Toletum XII / Toledo XII
General Council of the Visigothic Kingdom of Hispania; 681
The council met from 9 to 25 of January 681, (Era 719) in the first year of Ervigius’s reign, but barely 3 months into his reign. It had been a full twenty-five years since the general Tenth Council of Toledo (656) that another general council convened. The renowned Julian of Toledo was prominent in this and subsequent Toledan councils – the so-called 'Julian series?. At this one there were in attendance 35 bishops, another 3 were represented by Vicars, among them were 4 Metropolitans, 4 abbots, and 15 illustrious men. The provinces of Tarragona and Narbonne were not represented by any clergy. The council met in the Basilica Pretoriense of the Holy Apostles in Toledo. First on the agenda was a summary of the Tomus regius that laid out three main themes that Ervigius wanted addressed: the legitimacy of accession to throne after taking the throne from Wamba under suspicious circumstances, an aggressive offensive against Jews whom he wanted to expel from Hispania, designating them iudaeorum pestem. The last was to nullify the mobilization laws that Wamba had imposed and replace them with Ervigius’s new legislation. The Tomus regius is dated 9 January 681, the day that council started. A total of thirteen canons were promulgated by the bishops, some having lengthy texts.
In Canon 1 the entire assembly affirmed their fidelity to the Ecumenical councils and proceeded to profess the Nicaean-Constantinopolitan Creed that included the Filioque using the expression ex Patre et Filio procedentem. Ever since it was introduced at the Third Council of Toledo (589), it rapidly became standard in the Visigothic Church. There is also mention of the circumstances of the transfer of power from Wamba to Ervigius, citing how the former was thought to be on his deathbed after becoming very ill. He was hastily removed from power, Ervigius was consecrated king by the bishop. Unexpectedly, Wamba fully recovered but by then it was too late recover the throne. All were ordered to obey Ervigius recognizing him henceforth as the new king. The entire affair obviously was quite irregular. It is believed that it was a deliberate coup d’état by Ervigius against Wamba. After the successful dethronement, Wamba lived another seven years and three months in a monastery near Burgos where he died.
In Canon 2 the bishops dealt with those who abused a penance by having no desire to fulfil it. Their punishment was excommunication for a year which could be extended if they stubbornly refused to comply.
Canon 3 addressed situations where the king had pardoned and accepted into his favor, even at table, those who previously offended but were still estranged from the bishops. So as not to be in a state of division between king and bishops, it was ordered that the latter receive into communion those whom the king had accepted. The unity of king and bishops was thus maintained.
In Canon 4 it was ruled that in a place where there was never a bishop, none should be installed. Bishop Stephen of Mérida reported that in Chaves in a monastery where the body of venerable confessor Pimenius lay, King Wamba ordered a new bishop to be ordained and appointed there. Stephen said he was pressured to do so by Wamba, at the council he begged forgiveness for having acquiesced. The bishops cited Paul’s letter to Titus where he ordered that bishops be installed in the cities. The bishops in Toledo ruled that Wamba’s action was in violation of the ancient canons. To demonstrate it they cited some from various councils, beginning with Canon 8 of Nicaea that dictated that there could not be two bishops in the same city. They also referenced synods of Laodicea, several from Africa, Sardica, and Turin citing specific canons and the names of the prelates involved. The ordinations promoted by Wamba were declared null and void, the ordained and those who ordained them lost their clerical rank. The illegitimate bishop in Chaves, named Cuniuldus was not punished for having been pressured into submission by the king, he was sent to a bishopric where there was a vacancy to live in a monastery under the watch of the abbot with no episcopal privileges, however. As for the intrusion of the monarchy on the appointment and selection of bishops the intent was to limit their ability to do so.
Canon 5 legislated to correct the recurring practice of clergy who abstained from taking communion when offering multiple Masses in a given day, they waited until the last one to take communion. Priests were ordered to receive communion at every single Mass that they offered; those who disobeyed were denied communion for a year and it was understood that they could not offer Mass.
Canon 6 gave the Archbishop of Toledo the authority to consecrate any bishop recommended by the king anywhere in Hispania, all candidates had to be ultimately approved by the Archbishop. What the bishops did was to enhance the role of the Archbishop of Toledo [Metropolitan] in essence giving the authority to select and consecrate the candidate from those recommended by the king with the consecration to transpire in Toledo. This measure was done because at times distance and other mitigating circumstances delayed news from the king regarding a new candidate was unnecessarily prolonged. For greater efficiency the Archbishop of Toledo was given the authority to select and consecrate the new bishops in Toledo from any province. It was also required that after three months the new bishop had to present himself to his Metropolitan to receive further instructions. Having failed to do so, they would be declared excommunicated having proved that the delay was not caused by the monarchy. This policy in effect opened the way for the Archbishop of Toledo eventually to have primacy over all bishops in Hispania, but it did not reach full fruition until the High Middle Ages.
