Pelagianism received its name from Pelagius and designates a heresy of the
fifth century, which denied original sin as well as Christian grace.
Life and Writings of Pelagius
Apart from the chief episodes of the Pelagian controversy, little or
nothing is known about the personal career of Pelagius. It is only after he
bade a lasting farewell to Rome in A. D. 411 that the sources become more
abundant; but from 418 on history is again silent about his person. As St.
Augustine (De peccat. orig., xxiv) testifies that he lived in Rome "for a
very long time", we may presume that he resided there at least since the
reign of Pope Anastasius (398-401). But about his long life prior to the
year 400 and above all about his youth, we are left wholly in the dark.
Even the country of his birth is disputed. While the most trustworthy
witnesses, such as Augustine, Orosius, Prosper, and Marius Mercator, are
quite explicit in assigning Britain as his native country, as is apparent
from his cognomen of Brito or Britannicus, Jerome (Praef. in Jerem., lib. I
and III) ridicules him as a "Scot" (loc. cit., "habet enim progeniem
Scoticae gentis de Britannorum vicinia"), who being "stuffed with Scottish
porridge" (Scotorum pultibus proegravatus) suffers from a weak memory.
Rightly arguing that the "Scots" of those days were really the Irish, H.
Zimmer ("Pelagius in Irland", p.20, Berlin, 1901) has advanced weighty
reasons for the hypothesis that the true home of Pelagius must be sought in
Ireland, and that he journeyed through the southwest of Britain to Rome.
Tall in stature and portly in appearance (Jerome, loc. cit., "grandis et
corpulentus"), Pelagius was highly educated, spoke and wrote Latin as well
as Greek with great fluency and was well versed in theology. Though a monk
and consequently devoted to practical asceticism, he never was a cleric;
for both Orosius and Pope Zosimus simply call him a "layman". In Rome
itself he enjoyed the reputation of austerity, while St. Augustine called
him even a "saintly man", vir sanctus: with St. Paulinus of Nola (405) and
other prominent bishops, he kept up an edifying correspondence, which he
used later for his personal defence.
During his sojourn in Rome he composed several works: "De fide Trinitatis
libri III", now lost, but extolled by Gennadius as "indispensable reading
matter for students"; "Eclogarum ex divinis Scripturis liber unus", in the
main collection of Bible passages based on Cyprian's "Testimoniorum libri
III", of which St. Augustine has preserved a number of fragments;
"Commentarii in epistolas S. Pauli", elaborated no doubt before the
destruction of Rome by Alaric (410) and known to St. Augustine in 412.
Zimmer (loc. cit.) deserves credit for having rediscovered in this
commentary on St. Paul the original work of Pelagius, which had, in the
course of time, been attributed to St. Jerome (P. L., XXX, 645-902). A
closer examination of this work, so suddenly become famous, brought to
light the fact that it contained the fundamental ideas which the Church
afterwards condemned as "Pelagian heresy". In it Pelagius denied the
primitive state in paradise and original sin (cf. P. L., XXX, 678,
"Insaniunt, qui de Adam per traducem asserunt ad nos venire peccatum"),
insisted on the naturalness of concupiscence and the death of the body, and
ascribed the actual existence and universality of sin to the bad example
which Adam set by his first sin. As all his ideas were chiefly rooted in
the old, pagan philosophy, especially in the popular system of the Stoics,
rather than in Christianity, he regarded the moral strength of man's will
(liberum arbitrium), when steeled by asceticism, as sufficient in itself to
desire and to attain the loftiest ideal of virtue. The value of Christ's
redemption was, in his opinion, limited mainly to instruction (doctrina)
and example (exemplum), which the Saviour threw into the balance as a
counter-weight against Adam's wicked example, so that nature retains the
ability to conquer sin and to gain eternal life even without the aid of
grace. By justification we are indeed cleansed of our personal sins through
faith alone (loc. cit., 663, "per solam fidem justificat Deus impium
convertendum"), but this pardon (gratia remissionis) implies no interior
renovation of sanctification of the soul. How far the sola-fides doctrine
"had no stouter champion before Luther than Pelagius" and whether, in
particular, the Protestant conception of fiducial faith dawned upon him
many centuries before Luther, as Loofs ("Realencyklop�dies fur protest.
