00939 - History of Canon Law

Learning outcomes

The course of History of Canon Law aims at making students well aware of the long journey covered by the Church juridical order from its origins up to the code of 1917 in a continuous dialogue with the secular law. The profound knowledge of this development, wich is fundamental for the european law, will enable students to get new interpretations, both from a cultural and methodological perspective. The various phases of the history of canon law will be examined from a hermeneutic criterion according to which a better understanding of the past can be gained through the study  of the problems of our age and the question about our future. All the more so in the area the ius Ecclesiae, apparently immutable because based on an unchangeable divine law, but actually urged by continuous new tensions and dynamics.

Course contents

The contents of the course are brieflydescribed as follows:

Introduction: the concept of history of Canon law and the relations with other historical sciences.

The origins; Christians and Jews, Christians and the Roman Empire, the expansions of Christianity.

The beginning of the Church legal system: the canon sources, in particular the procedure council and law and the pontificial decrees; the side contributions, in particular the Patristics and the Roman law. The first canon-liturgical collections. A new society leads out: ordines fidelium, local organisation, episcopal collegiality and hierarchical system.

An outline of the Eastern Church and its collections.

Origin and development of the pope's primacy in the western world.

Development of the “national Churches” and the breaking of regulation. The Church in the barbarian kingdoms: splendour and dangers of the alliance.

The irish monasticism and the Libri poenitentiales.

The penetration of “germanism” into ecclesiastical institutions.

The carolingian age and the false canonical collections. The collections of the post-carolingian and imperial reformation.

The Gregorian Reform and the fight for investitures. The Dictatus Papae. The choiche of a Pope and his powers: the Pope's plenitudo potestatis.

The creative sources of law in the classical age: the pontificial legislation, the council legislation, the synodal legislation, the Customary law.

The importance of Bologna in the study of canon law. Law and theology at the age of Gratiano. The Concordia discordantium canonum. The decretisti and the roman law. The pope's ius novum and the first decretalistica. The creation of the Corpus Iuris Canonici.

The classical doctrine: types, methods, schools and teachers. The mediaeval universities.

The mediaeval councils and the other forms of synodality.

From sacramental to corporative ecclesiology.

The crisis of the pope's monarchy and the conciliarist hypothesis.

The Lutheran contestation of the canon order.

The Council of Trent: the tridentine law and the pastoral reformation. The relations with secular power.

The “reform” of roman curia and the production of ius pontificium.

Methods and canonist schools in 1600s-1700s.

The state integration of the Churches and ecclesiastic law.

Canonist repercussions of Gallicanism, Jansenism and Jurisdictionalism.

The ecclesiology of Restoration and the ius publicum ecclesiasticum. The Church and the States: agreements and breaches. Towards the 1917 codifications: the Church constitutional order in the Vatican Council I. The problem of canonical codification. The marking process of Codex Iuris Canonici.

 

For the integration of 1, 2, 3, credits, the student must contact the teacher by e-mail to decide a custom program.

Erasmus students must contact the teacher by e-mail to agree a custom program.

Readings/Bibliography

For students attending the degree course in Laurea Magistrale in Giurisprudenza:

C. FANTAPPIÈ, Storia del diritto canonico e delle istituzioni della Chiesa, Il Mulino, Bologna, 2011.

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G. BONI, A. ZANOTTI, La Chiesa tra nuovo paganesimo e oblio. Un ritorno alle origini per il diritto canonico del terzo millennio?, G. Giappichelli editore, Torino, 2012

G. DALLA TORRE, G. BONI, Conoscere il diritto canonico, Edizioni Studium, Roma, ristampa, 2009.

For students attending the degree course in Laurea Specialistica in Giurisprudenza:

C. FANTAPPIÈ, Storia del diritto canonico e delle istituzioni della Chiesa, Il Mulino, Bologna, 2011.

Teaching methods

The course consists of lectures and seminars. Lectures will be given in the I st semester. As a consequence, students obtaining their attendance certificate in the current academic year are allowed to take their exam only from January. Only the student who has already supported the exams of Constitutional law and Private law is admitted to the oral exam. Students will be informed about dates and times of the seminars during the lectures or through notices, also on the Faculty web site. The teacher uses slides that will be made available to the students.

Assessment methods

The verify of learning consists in a final proof which will explore the acquisition of knowledge and skills requested trough an oral examination sustained directly with the professor. In this way the student will be can show not only the learned knowledge, but also the critical and methodological capacities gained. In the same time he will must demonstrate to have some specific abilities. First of all, the possess of a mastery of expression and an appropriate technical language. The second one is the ability to move in safely within the system of the sources of this matter. The student moreover must have a clear perception of the information received and, finally, he must have properly understood the issues addressed in class and elucidated in the text books of reference.

 

Thesis

For the assignment of thesis the student must go to the reception of the teacher to discuss and decide the theme.

 

Teaching tools

Suggested readings:

J. GAUDEMET, Storia del diritto canonico. Ecclesia et Civitas, Edizioni San Paolo, Cinisello Balsamo (Milano), 1998.
J. GAUDEMET, Il matrimonio in Occidente, Società Editrice Internazionale, Torino, 1989.
G. DALLA TORRE, Santità e diritto. Sondaggi nella storia del diritto canonico, seconda edizione, G. Giappichelli editore, Torino, 2008.

G. BONI - A. ZANOTTI, Sangue e diritto nella Chiesa. Contributo ad una lettura dell'Occidente cristiano, Il Mulino, Bologna, 2009.

G. BONI, La canonizzazione dei santi combattenti nella storia della Chiesa, Libreria Editrice Vaticana, Città del Vaticano, 2012.

During the lessons, Professor Geraldina Boni will supply and recommend theaching aids and further learning material, according to students' specific requests and interests.

Office hours

See the website of Geraldina Boni