A Syllabus is defined, by the Merriam-Webster dictionary, as a summary outline of a discourse, treatise, or course of study or of examination requirements, often seen in a school, college, university or program of study setting. In this usage, the syllabus offers the description of a course of study and topics covered through a course of study. This differs from a curriculum, which prescribes the knowledge, skills and competencies students should learn through their study.
The Oxford English Dictionary offers a second usage for Syllabus; being a concise statement or table of the heads of a discourse, contents of a treatise, the subjects of a series of letter; or, in short, a compendium, abstract, summary, or epitome.
The first known use of the modern definition of syllabus occurs in 1656, in T. Blount's Glossographia Syllabus. The Oxford English Dictionary notes the modern usage of syllabus seems to be founded on a mistaken reading of the Latin syllabos in some early printed editions of Cicero's ad Atticum where the correct reading should have been the Greek sittybas, (the accusative plural of sittyba) defined as a parchment label or title-slip on a book. From this original misreading, there were further misreadings where the T's in sittyba (σίττυβα) were changed to L's and seem to be creating a transliteration of a non-existent Greek word σύλλαβος (derived from συλλαμβάνω, which is the modern word syllable).
The spelling of modern Syllabus, which does not occur naturally in Latin or Greek is believed to be from scholars and scribes trying to reconcile the error of the original misreading of syllabos and the new, modern understanding of the word Syllabus. If the word had been a natural derivation as a nomen actionis from the Greek συλλαμβάνω, Syllabus should logically follow the rules for such verbals. These rules would render the plural of Syllabus as syllabūs rather than syllabi. However modern usage of Syllabus has the plural as syllabi coming from natural usage and because Syllabus is in large part a "made-up" word.
Syllabus occurs in legal usage, where the syllabus occurs before the text of the opinion of the court. The syllabus is not part of the opinion of the court, but is generally prepared by a legal editor employed by a private publisher of court decisions. In this context, the syllabus serves as a quick reference for a researcher.
In the United States, the syllabus has largely no legal effect, although this is dependent on state. In most states, only the opinion of the court containing the original statement of the grounds for the opinion may be used in legal papers or in a lawsuit to convince a court or jury of a particular point of law.
The Oxford English Dictionary offers a specialized usage for the Roman Catholic Church, in which a syllabus is defined as a summary statement of points decided and errors condemned by ecclesiastical authority.
The syllabus of Pius IX is a listing of the chief errors of the time to be condemned. This document was originally prepared in 1852 with the errors grouped in eighty-five theses. A second commission was set up with these eighty-five theses to use and find further errors. They produced a further sixty-one errors with the theological qualifications. The document was laid for examination before 300 bishops in 1862. A third commission worked through the document and appended to each of the eighty theses a reference indicating its content in an attempt to determine the true meaning and theological value of the subjects treating. The document, in this way, took twelve years to prepare. The final document maintained twenty-two of the original points drawn up in 1852 and thirty of the original theses. The document was published in 1864.
The contents of the syllabus can be summed up in the headings of the ten paragraphs: Pantheism, Naturalism, Absolute Rationalism; Moderate Rationalism; Indifferentism and false Tolerance in Religious matters; Socialism, Communism, Secret Societies, Bible Societies, Liberal Clerical Associations, Errors regarding the Church and its rights; Errors on the State and its Relation to the Church; Errors on Natural and Christian Ethics; Errors on Christian Marriage; Errors on the Temporal Power of the Pope; Errors in Connection with Modern Liberalism.
Issued on 3 July, 1907, the syllabus of Pius X is the Decree "Lementabili sane exitu" ("with truly lamentable results") which condemns in sixty-five propositions the chief tenets of Modernism, although it never in itself uses the term "modernist" or "modernism". The syllabus serves as a doctrinal decision of the Holy Office, which watches over the purity of Catholic doctrine concerning faith and morals. After the publication, on 18 November, 1907, in a Motu Proprio, Pius X prohibited the defense of the condemned propositions under the penalty of excommunication.
