Letters of Celestine I (to and concerning the Council of Ephesus) 7.0–24.2

Celestine, bishop, to the holy synod assembled at Ephesus.

The gathering of priests bears witness to the presence of the Holy Spirit. For what we read is certain, since our Truth cannot lie, whose saying in the Gospel is this: 'Where two or three are gathered in my name, there I am in the midst of them.' Since this is so (for the Holy Spirit is not absent even from so small a number), how much more must we believe that he is present now, when a crowd of saints has come together into one! For holy, with the veneration due to it, is the college in which the reverence of that most crowded assembly of the apostles, of which we read, is now to be seen. Never were they without the one whom they had received to preach; the Lord and Master was always with them, and the teachers were never deserted by their teacher. He who had sent them was teaching; he who had

told them what to teach was teaching; he who affirms that he is heard in his apostles was teaching. This care for the commanded preaching has come to all the Lord's priests in common; by hereditary right we are bound to this anxiety, all of us who, in their place, preach the name of the Lord throughout the various lands, since it is said to them: 'Go, teach all nations.' Your Fraternity notes that we have received a general command; he who commanded all of them thus in common willed that all of us also act. We must follow the office of our forebears; let us all undertake the labours of those whom we have all succeeded in honour; let us show their diligence in what they preached, after which, as the apostle warns, we are commanded to admit no other preaching. The guarding of what has been handed down is no less a duty than the handing down. They sowed the seeds of faith; let this care of ours guard them, so that the coming of our householder may find fruit incorrupt and manifold, to whom alone the abundance is ascribed. For as the vessel of election says, to plant and to water is not enough unless God gives the increase. We must act now, then, with common labour, to keep what has been believed and held up to now through the apostolic

succession. What is called into question in us is that by which, according to the apostle, we walk; for it is not sight but our faith that is now called into court. Spiritual arms must be taken up, since the wars are of minds and the weapons are words, so that we may persevere in the covenant of our King. The blessed apostle Paul admonishes all who are now placed where he commanded Timothy to remain. The same place, then, and the same cause require the same duty. Let us too do now what he then undertook to be done, that no one think otherwise and that no one attend to questions supplied by fables; as he commanded, let us be of one mind, thinking one thing, since this is expedient. Let us be eager to do nothing through rivalry, nothing through vainglory; let there be one soul with one heart in all, since the faith, which is one, is under attack.

Let the whole college in common grieve, or rather mourn, this with us. He who is to judge the world is called into judgment; he who is to examine all is examined; he who redeemed us suffers slander. Let your Fraternity gird itself; you know what helmet protects our head, what breastplate encloses our breast. It is not only now that the camps of the church have received you as their leaders. Let no one doubt that, with the favour of the Lord who makes both one, there will be peace when arms are laid down, since the cause itself defends itself.

Let us look again also at those words of our teacher which he addresses specifically to bishops, foretelling this: 'Take heed,' he says, 'to yourselves and to the whole flock in which the Holy Spirit has placed you as bishops to rule the church of God, which he acquired with his own blood.' We read that those who heard this were called to the very place where your Holiness has now gathered, Ephesus. To those, then, to whom the preaching of the faith is known, let our defence of it also now be known. Let us show it the constancy of our mind with the veneration of which great things are worthy, the constancy that long tranquillity has kept with pious understanding; the things preached by the apostles have reigned inviolate among us. Never have words of tyrannical domination against the King of kings been admitted, nor could the business of truth be overwhelmed by falsehood. I exhort you, dearest brothers: let that love alone be regarded in which, according to the voice of the apostle John, whose relics you venerate in your presence, we must abide. Let there be common prayer to the Lord. We know what the force of that divine presence will be when so great a multitude of priests prays with one accord, since that place could be shaken in which we read that the Twelve prayed with one mind. And what was the petition of the apostles as they prayed? Surely that they might receive the gift to speak the word of God with boldness and to do through his hands, by mighty works, those things whose power they had received through the gift of Christ our God. And what else is to be asked now for your holy assembly than that you speak the word of the Lord with boldness, that he grant you to keep what he has allowed you to preach, and that, filled with the Holy Spirit, as it is written, though with different mouths, you bring forth the one thing which the Spirit himself taught? Encouraged briefly by all these things (for, as the apostle says, 'I speak to those who know,' and 'I speak wisdom among the perfect'), stand by the catholic faith and the peace of the churches; stand by, for so it must be said, past, present, and future, asking for and keeping the things that are for the peace of Jerusalem. In our anxiety we have sent our holy brothers and fellow priests, of one mind with us and most approved men, the bishops Arcadius and Projectus and the presbyter Philip, to be present at what is done and to carry out what was decided by us before; we do not doubt that your Holiness will give them its assent, since what is read will be seen to have been decreed for the security of the universal church.

