In view of it being thought that Pelagius' early education
took place at Llantwit Major (i.e. Llanilltud Fawr)
in Glamorgan (a reduction of Gwlad Morgannwg, "the
Land of the Morgans", in South Wales), it is more
than possible that we do not have a record of his real
name at all; but that Pelagius simply indicates "a
man of the Morgannwg". Although, as the Latinised
form of the Celtic people who inhabited that region
is Silures, and this may conceal a Goidelic name Sil
h-Ir (which would indicate an Erainnian tribe), it
is possible that the "Irish" origin of Pelagius
may not be wide of the mark.
He is thought to have been born in Britain around 360
AD, to have gone to Rome about 380 AD and been there
when the city was besieged and sacked by Alaric the
Visigoth in 408 AD. It is suggested by various authorities
that he became a monk in Rome, quite on what evidence
is unclear. In Rome he made the acquaintance of Paulinus
and Augustine, and acquired an acolyte in the "Irish"
monk Coelestius.
The Latinism "coelestius" (or "caelestius" - 'heavenly',
'celestial'; 'divine'; 'godlike'; 'glorious'; 'a heavenly
being', 'a god') may itself be a translation of a Celtic
name, or part of one. It would go back into Old Celtic
as nemetocos, or nemetos, 'heavenly' (Old Irish, nemde;
modern Gaelic, néamhaidh): but may be derived
from other related elements, such as, nemos (mod G,
néamhain), 'pearl', 'gem', or 'jewel'; nemacos
(mod G, néamhach) 'angel'; or be the first element
in a name beginning with noibos (Old Irish nòib
mod G, naomh), 'holy', 'sacred', 'consecrated'; "saint".
Together Pelagius and Coelestius crossed over the Mediterranean
to Sicily and Carthage in 410 AD, and made a journey
to the East in the following year.
Pelagius began his teaching in Rome, continuing it in
the other places he visited. His views were hotly disputed
by the orthodox, prominent among them being St Augustine of Hippo (author of (c400 AD) Confessions and (after 412 AD) The City of God)
and St Jerome (translator of the Greek Septuagint version of the Holy Bible into Latin as The Vulgate), and a series of synods (notably at Carthage in 411 AD). However, at Diospolis (Lydda in Palestine)
in 415 AD, Pelagius was rehabilitated.
The African bishops reacted, and at synods at Carthage and Milevis
in 416 AD they repeated their condemnations and asked
that the Pope add his to theirs. Seizing an opportunity
to restate in a dramatic way the claimed magisterium
of the Church of Rome, Pope Innocent I finally excommunicated
Pelagius in 417 AD (and died the same year).
The new pope, Zosimus, initially held that Pelagius, Coelestius,
and their followers had cleared themselves after a
hearing in San Clemente. But after the African bishops
kicked up a fuss (following a Council held in Carthage
in 418 AD, attended by 214 bishops, which condemned Pelagius),
demanding that Innocent's proscription stand, and appealed
to the Emperor, Zosimus had to back down and continue
the anathema. The appeal to the Emperor Honorius at
Ravenna had produced a rescript on 30 April 418 AD condemning
Pelagius, Coelestius, and their followers as heretics
and disturbers of the peace, and banishing them from
Rome.
It seems that the actions against Pelagius were precipitated
when Coelestius attempted to obtain orders and his
views were called into question and condemned by a
Carthaginian synod. When the news of this reached Jerusalem,
where Pelagius then was, a charge of heresy was brought
against him by Orosius, who was supported by St Jerome.
The fanaticism of the Church of Rome's bishops in Africa
may be explained by the fact that they were still waging
a losing battle against Arianism and Donatism, and
it had only been with the considerable help of Constantine's legions
commanded by the Empire's most able general, Bellisarius,
that the Church of Rome had got its way 100 years earlier
(with its hallmark mass slaughter of heretics) creating
the "Church of the Martyrs". According to
St Jerome, Donatism became the religion of nearly all
North Africa within a generation and neither force
nor argument could change it. Close parallels are possible
with Moorish Spain after the Reconquistà.
Some authorities state that Pelagius died in Egypt in
422 AD, but others claim that it is supposed that he
finally retired to Britain. Pelagianism was again condemned
and anathematised at the Council of Ephesus in 431 AD.
