ABSTRACT

Early medieval canon law collections contain excerpts from the Bible and from other authoritative texts, such as the decrees of councils, papal writings, or theological commentaries. These excerpts often discuss the moral quality of particular actions or state explicitly that the sin caused by a certain action could be expiated by a particular penance. Over the years, Christian thinkers and legislative bodies had issued conflicting decrees about the moral quality of certain actions or about the penance necessary to atone for those actions. As the compiler of a collection of canon law, Burchard, bishop of Worms, sought to understand what Catholics over the years had thought of God's law. Burchard, however, found contradictory rules and decrees in the books of law that he knew. Compilers might choose to include conflicting texts in order to be comprehensive, and/or in order to allow readers to choose among the best selection of texts.