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The condemnation of John Wyclif at the Council of Constance
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 21 March 2016
Extract
The Council of Constance was perhaps the most dramatic of all the ecumenical councils of the Church. Called under stress by an anti-pope whom it proceeded to depose, it was the scene of the fire that burned John Hus and the arena for the debate of the most potent political theories of the time. It was fitting that it should be an occasion for the condemnation of the works of John Wyclif, the firebrand heretic of the preceding century.
Consideration of Wyclif’s condemnation at Constance is usually overshadowed by the condemnation of John Hus, of which process the action concerning Wyclif was a part. However, for the purposes of this paper, the focus will be placed on the total condemnation process of the two men specifically insofar as it concerns Wyclif. When this is done, an interesting succession of events at the Council emerges from the general mass of its records.
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References
Page No 209 Note 1 Mansi, xxvi, 565 f. Cf. Poole’s, R. L. notes to the text in Johannis Wyclif, Tractatus De Civili Dominio, Liber Primus, ed. Poole, Reginald Lane , London 1885 Google Scholar.
Page No 209 Note 2 Lenfant, Jaques, Histoire du Concile de Constance, Amsterdam 1714,1, 25-6Google Scholar.
Page No 210 Note 1 Lenfant, Histoire, 19.
Page No 210 Note 2 Lenfant, Histoire, 28.
Page No 210 Note 3 Ibid.
Page No 210 Note 4 Lenfant, Histoire, 29.
Page No 210 Note 5 ‘ Unica est sancta Universalis ecclesia, quae est praedestinatorum universitas.’ Mansi, xxvii, 754. Cf. ‘Ecclesia autem sancta katholica, id est universalis, est omnium predestinatorum universitas’. Magistri Johannis Hus, Tractatus De Ecclesia, ed. Harrison Thomson, S., University of Colorado Press 1956, 2 Google Scholar. Cf. ‘Ecclesia catholica sive apostolica sit universitas predestinatorum’. Johannis Wycliffe, Tractatus De Civili Dominio, Liber Primus, ed. Poole, Reginald Lane, London 1885, 358 Google Scholar.
Page No 210 Note 6 Mansi, xxvii, 505 f.
Page No 210 Note 7 Lenfant, Histoire, 36.
Page No 211 Note 1 Lenfant, Histoire, 38.
Page No 211 Note 2 Lenfant, Histoire, 39.
Page No 211 Note 3 Lenfant, Histoire, 40.
Page No 211 Note 4 Mansi, xxvii, 539. Lenfant, Histoire, 35.
Page No 211 Note 5 ‘Item, quod in eadem sessione committatur materia fidei per hoc sacrum Concilium cum plena auctoritate, quoad doctrinam ipsius Joannis Wicleff, nec non Joannis Hus, & suorum sequacium, reverendissimis patribus.. .videant super materia Joannis Huss, hic propter errorem ipsius Joannis Wicleff, detenti.’ Mansi, xxvii, 592.
Page No 211 Note 6 Ibid. Cf. c. 594.
Page No 211 Note 7 Mansi, xxvii, 595.
Page No 211 Note 8 Mansi, xxvii, 597.
Page No 211 Note 9 Ibid. Re the names and orders, Cf. c. 606.
Page No 212 Note 1 Mansi, XXVII, 611.
Page No 212 Note 2 Mansi, xxvii, 623 f.
Page No 212 Note 3 Mansi, xxvii, 628.
Page No 212 Note 4 Mansi, xxvii, 629. Cf. also Lenfant, Histoire, 144 f. and Heinrich Finke & Johannes Hollnsteiner, Acta Concila Constanciensis, 11, Munster 1923, 34 f.
Page No 212 Note 5 Mansi, xxvii, 630.
Page No 212 Note 6 Hefele-LeClercq, Histoire des Conciles, vii, pt. 1, 226. Mansi, xxvii, 635.
Page No 213 Note 1 Mansi, xxvii, 630. Lenfant, Histoire, 156 f. Finke & Hollnsteiner, Acta, 11, 34. Cf.Hefele-Leclercq, , Histoire des Concils vii, pt. 1, 226 Google Scholar, where Cardinal Filastre is named as the interrupter.
Page No 213 Note 2 Mansi, xxvii, 631.
Page No 213 Note 3 Lenfant, Histoire, 172.
Page No 213 Note 4 Wyclif, Johannis, Diahgus Sive Speculum Ecclesie Militantis. ed. Pollard, Alfred W., London 1886 Google Scholar.
Page No 213 Note 5 Wyclif, Joannis, Trialogus cum Supplemento Trialogi, ed. Lechler, Gotthard, Oxford 1869. And see Wilkins, 111, 229-30Google Scholar. Aston, Margaret, Thomas Arundel: a Study of Church Life in the Reign of Richard II, Oxford 1967, 332 Google Scholar.
Page No 213 Note 6 Mansi, xxvii, 505 f., 632-4.
Page No 213 Note 7 Ibid. 634.
Page No 213 Note 8 Ibid, 635 f.
Page No 213 Note 9 Lenfant, Histoire, 157.
Page No 213 Note 10 Mansi, xxvii, 640 f.
Page No 214 Note 1 Mansi, xxvii, 655 f.