Theologie", XV, 753, Leipzig, 1904) assumes, probably needs more careful
investigation. For the rest, Pelagius would have announced nothing new by
this doctrine, since the Antinomists of the early Apostolic Church were
already familiar with "justification by faith alone" (cf. JUSTIFICATION);
on the other hand, Luther's boast of having been the first to proclaim the
doctrine of abiding faith, might well arouse opposition. However, Pelagius
insists expressly (loc. cit. 812), "Ceterum sine operibus fidei, non legis,
mortua est fides". But the commentary on St. Paul is silent on one chief
point of doctrine, i.e. the significance of infant baptism, which supposed
that the faithful were even then clearly conscious of the existence of
original sin in children.
To explain psychologically Pelagius's whole line of thought, it does not
suffice to go back to the ideal of the wise man, which he fashioned after
the ethical principles of the Stoics and upon which his vision was centred.
We must also take into account that his intimacy with the Greeks developed
in him, though unknown to himself, a one-sidedness, which at first sight
appears pardonable. The gravest error into which he and the rest of the
Pelagians fell, was that they did not submit to the doctrinal decisions of
the Church. While the Latins had emphasized the guilt rather than its
punishment, as the chief characteristic of original sin, the Greeks on the
other hand (even Chrysostom) laid greater stress on the punishment than on
the guilt. Theodore of Mopsuestia went even so far as to deny the
possibility of original guilt and consequently the penal character of the
death of the body. Besides, at that time, the doctrine of Christian grace
was everywhere vague and undefined; even the West was convinced of nothing
more than that some sort of assistance was necessary to salvation and was
given gratuitously, while the nature of this assistance was but little
understood. In the East, moreover, as an offset to widespread fatalism, the
moral power and freedom of the will were at times very strongly or even too
strongly insisted on assisting grace being spoken of more frequently than
preventing grace (see GRACE). It was due to the intervention of St.
Augustine and the Church, that greater clearness was gradually reached in
the disputed questions and that the first impulse was given towards a more
careful development of the dogmas of original sin and grace (cf. Mausbach,
"Die Ethnik des hl. Augustinus", II, 1 sqq., Freiburg, 1909).
Pelagius and Caelestius (411-415)
Of far-reaching influence upon the further progress of Pelagianism was the
friendship which Pelagius contracted in Rome with Caelestius, a lawyer of
noble (probably Italian) descent. A eunuch by birth, but endowed with no
mean talents, Caelestius had been won over to asceticism by his enthusiasm
for the monastic life, and in the capacity of a lay-monk he endeavoured to
convert the practical maxims learnt from Pelagius, into theoretical
principles, which successfully propagated in Rome. St. Augustine, while
charging Pelagius with mysteriousness, mendacity, and shrewdness, calls
Caelestius (De peccat. orig., xv) not only "incredibly loquacious", but
also open-hearted, obstinate, and free in social intercourse. Even if their
secret or open intrigues did not escape notice, still the two friends were
not molested by the official Roman circles. But matters changed when in 411
they left the hospitable soil of the metropolis, which had been sacked by
Alaric (410), and set sail for North Africa. When they landed on the coast
near Hippo, Augustine, the bishop of that city, was absent, being fully
occupied in settling the Donatist disputes in Africa. Later, he met
Pelagius in Carthage several times, without, however, coming into closer
contact with him. After a brief sojourn in North Africa, Pelagius travelled
on to Palestine, while Caelestius tried to have himself made a presbyter in
Carthage. But this plan was frustrated by the deacon Paulinus of Milan, who
submitted to the bishop, Aurelius, a memorial in which six theses of
Caelestius - perhaps literal extracts from his lost work "Contra traducem
peccati" - were branded as heretical. These theses ran as follows:
1. Even if Adam had not sinned, he would have died.
2. Adam's sin harmed only himself, not the human race.
3. Children just born are in the same state as Adam before his fall.
4. The whole human race neither dies through Adam's sin or death, nor
rises again through the resurrection of Christ.
