The See of Peter

The Early Church and Peter's Primacy

Letter LII, from Bishop Theodoret of Cyrrhus to Pope Leo

Synopsis: Theodoret of Cyrrhus writes to Pope Leo to declare that it is fitting for the Apostolic See to hold first place in all things, and that as Paul came to Peter so he now comes to Leo’s See for remedy; praises Leo’s letters and his defense of the faith; narrates the injustices committed against him at Ephesus; recounts his labors for the Church; begs that his appeal to the Apostolic See not be rejected and that he be permitted to prove his doctrine; asks Leo to tell him whether he must acquiesce in the unjust deposition, whose sentence alone he awaits; commends his legates and himself to Leo’s intercession and solicitude; and laments that he and others are being detained by imperial letters from coming to Leo in person.

Theodoret, Bishop of Cyrrhus, to Leo, Bishop of Rome.

Chapter I: It Is Fitting That the Apostolic See Hold First Place in All Things; Peter and Paul’s Tombs Have Made It the Apex of All Good

If Paul, the herald of the truth, the trumpet of the Holy Spirit, betook himself to the great Peter in order to obtain from him the resolution of a question raised in Antioch concerning legal observance, how much more do we — lowly and small — hasten to your Apostolic See to receive from you a remedy for the wounds of the churches. For it is fitting that you hold first place in all things.

Your See is adorned with many prerogatives. Other cities are adorned by size, or beauty, or the density of their inhabitants; some that lack these are illuminated by certain spiritual gifts. But to yours the giver of good things has given an abundance of good things. For it is the greatest and most famous of all cities, which presides over the whole world and is crowded with inhabitants. And to this, the empire — which now governs affairs and confers its own name upon its subjects — has been added. But above all, faith adorns it, of which the divine Paul is the fitting witness, crying: Your faith is proclaimed in all the world (Rom. 1:8). And if immediately after the reception of the seeds of saving preaching it produced such marvellous and abundant fruits — what prayer could equal what now flourishes there in piety? It possesses moreover the tombs of our common fathers and teachers of the truth — the tombs of Peter and Paul — illuminating the souls of the faithful. These have made your See most noble; this is the apex of your goods. And God has now also glorified it by constituting in it the sanctity of your right faith, radiating its rays.

Chapter II: Praise of Leo’s Letters Against the Manicheans and His Letter to Flavian

Of this many arguments are at hand; but it suffices [to cite] your zeal against the infamous Manicheans, which Your Holiness recently exercised, and which has made manifest how great a love for God is in you, devoted to the study of divine things. Sufficient also are the writings now coming from you to display your apostolic character. For we fell upon what Your Holiness wrote concerning the Incarnation of God our Savior, and marvelled at the exactness of its careful working. For both displayed the same deeds alike.

Chapter III: The Injustice Committed at Ephesus Against Theodoret

For he who once promoted the Apollinarian and Eutychian disease, not being able to bring about the death of my body, has attempted to take away my reputation. He has brought forward accusations against me that are neither true nor plausible; he has not summoned me before a synod nor granted me a hearing; he has driven out my defenders and admitted his own companions; and has forcibly obtained a condemnation of one absent, unsummoned, and unheard. He has done this contrary to all the canons established by the holy Fathers. And what is most grievous — by the force of his surrounding soldiers he induced the most religious bishops to subscribe, and they signed what they had not heard. Those who wished to speak on my behalf were driven out and prevented from entering the council.

Chapter IV: Theodoret’s Labors for the Church

Permit me, most holy and blessed Father, briefly to recount the labors I have undertaken for true religion. For twenty years now I have labored to build up those formerly given over to the Arian heresy, and others to the Marcionite sect, and others still to the Eunomian pestilence; and by God’s grace I have led many thousands to the orthodox faith. I have also composed many books against those who have destroyed the faith, and have expended great labors in their composition. And when the Nestorian storm arose, I not only did not share in it but opposed it with all my strength. These things are confirmed by the letters written at that time to the most holy bishops, and to the most pious emperors, and by the public deeds performed on behalf of the Church throughout the region of Antioch.

