Sixth Ecumenical Council: The victory of truth over political expediency

The Sixth Ecumenical Council. A miniature from the Chronicle of Constantine Manasses. 14th century. Photo: wikipedia.org

The Ecumenical Council of 451 in Chalcedon, one of the most significant in the history of the Church, resolved a theological issue but created a political one. It affirmed the Orthodox teaching of the two natures of Christ – Divine and human – united "unconfusedly, unchangeably, indivisibly, inseparably". However, in doing so, it cast out from the Church, or rather against the Church, the numerous supporters of Monophysitism, the doctrine that in Christ the human nature was absorbed by the Divine. And since Christianity was the state religion of the Empire, those opposed to the Church were, in effect, opposed to the state as well.

At the same time, it is difficult to determine which came first: political opposition driven by heretical beliefs or heretical beliefs driven by political opposition. Most likely, it was a combination of both. However, in any case, for the national peripheries of the Empire, particularly Egypt, there was a great temptation to strengthen their struggle for national independence from the Greeks with a religious foundation, making their cause one of defending their Monophysite beliefs.

Many peoples – Copts, Armenians, and others – raised the banner of Monophysitism not so much because they were convinced of its truth, but rather to distinguish themselves from the "imperial" religion of Constantinople.

This led to Monophysites stubbornly clinging to their delusion, making them impervious to any attempts by Orthodox theologians to convince them otherwise, even to the compromise proposals that were put forward. As church historian A. Kartashev wrote: "National separatists were never satisfied by any concessions. They needed heresy to separate themselves from the Greeks."

There were so many Monophysites in the Empire that emperors had to take them into account. Even Justinian the Great tried to reconcile the Monophysites with the Church in order to consolidate the empire. For this purpose he issued documents, which in essence were a digression from the Council of Chalcedon, and forced all the bishops to sign them. However, his efforts were in vain; in addition to causing further ecclesiastical turmoil, such policies achieved nothing. Emperor Heraclius (years of life: 575-641; years of emperorship: 610-641), faced much more serious challenges to the unity of the empire than Justinian the Great. His rise to power was accompanied by civil war, in the east he waged bloody wars with the Persians, in the north the tribes of the Avars and Slavs seized the Balkans and threatened Constantinople; and on top of that, a new significant threat had arisen from the spread of Islam, with its followers conquering Egypt, Syria, and Palestine. Therefore, religious unity of all the peoples of the Empire became an absolute necessity for Heraclius.

An interesting fact: in 613, Heraclius wished to marry his… niece, named Martina. Patriarch Sergius of Constantinople timidly attempted to dissuade the emperor from such an obvious sin, which is incest. However, Heraclius declared, "Until now, you have acted as a bishop, but now fulfill my will as a friend." And Patriarch Sergius blessed the unlawful marriage.

The emergence of Monothelitism

To win over the Monophysites, Patriarch Sergius and Emperor Heraclius (scholars debate who played the leading role in this) devised a common platform that they believed could reconcile both the Orthodox and the Monophysites. This platform was based on the following idea: the Council of Chalcedon established the doctrine of the unity of the person of Christ and His two natures.

However, the question regarding His action, energy, and will remained open. Could it be possible to admit that in Christ there exists a single will that unites both human and Divine energies and actions? Does this teaching fit within the theology of the Council of Chalcedon, and can the Monophysites be reconciled with the Church on this basis?

In truth, the issue of wills, actions, and energies would likely have arisen on its own, regardless of the political context, but in reality, a positive solution to this question seemed to the ruling authorities to be an effective means of religious consolidation for the Empire. Initially, Monoenergism, the doctrine of the unity of energies in the God-Man, emerged. And for a time, it seemed that this approach might work.

In a relatively short period, parts of the Armenians (630-632), the Syrian Jacobites (630), and, most importantly, the Alexandrian Monophysites (632) were reconciled with the Church. However, this was influenced not only by theological factors but also by political pressure, violence, bribery, and diplomacy. As a result, this reunification was largely formal, and in practice, everyone remained firm in their own convictions.

