Presbyters Uniwersytet Warszawski
ID
ER 93
The Council of Saragossa (Iberian Peninsula) in AD 380 forbids clerics to quit their office under the pretext of becoming monks.
Canon 6
 
Vt clericus qui propter licentiam monachus uult esse, excommunicetur.
 
Item legit: Si quis de clericis propter luxum uanitatemque praesumptam de officio suo sponte discesserit ac se uelut obseruatorem legis in monacho uideri uoluerit esse quam clericum, ita de ecclesia repellendum ut, nisi rogando atque obsecrando plurimis temporibus satisfecerit, non recipiatur. Ab universis episcopis dictum est: Ita fiat.
 
(eds. Martínez Díez, Rodríguez 1992: 295-296)
Canon 6
 
That a cleric who wants to be a monk on account of liberty shall be excommunicated
 
If one of the clerics leaves his office of his own will on account of presumed luxury and vanity and wants to seem to be some sort of observer of the law in a monastic lifestyle, rather than a cleric, he must thus be driven away from the church; unless he makes amends by beseeching and begging many times, he is not to be received. By all the bishops it was said: Let it be so.
 
(trans. Burrus 1995: 39)

Place of event:

Region
  • Iberian Peninsula
City
  • Saragossa

About the source:

Title: Council of Saragossa I, Councilium Caesaraugustanum I
Origin: Saragossa (Iberian Peninsula)
Denomination: Catholic/Nicene/Chalcedonian
The canons and acts of the Council of Saragossa were preserved in the 7th c. canonical collection Hispana. The canons have summaries which are provided as a table of canons at the beginning and as headings to each decision. They seem to derive from the source the author of Hispana used, but probably they were added later and were not included in the original draft of conciliar acts (Martínez Díez 1966:247-253; Rodríguez 1981: 11). Only one family of Hispana manuscripts contains the date: 418 of the Spanish era, that is 380 AD. This date is commonly accepted (Burrus 1995: 31, n. 35).
Edition:
Edition:
G. Martínez Díez, F. Rodríguez, eds., La colección canónica Hispana, v. 4 Concilios Galos. Concilios Hispanos: primera parte, Madrid 1984.
F. Rodríguez, "Concilio I de Zaragoza: Texto critico”, [in:] Primero Concilio Caesaraugustano: MDC anniversario, Zaragoza 1981, 9-25.
J. Vives, Concilios visigóticos e hispano-romanos, Barcelona-Madrid 1963.
 
Translation:
V. Burrus, The making of a heretic: gender, authority, and the Priscillianist controversy, Berkeley 1995.
 

Categories:

Functions within the Church - Wandering presbyter/Without office
    Described by a title - Clericus
      Administration of justice - Administration of justice
        Monastic or common life
          Please quote this record referring to its author, database name, number, and, if possible, stable URL: M. Szada, Presbyters in the Late Antique West, ER93, http://presbytersproject.ihuw.pl/index.php?id=6&SourceID=93