At the end of 543 or the beginning of 544 the Emperor Justinian I issued an edict in which the three chapters were anathematized, in hope of encouraging the Oriental Orthodox to accept the decisions of the Council of Chalcedon and the Tome of Pope Leo I, thus bringing religious harmony to the Byzantine Empire.
However, Evagrius[1] tells us that Theodorus Ascidas, the leader of the Origenists, had raised the question of the Three Chapters to divert Justinian from a persecution of his party.
Although Catholic canonists admit that theological errors, and in the case of Theodore very serious ones, can be found in the writings, the mistakes of Theodoret and Ibas were chiefly but not wholly due to a misunderstanding of the language of Cyril of Alexandria.
However these errors do not make the decision of condemnation easy, for there were no good precedents for dealing harshly with the memory of men who had died in peace with the Church.
Facundus, Bishop of Hermiane, pointed out in his Defensio trium capitulorum that Saint Cyprian had erred about the rebaptism of heretics, yet no one would dream of anathematizing him.
The first is from an African bishop named Pontianus, in which he entreats the emperor to withdraw the Three Chapters on the ground that their condemnation struck at the Council of Chalcedon.
When Vigilius arrived at Constantinople in January 547, Italy, Africa, Sardinia, Sicily, and the parts of Illyricum and Greece through which he journeyed were fiercely against the condemnation of the Three Chapters.
The matter was further complicated by the fact that the Latin-speaking bishops, Vigilius among them, were for the most part ignorant of Greek and therefore unable to judge the incriminated writings for themselves.
Vigilius had twice to take sanctuary, first in the Basilica of St. Peter, and then in the Church of St. Euphemia at Chalcedon, from which he issued an Encyclical letter describing the treatment he had received.
However, certain stalwart clerics were unhappy and having fled to mainland Aquileia under Lombard protection elected a John as a rival bishop who maintained the schism.
Isidore of Seville, in his Chronicle and De Viris Illustribus, judged Justinian a tyrant and persecutor of the orthodox[7] and an admirer of heresy,[8] contrasting him with Facundus of Hermiane and Victor of Tunnuna, who was considered a martyr.
In the decades following Justinian's death, the local Christians were more concerned for their safety in the wars first against a resurgent Persia, then next against the Arabs, who came to permanently control the territories beyond the Taurus Mountains in the 630s.