Eutyches Originally Acknowledged Pope Leo’s Global Authority

Jan 10, 2026

Eutyches (who died in 454) was a heretical archimandrite in the area of Constantinople who taught the Monophysite heresy. He held the following heretical position: “I confess that Our Lord had two natures before the union but after the union I confess but one.” By denying that Our Lord had two natures, he denied Jesus’ true humanity. Eutyches was condemned by Bishop Flavian of Constantinople at a synod in Constantinople on Nov. 22, 448. Following his condemnation by Flavian, Eutyches appealed to Pope St. Leo the Great. In Eutyches’ appeal to Pope Leo there’s an interesting acknowledgment of the pope’s authority to intervene in Church affairs in the East and to issue authoritative rulings.

Eutyches of Constantinople to Pope Leo (Letter 21 in the collection of Pope Leo’s letters), Winter 448-449: “I asked them to let your holiness know these things, that you might judge what seemed right to you, undertaking by all means to follow your ruling… I take refuge, therefore, with you the defender of religion and abhorrer of such factions… I beseech you not to be prejudiced against me by their insidious designs about me, but to pronounce the sentence which shall seem to you right upon the faith, and in the future not to allow any slander to be uttered against me by this faction, nor let one be expelled and banished from the number of the orthodox.”

Pope St. Leo the Great upheld the condemnation of Eutyches and condemned his false position in his famous Tome (Letter 13, June 13, 449).

Pope St. Leo the Great, Tome to Flavian (Letter 13), June 13, 449: “But when during your cross-examination Eutyches replied and said, I confess that our Lord had two natures before the union but after the union I confess but one, I am surprised that so absurd and mistaken a statement of his should not have been criticized and rebuked by his judges, and that an utterance which reaches the height of stupidity and blasphemy should be allowed to pass as if nothing offensive had been heard: for the impiety of saying that the Son of God was of two natures before His incarnation is only equalled by the iniquity of asserting that there was but one nature in Him after the Word became flesh.”

Eutyches was also condemned at the Council of Chalcedon in 451. Sadly, Eutyches remained obstinate to the end and did not fulfill his promise of following the ruling of Pope Leo. Nevertheless, his letter to Leo is additional evidence that the East recognized that a Roman Pontiff possessed a global jurisdiction that extended into the East.