But while all this was going on in the Mediterranean,
Pelagian doctrines were being spread in Britain, most
notably by Agricola, son of the Pelagian bishop Severianus,
and its remarkable popularity indicates that the British Celts
saw it "as a vessel of that druidic thought so
well suited to their temperament". The French
historian, Dom Louis Gougaud SJ commented in 1911 that
Pelagianism was in some sense the national heresy of
the Britons.
It continued to flourish in the British Isles. In 639 AD,
Pope John IV wrote rebukingly to the bishops of Ireland
(according to Bede),
Of course, the bishops he was writing to were largely
Celtic Christians and not likely to recognise that
he had any authority outside his diocese of Rome. But
this attitude of the Church to claim the magisterium
over the whole of Christianity was always eventually
backed up by military force to ensure its irreversible acceptance, initially by the legions of the Roman Empire and subsequently
by whatever replacement bully boys the Papacy could
find. As Thomas Hobbes wrote in Leviathan (part iv,
ch 47) "The Papacy is not other than the Ghost
of the deceased Roman Empire, sitting crowned upon
the grave thereof". But there wasn't yet enough
history for the Celts to notice the warning. Eventually
the Roman way was enforced on the Scots by the Picts
and the Anglo-Normans; on the Irish by the Normans
and Angevins; and on the Welsh by the Angevins and
Plantagenets, all with great loss of life and destruction
of property and treasure.
Christianity arrived among the Celts of the western
part of the British Isles very early, much earlier
than in the continental parts of the Roman Empire,
and it was brought here by sea direct from northern
Africa and the Holy Land without the intermediation
of Rome. As Gildas map Cauuos, a Strathclyde Briton resident in
South Wales, wrote in the 6th Century: Claudius Tiberius Caesar lived from 42 BC to 37 AD,
and was Emperor from 14 AD.
Therefore, according to Gildas' testimony, the teachings
of Christ were brought here sometime after 30 AD. As
Christ's Temptation in the Wilderness (the effective
beginning of his mission) is conventionally dated
to 30 AD, and the Crucifixion to 33 AD, then it is
possible that the Message arrived during his mission
and thus came direct from the Teacher himself. This
might go some way to explaining why the Celtic Christians
were so reluctant to accept the Church of Rome's revised
(or Orwellian) version.
And further, It is interesting that "foreign" to Gildas
was transmarina, 'across the open sea'. Presumably
'every heresy' refers to the beliefs of the Ebionites,
Priscillians and Donatists, among others from the East,
including Arianism. These could only have been sea-borne,
as the land route through Italy and Gaul would have
not only ensured effective filtering, but also would
have in any case taken much longer for them to reach
Britain than they seem to have needed.
It is, thus, against the backdrop of Celtic Christianity
that Pelagius' work and teachings (and his 'heresy')
needs to be set. No wonder he was in opposition to
the Roman authorities, such as St Augustine,
a 'Father of the Church' who prided himself on knowing
no Greek.
According to Professor Jean Markale, a Breton academic
authority on the Celts, [in Christine Hauch's translation]
"Grace" is the Greek charis and the
Latin gratia, and is never used by Christ. It is, however,
quite often used by St Paul. Modern Church theologians
try and claim that it is represented by several Hebrew words;
that fact alone shows that it is an unusual concept
in an Abrahamic religion. And these words already have
a semantic load that is different from the Graeco-Latin
"grace": for example, the Hebrew h-n-n, which
they often cite as one of the correspondences, means 'to be moved with pity'; and r-h-m, another, means 'mercy'.
According to Markale (Mme Hauch's translation):
According to this doctrine, then, man has complete freedom.
If he has a duty to avoid sin it is because he is able
by nature to do so. It would therefore be unjust to
impute to him any sin he personally is not able or
obliged to avoid. If the sin of Adam is to rebound
on those who have not themselves sinned, the justice
of Christ must also extend to those who do not believe.
In short, if we are a part of evil without committing
any fault then we ought also to be a part of good without
having to deserve it.
