Isidore of Seville and the Hispanic order of grades: considerations on the "De ecclesiasticis officiis" and the "Epistola ad Leudefredum"

Resumen
- Isidore, bishop of Seville (600-636), played an important role in the Visigothic kingdom, especially for the reformation of its Church. Indeed, after the conversion of king Reccared to the Nicene Creed in 589, the kingdom of Toledo offered a good environment to reorganize and reform the Church. The Second Council of Seville (619) and the Fourth of Toledo (633), both presided over by Isidore, produced numerous canons about Church discipline. As metropolitan bishop of Betica and author of two ecclesiological writings the bishop of Seville was particularly interested in organizing the clerical hierarchy. In his De ecclesiasticis officiis and his letter to bishop Leudefredus of Cordoba, Isidore presents an order of grades (ordo graduum) different from those used in the other Western Churches.