From: Unknown correspondent
To: Pope Hormisdas, Rome (Gratus)
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.]
(a.5i9m. Hormisdae papae ad Theodosium arcliidiacoiium et universos
ecclesiae Gonstautiuopolitanae catholicos.
Quod ah haereticorum molestiis liherati sint gratulatur, seque legaios destinasse
indicat, quo possit perfecta Ecclesiae concordia componi,
Hormisda Theodosio archidiacono Constantinopo-
litano et universis catholicis a pari.
Gratias misericordiae divinae competenter exsolvimus, quae fidem
vestram diu laborare non passa est. Nam tempus oblatum est, quo
fidos*) milites suos catholica recuperare possit Ecclesia. Quae enim
major animum vestrum potest obtinere jucunditas, quam malorum
commemorata depulsio? Gaudiis praesentibus compensate afflictia-
nis incommoda: quia Deus noster, qui remedio fuit, adversis op-
primi caritatem vestram noluit sed probari. Nam si transacti tem-
poris mala cum praesenti, quae divina esse non ambigitur, retribu-
tione compensetis, quis dubitat ampliora vos praemia consecutos,
quam nocere potuisset adversitas? Et quamvis pro statu fidei catho-
licae nunquam soUicitudo nostra cessaverit, tamen serenissimi prin-
cipis sacris aflfatibus incitati, legatos destinare curavimus, quorum
officio Deo auctore in his, quae saepe mandavimus, subsequi non
dubitamus effectum. Et ideo competenter enitere, ut Ecclesiae ca-
tholicae hoc praecipuum vestrae liberationis mimus possitis offerre:
quatenus, repulsis omnibus quae hactenus nocuerunt, in una quam
semper optavimus communionae gratulantes, Deo nostro laudes re-
ferre sine cessatione possimus.
— (
EPISTOLAF. 02 -JO. ^t
◆
From:Unknown correspondent
To:Pope Hormisdas, Rome (Gratus)
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.]
Modern English rendering for readability. See the 19th-century translation or original Latin/Greek for scholarly use.