Canon 104 of the Council of Carthage (North Africa, AD 407), preserved in the 5th-century Carthage Register, threatens with demotion clerics who ask the emperor for the judgement of secular judges.
Intended for scholary use. For credentials see Bibliography
Canon 104
De his qui publicorum iudiciorum cognitionem ab imperatore poposcerint.
Placuit ut quicumque ab imperatore cognitionem publicorum iudiciorum petierit, honore proprio priuetur; si autem episcopale iudicium ab imperatore postularit, nihil ei obsit.
(ed. Munier 1974: 218)
Canon 104
About those who ask the emperor for secular judges.
It pleased us that anyone who asks the emperor for the judgement of secular judges should be deprived of his dignity; if he asks the emperor for the judgement of bishops, nothing will happen to him.
(trans. S. Adamiak)
Discussion:
The canon does not explicitly mention clerics, but both the prohibition of using secular courts and the threat of "the depriving of dignity" makes sense only if it refers to them.
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 (AD 692).
Edition:
C. Munier ed., Concilia Africae a. 345-a. 525,Corpus Christianorum. Series Latina 149, Turnhoult 1974, 173-247.
Categories:
Public law - Ecclesiastical
Public law - Secular
Relation with - Monarch and royal/imperial family
Relation with - Secular authority
Further ecclesiastical career - Lay status
Administration of justice - Ecclesiastical
Administration of justice - Demotion
Please quote this record referring to
its author, database name, number, and, if possible, stable URL:
S. Adamiak, Presbyters
in the Late Antique West, ER313, http://www.presbytersproject.ihuw.pl/index.php?id=6&SourceID=313
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