Hilarus, pope, to his most beloved brothers Leontius, Veranus, and Victurus, bishops.
We are moved by the rationale of justice — which, though it ought to be guarded by all who hold right views, is especially not to be negligently ignored by the priests of the Lord, by whose institutions the rest are to be formed. Our brother and fellow bishop Ingenuus of Ebredunum, always supported by the honor of metropolitan of the province of the Maritime Alps, as the attached documents declare, reports that certain things were decreed by Us to his prejudice — at the request of Our brother and fellow bishop Auxanius — which ran counter to all defenses raised in this same cause. For once the reports which Our brother and fellow bishop Veranus had sent, together with the other priests of the province, to Our predecessor of holy memory were reviewed in Our judgment, and the response of the Apostolic See which had then been issued was made manifest, it was clear that nothing afterward should have been attempted — nor was it fitting that anything be established, to the injury of the synodal rules, by the deception which was recently perpetrated. For although even what was elicited from Us may be considered invalid — since it was reported that even the one who obtained it failed to execute it — nevertheless, lest We be moved by hatred or by favor (which ought not to have any place in the adjudication of causes), We delegate to your charity the investigation of the attached complaint — so that nothing may prevail against the venerable canons, nothing against the judgment of Our predecessor of holy memory, if it be established that anything has been obtained from Us by deception.
For We do not wish, dearest brothers, that the privileges of the churches — which must always be preserved — be confounded; nor do We permit a bishop of one province to hold rights in another’s. For by this the sanctions of holy traditions are no less violated than the Lord Himself is offended, the expectation of whose fruit from Our ministry is placed not in the breadth of regions but in the acquisition of souls. Therefore let Our brother and fellow bishop Ingenuus hold the pontifical authority of his province, concerning which he was long ago blamed by the Apostolic See for an illicit cession. And with all things preserved that the authority of Our predecessor of holy memory defined concerning the churches of the city of Cemelenum and the fortress of Nicaea, as We have said, let nothing harm the right of the churches — the fact that in one of the aforementioned places a bishop has recently been consecrated by the aforementioned brother (to exclude, as he alleged, another’s ambition). Rather let the form of the prescribed correction stand: that the aforementioned places, which ought not to have been divided between two bishops, return to the governance of a single bishop.
May God keep you safe, dearest brothers.
Footnotes
- ↩ Ingenuus was metropolitan of the province of the Maritime Alps, with his see at Ebredunum (modern Embrun). The dispute concerns Cemelenum (modern Cimiez) and the fortress of Nicaea (modern Nice), both within Ingenuus’s metropolitan province. Auxanius — bishop of another see in southern Gaul — had obtained papal rulings that appeared to transfer jurisdiction over these places to himself, first from Hilarius’s predecessor Leo, and then later from Hilarius himself. Ingenuus appealed, presenting the full documentary history of the case.
- ↩ The predecessor is Leo, who had been the previous holder of the Apostolic See and whose ruling on this case stands as binding precedent. Hilarius’s repeated appeals to decessoris mei — “my predecessor” — throughout this letter make the continuity argument explicit: what Leo defined remains in force; what Hilarius himself issued by deception against Leo’s ruling is void. The continuity is not of persons but of office, and the papal office’s acts are cumulative and normative across its occupants.
- ↩ The Latin obreptio denotes the obtaining of a favorable ruling by suppressing or misrepresenting relevant facts. Auxanius had apparently approached Hilarius with a version of the case that concealed the prior papal ruling Leo had issued in Ingenuus’s favor. When the full record emerged, Hilarius’s subsequent ruling was exposed as the product of deception. The significance for the primacy question is subtle but substantial: Hilarius holds his own prior ruling to the same standard of truth as he holds any other — a ruling obtained by deception does not stand, even when it came from the reigning pope. The papal office is not above correction when the record shows the ruling was secured fraudulently.
- ↩ The phrase cujus exspectatio fructus nostri ministerii non in latitudine regionum, sed in acquisitione ponitur animarum was singled out by the early modern editor Severin Binius as “a golden and noteworthy sentence” directed against those “who suffer from an insane desire to expand the boundaries of their diocese.” The theological logic is direct: the Lord looks for fruit from the ministry in souls gained, not in territory acquired, which means ambition for jurisdictional expansion is not merely a disciplinary fault but an offense against the purpose for which the ministry exists.
Historical Commentary