1911 Encyclopædia Britannica/Laodicea, Synod of

by Theodore Freylinghuysen Collier

LAODICEA, SYNOD OF, held at Laodicea ad Lycum in Phrygia, some time between 343 and 381 (so Hefele; but Baronius argues for 314, and others for a date as late as 399), adopted sixty canons, chiefly disciplinary, which were declared ecumenical by the council of Chalcedon, 451. The most significant canons are those directly affecting the clergy, wherein the clergy appear as a privileged class, far above the laity, but with sharply differentiated and carefully graded orders within itself. For example, the priests are not to be chosen by the people; penitents are not to be present at ordinations (lest they should hear the failings of candidates discussed); bishops are to be appointed by the metropolitan and his suffragan; sub-deacons may not distribute the elements of the Eucharist; clerics are forbidden to leave a diocese without the bishop’s permission. Other canons treat of intercourse with heretics, admission of penitent heretics, baptism, fasts, Lent, angel-worship (forbidden as idolatrous) and the canonical books, from which the Apocrypha and Revelation are wanting.

See Mansi ii. 563-614; Hardouin i. 777-792; Hefele, 2nd ed., i. 746-777 (Eng. trans. ii. 295-325).  (T. F. C.)