Heresy vs Error – Should Communion Be Withdrawn Over Semantics?

The Counsel of St. Theodore the Studite on the division among the Studite monks who refused to call Moechiansm a heresy in the 9th century.

 

 

To Gregory, my son

Receive the whole discourse, beloved brother, as a soldier of Christ, as one shut up together with me, a sinner, for the sake of His Gospel, neither without feeling (for that would be most irrational), nor again overwhelmed with grief beyond what is fitting (for that would be most useless).

I received two letters: one from our Father, and another from brother Athanasios. Our Father truly laid hold of my humility, but also broke my pitiable soul unto sympathy; while brother Athanasios blew so greatly against my weakness that, had the Lord not helped me, my soul had almost dwelt in Hades. For you know that from whomever a man hopes to be helped, he also supposes such a one to be of like soul and of like inclination; this makes him eager. But whenever, in time of war, he sees from such a one a turn in the opposite direction, he suffers something like a mortal passion.

Something of this sort, most desired one, appeared to me now. The second one — a report upon a grievous report, or rather an evil one — was struggling to drag down my mind and my pitiable soul into Hades, even if, as he says, with sparingness. For both, speaking especially of the matters of B and Γ, say that it is not heresy potentially (for I understand the words and the dispositions of both), and hence they suggest and remind me to examine the things written by me as erroneous, and as though so that, not being ashamed to correct myself, I may not fall away from the Church under the judgment of later generations, who would find the writings alien to God. The first inscribes me as wrathful and deranged; but the second says that we are worse than the κεν[ ]λαν [lacuna; “vain talker”?], and that no one of the brethren keeps your words. He attacks, without noticing, my answers made by way of questions; and says that they have been divided into myriads of opinions; and that the majority, and indeed of the prominent ones, say these things, even if no one knew that I had sent a letter, bringing forward senseless and strange arguments, as though I fall into contradiction with myself in my writings. And teaching this with all strength, he says it is well, since he says that all the friends and pious ones say not to call it heresy, but only a transgression of the commandments of God, and that they are tramplers of the divine canons and unholy men (flee their communion altogether), and he adds other reproaches besides the things mentioned, which the letter cannot report because of their multitude.

What then was I, humble as I am, to do? Having shaken off despondency, with the help also of brother Euprepeianus, and having in disposition renounced all flesh, and looking to God alone, for Whom these things have happened to me and through Whom there is help, especially for one weak and decayed, I sent a reply, duly resolving their perplexities and objections by scriptural and patristic testimonies, in eight and a half quires. Seeing, then, that the cause of the disagreement was their inability to bear the ruler’s wrath caused by calling it heresy; or, in some, a narrowness of mind; or perhaps also the hidden sting of envy; and being perplexed on every side, fearing both that our schism itself would become a joy for the devil and for those who heretically incline, and that coming together with them would be apostasy from the truth, by counsel also of the brother I came to an economy, in imitation of our holy Fathers, one which, as I think, has nothing harmful or contrary to what is fitting with respect to the law of God. And now I set it forth as follows.

Since I see that you have yielded to such an extent that a rupture has arisen with us, this opinion has seemed to me to be good by way of economy: If someone, through narrowness of mind, cannot bear to call it heresy, this is indeed a matter of weakness, even if the hearer does not wish to reckon it so; nevertheless, the term should be permitted to be omitted for the sake of union, while the other things are preserved—I mean, namely, complete non-communion and the absence of any other kind of condescension—just as your friends, supposedly, praise you. But let it be permitted both to me and to those who choose the same as I do to call it heresy, as we have believed, in demonstration of the truth. And if those who see this in the opposite way slander us as being in disagreement, as though we are not seeking either side—let them do so. For in silence, agreement is being negotiated for us in the matters, since we equally withdraw from communion with them, until God fully assures us, knowing this: that schism too is nothing less than heresy, as has been said by Chrysostom. (Emphasis added.)

Original Greek source: Codex Vaticanus Graecus 712.

Translated from the Greek (as opposed to the Latin edition) as published in “An Unpublished Letter of St Theodore the Studite,” by Joseph Gill, S.J., Orientalia Christiana Periodica 31 (Rome: Pontificio Instituto Orientalium Studiorum, 1968), posted here:

https://orthodoxmiscellany.blogspot.com/2026/06/an-unpublished-letter-of-st-theodore.html