ON SAINT PELAGIUS, BISHOP OF LAODICEA IN SYRIA, AT THE END OF THE FOURTH CENTURY.
HISTORICAL COMMENTARY.
Pelagius, Bishop of Laodicea in Syria (S.)
[1] The Tables of the Roman Martyrology celebrate among other Saints on March 25 Saint Pelagius, Bishop of Laodicea in the coastal territory of Syria, opposite the island of Cyprus: whose illustrious life before he assumed the Episcopate is described by Theodoret, Bishop of Cyrus in the same Syria, in book 4 of his Ecclesiastical History, chapter 12. "Pelagius," he says, He lives in chastity with his wife: "having taken a wife in his youth; on the very nuptial couch, on the first day of marriage, persuaded his bride to prefer chastity to marriage, and taught her to embrace brotherly love in place of conjugal union. He gave this proof of perfect continence: and since he had added other virtues as companions, leading choruses together, he therefore obtained the Episcopate by common suffrage." The same things from Theodoret are described by Nicephorus, book 11, chapter 21.
[2] The time of the conferral of the Episcopate is indicated by Philostorgius the Cappadocian, who under Theodosius the Younger wrote a History epitomized by Photius: he is ordained Bishop of Laodicea around the year 360. in which, having treated in book 4, chapter 12, of the Council held at Constantinople under the Emperor Constantius in the year of Christ 359; he begins the fifth book from the deposition of various Bishops and the substitution of others, accomplished by Acacius, Bishop of Caesarea in Palestine, and then adds the following: "He appointed Meletius, Bishop of Sebastia in Armenia, at Antioch; who, when he was elevated to the See of Antioch, became a fervent champion of the Homoousios. Acacius also ordained Pelagius at Laodicea. And in short, where there was power, he gave counsel as much as he could, so that in place of those who had been sent into exile, those who most openly worshipped the Homoousios should be ordained." Thus far that source. Saint Meletius is venerated on February 12, on which day we discussed his Acts at length, and in §1 concerning his assumption of the Antiochene Episcopate we adduced the testimonies of Saints Jerome, Epiphanius, and Gregory Nazianzen, as well as Socrates, Sozomen, Theodoret, Cassiodorus, and Nicephorus: from whom it is established that he was received with the greatest joy of all and with the concurrence of Clergy and people, which we gather was also done for Saint Pelagius from the fact that he obtained the Episcopate by common suffrage.
[3] After the death of the Emperor Constantius and his successor Julian the Apostate, Jovian was substituted, in the year 363 he attends the Council of Antioch, under whom through Saint Meletius a Council was celebrated at Antioch in the year of Christ 363, in which, as Socrates relates in book 3 of his Ecclesiastical History, chapter 21, twenty-seven Bishops by common consent composed a document in which they confess the Homoousios or Consubstantial, and determine the Nicene faith to be ratified, and presented this document to the Emperor Jovian, to which among other Bishops Pelagius, Bishop of Laodicea, subscribed. The same things are found in Nicephorus, book 10, chapter 40. Two years later, at the end of the year of Christ 365, in the year 365 at the Synod of Tyana, with the Emperor Valens reigning in the East, a Synod was held at Tyana in Cappadocia at the foot of Mount Taurus by Catholic Bishops, and Eustathius, Bishop of Sebastia, having accepted the Nicene faith, but with dissimulation, was restored at the request of Pope Liberius, on account of the authority and majesty of the First See. Sozomen pursues this Synod at greater length in book 6 of his Ecclesiastical History, chapter 12, and these three Bishops are named first by him: Eusebius of Caesarea in Cappadocia, Athanasius of Ancyra, and Pelagius of Laodicea.
