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Chapter VIII.—Synodical Epistle of the Synod in Illyricum concerning the Faith.; original source section: Chapter 8
Complete historical editorial footnotes. These notes retain the original edition’s wording; individual note authors are unspecified.
English translation and editorial credits: Blomfield Jackson.
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The original is here obscure, and has been altered and interpreted in various ways.
Editorial footnote · Ecclesiastical History, Chapter VIII.—Synodical Epistle of the Synod in Illyricum concerning the Faith.; original source section: Chapter 8, editorial note cite_note-2 · Original source
“While writing on this point we have also been reminded to pen this letter to you about the present or future appointment of our fellow ministers as bishops, if there be any sound men among the bishops who have already discharged a public office; and, if not, from the order of presbyters: in like manner of the appointment of presbyters and deacons out of the actual priestly order that they may be in every way blameless, and not from the ranks of the senate and army.
ἐξ αὐτοῦ τοῦ ἱερατικοῦ τάγματος. It is noticeable that the word ἱερατικόν is used here of the clerical order generally, inclusive of lower ranks, such as the readers, singers, doorkeepers and orphans enumerated in the Apostolic Constitutions from whom deacons and presbyters were to be appointed. For illustrations of the phrases ἱερατικὴ τάξις and ἰερατικὸν τάγμα vide Dict. Christ. Ant. ii. 1470. The exclusively sacrificial sense sometimes given to ἱερεὺς and sacerdos, with their correlatives, is modified by the fact that derivatively both only mean “the man concerned with the sacred.” (ἱερος = vigorous, divine. IS.; sacer = inviolate, holy, SAK, fasten; of the latter the suffix adds the idea of giver.
Editorial footnote · Ecclesiastical History, Chapter VIII.—Synodical Epistle of the Synod in Illyricum concerning the Faith.; original source section: Chapter 8, editorial note cite_note-3 · Original source
“While writing on this point we have also been reminded to pen this letter to you about the present or future appointment of our fellow ministers as bishops, if there be any sound men among the bishops who have already discharged a public office; and, if not, from the order of presbyters: in like manner of the appointment of presbyters and deacons out of the actual priestly order that they may be in every way blameless, and not from the ranks of the senate and army.