ADALBERTO (ALDEBERTO)

ADALBERTO (ALDEBERTO). — A Frankish heretical bishop who lived in the 8th century. Although he had himself ordained by ignorant bishops, he boasted of being able to dispense with the hierarchy as well as the sacraments and claimed that he could guarantee the salvation of his followers through relics that an angel had brought him from the ends of the earth, but above all by means of a letter from Jesus Christ that had fallen from heaven in Jerusalem. His activity was particularly directed toward the countryside, where he had crosses erected everywhere, around which he gathered the poor folk whom he galvanized mainly with a prayer he had composed to introduce the cult of angels, to whom he had given new names. His doctrine was condemned at the Council of Neustria, held at Soissons on 2 March 744. St Boniface pronounced his deposition against him, which was confirmed at the general Frankish Council of the spring of 745, where the condemnation of the doctrine was also reiterated. The Council of Rome on 25 October of the same year and the new general Frankish Council of 747 again condemned A., whom his fanatical followers regarded as a martyr (cf. in the correspondence of St Boniface, Epist. 57, 59, 60, 77). At the Roman Council of 743, together with the letter attributed by A. to Jesus Christ and the heretical prayer of the impostor, an apologetic autobiography of his was also mentioned. However, nothing remains of these three writings through which his doctrine and activity were particularly assessed and condemned.