Canons of the VII Ecumenical Councils

Interpretation.

The present Canon decrees with reference to persons that had been followers of the heresy of Paul of Samosata,[35] but who later resorted to the catholic Church, that the Canon and form requires such heretics to be rebaptized by decision (note that the Council improperly designates the baptism of Paulianists as a baptism, and in comparing it with our baptism, and not with itself, it employed also the verb “rebaptize,” which means to baptize a second time; and see the prolegomena to the Council of Carthagene with respect to their not being baptized in identically the same manner as Orthodox Christians). But if some of them had been ordained clergymen before their Orthodox baptism, because the prelates who ordained them were not aware of the fact that they were heretics or that they had been ordained in the clergy according to the Paulianists; then and in that case, I say, after being rebaptized with an Orthodox baptism, if their life appears to have been blameless and unimpeachable,[36] let them be ordained by a Bishop of the catholic and Orthodox Church, since the former ordination which they had received while heretics is not considered an ordination at all. For how can anyone that has not been baptized in accordance with the Orthodox faith receive a visitation of the Holy Spirit, and grace, in ordination? But if when examined they are found to be unworthy of holy orders, they must be deposed, or, in other words, they must be ousted from the clergy. For the word depose was employed here improperly instead of the word oust, since, properly speaking, one who has previously been elevated to the height of holy orders and of the clergy, is said to be deposed. But as to these men who have never received any ordination at all, from what height shall they be deposed? From none, of course. Or perhaps it means for them to be deposed from the (height? of the) holy orders and clergy claimed by the Paulianists. For just as it called what they instituted baptism, it also called what they had proposed clergy, and by the same token deposition, in the same way as c. VIII of Laodicea calls the ones set up by the Montanists clergy. But this which we have asserted as concerning men must also be observed in identically the same manner in regard to women: that is to say, in other words, if any Orthodox Bishop has ordained any of the women of the Paulianists deaconesses, because of his being unaware of their heresy, or if they had been ordained in the order of deaconesses instituted by the Paulianists, in this case, I say, let them be rebaptized; and thereafter if they appear to be worthy of a diaconate, let them be ordained deaconesses too. (See also Ap. cc. XLVI and XLVII, and c. VII of the 2nd.) As for that which the Canon proceeds to add, to wit, “We have referred to the deaconesses who have been examined under cover of the habit, since they have neither any claim to appointment to any order, so that they are to be examined without fail among the laymen,” notwithstanding that these words are hard to understand, yet their meaning is this: We have referred to deaconesses separately, who wore this habit when they were with Paulianists, or, at any rate, who were following the profession of deaconesses, since they too, like their other clergymen, ought to be reckoned as laymen, because just as those clergymen possessed no real ordination, being destitute of divine grace, so too the deaconesses among them possessed only the habit of deaconesses, but no true appointment impartitive of grace; so that they ought to be reckoned as laywomen after baptism, just as they were prior thereto.

    Canon XCV of the 6th says in identically the same manner as does the present Canon: It is made a definition that Paulianists be rebaptized, by which name is meant those who have been adherents of Paul’s heresy ever since they were born. Canon XV of the 4th, however, commands that a deaconess be ordained such when forty years old (as does also c. 14 of the 6th, and c. XL of the same council says the same thing); but it anathematizes her if after staying a short while in the liturgy[37] she later gets married. Canon XLIV of St. Basil excommunicates from the Mysteries any deaconess that commits fornication for a period of seven years, though it does not deprive her of prayer and communion with the faithful. The second ordinance of the first Title of the Novels (Photius, Title VIII, ch. 14) says that a deaconess ought not to live with anyone of the male sex who might arouse a suspicion of immodesty or indecency. If when ordered by the Bishop to oust him from sharing her dwelling or sleeping quarters, she postpones the time, she is deprived of the diaconate and is shut up in a convent for the rest of her life. Read also the footnote to Ap. c. XLVII.

