Halitgar

Halitgar (Halitgarius, Halitcharius, Halitgaire, Aligerio) was a ninth-century bishop of Cambrai (in office 817-831). He is known also as an apostle to the Danes, and the writer of a widely-known penitential.

Life

In 822 he travelled to Denmark as a missionary with Ebbo of Rheims and Willeric of Bremen, though not to great immediate effect. [Carole M. Cusack, "Conversion among the Germanic Peoples" (1998), p. 135.] In 823 he was dedicating the church and relics of St Ursmer at Lobbes [http://users.skynet.be/bk342309/Lobbes/page7.html, in French.] . In 825, with Amalarius of Metz, he carried the conclusions of a Paris synod on iconoclasm to Louis the Pious [Rosamund McKitterick, "The Frankish Kingdoms under the Carolingians" (1983), p. 133.] . He went as ambassador to Byzantium in 828 [ [http://www.ccel.org/ccel/schaff/encyc05/Page_122.html New Schaff-Herzog Encyclopedia of Religious Knowledge, Vol. V: Goar - Innocent | Christian Classics Ethereal Library ] ] .

De Paenitentia

His "De Paenitentia" laid down qualities Christians should aspire to in their lives. [Philippe Ariès, Paul Veyne, Georges Duby, "A History of Private Life" (English translation 1987), p. 536.] He discussed a distinction between killing in warfare (a sin), and in self-defense in battle. [Frederick H. Russell, "The Just War in the Middle Ages" (1975), p. 31.] [Janet L. Nelson, "The Frankish World, 750-900" (1996), p. 78.] Heavy penances for homosexual acts were imposed on older men. [ [http://law.richmond.edu/rjolpi/Issues_Archived/2004_Summer_Issue/Article_1_Madeira.pdf Jody Madeira, "Rebuilding the Closet: Bowers v. Hardwick, Lawrence v. Texas, and the Mismeasure of Homosexual Historiography"(PDF), p. 10] ] The work is also a source for information about surviving pagan practices [John T. McNeill, "Folk-Paganism in the Penitentials", The Journal of Religion, Vol. 13, No. 4 (Oct., 1933), pp. 450-466.] .

It was written in five volumes, at Ebbo's request [http://www.ccel.org/ccel/schaff/encyc02.canon_law.html#canon_law-Page_384 New Schaff-Herzog Encyclopedia of Religious Knowledge, Vol. II: Basilica - Chambers | Christian Classics Ethereal Library ] ] . Ebbo's intention was to have a normative penitential; Halitgar set aside tariffs of penances for exhortations.Henry Charles Lea, "A History of Auricular Confession and Indulgences in the Latin Church" I (1896), p. 105.] [Michael Lapidge, "Anglo-Saxon England" (2003), p. 227.] This work and the two attributed to Hrabanus Maurus were considered to supersede those written before, and were very influential, particularly in pre-Norman England [Thomas Pollock Oakley, "English Penitential Discipline and Anglo-Saxon Law in Their Joint Influence" (2003), p. 31.] . At this point, "the books used by confessors began to consist more and more of instructions in the style of the later moral theology" [ [http://www.1911encyclopedia.org/Canon_law Canon law - LoveToKnow 1911 ] ] .

His sources have been much debated:
*material from Gregory the Great, Prosper of Aquitaine, the "Collectio Acheriana"
*the Canons of Elvira and other old collections
*Julianus Pomerius [David Ganz, "The Ideology of Sharing" p. 26 in "Property and Power in the Early Middle Ages" (1995) edited by Wendy Davies, Paul Fouracre.]
*a source common to Halitgar, the "Collectio Quadripartita", and the penitential writings of Hrabanus Maurus. ["Ghostly Recensions in Early Medieval Canon Law: The Problem of the Collectio Dacheriana and its Shades", The Legal History Review, Volume 68, Numbers 1-2, January, 2000]

References

*"Die altenglische Version des Halitgar'schen Bussbuches : (sog. Poenitentiale pseudo-Ecgberti)", Darmstadt, Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft, 1964
*Raymund Kottje (1980), "Die Bussbucher Halitgars von Cambrai und des Hrabanus Maurus: Ihre Uberlieferung und ihre Quellen"

Notes