The
Papacy and the Early Fathers
A
Response by Scott Windsor
This
webpage is a response to another one located at: http://www.christiantruth.com/forgeries.html
written by William
Webster. I was pointed to Webster's website by James
White (Alpha and Omega Ministries) who
challenged me on a document known as "The Donation of Constantine" (Donatio
Constantini) and also known as the Psuedo-Isidorian Decretals (or False
Decretals). They were alleged to be given by the Emperor Constantine to
Pope Sylvester I (314-35). The document is without a doubt a forgery, being
written somewhere between 750 and 850 A.D.
The
fact that this document is a forgery is not debated by Catholics. The point
that White and Webster try to make is that the entire doctrine of the papacy
hinges on and/or was created due to this forged document. This could not be
further from the truth. Anyone who would hold to this belief is either grossly
misinformed or just plain dishonest in their portrayal of the Catholic Church
and the papacy. (See Addendum)
In
order for the claims of White and Webster to be true, then the papacy and all
evidence of a Petrine Primacy and succession of such must come after 750 – 850
A.D. It then becomes the challenge of Catholic apologists to show that such
teachings came earlier. On this webpage we will show definite proof that such
evidence does indeed exist and totally discredit anyone who would hold that the
"Donation of Constantine" is the basis for the papacy.
Scriptural
Foundation:
Matthew
16:18 – "And I say to thee, thou art Peter, and upon this rock will I
build My Church, and the gates of hell will not prevail against it." Here
we have Jesus bestowing upon Peter (whose name means "rock") the
foundation of the Church. In fact, in the Aramaic, which is what Jesus was
likely speaking when speaking to His Apostles, and also the likely original
language that the book of Matthew was written in, there is no distinction
between the name "Peter" (Kepha) and the term for "rock"
(kepha). Hence, if we stuck closer to the original language (instead of
transliterating it to Greek and then English), that same verse would read
something like: "… thou art Kepha, and upon this kepha will I build My
Church." This one verse alone is enough for one who has The Faith, but for
the Protestant opposition, they require more so let us go on.
Testimony
from the Early Fathers:
"In
517 the Eastern bishops assented to and signed the formula of Pope Hormisdas,
which states in part: ‘The first condition of salvation is to keep the norm of
the true faith and in no way deviate from the established doctrine of the
Fathers. For it is impossible that the words of our Lord Jesus Christ who said,
"Thou art Peter and upon this rock I will build My Church" [Matt.
16:18], should not be verified. And their truth has been proved by the course
of history, for in the Apostolic See the Catholic religion has always been kept
unsullied.’" (qtd in This
Rock, October 1998).
A.D.
220 – Tertulian: "…that the power of binding and loosing has thereby been
handed on to you, that is to every church akin to Peter? What kind of man are
you, subverting and changing what was the manifest intent of the Lord when He
conferred this personally upon Peter? On you, He says, I will build my Church;
and I will give to you the keys, not to the Church; and whatever you shall have
bound or you shall have loosed, not what they shall have bound or they shall
have loosed. " [Modesty, qtd in Jurgens 387]
A.D.
190/210 – St. Clement of Alexandria: "Nor does the kingdom of heaven
belong to the sleeping and the lazy; rather, the violent take it by force… On
hearing these words, the blessed Peter, the chose, the pre-eminent, the first
among the disciples, for whom alone with Himself the Savior paid the tribute,
quickly grasped and understood their meaning." [Who is the Rich Man That
is Saved? qtd in Jurgens 436]
A.D.
226 – 232 et postea - Origen: "Peter, upon whom is built the Church of
Christ, against which the gates of hell shall not prevail, left only one
Epistle of acknowledged genuinity. Let us concede also a second which, however,
is doubtful." [Commentaries on John, qtd in Jurgens 479a] (This was a
comment on the epistles of St. Peter, which later were both confirmed as
genuine. As a side note, this discredits those who adhere to sola scriptura as well, since here, two centuries after
Christ, they are still debating which books belong to the Canon of Sacred
Scripture).
A.D.
244 – Origen: (Speaking about Peter) "Look at the great foundation of the
Church, that most solid of rocks, upon whom Christ built the Church! And what
does the Lord say to him? ‘O you of little faith,’ He says, ‘why did you
doubt!’ (Matt. 14:31)" [Homilies on Exodus, qtd in Jurgens 489]
A.D.
