The maintenance of honor, in the Church as in the broader culture, required considerable attention to the saving of face. Mistakes or policy changes, in ecclesiastical matters as in secular affairs, were not to be admitted or acknowledged, but rather concealed and finessed to the greatest extent possible. This imperative not only arose with respect to current authorities - individual bishops as well as institutions - but also implicated revered theologians and councils from the past. The ‘‘Fathers,’’ on occasion, were found in retrospect to have been frustratingly imprecise or inconsistent in their choice of words when addressing particular doctrinal questions on which, long after their deaths, new controversies would underline the need for greater exactitude (see Graumann, ch. 36). The same fifth-century bishops who held up the Nicene Creed as a perfect standard of orthodoxy recognized that its authors - being unable to answer questions not yet asked - had failed to anticipate the controversies that would divide the Church in their own time. Ambiguity in Cyril’s usage of key terms like physis (‘‘nature’’) would later allow his writings to be invoked by both Monophysites and Dyophysite Chalcedonians in support of their respective Christological arguments (Gray 1997; Wessel 2004; Price and Gaddis 2005, i: 60-75).
An especially ticklish problem was posed by past emperors who had backed what in retrospect was judged to be the wrong side. This problem complicated the legacies of the fourth-century rulers Constantius and Valens, both of whom favored a moderate Homoian doctrinal position later remembered by Nicene orthodox tradition as ‘‘Arian’’ heresy. The same issue arose in the fifth century with respect to Theodosius II, whose backing of Dioscorus and of the violent Ephesus II in ad 449 had to be accounted for when his ecclesiastical policies, shortly after his death, were reversed at Chalcedon. Similar difficulties implicated later sovereigns in the course of the various doctrinal reversals of the late fifth and early sixth centuries (see generally Frend 1972; Grillmeier 1987; Meyendorff 1989). The emperor’s complicity needed to be finessed or excused, and blame quietly displaced onto acceptable scapegoats such as the unpopular court eunuch Chrysaphius (‘‘seduced by Chrysaphius’’: annotation by Rusticus in the Latin Acts, ACO 2. 3. 2: 347-8; Price and Gaddis 2005, iii: 188-92).
Defining orthodox doctrine necessarily required passing judgments upon persons, who earned condemnation or rehabilitation as they either clung to or backed away from teachings now judged incorrect. In most cases, timely repentance would resolve the problem. Several bishops who had been among the ringleaders at Ephesus II in AD 449 were allowed at Chalcedon to retain their offices after they abandoned Dioscorus and agreed to endorse the decrees of the new council (Juvenal of Jerusalem, Thalassius of Caesarea, and others: Chalcedon, session 1, 284-98, Price and Gaddis 2005, i: 188-90; and session 4, 14-18, Price and Gaddis 2005, ii: 147). At the same time, those whom the prior council had condemned as heretics (Theodoret of Cyrrhus, Ibas of Edessa, Eusebius of Dorylaeum, and, posthumously, Flavian of Constantinople) were restored to communion. More than 100 bishops who had attended and acclaimed the decisions of Ephesus II were also seated at Chalcedon, many of them admitting error and asking forgiveness. Among the architects of that infamous ‘‘Robber Council,’’ only Dioscorus would remain condemned (Chalcedon, session 3, esp. 98-103, Price and Gaddis 2005, ii: 110-15).
Lesser clerics, monks, and laity might be forgiven for being ‘‘seduced’’ into heresy, if they invoked the necessary discourses of appeal and repentance in their petitions. By pronouncing an orthodox creed, those who had strayed could be restored to communion (e. g., repentant Quartodecimans from Lydia, at Ephesus I: Chalcedon, session 1, 918-43, Price and Gaddis 2005, i: 311-23). Humility and submission to authority were encouraged and rewarded. But obstinacy and defiant persistence in error - which in the all-important context of the faith could offer no clearer illustration of the sin of pride - brought anathema (e. g., the defiant monks Carosus and
Dorotheus, at Chalcedon, session 4, 63-116, Price and Gaddis 2005, ii: 153-63). Sometimes the tables might be turned: the archimandrite Eutyches, with the support of Dioscorus and his allies, brought about in ad 449 the condemnation of the bishops who had judged him in Constantinople in ad 448, because they had overreached in attempting to force him to accept the controversial formula ‘‘in two natures’’ (Chalcedon, session 1, esp. 484-551, 864-84, 943-64, Price and Gaddis 2005, i: 218-25, 271-92, 340-4; see discussion at i: 25-33).
World History
