Canons of St. Basil the Great, included in the Rudder:
7. Sodomists and bestialists and murderers and sorcerers and adulterers and idolaters deserve the same condemnation, so that whatever rule you have as regarding the others observe it also in regard to these persons. But as for those who have been for thirty years penitent for an act of impurity which they committed unwittingly, there is no ground for our doubting that we ought to admit them. Both the fact of their ignorance renders them worthy of pardon, and so do also the voluntary character of their confession, and the fact that they have been exhibiting good intentions for such a long time, for they have surrendered themselves to Satan for nearly a whole human generation, in order to be educated not to indulge in shameful acts. So bid them to be admitted without fail, especially if they have shed tears that move you to compassion, and are exhibiting a life that deserves sympathy.
Interpretation.
The present Canon condemns to the same chastisement and sentence both those who are guilty of the crime of sodomy and those who are guilty of the crime of bestiality (concerning whom see c. XVI of Ancyra), and murderers (see Ap. c. LXVI), and sorcerers (see c. LXI of the 6th), and adulterers (see Ap. c. XLVIII, and c. LXXXVII of the 6th), and idolaters, by which terms are meant, according to Balsamon and Zonaras, magicians, because of their invoking the demons, or, according to others, those who have on some occasion or under some circumstance denied Christ and have sacrificed to idols (and see c. XI of the 1st). All these persons are condemned to the same chastisement, not according to the years of sentence, because some of them are sentenced to more years and others to fewer, as is to be seen in their particular places and Canons; but in respect that all of them are subjected to sentences of many years, according to Zonaras, and in respect that all of them used to be assigned to the four stations of penitence, according to Balsamon. All those, on the other hand, who have been penitent for thirty years on account of the carnal impurity they committed unwittingly (possibly by indulging in sexual intercourse with some female relative without being aware that she was a relative, or something else of the kind), they ought undoubtedly to be admitted to the communion of the Mysteries, because of the tears and the life deserving of mercy which they are exhibiting, and on account of the many years sentence they have had to serve out. Because they have given themselves up to Satan for nearly a whole human generation, after being separated from communion with the faithful, like that Corinthian who gave himself up to Satan, in order that they too, like him, might learn not to do such impure acts.
Concord.
The same St. Basil in his c. LXII canonizes sodomists to fifteen years, as well as adulterers. St. Gregory of Nyssa in his c. IV canonizes them to eighteen, remarking that this is a sin against aliency and that it is one that is unnatural. The Faster in his c. XVIII excludes the sodomist from communion for three years, with the additional penalties of fasting, zerophagy, and penances. In his c. XIX he says that if a child has been violated by someone he cannot become a priest, unless he received the sperm only between the thighs. But God commands in Leviticus that sodomists be put to death:
"And if any man sleep with a male person in lieu of a woman, they have both of them committed an abomination; they shall surely be put to death; they are guilty" (Lev. 20:13).
62. As for any man who uncovers his nakedness in the midst of males, he shall be allotted the time fixed for those transgressing in the act of adultery.
(c. VII of Basil; c. IV of Nyssa.).
Interpretation.
The present Canon canonizes anyone guilty of sodomy, i.e., sexual intercourse between males, like an adulterer, or, more expressly speaking, fifteen years. See also c. VII of the same St. Basil.
Canons of St. Gregory of Nyssa, included in the Rudder:
4. As for sins done for the satisfaction of desire and for pleasure, they are divided as follows: It has pleased some of the more accurate authorities, indeed, to deem the offense of fornication to be tantamount to adultery; for there is but one lawful state of matrimony and conjugal relationship, namely, that of wife to husband and of husband to wife. Everything, then, that is not lawful is unlawful at any rate, including even the case in which a man has no wife of his own, but has that of another man. For only one helper was given to man by God (Gen. 2:20), and only one head was set over woman.
