Traditors

Traditor, pl."traditores (lat)", is a term meaning "the one(s) who had handed over". This refers to bishops and other Christians who turned over sacred scriptures or betrayed their fellow Christians to the Roman authorities under threat of persecution. During the persecution of Diocletian between 303–305 A.D., many church leaders had gone as far as turning in Christians to the authorities and had handed over sacred religious texts to authorities to be burned. Later some traditors would be returned to positions of authority under Constantine, sparking a split with the Donatist movement.

While many church members would eventually come to forgive the traditors, the Donatists were much less forgiving. They proclaimed that any sacraments celebrated by these priests and bishops were invalid. They refused to accept the sacraments and spiritual authority of the priests and bishops who had fallen away from the faith during the persecution. As a result, many towns were divided between Donatist and non-Donatist congregations.

The sect had particularly developed and grown in North Africa. Constantine, as emperor and non-Christian, began to get involved in the dispute, and in 314 A.D. he called a council at Arles in Gaul, modern France; the issue was debated and the decision went against the Donatists. The Donatists refused to accept the decision of the council. Their distaste for bishops who had collaborated with Rome came out of their broader view of the Roman empire.

The word "traditor" comes from the Latin "transditio" from "trans" ("across") + "dare" ("to hand", "to give"), and is the source of the modern words "traitor" and "treason". The same derivation, though with different context of what is handed to whom, gives us the word "tradition".

ee also

* Agonistici
* Novatianism
* Donatist
* Anabaptist