The Pelagian Controversy

In Our Time

BBC

History

4.6 • 9.2K Ratings

🗓️ 21 April 2011

⏱️ 42 minutes

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Summary

Melvyn Bragg and his guests discuss the Pelagian Controversy.In the late 4th century a British monk, Pelagius, travelled to Rome, where he became a theologian and teacher, revered for his learning and ascetic lifestyle. But he soon aroused the ire of some of the Church's leading figures, preaching a Christian doctrine which many regarded as heretical. Pelagius believed that mankind was not inherently depraved, and disputed the necessity of original sin. His opinions were highly controversial and led to fierce division. Pelagius's most prominent opponent was the African bishop St Augustine of Hippo. Their dispute resulted in the persecution and eventual condemnation of Pelagius and his followers, and was to be of long-lasting significance to the future of the Church.With:Martin PalmerDirector of the International Consultancy on Religion, Education, and CultureCaroline HumfressReader in History at Birkbeck College, University of LondonJohn MilbankProfessor in Religion, Politics and Ethics and the Director of the Centre for Theology and Philosophy at Nottingham UniversityProducer: Thomas Morris.

Transcript

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0:00.0	Thanks for downloading the In Our Time podcast. For more details about In Our Time and for our terms of use
0:05.4	Please go to bbc.co.uk forward slash radio for I hope you enjoy the program
0:10.8	Hello in the late fourth century a British monk arrived in Rome and began to write highly regarded and popular works of theology
0:17.3	But within a few years he become one of the most reviled men in the Christian world described by the church father said Jerome as
0:23.8	A fat man weighed down by Irish porridge while another contemporary commentator called him a grotesque
0:30.6	Goliath with a bulging forehead the victim of these personal attacks was Pallegius his crime was to question the doctrines of the Catholic Church
0:38.8	His contentious teachings about redemption divine grace and original sin brought him into public dispute with Center
0:45.2	Gustin of Hippo and prompted one of the most significant theological debates of the early church
0:49.8	The Pallegian controversies it became known shaped church doctrine for centuries and its influence was still being felt a thousand years later
0:57.0	We'd me to discuss the Pallegian controversy a Martin Palmer director of the International Consultancy on Religion, Education and Culture
1:04.8	Caroline Humphreys reader in history at Birkbeck College University of London and John Milbank professor in religion, politics and ethics and the director of the Center for Theology and
1:14.2	Philosophy at Nottingham University
1:16.3	Martin Palmer, will you set the scene for us?
1:18.4	What was the position and status of the Catholic Church when Pallegius arrived in Rome at the end of the fourth century?
1:24.2	Well, it had been probably the most tumultuous century of of the church's history
1:29.0	It began that century being persecuted and die-clean the worst persecution that the church had experienced and by the end of the century
1:37.4	It itself using the emperor was persecuting those Christians that the Catholic Church decided were not proper Christians
1:44.2	So it had shifted quite significantly. It had also gained huge wealth
1:48.4	There is a wonderful story of the Council of Nicere in 325
1:52.6	When the bishops who were invited to attend came in exhibiting the wounds that they had suffered under the persecution
2:00.6	It must have been rather a grotesque scene
2:02.8	But it brought home the point that the very people who are now at the center of power just beginning to be at the center of power and wealth
	...

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