Die Rechtsgeschichtliche Entwicklung des “Handelns Durch Andere” im Kanonischen Recht: Grundlage einer Teilhabe von Laienan der potestas regiminis? by Peter Platen

Abstract

the prerequisites for entry into the clergy in the first five centuries on the basis of the sources reviewed (pp. 273–306). An excellent bibliography (pp. 313–355) and a helpful index (pp. 357–364) complete this remarkable and masterful work. Teachers and students of the early church will find here rich material translated and presented in a comprehensive manner. While the latest historical scholarship has been taken into account, the book’s main focus is on the spiritual rather that the social role of the clergy. It is the reviewer ’s deepest wish (along with the author’s) that those preparing for the ordained ministry might find here an accurate and vivid account of the virtuous life that should always be their goal. George Dmitry Gallaro Byzantine Catholic Seminary Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania DIE RECHTSGESCHICHTLICHE ENTWICKLUNG DES “HANDELNS DURCH ANDERE” IM KANONISCHEN RECHT: GRUNDLAGE EINER TEILHABE VON LAIEN AN DER POTESTAS REGIMINIS? by Peter Platen. Beihefte zum Münsterischen Kommentar . Essen: Ludgerus, 2007. Pp. liv–435. This study principally examines the historical development of the juridical concept of “acting through others” (Handeln durch andere) and the various ways that this has been admitted in canon law, including various offices like the papal legate, chorbishop, archdeacon, archpriest, officialis , vicar general, procurators, delegated judge, synodal and pro-synodal judges as well as various juridic institutes like the delegation of papal jurisdiction, the concept of commissio, the notions of delegatio ab homine and a iure and delegatio directa and indirecta. The work is a major contribution to the history of canon law, one that sheds light on juridic offices, institutes, rules and principles still operative in canon law today, especially as seen in Books I, II, and VII of the 1983 Code of Canon Law and the comparable titles of the Code of Canons of the Eastern Churches.A secondary concern of this work, reflected in the subtitle, is contemporary: whether the notion of “acting through others” in the history of canon law lays a foundation for a participation of the laity in the power of governance. After a thirty-eight page bibliography of sources and secondary literature (mostly historical) and an introduction discussing the work’s scope, 494 the jurist methodology, and some terminological questions, there follows the body of the work which is divided into two parts. The first part, in two chapters , looks at how the notion of “acting through others” was expressed in Roman law. The first chapter treats Roman private and procedural law and the second is on the exercise of jurisdiction and administrative activity in Roman law. Roman law’s greatest influence on canon law with respect to the topic of the work lay in its notions of iurisdictio ordinaria, iurisdictio mandata, and iurisdictio delegata. Part II is devoted to the principal subject matter of the book—the development of the concept of “acting through others” in the history of canon law. It is divided into four chapters covering major periods of the history of canon law that saw significant developments in the notion: the beginning of the classical period of the science of canon law up to 1140; the period from 1140 to 1348; the middle of the fourteenth to the end of the eighteenth centuries; and the beginning of the nineteenth century until the 1917 code. It is interesting to see in several of these chapters the extent to which scholarly reflection on the “delegated judge,” acting on behalf of pope or bishop, led to increasing refinement of the concept of “jurisdiction” in the science of canon law. One of the questions addressed historically was whether a lay person could be vicar general. Opinions varied, but the authors did not exclude this possibility on the grounds of any essential incapacity of the laity. Moreover, it was admitted that the pope could appoint a lay person to be vicar general as well as to permit a bishop to do the same, and the possibility of appointing a lay person as vicar for temporal matters was unproblematic . There was also general agreement among canonists that the pope could delegate jurisdiction to a lay person. In fact, there are numerous examples of the actual exercise of jurisdiction by lay...