Notes

[35] Paul, hailing from Samosata, a city situated in Mesopotamia near the Euphrates River, and on this account called Paul of Samosata (and not because he served as Bishop of Samosata, as Balsamon, or even others, has said), was a son of a Manichean woman named Callinica, according to Cedrenus, Blastaris, and Balsamon, and was also made Bishop of Antioch after the death of Demetrianus, the previous Bishop of Antioch, in A.D. 260; according to Eusebius (Eccl. History, Book VII, ch. 27) he believed wrongly not only in connection with the mystery of theology in that he declared that there was but one God, not because the Father is the source of divinity, but by denying the hypostasis of the Son and of the Spirit, like Sabellius, and taking God to be but one person together with His Logos, in the same manner as a human being is one with his own logos (i.e., reason), and believing nothing more than the Jews, according to divine Epiphanius (Haer. 65), but also even waxed blasphemous in connection with the incarnate economy; according to Theodoret (Conversation II), Artemon, and Theodosius, both Sabellius and Marcellus, Photinus, and Paul of Samosata, all declare Christ to have been only a mere human being, and they all deny the divinity which had been existing in Him ever since before all the ages. In A.D. 272 the regional Council held in Antioch deposed him and anathematized him. Whereof even the Conciliar letter is to be found in Eusebius ibidem, which even states that Paul used to assert that the Son of God had not come down out of heaven, but, on the contrary, that he had commenced from below out of Mary. Note, furthermore, that Cedrenus, Blastaris, and Balsamon say that the Manicheans had their names changed by this same Paul to Paulicians, who sprang up a few years after Paul. See also the prolegomena of Dionysius of Alexandria. See also page 155 of the dogmatic Panoply, wherein it is written that the Paulicians are descended from the Manichees, being called Paulicians barbarically instead of Paulojohns.

[36] Indictment is one thing and reprehension is another (says divine Chrysostom in his Second Discourse on the Book of Job). An indictment (charge or accusation) is suffered in the case of grave offenses; a reprehension (reproach or censure) is incurred in the case of light trespasses. Whoever is not liable to either of these two treatments is called unindictable. For a person that cannot be indicted as an adulterer, or as a murderer, or the like, is unindictable. A person, on the other hand, that can be reprehended as an insulter, or calumniator, or vituperator, or drunkard, or the like, though exempt from indictments, is liable, nevertheless, to reprehension. On this account Job is called irreprehensible because he was far from being guilty of even the slightest offenses. That is why God said to Abraham "Be thou complaisant towards me, and become irreprehensible" (Gen. 17:1). The Apostle, wishing to appoint shepherds of the inhabited earth, since the good things of virtue were then rare, says to Titus: Appoint Bishops, as I have ordered thee, if there be anybody that is unindictable (Titus 1:7). The word irreprehensible (or blameless) would not have been applicable at that time. . . . Irreprehensibility was too comprehensive a term. The middle ground was that reflected in the term unindictable. Even a small good can be great in evils . . . not because He laid this down as a law, but because He condescended to allow delusion. For He knew that when piety blossomed, the very nature of the fact of the matter would of its own accord prefer what is good, and that there would result a selection of those things which are superior and better. Note also that according to the assertion of Chrysostom this Canon demands that those who are about to be admitted to holy orders should be not only unindictable but also irreprehensible; since piety blossomed after St. Paul, although even during the time of St. Paul the term irreprehensible was of limited applicability. For St. Paul himself wrote to Titus as well as to Timothy, saying: "A bishop, then, must be irreproachable" (1 Tim. 3:2). This word irreproachable is almost entirely indistinguishable from the word irreprehensible, which word Chrysostom himself interprets by asserting that in saying " irreproachable" St. Paul was alluding to every virtue . . . so that if anyone's conscience upbraids him for having committed some sins, he is not doing right if he desires a bishopric and holy orders, of which by his own deeds he has made himself unworthy. Even the present Canon, too, demands irreproachability of priests, and so does c. IX of the same Council. But if it demands this of priests in general, how much more must not it demand of prelates?