5. The (Mosaic Law) is as good a guide to heaven as the Gospel.
6. Even before the advent of Christ there were men who were without sin.
On account of these doctrines, which clearly contain the quintessence of
Pelagianism, Caelestius was summoned to appear before a synod at Carthage
(411); but he refused to retract them, alleging that the inheritance of
Adam's sin was an open question and hence its denial was no heresy. As a
result he was not only excluded from ordination, but his six theses were
condemned. He declared his intention of appealing to the pope in Rome, but
without executing his design went to Ephesus in Asia Minor, where he was
ordained a priest.
Meanwhile the Pelagian ideas had infected a wide area, especially around
Carthage, so that Augustine and other bishops were compelled to take a
resolute stand against them in sermons and private conversations. Urged by
his friend Marcellinus, who "daily endured the most annoying debates with
the erring brethren", St. Augustine in 412 wrote the famous works: "De
peccatorum meritis et remissione libri III" (P. L., XLIV, 109 sqq.) and "De
spiritu et litera" (ibid., 201 sqq.), in which he positively established
the existence of original sin, the necessity of infant baptism, the
impossibility of a life without sin, and the necessity of interior grace
(spiritus) in opposition to the exterior grace of the law (litera). When in
414 disquieting rumours arrived from Sicily and the so-called "Definitiones
Caelestii" (reconstructed in Garnier, "Marii Mercatoris Opera", I, 384
sqq., Paris, 1673), said to be the work of Caelestius, were sent to him, he
at once (414 or 415) published the rejoinder, "De perfectione justitiae
hominis" (P. L., XLIV, 291 sqq.), in which he again demolished the illusion
of the possibility of complete freedom from sin. Out of charity and in
order to win back the erring the more effectually, Augustine, in all these
writings, never mentioned the two authors of the heresy by name.
Meanwhile Pelagius, who was sojourning in Palestine, did not remain idle;
to a noble Roman virgin, named Demetrias, who at Alaric's coming had fled
to Carthage, he wrote a letter which is still extant (in P. L., XXX, 15-45)
and in which he again inculcated his Stoic principles of the unlimited
energy of nature. Moreover, he published in 415 a work, now lost, "De
natura", in which he attempted to prove his doctrine from authorities,
appealing not only to the writings of Hilary and Ambrose, but also to the
earlier works of Jerome and Augustine, both of whom were still alive. The
latter answered at once (415) by his treatise "De natura et gratia" (P. L.,
XLIV, 247 sqq.). Jerome, however, to whom Augustine's pupil Orosius, a
Spanish priest, personally explained the danger of the new heresy, and who
had been chagrined by the severity with which Pelagius had criticized his
commentary on the Epistle to the Ephesians, thought the time ripe to enter
the lists; this he did by his letter to Ctesiphon (Ep. cxxliii) and by his
graceful "Dialogus contra Pelagianos" (P. L., XXIII, 495 sqq.). He was
assisted by Orosius, who, forthwith accused Pelagius in Jerusalem of
heresy. Thereupon, Bishop John of Jerusalem "dearly loved" (St. Augustine,
"Ep. clxxix") Pelagius and had him at the time as his guest. He convoked in
July, 415, a diocesan council for the investigation of the charge. The
proceedings were hampered by the fact that Orosius, the accusing party, did
not understand Greek and had engaged a poor interpreter, while the
defendant Pelagius was quite able to defend himself in Greek and uphold his
orthodoxy. However, according to the personal account (written at the close
of 415) of Orosius (Liber apolog. contra Pelagium, P. L., XXXI, 1173), the
contesting parties at last agreed to leave the final judgment on all
questions to the Latins, since both Pelagius and his adversaries were
Latins, and to invoke the decision of Innocent I; meanwhile silence was
imposed on both parties.
