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4 - Ecclesiastical Councils

from Part I

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  21 June 2019

By
Gregory I. Halfond
Edited by
Philip L. Reynolds
Philip L. Reynolds
Affiliation:
Emory University, Atlanta
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Summary

The history of conciliarism during the first millennium is also the story of episcopal corporatism. During this period, hundreds of episcopal councils assembled throughout the Latin West. Primarily regional meetings, these defy easy generalizations as regards their priorities and agendas and their influence on religious policy and practice. Despite their diversity, however, they constituted an institutional mechanism for bishops to craft rules whose authority was predicated chiefly on the consensus of the bishops as legislators. Collectively, bishops contributed to a growing body of ecclesiastical norms, which had yet to be fully delineated or codified. While promulgating policies for their immediate context, bishops consciously grounded their work in authoritative precedent, reaffirming both their shared corporate identity and authority and their role in the continuation of the apostolic tradition.

Keywords

councils, synods, canons, bishops, Cyprian of Carthage, Nicaea, Toledo, Gaul, Franks, Caesarius of Arles
Type
Chapter
Information
Great Christian Jurists and Legal Collections in the First Millennium , pp. 107 - 127
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2019

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Further Reading

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