|
ZEALOUS of reforming the life of those who were engaged about the
churches, the Synod enacted laws which were called canons. While
they were deliberating about this, some thought that a law ought to be
passed enacting that bishops and presbyters, deacons and subdeacons,
should hold no intercourse with the wife they had espoused before they
entered the priesthood; but Paphnutius, the confessor, stood up and
testified against this proposition; he said that marriage was honorable
and chaste, and that cohabitation with their own wives was chastity,
and advised the Synod not to frame such a law, for it would be
difficult to bear, and might serve as an occasion of incontinence to
them and their wives; and he reminded them, that according to the
ancient tradition of the church, those who were unmarried when they
took part in the communion of sacred orders, were required to remain
so, but that those who were married, were not to put away their
wives. Such was the advice of Paphnutius, although he was himself
unmarried, and in accordance with it, the Synod concurred in his
counsel, enacted no law about it, but left the matter to the decision
of individual judgment, and not to compulsion. The Synod, however,
enacted other laws regulating the government of the Church; and these
laws may easily be found, as they are in the possession of many
individuals.
|
|