Apostolic Canons

Let a bishop, then, be ordained by two or three bishops; a presbyter by one bishop, and a deacon and the other clergy likewise.

If any bishop or presbyter, contrary to the Lord's ordinance concerning the sacrifice, offers other things on the altar of God, such as honey or milk, or strong drink made artificially instead of wine, or birds or any animals or pulse, contrary to the ordinance, let him be deposed.

Except new ears of grain or grapes at the proper season, let it not be lawful to bring anything to the altar, besides oil for the lamp and incense at the time of the divine offering.

Let all other produce be sent to the house as firstfruits for the bishop and the presbyters, and not to the altar; and it is clear that the bishop and the presbyters share it with the deacons and the other clergy.

Let a bishop or presbyter or deacon not put away his own wife on the pretext of piety; and if he puts her away, let him be excommunicated, and if he persists, let him be deposed.

Let a bishop or presbyter or deacon not take on worldly cares; otherwise let him be deposed.

If any bishop or presbyter or deacon celebrates the holy day of Pascha before the spring equinox with the Jews, let him be deposed.

If any bishop or presbyter or deacon, or anyone from the priestly list, does not partake when the offering has been made, let him state the reason, and if it is reasonable, let him receive pardon; but if he does not state it, let him be excommunicated, as having become a cause of harm to the people and having raised a suspicion against him who offered, as though he had not offered soundly.

All the faithful who come in and hear the Scriptures, but do not remain for the prayer and the holy communion, must be excommunicated, as causing disorder in the church.

If anyone prays with an excommunicated person, even in a house, let him be excommunicated.

If anyone who is a cleric prays with a deposed cleric as with a cleric, let him also be deposed.

If any cleric or layman whether excommunicated or admissible, goes away and is received in another city without letters of commendation, let both those who received him and him who was received be excommunicated.

And if he is excommunicated, let his excommunication be extended, as one who has lied and deceived the church of God.

A bishop may not leave his own diocese and leap into another, even if he is compelled by many, unless there is some good reason compelling him to do this, as being able to bring greater gain to those there by the word of piety; and even this not of himself, but by the judgment of many bishops and at the greatest entreaty.

If any presbyter or deacon, or anyone at all on the list of the clergy, leaves his own diocese and goes to another, and, having moved altogether, stays in another diocese without the consent of his own bishop, we bid that he no longer minister, especially if he did not obey when his bishop summoned him to return, persisting in the disorder; but let him take communion there as a layman.

And if the bishop with whom they are staying, setting at nought the suspension decreed against them, receives them as clergy, let him be excommunicated as a teacher of disorder.

He who has been joined in two marriages after baptism, or has acquired a concubine, cannot be a bishop or presbyter or deacon, or anyone at all on the priestly list.

He who has taken a widow, or a woman who has been put away, or a courtesan, or a household slave, or one of those on the stage, cannot be a bishop or presbyter or deacon, or anyone at all on the priestly list.

He who has married two sisters, or a niece, cannot be a cleric.

A cleric who gives sureties, let him be deposed.

A eunuch, if he became so by the violence of men, or was deprived of his manhood in persecution, or was so born, and is worthy of the episcopate, let him be made bishop.

He who has mutilated himself, let him not be made a cleric; for he is a self-murderer and an enemy of God's creation.

If anyone who is a cleric mutilates himself, let him be deposed; for he is his own murderer.

A layman who has mutilated himself, let him be excommunicated for three years; for he is a plotter against his own life.

A bishop or presbyter or deacon who is caught in sexual immorality or perjury or theft, let him be deposed, but not excommunicated; for the Scripture says, “You shall not punish twice for the same thing.” Likewise the other clergy also.

Of those who have entered the clergy unmarried, we bid that only readers and singers marry, if they wish.

A bishop or presbyter or deacon who strikes the faithful when they sin, or unbelievers when they do wrong, and wishes to make them afraid by such means, we command to be deposed; for nowhere did the Lord teach us this; on the contrary, when he himself was struck he did not strike back, “when reviled he did not revile in return, when suffering he did not threaten.”