But Pelagius was granted only a short respite. For in the very same year,
the Gallic bishops, Heros of Arles and Lazarus of Aix, who, after the
defeat of the usurper Constantine (411), had resigned their bishoprics and
gone to Palestine, brought the matter before Bishop Eulogius of Caesarea,
with the result that the latter summoned Pelagius in December, 415, before
a synod of fourteen bishops, held in Diospolis, the ancient Lydda. But
fortune again favoured the heresiarch. About the proceedings and the issue
we are exceptionally well informed through the account of St. Augustine,
"De gestis Pelagii" (P. L., XLIV, 319 sqq.), written in 417 and based on
the acts of the synod. Pelagius punctually obeyed the summons, but the
principal complainants, Heros and Lazarus, failed to make their appearance,
one of them being prevented by ill-health. And as Orosius, too, derided and
persecuted by Bishop John of Jerusalem, had departed, Pelagius met no
personal plaintiff, while he found at the same time a skillful advocate in
the deacon Anianus of Celeda (cf. Hieronym., "Ep. cxliii", ed. Vallarsi, I,
1067). The principal points of the petition were translated by an
interpreter into Greek and read only in an extract. Pelagius, having won
the good-will of the assembly by reading to them some private letters of
prominent bishops - among them one of Augustine (Ep. cxlvi) - began to
explain away and disprove the various accusations. Thus from the charge
that he made the possibility of a sinless life solely dependent on free
will, he exonerated himself by saying that, on the contrary, he required
the help of God (adjutorium Dei) for it, though by this he meant nothing
else than the grace of creation (gratia creationis). Of other doctrines
with which he had been charged, he said that, formulated as they were in
the complaint, they did not originate from him, but from Caelestius, and
that he also repudiated them. After the hearing there was nothing left for
the synod but to discharge the defendant and to announce him as worthy of
communion with the Church. The Orient had now spoken twice and had found
nothing to blame in Pelagius, because he had hidden his real sentiments
from his judges.
Continuation and End of Controversy (415-418)
The new acquittal of Pelagius did not fail to cause excitement and alarm in
North Africa, whither Orosius had hastened in 416 with letters from Bishops
Heros and Lazarus. To parry the blow, something decisive had to be done. In
autumn, 416, 67 bishops from Proconsular Africa assembled in a synod at
Carthage, which was presided over by Aurelius, while fifty-nine bishops of
the ecclesiastical province of Numidia, to which the See of Hippo, St.
Augustine's see belonged, held a synod in Mileve. In both places the
doctrines of Pelagius and Caelestius were again rejected as contradictory
to the Catholic faith. However, in order to secure for their decisions "the
authority of the Apostolic See", both synods wrote to Innocent I,
requesting his supreme sanction. And in order to impress upon him more
strongly the seriousness of the situation, five bishops (Augustine,
Aurelius, Alypius, Evodius, and Possidius) forwarded to him a joint letter,
in which they detailed the doctrine of original sin, infant baptism, and
Christian grace (St. Augustine, "Epp. clxxv-vii"). In three separate
epistles, dated 27 Jan., 417, the pope answered the synodal letters of
Carthage and Mileve as well as that of the five bishops (Jaff�, "Regest.",
2nd ed., nn. 321-323, Leipzig, 1885). Starting from the principle that the
resolutions of provincial synods have no binding force until they are
confirmed by the supreme authority of the Apostolic See, the pope developed
the Catholic teaching on original sin and grace, and excluded Pelagius and
Caelestius, who were reported to have rejected these doctrines, form
communion with the Church until they should come to their senses (donec
resipiscant). In Africa, where the decision was received with unfeigned
joy, the whole controversy was now regarded as closed, and Augustine, on 23
September, 417, announced from the pulpit (Serm., cxxxi, 10 in P. L.,
XXXVIII, 734), "Jam de hac causa duo concilia missa sunt ad Sedem
apostolicam, inde etiam rescripta venerunt; causa finita est". (Two synods
having written to the Apostolic See about this matter; the replies have
come back; the question is settled.) But he was mistaken; the matter was
not yet settled.
Innocent I died on 12 March, 417, and Zosimus, a Greek by birth, succeeded
him. Before his tribunal the whole Pelagian question was now opened once
more and discussed in all its bearings. The occasion for this was the
statements which both Pelagius and Caelestius submitted to the Roman See in
order to justify themselves. Though the previous decisions of Innocent I
had removed all doubts about the matter itself, yet the question of the
persons involved was undecided, viz. Did Pelagius and Caelestius really
teach the theses condemned as heretical? Zosimus' sense of justice forbade
him to punish anyone with excommunication before he was duly convicted of
his error. And if the steps recently taken by the two defendants were
considered, the doubts which might arise on this point were not wholly
groundless. In 416 Pelagius had published a new work, now lost, "De libero
arbitrio libri IV", which in its phraseology seemed to verge towards the
Augustinian conception of grace and infant baptism, even if in principle it
did not abandon the author's earlier standpoint. Speaking of Christian
grace, he admitted not only a Divine revelation, but also a sort of
interior grace, viz. an illumination of the mind (through sermons, reading
of the Bible, etc.), adding, however, that the latter served not to make
salutary works possible, but only to facilitate their performance. As to
infant baptism he granted that it ought to be administered in the same form
as in the case of adults, not in order to cleanse the children from a real
original guilt, but to secure to them entrance into the "kingdom of God".