At the same time, Monenergism was opposed by the learned monk Sophronius. This was the very same Sophronius who had spent many years wandering various monasteries with the famous John Moschus, gathering treasures of spiritual wisdom. Together, they wrote the well-known book “The Spiritual Meadow”. By the time of the Monenergism controversy, Sophronius had gained great authority and strongly asserted that in Christ, there could be no single energy, but only two, since there are two natures.

During Sophronius' conversations with Patriarch Sergius of Constantinople, a gentleman's agreement was reached, as we would say nowadays: Sergius agreed to stop talking about the number of energies altogether, and Sophronius promised not to denounce the heresy of monoenergism in public.

In 634, Sophronius became the Patriarch of Jerusalem and, according to the custom of the time, was required to issue a circular letter, known as a synodicon, in which he notified everyone of his election and testified to his faith. Fearing (not without reason) that in his synodicon Sophronius would loudly denounce the heresy, Patriarch Sergius of Constantinople hastened to send a letter to Pope Honorius in Rome, in which he tried to present the matter in a way that would benefit him. He wrote that there was no need to discuss whether there was one or two energies in Christ, and that it would be possible to agree on the assertion that in the God-Man, there is a single will. Sergius also asked for the Pope’s opinion on this matter.

In his response, the Pope fully supported Sergius's position and formulated the doctrine of Monothelitism in the form that would later be condemned at the Sixth Ecumenical Council. Pope Honorius wrote that, while acknowledging Christ as "acting in many ways", i.e. both divinely and humanly, it should be recognised that He has a "single will". Thus, the Pope ascribed the will not to nature but to the hypostasis, and from the hypostatic unity of Christ inferred the unity of His will.

Soon after, both Alexandria and Jerusalem were captured by the Arabs, which gave a new impetus to Emperor Heraclius's attempts to unite the Empire religiously on the basis of Monothelitism, already approved by Pope Honorius.

"Ecthesis" and "Typus"

In 638, in Constantinople, they decided to repeat the mistake of Justinian the Great and issued a doctrinal definition called the “Ecthesis”, in which the new teaching, mandatory for the entire empire, was formulated as follows:

"Although some of the Fathers used the expression 'one energy', it offends the ears of many, for they think that by this, the two natures are denied. On the other hand, some are also tempted by the 'two energies', because this expression is not found in any of the holy Fathers, and it leads to the idea of two opposite wills, which is the heresy of Nestorius. Without sharing this, we confess that there is only one will of our Lord Jesus Christ, the True God, because at no moment did His flesh, endowed with a rational soul, separate from God the Word, who is hypostatically united with it, and it did not act of its own accord or against the will of the Word, but only in the way and at the time that God the Word wished."

The theological error of this theological definition was that from the fact that the human will of Christ never opposed the will of God the Word, it was concluded that there was, ontologically, no human will in Christ. Thus, the humanity of Christ was once again, as in the case of Monophysitism, considered deficient, and therefore not saved in its fullness.

Again, we recall the saying of St Athanasius the Great: "What has not been assumed by the God-Man has not been saved."

At this time Pyrrhus, an even greater supporter of Monothelitism, took the throne in place of the deceased Patriarch Sergius of Constantinople, the compliant Sergius of Jaffa took the place of Sophronius of Alexandria, and Macedonius, who had also aссepted “Ecthesis”, was placed on the throne of Antioch. The matter stalled in Rome. After the death in 638 of the formal author of Monothelitism, Pope Honorius, Severinus took the throne, but in 640 he also died, and the next Pope John IV firmly rejected the “Ecthesis”.

In the following years, the futility of the “Ecthesis” in uniting the Orthodox with the Monophysites became clear, and moreover, the theological disputes caused by the doctrine of Monothelitism led to more divisions than benefits. In 648, the emperor was already Constans II and the patriarch was Paul II. At the behest of the patriarch, the emperor issued the “Typus”, a decree that abolished the “Ecthesis”, but at the same time, under threat of exile and confiscation of property, it prohibited any teaching or discussion of the question of wills in Christ.

However, the theological dispute could no longer be contained by imperial decrees.

