The Penitential Discipline

In baptism the convert received remission of all former sins, and, what

was equivalent, admission to the Church. If he sinned gravely after

baptism, could he again obtain remission? In the first age of the Church

the practice as to this question inclined toward rigorism, and the man who

sinned after baptism was in many places permanently excluded from the

Church (cf. Heb. 10:26, 27), or the community of those whose sins had
< r /> been forgiven and were certain of heaven. By the middle of the second

century the practice at Rome tended toward permitting one readmission

after suitable penance (a). After this the penitential discipline

developed rapidly and became an important part of the business of the

local congregation (b). The sinner, by a long course of

self-mortification and prayer, obtained the desired readmission (c). The

Montanists, however, in accord with their general rigorism, would make it

extremely hard, if not impossible, to obtain readmission or forgiveness.

The body of the Church, and certainly the Roman church under the lead of

its bishop, who relied upon Matt. 16:18, adopted a more liberal policy and

granted forgiveness on relatively easy terms to even the worst offenders

(d). The discipline grew less severe, because martyrs or confessors,

according to Matt. 10:20, were regarded as having the Spirit, and

therefore competent to speak for God and announce the divine forgiveness.

These were accustomed to give "letters of peace," which were commonly

regarded as sufficient to procure the immediate readmission of the

offender (e), a practice which led to great abuse. One of the effects of

the development of the penitential discipline was the establishment of a

distinction between mortal and venial sins (f), the former of which

were, in general, acts involving unchastity, shedding of blood, and

apostasy, according to the current interpretation of Acts 15:29.





(a) Hermas, Pastor, Man. IV, 3:1.





For Hermas and the Pastor, v. supra, § 15.





I heard some teachers maintain, sir, that there is no other repentance

than that which takes place when we descend into the waters and receive

remission of our former sins. He said to me, That was sound doctrine which

you heard; for that is really the case. For he who has received remission

of his sins ought not to sin any more, but to live in purity. The Lord,

therefore, being merciful, has had mercy on the work of His hands, and has

set repentance for them; and He has intrusted to me the power over this

repentance. And therefore I say unto you that if any one is tempted by the

devil, and sins after that great and holy calling in which the Lord has

called His people to everlasting life, he has opportunity to repent but

once. But if he should sin frequently after this, and then repent, to such

a man his repentance will be of no avail, for with difficulty will he

live.





(b) Tertullian. Apology, 39. (MSL, 1:532.)





We meet together as an assembly and congregation that, offering up prayer

to God, with united force we may wrestle with Him in our prayers. In the

same place, also, exhortations are made, rebukes and sacred censures are

administered. For with a great gravity is the work of judging carried on

among us, as befits those who feel assured that they are in the sight of

God; and you have the most notable example of judgment to come when any

one has so sinned as to be severed from common union with us in prayer, in

the congregation, and in all sacred intercourse.





(c) Tertullian, De Poenitentia, 4, 9. (MSL, 2:1343, 1354.)





According to Bardenhewer, § 50:5, this work belongs to the

Catholic period of Tertullian's literary activity. Text in part in

Kirch, nn. 175 ff.





Ch. 4. As I live, saith the Lord, I prefer penance rather than death

[cf. Ezek. 33:11]. Repentance, then, is life, since it is preferred to

death. That repentance, O sinner like myself (nay, rather, less a sinner

than myself, for I acknowledge my pre-eminence in sins), do you hasten to

embrace as a shipwrecked man embraces the protection of some plank. This

will draw you forth when sunk in the waves of sin, and it will bear you

forward into the port of divine clemency.



Ch. 9. The narrower the sphere of action of this, the second and only

remaining repentance, the more laborious is its probation; that it may not

be exhibited in the conscience alone, but may likewise be performed in

some act. This act, which is more usually expressed and commonly spoken of

under the Greek name, exomologesis, whereby we confess our sins to the

Lord, not indeed to Him as ignorant of them, but inasmuch as by confession

a satisfaction is made; of confession repentance is born; by repentance

God is appeased. And thus exomologesis is a discipline for man's

prostration and humiliation, enjoining a demeanor calculated to move

mercy. With regard, also, to the very dress and food, it commands one to

lie in sackcloth and ashes, to cover the body as in mourning, to lay the

spirit low in sorrow, to exchange for severe treatment the sins which he

has committed; furthermore, to permit as food and drink only what is

plain--not for the stomach's sake, but for the soul's; for the most part,

however, to feed prayers on fastings, to groan, to weep, and make outcries

unto the Lord our God; to fall prostrate before the presbyters and to

kneel to God's dear ones; to enjoin on all the brethren to be ambassadors

to bear his deprecatory supplication before God. All this exomologesis

does, that it may enhance repentance, that it may honor the Lord by fear

of danger, may, by itself, in pronouncing against the sinner stand in

place of God's indignation, and by temporal mortification (I will not say

frustrate, but rather) expunge eternal punishments.





(d) Tertullian, De Pudicitia, 1, 21, 22. (MSL, 2:1032, 1078.)





Callistus, to whom reference is made in the first chapter, was

bishop of Rome 217 to 222. The work, therefore, belongs to the

latest period of Tertullian's life.