"That every one of you should know how to possess his vessel in sanctification and honor," as divine Paul says (I Thess. 4:4-5), the law of nature permits the right use of it. But if anyone turns from his own, he will infringe upon anothers in any case; but anothers is whatever is not ones own, even though its owner is not acknowledged. Hence it is evident that fornication is not far removed from the offense of adultery, as has been shown by those who give the question more accurate consideration, seeing that even the divine Scripture says:
"Be not too intimate with another mans wife" (Prov. 5:20). Nevertheless, inasmuch as a certain concession was made by the Fathers in the case to weaker men, the offense has been distinguished on the basis of the following general division to the effect that whenever a man fulfills his desire without doing any injustice to another man, the offense is to be called fornication; but when it is committed by plotting against and injuring another man, it is to be called adultery. Copulation with the lower animals, too, and paederasty are considered to belong to this class of offenses, because they too are a sort of adultery, or in the nature of adultery. For the wrongfulness consists in infringing upon what belongs to another or acting contrary to nature. This division, then, having been made also in connection with this kind of sin, the general remedy for it consists in the marts becoming purified and being made pure as a result of regret for the passionate madness for such pleasures. But inasmuch as no injustice has been made admixed with the sin of those polluting themselves by fornication, therefore and on this score the length of time fixed for the return of those tainted by adultery has been double that fixed for the other forbidden evils. For, the penalty for copulation with lower animals and for the madness practiced upon males has been doubled, as I have said, because such cases involve one sin consisting in the enjoyment of a forbidden pleasure, and another sin consisting committing an injustice with what belongs to another man, after the manner of abusing another marts wife. The difference between cases testing upon repentance, and offenses committed for the sake of pleasure amounts to the following. For any man who on his own initiative and of his own accord proceeds to confess the sins, the mere fact that he has condescended on account of secret acts to become an accuser of himself as a result of an impulse of his own, is to be considered proof that the cure of the disease has already begun, and since he has shown a sign of improvement, he is entitled to kinder treatment. One, on the other hand, who has been caught in the act of perpetrating the offense, or who has been exposed involuntarily as a result of some suspicion or of some accusation, incurs an intensification of the penalty, when he returns; so that only after he has been purified accurately may he then be admitted to communion of the Sanctified Elements. The canon, therefore, is such that as for those who have polluted themselves by fornication, they are to pray along with kneelers for three years in a state of return, and are then to be allowed to partake of the Sanctified Elements. But in the case of those who have made better use of their reversion and life and are showing a return to what is good, it is permissible for the one entrusted with the management of the matter, with a view to what is of advantage to the ecclesiastical economy, to reduce the length of time of listening and to allow a quicker reversion, and again he may even reduce the length of time and allow Communion to be administered sooner, as he may by actual test be persuaded to approve the condition of the person under treatment (Matt. 7:6). For precisely as it has been forbidden to throw a pearl to swine, so too it is a piece of absurdity the man in question of the most precious Pearl through indifference and insistence upon purity. A transgression committed after the manner of adultery, or, in other words, after the example of the other kinds of filthiness, as has been said previously, shall be treated in all respects in the same way of judgment as is the abominable sin of fornication, but the length of time shall be doubled. But the disposition of the person being treated shall be observed in regard thereto, in the same manner as in the case of those who have allowed themselves to be polluted by fornication, so that sooner or later they shall be allowed the privilege of partaking of the essence of the good.
Interpretation.
The Saint is decreeing in this Canon respecting penalties pertaining to the desiderative faculty in connection with sinful deeds, and first of all as respecting fornication, by stating that the more accurate and more discerning authorities say that fornication is considered to be regarded as adultery, and offer some such proof as the following. For, if adultery is a sin committed with a strange woman, by the same token fornication is to be regarded as a sin committed with a strange woman too and therefore is to be considered adultery. For there can be but one lawful conjugal relationship and coition of a woman with a man, and of a man with a woman, which takes place with his own body. Every other kind of sexual intercourse, besides this, is unlawful, and consequently is not had with ones own body, but with a strange body, since in the beginning God gave man only one wife, and woman only one husband. And so, if one has a vessel of his own (as St. Paul says), or, in more express terms, a wife, he is allowed to have sexual intercourse with her; but if he has sexual intercourse with any other besides his own, then, of course, he is guilty of coition with a strange body, even though the latter has no definite and manifest owner. But it is apparent, however, that all these acts follow the course of fornication; so, according to this proof, is not far from being adultery, and indeed this agrees with what Solomon says: "Be not too intimate with a strange woman"; or, in other words, do not commit any breach of propriety with a strange woman, i.e., with a harlot. Nevertheless, in spite of all these facts, the Fathers indulgently call the sin committed with any woman fornication, provided no other man has any right to exact revenge for the deed: this amounts to saying that when a man commits the sin with any unmarried woman it is fornication. Hence they canonized it more leniently than adultery, to nine years; that signifies that fornicators are sentenced to weep outside the narthex for three years, to listen for three years, and to kneel for three years, and thereafter to partake of communion (see also c. XXII of St. Basil). It is competent, however, to the spiritual physician to reduce the number of years of listening for those fornicators who repent more eagerly, as well as to reduce the number of years of kneeling, and to allow them to participate in the Mysteries sooner than they would be allowed to do without a commutation of their sentence, in accordance with his opinion of the disposition of the penitent. For, just as it is absurd for one to throw pearls, the holy mysteries, that is to say, to swine, to the impure, that is to say, who are not genuinely repentant, so and in like manner it is also absurd for one to deny the most precious Pearl, or, more expressly speaking, the body of Christ, to a man who has been purified through the process of repentance and abstention from the evil, and who has become reconverted from a swine into a human being. So much for fornication. As for adultery, sodomy, and bestiality, the Fathers canonized these sins doubly more than fornication, or, more expressly, each of them eighteen years, because the sin involved in them is also double. For, that is to say, adultery, besides the unlawful pleasure it affords, also inflicts an injustice upon the husband of the woman with whom the guilty man has committed the adultery, because he appropriated unjustly that husbands own property, his wife, that is to say. As for sodomy, on the other hand, and bestiality (or sexual intercourse with beasts), in these too besides the unlawful pleasure they afford, there is an actual injustice done to what is strange or unnatural, or, more explicitly speaking, they violate the laws of nature, in that they are sins contrary to nature. The number of years for each of these sinful deeds has likewise been economically fixed like those for fornication, but doubly as many: that is to say, in other words, adulterers are to spend six years in weeping outside the church, and so are those guilty of sodomy and of bestiality; they are to listen for six years, and to kneel for six years more, and then they are to commune. Nevertheless, the disposition of such persons has to be observed by the spiritual father, as is also that of fornicators, so that, if they repent more willingly and more eagerly, he may allow them the sooner to partake of communion; but if they revert more negligently, he may not allow to them the right to commune even later than the eighteen years. The general medical treatment both of fornicators and of adulterers and of sodomists and of bestialists is to have them abstain entirely from such pleasures as these and to repent.