Pope Saint Gelasius I (died November 21, 496) was
pope from 492 until his death in 496. He was the third and last
pope of African origin in the
Roman Catholic Church, Gelasius was a prolific writer whose style placed him on the cusp between
Late Antiquity and the
Early Middle Ages.
[The title of his biography by Walter Ullmann expresses this:Gelasius I. (492-496): Das Papsttum an der Wende der Spätantike zum Mittelalter (Stuttgart) 1981.] Gelasius had been closely employed by his predecessor,
Felix III, especially in drafting papal documents. His reign was characterized by his call for strict orthodoxy, a more assertive push for papal authority, and increasing tension between the churches in the West and the East.
Struggle with Anastasius I and Acacius
Gelasius' election, March 1, 492, was a gesture for continuity: Gelasius inherited Felix's struggles with
Eastern Roman Emperor Anastasius I and the
patriarch of Constantinople and exacerbated them by insisting on the removal of the name of the late
Acacius, patriarch of Constantinople, from the
diptychs, in spite of every ecumenical gesture by the current, otherwise quite orthodox patriarch
Euphemius (
q.v. for details of the
Acacian schism).
The split with the emperor and the patriarch of Constantinople was inevitable, from the western point of view, because they had embraced a view of a single, Divine ('
Monophysite') nature of
Christ, which was a Christian
heresy. Gelasius' book
De duabus in Christo naturis ('On the dual nature of Christ') delineated the Western view. Thus Gelasius, for all the conservative Latinity of his writing style stood on the cusp of
Late Antiquity and the
Early Middle Ages.
Powers of Church and State
During the Acacian schism, Gelasius went further than his predecessors in asserting the primacy of Rome over the entire Church, East and West, and he presented this doctrine in terms that set the model for subsequent popes asserting the claims of
papal supremacy.
In 494, Gelasius wrote a very influential letter, known from its
incipit as
Duo sunt, to Anastasius
. This letter established the dualistic principle that would underlie all Western European political thought for almost a
millennium. In the letter Gelasius expressed a distinction between "two powers", which he called the "holy authority of bishops" (
auctoritas sacrata pontificum) and the "royal power" (
regalis potestas). These two powers,
auctoritas lending justification to
potestas, and
potestas providing the executive strength for
auctoritas were, he said, to be considered independent in their own spheres of operation, yet expected to work together in harmony.
Suppression of pagan rites and heretics
Closer to home, Gelasius finally suppressed the ancient Roman festival of the
Lupercalia after a long contest. Gelasius' letter to
Andromachus, the senator, covers the main lines of the controversy and incidentally offers some details of this festival combining
fertility and
purification that might have been lost otherwise. Significantly, this festival of purification, which had given its name—
dies februatus, from
februare, "to purify"— to the month of February, was replaced with a Christian festival celebrating the purification of the
Virgin Mary instead:
Candlemas, observed forty days after Christmas, on February 2.
Gelasius successfully suppressed the
Manichaeans, a dualist sect suspected to be present in Rome in large numbers. Gelasius decreed that the
Eucharist had to be received "
under both kinds", with wine as well as bread. As the Manichaeans held wine to be impure and essentially sinful, they would refuse the chalice and thus be recognized. Later, with the Manichaeans suppressed, the old method of receiving communion under one kind - the bread - was restored.
Death
After a brief but dynamic reign, his death occurred on November 21, 496
Gelasius natione Afer
Some have asserted that Gelasius was a black African by descent, because the
Liber Pontificalis plainly states that he was
natione Afer ('
African by birthright'). This however does not necessarily mean that he was black, because black Africans were generally referred to in Latin as
Aethiopes. Gelasius' own statement in a letter that he is
Romanus natus (Roman-born) is certainly not inconsistent.
Writings
Gelasius was the most prolific writer of the early popes. A great mass of correspondence of Gelasius has survived: forty-two letters according to the
Catholic Encyclopedia, thirty-seven according to Father Bagan and fragments of forty-nine others, carefully archived in the
Vatican, ceaselessly expounding to Eastern bishops the
primacy of the see of Rome. There are extant besides six treatises that carry the name of Gelasius. According to
Cassiodorus, the reputation of Gelasius attracted to his name other works not by him.
Decretum Gelasianum
The most famous of pseudo-Gelasian works is the list
de libris recipiendis et non recipiendis ("books to be received and not to be received"), the so-called
Decretum Gelasianum, supposed to be connected to the pressures for orthodoxy during the pontificate of Gelasius and intended to be read as a decretal by Gelasius on the canonical and apocryphal books, which internal evidence reveals to be of later date. Thus the fixing of the
canon of scripture has traditionally been attributed to Gelasius
and a non-historical Roman synod of 494 has been invented as the supposed occasion.
The "Gelasian Sacramentary"
In the Catholic tradition, the so-called "Gelasian Sacramentary", actually the
Liber sacramentorum Romanae ecclesiae ("Book of Sacraments of the Church of Rome") is a book of liturgy that was actually composed in
Merovingian times. An old tradition linked the book to Pope Gelasius, apparently based on
Walafrid Strabo's ascription to him of what is evidently this book. Most of its liturgy reflects the mix of Roman and Gallican practice inherited from the Merovingian church.
See also
