De concilio Carthaginensi octavo, habito circa annum CCLVII (editorum dissertatiuncula)

Eighth Council, held about the year 257.

Although I am wholly persuaded that St Jerome erred when he wrote that the same African bishops who had sanctioned rebaptism together with St Cyprian, meeting again, issued a new decree and changed their opinion on baptism, I nevertheless thought that a place should be given in this collection of ours to this assembly of bishops, just as some councils are reported in the common editions of the councils which it is nevertheless certain were never held, only so that nothing on this subject may be passed over, whether it be true or false. Jerome, then, says in the Dialogue against the Luciferians that those very bishops who with the blessed Cyprian had determined that heretics must be rebaptized, having reverted to the ancient custom, issued a new decree, by which, namely, the doctrine of the earlier council on the baptism of heretics was condemned.

Many things seem to conflict with this opinion of Jerome. For first, it is established on the authority of the Council of Arles that the doctrine of rebaptism flourished among the Africans for a long time after Cyprian. Next, this same point is proved also from the council held at Carthage under Bishop Gratus; which, although it consisted of bishops whose mind was averse to rebaptism, nevertheless demonstrates that this doctrine had not yet been abolished among the Africans, even though most held the contrary view. Furthermore, that Cyprian's council was still held in authority in the age of Vincent of Lérins is proved by the example of the Donatists, who, as the same Vincent says, and as is established from the acts of the Conference of Carthage and from many passages of Augustine, boasted that they rebaptized on the authority of that council. Finally, no testimony to this new decree exists anywhere else in all antiquity. Yet if there had been one, the adversaries of the Donatists would without doubt have made frequent use of it. On the contrary, Augustine in Letter 47 notes that Cyprian is not found to have corrected his opinion on the rebaptizing of heretics; which can also be gathered abundantly from chapter 8 of book 2 against Gaudentius. It may therefore be that Jerome, seeing rebaptism rejected by the Catholic Africans, perhaps from hatred of the Donatists, supposed that the Africans had reverted to the ancient custom immediately after the council held under Cyprian, just as Augustine, in book 3 On Baptism, chapter 2, says that they returned to their former custom after Agrippinus. Stephen Baluze. (New Collection of Councils.)