Celestine's instruction to Arcadius and Projectus, bishops, and Philip, our presbyter, sent to the East in this same case.

When, with God as our guide, as we believe and hope, your Charity has come to the appointed places, turn all your counsel to our brother and fellow bishop Cyril, and whatever you see to be his judgment, you will do. We command that the authority of the apostolic see be guarded. Since the instructions given to you say that you should attend the assembly, if it comes to debate you must judge their opinions, not enter the contest. But if you find the synod over and all the bishops gone home, you must inquire how matters were concluded. If things were done in accordance with the ancient catholic faith and you learn that my holy brother Cyril has gone to Constantinople, you must go there, so as to hand our letters to the emperor. But if things were done otherwise and matters are in dissension, you will be able to judge from the circumstances themselves what you ought to do with the counsel of our above-mentioned brother.

Celestine to Theodosius the Younger, Augustus.

Your Clemency's care for the defence of the catholic faith may well suffice. For the love of Christ our God, who is the ruler of your empire, you hasten to support it in every way, keeping it whole and spotless by condemning the error of depraved doctrines, always setting in this the bulwark of your empire, knowing that your reign, fortified by the observance of holy religion, will endure the more firmly. Yet to this heavenly care and glory each of us, according to his priestly office, devotes our effort as far as we are able; and to this synod, which you ordered to be held, we show our presence in those whom we have sent, beseeching your Piety, under the adjuration of the divine judgment, that your Mildness not allow anything to be permitted to turbulent novelty, nor any opportunity be granted to those who strive to confine the power of the divine majesty within the reasoning of human disputation, by which the peace of the church may be disturbed.

The cause of the faith ought to matter more to you than that of the kingdom, and your Clemency ought to be more anxious for the peace of the churches than for the security of all lands. For all prosperity follows if first the things that are God's are kept dearer. Abraham flourished by faith and filled the whole world with the glory of his prosperity. Moses, the liberator of the people, armed himself with zeal for the Lord against those whom he had found to have withdrawn from the true worship of God. The Lord guarded King David in his kingdom, because he kept his precepts, so as to subject his enemies to him. Fortified, then, by the defence of these examples, guard by faith, observance, and virtue the most pious worship of the universal church toward our God, so that dissension may claim nothing for itself. For whatever is laboured for the quiet of the church or the reverence of holy religion is done for the ease of your empire. These things, most glorious and most serene emperor Augustus, which we know to be in your heart, where we do not doubt that God dwells, we make known also to your august ears through my brothers and fellow bishops Arcadius and Projectus and my fellow presbyter Philip, whom we have sent, humbly asking of your Piety what we believe you have in your prayers: that what you ask of God, you grant for the cause of faith itself.

Celestine to Cyril, bishop of Alexandria.

I perceive that the saying of the most wise Solomon has been fulfilled: for not otherwise than one thirsting for cold water have I received a repeated message from a distant land through the letter of your Love, which joins us to each other in sharing counsel. The peace of the churches and of the catholic faith is to be hoped for without difficulty, when we see the most Christian princes labouring for it in this way. Royal care is not ineffective, especially in divine causes, since it belongs to God, who faithfully holds the hearts of rulers. So we give your Holiness a brief reply. For you ask whether the holy synod ought to receive a man who condemns what he has preached, or whether, since the time of delay has run out, the sentence passed long ago should stand. On this let us both consult our common Lord in common consultation. Does he not answer us at once through the prophet that he does not want the death of the one who dies, and through the apostle Paul that he wants all people to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth? A speedy correction in anyone never displeases God. Let this perhaps be reserved by God for your Holiness and the venerable council of brothers, that the uproars arisen within the church be