Canon 7 supported Ervigius’s rescinding a law regarding military service issue by Wamba which resulted in the recruits losing their right to testify in the tribunals.
Canon 8 issued strong consequences of barons who through divorce abandoned their wives; the only exception being on the grounds of adultery. The guilty barons were declared excommunicated. The penalty could be reversed if the husband received back his wife. Those who rejected the bishop’s injunction up to three times would lose their palatine rights so long as they remained separated from their spouse.
Canon 9 reproduced the twenty-eight laws against Jews in book XII of the Liber Iudiciorum to apply them to Jews in Hispania. Ervigius wanted to expel unbaptized Jews and bring to light the conversos who continued to practice their rites secretly. These and Ervigius’s laws were read publicly to the Jews who were forced to be present at the Church of St. Mary on 27 January 681, two days before the council ended. Many scholars have pointed out that the harsh Ervigian anti-Jewish laws as well as those of other Visigothic monarchs were hardly enforced and had limited success. Jews en masse were never expelled in the Visigothic period; however, they did contribute to the suffocant constant repression and marginalization of Jews. This state of affairs against Jews was not unique to Visigothic Hispania. Ervigius saw himself as a champion of orthodoxy. Julian of Toledo in his De sextae aetatis comprobatione felt obliged to attach a letter directed to Ervigius to inform him that it was an anti-Jewish Christian book to stay in his good graces. There were always bishops who rejected harsh measures and promoted a milder and measured approach to the Jewish question, Isidore of Seville and Braulio of Zaragoza are two prominent examples.
In Canon 10 the bishops articulated the norms for ecclesiastical asylum in churches for fugitives. It was established that up to thirty steps surrounding the church was considered refuge territory where they could remain safe. It not only expanded the safe perameters but it afforded the refugee opportunity to go outside and not be confined to the interior of the church. Any violation was met with excommunication and severe consequences from the king. Bishops were bound to uphold this decision.
Canon 11 decreed some stringent measures against those caught in the act of idolatry. They identify servants who worked in the countryside that still kept alive many practices of residual paganism and superstition. Those caught in such activitiy were seized, beaten, and chained to be delivered to the owners of the estates where they worked. It then became the responsibility of the owners to see that the servants never lapsed into idolatry. Owners who failed in their diligence were excommunicated and lost all rights to the servants in question. If the idolaters were freedmen they were declared perpetually excommunicated and subjected to a severe banishment. This canon reveals that pagan practices never fully disappeared especially in the countryside despite the best efforts to expunge them.
Canon 12 revisited the topic on the frequency of when councils were to convene and the time of year. This question was answered in two previous councils: the Third Council of Toledo (589), Canon 18, ordered them to convene annually on 1 November and the Fourth Council of Toledo (633), Canon 3, also annually but moved the date to 18 May. The bishops in Toledo XII moved the date back to 1 November and maintained the annual requirement. Any cleric who failed to attend a council without a valid reason suffered excommunication.
Lastly, Canon 13 has the final official statement to close the council. After all of the signatories the Appendix Toletana was attached to the council record that contains several documents [Vives edition]: Decretum Gundemari regis, Constitutio Carthaginensium sacerdotum, Suggestio servi vestri Sesuldi, Alia proprii vernuli vestri Sunilani suggestio, and Alia suggestio Ermegildi Iohanni et servis eius.
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QQ.: Vives/Marín Martínez/Martínez Díez, Concilios Visigóticos e Hispano-Romanos, 380-410; Hispana edition is in: Martínez Diez/Rodríguez. La Colección Canónica. VI, 135-204; Weckwerth, Clavis Conciliorvm, 218-220.
Lit.: Orlandis/Ramos-Lissón, Concilios de la España Romana y Visigoda, 402-421; Rachel L. Stocking, Bishops, Councils, and Consensus in the Visigothic Kingdom, 589-633, Ann Arbor (MI) 2000; J. F. Rivera Recio, Encumbramiento de la Sede Toledana durante la dominación visigótica, in: HispSac 8 (1956) 24-31.
Empfohlene Zitierweise:
Ferreiro, Alberto, "Toletum XII / Toledo XII: General Council of the Visigothic Kingdom of Hispania; 681", in: Lexikon der Konzilien [Online-Version], Juni 2025;
URL: http://www.konziliengeschichte.org/site/de/publikationen/lexikon/database/641.html