[37] Note that a Deaconess, though apparently ordained later by a Presbyter and Deacon, according to c. XIV of the 6th, and authorized to officiate in the liturgy, according to c. XV of the 4th, yet according to the Apostolical Injunctions she does not appear to carry out the male deacon's service in the liturgy of the divine Mysteries in the Bema, but only that service which is performed outside the Bema. For these Injunctions say, in Book III, ch. 9, in connection herewith: “Though we have not allowed women to teach in church (because St. Paul expressly says, in his First Epistle to Timothy, ch. 2, v. 12: “I suffer not a woman to teach”), how can anyone permit them to serve as priestesses? For this reason it is a mistake of the godlessness of Greeks to ordain priestesses to their female goddesses and not of the legislation of Christ. So this deaconess was ordained at first (ibid. ch. 15 and 16) for the sake of women being illuminated, i.e., being baptized, whom, after the Bishop anointed their head with holy oil, and the deacon only their forehead, she took charge of and anointed their whole body, owing to the fact that it was not proper for a woman's naked body to be seen by men. Secondly, for the other services to women. For in those homes where women were dwelling together with unbelieving men, to which it was not perfectly decent for male deacons to be sent, on account of the risk of evil suspicions, a woman deaconess was sent, according to the 15th ch. of the 3rd book (of the Injunctions), to watch at the doors of the church lest any uncatechized and unfaithful woman might enter (Book II, ch. 17); and she examined those women who went from one city to another with letters commendatory as to whether they really were Orthodox Christian women; as to whether they were tainted by any heresy; as to whether they were married or were widows: and after the examination she would provide a place in the church for each one of them to stand according to her luck and attitude (Book III, ch. 14 and 19). But a deaconess was also needed to render services to those widows who were listed in the church roll, by offering them the alms donated by Christians; and they were useful also in connection with other services too. But most of all, according to chapters 20 and 28 of the eighth book (of the Injunctions) she was ordained for the purpose of guarding the holy gates and serving the presbyters when they were baptizing women with a view to decency and propriety, wherein it is written that “A Deaconess can neither bless nor do anything that presbyters and deacons do.” In addition Epiphanius (Haer. 9) says concerning them that the ecclesiastical order needed womankind only by way of deaconesses, whom it called widows, and the older ones among whom it called presbytidas. Nevertheless it did not command anywhere for presbyteresses or priestesses to be made such. For neither did deacons in the ecclesiastical order receive any authority to perform any mystery, but only to serve as assistant in connection with the rites being performed by the priests. And again, it is said that the battalion of deaconesses is in the Church, not to serve in the capacity of priests, nor to undertake to pardon anything, but for the sake of preserving the decency of the female sex, either in connection with rite of baptism, say, or in connection with the function of visiting the sick or those in distress, or, in time of necessity of denuding a woman's body, in order that it may be beheld only by her, and not by the male dignitaries officiating in the process of performing the sacred offices. Though it is true that Balsmon says, in reply to Question 35 of Marcus of Alexandria, that Deaconesses enjoyed a rank in the Bema (or Sanctuary), but that the complications due to menstruation dispossessed them of their rank and removed their service from the Bema, yet he himself again in the same reply says that in Constantinople deaconesses are ordained who have no share or privilege in the Bema, but who perform many ecclesiastical services and help to correct women ecclesiastically. Clement of Alexandria, surnamed Stromateus, in his Book III, says that the Apostles had women with them as sisters and fellow deaconesses in the matter of preaching for women confined to the house, through whom the Lord's teaching penetrated into the chamber and private apartment of women. It is also found stated in some books that the appointment (or quasi ordination) of a deaconess consisted in her bowing her head while the prelate laid his hand upon her, and in his making the sign of the cross three times, and repeating some prayers over her. Concerning deaconesses St. Paul writes in his First Epistle to Timothy: “Even so must their wives be modest, not calumniators, sober, faithful in all things” (1 Tim. 3:11). Note that although deaconesses were not the same as widows, nor the same as presbytides, yet, in spite of this fact, it is true that deaconesses were recruited and ordained from the battalion of widows enrolled in the church. Read also the second footnote to c. XL of the 6th, and the footnote to c. XXI of Laodicea. If anyone fond of learning things would like to know the particular way in which such deaconesses were ordained, he may learn this more in detail from Blastaris. For the latter states that in old books it was found written that the women in question were forty years old when they were ordained, and that they wore a full monachical habit (which means that of the great habit), and that they were covered with a maphorion, having its extremities hanging down in front. That when the prelate recited over them the words “The Divine Grace,” they did not bend their knee like the deacons, but only bowed their head. Afterwards the prelate would place on their neck underneath the maphorion a deacon’s stole (or scarf), bringing the two extremities of the stole together in front. He would not permit them, however, to serve in the Mysteries, or to hold a fan, like the deacons, but only to commune after the deacons, and, after the prelate communed the others, they could take the cup from his hands and replace it upon the holy table, without communing anyone. Blastaris, however, adds of his own accord that they were later forbidden by the Fathers to enter the Bema or to perform any such services, on account of dire results of menstruation, as Balsamon stated further above.

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