In his lonely prison at Hautvilliers, the condemned monk composed two confessions, a
shorter and a longer one, in which he strongly re-asserted his doctrine of a double predestination.
He appealed to Pope Nicolas, who seems to have had some sympathy with him, and demanded a
reinvestigation, which, however, never took place. He also offered, in reliance on the grace of God,
to undergo the fiery ordeal before the king, the bishops and monks, to step successively into four
cauldrons of boiling water, oil, fat and pitch, and then to walk through a blazing pile; but nobody
could be found to accept the challenge. Hincmar refused to grant him in his last sickness the
communion and Christian burial) except on condition of full recantation.^682 Gottschalk scorned the
condition, died in his unshaken faith, and was buried in unconsecrated soil after an imprisonment
of twenty years (868 or 869).
He had the courage of his convictions. His ruling idea of the unchangeableness of God
reflected itself in his inflexible conduct. His enemies charged him with vanity, obstinacy, and
strange delusions. Jesuits (Sirmond, Peteau, Cellot) condemn him and his doctrine; while Calvinists
and Jansenists (Ussher, Hottinger, Mauguin) vindicate him as a martyr to the truth.
§ 122. The Contending Theories on Predestination, and the Victory of Semi-Augustinianism.
During the imprisonment of Gottschalk a lively controversy, was carried on concerning the
point in dispute, which is very creditable to the learning of that age, but after all did not lead to a
clear and satisfactory settlement. The main question was whether divine predestination or
foreordination which all admitted as a necessary element of the Divine perfection, was absolute or
relative; in other words, whether it embraced all men and all acts, good and bad, or only those who
are saved, and such acts as God approves and rewards. This question necessarily involved also the
problem of the freedom of the human will, and the extent of the plan of redemption. The absolute
predestinarians denied, the relative predestinarians affirmed, the freedom of will and the universal
import of Christ’s atoning death.
The doctrine of absolute predestination was defended, in substantial agreement with
Gottschalk, though with more moderation and caution, by Prudentius, Bishop of Troyes, Ratramnus,
monk of Corbie, Servatus Lupus, Abbot of Ferrières, and Remigius, Archbishop of Lyons, and
confirmed by the Synod of Valence, 855, and also at Langres in 859.
The doctrine of free will and a conditional predestination was advocated, in opposition to
Gottschalk, by Archbishop Rabanus Maurus of Mainz, Archbishop Hincmar of Rheims, and Bishop
Pardulus of Laon, and confirmed at a synod of Chiersy, 853, and in part again at Savonnières, near
Toul, in 859.
A third theory was set forth by John Scotus Erigena, intended against Gottschalk, but was
in fact still more against the orthodox view, and disowned by both parties.
I. The doctrine of an Absolute and Two-Fold Predestination.
Gottschalk professed to follow simply the great Augustin. This is true; but he gave undue
disproportion to the tenet of predestination, and made it a fundamental theological principle,
(^682) Gottschalk had provoked him by his disregard of episcopal authority, and by the charge of Sabellianism for altering
"trina Deitas," in a church hymn, into "summa Deitas." Hincmar charged him in turn with Arianism, but the word to which he
had objected, retained its place in the Gallican service.