Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Ser. II, Vol. XII:
The Book of Pastoral Rule, and Selected Epistles, of Gregory the Great.: Epistle XIV

Epistle XIV.

To the Count Narses 1642 .

Gregory to Narses, &c.

Your Charity, being anxious to learn our opinion, has been at the pains of writing to us to ask what we think of the book against the presbyter Athanasius which was sent to us.  Having thoroughly perused some parts of it, we find that he has fallen into the dogma of Manichæus.  But he who has noted some places as heretical by a mark set against them slips also himself into Pelagian heresy; for he has marked certain places as heretical which are catholicly expressed and entirely orthodox.  For when this is written; that when Adam sinned his soul died, the writer shews afterwards how it is said to have died, namely that it lost the blessedness of its condition.  Whosoever denies this is not a Catholic.  For God had said, In the hour ye eat thereof, in death ye shall die (Gen. ii. 17).  When, therefore, Adam ate of the forbidden tree, we know that he did not die in the body, seeing that after this he begat children and lived many years.  If, then, he did not die in the soul, the impious conclusion follows that He himself lied who foretold that in the day that he sinned he should die.  But it is to be understood that death takes place in two ways; either from ceasing to live, or with respect to the mode of living.  When, then, man’s soul is said to have died in the eating of the forbidden thing, it is meant, not in the sense of ceasing to live, but with regard to the mode of living;—that he should live afterwards in pain who had been created to live happily in joy 1643 .  He, then, who has marked this passage in the book sent to me by my brother the bishop John as heretical is a Pelagian; for his view is evidently that of Pelagius, which the apostle Paul plainly confutes in his epistles.  The particular passages in his epistle I need not quote, as I write to one who knows.  But Pelagius, who was condemned in the Ephesine synod, maintained this view with the intention of shewing that we were redeemed by Christ unreally.  For, if we did not through Adam die in the soul, we were redeemed unreally, which it were impious to say.  Further, having examined the acts of the synod of Ephesus, we find nothing at all about Adelphius and Sava, and the others who are said to have been condemned there, and we think that, as the synod of Chalcedon was in one place falsified by the Constantinopolitan Church, 1644 so something of the kind has been done with regard to the synod of Ephesus.  Wherefore let your Charity make a thorough search for old copies of the acts of this synod, and thus see whether anything of the kind is found there, and send such copy as you may find to me, which I will return as soon as I have read it.  For recent copies are not entirely to be trusted; and it is for this reason that I have been in doubt, and have not wished as yet to reply in this case to my aforesaid brother the bishop John.  Further, the Roman copies are much more correct than the Greek p. 193b ones, since, as we have not your cleverness, so neither have we any impostures.

Now concerning the presbyter John, know that his case has been decided in synod, whereby I have clearly ascertained that his adversaries have wished and long endeavoured to make him out a heretic, but have entirely failed.

Salute in my name your friends, who are ours:  ours also, who are yours, salute you heartily through me.  May Almighty God protect thee with His hand in the midst of so many thorns, that thou mayest, unhurt, gather those flowers which the Lord hath chosen.

Footnotes

On the case of John of Chalcedon and Athanasius of Isaura, referred to in this and the three following letters, see III. 53, note 9.

Cf. VII. 34 and IX. 49, where the same argument, in nearly the same words, is set forth.

The reference may be to Canon xxviii. of the Council of Chalcedon, assigning rank and jurisdiction to the patriarchs of Constantinople, which was protested against by the Roman legates at the Council and afterwards disallowed by Pope Leo.  It is omitted in the Latin version of the canons published by Dionysius Exiguus about the beginning of the sixth century, though it had been in the Prisca Versio which he amended.  It appears as if Gregory, not finding it in the Latin version before him, supposed it to have been interpolated at Constantinople; the fact being that it had been purposely omitted at Rome, as not having the Pope’s sanction.  If such is the allusion, it may seem strange that Gregory did not know the circumstances better.  But this is not the only instance of his imperfect knowledge of past events, even in ecclesiastical matters.  Cf. II. 51, note 2.