Talk:Pope Agatho

Age Claim

The claim that he was born in 577 seems incredibly dubious. A 101 year old elected pope? I understand that this is the tradition, but do modern historians really believe the two Agathos are the same? john k (talk) 03:58, 16 November 2010 (UTC)

The Guinness Book of Records (1972 edition) states: "It is recorded that Pope St. Agatho (reigned 678-681) was elected at the age of 103 and lived to 106, but recent scholars have expressed doubts." It would be helpful to identify and date the earliest record of him being that age.Cloptonson (talk) 06:41, 20 March 2015 (UTC)

Letter, and a monk named Agatho

A letter written by St. Gregory the Great to the abbot of St. Hermes in Palermo mentions an Agatho, a Greek born in Sicily to wealthy parents, who wished to give away his inheritance and join a monastery. In this letter Gregory advises that this Agatho may do so as long as his wife was willing to enter a convent.

Popes Through the Ages (1959) doesn't seem a bad source, though it is clearly speculating on this. However, because the work is itself claiming reference to older works (no cites found in that book), and because the fact is so old that it should be well-established, and also because more-scholarly articles (like the Catholic Encyclopedia) make no mention of this connection, we would need a number of substantial sources in order to connect "just maybe" a pope named Agatho to a wealthy married Greek named Agatho mentioned some unspecified number of years earlier (maybe over 100 years earlier). Openverse (talk) 18:58, 12 January 2013 (UTC)

References

Councils

It disturbs me that there are no references to standard works on Councils (Hefele, for instance, who is in English: Karl Joseph von Hefele (1896). A History of the Councils of the Church, from the Original Documents. Vol. Volume V (A.D. 626 to A.D. 787). Edinburgh: T. & T. Clark. pp. 139–180. {{cite book}}: |volume= has extra text (help)). The article omits notice of the Roman synod of 679 and the Roman Synod of 680, both of which are of some importance. The claim that the Ecumenical Council of 680 ended Monothelitism is laughable ("The Council had not only ended the Monothelite heresy, but also had healed the schism"). Not even all the bishops who were present at the Council accepted the decisions.

The article also fails to mention or use the "Life of Agatho" from the Liber Pontificalis, which is available in English: Raymond Davis (2000). The Book of Pontiffs (Liber Pontificalis): The Ancient Biographies of the First Ninety Roman Bishops to AD 715. Liverpool University Press. pp. 76–80. ISBN 978-0-85323-545-3.

For some balance, or at least another viewpoint than the ultramontane Catholic, one might cite (and even use): Bower, A. (1869). Pope Agatho; his life and times: a reprint [from A. Bower's “History of the Popes”], intended as a reply to Archbishop Manning's Pastoral Letter on the Œcumenical Council and the Infallibility of the Roman Pontiff. Edited, with a preface, by Edmund Tew. London: Rivingtons.

--Vicedomino (talk) 12:45, 4 October 2016 (UTC)

Papacy start year

There is some conflict between the sources cited here about the year that Agatho's papacy began: 678 or 679.

• 678: Kelly & Walsh (2015), Richards (2014), p.369, Catholic Encyclopedia, plus these other sources I found:
  • Bower, A. (1869) History of the Popes, p. 57
  • Placher, William (1988) Readings in the History of Christian Theology, p. 77
  • Mann, Horace (1903) The Lives of the Popes in the Early Middle Ages, p. 23
  • Bottalla, Paolo (1870) The pope and the Church considered in their mutual relations, p. 89
  • In fact, the first few pages of Google Books results for "Pope Agotho" mostly say 678 (when the start year is even mentioned in the first place)
• 679: Butler (1866), Orthodox Church in America
  • Other Google Books results that say 679 are different editions of the Butler work.

Thus, on the whole, it appears that 678 is the correct year. —howcheng {chat} 03:44, 27 June 2018 (UTC)