Peter's Rock in Mohammed's Flood, from St. Gregory the Great to St. Leo III. Allies Thomas William

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СКАЧАТЬ “We acknowledge one Son and Lord Jesus Christ, who is at once capable and incapable of suffering, visible and invisible. We teach that the miracles and the sufferings belong to one and the same; we ascribe all divine and human Operation to one and the same Word become flesh; we offer … to Him one adoration, and allow no man to hold and teach either One or Two Operations in the Divine Incarnation of the Lord; but rather, according to the tradition of the holy General Councils, that one and the same only-begotten Son, our Lord Jesus Christ, works both the divine and the human actions, and that the whole Operation belonging at once to God and to man proceeds from one and the same Incarnate God, the Word, indivisibly and unconfusedly, and is to be referred to one and the same. Since the expression, One Operation, if used by some fathers, still sounds strange and disturbs the ears of some who conceive that it is used for the doing away of the Two Natures personally united in Christ our God, and in like manner the expression Two Operations offends many, as not used by any one of the chief doctors of the Church, and because there follow from it two Wills opposed to each other, as if God the Word willed to fulfil His saving passion, while His Manhood resisted that will of His, and so two are introduced willing contrary things, an impious thing opposed to Christian doctrine. For even the impious Nestorius, though he divided the divine taking of the manhood from the Lord, and introduced two Sons, did not venture to speak of two Wills. Rather he taught identity of will in the two persons invented by him. How then can they who confess the right faith, and glorify one Son, our Lord Jesus Christ, the true God, receive two Wills and those opposed to each other in Him? Following, therefore, the holy Fathers in all things and in this, we confess One Will of our Lord Jesus Christ, the true God, so that at no time did His Flesh, animated by the mind, make a natural movement of itself separately and by its own impulse, which was contrary to the bidding of God the Word personally united with it; but when and such and as much as God the Word Himself willed … and we exhort all Christians to be so minded, and so to hold, adding nothing and taking away nothing. I, Heraclius, the faithful emperor in Jesus Christ our Lord, have subscribed.”

      Sergius did not fail to have the Ecthesis confirmed by a council at Constantinople. He died himself in December, 638, but before this he had it read, probably, to his Resident Council, and asked for the judgment of its members. The bishops answered, like good courtiers, “The exposition of our great and most wise Emperor agrees in truth with the teaching of the Apostles. This is the doctrine of the Fathers, this the support of the Church. This the confessions of the Five Councils teach; by this the unity of the Christian people is assured, the weakness of the simple strengthened. This works the salvation of mankind. This we also believe; this we confirm; with this we agree.” Sergius gave his solemn confirmation, and added, “If any one henceforth, disregarding the prohibition of the Emperor and the Council, dares to teach that there is One Operation or that there are Two in Christ he shall, if he be bishop, priest, deacon, or clerk, be deposed; but if monk or layman, be excluded from Communion in the Body and Blood of our Lord until he return to his duty”. Thereupon the Ecthesis was attached publicly to the narthex of Sancta Sophia.

      The Ecthesis had been specially drawn up against the teaching of the champion of orthodoxy in the East, Sophronius, patriarch of Jerusalem, who had appealed to Pope Honorius, and expressed full trust in his defence of the truth. But before its appearance Sophronius was already dead, and his see had come into the hands of the Monothelite Sergius, Bishop of Joppa. Macedonius had, contrary to the canons, been imposed on the see of Antioch, and consecrated by Sergius of Constantinople. It is true he had never entered his city, which was already captured by the Arabs. He had remained in Constantinople.

      Cyrus, patriarch of Alexandria, in an epistle read afterwards at the Roman Council of Pope St. Martin, expressed to his spiritual brother and fellow-ministrant, Sergius of Constantinople, his intense delight at the Ecthesis which his great sovereign had drawn up in behalf of the faith, which was ready to be sent to the exarch Isaac at Ravenna, and was to be accepted by his brother Severinus, elected at Rome. I have read it, he said, not once or twice but many times. I admire an exposition brilliant as the sun's light, announcing with unswerving accuracy the true faith; and I sung praises to God who had bestowed on us so wise a governor, guiding to harbour the holy churches. He has saved us once, twice, and thrice from tyrannous power, from Persian boastfulness, from Saracen domination.