Pope Martin, Maximus the Confessor and the Lateran Council

In 649, Pope Martin convened a council at the Basilica of the Saviour in the Lateran, which was attended by around 500 bishops, including those from the East. The initiator of the Council, alongside the Pope, was St. Maximus the Confessor, a renowned and authoritative monk-philosopher, and a disciple of Sophronius of Jerusalem, who had long been a staunch opponent of Monothelitism. It is believed that he was the one who composed the decree adopted at the Lateran Council of 649. This decree consisted of 20 anathemas, in which the Monothelite doctrine was examined in detail and condemned.

The decree was sent to the Emperor and all the Local Churches. However, the Emperor sought to force through the acceptance of the “Typus”. To achieve this, the imperial exarch Olympius was sent to Rome with strong powers to oppose the Pope and the entire Lateran Council. Despite the threats, everyone remained loyal to the decisions of the Council.

According to tradition, Olympius instructed one of his subordinates to kill Pope Martin, during the Divine Liturgy as he approached the Chalice. However, the man was unable to carry out the order, as he was suddenly struck blind.

This miracle caused Olympius to radically change his position. Instead of continuing his fight against the Pope, he decided to rebel against the Emperor. This decision was likely influenced by the mood of the local military garrison. Although the rebellion never took place, as Olympius was killed by Saracens, his betrayal became known in Constantinople and gave Emperor Constans II the pretext to accuse Pope Martin and St Maximus of treason and take action against them under this pretext.

In 653, a new exarch, Theodore Calliopas, arrived in Rome with troops and announced the imperial decree for the deposition of Pope Martin. He arrested the Pope and sent him under guard to Constantinople. On the way, Pope Martin spent an entire year on the island of Naxos. He was treated very harshly. Pope Martin, who suffered from gout and a chronic intestinal disorder, was starved, exposed to the cold, deprived of water, and denied basic living conditions. After subjecting him to such torment, in 654, Pope Martin was condemned for a political crime, charged with failing to prevent Olympius from inciting a rebellion against the Emperor.

At the request of Patriarch Paul of Constantinople, the death sentence was replaced by exile in Chersonesus, which only prolonged Pope Martin’s unbearable suffering. His words at the trial are known: "I beg you, for the sake of Christ, do with me whatever you wish. Any death will be a blessing for me." Pope Martin died in Chersonesus in 655.

Before the Pope's arrest, St Maximus had already been detained in Rome, and he too was brought to Constantinople and accused of treason. Maximus rejected these charges and refused to accept the “Typus”. Meanwhile, in Rome, despite Pope Martin still being alive and not yet convicted, a new Pope, Eugene, was elected, who had no intention of opposing the Emperor. He sent his representatives to Constantinople, ready to enter into communion with the Patriarch of Constantinople.

This gave Patriarch Pyrrhus, who was elected after the death of Patriarch Paul, the opportunity to address Maximus: "Let us see to which Church you now belong – Constantinople, Rome, Antioch, Alexandria, Jerusalem? All now agree (with Monophysitism)."

To which St Maximus said his famous phrase: "If the whole universe were to receive communion with the Patriarch (the Monophysite), I would not commune with him. The Holy Spirit, through the Apostle, anathematized even the angels who bring anything new and alien to the preaching."

Maximus was subjected to torture: his tongue was cut out and his right hand was severed. He died in exile in Georgia in 662. Both Pope Martin and Maximus the Confessor were canonised by both the Eastern and Western Churches.

The sufferings of these confessors and their firm stand in the faith became the cornerstone for the establishment of truth at the Sixth Ecumenical Council.

The convocation of the Council and its doctrinal definition

The Sixth Ecumenical Council was convened in Constantinople in 680 by Emperor Constantine Pogonatus, who also sought peace within the Church. However, rather than using force or even persuasion, he preferred to simply give the hierarchs and theologians the opportunity to define the true doctrine on the question of the wills of Christ. To be precise, the Emperor did not convene a full council, but merely a pre-council conference. Moreover, Constantine did not set specific tasks before the Ecumenical Council, as other emperors had done. Instead, he suggested sending delegates "who had knowledge of the entire divinely inspired Scripture and possessed impeccable knowledge of the dogmas, men who would bring the necessary books with them."

