Novels (New Constitutions)

Justinian IAD 535–565

The new laws issued by Justinian after the completion of his Code. Novel 6, of March 535, on the ordination of bishops and clergy, opens with a classic statement of the relation between priesthood and empire.

The Novels are the emperor’s own legislation, sent to the officials or bishops who had to apply it. Many deal with the church: the choice and conduct of bishops, the property of churches, monasteries, marriage. They show an emperor who regarded the good order of the clergy as part of his duty and legislated for it in detail.

Novel 6 is addressed to Epiphanius, patriarch of Constantinople, and dated at Constantinople on 16 March 535. Its preface calls the priesthood and the empire the two greatest gifts of God to humankind, the one serving divine things and the other ruling human affairs, both coming from one source; when each does its part, it says, the result is a harmony that brings every good. The link above opens Novel 6; the other Novels are on the same sites.

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