Pope John IV (died 642)

The pope who turned Severinus' refusal into an explicit Roman position

Severinus had refused to subscribe the Ecthesis, but his effective pontificate had lasted little more than two months. John IV took up the dossier again with greater means: he was no longer merely the elect of a Church under pressure; he was the consecrated pope who gave the Roman resistance a synodal and epistolary form.^[7][8]

Treccani places John IV's election in August 640 and his consecration on the following 24 December.^[9] This relatively short delay, compared with Severinus' long wait, leads Horace K. Mann to suppose that papal confirmation now passed more directly through the exarch of Ravenna, the Byzantine governor residing at Ravenna^[10]; but it does not mean that Rome had become docile. Treccani notes that Exarch Isaac is said to have influenced this election, hoping that the son of a Byzantine official would prove malleable on monothelitism.^[11] The outcome was the opposite.

A short but highly concentrated pontificate

The Liber Pontificalis gives John IV a pontificate of one year, nine months and nineteen days, and records above all three actions: sending money to Dalmatia and Istria through Abbot Martin, building a chapel for the relics of the martyrs, and ordaining priests, deacons and bishops.^[12]

These are few lines, but they touch on three major dimensions of 7th-century papacy: care for captives, memory of the martyrs, and doctrinal defence against the Empire. John IV is therefore not a mere name between Severinus and Theodore; he is one of the links leading to Martin I and the Lateran Council of 649.

A Dalmatian pope at the heart of Rome

John IV's Dalmatian origin is not decoration. It explains his attention to the Adriatic coast, to captives, to the relics of Salona and Istria, and to the memory of martyrs that Rome gathered when local Churches were weakened.^[13][14]

This origin also illustrates the composition of Byzantine Rome. The pope is bishop of Rome, but the Roman Church of the 7th century was crossed by Greeks, Syrians, Dalmatians, imperial officials, monks, refugees and communities from the Adriatic. Catholicity was not yet an abstract idea: it was visible in people, relics, languages and journeys.

Table of witnesses

The Holy See and the official chronology

The current Vatican file lists John IV as the 72nd pope, born in Dalmatia, with the note "... VIII, 24.XII.640": August for the election and 24 December 640 for the consecration, which opens the pontificate, closed on 12 October 642.^[15][16]

The Liber Pontificalis gives a duration of one year, nine months and nineteen days. It also notes a vacancy of one month and thirteen days after his death, before the consecration of Theodore I.^[17] This chronology places John IV at the exact heart of a transition: Heraclius dies on 11 February 641; Constantine III reigns very briefly; the Empire enters a dynastic crisis while Rome seeks to have the Ecthesis withdrawn.^[18]

The Liber Pontificalis: biographical core

The Roman notice begins with a dense formula: John is Dalmatian, son of Venantius, scholasticus.^[19] The term here designates a man linked to law and administration, probably in the Byzantine milieu. Treccani deduces that Venantius had been part of the imperial administration and could assist the exarch above all in legal matters.^[20]

"John, of Dalmatian nation, son of Venantius the scholasticus." — Liber Pontificalis, notice on John IV (Latin text in note)^[21]

The same text gives the essentials of his Roman work: the sending of large sums of money through the holy and faithful Abbot Martin to ransom captives, then the building of a church or chapel near the Lateran baptistery, intended for the martyrs Venantius, Anastasius, Maurus and many others, whose relics had been brought from Dalmatia and Istria.^[22]

Bede: the letter to the Irish

Bede preserves a letter sent while John IV was still elect, not yet consecrated. The Irish clergy had sent questions to Severinus; his death left them unanswered; the leaders of the Roman Church therefore took up the dossier and replied.^[23]

The text corrects two points: the computation of Easter, which must fall between the fifteenth and the twenty-first moon according to the Nicene rule, and the danger of a Pelagian resurgence. Bede cites the opening of the letter, naming Hilary the archpriest, John the deacon as yet only elect, John the primicerius (the head of the chancery of the Roman Church) and another John, counsellor of the same Roman Church.^[24]

Treccani: the doctrinal dossier

The notice by Luigi Andrea Berto clarifies the centre of the pontificate. In January 641, John IV organised a synod that condemned monothelitism as heresy. The condemnation did not explicitly target all promoters of the doctrine, which avoided an immediate break with Constantinople, but the Roman line became clear.^[25]