This Council, also known as the Third Council of Constantinople, became the longest of all the Ecumenical Councils. It opened on 7 November 680 and concluded on 16 September 681. Initially, only 43 people attended the first session, but by the final session, there were 163 attendees. At the very first session, the Council declared itself Ecumenical, a decision which Emperor Constantine immediately accepted.

At the Council, there were supporters of both Orthodoxy and Monophysitism, yet no one exerted pressure on others or threatened reprisals. During one of the sessions, Constantine Pogonatus declared that he had convened the Council not for any political reasons but solely for the peace of the Church and the truth of the faith. As church historian A. Kartashev writes: “...the Council presented a fortunate image of the complete absence of political pressure, <...> and of full freedom of theological opinions and speech. The theological debates were conducted calmly, thoroughly, and all quotations and references were verified against the documents. The Council was not merely in name, but in reality, a 'synodal' work of theological thought.”

At the Council, the "necessary books" – that is, the documents from previous councils, theological letters from various hierarchs, and the writings of the Church Fathers – were examined very carefully, thoughtfully, and methodically. Some of them were recognised as forgeries and were rejected.

Though the Emperor initially intended to convene only a pre-council conference, Pope Agatho prepared for it thoroughly. He gathered a local council in Rome, at which the confession of faith of the Roman Church on this issue was formulated. It was brought to Constantinople by papal legates. It read as follows:

"We, then, following the holy Fathers, all with one consent, teach men to confess one and the same Son, our Lord Jesus Christ, the same perfect in Godhead and also perfect in manhood; truly God and truly man, of a rational soul and body; consubstantial with the Father according to the Godhead, and consubstantial with us according to the Manhood; in all things like unto us, without sin; begotten before all ages of the Father according to the Godhead, and in these latter days, for us and for our salvation (born) of Mary the Virgin Theotokos as to the manhood."

This doctrinal definition played the same role for the VI Ecumenical Council as Pope Leo's Tomos did for the IV Ecumenical Council, i.e. on its basis the Council formulated the Church-wide dogma on the wills in Christ:

"One and the Same Christ, Son, Lord, Only-begotten; acknowledged in Two Natures unconfusedly, unchangeably, indivisibly, inseparably; the difference of the Natures being in no way removed because of the Union, but rather the properties of each Nature being preserved, and (both) concurring into One Person and One Hypostasis; not as though He was parted or divided into Two Persons, but One and the Self-same Son and Only-begotten God, Word, Lord, Jesus Christ; even as from the beginning the prophets have taught concerning Him, and as the Lord Jesus Christ Himself hath taught us, and as the Symbol of the Fathers hath handed down to us."

All those who adhered to Monothelitism were anathematized, with the chief heretics named individually. In the Acts of the Sixth Ecumenical Council, we read:

"Also, the names of these men must be thrust out of the Church, namely, that of Sergius, the first who wrote on this impious doctrine. Further, that of Cyrus of Alexandria, of Pyrrhus, Paul, and Peter of Constantinople, and of Theodore of Pharan, all of whom also Pope Agatho rejected in his letter to the Emperor. We punish them all with anathema. But along with them, it is our universal decision that there shall also be shut out from the Church and anathematized the former Pope Honorius of Old Royce, because we found in his letter to Sergius, that in everything he followed his view and confirmed his impious doctrines."

The anathema against Pope Honorius is evidence that, firstly, the Church did not recognise papal infallibility, and secondly, that the popes were as subject to the court of the council as any other hierarchs.

As is usual in such cases, the emperor ordered all his subjects to adhere to the faith of the Sixth Ecumenical Council, threatening punishment for those who disobeyed: bishops, clergy, and monks were to be deposed; officials were to be stripped of their office and property; and ordinary citizens were to be exiled from the city in which they lived.

The Sixth Ecumenical Council resolved the dogmatic dispute but did not pass any canonical rules regarding the pressing issues of the time. To remedy this oversight, ten years later, in 691, another council was convened, now known as the Council of Trullo (the Quinisext Council), which adopted a number of church canons. However, more on that in the next publication.

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