Chapter V: Theodoret Awaits the Sentence of the Apostolic See

But I await the sentence of your Apostolic See, and I ask and beseech Your Holiness that your just and right tribunal may come to the aid of one calling upon it; that you command me to come to you and demonstrate that my doctrine clings to the apostolic footsteps. For I have what I have written partly twenty years ago, partly eighteen, and partly fifteen or twelve years ago — against the Arians and the Eunomians, against the Macedonians, against the Judaizers and pagans, against magicians in Persia, and others on divine providence, on theology, and on the divine Incarnation. Presented before you, it is easy to discern from these whether I hold the straight rule of faith, or have deviated from its rectitude.

Chapter VI: Theodoret Awaits Leo’s Sentence on Whether to Acquiesce

Above all I ask to be instructed by you whether it is proper for me to acquiesce in this unjust deposition or not. For I await your sentence. For if you command that I remain in my judgment, I will remain, and I will trouble no one henceforward, but I will await the just judgment of God our Savior. For He is not ignorant of honor and shame, but He also attends only to the scandal that has been produced, not to the cause of its generation — that many of the simpler sort, seeing those condemned who were waging war on behalf of the truth, will perhaps take the condemned for heretics when they cannot perceive the perfection of the dogmas, inasmuch as I have held the episcopate so long without receiving any salary, without a field, a small coin, an obol, or a farthing — but having willingly embraced poverty and having distributed at once what came to us from our parents after their death, as all who dwell in the East know.

Chapter VII: Theodoret Commends His Legates to Leo; Imperial Letters Prevent His Coming in Person

Above all I beseech your holy and God-beloved head to extend to my legates your prayers and assistance. I have suggested these things to Your Holiness on behalf of the most reverend presbyters Hypatios and Abramios my chorepiscopos, and Alypios the archimandrite of those monasteries beside us — most holy and theophilous men, who have taught us this discipline. Indeed, I myself would have come to Your Holiness — for I am held back from coming to you by the bonds of imperial letters, just as the others are — so that the bonds of royal letters have detained me, in the same way as all the others. I beseech your sanctity to extend the paternal affection to those coming to you, to lend your sincere ears to them benevolently, to deem worthy of your care and providence my old age vexed by calumnies and baseless attack, above all to apply whatever care you are able to the faith being undermined, so that it may keep the churches whole and intact — that for these things also your sanctity may receive the recompense prepared by a generous and liberal Lord.

Source/Reference

PL 54:845

Notes / Historical Commentary

Letter LII is addressed to Leo by Theodoret, Bishop of Cyrrhus (in Syria, modern Küruş in southeastern Turkey, near the Euphrates). Theodoret was one of the most learned theologians of his generation — a prolific commentator, apologist, and historian, associated with the Antiochene theological tradition. He had been a moderate critic of Cyril of Alexandria’s Christology in the 430s and had been among the bishops Dioscorus targeted at Ephesus II; he was condemned in absentia by the council in August 449. His letter to Leo is written from exile — imperial letters were confining him and other targeted bishops to their sees — in the second half of 449.

Chapter I is the letter’s most important passage for the primacy question, and its importance cannot be overstated. Theodoret explicitly invokes the parallel of Paul coming to Peter at Antioch (Gal. 2) as the model for his own coming to Leo’s See — and the parallel is structural, not merely rhetorical. Just as Paul came to Peter to obtain the authoritative resolution of a doctrinal dispute, Theodoret comes to the Apostolic See “to receive a remedy for the wounds of the churches.” The premise of the appeal is the premise of the Roman primacy: the Apostolic See holds the authoritative judgment in matters of faith and discipline, and those who need remedy must come there to receive it. “It is fitting that you hold first place in all things” is not diplomatic flattery; it is the juridical premise that makes the appeal meaningful.