If any bishop or presbyter or deacon, justly deposed for manifest crimes, dares to touch the ministry once entrusted to him, let him be cut off from the church altogether.

If any bishop, or presbyter or deacon, obtains this dignity by money, let both him and the one who ordained him be deposed, and let him be cut off altogether from communion also, as Simon Magus was by me, Peter.

If any bishop, making use of worldly rulers, obtains a church through them, let him be deposed and excommunicated, and all who communicate with him.

If any presbyter, despising his own bishop, holds assemblies apart and sets up another altar, without having condemned the bishop in matters of piety and righteousness, let him be deposed as one who loves to rule, for he is a tyrant; and likewise the other clergy, as many as join him; and let the laymen be excommunicated. But let this be done after one, a second, or even a third entreaty from the bishop.

If any presbyter or deacon is put under excommunication by a bishop, he may not be received by another, but only by him who excommunicated him, unless the bishop who excommunicated him happens to die.

Receive none of the foreign bishops or presbyters or deacons without letters of commendation; and even when they bring them, let them be examined; and if they are preachers of piety, let them be received; but if not, supply them with what they need, but do not receive them into communion; for many things are done by fraud.

The bishops of each nation must know the first among them and consider him as head, and do nothing of consequence without his consent; but each may do only those things that concern his own diocese and the country districts under it. But neither let him do anything without the consent of all; for so there will be concord, and God will be glorified through Christ in the Holy Spirit.

Let a bishop not dare to perform ordinations outside his own bounds in cities and country districts not subject to him; and if he is convicted of having done so without the consent of those who hold those cities or districts, let both him and those he ordained be deposed.

If anyone ordained bishop does not accept the ministry and the care of the people entrusted to him, let him remain excommunicated until he accepts it; likewise a presbyter and a deacon. But if he goes and is not received, not against his own will but because of the wickedness of the people, let him remain bishop, and let the clergy of the city be excommunicated, because they did not become teachers of so unruly a people.

Let a synod of the bishops be held twice a year, and let them examine with one another the doctrines of piety, and settle the ecclesiastical disputes that arise: once in the fourth week of Pentecost, and the second time on the twelfth of Hyperberetaeus.

Let the bishop have the care of all the affairs of the church, and administer them as with God overseeing; but let him not be permitted to appropriate any of them, or to give the things of God to his own relatives. If they are poor, let him supply them as poor, but not sell off the church's property on their pretext.

Let the presbyters and the deacons do nothing without the consent of the bishop; for it is he who has been entrusted with the Lord's people and who will be required to give account for their souls.

Let the bishop's own property, if indeed he has any of his own, be clearly known, and the Lord's property clearly known, so that the bishop may have power at his death to leave his own property as he wishes and to whom he wishes, and so that the bishop's property may not be lost on the pretext of church property, since he sometimes has a wife and children, or relatives, or household slaves. For this is just “before God and men,” that neither the church suffer any loss through ignorance of the bishop's property, nor the bishop or his relatives have their goods confiscated on the pretext of the church, nor those who belong to him fall into lawsuits, and his death be surrounded with ill repute.

We command that the bishop have authority over the affairs of the church; for if the precious souls of men are to be entrusted to him, much more ought he to be charged with the money, so that by his authority everything may be distributed to those in need through the presbyters and the deacons, and supplied with the fear of God and all reverence; and that he himself also partake of what is needed, if indeed he needs it, for his own necessary uses and those of the brothers who are his guests, so that they may in no way be in want. For the law of God ordained that those who serve at the altar should be fed from the altar, since not even a soldier bears arms against the enemy at his own expense.

A bishop or presbyter or deacon who gives himself to dice and drunkenness, let him either stop or be deposed.

A subdeacon or reader or singer who does the like, let him either stop or be excommunicated; likewise a layman also.

A bishop or presbyter or deacon who demands interest from those who borrow, let him either stop or be deposed.

