical. Nay, the Trullan Synod itself speaks for us; for had it held the Synod of Sardica to be the second General Council, it would have placed its canons immediately after those of Nice, whereas they are placed after the four ancient General Councils, and from this we see that the Trullan Synod did not reckon the Sardican among those councils, but after them. To this it must be added that the highest Church authorities speak most decidedly against the synod being ecumenical. We may appeal first to Augustine, who only knew of the Eusebian assembly at Sardica, and nothing at all of an orthodox synod in that place; which would have been clearly impossible, if it had at that time been counted among the ecumenical synods. Pope Gregory the Great [414] and St. Isidore of Seville [415] speak still more plainly. They only know of four ancient General Councils--those of Nice, Constantinople, Ephesus, and Chalcedon. The objection of the Ballerini that Gregory and Isidore did not intend to enumerate the most ancient general synods as such, but only those which issued important dogmatic decrees, is plainly quite arbitrary, and therefore without force. Under such circumstances it is natural that among the later scholars by far the great majority should have answered the question, whether the Synod of Sardica is ecumenical, in the negative, as have Cardinal Bellarmin, Peter de Marca, Edmund Richer, Fleury, Orsi, Sacharelli, Tillemont, Du Pin, Berti, Ruttenstock, Rohrbacher, Remi Ceillier, Stolberg, Neander, and others. On the other hand, Baronius, Natalis Alexander, the brothers Ballerini, Mansi, and Palma [416] have sought to maintain the ecumenical character of the synod, but as early as the seventeenth century the Roman censors condemned the direct assertions of Natalis Alexander on the subject.

[412] Nat. Alex. H. E., sec. iv., Diss. xxvij., Art. 3.

[413] Socrates. H. E., Lib. ii., cap. 20.

[414] Greg. M. Lib. ii., Epist. 10.

[415] Isidor. Hispal. Etymolog., Lib. vi., cap. 16.

[416] Jno. Bapt. Palma. Praelectiones Hist. Eccl. quas in Collegio Urbano habuit. Rome, l838. Tom. i., P. ii., p. 85.

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