[4] The Emperor Valens, gradually lured by the blandishments of his wife's words and ensnared by her deceits (the words are Theodoret's, book 4, chapters 11 and 12), by the heretical Emperor Valens, deflected into heresy: whose leader and mystagogue was Eudoxius, who held the helm of the Church at Constantinople, not steering the ship but sinking it. He, when he initiated Valens with baptism, bound him by a most unhappy oath to persevere in the impious dogma and to expel from all places those who thought otherwise. Thus, having abandoned Apostolic doctrine, he was drawn to the opposing side: and it was not long before he fulfilled the other things he had sworn. For he ejected from Antioch the Great Meletius, and from Samosata the Divine Eusebius: he also deprived Laodicea of its admirable Pastor. Of Pelagius ... For the splendor of this praiseworthy way of life did not bend the enemy of truth to reverence: he is driven into exile in Arabia but he relegated this man to Arabia, Meletius to Armenia, and Eusebius, abounding in Apostolic labors, to Thrace. around the year 374, Thus far that source. The same things are again described by Nicephorus, book 11, chapter 21. The said Eusebius is venerated on June 21. Theophanes in his Chronography, at the tenth year of Valens, the year of Christ 374, has this: "Barses, Bishop of Edessa, and Pelagius of Laodicea, as champions of the right faith, Valens drove into exile." We treated of Saint Barses and his various exiles on January 30. This exile of Saint Pelagius is commemorated in the Roman Martyrology in these words on March 25: "At Laodicea, Saint Pelagius the Bishop, who for the Catholic faith in the time of Valens suffered exile and other things, and rested in the Lord." We have the Additions collected from Usuard and Greuen by the Brussels Carthusians, in which at March 4 the memorial of Saint Pelagius, Bishop and Martyr, is celebrated, but whether this concerns this or another Saint is not clear to us.
[5] Saint Pelagius did not remain idle in exile, but flourished further under the Emperors Gratian and Theodosius. For when Valens died without children in the year 378, Gratian, his nephew through his brother Valentinian, he is recalled in the year 378, obtained the entire Roman Empire. He indeed soon made manifest the piety innate to him, and offered the first fruits of his reign to the King of all, by a law enacted ordering both that the Pastors who had been driven into exile should return and be restored to their flocks, and that sacred buildings should be handed over to those who embraced the communion of Damasus, Bishop of Rome: as Theodoret writes in book 5, chapters 1 and 2. Together with others, therefore, the above-mentioned Saints Meletius, Eusebius, and Pelagius returned. But because the discord of the Antiochene Church was revived on account of two Catholic Bishops residing there, other Bishops throughout the world were attracted in favor of one or the other, he adheres to Saint Meletius. and those who lived in the East embraced the communion of Saint Meletius, and among others Saint Pelagius, Bishop of Laodicea, as we deduced at length in the Life of the said Meletius, §8.
[6] Another controversy arose in the year 379 at Constantinople, where Saint Gregory Nazianzen, having gone there, was fostering the remnants of the Catholic faith with such illustrious success and admiration that he was promoted to the Episcopal See of that city, introduced into the Church on the sixth before the Kalends of December in the year 380: he defends at Constantinople the election of Saint Gregory Nazianzen, against whom, as the same Theodoret relates in book 5, chapter 8, Timothy, Bishop of Alexandria, ordained a certain Cynic named Maximus, his Cynic hair having been suddenly shorn: who had also filled his mind with the frivolous subtleties of Apollinaris. And so such an absurd deed was not tolerated by the admirable men who had then assembled, full of divine zeal and wisdom. Among whom were Helladius, the successor of the Great Basil in the Episcopate, also Gregory and Peter, born of the same father as Basil, and Amphilochius, Pastor of the Lycaonians, and Optimus of the Pisidians, and Diodorus of the Cilicians. There were also present Pelagius of Laodicea and Eulogius of Edessa and Acacius and Isidore, and Cyril of Jerusalem and Gelasius of Caesarea in Palestine, and very many other champions of virtue. All of these, separating themselves from the Egyptians, held assemblies with the Great Gregory. Similar things are found in Nicephorus, book 12, chapter 11. We have given the Acts of some of the Bishops mentioned here: Peter, brother of Saint Basil, on January 9; Gregory of Nyssa on March 9; and Cyril of Jerusalem on March 18. Some others must be treated in their due time: Saint Amphilochius on November 23 and Saint Eulogius on May 5.