Treccani also reports a fragment attributed to Heraclius, preserved in the dossier of Saint Maximus the Confessor: the emperor distances himself from the Ecthesis, stating that Sergius had prepared it and that he had only agreed to sign it. The full text is not preserved and its effective dispatch to John IV remains debated; it shows at least that, in the anti-monothelite dossier, opponents of the Ecthesis could invoke a late imperial withdrawal.^[26]

Son of Venantius, scholasticus

John IV's father was called Venantius. The Liber Pontificalis gives him the title scholasticus, which Horace K. Mann (The Catholic Encyclopedia, vol. 8, 1910) renders as "advocate", that is "lawyer" or jurist, and which Treccani describes as an administrative legal official linked to the exarch.^[27][28]

We possess no biography of Venantius, nor any administrative act that would allow us to place him precisely. But the title helps to understand why John IV's election could have seemed acceptable to the Byzantine apparatus: the new pope came from a Dalmatian and imperial world, not from a Roman opposition anti-Byzantine on principle.

Archdeacon of the Roman Church

Horace K. Mann (The Catholic Encyclopedia, vol. 8, 1910) reports that John IV was archdeacon of the Roman Church at the time of his election.^[29] The office is not secondary. In papal Rome, the archdeacon deals with administration, property, the poor, clergy, and the very concrete workings of ecclesiastical government.

This profile fits the pontificate. John IV is not presented as a visionary monk or a great speculative theologian; he acts as a firm administrator: answering the Irish, convening a synod, writing to the emperor, sending an abbot with money, organising a translation of relics, endowing a chapel.

Rome after Severinus

The immediate predecessor, Severinus, had been elected around October 638 but consecrated only on 28 May 640 after a long crisis of imperial confirmation and the plundering of the Lateran.^[30] John IV thus inherits a wounded Holy See, materially and doctrinally.

The first need is to emerge from ambiguity. Honorius's letters left a dangerous vocabulary; Severinus refused to sign the Ecthesis; John IV must now state, write and organise the Roman position. The sequence is clear: Honorius's ambiguous letters create the problem, Severinus opposes the refusal, John IV brings the clarification.

The problem in simple terms

Monothelitism claims there would be only one will in Christ. The idea seems to protect Jesus' unity: one Christ, therefore one will. But it ends up mutilating his humanity. If Christ has no real human will, he does not fully assume man, and the obedience of Gethsemane becomes incomprehensible.

The Catholic faith will therefore confess that the one person of the incarnate Word possesses two natures, divine and human, and that each has its natural will and its natural operation. Christ's human will is not rebellious; it freely follows the divine will.^[31]

The synod of January 641

Treccani reports that in January 641, shortly after his consecration, John IV convened a synod which established that monothelitism was a heresy.^[32] The New Catholic Encyclopedia gives the same line: at the beginning of 641, John assembled a synod that condemned monothelitism, with reference to the conciliar acts edited by Mansi.^[33]

This synod is the central act of the pontificate. Severinus had been able to resist personally; John IV commits the Roman Church to a formal position. Diplomatic prudence remains, as he does not yet launch an open rupture with Constantinople. But the doctrinal content is clear: the Ecthesis is not acceptable.

Heraclius' belated retreat

Heraclius died on 11 February 641. According to the fragment preserved by Saint Maximus the Confessor and cited by Treccani, he is said to have stated before his death that the Ecthesis was not really his own work, but that of Sergius of Constantinople, and that he had only agreed to sign it.^[34]

The exact value of this fragment is debated. Treccani notes that the full text of the edict is not extant and that it is not certain that Heraclius actually sent it to John IV.^[35][36] This piece therefore cannot be held as certain. But it has historical value: even on the imperial side, the Ecthesis quickly appears as a text from which it was necessary to disengage.

Pyrrhus exploits Honorius

After Sergius, Patriarch Pyrrhus of Constantinople tried to have the Ecthesis accepted in the West. His argument was formidable: Honorius, pope of Rome, had himself accepted a formula compatible with monothelitism.^[37]

John IV saw the danger. If Honorius is tied to the Ecthesis, the imperial error can present itself as received by Rome. He therefore wrote to Constantine III, son of Heraclius, to defend the possible orthodox meaning of Honorius' letters and to ask that the Ecthesis be removed from the places where it had been displayed, then destroyed.^[38]

What John IV wanted to save

John IV does not deny that Honorius' letters had become a problem. He contests Pyrrhus' interpretation: Honorius would not have taught monothelitism as doctrine, but meant to say that there are not in Christ two contrary wills, as there are in man wounded by sin.^[39][40]

This defence is important, but limited. It precedes Honorius' posthumous condemnation by Constantinople III in 681. It thus represents the first Roman attempt to read Honorius in the most orthodox way possible, not the Church's definitive judgment on his responsibility.

