Читать книгу Crises in the History of the Papacy. Lives and Legacy of the Most Influential Popes Who Shaped the Development & History of Church онлайн

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Another aspect of Leo's character appears in his treatment of the Manichæans at Rome: an interesting illustration of how he kept the strength and serenity of the old Roman though lacking his culture. Leo had a terribly sombre idea of the Manichæans. They lingered in obscure corners of the metropolis, and met stealthily, just as Christians had done two centuries earlier; and of them were told, as had been told of the obscure Christians, dreadful stories. Leo conducted a great inquisition in 444, and brought the Manichæan bishop, with his "elect," to a solemn judgment before the clergy and nobles of Rome. There, he says,50 they all confessed that the violation of a girl of ten years was part of their ritual. He called down upon them the secular arm, and crushed them in Rome and Italy. What sort of a judicial process was employed to elicit this extraordinary confession—so utterly at variance with all that we know of the ascetic Manichæans—we are not told. But we are painfully reminded of a similar declaration of Augustine in his old age.51