CORPUS
■A91
CORPUS
X5 havp I)ppn increased by a vision of tlio Clnirrh
inder the appoaranro of tlii' full moon liaviiig oiu'
lark spot, which signified the al)sctico of such a
- olemnity. She made known her ideas to Robert de
rhorete, then Bishop of Liege, to the learned Domini- can Hugh, later cardinal legate in the Netherlands, md to Jacques Pantaleon, at that time Arclideacon of l.iege, afterw ards Bishop of \'erdun, Patriarch of Jeru- lalem, and finally Pope Urban IV. Bishop Robert vas favoiiral)!y impressed, and, since bishops as yet lad the right of ordering feasts for their diocese.s, le calleil a .synod in 1246 and ordered the celebra- ion to be held in the following year, also, that a nonk nametl John should write the Office for the oc- asion. The decree is preserved in Binterim (Denk- siirdigkeiten, V, 1, 276), together with parts of the Office.
Bishop Robert did not live to see the execution of lis order, for he died 16 October, 1246; but the feast I'as celebrated for the first time by the canons of St. riartin at Liege. Jacques Pantaleon became pope 29 Uigust, 1261. The recluse Eve, with whom Juliana lad spent some time, and who was also a fervent idorer of the Holy Eucharist, now urged Henry of iiielders. Bishop of Liege, to request the pope to ex- end the celeljration to the entire world. Urban IV, .iways an ailmirer of the feast, published the Bull 'Transiturus" (8 September, 1264), in which, after laving extolled the love of Our .Saviour as expressed n the Holy Eucharist, he ordered the annual celebra- ion of Corpus Christi on the Thursday next after rrinity Sunday, at the same time granting many ndulgences to the faithful for the attendance at Mass ,nd at the Office. This Office, composed at the re- |uest of the pope by the Angelic Doctor St. Thomas Iquinas, is one of the most beautiful in the Roman Jreviary and has been admired even by Protestants.
- 'he death of Pope Urban IV (2 October, 1264),
hortly after the publication of the decree, somewhat aipedcd the spread of the festival. Clement V again ook the matter in hand and, at the General Council if Vienne (1311), once more ordered the adoption of he feast. . He publi.shed a new decree which em- (odied that of I'rban IV. John XXII, successor of 'lemint V, urged its observance. Neither decree peaks of the theophoric procession as a feature of he celebration. This procession, already held in ome places, was endowed with Indulgences by Popes ilartin V and Eugene IV. The feast had been ac- epted in 1.106 at Cologne; Worms .adopted it in 1315; itrasburg in 1316. In England it was introduced rom Belgium between 1320 and 132.5. In the United States;ind some other countries the solemnity is held in the .Sunday after Trinity.
In the ( ireek Church the feast of Corpus Christi is mown in the calendars of the Syrians, Armenians, ^opts, Melchites, and the Ruthenians of Galicia, Calabria, and .Sicily.
Gikiian<;f.r. The LUurgical Year (tr. Worcester, s. d.); BcT- £R. Ffiist.^ and Faxis; Kellneb, Heortologie (2nd ed., Freiburg, 906): Per Kalholik (Aug., 1898), 151; BXLMEn, Gcich. des irevuTx (Freiburg, 1895).
Francis Meushiian.
Corpus Juris Canonici. — I. Definition. — The enn cor//)/.'? liere denotes a collection of documents; or/iiis juris, a collection of laws, especially if they are )laced in systematic order. It may signify also an pffici.al and compU'te collection of a legislation made >y thcr legislative power, comprising all the laws vhich are in force in a country or soeiety. The term, ilthough it never received legal .sanction in either toman or canon law, being merely the i)hraseology if the learned, is used in the above sense when the 'Corpus Juris Civilis of the Roman Christian em- )prors is meant. The expression corpux juris may Jso mean, not the collection of laws itself, but the egislation of a society considered as a whole. Hence
Benedict XIV could rightly say that, the collection of
his Bulls formed part of the mrjuis juris (.lam fere sex-
tus, 1746). We cannot better explain the significa-
tion of the term corpus juris nnwriici than by showing
the successive meanings which were assigned to it in
the past and which it usually bears at the present day.
Under the name of "corpus canonum" were desig-
nated the collection of Dionysius Exiguus and the
"Collectio Anselmo dedicatii" (see below). The
"Decree" of Gratian is already called "Corpus Juris
Canonici" by a glossator of the twelfth century, and
Innocent IV calls by this name the "Decretals" of
Gregory IX (Ad expediendos, 9 Sept., 12.53). Since
the second half of the thirteenth century. Corpus
Juris Crinonici in contradistinction to Corpus Juris
Civiiis, or Roman law, generally denoted the following
collections: (1) the "Decretals" of Gregory IX; (2)
those of Boniface VIII (Sixth Book of the Decretals);
(3) those of Clement V (Clementinie), i. e. the collec-
tions which at that time, with the "Decree" of Gra-
tian. were taught and explained at the universities.
At the present day, under the above title are com-
monly untlerstood these three collections with the
addition of the "Decree" of Gratian, the "Extrava-
gantes" of John XXII, and the " Extra vagantes Com-
munes ' '.
Thus understood, the term dates back to the six- teenth century and was officially .sanctioned by Greg- ory XIII (Cum pro munere, 1 July, 1,580). The earli- est editions of these texts printed under the now usual title of "Corpus Juris Canonici", date from the end of the sixteenth century (Frankfort, 8vo, 1586; Paris, fob, 1587). In the strict sense of the word the Qiurch does not posse-ss a corpus juris clausum, i. e. a collec- tion of laws to which new ones cannot be added. The Council of Ba.sle (Sess. XXIII, ch. vi) and the decree of the Congregation "Super statu regularium" (25 Jan., 1848) do not speak of a cor/ms clautsum: the first refers to reservationihus in corpore juris rxpressc chiusis, that is, reservations of ecclesiastical benefices contained in the "Corpus Juris", especially in the "Liber .Sextus" of Boniface VIII, to the exclusion of tho.se held in the " Extra vagantes " described l)clow, and at that time not comprised in the "Corpus Juris Canonici"; the .second speaks of cuilihet pririlegio, licet in corpore juris chiuso et confirmato, i. e. of privileges not only granted by the Holy See, but also inserted in the oflS- cial collections of canon law.
11. PiuNciPAi- Canonical Collections. — We shall briefly sketch the history of the earliest collections of canons, and shall add a brief description of the "Cor- pus Juris Canonici" as it is now understood. The his- tory of canon law is generally divided into three periods. The first extends to the "Decree" of (Gra- tian, i. e. to the middle of the twelfth century {jus antiquum); the .second reaches to the Council of Trent (jus novum); the third includes the latest en- actments since the Council of Trent inclusively (jus nonissimum).
(1) Jus nniiquum. — The most ancient collections of canonical legislation are certain very early pseudo- Apostolic documents: for instance, the AiSax»> tQv SiiScKa awoarbXav or "Teaching of the Twelve Apos- tles", which dat(« from the end of the first or the be- ginning of the second century; the Apostolic Church Ordinance; the "Didascalia", or "Teaching of the Apostles" (third century); the Apostolic Canons (see Canons, Ai-o.stolic); and Apostolic Con.stitutions. These collections have never had any official value, no more than any other colleetion of this first period. It was in the East, after the F-dict of Milan (313), that arose the first systematic collections. We cannot so designate the chronological collections of the canons of the councils of the fourth and fifth centuries (314- 451); the oldest systematic collection, made by an un- known author in 535, has not come down. The most important collections of this epoch are the 'S.vna.yuy^
