First Lateran Council

Background

The Investiture Controversy between the papacy and the German empire over the appointment of bishops, which had lasted for decades, reached a settlement in the Concordat of Worms in 1122. To have this settlement confirmed by the whole Western Church, Calixtus II held at the Lateran palace what is counted as the first ecumenical council in the West.

The council and its decrees

The council lasted from late March to early April and adopted canons on church discipline, simony and clerical marriage. The canon important for crusading confirms the remission of sins for those who go to Jerusalem to help defend the Christian people, and the church's protection of their families and property.

The same canon states that those who had taken the cross but not departed must fulfil their vows by the following Easter or be excluded from the church. The council was in line with papal policy that granted similar privileges to those fighting Muslims in Spain.

Outcome and significance

With the First Lateran Council, the privileges granted at Clermont for the First Crusade entered written canon law at the level of an ecumenical council. The binding force of the crusade vow, and the penalty for breaking it, became a principle invoked constantly in the organisation of later expeditions.

Sources and debates

The council's canons are published in Tanner's Decrees of the Ecumenical Councils; their number and order differ in the manuscripts. There is no detailed record of the sessions. Whether the crusade canon had any concrete effect on the Latin states in the East is debated.