suppressed and that we may learn, with God's help, that the business has been finished with the correction we pray for. But we do not say that we are absent from the assembly; for we cannot be absent from those to whom, wherever we are placed, one faith nevertheless joins us. I do not want us to be reckoned by this body, whose presence the apostle calls weak; we are there, we who are thinking about what is being done there for all; we do spiritually what we are not seen to do bodily. I am devoted to catholic peace; I am eager for the salvation of the one perishing, if only he is willing to confess his sickness. We say this so that we may not seem to fail one who may perhaps be willing to correct himself. For if, while we wait for grapes, he adds thorns to himself, let the former decisions remain in force and be fulfilled with the fruit of judgment; let him gather what he sowed in the devil's furrow. Not by our counsel, but by his own doing, perishing, he proves that we do not have feet swift to shed blood, since he knows that a remedy too has been offered to him. As for those whom your Fraternity says you hold suspect concerning the catholic faith, if they send writings, we must answer them according to the nature of the matters; in this business let no one be deceived, since it is being handled with all caution.

Celestine, bishop, to Theodosius the Younger, Augustus.

We have recognized that divine providence has granted to its own cause what we hoped for. Nor could the minds of the faithful expect anything else to happen during your reign than what we rejoice has come about: that the impious preaching against God has fallen, and that the depravity of the new doctrine, condemned with its author, has perished. Wars were indeed waged against the faith, and the birth of the eternal King was assailed with sacrilegious darts of words; but you, who reign with Christ our God as your author, have conquered the impious enemies by the strength of your faith, bringing back a heavenly triumph, by which you may furnish a defence to a religious empire forever. For truly the prophet's voice fits your glory, and your kingdom can be called a kingdom of all ages, which is extended by the merit of the faith defended, and, grafted onto Christian reverence, ever grows as the observance of holy religion increases, most glorious and most serene emperor Augustus. Behold, now the houses of the Lord are free for prayer, and your empire is commended to our God throughout all the churches in the sacrifices offered. With the daring of the disturber removed, nothing is permitted to scandals; a pestilent speech no longer wounds the souls of men; while you take thought for the universal church, you have restored to all the salvation of their souls. This is your clemency, to be proclaimed of your reign, by which not lands, not provinces, but the souls of all have been defended. You will credit to the whole world this victory, which you won not by wars, not by swords, but by the devotion alone by which you are dedicated to God. This title of your glory remains and will remain, so that no age, no length of time, will abolish it; for eternal are the things done for love of the eternal King. So the faith of Abraham endures through the ages; zeal for God made King David's merit everlasting, since he believed God's enemies to be his own enemies and hated those whom he had found hateful to God. The prophet Elijah, too, was not content to refute those who prophesied falsely, but wished so to punish them that he destroyed by pursuing those whom he saw striving for the ruin

of his people. Your glory is equal to his. He resisted those who prophesied falsely, you those who teach falsely; he pursued the prophets who lied against God, you drive away the priests who preach impious things about Christ our God. He was intent only on punishment; your Piety so punishes impiety as to defend what is religious. For it would not have been enough to drive away the diseases and repel the pestilence, unless you had also restored healthy air and supplied life-giving substance to the infected, by appointing for that church such a bishop as had long since proved himself worthy of this height to all who knew him. The Roman church, which always had and counted him among its own, bears him witness as though to a part of its own body; the merits of his predecessors, to whom he had been holily attached, bear him witness. For he was so joined in mind and in office to the man of most reverend memory, Atticus, the bravest champion of the catholic faith, that already then the marks of the future episcopate in him

