§ 113. The Heresy of Honorius.
J. von Döllinger (Old Cath.): Papstfabeln des Mittelalters. München, 1863. The same translated by
A. Plummer: Fables respecting the Popes in the Middle Ages; Am ed. enlarged by Henry B.
Smith, N. York, 1872. (The case of Honorius is discussed on pp. 223–248 Am. ed.; see German
ed. p. 131 sqq.).
Schneemann (Jesuit): Studien über die Honoriusfrage. Freiburg i. B, 1864.
Paul Bottala (S. J.): Pope Honorius before the Tribunal of Reason and History. London, 1868.
P. Le Page Renouf: The Condemnation of Pope Honorius. Lond., 1868. The Case of Honorius
reconsidered. Lond. 1870.
Maret (R.C.): Du Concil et de la paix relig. Par. 1869.
A. Gratry (R.C.): Four Letters to the Bishop of Orleans (Dupanloup) and the Archbishop of Malines
(Dechamps), 1870. Several editions in French, German, English. He wrote against papal
infallibility, but recanted on his death-bed.
A. de Margerie: Lettre au R. P. Gratry sur le Pape Honorius et le Bréviaire Romain. Nancy, 1870.
Jos. von Hefele (Bishop of Rottenburg and Member of the Vatican Council): Causa Honorii Papae.
Neap., 1870. Honorius und das sechste allgemeine Concil. Tübingen, 1870. (The same translated
by Henry B. Smith in the "Presbyt. Quarterly and Princeton Review, "N. York, April, 1872, p.
273 sqq.). Conciliengeschichte, Bd. III. (revised ed., 1877), pp. 145 sqq., 167 sqq., 290 sqq.
Job. Pennachi (Prof. of Church Hist. in the University of Rome): De Honorii I. Romani Pontificis
causa in Concilio VI. ad Patres Concilii Vaticani. Romae, 1870. 287 pp. Hefele calls this the
most important vindication of Honorius from the infallibilist standpoint. It was distributed
among all the members of the Vatican Council; while books in opposition to papal infallibility
by Bishop Hefele, Archbishop Kenrick, and others, had to be printed outside of Rome.
A. Ruckgaber: Die Irrlehre des Honorius und das Vatic. Concil. Stuttgart, 1871.
Comp. the literature in Hergenröther; Kirchengesch., III. 137 sqq.
The connection of Pope Honorius I. (Oct. 27, 625, to Oct. 12, 638) with the Monotheletic heresy
has a special interest in its bearing upon the dogma of papal infallibility, which stands or falls with
a single official error, according to the principle: Si falsus in uno, falsus in omnibus. It was fully
discussed by Catholic scholars on both sides before and during the Vatican Council of 1870, which
proclaimed that dogma, but could not alter the facts of history. The following points are established
by the best documentary evidence:
- Honorius taught and favored in several official letters (to Sergius, Cyrus, and Sophronius),
therefore ex cathedra, the one-will heresy. He fully agreed with Sergius, the Monotheletic patriarch
of Constantinople. In answer to his first letter (634), he says: "Therefore we confess one will
(qevlhma, voluntas) of our Lord Jesus Christ."^623 He viewed the will as an attribute of person, not
of nature, and reasoned: One willer, therefore only one will. In a second letter to Sergius, he rejects
both the orthodox phrase: "two energies," and the heterodox phrase: "one energy" (ejnevrgeia,
operatio), and affirms that the Bible clearly teaches two natures, but that it is quite vain to ascribe
to the Mediator between God and man one or two energies; for Christ by virtue of his one theandric
623
ο θεν καὶ ε ν θέλημαὁμολογου̑μεντου̑ ΚυρίοὐΙης.Χρ.—-unde et unam voluntatatem fatemur Domini nostri
lesu Christi. Mansi, XI. 538 sqq.; Hefele, III. 146 sq.