Acts, Sentence and Capitula of the Second Council of Constantinople

The council sat in eight sessions at Constantinople in 553 under the patriarch Eutychius. The manuscripts of its acts differ in places, and Percival notes that the copy kept at Constantinople was found, at the council of 680–681, to contain forged insertions. His selection gives the emperor’s letter read at the first session, the exchange about Pope Vigilius at the seventh, the long sentence in which the bishops explain and justify their decision, and the fourteen capitula, each ending “let him be anathema”.

The same volume prints fifteen anathemas against Origen under the council’s name. Whether the council issued them or an earlier synod at Constantinople did is disputed, as Percival’s note explains; the eleventh capitulum does name Origen among the heretics, and Evagrius says that the council condemned his teaching. The letter of Vigilius to Eutychius, dated 8 December 553, is printed last. Its authenticity has been questioned, but Percival reports that most scholars accept it.