Unbaptized children, he thought, would after their death be excluded from
the "kingdom of God", but not from "eternal life". This work, together with
a still extant confession of faith, which bears witness to his childlike
obedience, Pelagius sent to Rome, humbly begging at the same time that
chance inaccuracies might be corrected by him who "holds the faith and see
of Peter". All this was addressed to Innocent I, of whose death Pelagius
had not yet heard. Caelestius, also, who meanwhile had changed his
residence from Ephesus to Constantinople, but had been banished thence by
the anti-Pelagian Bishop Atticus, took active steps toward his own
rehabilitation. In 417 he went to Rome in person and laid at the feet of
Zosimus a detailed confession of faith (Fragments, P. L., XLV, 1718), in
which he affirmed his belief in all doctrines, "from the Trinity of one God
to the resurrection of the dead" (cf. St. Augustine, "De peccato orig.",
xxiii).
Highly pleased with this Catholic faith and obedience, Zosimus sent two
different letters (P. L., XLV, 1719 sqq.) to the African bishops, saying
that in the case of Caelestius Bishops Heros and Lazarus had proceeded
without due circumspection, and that Pelagius too, as was proved by his
recent confession of faith, had not swerved from the Catholic truth. As to
Caelestius, who was then in Rome, the pope charged the Africans either to
revise their former sentence or to convict him of heresy in his own (the
pope's) presence within two months. The papal command struck Africa like a
bomb-shell. In great haste a synod was convened at Carthage in November,
417, and writing to Zosimus, they urgently begged him not to rescind the
sentence which his predecessor, Innocent I, had pronounced against Pelagius
and Caelestius, until both had confessed the necessity of interior grace
for all salutary thoughts, words, and deeds. At last Zosimus came to a
halt. By a rescript of 21 March, 418, he assured them that he had not yet
pronounced definitively, but that he was transmitting to Africa all
documents bearing on Pelagianism in order to pave the way for a new, joint
investigation. Pursuant to the papal command, there was held on 1 May, 418,
in the presence of 200 bishops, the famous Council of Carthage, which again
branded Pelagianism as a heresy in eight (or nine) canons (Denzinger,
"Enchir.", 10th ed., 1908, 101-8). Owing to their importance they may be
summarized:
1. Death did not come to Adam from a physical necessity, but through sin.
2. New-born children must be baptized on account of original sin.
3. Justifying grace not only avails for the forgiveness of past sins, but
also gives assistance for the avoidance of future sins.
4. The grace of Christ not only discloses the knowledge of God's
commandments, but also imparts strength to will and execute them.
5. Without God's grace it is not merely more difficult, but absolutely
impossible to perform good works.
6. Not out of humility, but in truth must we confess ourselves to be
sinners.
7. The saints refer the petition of the Our Father, "Forgive us our
trespasses", not only to others, but also to themselves.
8. The saints pronounce the same supplication not from mere humility, but
from truthfulness.
9. Some codices containing a ninth canon (Denzinger, loc. cit., note 3):
Children dying without baptism do not go to a "middle place" (medius
locus), since the non reception of baptism excludes both from the
"kingdom of heaven" and from "eternal life".
These clearly worded canons, which (except the last-named) afterwards came
to be articles of faith binding on the universal Church, gave the death
blow to Pelagianism; sooner or later it would bleed to death.
Meanwhile, urged by the Africans (probably through a certain Valerian, who
as comes held an influential position in Ravenna), the secular power also
took a hand in the dispute, the Emperor Honorius, by rescript of 30 April,
418, from Ravenna, banishing all Pelagians from the cities of Italy.
