Treatise on the Power of the Pope and the Emperor with Respect to Unbelievers

Introduction

Włodkowic presented the treatise at the Council of Constance in 1415 as part of the Polish case against the Teutonic Order. In a series of conclusions it asks what power pope and emperor have over unbelievers. Drawing on Innocent IV and Thomas Aquinas, it answers that unbelievers possess dominion, property and jurisdiction by natural law; the pope may act against them only for offences against natural law and may not authorise war against peaceful unbelievers, and the emperor has no universal lordship over them. Conversion must be won by persuasion, not by the sword. The council did not decide the question, but the treatise is now read as an early text on the rights of non-Christian peoples and on the limits of religious war, written as advocacy in a concrete political conflict.