Palm-synod

Palm-Synod (Palmaris Synodus), an important ecclesiastical council, so called after the building in which it was held ("A porticu beati Petri Apostoli qum appellatur ad Palmaria," as Anastasius says), was convened by Theodoric in A.D. 50 (Gieseler and others place it in A.D. 503) to consider the charges of simony and adultery brought against Symmachus (q.v.) by his rival Laurentius (q.v.). The verdict of the synod and of the king was in favor of the former. He was acquitted without investigation, on the presumption that it did not behoove the council to pass judgment respecting the successor of St. Peter. SEE PAPACY. Of course the opposition was not satisfied with this decision, and the ecclesiastical strife continued for some time. Among the ablest defenders of the synodic decision is the deacon Ennodius, afterwards bishop of Pavia (died 521), who in his work Libellus apologeticus pro Synodo IV Romana (in Mansi, 8:274) favored the absolutism of the papacy, and claimed that the incumbent of St. Peter's chair should be regarded as above every human tribunal, and as responsible only to God himself. See Hefele, ConcilienGesch. 2:615 sq.; Schaff, Ch. Hist. 2:324, 325; Gieaeler, Eccles. Hist. 1:338; Nitzsch, De Synodo Palmari (Wittenb. 1775).