A true theological distinction, but insufficient to acquit entirely

John IV points to a real distinction: one must differentiate between two natural wills and two contrary wills. Christ indeed has a human will and a divine will; but his human will is never at war with God. It is not marked by concupiscence nor by the law of sin of which Saint Paul speaks in Romans 7.^[41]

This distinction makes it understandable how Honorius could have used a formula of unity without intending to deny Christ's humanity. But history will show that the formula was too dangerous. The Third Council of Constantinople, in its thirteenth session (28 March 681), anathematised Honorius for having followed the opinion of Sergius in everything and confirmed his dogmas^[42]; the fault of negligence — not having, as befitted apostolic authority, extinguished from the start the flame of heretical teaching — is the qualification retained by Pope Leo II in his letter to the bishops of Spain; to the Visigothic king Erwig, he wrote in similar terms that Honorius let the spotless rule of apostolic tradition be defiled^[43]. These letters were not dogmatic definitions: they do not engage infallibility, which covers only the act by which the pope defines a doctrine for the universal Church. See the article Pope Honorius I^[44].

The Catholic lesson

John IV's defence is not concealment. It manifests a law of ecclesial charity: before charging a predecessor, one seeks the least bad meaning of his words. But this charity is not enough to replace dogmatic truth. When ambiguity becomes a heretical weapon, it must be corrected.

John IV therefore occupies a delicate position: he defends Honorius against a monothelite co-optation, while condemning the monothelitism that this co-optation favoured. It is exactly the Catholic line: protecting justice toward persons without sacrificing the truth about Christ.

A reply sent as pope-elect

Bede recounts that writings sent to Severinus by Irish clergy remained unanswered because of his death. John IV, still elect, took part with other Roman leaders in the reply.^[45]

The letter is valuable because it shows John IV even before his consecration. He already acts as guardian of ecclesial unity: faith in Christ, the paschal calendar and the rejection of Pelagianism are not local options, but points of communion.

The computation of Easter

Rome reproached certain Irish for wanting to celebrate Easter on the fourteenth day of the moon, with the Hebrews, as the letter itself puts it (Latin text in note). Bede summarises the correction: Easter Sunday must be found between the fifteenth and the twenty-first moon, in accordance with Nicaea.^[46]

This debate may seem technical. It was not for Christian antiquity. Celebrating Easter together with the universal Church means confessing the Resurrection together. The calendar becomes an act of communion.

Pelagianism as a recurring danger

Bede also cites the warning against Pelagianism. The Roman letter speaks of the "poison" of this heresy re-emerging among some; it recalls that the error has long been condemned and is anathematised daily by Rome.^[47]

The doctrinal point is simple: man cannot live without sin by his own free will, without God's grace. The letter targets above all the blasphemous idea that man could be without sin by himself, whereas, in its own words, only Christ, mediator between God and men, was conceived and born without sin (Latin text in note).^[48] Christ is without sin by himself; Mary, his Mother, was preserved from it by a singular grace, in prevision of his merits: this is the dogma of the Immaculate Conception, defined in 1854 (CCC 491-493).

"The poison of the Pelagian heresy is springing up again among you." — Roman letter preserved by Bede, II, 19^[49]

A doctrinal Rome, not merely administrative

This letter completes the monothelite dossier. John IV defends Christ's real human will against the Ecthesis; he also defends the need for grace against Pelagianism. In both cases, man is saved by the total Christ: true God, true man, sinless mediator, source of grace.

There are therefore not two John IVs: a Byzantine pope busy with the East and a Latin pope busy with the islands. The same pontiff watches so that the extremities of Christendom do not separate from the received rule of faith.

The mission of Abbot Martin

The Liber Pontificalis reports that John IV sent throughout Dalmatia and Istria large sums of money through the most holy and faithful Abbot Martin, to ransom captives taken away by hostile peoples.^[50] Horace K. Mann (The Catholic Encyclopedia, vol. 8, 1910) identifies these troubles with the Slav invasions and stresses that John IV cared for his native land.^[51]

The action is very concrete. The pope does not content himself with a general prayer for the Christians of the Adriatic; he sends a trusted man with money. In late antique Rome, the ransom of captives is one of the most urgent works of mercy: it restores to families men, women and children threatened with servitude.