251 – St. Cyprian of Carthage: "The Lord says to Peter: ‘I say to you,’ He
says, ‘that you are Peter, and upon this rock I will build My Church, and the
gates of hell will not overcome it. And to you I will give the keys to the
kingdom of heaven: and whatever things you shall bind on earth shall be bound
also in heaven, and whatever you loose on earth, they shall be loosed also in
heaven.’ | first edition | And again He says to him after His resurrection:
‘Feed my sheep.’ On him He builds the Church, and to him He gives the command
to feed the sheep; and although He assigns a like power to all the Apostles,
yet He founded a single chair, and He established by His Own Authority a source
and an intrinsic reason for that unity. Indeed, the others were that also which
Peter was; but a primacy is given to Peter, whereby it is made clear that there
is but one Church and one chair.’" [The Unity of the Catholic Church, qtd
in Jurgens 555-556]
A.D.
254 – St. Cyprian of Carthage: "You have written also that on my account
the Church now has a portion of itself in a state of dispersion. In truth, the
whole people of the Church are collected together and made one and joined to
each other in an indivisible harmony. They alone have remained outside who,
were they within, would have to be ejected. … And the Lord too, in the Gospel,
when the disciples abandoned Him while He was speaking, turned to the twelve
and said, ‘And do you too wish to go away?’ Peter answered Him saying, ‘Lord,
to whom shall we go? You have the word of eternal life: and we believe that you
are the Son of the Living God.’
There
speaks Peter, upon whom the Church would be built, teaching in the name of the
Church and showing that even if a stubborn and proud multitude withdraws
because it does not wish to obey, yet the Church does not withdraw from Christ.
The people joined to the priest and the flock clinging to their shepherd are
the Church.’" [Letter of Cyprian to Florentius Pupianus, qtd in Jurgens
587]
A.D.
306 – 373 – St. Ephraim: "Simon, My follower, I have made you the
foundation of the holy Church. I betimes called you Peter, because on you will
support all its buildings. You are the inspector of those who will build on
earth a Church for Me. If they should wish to build what is false, you the
foundation, will condemn them. You are the head of the fountain from which My
teaching flows, you are the chief of My disciples. Through you will I give
drink to all peoples. Yours is that life-giving sweetness which I dispense. I
have chosen you to be, as it were, the first-born in My Institution, and so
that, as the heir, you may be executor of my treasures. I have given you the
keys of My kingdom. Behold, I have given you authority over all My
treasures!" [Homilies, qtd in Jurgens 706]
A.D.
461 – St. Leo I: "From the whole world only one, Peter, is chosen to
preside over the calling of all nations, and over all the other Apostles, and
over the Fathers of the Church. Thus, although among the people of God there
are many priests and many pastors, it is really Peter who rules them all, of
whom, too, it is Christ who is their chief ruler. Divine condescension, dearly
beloved, has granted to this man in a wonderful and marvellous manner the
aggregate of its power; and if there was something that it wanted to be his in
common with other leaders, it never gave whatever it did not deny to others
except through him. [Sermons, qtd in Jurgens 2191]
Circa
A.D. 391 – 430 – St. Augustine of Hippo: "Before His suffering the Lord
Jesus Christ, as you know, chose His disciples, whom He called Apostles. Among
the Apostles almost everywhere Peter alone merited to represent the whole
Church. For the sake of representing the whole Church, which he alone could do,
he merited to hear: ‘I will give to you the keys to the kingdom of
Heaven.’" [Sermons, qtd in Jurgens 1526]
Well,
there are many more but the above is plenty of proof and far more than is
needed to show that the authority of Peter and the Apostolic See clearly
pre-existed the Donation of Constantine forgery. Another point of fact to make
here is that if the papacy was not already recognized as authoritative, this
forgery would have been cast off as ludicrous. The fact that they existed for a
time before Pope Nicholas I cited them indicates that there was credibility to
the concept.
Why was
the Donation of Constantine written in the first place? Was it to shore up the
papacy? No, on the contrary, it was to "support the local bishops against
their metropolitans and other authorities, so as to secure absolute impunity
and the exclusion of all influence of the secular power." (Dollinger, qtd
in This Rock, 22 -
October 1998).
To send
comments to Scott
Windsor, click here!