Ch. 1. I hear that there has been an edict set forth, and, indeed, a

peremptory one; namely, that the Pontifex Maximus, the bishop of bishops,

issues an edict: "I remit to such as have performed penance, the sins both

of adultery and fornication."



Ch. 21. "But," you say, "the Church has the power of forgiving sins." This

I acknowledge and adjudge more, I, who have the Paraclete himself in the

person of the new prophets, saying: "The Church has the power to forgive

sins, but I will not do it, lest they commit still others." I now inquire

into your opinion, to discover from what source you usurp this power to

the Church.



If, because the Lord said to Peter, "Upon this rock I will build My Church

[Matt. 16:18]. To Thee I have given the keys of the kingdom of heaven,"

or "Whatsoever thou shalt bind or loose on earth, shall be bound or loosed

in heaven," you therefore presume that the power of binding and loosing

has descended to you, that is, to every church akin to Peter; what sort of

man, then, are you, subverting and wholly changing the manifest intention

of the Lord, who conferred the gift personally upon Peter? "On Thee," He

says, "I will build my Church," and "I will give thee the keys," not to

the Church; and "whatsoever thou shalt have loosed or bound," not what

they shall have loosed or bound. For so the result actually teaches. In

him (Peter) the Church was reared, that is, through him (Peter) himself;

he himself tried the key; you see what key: "Men of Israel, let what I say

sink into your ears; Jesus, the Nazarene, a man appointed of God for

you,"(65) and so forth. Peter himself, therefore, was the first to unbar,

in Christ's baptism, the entrance to the kingdom of heaven, in which are

loosed the sins that aforetime were bound.



What, now, has this to do with the Church and your Church, indeed, O

Psychic? For in accordance with the person of Peter, it is to spiritual

men that this power will correspondingly belong, either to an Apostle or

else to a prophet. And accordingly the "Church," it is true, will forgive

sins; but it will be the Church of the Spirit, by a spiritual man; not the

Church which consists of a number of bishops.



Ch. 22. But you go so far as to lavish this power upon martyrs indeed; so

that no sooner has any one, acting on a preconceived arrangement, put on

soft bonds in the nominal custody now in vogue, than adulterers beset him,

fornicators gain access to him; instantly prayers resound about him;

instantly pools of tears of the polluted surround him; nor are there any

who are more diligent in purchasing entrance to the prison than they who

have lost the fellowship of the Church. Whatever authority, whatever

reason, restores ecclesiastical peace to the adulterer and the fornicator,

the same will be bound to come to the aid of the murderer and the idolater

in their repentance.





(e) Tertullian, Ad Martyres, 1. (MSL, 1:693.)





The following extract from Tertullian's little work addressed to

martyrs in prison, written about 197, shows that in his earlier

life as a Catholic Christian he did not disapprove of the practice

of giving libelli pacis by the confessors, a custom which in his

more rigoristic period under the influence of Montanism he

denounced most vehemently; see preceding extract from De

Pudicitia, ch. 22. The reference to some discord among the

martyrs is not elsewhere explained. For libelli pacis, see

Cyprian, Ep. 10 (=Ep. 15), 22 (=21).





O blessed ones, grieve not the Holy Spirit, who has entered with you into

the prison; for if He had not gone with you there, you would not be there

to-day. Therefore endeavor to cause Him to remain with you there; so that

He may lead you thence to the Lord. The prison, truly, is the devil's

house as well, wherein he keeps his family. Let him not be successful in

his own kingdom by setting you at variance with one another, but let him

find you armed and fortified with concord; for your peace is war with him.

Some, not able to find peace in the Church, have been accustomed to seek

it from the imprisoned martyrs. Therefore you ought to have it dwelling

with you, and to cherish it and guard it, that you may be able, perchance,

to bestow it upon others.





(f) Tertullian, De Pudicitia, 19. (MSL, 2:1073.)





The distinction between mortal and venial sins became of great

importance in the administration of penance and remained as a

feature of ecclesiastical discipline from the time of Tertullian.

The origin of the distinction was still earlier. See above, an

extract from the same work.





We ourselves do not forget the distinction between sins, which was the

starting-point of our discussion. And this, too, for John has sanctioned

it [cf. I John 5:16], because there are some sins of daily committal to

which we are all liable; for who is free from the accident of being angry

unjustly and after sunset; or even of using bodily violence; or easily

speaking evil; or rashly swearing; or forfeiting his plighted word; or

lying from bashfulness or necessity? In business, in official duties, in

trade, in food, in sight, in hearing, by how great temptations are we

assailed! So that if there were no pardon for such simple sins as these,

salvation would be unattainable by any. Of these, then, there will be

pardon through the successful Intercessor with the Father, Christ. But

there are other sins wholly different from these, graver and more

destructive, such as are incapable of pardon--murder, idolatry, fraud,

apostasy, blasphemy, and, of course, adultery and fornication and whatever

other violation of the temple of God there may be. For these Christ will

no more be the successful Intercessor; these will not at all be committed

by any one who has been born of God, for he will cease to be the son of

God if he commit them.