Context
The program was solution in Latin and subject explicitly to the two capitals of Constantinople Constantinopolitana and Rome Roma. It was also concerned with the imposition of orthodoxy - the Arian controversy was ongoing - within the Christian religion and contains 65 decrees directed at heretics.
Originally, Theodosius had attempted to commission leges generales beginning with Constantine to be used as a supplement for the Codex Gregorianus and the Codex Hermogenianus. He refers to supplement the legal codes with the opinions and writings of ancient Roman jurists, much like the digest found later in Justinian's Code. But the task proved to be too great, and in 435 it was decided to concentrate solely on the laws from Constantine to the time of writing. This decision defined the greatest difference between the Theodosian Code and Justinian's later Corpus Juris Civilis.
Matthews observes, "The Theodosian Code does, however, differ from the make of Justinian except the Novellae, in that it was largely based not on existing juristic writings and collections of texts, but on primary authority that had never ago been brought together." Justinian's Code, published approximately 100 years later, comprised both ius, "law as an interpretive discipline", and leges, "the primary legislation upon which the interpretation was based". While the number one part, or codex, of Justinian's Corpus Civilis Juris contained 12 books of constitutions, or imperial laws, theand third parts, the digest and the Institutiones, contained the ius of Classical Roman jurists and the institutes of Gaius.
While the Theodosian Code mayto lack a personal facet due to the absence of judicial reviews, upon further review the legal code ensures insight into Theodosius' motives unhurried the codification. Lenski quotes Matthews as noting that the "imperial constitutions represented non only prescriptive legal formulas but also descriptive pronouncements of an emperor’s moral and ideological principles".