The Presbyters Project

Canon 10

De familiaritatibus mulierum licet crebrius sit in canonibus replicatum, adtamen necesse est, ut, si secta uirgulta, quae mala pollulauerant, rursus fidei falce succidantur et iam radicitus eruantur. Nullus deinceps clericorum pro occasione necessitatis faciende vestes aut causa ordinandae domus extraneam mulierem in domum suam habere praesumat. Et cum iubeamur uictum aut uestitum artificiolo quaerere et manibus propriis laborare, quid opus est in domum serpentem includere pro ueste, quae multeformis uestem non propterea deponit, ut nudetur, sed ut se gratiorem, dum renouatur, ostendat?

(ed. de Clercq 1963: 179)

Canon 10

Concerning familiarity with women, although it has been repeatedly stated in [previous] canons, it is nevertheless necessary that the cut off brushwoods, which have sprouted evil, are in turn cut down with the scythe of faith and this time dug up with the roots. Therefore, no cleric should dare to have in his house a non-related woman under the pretext of the necessity to make clothes or keep the house in order. And since we were ordered to obtain nourishment and clothing by our own skill and hand, what is beneficial in accepting a serpent inside a house for the sake of clothing, a serpent which takes many forms and takes off clothes not in order to get naked but to seem more pleasing while changing?

(trans. J. Szafranowski)

Place of event:

Region

Gaul

City

Tours

About the source:

Title: The Second Council of Tours, Concilium Turonense II anno 567
Origin: Tours (Gaul)
Denomination: Catholic/Nicene/Chalcedonian

This council, the second one held in the city of Tours, gathered under the auspices of Charibert I on 18 November 567, in the last year of his reign. The list of subscribers for that synod is quite short as it holds only eight signatures. Suprisingly, it lacks even the bishop of Tours himself, Eufronius, or any bishop from his metropolitan province. Most probably, the original list was substantially longer.

Edition:

C. de Clercq ed., Concilia Galliae a. 511-a. 695, Corpus Christianorum. Series Latina 148 A, Turnhout 1963.

Translation:

J. Gaudemet, B. Basdevant, Les canons des conciles mérovingiens VIe-VIIe siècles, Sources chrétiennes 353, Paris 1989.

Categories:

Sexual life - Sexual activity

Sexual life - Sexual abstinence

Food/Clothes/Housing - Clothes

Food/Clothes/Housing - Type of housing

Described by a title - Clericus

Public law - Ecclesiastical

Relation with - Father/Mother

Relation with - Brother/Sister

Relation with - Other relative

Relation with - Woman

Please quote this record referring to its author, database name, number, and, if possible, stable URL: J. Szafranowski, Presbyters in the Late Antique West, ER1464, http://www.presbytersproject.ihuw.pl/index.php?id=6&SourceID=1464