192. [in Coll. Avell.]
JUSTIN THE EMPEROR TO POPE HORMISDAS THROUGH OUR LEGATES, THAT IS, BISHOPS GERMANUS AND JOHN, DEACONS FELIX AND DIOSCORUS AND THE PRESBYTER BLANDUS.
1. You shall have the highest grace because you do not hestitate in undertaking an immediate task of gathering and uniting the venerable Churches. Truly, your perfect care shines most in the fact that you chose the people who could serve with sincere and wholly devoted minds to the benevolent purpose of Your Sanctity. 2. Since indeed, the most reverent bishop Germanus as well as Felix, Dioscorus, and Blandus, the most religious men, with such industry apply themselves to this task and they act with such wisdom that in respect to what pertains to their office, they have performed and worked out everything in full, leaving nothing more to discuss.
In what follows, however, the emperor asks the Pope for more leniency. In the libellus which the Pope demanded to sign from all the Eastern bishops in order to return to the communion, there was a requirement to condemn as heretics many bishops who are held in great esteem in the Eastern cities. The emperor asks the Pope to allow those Churches in which these bishops ruled and are well-remembered, to refrain from this condemnation. As the papal legates cannot change anything in the libellus without the consent of the Pope, the emperor sends them back to Rome and promises to also send his own legate shortly afterwards. The letter is dated to the 7th day before the Ides of July in the year of consulship of Vitalianus and Rusticius (i.e. 9 July AD 520).
(trans. and summary M. Szada)