These far-reaching ideas were taken up and expanded
by Celstius [sic] who stated, "Sin is not born
with man. It is an act of will which he may be led
to commit by his individual imperfection, but it is
not a necessary result of the essential imperfection
of mankind". Celstius did not want children
to be baptized for fear that the administration of
the sacrament would be taken as recognition of the
mistaken notion that "man is wicked by his very
nature before he has committed any evil" a notion
insulting to the Creator. Any grace which may exist
in the form of supernatural succour can only influence
the intelligence and not the will...
But Pelagius was not alone. Apart from his disciple
Celstius, he had a number of sympathizers including
Julian bishop of Eclanum who began to spread his doctrine
and mounted a skilful attack on Augustine... Arguments
between the two sides acquired a more theological turn.
Pelagius' supporters laid their emphasis on the total
autonomy of man's free will, thereby obviating any
responsibility for the origin of sin being attributed
to God. The Lord's Prayer, after all, contains the
very ambiguous phrase "Lead us not into temptation",
and unless we are to conclude that the word "Lead"
in this context means that God himself is making us
do wrong, we must assume that He is merely presenting
us with situations in which we can exercise our free
will to choose between good and evil. Grace is only
the primordial, divine light which enables us to acquire
knowledge of good and evil.
Augustine's response was that this argument was morally
wicked since it invites the individual to take pride
in his good deeds. To impute all responsibility for
good to man is to adopt the stoic ethics of Marcus
Aurelius and Epictetes. If original sin is not passed
on into each new person, then baptism is unnecessary,
and the incarnation and redemption occurred to no purpose.
As Saint Paul argued, man does not receive grace because
of the good in him, rather he has good in him because
he has received grace. Certainly our will must act
in accordance with that grace but it can do so only
if we have faith. And faith is the gift of God..."
The "semi-Pelagians" arose after the Council
of Ephesus (431 AD), and were those who attempted a reconciliation
between the doctrines of free will and predestination
and election; but the times in which they lived were
not favourable to compromises. The position was upheld
by St John Cassian, a disciple of St John Chrysostom,
and Faustus, the (Breton) bishop of Riez, and by Vincent,
abbot of Lérins, who fiercely refuted Augustinian beliefs
in predestination, according to Professor Markale.
Cassian and Faustus claimed at the Council of Arles,
in 472 AD, that there was no other incorporeal being than
God. Through semi-Pelagianism, Celtic ideas kept reappearing in the Graeco-Latinising theology of the Church. But, finally, at Orange in 529 AD and Valence in 530 AD, semi-Pelagianism
received official Papal condemnation. Nevertheless,
Pelagianism has never really ceased to influence the
Church. Duns Scotus Erigena and St Thomas Aquinas both
held more or less Pelagian views; in Aquinas' case
this is of great importance, because most of the Church's
present theology is Thomist in inspiration.
Pelagianism may be summarised as:
Short Version
Pelagius (c. 360 - c. 420 AD) is the originator of the
heretical Christian doctrine known as Pelagianism.
He was born in Britain, and settled in Rome for a while
(c. 380 AD), and later preached in Africa and Palestine.
He rejected the doctrines of original sin and predestination,
believing in man's free will and capacity for good.
These beliefs were hotly disputed by St Augustine and
a series of synods. Pope Innocent I condemned
them in 417 AD and excommunicated Pelagius. His teachings
were finally anathematised at the Council of Ephesus in
431 AD after which the school of "semi-Pelagianism"
arose, associated particularly with the name of St
John Cassian, a disciple of St John Chrysostom. Semi-Pelagianism
is a strong thread in the theology of Duns Scotus Erigena
and St Thomas Aquinas.Long Version
The originator of the heretical Christian doctrine known
as Pelagianism was a British monk after whom it is
named.
He is known to us as Pelagius, which is a Greek adjective
(pelagios, -a, -on) meaning "of, on, or by the
sea; living in the sea" and is thought to be a
translation of the Celtic name Morgan (from morigenos,
"sea born"). It is usual to call him a "Scot"
(i.e. a man from Ireland - it was not used of Scotland
before the 9th Century) or of Gaelic origin, mostly
on the basis of a vituperative remark from St Jerome
that he was "swollen up with Irish porridge"."We have learnt that the poison of the Pelagian error has reappeared among you. We urge you to reject this odious doctrine. Is it not
blasphemous to claim that man can be without sin? As if this privilege had not been reserved for the mediator between God and men, the Christ who was conceived and born without sin. All other men are born with original sin and bear within them the mark of Adam's failings".
