The Council of Sardica - A.D. 343/344

Edited from a variety of translations (mentioned in the preface) by H. R. Percival

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Aristenus.

This [penalty] is something unheard of and horrible, that he should not be deemed worthy of communion even at the hour of death; for it is a provision found nowhere else imposed by any canon, nor inflicted upon any sin.

Van Espen.

The Greek author Aristenus [in the above remarks] probably has not erred from the truth when he asserts that to no crime was this penalty attached, if he refers to the Eastern Churches; for Morinus himself (in the xix^th chapter of the ix^th book, De Penitentia), confesses that this penalty was never attached to any crime among the Easterns: nevertheless in some Churches in the first ages the three crimes of idolatry, murder, and adultery were thus punished: that is, that to those who admitted any one of these, reconciliation was denied even at his death, "and this," says Morinus, "I think no one can deny, who is at all versed in the testimony of the ancients on this point."

Hefele.

The addition in the Latin text, qui sinceram fidem non habent, is found both in Dionysius Exiguus and in Isidore and the Prisca, and its meaning is as follows: "In a town, some few, especially those who have not the true faith, can be easily bribed to demand this or that person as bishop." The Fathers of Sardica plainly had here in view the Arians and their adherents, who, through such like machinations, when they had gained over, if only a small party in a town, sought to press into the bishoprics. The Synod of Antioch moreover, in 341, although the Eusebians, properly speaking, were dominant there, had laid down in the twenty-first canon a similar, only less severe, rule.

This canon is found in the Corpus Juris Canonici, Raymond's Decretales, cap. ii, De electione, but with the noteworthy addition "unless he shall have repented." These words do not occur in the other Latin versions, and Hefele thinks them to have been added by Raymond of Pennaforte.

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