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Edited from a variety of translations (mentioned in the preface) by H. R. Percival
THE ECUMENICAL COUNCILS Resources Online and in Print
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69 Pages
Page 60
Notes.
Ancient Epitome of Canon XXVIII.
The bishop of New Rome shall enjoy the same honour as the bishop of Old Rome, on account of the removal of the Empire. For this reason the [metropolitans] of Pontus, of Asia, and of Thrace, as well as the Barbarian bishops shall be ordained by the bishop of Constantinople.
Van Espen.
It is certain that this canon was expressly renewed by canon xxxvi. of the Council of Trullo and from that time has been numbered by the Greeks among the canons; and at last it was acknowledged by some Latin collectors also, and was placed by Gratian in his Decretum, although clearly with a different sense. (Pars I., Dist. xxii., C. vj.)
Bright.
Here is a great addition to the canon of 381, so ingeniously linked on to it as to seem at first sight a part of it. The words kai hoste are meant to suggest that what follows is in fact involved in what has preceded: whereas a new point of departure is here taken, and instead of a mere "honorary pre-eminence" the bishop of Constantinople acquires a vast jurisdiction, the independent authority of three exarchs being annulled in order to make him patriarch. Previously he had proedria now he gains prostasia. As we have seen, a series of aggrandizements in fact had prepared for this aggrandizement in law; and various metropolitans of Asia Minor expressed their contentment at seeing it effected. "It is, indeed, more than probable that the self-assertion of Rome excited the jealousy of her rival of the East," and thus "Eastern bishops secretly felt that the cause of Constantinople was theirs" (Gore's Leo the Great, p. 120); but the gratification of Constantinople ambition was not the less, in a canonical sense, a novelty, and the attempt to enfold it in the authority of the Council of 381 was rather astute than candid. The true plea, whatever might be its value, was that the Council had to deal with a fait accompli, which it was wise at once to legalize and to regulate; that the "boundaries of the respective exarchates...were ecclesiastical arrangements made with a view to the general good and peace of the Church, and liable to vary with the dispensations to which the Church was providentially subjected," so that "by confirming the ek pollou kratesan ethos in regard to the ordination of certain metropolitans (see Ep. of Council to Leo, Leon. Epist. xcviij., 4), "they were acting in the spirit, while violating the letter, of the ever-famous rule of Nicaea, ta archeia ethe krateito (cp. Newman, Transl. of Fleury, iii., 407). It is observable that Aristenus [295] and Symeon, Logothetes reckon this decree as a XXIX^th canon (Justellus, ii., 694, 720).
After the renewal of this canon by the Council of Trullo, Gratian adds "The VIII^th Synod held under Pope Hadrian II., canon xxj." (Decretum Pars I., Dist. xxij., C. vij.) "We define that no secular power shall hereafter dishonour anyone of these who rule our patriarchal sees, or attempt to move them from their proper throne, but shall judge them worthy of all reverence and honour; chiefly the most holy Pope of Old Rome, and then the Patriarch of Constantinople, and then those of Alexandria, and Antioch, and Jerusalem."
Reference address : https://elpenor.org/ecumenical-councils/fourth.asp?pg=60