      In the meantime Sergius had died, and Heraclius had put his friend Pyrrhus, who shared his Monothelite heresy, in his place at Constantinople. We learn from the letter just quoted that the death of Pope Honorius and the choice of Severinus to succeed him had already been made known at Constantinople before the Ecthesis was sent to Rome, which was, therefore, never presented for acceptance to Honorius.

      I will now take another narrative of what was happening at Rome. Honorius died on 12th October, 638, and was buried in peace and great renown at St. Peter's. The Romans chose their countryman Severinus, son of Labienus, for his successor. The confirmation was delayed during nineteen months and sixteen days, as it seems, because the elected refused to subscribe the Ecthesis of the patriarch Sergius, being a formulary favouring Monothelism.

      Before Severinus was yet consecrated the imperial officers practised a robbery upon the treasury of the Church, in which the violence exercised reminds of the dealing of Turkish pashas, with whom in general Byzantine ministers may be compared. The treasures of the Roman Church were kept in the vestiary of the episcopal palace. There were the costly presents which various Christian emperors, patricians, and consuls had left to the blessed Apostle Peter for the redemption of their souls, to be given, as occasion might be, in alms to the poor or for ransoming of captives. There was a report that Honorius had stored up vast sums, and his magnificent buildings caused full credence to be given to this report. Isaac, the exarch in Ravenna, found himself in want of money. The imperial troops riotously demanded to be paid. Isaac had long cast his eyes on the Church's treasury, and now devised a plan to get possession of it. The Book of the Popes gives a detailed description of this incident, and it is not only an exception to the scantiness of historical accounts about Rome, but casts a passing light on the circumstances of the city.

      The chartular Mauritius was then at Rome, perhaps as Magister Militum and commander of the Roman army. This consisted of troops in Byzantine pay, but no doubt was already organised as a city militia. Mauritius led by deceit against the Church of God, and taking counsel with certain ill-minded persons, stirred up this Roman force. What good, he said, is it that such a mass of money has been laid up by Pope Honorius in his Lateran Palace while your wages are not paid, which our lord the emperor has sent, and the holy man has put them in his treasury? Kindled by these words, all the armed men in the city of Rome, young and old, flocked to the Lateran Palace. They could not force an entrance, because those who attended on Severinus, the Pope elect, resisted. Mauritius, seeing this, encamped his army there for three days. Then he summoned the judges, that is, the high officers of the city, who were in his counsel. They broke in and set the imperial seal upon the treasure. Then Mauritius wrote an account of what he had done to the exarch Isaac at Ravenna, saying that he had put his seal on the treasury and they could take without harm anything which they liked. When Isaac learnt this he came to Rome; he banished all the chief persons of the church who resided in the several cities, so that none of the clergy could resist him, and, after some days, he entered the Lateran Palace; he stayed there eight days, and plundered everything. Part he sent to the emperor in the imperial city, part he gave to the troops, part he kept for himself. Anastasius concludes with the words: After this the most holy Severinus was consecrated, and Isaac returned to Ravenna. The meaning of which seems to be that Isaac had come to Rome under pretence of confirming the election of Severinus, which he made the elected Pope pay for by the plunder of his treasury.

      In the meantime Roman Commissioners were urging upon the emperor Heraclius at Constantinople to issue the imperial consent to the consecration of the Pope. After many negotiations, the chief of the clergy there showed them a doctrinal writing, the Ecthesis, and said, “We will only support you in your matter if you promise us to persuade the Pope to subscribe this act and to recognise without reserve the doctrines therein contained”. The Commissioners, who perceived the drift of the act, and that on account of this the first See of Christendom had so long remained unfilled, answered calmly and prudently: “In this affair we can do nothing. A message СКАЧАТЬ