Letter 153

From: Unknown correspondent To: Pope Hormisdas, Rome (Justinian/Justin, Constantinople) 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.]

rustiiiiani comitis ad Hormisdam papam^ missa per eumdem ^^ g^e^^^f Oratum imperatoris legatum. De imperatoris soUicitudine pro concordia ecclesiarum nuntiat, utque Hormisda Constantinopolim vel ipse se conferre vel legatos destinare non differat, rogat. Justinianus comes Hormisdae papae. Desiderabile tempus, quod summis votis optavimus, divina cle- aentia; dolores generis humani respiciens, largiri dignata est, quo •rnnes catholici et Deo perfecte fideles majestati ejus se valeant com- aendare. Idcirco has ad apostolatum vestrum, libera licentia jam oihi beneficio coelesti indulta, direxi. Dominus etenim noster in- ictissimus imperator orthodoxam religionem semper amplectens brdentissima fide, cupiensque sacrosanctas ecclesias ad concordiam evocare, mox ut adeptus est coelesti judicio infulas principales, Acerdotibus hic positis denimtiavit, ut pro regulis apostolicis uniren- or ecclesiae. Et magna quidem pars fidei^) est composita Deo kuctore; de nomine tantummodo Acacii vestrae beatitudinis convenit »rdiri^) consensum. Quam ob causam dominus noster serenissimus ') Leonis nomen a Timotheo e sacris diptychis sublatum esse id argumento »t; nam hoc nefas a Macedonio, in crgus sedem is Timotheus invaserat, nemo rediderit admisBum. Thrist. tom. I pag. 434 sq.). Hinc confirmatur, quod Pagius ad annum 518 n. 1 >robat, frustra a nonnullis Florentium Magno coUegam a(^'ungi. 14 0 b omitt. fidei. EPI8T0LAB BOMAN. PONTIF. I. 53 (a. 518.) princeps Gratum yirum sublimem^ unanimem mihi amicum, cimi paginis augustis ad sanetitatem tuam transmisit, ut modis omnibus dignetur Constantinopolim ad reliqua concordiae componenda Tenire. Sed absque quadam^) dilatione vestrum exspectamus adventimi, quem si qua tarditas, quo fieri debet, forsitan retinuerit, interim vel sacerdotes idoneos destinare festinet, quia totus mundus partiiiin nostrarum conversus ad unitatem moras non patitur. Aceelerate ergo, domini sanctissimi, ne vobis absentibus, quae debent*) prae- sidentibus, ordinari. Scimus etenim litteras vestrae beatitudinis et antecessorum vestrorum ad Orientem directas, quid super hac eadem causa contineant. Ut autem nihil praetermittatur, propter causam saepius memoratam ad^) invictissimum regem religionis quoque ne- gotium filio vestro viro subUmi Grato est injunctum, favente Domino nostro Jesu Christo.