A bishop or presbyter or deacon who has only prayed with heretics, let him be excommunicated; but if he has also permitted them to perform any function as clergy, let him be deposed.

We command that a bishop or presbyter or deacon who has accepted the baptism or sacrifice of heretics be deposed. “For what agreement has Christ with Beliar? Or what part has a believer with an unbeliever?”

If a bishop or presbyter baptizes again one who has true baptism, or does not baptize one who has been polluted by the ungodly, let him be deposed, as mocking the cross and the death of the Lord, and not distinguishing priests from false priests.

If any layman puts away his own wife and takes another, or one who has been divorced by another man, let him be excommunicated.

If any bishop or presbyter does not baptize, according to the Lord's ordinance, into the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit, but into three without beginning, or into three sons, or into three paracletes, let him be deposed.

If any bishop or presbyter does not perform three immersions of one initiation, but one immersion given into the death of the Lord, let him be deposed; for the Lord did not say, “Baptize into my death,” but, “Go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them into the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit.”

If any bishop or presbyter or deacon, or anyone at all of the priestly list, abstains from marriage and meat and wine not for the sake of discipline but out of abhorrence, forgetting that “all things are very good,” and that “God made man male and female,” but blasphemously slanders the creation, let him either be corrected or be deposed and cast out of the church; likewise a layman also.

If any bishop or presbyter does not receive one who turns back from sin, but rejects him, let him be deposed, because he grieves Christ, who said, “There is joy in heaven over one sinner who repents.”

If any bishop or presbyter or deacon does not partake of meat and wine on the days of the feasts, let him be deposed, as “seared in his conscience” and becoming a cause of stumbling to many.

If any cleric is caught eating in a tavern, let him be excommunicated, except when he lodges at an inn on a journey from necessity.

If any cleric insults the bishop unjustly, let him be deposed. “For you shall not speak evil,” it says, “of a ruler of your people.”

If any cleric insults a presbyter or deacon, let him be excommunicated.

If any cleric mocks one who is deaf or lame or blind or crippled in the legs, let him be excommunicated; likewise a layman also.

A bishop or presbyter who neglects the clergy or the people and does not instruct them in piety, let him be excommunicated, and if he persists in his negligence, let him be deposed.

If any bishop or presbyter, when one of the clergy is in need, does not supply what he needs, let him be excommunicated; and if he persists, let him be deposed, as having murdered his brother.

If anyone reads publicly in the church the falsely inscribed books of the ungodly as holy, to the harm of the people and the clergy, let him be deposed.

If an accusation is made against a believer of sexual immorality or adultery or any other forbidden act, and he is convicted, let him not be promoted to the clergy.

If any cleric, through human fear of a Jew or a Greek or a heretic, denies: if it is the name of Christ, let him be cast out; if the name of cleric, let him be deposed; but if he repents, let him be received as a layman.

If any bishop or presbyter or deacon, or anyone at all of the priestly list, “eats meat with its life-blood,” or what has been “torn by beasts,” or “what has died,” let him be deposed; for the law forbade this. And if he is a layman, let him be excommunicated.

If any cleric is found fasting on the Lord's day, or on the Sabbath except for the one only, let him be deposed; and if a layman, let him be excommunicated.

If any cleric or layman enters a synagogue of Jews or of heretics to pray, let him be deposed and excommunicated.

If any cleric strikes someone in a fight and kills him with the one blow, let him be deposed for his rashness; and if he is a layman, let him be excommunicated.

If anyone has violated an unbetrothed virgin and keeps her, let him be excommunicated; and let it not be permitted him to take another, but let him keep her whom he chose, even if she happens to be poor.

If any bishop or presbyter or deacon receives a second ordination from anyone, let both him and the one who ordained him be deposed, unless he shows that he had his ordination from heretics; for those baptized or ordained by such cannot be either believers or clergy.

If any bishop or presbyter or deacon or subdeacon or reader or singer does not fast the holy Forty Days, or the Wednesday or the Friday, let him be deposed, unless he is hindered by bodily weakness; and if he is a layman, let him be excommunicated.