The extended praise of Rome in Chapter I moves through three levels: the city’s imperial prominence, the presence of Peter and Paul’s tombs, and the current sanctity of Leo’s right faith. This three-level argument is worth noting because none of the three levels attributes Rome’s primacy to personal achievement. Rome presides over the world (historical fact), possesses the apostolic tombs (theological fact), and has been constituted by God as the home of right faith (doctrinal fact). Theodoret is describing an objective structure, not a personal compliment.

Chapters V and VI contain the most explicit appellate-jurisdiction language in any letter to Leo in the corpus. “I await the sentence of your Apostolic See” is unambiguous: Theodoret is not merely asking for Leo’s intercession or opinion; he is submitting his case to a juridical institution and declaring that its judgment will be binding. Chapter VI is even more direct: if Leo commands him to accept the deposition, he will accept it; if Leo commands him to come and be heard, he will come. The Apostolic See’s sentence governs the outcome. This from a bishop who had been one of the most prominent theologians in the Eastern church for twenty years, who had condemned the Arians, Marcionites, and Eunomians in dozens of published works, and who is now, in his extremity, appealing to Rome as the one court that can hear him.

A question the reader may naturally raise is why Theodoret does not appeal to his own patriarch. The answer is instructive on both the historical and the theological level. Theodoret’s patriarch was Domnus of Antioch — the see that governed the Diocese of Oriens, of which Cyrrhus in Syria was part. But Domnus himself was deposed at Ephesus II by the same proceedings that condemned Theodoret. Theodoret has no functioning superior within his own patriarchate to appeal to; his patriarch is a fellow victim. Nor could any of the other ancient sees have helped him. Of the five patriarchal sees in 449, Alexandria drove the condemnation (Dioscorus presided), Constantinople’s bishop was deposed and dying (Flavian), Antioch’s bishop was deposed at the same council (Domnus), and Jerusalem’s bishop Juvenal had sided with Dioscorus. The only patriarchal see untouched by the disaster — and the only one that had already formally declared the council’s acts invalid — was Rome.

But the reader should note carefully that Theodoret does not frame his appeal in these terms. He does not say “I come to you because all other options are unavailable.” He says “I come to you because it is fitting that you hold first place in all things.” The circumstantial elimination of alternatives does not appear in his argument at all; it is not what he is appealing to. What he is appealing to is the structural primacy of the Apostolic See — the principle stated in Chapter I, grounded in Paul’s coming to Peter, in Rome’s apostolic prerogatives, and in the divine constitution of Leo’s see as the home of right faith. The fact that Rome was also the only practically available court in the crisis of 449 confirms and reinforces the theological point rather than replacing it: when everything else failed, what remained standing was the institution that holds first place in all things. Theodoret knew what that institution was and went there directly.

The Orthodox theological tradition reads “first place” language of this kind as expressing primus inter pares — a primacy of honor within a collegial episcopate, not a governing jurisdiction. Letter LII presses that reading with particular force at two points. The first is the Paul-to-Peter parallel in Chapter I. Theodoret does not say that Paul consulted Peter as a peer, or deliberated with him as with a fellow apostle of equal standing. He says Paul “betook himself to the great Peter in order to obtain from him the resolution” of the dispute — a movement of coming to receive an authoritative answer, not to participate in a collegial discussion. Theodoret then explicitly maps his own coming to Leo onto that pattern: as Paul to Peter, so Theodoret to Leo. The parallel frames the Roman bishop’s role as answering rather than merely presiding. The second pressure point is the vocabulary of Chapters V and VI: sententiam — “sentence,” “verdict,” “judgment.” Theodoret does not say “I await your recommendation” or “your view” or “your counsel.” He says he awaits Leo’s sentence, and he means it in its full judicial force: if Leo commands him to accept the deposition, he will accept it; if Leo commands him to come, he will come. An equal deliberates; a judge sentences. Theodoret’s language places Leo unambiguously in the second role.