Folia Canonica 10. (2007)

PROCEEDINGS OF THE INTERNATIONAL CONFERENCE - Szabolcs Anzelm Szuromi: Development of the Clerical Duties and Rights Based on the 11th-12th Centuries. Canonical Collections

DEVELOPMENT OF THE CLERICAL DUTIES AND RIGHTS

213

166-167).44 At the end of Book 2 we can read canons about some crimes as reason to remove the cleric from his position, or possible: to excommunicate. The process has to be done by the competent diocesan bishop (cc. 179-182).45

This explained sketch based on Burchard’s Decree shows well, that there was no “right” of clerics without “duty”, however, the “duty” involved “rights” to fulfill the obligation which springs from the status of the particular cleric on adequate level of his degree in the Holy Order.

The majority of Burchard’s canonical material concerning clerics took place in the best Gregorian canon law collection of the 11th century, which is the Collectio Anselmi Lucensis (1081-1083).46 Book 7 of Anselm’s Collection summarizes the ecclesiastical discipline concerning clerics. The entire previous book (6th) is dedicated to explaining the duties and rights of bishops, even the regulation of relationship between the diocesan bishop and his clerics.47 Ans. 7. 46-52 discuss about the duties of every clerical degree, through the explanation of the essential elements of the particular ordination rite.48 Reception happens mostly from the hands of the bishop. The text contains expressly the active cooperation of the bishop concerning a deacon’s ordination. The deacon can be ordained only by a bishop (solus episcopus), who blesses him and stretches out his arms over the applicant’s head. The subdeacon’s ordination happens without the imposition of hands by the bishop, but by the reception of an empty patena and chalice, which are given by the bishop. The subdeacon receives a jug, a dishcloth and a handwashing bowl from the archdeacon’s hand in the rite of ordination. The priest’s ordination happened by the imposition of the bishop’s hands, then

44 BW 2. 166: Ut curam hospitum, maxime pauperum atque debilium orphanorum quoque atque peregrinorum habeat presbyter, hosque ad prandium suum quotidie iuxta possibilitatem convocet, eisque hospitum tribuat. Fransen, G.-Kölzer, Th. (Hrsg.), Burchard von Worms,4 8 ra-4 8 rb.

45 BW 2. 179: Si quis presbyter ab episcopo suo fuerit degradatus, aut officio procertis criminibus suspensus, et ipse per contemptum et superbiam aliquid de ministerio sibi interdicto agere praesumpserit, et postea ab episcopo suo correptus, in certa presumptione perduraverit, hic omnimodis excommunicetur, et ab Ecclesia expellatur. Et quicunque cum eo communicaverit, similiter se sciat esse excommunicatum. Similiter de clericis, laicis, vel foeminis excommunicatis observandum est. Quod si aliquis ista omnia contempserit, et episcopus emendare potuerit minime, regis iudicio exilio damnetur. Fransen, G.-Kölzer, Th. (Hrsg.), Burchard von Worms, 48vb.

46 Edition: Thaner, F. (ed.), Anselmi collectio canonum una cum collectione minore, I—II. Oeniponte 1901-1915 (repr. Aalen 1965).

47 Thaner 265-356, cf. Szuromi, Sz.A., A püspökökre vonatkozó egyházfegyelmi szabályok az Anselmi Collectio Canonumban (Bibliotheca Instituti Postgradualis Iuris Canonici Universitatis Catholicae de Petro Pázmány nominatae IV/1) [Episcopal discipline in the Collection of Anselm of Lucca], Budapest 2000.

48 Thaner 383-385; e. g. Ans. 7.52: Diaconus cum ordinatur, solus episcopus, qui eum benedicit, manus super caput illius ponat, quia non ad sacerdotium sed ad ministerium consecratur. Thaner 385.