Man should not have to ask for grace in order to be obedient. Man was born in a state of righteousness, and as one created in the image of God, he was created immutably so.
Even though it was possible for him to sin, it was not possible for him to lose his basic human nature, which was capable always and everywhere to be obedient. Pelagius went on to say that it is, even after the sin of Adam, possible for every human being to live a life of perfect righteousness and that, indeed, some have achieved such status.
Pelagius was not opposed to grace, only to the idea that grace was necessary for obedience. He maintained that grace facilitates obedience but is not a necessary prerequisite for obedience. There is no transfer of guilt from Adam to his progeny nor any change in human nature as a subsequence of the fall.
The only negative impact Adam had on his progeny was that of setting a bad example, and if those who follow in the pathway of Adam imitate his disobedience, they will share in his guilt, Pelagius asserted, but only by being actually guilty themselves. There can be no transfer or imputation of guilt from one man to another according to the teaching of Pelagius.
On the other side, Augustine argued that the fall seriously impaired the moral ability of the human race. Indeed, the fall of Adam plunged all of humanity into the ruinous state of original sin. Original sin does not refer to the first sin of Adam and Eve, but refers to the consequences for the human race of that first sin.
Paul develops this theme in the fifth chapter of his epistle to the Romans. Augustine argued that prior to the fall, Adam and Eve enjoyed a free will as well as moral liberty. The will is the faculty by which choices are made.
This likely fostered a shallow understanding of his true state of sinfulness. When he moved to Rome and found that few in society shared his commitment to an ascetic lifestyle, he increased his enthusiasm for moralism and formed his theology around it. About the time the Visigoths attacked Rome in , Pelagius fled to safety in Carthage in North Africa not far from where Augustine served as the bishop of Hippo. Contrary to Pelagius, Augustine supported the doctrine of original sin and grace.
That our wills are in bondage to sin. He argued that the doctrine of original sin enabled—perhaps even encouraged—society to sin with immunity since they could simply declare their sin nature made them do it.
Augustine replied with equal zeal. In a council of bishops in Carthage, led by Augustine, condemned Pelagius as a heretic—someone who teaches contrary to Scripture. The African churches appealed to Innocent I , who excommunicated Pelagius. After Innocent I died in , his successor, Zosimus, overturned the ex-communication orders, but Augustine appealed to the emperor. Zosimus then changed his decision and declared Pelagius excommunicated and a heretic.
After Zosimus died in , his successor dropped the matter altogether. Pelagius moved to Egypt and nothing more is known about him.
But his influence remained. Pelagianism grew as did the spin-off belief of Semi-Pelagianism. In , the Council of Ephesus condemned Pelagius as a heretic, as did the Council of Orange in , the Council of Trent in , and at least six protestant councils.
Pelagianism was condemned by more church councils than any other heresy. Semi-Pelagianism attempts to strike a balance between Pelagianism and Augustinianism. God assists man toward salvation but never to the point that man loses his free will. God works with mankind in salvation, but salvation is still a work of man. The Council of Orange maintained that salvation is a work of God alone and condemned this spin-off as heresy in Around this time a new view emerged— prevenient grace.
Whether they will is up to man, not God. Pelagianism made large strides in the 19 th century at the hands of Charles Grandison Finney , an American revivalist and a leader of the Second Great Awakening. Some consider him the father of modern revivalism. Pelagius, having won the good-will of the assembly by reading to them some private letters of prominent bishops among them one of Augustine Ep.
Thus from the charge that he made the possibility of a sinless life solely dependent on free will , he exonerated himself by saying that, on the contrary, he required the help of God adjutorium Dei for it, though by this he meant nothing else than the grace of creation gratia creationis.
Of other doctrines with which he had been charged, he said that, formulated as they were in the complaint, they did not originate from him, but from Caelestius, and that he also repudiated them. After the hearing there was nothing left for the synod but to discharge the defendant and to announce him as worthy of communion with the Church.
The Orient had now spoken twice and had found nothing to blame in Pelagius, because he had hidden his real sentiments from his judges.
Continuation and end of controversy The new acquittal of Pelagius did not fail to cause excitement and alarm in North Africa, whither Orosius had hastened in with letters from Bishops Heros and Lazarus.
To parry the blow, something decisive had to be done. In autumn, , 67 bishops from Proconsular Africa assembled in a synod at Carthage , which was presided over by Aurelius, while fifty-nine bishops of the ecclesiastical province of Numidia, to which the See of Hippo , St.
Augustine's see belonged, held a synod in Mileve. In both places the doctrines of Pelagius and Caelestius were again rejected as contradictory to the Catholic faith. However, in order to secure for their decisions "the authority of the Apostolic See", both synods wrote to Innocent I , requesting his supreme sanction.
And in order to impress upon him more strongly the seriousness of the situation, five bishops Augustine , Aurelius, Alypius, Evodius, and Possidius forwarded to him a joint letter, in which they detailed the doctrine of original sin , infant baptism , and Christian grace St.
Augustine , "Epp. In three separate epistles, dated 27 Jan. Starting from the principle that the resolutions of provincial synods have no binding force until they are confirmed by the supreme authority of the Apostolic See , the pope developed the Catholic teaching on original sin and grace, and excluded Pelagius and Caelestius, who were reported to have rejected these doctrines, form communion with the Church until they should come to their senses donec resipiscant.
In Africa, where the decision was received with unfeigned joy , the whole controversy was now regarded as closed, and Augustine, on 23 September, , announced from the pulpit Serm. Two synods having written to the Apostolic See about this matter; the replies have come back; the question is settled. But he was mistaken; the matter was not yet settled. Innocent I died on 12 March, , and Zosimus, a Greek by birth, succeeded him.
