Definitions
from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.
- noun A member of a rigoristic, schismatic Christian sect, strongly opposed by Saint Augustine, that arose in North Africa in the fourth century AD and believed in sanctity as requisite for church membership and administration of all sacraments.
from The Century Dictionary.
- noun One of an early Christian sect in Africa which originated in a dispute over the election of Cæecilian to the see of Carthage,
a. d. 311, occasioned by his opposition to the extreme reverence paid to relics of martyrs and to the sufferers for the Christian faith called confessors, and the rivalry of Secundus, primate of Numidia.
from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.
- noun (Eccl. Hist.) A follower of Donatus, the leader of a body of North African schismatics and purists, who greatly disturbed the church in the 4th century. They claimed to be the true church.
from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.
- noun Christianity, historical One of a group of Christians in fourth-century North Africa who broke away as a group after opposing the appointment of Caecilianus as Bishop of Carthage, and who disputed the validity of
baptisms performed by others.
from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.
- adjective of or relating to Donatism
- noun an adherent of Donatism
Etymologies
from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 4th Edition
from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License
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Examples
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She is a Donatist from the third or fourth century, and regards the surviving Church as a mass of corruption and error.
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It was debated in the 4th and 5th centuries in the context of what is known as the Donatist controversy.
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He says that calling someone a "Donatist" or a "gnostic" doesn't engage the issues at stake and doesn't win arguments.
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In modern parlance, a 'Donatist' is someone who refuses to empty the Sacraments of doctrinal content.
Stand Firm 2010
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For a similar reason, the Donatist heresy was rejected.
Augustine vs. Pelagius Part Four - The Politics of Free Will | Heretical Ideas Magazine 2009
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President Obama could learn a lesson from the Donatist heretics in how to handle government officials who were involved in the torture of detainees.
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President Obama could learn a lesson from the Donatist heretics in how to handle government officials who were involved in the torture of detainees.
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We start briefly with the Donatist schism, which was basically political; and then we have a prolonged and detailed discourse on Platonism and the doctrine of the Trinity, which I must say explained both in more lucid and provocative terms than I recall reading anywhere else.
Gibbon Chapter XXI nwhyte 2010
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At the time of the Pelagian controversy, Augustine was already successful in defending orthodoxy and having the Donatist and Manichean sects declared heresies.
Augustine vs. Pelagius Part Four - The Politics of Free Will | Heretical Ideas Magazine 2009
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Although Pelagius was not a Donatist, Augustine and others felt that his ideas of salvation might lead the church in a Donatist direction because clergy would be judged by their ability to be free of sin.
Augustine vs. Pelagius Part Four - The Politics of Free Will | Heretical Ideas Magazine 2009
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