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The Synod of Whitby Obsculta Volume 1 Issue 1 Article 20 5-1-2008 The Synod of Whitby Nick Ratkay College of Saint Benedict/Saint John's University Follow this and additional works at: https://digitalcommons.csbsju.edu/obsculta Part of the Religion Commons ISSN: 2472-2596 (print) ISSN: 2472-260X (online) Recommended Citation Ratkay, Nick. 2008. The Synod of Whitby. Obsculta 1, (1) : 39-43. https://digitalcommons.csbsju.edu/ obsculta/vol1/iss1/20. This Article is brought to you for free and open access by DigitalCommons@CSB/SJU. It has been accepted for inclusion in Obsculta by an authorized administrator of DigitalCommons@CSB/SJU. For more information, please contact [email protected]. The Synod of Whitby Nick Ratkay The Venerable Bede is arguably one of the yet prospering throughout his/her life, without most important figures of early medieval Christian- the eventuality of divine punishment. This is ity. Born in the late seventh century, Bede became not to imply that all the information in the His- the premier scholar of the monastic communities tory should be viewed as false. However, Bede at Wearmouth and Jarrow and was well-known for constructed his material to emphasize certain his scriptural commentaries and other works. His viewpoints. various writings have offered historians insights into The theological and spiritual viewpoints of the the popular customs, beliefs, and spirituality of his Ecclesiastical History did not end with Bede providing era, while simultaneously expressing medieval writ- examples for imitation. Bede also wished to stress ing styles and trends. Bede’s most famous work is that unity in the church, under the Roman tradition, entitled The Ecclesiastical History of the English Nation, was of the utmost spiritual importance.4 This was and as the title suggests, it was written to document especially true when concerning the celebration of the history of the English people in relation to the Easter and other festivals. Corning points out that Roman church. Bede wanted to show how God had “Bede well understood the harm that division could planned for the English to unite under the Roman bring to the Church and its mission if it divided into church and become the English nation. One must competing groups,” so to emphasize the importance recognize, however, that Bede’s Ecclesiastical History of unity, Bede gave the Synod of Whitby a central was not a study of history according to modern dis- location in the Ecclesiastical History (book III of V; ciplines, but was shaped and developed according to right in the middle). At this synod, which took place Bede’s own theological agenda. This particular work in the mid-seventh century, the representatives of was composed under the guise of a “salvation his- Rome persuaded the Celtic Christians of Northum- tory,” whose purpose was to explore how God had bria to conform to Roman practice. By implement- been manifested through the medium of human ing the Roman liturgical rite throughout the British time and events. 1 Isles, the dissident Celtic church was brought into When one considers Bede and the genre of communion with Rome and mainstream Christian- salvation history, it is important to recognize that ity. Bede clearly stated his Roman allegiance in the the Ecclesiastical History conveys Bede’s own spiritu- dialogue between Wilfred, who represented Rome, ality and theological outlook. Bede pointed out in and Colman, who represented the Celtic rite. At the the preface to the Ecclesiastical History that histories synod Wilfred stated: were written in order to serve a moral purpose. Bede You certainly sin, if, having heard the decrees of states: the Apostolic See, and of the universal church, For if history relates good things of good men, and that the same is confirmed by holy writ, the attentive hearer is excited to imitate that you refuse to follow them; for, though your fa- which is good; or if it mentions evil things of thers were holy, do you think that their small wicked persons, nevertheless the religious and number, in a corner of the remotest island, is pious hearer or reader, shunning that which is to be preferred before the universal church of hurtful and perverse, is the more earnestly ex- Christ throughout the world? And if that Co- cited to perform those things which he knows lumba of yours (and, I may say, ours also, if to be good, and worthy of God. he was Christ’s servant), was a holy man and In response to Bede’s view, Caitlin Corning states the powerful in miracles, yet could he be preferred following: before the most blessed prince of the apostles, Bede viewed it as his responsibility to produce to whom our Lord said, “Thou art Peter, and a work of history that would edify his read- upon this rock I will build my church, and the ers, he would not present someone as evil and Caitlin Corning, The Celtic and Roman Traditions: Conflict and Consensus in the Early Medieval Church (New York: Palgrave 1 Osmund Lewry, The Theology of History (Notre Dame, IN: MacMillian, 006), 69. Fides Publishers, Inc., 1969), 41–46. 