Whether Caelestius evaded the hearing before Zosimus, to which he was now
bound, "by fleeing from Rome" (St. Augustine, "Contra duas epist. Pelag.",
II, 5), or whether he was one of the first to fall a victim to the imperial
decree of exile, cannot be satisfactorily settled from the sources. With
regard to his later life, we are told that in 421 he again haunted Rome or
its vicinity, but was expelled a second time by an imperial rescript (cf.
P. L., XLV, 1750). It is further related that in 425 his petition for an
audience with Celestine I was answered by a third banishment (cf. P. L.,
LI, 271). He then sought refuge in the orient, where we shall meet him
later. Pelagius could not have been included in the imperial decree of
exile from Rome. For at that time he undoubtedly resided in the Orient,
since, as late as the summer of 418, he communicated with Pinianus and his
wife Melania, who lived in Palestine (cf. Card. Rampolla, "Santa Melania
giuniore", Rome, 1905). But this is the last information we have about him;
he probably died in the orient. Having received the Acts of the Council of
Carthage, Zosimus sent to all the bishops of the world his famous "Epistola
tractoria" (418) of which unfortunately only fragments have come down to
us. This papal encyclical, a lengthy document, gives a minute account of
the entire "causa Caelestii et Pelagii", from whose works it quotes
abundantly, and categorically demands the condemnation of Pelagianism as a
heresy. The assertion that every bishop of the world was obliged to confirm
this circular by his own signature, cannot be proved, it is more probable
that the bishops were required to transmit to Rome a written agreement; if
a bishop refused to sign, he was deposed from his office and banished. A
second and harsher rescript, issued by the emperor on 9 June, 419, and
addressed to Bishop Aurelius of Carthage (P. L., XLV, 1731), gave
additional force to this measure. Augustine's triumph was complete. In 418,
drawing the balance, as it were, of the whole controversy, he wrote against
the heresiarchs his last great work, "De gratia Christi et de peccato
originali" (P. L., XLIV, 359 sqq.).
The Disputes of St. Augustine with Julian of Eclanum (419-428)
Through the vigorous measures adopted in 418, Pelagianism was indeed
condemned, but not crushed. Among the eighteen bishops of Italy who were
exiled on account of their refusal to sign the papal decree, Julian, Bishop
of Eclanum, a city of Apulia now deserted, was the first to protest against
the "Tractoria" of Zosimus. Highly educated and skilled in philosophy and
dialectics, he assumed the leadership among the Pelagians. But to fight for
Pelagianism now meant to fight against Augustine. The literary feud set in
at once. It was probably Julian himself who denounced St. Augustine as
damnator nupitarum to the influential comes Valerian in Ravenna, a
nobleman, who was very happily married. To meet the accusation, Augustine
wrote, at the beginning of 419, an apology, "De nuptiis et concupiscentia
libri II" (P. L., XLIV, 413 sqq.) and addressed it to Valerian. Immediately
after (419 or 420), Julian published a reply which attacked the first book
of Augustine's work and bore the title , "Libri IV ad Turbantium". But
Augustine refuted it in his famous rejoinder, written in 421 or 422,
"Contra Iulianum libri VI" (P. L., XLIV, 640 sqq.). When two Pelagian
circulars, written by Julian and scourging the "Manichaean views" of the
Antipelagians, fell into his hands, he attacked them energetically (420 or
421) in a work, dedicated to Boniface I, "Contra duas epistolas
Pelagianorum libri IV" (P. L., XLIV, 549 sqq.). Being driven from Rome,
Julian had found (not later than 421) a place of refuge in Cilicia with
Theodore of Mopsuestia. Here he employed his leisure in elaborating an
extensive work, "Libri VIII ad Florum", which was wholly devoted to
refuting the second book of Augustine's "De nuptiis et concupiscentia".
Though composed shortly after 421, it did not come to the notice of St.
Augustine until 427. The latter's reply, which quotes Julian's
argumentations sentence for sentence and refutes them, was completed only
as far as the sixth book, whence it is cited in patristic literature as
"Opus imperfectum contra Iulianum" (P. L., XLV, 1049 sqq.). A comprehensive
account of Pelagianism, which brings out into strong relief the
diametrically opposed views of the author, was furnished by Augustine in
428 in the final chapter of his work, "De haeresibus" (P. L., XLII, 21
sqq.). Augustine's last writings published before his death (430) were no
longer aimed against Pelagianism but against Semipelagianism.
