Gundun

Gundun, founder of a sect in Arras and Liege in the 11th century. In the year 1025, Gerhard, bishop of Cambrai and Arras, caused the arrest of a number of persons charged with having propagated heretical doctrines in his diocese, and in various parts of the north of France. A synod was convoked at St. Mary's church, in Arras, for their trial. Their rules commanded them to forsake the world; to bring into subjection their fleshly lusts and passions; to support themselves by the work of their bands; to wrong no one, and to evince love to all who felt inclined to adopt their mode of life. This confession, joined with their well-known practice of washing each other's feet, led to the belief that they differed from other Christians only in a devoted attachment to the letter of Scripture. But Gerhard professed to know more of their rules than they acknowledged publicly. He had caused himself, he says, to be initiated into their worship by some proselytes, and so learned all their tenets. They appear to have held the following principles: "The holy Church is the community of the righteous, and is formed of persons chosen by election. Admission into it is signified by the imposition of hands, after a confession of faith and taking certain vows. Besides the regular assemblies in the church, there are prayer-meetings, in which the disciples wash each other's feet. The apostles and martyrs are to be venerated, but saint-worship is forbidden. The fulfilment of the law constitutes righteousness, which alone works salvation. Disobedience in the elect, and disregard of their professional vows, entail everlasting condemnation on them. Neither penitence nor conversion can afterwards avail them." These people rejected the Roman Catholic Church, the supremacy or' the bishop of Rome, the respect shown to bishops, the whole hierarchical system, and even all clergy whatever. "Dogmatic, liturgic, and constitutive traditions are worthless and of no account. All the sacraments of the Roman Catholic Church are rejected, especially baptism and the Lord's supper. The consecrated elements of the Lord's supper are nothing more than what they appear to our senses. At the last supper, Christ did not really give his disciples his body for food and his blood for drink. Marriage and all sexual intercourse are to be avoided. Churches are not holy, hence worship does not derive any special virtue from its being held in them. The altar is but a heap of stones. Fumigations and the ringing of bells are useless ceremonies. Crosses, crucifixes, images, etc., tend to idolatry." Bishop Gerhard charged the Gundulfians with holding these and similar opinions, but they refused to acknowledge them. They attempted only to defend their views regarding baptism, but finally announced that they were ready to recant their errors. Then the bishop and other members of the clergy solemnly condemned the heresy, excommunicated its originators in case they did not repent, and made the prisoners sign a Roman Catholic statement of the doctrines on which they had held heretical opinions, translated from Latin into the vernacular; after which the prisoners were released and the synod closed. Gerhard sent a copy of its acts to the bishop of Liege, who applied himself also with great zeal to the suppression of the heresy. These acts, which are the only source from which the details of this affair cast be obtained, are to be found in D'Achery's Spicilergium (2d edit., i, 607-624), and in Mansi's Concilia (xix, 423 sq.). Still they give no information as to the rise and development of this party, nor on its relation to those which arose before and after it in the same and neighboring districts. Gundulf appears to have made northern France the exclusive field of his exertions, and it was probably there he had made the converts which were afterwards arrested at Arras. His connection with them was probably an imitation of Christ's connection with his disciples; they called him the Master, and, as already stated, considered the imitation of the apostles as their highest aim. Gundulf may have been himself a working man who went to that country because the trades, and especially that of weaver, were in a prosperous condition there. Once there, he probably found a body of disciples among his fellow-workmen, whom he instructed in his principles, and whom he afterwards sent as travelling workmen to propagate his views in their own districts. Of the end of Gundulf's career nothing is known. The period of his greatest activity was probably already over in 1025. As we see no mention of search for him having been made by order either of Gerhard or of the bishop of Liege, although his disciples had proclaimed him as their chief, it is probable that he was out of the reach of both, and had perhaps been already removed by death. We have no further information as to what became of the sect afterwards, and, at any rate, it continued, if at all, in secret. Similar sects have existed at all times in the bosom of the Romish Church, and they are generally found to represent vital piety as opposed to the corrupted Christianity of Rome. See Hahn, Gesch. d. Ketzer im Mittelalter, pt. i, p. 39 sq.; Herzog, Real-Encykl. v, 414 sq.; Neander, Ch. History, iii, 597.