The controversy that led to the Synod of Whitby was not caused by the British Church. The Britons had little to do with the English beyond allying with one small Kingdom as a more efficient method of killing the members of another. The English had pretty much the same attitude to the Welsh. The problem starts with the Scots who as all reader of 1066 and all that will know lived in Ireland. They had been converted to Christianity in the 5^th century by Patrick a Christian captured in Britain and taken to Ireland (where the Scots lived). In time a Scottish Church arose based on the authority of Abbots who appointed Bishops. The Abbot did not have to be a Bishop himself to control his subordinate Bishops. The Scots raided parts of Britain, founding colonies including Scotland. Much of what is now Scotland was ruled by the native Picts or by Saxons from Northumbria. Around 563 St. Columba set up a Monastry at Iona as a mother house with authority to appoint Bishops and convert the heathen.

This is the problem that led to Whitby; there are two authorities in Britain attempting to convert the heathen. Augustine was the first Archbishop of Canterbury with Papal authority to convert, the Abbot at Iona similarly had authority to convert although not from the Pope. The native Britons were already Christian and hence were not in need of conversion. Having been out of touch with official ecclesiastical debate for some 200 hundred years the Iona Church did not do things in quite the same way as the Romans. The groups could be told apart by the way that monks shaved their heads. Romans favoured a Hollywood style tonsure in imitation of Christ's crown of thorns whereas the Scots shaved the front of the head but allowed hair to grow at the back. Lacking the latest Christian edicts the Celtic Church happened to celebrate Easter on a different day to Rome each year. The Celtic Church kept to an 84 year Easter cycle that had been the norm in the Western Church since the Council of Arles in 314. Those Churches that had maintained contact with Rome had adopted a 532 year cycle of Easter in 525 based on the Alexandrine cycle of Anatolius. Fortunately this cycle also matched the Easter calculations of Alexandria and the Eastern Church.

King Oswy had ruled Northumbria since 655 and had done pretty well for himself beginning as a subordinate King of Bernicia controlling the Northern half of Northumbria as a subject of Mercia. He defeated the Mercians in 655 overrunning the rest of Northumbria and annexing Northern Mercia. His control of Mercia fizzled out with a noble's revolt in 657 but Oswy was still a pretty important guy in 663; more than your average Saxon princeling, Oswy's Northumbria was the temporary Saxon political powerhouse. Oswy attributed his victory over the Mercians to the will of God and was keen to repay his debt. He gave twelve plots of land to the Church and signed his one year old daughter Aelffled up a nun; she ended up at the Abbey of Whitby, built around 657 on land acquired by the Abbess Hilda of Hartlepool. The modern Abbey ruin is not the place of the Synod of Whitby as the original was destroyed by the Danes. The old Abbey cannot of grown to any great size in the 6 years before the Synod of 663.

Oswy had been baptised in the Scottish tradition as Northumbria had been converted by St. Aidan the first Bishop of Lindisfarne and a disciple of the Celtic Curch at Iona. So the Northumbrian court of King Oswy kept the Celtic Easter while Eanfled, his queen, who had been brought up in the south under the Roman system, was still fasting. While Aidan was still alive his influence was strong enough to control Northumbria. Aidan was succeeded by Finan and then by Colman both Irishmen and by his time there was growing controversy over exactly when Easter fell. Oswy was a devout man and was as keen to sort the matter out as anyone although he favoured the discipline that he had been baptised into and spoke fluent Gaelic. Oswy's son Alchfrid had been brought up in the Roman tradition and had founded a Roman style monastery at Ripon under Abbot Wilfred (trained in Gaul and Rome), the previous Celtic monks had preferred to return home rather than change their allegiance. Two Christian teachers (count 'em Colman and Wilfred) were joined by a third Agilbert Bishop of the West Saxons who had come to visit his friend Wilfred. The confusion of the roles of Abbot and Bishop is illustrated by the Abbot Wilfred making the Bishop Agilbert a priest in his monastery.

The Abbey of Whitby was chosen to sort out the differences of Church procedure and the correct Easter. The Abbess, Hilda supported the Scottish practice as did Bishop Cedd of the East Saxons who had been ordained by the Scots and came to Whitby as translator. Agilbert was a Frank and rather than use another translator to turn his Frankish into Saxon and Gaelic elected to have Wilfred put his views forward. It appears that the concept of the Church having a universal language in Latin had not reached 660s Northumbria.

Colman put forward the Celtic viewpoint. These are the words recorded by Bede in 731. "The Easter customs which I observe were taught me by my superiors, who sent me here as a Bishop; and all our forefathers, men beloved of God, are known to have observed these customs. And lest anyone condemn or reject them as wrong, it is recorded that they owe their origin to the blessed evangelist Saint John, the disciple especially beloved by our Lord, and all the churches over which he presided"

Wilfred replied; " Our Easter customs are those that we have seen universally observed in Rome, where the blessed Apostles Peter and Paul lived, taught, suffered and are buried. We have also seen the same customs generally observed throughout Italy and Gaul when we travelled through these places for study and prayer. Furthermore, we have learnt that Easter is observed by men of different nations and languages at one and the same time, in Africa, Egypt, Asia, Greece and throughout the world wherever the Church of Christ has spread. The only people who stupidly contend against the whole world are the Scots and their partners in obstinacy the Picts and Britons, who inhabit only a part of these two uttermost islands of the ocean."

The debate continued with Colman relying on the interpretation of Easter given in John, which does not agree with the other Apostles and the Christian reputation of previous Scottish holy men like Columba who followed the Celtic Easter. It was finally agreed to keep the Roman Easter because it came from the successors of Peter. Christ had said; "Thou art Peter and upon this rock I shall build my Church, and the gates of Hell shall not prevail against it, and I will give unto thee the keys of the Kingdom of Heaven." Colman could not argue that a similar authority had been give to Columba.

The synod ended in 664. Agilbert returned to his Bishopric in the South. Cedd abandoned the Scottish customs and retained his Bishopric. Colman and those who supported him returned to the Scottish lands to discuss the ruling, he was replaced by Tuda who although trained by Scots had kept the Roman Easter. Tuda was to die of plague within a year. The authority of the Scottish Church in Northumbria had lasted 30 years. The Saxons were now represented by a single Christian Church although the Celtic Church continued in Wales until the 11^th Century and in Scotland and Ireland until the 12^th.