Religious Intolerance in the Later Roman Empire - Bad request ...

Miltiades copies of the correspondence he had had with Anullinus on the subject.
Although the letter effectively gives Miltiades full authority to judge the case according
to how he sees fit, the letter nevertheless shows no evidence of Constantine having
prejudged the issue or of forming any opinion about the merits or otherwise of either
party in the dispute. 41 On the contrary, in this letter Constantine granted the
Donatists’ request that judges from Gaul should be appointed to hear their grievance. 42
In this letter, Constantine's overriding concern was for the unity of the Church
and to see an end to the dispute and to the divisions amongst the laity and the Bishops;
he was conscious that God had entrusted the North African provinces to his
stewardship and in his penultimate sentence he stressed the importance of the job
which he had entrusted to Miltiades and hoped that the bishop would not overlook
the fact that “respect which I pay to the lawful Catholic church is so great, that it is my
wish that you should leave no schism whatsoever or division in any place.” 43
Constantine expected Miltiades to come up with a settlement and see that unity was
secured; there is no explicit evidence that the Donatists were placed under similar
pressure.
The council was held at the Lateran palace in Rome between 30 September and
3 October 313. Despite Constantine's instructions that there should be ten Bishops
from each side, Miltiades appears to have been able to pack the council with sixteen of
his colleagues from Italy, plus the three Gallic Bishops. Optatus does not mention
whether the ten Donatist Bishops attended. 44 The council found that Donatus’
practice of rebatising lapsed Bishops was “alien to the custom of the Church” and that
nothing alleged against Caecilian had been proved by the Donatists. Miltiades
41 Jones (1948) 108, cited in Frend (1952) 148 that Constantine's letter reads more like a minute to a civil
servant without any sense of reverence or familiarity.
42 Opt. 1.23
43 Eus. HE. 10.5.20: oJpovte mhde; th;n uJmetevran ejpimevleian lanqavnei
tosauvthn me aijdw` th/` ejnqevsmw/ kaqolikh/` ejkklhsiva/ ajponevmein,
wJ~ mhde;n kaqovlou scivsma h] dicostasivan e[n tini tovpw/ bouvlesqaiv
me uJma`~ katalipei`n.
44 Opt. 1.23-4
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