The relics of the martyrs

The Liber Pontificalis adds that John IV ordered the relics of Dalmatian and Istrian martyrs to be brought to Rome: Venantius, Anastasius, Maurus and many others (Latin formula in note).^[52] The ancient text names Martin only for the ransom of captives; it is recent historiography that links Martin to this transfer of relics.^[53] The Basilica of Saint John Lateran explains today that the Chapel of Saint Venantius was designed to receive the relics of the Dalmatian martyrs Venantius and Domnius, and that it remains particularly venerated by Slavs and Croats.^[54]

This transfer must not be read as an abandonment of local Churches. It manifests a communion of memory. When regions are weakened, Rome gathers their martyrs and places them near the Lateran baptistery, at the heart of Christian initiation.

A recent interpretation: more than a rescue mission?

Historian Danijel Džino proposed in 2021 to reread Martin's mission as a gesture of papal dissent vis-à-vis Constantinople and a political offensive against monothelitism in the West, rather than as a mission to rescue relics from a danger which, in his view, did not exist (English summary in note).^[55]

This thesis remains a scholarly hypothesis, not a certainty. The established fact remains Martin's mission, the money for captives, the relics and the chapel. Džino's interpretation nevertheless helps to understand that, in this century, charity, relics, territory and doctrine were never completely separate.

A monument of Dalmatian memory

The Chapel of Saint Venantius is located near the Constantinian baptistery of the Lateran. The Liber Pontificalis places it near the Lateran baptismal fonts (Latin formula in note) and the oratory of Saint John the Evangelist.^[56] The official page of the archbasilica states that it was built by John IV and Theodore I to receive the relics of the Dalmatian martyrs, and that neophytes receive confirmation there.^[57]

The place is therefore theologically powerful. The relics of Dalmatian martyrs are not placed in a decorative corner; they surround the baptismal passage. The newly baptized Christian enters the Church in the presence of witnesses who confessed Christ unto blood.

The programme of the mosaic

The apse mosaic places the Saviour at the centre. Below him, the Church is represented by the Virgin in prayer, Saint Peter, Saint John the Baptist, Saint Domnius and John IV on one side; Saint Paul, Saint John the Evangelist, Saint Venantius and Theodore on the other.^[58]

The visual programme unites several levels: Christ, apostles, Virgin, martyrs, builder popes, the cities of Bethlehem and Jerusalem recalling birth and Easter.

A co-construction with Theodore I

The chapel is linked to John IV and his successor Theodore I.^[59] This detail corresponds to the handover in the monothelite dossier. John IV condemns the error and defends Honorius; Theodore will continue resistance against Patriarch Paul of Constantinople; Martin I will go as far as the Lateran Council of 649 and martyrdom in exile.^[60]

The monument at the Lateran is therefore not only a Dalmatian memory. It is the visible threshold of a decade of Roman resistance.

Death and burial

John IV died on 12 October 642 and was buried in Saint Peter's.^[61][62] The Liber Pontificalis notes two ordinations in the month of December: eighteen priests, five deacons and eighteen bishops for various places.^[63]

His successor, Theodore I, arrived with the dossier still open. The Ecthesis had not settled Eastern unity; the Typos ("model" in Greek), the decree of Emperor Constans II, would soon try to forbid both the formula of the single will (monothelite) and that of the two wills (dyothelite); Martin I would condemn both at the Lateran in 649.^[64]

The meaning of a "secondary" pope

John IV is often seen as a transitional pope, but his pontificate sheds light on four major realities. It shows first that Rome does not passively receive an imperial Christological formula. It shows then how the Church corrects a pontifical ambiguity without denying the succession of Peter. It shows further that Catholic unity touches calendars, islands, Adriatic provinces and captives. It shows finally that the relics of martyrs are a living memory of communion.

It would be exaggerated to make him a great doctor. It would be unjust to make him a mere transition. John IV is a brief, administrative, Dalmatian, Roman, anti-monothelite pope, charitable toward captives, and lucid enough to understand that an ambiguous phrase of Honorius could become the alibi of a heresy.

• Pope Honorius I — indirect predecessor, at the heart of the monothelite affair.
• Pope Severinus — the pope who refused the Ecthesis before John IV.
• Pope Theodore I — successor of John IV and continuator of Roman resistance.
• Pope Saint Martin I — martyr pope of the Lateran Council of 649.
• Council of Constantinople III (680-681) — definition of the two wills of Christ and definitive condemnation of monothelitism.
• The heresies of the early centuries — general framework of the great Christological crises.