[7] Moreover, whether the aforesaid Bishops held this assembly before the Ecumenical Council gathered at Constantinople under the Emperor Theodosius in the year 381 on the seventh before the Ides of July, or whether they did so then together with the remaining one hundred and fifty Fathers, we leave to others to discuss. Nicephorus, book 12, chapter 13, says that the Fathers of the Synod approved the governance of the Eastern Churches by their Bishops, namely Pelagius of Laodicea and Diodorus of Tarsus. But Theophanes, with greater praise of Saint Pelagius, writes that the following was accomplished at this Synod: "The holy and ecumenical Synod established the dogma of the Consubstantial, There at the Ecumenical Synod he defends the faith: and added to the Creed the holy doctrine concerning the Holy Spirit. It also promulgated Canons, by which it granted privileges to the See of Constantinople, the New Rome. Then Gregory of Nyssa and Pelagius of Laodicea, Eulogius also of Edessa and Amphilochius of Iconium, together with the Great Gregory and the other aforementioned men, flourished at that Synod. The holy Synod condemned with anathema he condemns heretics: Arius and Eusebius of Nicomedia, Euzoius as well and Acacius, Theognis and Euphronius and the rest, and besides them Macedonius, who attacked the Holy Spirit, and rejected Eudoxius and Aetius and Eunomius." One hundred and fifty Bishops subscribed, who assembled in the same Council, and from the Province of Syria, after Saint Meletius of Antioch, Pelagius of Laodicea, who is incorrectly written Pegasius in some codices. "The Great Meletius," says Theophanes at the place cited above, "having completed the Synod, rested in peace at Constantinople." Which now seems more probable to us than what others say, that he died before the Synod on March 12 of this year, since this day could have been the deposition among the Antiochenes or of some Translation.
[8] The Emperor Theodosius, knowing that various heretical Bishops still retained Churches in the East under the Catholic name, by the Emperor Theodosius in order to expose their frauds, named certain Bishops of sincere and orthodox faith, with whom those who joined in communion would likewise be considered Catholic and would be placed over Churches. That ordinance is contained in law 53 of the Code on the Catholic Faith, in these words:
"The Emperor Theodosius to Auxonius, Proconsul of Asia.
We order that all Churches be immediately handed over to those Bishops who confess the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit as being of one majesty and power, communion with him and other Bishops of the same glory and brightness; making no discordant division by profane separation, but professing the order of the Trinity, the assertion of the Persons, and the divinity: who shall be found to be associated in the communion of Nectarius, Bishop of the Church of Constantinople, and also of Timothy, Bishop of the city of Alexandria within Egypt: and who also in the parts of the East with Pelagius, Bishop of Laodicea, and Diodorus, Bishop of Tarsus, and also in the Proconsular and Asian diocese with Amphilochius, Bishop of Iconium, and Optimus, Bishop of Antioch: in the Pontic diocese with Helladius, Bishop of Caesarea, and Otreius of Melitene, and Gregory, Bishop of Nyssa, Terentius, Bishop of Scythia, and Martyrius, Bishop of Marcianopolis, shall be found to be in communion. is proposed as a sign of orthodox faith: Those whom communion with such approved Priests shall demonstrate ought to be admitted to obtain Catholic Churches: but all who dissent from the faith and communion of those whom the special enumeration has named are to be expelled from the Churches as manifest heretics, and no faculty of obtaining the Pontificate of Churches is to be permitted to them hereafter at all: so that the Priesthoods of the true Nicene faith may remain pure, and after the clear form of our precept, no place may be given to malicious cunning.
Given on the third before the Kalends of August, at Heraclea, under the Consuls Eucherius and Syagrius." This is the said year 381.
Nicephorus, book 12, chapter 13, asserts that the Fathers at the aforesaid Council appointed Bishops for the cities around Thrace and Scythia: Terentius of Tomis and Martyrius of Marcianopolis, who also subscribed among the other Bishops, but in place of Terentius, Gerontius is read, who is also called Bretannius by others. How long Saint Pelagius lived afterward, or in what year, month, or day he migrated to heavenly beatitude, is not clear.