The Presbyters Project

Canon 80

Vt de alieno monasterio susceptos nec praepositos monasterii nec clericos liceat ordinare.

Item placuit ut si quis de alterius monasterio repertum uel ad clericatum uel in suo monasterio maiorem monasterii constituerit episcopus, qui hoc fecerit, a communione seiunctus, suae tantum plebis communione contentus sit; et ille neque clericus neque praepositus perseueret.

(ed. Munier 1974: 204)

Canon 80

Those who are taken from another monastery should not be made superiors of the monastery or clerics.

It pleased us that if a bishop makes someone taken from a monastery of another [bishop] a cleric or superior of the monastery, he will be separated from the communion and will have to be satisfied by the communion with his own people. And the person in question will remain neither a cleric, nor a superior.

(trans. S. Adamiak)

Discussion:

Apart from barring monks from too easy an ecclesiastical career, the canon threatens the bishops guilty of promoting such monks with the unusual punishment of the breaking of communion with them by other bishops, without excommunicating them (leaving them 'the communion with their own peoples'). The function of the superior of a monastery is still clearly separated from clerical status.

Place of event:

Region

Latin North Africa
Italy south of Rome and Sicily

City

Carthage
Capua

About the source:

Title: Carthage Register, Registri Ecclesiae Carthaginensis Excerpta
Origin: Carthage (Latin North Africa)
Denomination: Catholic/Nicene/Chalcedonian

The text of the canon was transmitted in the Carthage Register (Registri Ecclesiae Carthaginensis Excerpta). This collection was compiled by an anonymous author in the 5th century and included by Dionysius Exiguus in his `Codex canonum Ecclesiae Universae` in the early 6th century. It is sometimes known as `Codex canonum Ecclesiae Africanae` (Clavis Patrum Latinorum erroneously attributes this name to the `Codices in causa Apiarii` alone). In the text of the collection, the fiction is maintained, as if they were all read at the session of the council of Carthage, 30 May 418. The canons from this collection were accepted later by the council of Trullo (692).

Edition:

C. Munier ed., Concilia Africae a. 345-a. 525, Corpus Christianorum. Series Latina 149, Turnhoult 1974, 173-247.

Categories:

Described by a title - Clericus

Monastic or common life - Monastic superior (abbot/prior)

Administration of justice - Excommunication/Anathema

Monastic or common life

Please quote this record referring to its author, database name, number, and, if possible, stable URL: S. Adamiak, Presbyters in the Late Antique West, ER311, http://www.presbytersproject.ihuw.pl/index.php?id=6&SourceID=311