Acknowledgements:
My
thanks go to Steven O’Reilly, freelance writer for This Rock, from
Snellville, Georgia. O’Reilly wrote the article which appears in This Rock, in the
October 1998 issue. His article helped send me in the proper direction. I also
wish to thank Michael Forrest, who sent the article to me.
Source
for most of my quotes: The Faith of the Early Fathers , Volumes 1 and 3,
by William A. Jurgens. The Liturgical Press, 1970.
For a
more in depth treatment of the Donation of Constantine, check The
Catholic Encyclopedia online at: http://www.knight.org/advent/cathen/05118a.htm
* ADDENDUM: On May 4, 1999 I was in IRC
chat with James White again. James clarifies his thesis. He states that St.
Thomas Aquinas based his doctrine of the papacy entirely upon the False
Decretals and that the Church eventually constructs the Her entire doctrine
and dogma upon St. Thomas' Summa. His claim is that the above document (mine)
does nothing to refute his thesis. Well, I beg to differ.
This
webpage clearly shows that the papacy, even as we know it today, is spoken of
centuries before the False Decretals. Now, Webster's thesis quite
clearly is that "in the 9th century, a literary forgery occurred which
completely revolutionized the ancient government of the Church in the
West." Webster's thesis is that the False Decretals is the starting
point of this concept of the papacy. This webpage has clearly shown that Webster's
premise is entirely false, and hence his argument utterly fails.
James'
premise is slightly different, but the fact that he relied upon Webster's
documentation weakens James' position.
James
argues that this document is Aquinas' sole source for his doctrine on the
papacy as found in the Summa. Clearly I have shown that the doctrine is spoken
of and taught centuries before Aquinas. If Aquinas only used this one source,
but there are many others out there to support him, then so what!? Is Aquinas'
argument destroyed because he used a forged document that he had no way of
knowing was forged? It would IF there were no other proofs available to support
Aquinas' conclusions. Since I have shown here that MANY other sources are
available - James' argument holds little water.
I will
be looking for other citations of papal authority from within the Summa that
are not from the False Decretals and will post them here when found.
Keeping in mind, I would only need ONE such source to soundly put down James'
argument (that Aquinas used "no" other source).
If anyone reading this has such references, please send them to me, citing your
sources (preferably internet sources) to: bigscott@a2z.org.
If I use your sources, I will give proper credit.
In JMJ,
Scott<<<
*ADDENDUM
2:
"Further, the blessed Cyril, bishop of Alexandria, says: "That we may
remain members of our apostolic head, the throne of the Roman Pontiffs, of whom
it is our duty to seek what we are to believe and what we are to hold,
venerating him, beseeching him above others; for his it is to reprove, to
correct, to appoint, to loose, and to bind in place of Him Who set up that very
throne, and Who gave the fulness of His own to no other, but to him alone, to
whom by divine right all bow the head, and the primates of the world are
obedient as to our Lord Jesus Christ Himself." Therefore bishops are
subject to someone even by divine right." [Question 40 - Article 6:
Whether in the Church there can be anyone above the bishops? - St. Thomas Aquinas, Summa
Theologica]
James'
argument was that St. Thomas didn't use any other sources when
discussing the papacy and papal authority. Clearly it is shown here that
St. Thomas cites Cyril of Alexandria. Case closed.
PS- It
took me literally about 5 minutes to find this citation on NewAdvent's site.
There may be others, but since I only needed one, I stopped here. If you, the
reader, finds or knows of any others, I will gladly add them to this list.
A reader of this page submitted this additional information on the
quote from St. Thomas:
I looked this up in the Summa, and it comes from the Supplement. Which
was finished after St.Thomas' death. I believe it is taken from his
"Commentary on the "Sentences"". Would it be possible to add that the
quotation is on your page is from the Supplement? This is not always
translated - the 60-volume "Blackfriars" translation includes only the
Summa Theologiae proper.
As to the quotation - The Marietti edition of the Latin [Turin 1955]
gives a reference to the Contra Errores Graecorum of St.Thomas. Which
uses this text, which is apparently not St.Cyril's own. So it would be
dangerous to rely on it as Cyrilline - - but, a Patristics scholar would
know whether it is genuine. A number of St.Thomas' quotations are
misattributed; usually the words of one Father are ascribed to another.
But sometimes non-Patristic writings are ascribed to Fathers.
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