4 Ibid., 70. Bede, Preface. Ibid. 9 obsculta gates of hell shall not prevail against it, and law of the creation and the divine plan.9 to thee I will give the keys of the kingdom of Bede felt that Rome knew the “law in the universe” heaven”? 6 and with that, the precise times and dates in which According to Bede the only proper doctrine was liturgical celebrations were to be carried out. Cele- the Roman tradition, which “ought to be preferred brating on the correct day ensured that the universal before all the traditions of the Scots.”7 Anything church was fully orthodox and always on par with outside the Roman practice was considered to be God in heaven. in error and subject to scrutiny until unity had been Bede’s spirituality can also be seen in the role achieved. that he gave to Scripture in the Ecclesiastical History. The strategic placement of the Synod of Whitby The Easter controversy provided Bede with an op- in the Ecclesiastical History suggests that Bede viewed portunity to use Scripture to justify why the Roman the adoption of Roman practice as a climax, or turn- Easter was more orthodox. One example of Bede’s ing-point in the history of the English and Irish use of Scripture to support Roman authority can be churches. Bede wanted to stress the harmony that found in his description of the conversion of the there was between the “divine law” and the “human northern Picts. Bede describes the Picts as being law.” In class8, a fellow-student commented on the “rude and barbarous,” yet “because they had not laid relationship between divine law and human law and aside the fervent grace of charity, they were worthy mentioned the harmony that is recognizable in the to be informed in the true knowledge of this par- church when Catholics throughout the world are ticular.”10 From Bede’s perspective only Rome had celebrating a great feast with a common rite. One the scriptural authority to teach the “true knowl- might ask what American Catholics would learn edge” to the Picts. Bede cites Philippians 3:1 where of other Catholic cultures if they knew how much Paul refers to those of a different attitude (the Celtic they had in common through Christ and the church. church, according to Bede) being corrected by God Awareness would cultivate the harmony that would (the Roman church, according to Bede). Keeping up lead to a new appreciation for other cultures and in- with the genre of salvation history, Bede wants to creased faith through fellowship. Where can we find stress that it was God’s will that the Picts were to be the leadership necessary for this type of unity? Bede converted and Bede uses this biblical prooftext to found it in Rome. The harmony and unity he sought justify Rome’s place in that conversion. could only be realized through communion with the Scripture also played a major role in the Synod Roman church and its customs. Thomas O’Loughlin of Whitby due to each side citing specific biblical states what is most important to this communion: passages and biblical traditions as evidence for their What was at stake was the harmony between arguments. Colman cited the Johannine tradition of human and divine law. God had created the celebrating Easter between the fourteenth and the universe in an orderly and numbered way; ev- twentieth moon of Nisan, while Wilfred represented erywhere its order was a testimony to the ideas the synoptic tradition of keeping Easter from the fif- in mind of God as he created, and to see these teenth to the twenty-first moon of Nisan. The differ- patterns in material creation was to see beyond ence between the two was clearly biblical. The Celts matter into the divine purposes. So fixing rightly believed that Christ’s passion took place on any festival, much less the central festival of the same day in which the Passover lambs were slain Easter, was not just a matter of ecclesiastical (John 19:14). The Romans, however, believed that decision, but of tuning in to the law in the uni- Christ’s passion took place on the day of Passover verse around one. Christ had suffered at the and that the last supper was a Jewish Passover meal. time of the Passover; that was when the divine- This would have meant that the Jewish Sanhedrin ly chosen “hour had come” and it was this key would have broken tradition and left their homes on moment in the whole history of the universe the night of Passover in order to search for Christ to that they wanted to relive at Easter.
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