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ER 2252

Canon 6 (6b in the Greek version) of the Council of Serdica (Dacia) in 343 forbids to raise cities to the status of bishoprics if they are so small that they do not need more than a single presbyter.

Latin text:

Canon 6

Sed licentia danda passim non est: si enim subito aut uicus aliqui aut modica ciuitas, cui satis est unus praesbyter, uoluerit petere episcopum sibi ordinari, ut uilescat nomen episcopi et auctoritas, non debent illi ex alia prouincia inuitati facere episcopum, nisi aut in his ciuitatibus quae episcopos habuerint aut si qua talis et tam populosa est quae mereatur habere episcopum.

Si hoc omnibus placet?

SYNODVS RESPONDIT: Placet.

Greek text:

Canon VIb

Μἠ ἐξεῖναι δὲ ἁπλῶς καθιστᾶν ἐπίσκοπον κώμῃ τινὶ ἤ βραχείᾳ, πόλει, ᾗτινι καὶ εἷς μόνος πρεσβύτερος ἐπαρκεῖ· οὐκ ἀναγκαῖον γὰρ ἐπισκόπους ἐκεῖσε καθίστασθαι, ἵνα μὴ κατευτελίζηται τὸ τοῦ ἐπισκόπου ὄνομα καὶ ἡ αὐθεντία. ἀλλ᾽οἱ τῆς ἐπαρχίας, ὡς προεῖπον, ἐπίσκοποι ἐν ταύταις ταῖς πόλεσιν καθιστᾶν ἐπισκόπους ὀφείλουσιν ἔνθα καὶ πρότερον ἐτύγχανον γεγονότες ἐπίσκοποι· εἰ δὲ εὑρίσκοιτο οὕτως πληθύνουσά τις ἐν πολλῷ, ἀριθμῷ, λαοῦ πόλις ὡς ἀξίαν αὐτὴν καὶ ἐπισκοπῆς νομίζεσθαι, λαμβανέτω.

Εἰ πᾶσιν ἀρέσκει τοῦτο;

Ἀπεκρίναντο πάντες·

Ἀρέσκει.

(ed. Turner 1939)

Latin text:

Canon 6

But permission is not to be given indiscriminately. If, indeed, suddenly either a village or small city, for which one presbyter is sufficient, wishes to ask for a bishop to be ordained for that place, in order that the name and authority of bishop not be debased, those [bishops] invited from another province ought not to make a bishop, except in those cities which have had bishops, or if they are sufficiently populous to merit having a bishop.

Is this pleasing to all?

THE COUNCIL RESPONDED: It is pleasing.

Greek text:

Canon 6b

It is not permitted to appoint a bishop in a village or small city where one presbyter suffices. It is necessary that a bishop not be appointed there lest the name and power of bishop be degraded. But the [bishops] of the province ought, as I have said before, to appoint bishops in the cities in which bishops have formerly been. And if there be found a city abounding in great numbers of people so as to be thought worthy of an episcopal [see], let it receive [one].

Does this please all? ALL RESPONDED: It is pleasing.

(trans. Hess 2002: 215, 231)

Place of event:

Region

Danubian provinces and Illyricum

City

Serdica

About the source:

Title: Council of Serdica 343, Council of Sardica 343, Concilium Serdicense a. 343, Concilium Sardicense a. 343
Origin: Serdica (Danubian provinces and Illyricum)
Denomination: Catholic/Nicene/Chalcedonian, Arian

The Council of Serdica in Dacia was a part of the Trinitarian controversy. The matter failed to be settled at the council of Nicaea in 325 which produced a credo with the controversial term "homoousios" (consubstantial) to describe the Son-Father relation in the Trinity. One of the fiercest pro-Nicenes was bishop Athanasius of Alexandria, whom his opponents managed to sentence at the council of Tyre in 335. This decision caused controversy and there were attempts to revise it. In 341, in Rome, Pope Julius I gathered a council which overturned the sentence. Julius asked the Eastern bishops to approve this revision, but when they gathered in Antioch in 341 they failed to do that; they also issued the formulation of faith which avoided the term "homoousios", approved by the council of Nicaea. Julius I asked the emperors Constans and Constantius to convene a new council to resolve this disagreement. The council gathered in Sardica in 343 and was presided over by Hosius of Cordoba. Eastern bishops arrived but were unwilling to acquit Athanasius (and other pro-Nicenes condemned by the Eastern councils: Marcellus of Ancyra and Asclepus of Gaza) and they soon left the council and withdrew to Philippopolis where they held their own gathering. The Westerners continued the proceedings, rehabilitated Athanasius, and issued a set of disciplinary canons. These survived in two differing versions, Latin and Greek. There are 21 canons in the Latin text, and twenty in the Greek; the arrangement also slightly differs. For a detailed discussion of the council of Serdica 343 and the textual problems caused by the surviving text see: Hess 2003, Stephens 2015. See also Simonetti 1975: 161-87; Hanson 1988: 293-305.

Edition:

C.H. Turner (ed.), Ecclesiae Occidentalis monumenta iuris antiquissima, 2 vols, Oxford 1899-1939

Translation:

H. Hess, The Early Development of Canon Law and the Council of Serdica, Oxford 2002

Bibliography:

R.P.C. Hanson, The search for the Christian doctrine of God: the Arian controversy 318-381, Edinburgh 1988.

M. Simonetti, La crisi ariana nel IV secolo, Roma 1975.

C.W.B. Stephens, Canon law and episcopal authority: the canons of Antioch and Serdica, Oxford 2015.

Categories:

Further ecclesiastical career - Bishop

Functions within the Church - Urban presbyter

Described by a title - Presbyter/πρεσβύτερος

Specific number of presbyters from the same church

Public law - Ecclesiastical

Please quote this record referring to its author, database name, number, and, if possible, stable URL: M. Szada, Presbyters in the Late Antique West, ER2252, http://www.presbytersproject.ihuw.pl/index.php?id=6&SourceID=2252