shone out beforehand. But this happens by the hidden decision of the divine majesty, that whatever things are better are kept for later, and that peace is reached through certain scandals of disturbers. It is due to the glory of my brother Bishop Maximian that the city should regret, in view of what it endured, that anyone was preferred to him, and should now feel, having chosen him, that it owes to him the integrity of the faith. But for this priest, chosen for that church as his merit deserved, and ordained also with the consent of the holy assembly that was present, to settle the state of the church and to tear out by the roots every wound of depraved heresy, lest what has been cut off dare to sprout again, we beseech and ask, invoking him whom you worship, that you furnish the arms of your faith as you are accustomed. For now every guard must be set, lest the ravening wolf, shut out from the folds of the Lord's flock after his raging, return again by serpentine stealth to the death of souls, having dug tunnels wherever he can. For he cannot rest, since in his rage he longs to brood over his prey. Give protection to the healthy and remedies to those who are to be healed; surround the truth of the catholic religion with the walls of your faith, by which believers may be protected and the followers of so great an error may not dare to enter. For this is the full fruit of your victory, to leave nothing that the church of God should fear again. Him, then, whom the sentence of all the priests cast out for persisting in sacrilegious preaching, let your Clemency remove from all fellowship, so that he may have no opportunity of destroying anyone. My religious sons John the presbyter and Epithymitus the deacon, the messengers of so great a matter, we received with the rejoicing of the whole church; and having read the letter of your Piety in the assembly of the whole Christian people at the church of the most blessed apostle Peter, we paid our vows to our God for you. For by the Lord's arrangement they reached us so as to arrive on the very day of the birth according to the flesh of Christ our God, about which the question had been raised, so that the whole assembly refuted the impiety now convicted. To the cause of the faith is fittingly joined a matter of benefit to the church and to the poor, so that you who have secured the integrity of the faith may also take thought for the interests of the poor. Proba, of illustrious and holy memory, so left her estates situated in Asia, held from her ancestors for a long time, that she directed the greater part of their revenues to be paid out every year to the clergy, the poor, and monasteries. But these estates there have been so handled, to the loss of the poor, through the negligence, to say nothing worse, of the man who managed them, that not only do they not pay the customary sums, but even their right and ownership is being violated by a grant obtained by stealth. We ask your Piety that, of your clemency, you grant this to the religious and illustrious house and to the church: that all disturbance from those lying in wait depart from them, and that the possession be secure both for the church and for its owners, so that what is gained from it for the feeding of the poor may be counted as yours.

Celestine, bishop, to Maximian, fellow bishop of Constantinople.

We have seen and embraced your Fraternity in your letter, and we beheld your Holiness such as we had known it, glorious in simple purity and conspicuous for brightness of mind rather than of speech. That church, of whose faith we always boasted, returns to itself and to its own state, now that, after casting out the one who besieged it, it has received you as its bishop by divine judgment. Take the helm of the ship known to you, and steer it as we know you learned from your predecessors. Withstand the waves which that wind stirred up, troubling what was calm, the enemy not only of those he had as passengers in that ship but of all, desiring to break it apart in every joint of its sides so that he could devour it in swift whirlpools, having falsely professed (for what does iniquity not profess?) the office of helmsman, so as to seem to steer those whom he was striving to destroy. The waves he stirred up still sound around you, and the swollen billows and storms trouble you. Resist, ever watchful, and as master of the ship entrusted to you, help with what care you can the safety of those entrusted to you. Make calm the sea you sail; by your skill make safe the ship you steer, after the tempests it has endured. Follow that fisherman who trod the waters of the sea with his feet so that he might come to Christ our God, whom he had seen walking on the sea.

Follow the examples of the earlier bishops by whom you were taught and nurtured: the knowledge of the most blessed John in preaching, the vigilance of holy Atticus in opposing heresies, the simple purity of your predecessor holy Sisinnius, whose successor we believe you to be, so that we may rejoice over that church as we used to. Gather the scattered, and exercise the pious spirit we know you have toward those whom the disturber had dispersed. Gather your peoples to their mother's breasts; call back those whom the enemy had drawn away against their will by the taste of poison. Confirm in the faith those you see assailed, heal those you see wounded, remove those who do not respond to the medicine. Sometimes poison is removed with pain, and when the harmful parts are cut off, health is prepared for the rest. A field has been given you, dearest brother, in which to exercise the glory of a watchful shepherd and a kind priest, and to pour the taste of Christian health into the mouth, so that it may be clear that you could do more in restoring than he could in harming, who preferred to be an imitator of the devil rather than of Christ, disturbing the peace of all the churches. To this peace we must now give our effort in common, so that there may be one faith and one mind of all the priests. Let your hand hold the Lord's winnowing fork and purge the threshing floor entrusted to it, so that the chaff may be separated from the grain and the wheat, cleansed with all care, may be gathered into the barns of Christ our God. Let the new impiety have no place, and let your vigilance resist the Caelestian error, long since suppressed throughout the world and known by its condemnation, so that all who follow this doctrine may be driven from all fellowship of men. May the Holy Spirit oppose them through you, he who opposes them in all the provinces they try to reach, lest their impious preaching rise again. For wherever they arrive they become known, so as to be condemned; and, as though a sentence so often repeated were not enough for some, they disturb distant lands and remote provinces. But he pursues them whose faith they tried to persecute by their depravity, and from whom they cannot hide, to whatever hiding place they flee, since their impiety betrays them. Our sons, the religious men John the presbyter and Epithymitus the deacon, we received with great joy and sent back with greater rejoicing.