Council of Aachen (809)

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The Council of Aachen (also Synod of Aachen ) was an assembly of Frankish theologians convened by Charlemagne in November 809 , with the mandate to prove the addition of the Filioque to the great creed as orthodox and to Pope Leo III. to make this formula binding for the whole Church.

Starting position

At the Council of Constantinople (381) the creed was formulated, which at the time of the council of Aachen united almost all of Christianity as a common creed. The Council of Ephesus decreed in 431 a ban on changing the text in future, the Council of Chalcedon made this even more severe in 451 when it forbade anyone to think or teach differently in future.

In the extreme west of Europe, in Visigothic-ruled Spain, however, in defense of Arian doctrines, which propagated the subordination of the Son of God Jesus Christ to God the Father ( YHWH ), the definition of the equality of the son with the father was formulated, just like going from the father the Holy Spirit also from the Son (“filioque”). The extent to which this formulation was received literally at Visigothic councils (e.g. Toledo 400) is a matter of controversy, but it is certain that corresponding formulas were used in Western texts, for example in the so-called Athanasianum .

Around the year 807 a dispute broke out when Greek monks in Jerusalem accused Frankish monks of heresy because they sang the creed with the Filioque formula switched on. The Franks appealed to the Pope for clarification. They claimed to have heard the confession in this form at the Emperor's court in Aachen, and the Athanasianum also said the same thing. Leo, however, obliged the Frankish monks to follow the wording of the Ecumenical Council of Constantinople and informed the emperor about it.

Consultations

Karl then commissioned high-ranking theologians of his empire to draw up reports, one of which should be selected. Reports were prepared by:

The Aquisgranense Decretum passed in Aachen is essentially based on the draft of Arns and was submitted to the Pope in Rome at the beginning of 810.

Results

A minutes of the conversation, the Ratio de symbolo fidei inter Leonem III Papam et missos Caroli Imperatoris, informs about the inclusion of the Decretum Aquisgranense . Accordingly, Leo sympathized with the Filioque doctrine, but rejected the change of the wording. Leo later had the still valid text in Greek and Latin attached to the doors of St. Peter's Church in Rome.

However, the Frankish Church sang - against the will of the Pope - the creed with the Filioque formula. It was not officially entered into the urban Roman (and thus exemplary) liturgy until 1014 under Pope Benedict VIII. Today, the Filioque is considered the greatest dogmatic obstacle to a communion of the Western and Eastern Churches.

See also

literature

  • Michael Böhnke / Assaad Elias Kattan / Bernd Oberdorfer (eds.): The Filioque Controversy. Historical, ecumenical and dogmatic perspectives 1200 years after the Aachen Synod (Quaestiones Disputatae 245), Freiburg 2011.
  • Harald Willjung: The Council of Aachen 809 ( MGH Conc. II, Suppl. II), Hanover 1998.
  • Michael Borgolte : Pope Leo III, Charlemagne and the Filioque dispute of Jerusalem , Byzantina 10 (1980), 401-427.