Before his tribunal the whole Pelagian question was now opened once more and discussed in all its bearings. The occasion for this was the statements which both Pelagius and Caelestius submitted to the Roman See in order to justify themselves. Though the previous decisions of Innocent I had removed all doubts about the matter itself, yet the question of the persons involved was undecided, viz.
Did Pelagius and Caelestius really teach the theses condemned as heretical? Zosimus' sense of justice forbade him to punish anyone with excommunication before he was duly convicted of his error. And if the steps recently taken by the two defendants were considered, the doubts which might arise on this point were not wholly groundless.
In Pelagius had published a new work, now lost, "De libero arbitrio libri IV", which in its phraseology seemed to verge towards the Augustinian conception of grace and infant baptism , even if in principle it did not abandon the author's earlier standpoint. Speaking of Christian grace , he admitted not only a Divine revelation , but also a sort of interior grace, viz.
As to infant baptism he granted that it ought to be administered in the same form as in the case of adults, not in order to cleanse the children from a real original guilt, but to secure to them entrance into the "kingdom of God".
Unbaptized children, he thought, would after their death be excluded from the "kingdom of God" , but not from "eternal life".
This work, together with a still extant confession of faith , which bears witness to his childlike obedience, Pelagius sent to Rome , humbly begging at the same time that chance inaccuracies might be corrected by him who "holds the faith and see of Peter".
All this was addressed to Innocent I , of whose death Pelagius had not yet heard. Caelestius, also, who meanwhile had changed his residence from Ephesus to Constantinople, but had been banished thence by the anti-Pelagian Bishop Atticus, took active steps toward his own rehabilitation. In he went to Rome in person and laid at the feet of Zosimus a detailed confession of faith Fragments, P. Augustine , "De peccato orig. Highly pleased with this Catholic faith and obedience, Zosimus sent two different letters P.
As to Caelestius, who was then in Rome , the pope charged the Africans either to revise their former sentence or to convict him of heresy in his own the pope's presence within two months. The papal command struck Africa like a bomb-shell.
In great haste a synod was convened at Carthage in November, , and writing to Zosimus, they urgently begged him not to rescind the sentence which his predecessor, Innocent I , had pronounced against Pelagius and Caelestius, until both had confessed the necessity of interior grace for all salutary thoughts, words, and deeds. At last Zosimus came to a halt. By a rescript of 21 March, , he assured them that he had not yet pronounced definitively, but that he was transmitting to Africa all documents bearing on Pelagianism in order to pave the way for a new, joint investigation.
Pursuant to the papal command, there was held on 1 May, , in the presence of bishops , the famous Council of Carthage , which again branded Pelagianism as a heresy in eight or nine canons Denzinger , "Enchir. Owing to their importance they may be summarized: Death did not come to Adam from a physical necessity, but through sin.
New-born children must be baptized on account of original sin. Justifying grace not only avails for the forgiveness of past sins , but also gives assistance for the avoidance of future sins. The grace of Christ not only discloses the knowledge of God's commandments , but also imparts strength to will and execute them. Without God's grace it is not merely more difficult, but absolutely impossible to perform good works. Not out of humility , but in truth must we confess ourselves to be sinners.
The saints refer the petition of the Our Father , "Forgive us our trespasses", not only to others, but also to themselves. The saints pronounce the same supplication not from mere humility , but from truthfulness.
Some codices containing a ninth canon Denzinger , loc. These clearly worded canons, which except the last-named afterwards came to be articles of faith binding on the universal Church, gave the death blow to Pelagianism; sooner or later it would bleed to death.
Meanwhile, urged by the Africans probably through a certain Valerian, who as comes held an influential position in Ravenna , the secular power also took a hand in the dispute, the Emperor Honorius , by rescript of 30 April, , from Ravenna , banishing all Pelagians from the cities of Italy.
Whether Caelestius evaded the hearing before Zosimus, to which he was now bound, "by fleeing from Rome " St. Augustine , "Contra duas epist. With regard to his later life, we are told that in he again haunted Rome or its vicinity, but was expelled a second time by an imperial rescript cf.
It is further related that in his petition for an audience with Celestine I was answered by a third banishment cf. He then sought refuge in the orient, where we shall meet him later. Pelagius could not have been included in the imperial decree of exile from Rome.
For at that time he undoubtedly resided in the Orient, since, as late as the summer of , he communicated with Pinianus and his wife Melania, who lived in Palestine cf. Rampolla, "Santa Melania giuniore", Rome, But this is the last information we have about him; he probably died in the orient.
Having received the Acts of the Council of Carthage , Zosimus sent to all the bishops of the world his famous "Epistola tractoria" of which unfortunately only fragments have come down to us. This papal encyclical, a lengthy document, gives a minute account of the entire "causa Caelestii et Pelagii", from whose works it quotes abundantly, and categorically demands the condemnation of Pelagianism as a heresy.
The assertion that every bishop of the world was obliged to confirm this circular by his own signature, cannot be proved , it is more probable that the bishops were required to transmit to Rome a written agreement; if a bishop refused to sign, he was deposed from his office and banished. A second and harsher rescript , issued by the emperor on 9 June, , and addressed to Bishop Aurelius of Carthage P. Augustine's triumph was complete. In , drawing the balance, as it were, of the whole controversy, he wrote against the heresiarchs his last great work, "De gratia Christi et de peccato originali" P.
The disputes of St. Augustine with Julian of Eclanum Through the vigorous measures adopted in , Pelagianism was indeed condemned, but not crushed.
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