Folia Theologica et Canonica 10. 32/24 (2021)

Ius canonicum

SUBTLE DISTINCTION BETWEEN ‘ANATHEMA’ AND ‘EXCOMMUNICATION’ 153

Council of Laodicea, Can. 29: “Christians should not follow Jewish customs and not have a rest on the Sabbath, but work on that day. As Christians, they should rather keep the Lord’s Day as a day of rest if possible. If they are however caught following Jewish customs, they should be anathematized before Christ.”

Council of Chalcedon I, Can. 2: “If any bishop makes an ordination for money, thus offering for sale an inalienable grace, and ordains for money a bishop, a chorepiscopus, a presbyter or a deacon, or any other person belonging to the clergy; or appoints for money a procurator or a guardian, or any other ecclesiastical person at all, for personal benefit; he who has attempted to do so and has been convicted, shall lose his personal rank; and the person who is ordained shall not profit anything by the ordination or appointment, but shall be removed from that dignity or responsibility which he has received for money. And if any person appears to be even as a mediator in such disgraceful and unlawful transactions, let him also be deprived from his rank, if he be a clergyman, and if he is a layman or a monk, he should be anathematized.”

These examples must be supplemented with the most famous list of anathemas (twelve), compiled by St. Cyril of Alexandria in the context of the Christological debate at the Council of Ephesus (431 )22, in defense of the dogmatic teaching of the Church.23

Following the above cited conciliar canons of the 3rd-5th centuries, during the 6th-9th centuries appeared some distinctions between the ‘anathema and ‘excommunication but the disciplinary and doctrinal texts did not used them consequently by provincial synods in Europe. However, it is the Council of Nicaea II (787) which explicitly uses the two terms separately in its text:

Council of Nicaea II, Can. 1: “(...) Accordingly, those whom they placed under anathema, we likewise anathematize; those whom they deposed, we also depose; those whom they excommunicated, we also excommunicate; and those whom they delivered over to punishment, we make them subject to the same penalty (.. ,).”24

Since the 9th century, the councils have been concerned about the great multiplicity of anathemas, which made it necessary to specify the difference between ‘anathema' and ‘excommunication’. This problem was finally solved by Pope John VIII (872-882) at the Council of Troyes in 878, when he gave a brief definition of the two terms: “Know that Engeltrude is not only under the ban of excommunication, which separates the person from the society of breth-22 COD 37-74.

23 Cf. McGuckin, J., St. Cyril of Alexandria The Christological Controversy: Its History, Theology, and Texts, Yonkers, N.Y. 2004. Wessel, S., Cyril of Alexandria and the Nestorian Controversy: The Making of a Saint and of a Heretic (Oxford Early Christian Studies), Oxford 2004.

24 COD 138-139.