Annotation CCCXLIII

”There is a sin unto death: not for that do I say, that anyone should ask.” — 1 John 5:16

Whether the impugning of the brotherhood is an irremissible sin.

Bede the presbyter, in the commentaries, explaining this, seems to think that the sin of those who impugn the brotherhood [fraternity] is altogether irremissible; thus saying: “A GREAT question is born here, because blessed John openly shows that there are certain brethren for whom we are not commanded to pray — since the Lord commands us to pray even for our persecutors. Which cannot otherwise be solved, unless we confess that there are certain sins in the brethren which are graver than the persecution of enemies. The sin of a brother, therefore, is unto death, when, after the knowledge of God (which was given through the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ), someone impugns the brotherhood, and is agitated by the firebrands of envy against that very [brotherhood] by which he was reconciled to God.” This opinion, taken by Bede in almost the same words from the first book of Augustine’s On the Lord’s Sermon on the Mount, Augustine retracted in the first book of the Retractations.