After the death of Theodore of Mopsuestia (428), Julian of Eclanum left the
hospitable city of Cilicia and in 429 we meet him unexpectedly in company
with his fellow exiles Bishops Florus, Orontius, and Fabius, and the Court
of the Patriarch Nestorius of Constantinople, who willingly supported the
fugitives. It was here, too, in 429, that Caelestius emerged again as the
prot�g� of the patriarch; this is his last appearance in history; for from
now on all trace of him is lost. But the exiled bishops did not long enjoy
the protection of Nestorius. When Marius Mercator, a layman and friend of
St. Augustine, who was then present in Constantinople, heard of the
machinations of the Pelagians in the imperial city, he composed towards the
end of 429 his "Commonitorium super nomine Caelestii" (P. L., XLVIII, 63
sqq.), in which he exposed the shameful life and the heretical character of
Nestorius' wards. The result was that the Emperor Theodosius II decreed
their banishment in 430. When the Ecumenical Council of Ephesus (431)
repeated the condemnation pronounced by the West (cf. Mansi, "Concil.
collect.", IV, 1337), Pelagianism was crushed in the East. According to the
trustworthy report of Prosper of Aquitaine ("Chronic." ad a. 439, in P. L.,
LI, 598), Julian of Eclanum, feigning repentance, tried to regain
possession of his former bishopric, a plan which Sixtus III (432-40)
courageously frustrated. The year of his death is uncertain. He seems to
have died in Italy between 441 and 445 during the reign of Valentinian III.
Last Traces of Pelagianism (429-529)
After the Council of Ephesus (431), Pelagianism no more disturbed the Greek
Church, so that the Greek historians of the fifth century do not even
mention either the controversy of the names of the heresiarchs. But the
heresy continued to smoulder in the West and died our very slowly. The main
centres were Gaul and Britain. About Gaul we are told that a synod, held
probably at Troyes in 429, was compelled to take steps against the
Pelagians. It also sent Bishops Germanus of Auxerre and Lupus of Troyes to
Britain to fight the rampant heresy, which received powerful support from
two pupils of Pelagius, Agricola and Fastidius (cf. Caspari, "Letters,
Treatises and Sermons from the two last Centuries of Ecclesiastical
Antiquity", pp. 1-167, Christiana, 1891). Almost a century later, Wales was
the centre of Pelagian intrigues. For the saintly Archbishop David of
Menevia participated in 519 in the Synod of Brefy, which directed its
attacks against the Pelagians residing there, and after he was made Primate
of Cambria, he himself convened a synod against them. In Ireland also
Pelagius's "Commentary on St. Paul", described in the beginning of this
article, was in use long afterwards, as is proved by many Irish quotations
from it. Even in Italy traces can be found, not only in the Diocese of
Aquileia (cf. Garnier, "Opera Marii Mercat.", I, 319 sqq., Paris, 1673),
but also in Middle Italy; for the so-called "Liber Praedestinatus", written
about 440 perhaps in Rome itself, bears not so much the stamp of
Semipelagianism as of genuine Pelagianism (cf. von Schubert, "Der sog.
Praedestinatus, ein Beitrag zur Geschichte des Pelagianismus", Leipzig,
1903). A more detailed account of this work will be found under the article
PREDESTINARIANISM. It was not until the Second Synod of Orange (529) that
Pelagianism breathed its last in the West, though that convention aimed its
decisions primarily against Semipelagianism (q. v.).
JOSEPH POHLE
Transcribed by Anthony A. Killeen
Aeterna non caduca
Taken from the New Advent Web Page (www.knight.org/advent).
This article is part of the Catholic Encyclopedia Project, an effort aimed at placing the entire Catholic Encyclopedia 1913 edition on the World Wide Web. The coordinator is Kevin Knight, editor of the New Advent Catholic Website. If you would like to contribute to this worthwhile project, you can contact him by e-mail at (knight.org/advent). For more information please download the file cathen.txt/.zip.