Interea glaciali frigore rigenti insulae et velut longiore
terrarum secessu soli visibili non proximae... tempore,
ut scimus, summo Tiberii Caesaris, quo absque ullo
impedimento eius propagabatur religio, comminata senatu
nolente a principe morte delatoribus militum eiusdem,
radios suos primum indulget, id est sua praecepta,
Christus [Gildas, De Excidio Britonum, 8]
"Meanwhile, to an island numb with chill ice and
far removed, as in a remote nook of the world, from
the visible sun, Christ made a present of his rays
(that is, his precepts),... This happened first, in
the last years of the emperor Tiberius, at a time when
Christ's religion was being propagated without hindrance:
for, against the wishes of the senate, the emperor
threatened the death penalty for informers against
soldiers of God." [Gildas, The Ruin of Britain, 8]
Mansit namque haec Christi capitis membrorumque consonantia
suavis, donec Arriana perfidia, ... transmarina nobis
evomens venena ... ac sic quasi via facta trans oceanum
omnes omnino bestiae ferae mortiferum cuiuslibet haeresos
virus horrido ore vibrantes letalia dentium vulnera
patriae novi semper aliquid audire volenti et nihil
certe stabiliter optinenti infigebant. [Gildas,De
Excidio Britonum, 12]
"This pleasant agreement between the head and limbs
of Christ [after the Diocletian persecution - author] endured
until the Arian treason, ... vomited its foreign poisons
upon us... And as though there were a set route across
the ocean there came every kind of wild beast, brandishing
in their horrid mouths the death-dealing venom of every
heresy, and planting lethal bites in a country that
always longed to hear some novelty - and never took
firm hold of anything". [Gildas, The Ruin of Britain, 12]
"Pelagianism has been regarded as an attempt on
its author's part to syncretize Christian teaching
with druidism which had no concept of sin and saw individual
freedom as the basic principle of its tradition...
Certainly Pelagianism is not druidism; far from it.
But there is no denying that this doctrine with its
basis in total human freedom, is very clearly Celtic
in its leanings. It is also distinctly anti-Mediterranean
since it emphasizes the solitude of man... The very
concept of grace is Graeco-Latin in origin, being an
extension of the superstitious belief that man was
incapable of acting alone and required the help of
some impartial numen or divine will. By denying the
power of grace Pelagius was fighting against that superstition,
re-establishing the notion that man is entirely responsible
for his own acts and restoring to human dignity a respect
which the early Christian leaders with their erroneous
ideas of evangelical humility sought to remove. It
was not long before the Church Fathers retaliated,
chief of Pelagius' critics being Saint Augustine who
began a violent attack on his former friend in 412..."
[Jean Markale, Les Celtes et la Civilisation Celtique,
Éditions Payot, Paris 1976; translated by Christine
Hauch as Celtic Civilisation, Gordon and Cremonesi,
London, 1978, pp. 138-143].
"The essence of Pelagian doctrine is that there is no
such thing as original sin. Being created mortal Adam
was subject to concupiscence. Human nature has not
been corrupted, the will of man is unimpaired and he
is capable of doing good when he wills it. Baptism
washes away no original sin, since none exists, but
only the actual sins committed by those receiving the
sacrament (in the early days only adults were baptized).
Baptism is however a prerequisite for entering the
flock, a trial of initiation which Christ himself underwent.
"Grace" denotes only those natural good things
God gave to man, particularly his freedom, together
with the teachings provided by the revelation and the
words of Jesus Christ.
Augustine's position is the typical one adopted by the
Church of Rome down the centuries, which is to assume
the veracity and universal applicability of its own
theology (which has clearly deviated some considerable way from the simple teachings of Christ, and even of St Paul, contained in those favourable books of the New Testament that the Church of Rome allowed to survive after the Council of Nicaea in 325 AD), use this assumption as the datum point, and then judge the proposition by reference to it. When the proposition shows the Church's theology to be wrong, it is the
proposition that is wrong because the Church's position
is right (why is it right? Because the Church says
it is). By this means no dissenter can win an argument.
The same antics are visible in Bede's account of the
Synod of Whitby in 664 AD as Professor J. T. MacNeill
has indicated.Pelagianism: A Summary