If any bishop or other cleric fasts with the Jews, or keeps festival with them, or receives from them the gifts of their festival, such as unleavened bread or anything of the kind, let him be deposed; and if a layman, let him be excommunicated.

If any Christian brings oil to a temple of the Gentiles or to a synagogue of the Jews, or lights lamps at their festivals, let him be excommunicated.

If any cleric or layman takes away wax or oil from the holy church, let him be excommunicated and add a fifth part to what he took.

Let no one any longer appropriate for his own use a vessel of silver or gold, or a linen cloth, that has been sanctified; for it is unlawful. And if anyone is caught, let him be punished with excommunication.

When a bishop has been accused of something by trustworthy and faithful men, he must be summoned by the bishops; and if he appears and confesses, let the penalty be determined once he has been convicted. But if when summoned he does not obey, let him be summoned a second time, two bishops being sent to him; and if even so he does not obey, let him be summoned a third time, two bishops again being sent to him; and if even so he despises it and does not appear, let the synod pronounce against him what seems good, so that he may not seem to profit by evading judgment.

For testimony against a bishop do not receive a heretic, nor even one believer alone; for “on the mouth of two or three witnesses every word shall be established.”

A bishop must not, as a favor to his brother or son or other relative, ordain to the dignity of the episcopate whom he wishes; for it is not just to make heirs of his episcopate, giving the things of God as a favor to human affection; for he must not place the church of God under inheritance. And if anyone does this, let the ordination be void, and let him be punished with excommunication.

If anyone is maimed, or injured in an eye or a leg, but is worthy of the episcopate, let him be made bishop; for a bodily defect does not defile him, but pollution of the soul.

But one who is deaf and blind, let him not be made bishop, not as defiled, but so that the affairs of the church may not be hindered.

If anyone has a demon, let him not be made a cleric, nor even pray with the faithful; but when he has been cleansed, let him be received, and, if he is worthy, let him be made one.

It is not right that one who has come over from the Gentiles and been baptized, or from an evil way of life, should at once be advanced to the episcopate; for it is unjust that one who has not yet given proof of himself should be a teacher of others, unless perhaps this happens by divine grace.

We have said that a bishop must not let himself down into public administration, but devote himself to the needs of the church. Let him therefore either be persuaded not to do this or be deposed. “For no one can serve two masters,” according to the Lord's exhortation.

We do not permit household slaves to be advanced into the clergy without the consent of their masters, to the grief of their owners; for such a thing works the overthrow of households. But if ever a household slave should appear worthy of ordination to a rank, as our Onesimus appeared, and the masters consent and set him free and send him out of their household, let him be ordained.

A bishop or presbyter or deacon who stays in military service and wishes to do both, to hold a Roman command and to administer a priestly office, must be deposed; for “the things of Caesar to Caesar, and the things of God to God.”

Whoever insults an emperor or a ruler contrary to justice, let him pay the penalty; and if he is a cleric, let him be deposed, and if a layman, let him be excommunicated.

And let the venerable and holy books for all of you, clergy and laity, be these. Of the Old Testament: five of Moses, Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, Deuteronomy; one of Joshua the son of Nun; one of Judges; one of Ruth; four of Kingdoms; two of Chronicles, of the book of Days; two of Ezra; one of Esther; one of Judith; three of Maccabees; one of Job; a hundred and fifty Psalms; three books of Solomon, Proverbs, Ecclesiastes, Song of Songs; sixteen Prophets. And besides these, let it be added for you that your young people learn the Wisdom of the very learned Sirach. And ours, that is, of the New Testament: four Gospels, as we said also before, of Matthew, Mark, Luke, John; fourteen letters of Paul; one of James; three of John; one of Jude; two of Peter; two of Clement; and the Constitutions addressed to you bishops through me, Clement, in eight books, which must not be made public before all because of the mysteries in them; and the Acts of us the apostles.