Pope Gelasius I

Gelasius I was Pope (492 - 496). He is known as the third pope of African origin (more exactly from Kabylie) in Catholic history. Gelasius had been closely employed by his predecessor Felix, especially in drafting papal documents, and his election, March 1, 492, was a gesture for continuity: Gelasius inherited Felix's struggles with Eastern Roman Emperor Anastasius I and the patriarch of Constantinople and exacerbated them by insisting on the removal of the name of the late Acacius, patriarch of Constantinople, from the diptychs, in spite of every ecumenical gesture by the current, otherwise quite orthodox patriarch Euphemius (q.v. for details of the Acacian schism).

Writings

Gelasius was the most prolific writer of the early popes. A great mass of correspondence of Gelasius has survived, forty-two letters and fragments of forty-nine others, carefully archived in the Vatican, ceaselessly expounding to Eastern bishops the primacy of the see of Rome. There are extant besides six treatises that carry the name of Gelasius. The reputation of Gelasius attracted to his name other works not by him.

Related Topics:
Vatican - Primacy

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:Main article: Decretum Gelasianum.

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The most famous of pseudo-Gelasian works is the 5th-century list de libris recipiendis et non recipiendis ("books to be received and not to be received"), the so-called Decretum Gelasianum, connected to the pressures for orthodoxy during the pontificate of Gelasius and intended as a decretal by Gelasius on the canonical and apocryphal books, which internal evidence reveals to be of later date. Thus the fixing of the canon of scripture has traditionally been attributed to Gelasius http://www.tertullian.org/articles/burkitt_gelasianum.htm and a non-historical Roman synod of 494 has been invented as the supposed occasion.

Related Topics:
Decretum Gelasianum - Canon of scripture - 494

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