Page No 214 Note 2 Mansi, xxvii, 658.
Page No 214 Note 3 Lenfant, Histoire, 172 f.
Page No 214 Note 4 Mansi, xxvii, 660.
Page No 214 Note 5 Mansi, xxvii, 661 f.
Page No 214 Note 6 Mansi, xxvii, 748 f.
Page No 214 Note 7 Lenfant, Histoire, 200 f.
Page No 214 Note 8 Lenfant, Histoire, 203.
Page No 214 Note 9 Lenfant, Histoire, 205.
Page No 214 Note 10 Mansi, xxvii, 754 f., where thirty articles are given. Cf. Lenfant, Histoire, 210-24.
Page No 215 Note 1 ‘Unica est sancta Universalis ecclesia, quae est praedestinatorum universitas.’ Art. 1, Mansi, xxvn, 754.
Page No 215 Note 2 Lenfant, Histoire, 210.
Page No 215 Note 3 Mansi, xxvii, 632 f.
Page No 215 Note 4 On this point especially Wyclif, Johannis, De Eucharistia Tractatus Maior, ed. Loserth, Johann, London 1892 Google Scholar.
Page No 215 Note 5 Wyclif says that the mass is more efficacious insofar as the priest is more good than bad. Then he goes further: ‘Dicunt enim quod denarius est melior in manu prudentis quam fatui, et tarnen negant sacramentum esse melius in ministerio iusti qui facit cum ilio fructum centuplum quam in ministerio reprobi qui cum illo dampnificat se ipsum et populum.’ De Eucharistia, 113-14. Cf. De Civili Dominio, 1, 284 f., in passages condemned by Pope Gregory XI. On the pope, op. cif., 415 f.
Page No 215 Note 6 Wyclif, Dialogus, p. 3.
Page No 215 Note 7 Wyclif, De Civili Dominio, 1, 12, 21 f., 102. On the pope, De Ecclesia, 17-19.
Page No 215 Note 8 Mansi, xxvi, 565 f.
Page No 215 Note 9 Wyclif, De Civili Dominio, 1, 267, 345, 351.
Page No 216 Note 1 Wyclif, Johannis, Tractatus De Officio Regis, ed. Pollard, Alfred W. & Sayle, Charles, London 1887, 159 fGoogle Scholar.
Page No 216 Note 2 Wyclif, Trialogus, 40, 121-2.
Page No 216 Note 3 Wyclif, De Eucharistia, 114. Cf.Wyclif, Johannis, De Civili Dominio, 11, ed. Loserth, Johann, London 1900, 49 f.Google Scholar, where Wyclif questions whether prayers on behalf of the foreknown are valid.
Page No 216 Note 4 Wyclif, , De Civili Dominio, 1, 255, 274 f.Google Scholar; Dialogus, 25; De Ecclesia, 19; Wyclif, Johannis, Tractatus De Potestate Pape, ed. Loserth, Johann, London 1907, 31 Google Scholar.
Page No 216 Note 5 Wyclif, De Potestate Pape, 118 f.
Page No 216 Note 6 Wyclif, De Potestate Pape, 82 f.; De Officio Regis, 160 f.
Page No 216 Note 7 Wyclif, Dialogus, 6-7. Cf. De Ecclesia, 88.
Page No 216 Note 8 Wyclif, De Ecclesia, 14-18, 85-8; De Civili Dominio, 1, 381 f., 415 f.; De Potestate Pape, 32 f., 95 f.
Page No 216 Note 9 Wyclif, Johannis, De Civili Dominio, 111, ed. Loserth, Johann, London 1903, 215 f.Google Scholar; De Officio Regis, 36 f.; De Potestate Pape, 226-31.
Page No 217 Note 1 E.g., Art. 4, in list as given in Wilkins, 111, 339-49. Cf. Wyclif, De Potestate Pape, 118 f.
Page No 217 Note 2 E.g., Art. 65-71, 121 f., 160-70, 259-63.
Page No 218 Note 1 ‘61. Experimento cognoscimus, quod mortuo papa vel deposito, cum suis cardinalibus et praelatis Caesareis, non minus, sed amplius prosperatur ecclesia. Nam quantum ad sacramentum confirmationis, cum sacramento ordinis, et benedictione chrismatis, cum ecclesiis dedicandis, quae appropriantur episcopis, videtur quod Christus perpendiculariter residens in caelis super justos presby teros daret illis potestatem talia faciendi.’ Wilkins, 111, 342. Cf.Wyclif, : ‘Ergo per idem summus sacerdos Romane ecclesie deponi poterit et dampnari.’ De Civili Dominio, 1, 414 Google Scholar.
Page No 218 Note 2 On Jean Gerson in this connection, see Morrall, John B., Gerson and the Great Schism, Manchester 1960, 92, 98, 109 Google Scholar. Cf. on Pierre d’Ailly, Oakley, Francis, The Political Thought of Pierre d’Ailly, New Haven 1964, 73, n. 17 Google Scholar; 112; 157 f. These authors show clearly that Gerson and d’Ailly both took great care to disassociate themselves from Wyclif, but that this should have been so necessary seems significant.
Page No 218 Note 3 Mansi, xxvii, 754.