JSRG
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Pope John VIII (I think) condemned it as heretical in a letter and called a local council to excommunicate anyone who used it in the Creed.
I looked into this. There is a letter attributed to Pope John VIII to Photius which has often been interpreted as being a statement that the filioque is heretical. However, this is disputed on two grounds.
The first is the question of whether it actually condemns the filioque heretical at all. The key statement seems to be this one:
"But, I think your wise Holiness well knows how difficult it is to change immediately a custom, which has been entrenched for so many years. Therefore, we believe the best policy is not to force anyone to abandon that addition to the Creed. But rather we must act with wisdom and moderation, urging them little by little to give up that blasphemy."
The usage of "blasphemy" is the key point here. However, is it saying that the filioque--the statement that the Holy Spirit proceeds from the Father and the Son--is blasphemy, or it is saying (with perhaps some rhetorical flourish) that the changing of the Creed is blasphemy?
The other question is whether this letter is authentic to begin with, as it has been questioned. For example, Francis Dvornik discusses it in his 1948 work "The Photian Schism" (pages 197-198) and notes "the fact that the existence of this letter was never referred to either by Photius or by any of the Greek polemists before the fourteenth century" and that it uses phrases that would have been extremely odd for John VIII to use ("the particular passage in which the writer compares the initiators of the innovation to Judas certainly did not issue from the Pontifical Chancellery"). In some fairness he gives possible reasons for them to not use the letter during that time period even if they knew of it, but still ultimately concludes the letter is either completely fictitious or heavily altered.
On the other hand, Richard Haugh in his work "Photius and the Carolingians" (1975) discusses the matter on pages 128-130 (the translation I offered is taken from that work) and, while not apparently concluding for certain the letter is real, asserts some things in it would be very odd for a later forger to invent and that it is largely consistent with what we know of the situation. It does, however, seem to take the interpretation that the "blasphemy" was changing the Creed, not the theology behind the filioque, as it asserts "Pope John's position is the same as that of Pope Leo III" (see below for Leo III).
So I can't really weigh in on the subject of whether it's real or not; there's too much stuff I'd need to do a lot more research on to try to have an informed opinion. But there are definitely some questions on whether it's real and, if real, whether it was saying the Holy Spirit proceeding from the Son was in itself heretical or whether it was just objecting to the Creed adjustment. To try to see what the most recent scholarship states I looked at "The filioque: history of a doctrinal controversy" from 2010, but it didn't mention the letter at all.
You don't specify which pope is in view here, but @CantorSeraphim helpfully mentioned it's Pope Leo III. It is true that Leo III put up the Creed in silver in the Vatican in Latin and Greek without the filioque. However, it's certain he didn't do so to show it's heretical, because he agreed with the filioque in terms of theology.another Pope put up the Creed in silver in the Vatican in Latin and Greek without the filioque to show it’s heretical.
In a letter to the Eastern churches, he says "we are sending you this Creed of the Orthodox Faith so that you and everyone may hold the correct and inviolate faith according to the Holy Roman Catholic and Apostolic Church." He then goes on to say "The Holy Spirit proceeds equally from the Father and the Son and is consubstantial and co-eternal with the Father and the Son. The Father is fully God in himself, the Son born of the Father is fully God. The Holy Spirit, proceeding from the Father and the Son, is fully God..." (translation from Haugh's book noted above on page 68, it's also quoted in "The filioque: history of a doctrinal controversy" (2010) by Anthony Siecienski on page 97)
It is fairly obvious that Leo III was not condemning as heretical a belief he declared to be "the correct and inviolate faith according to the Holy Roman Catholic and Apostolic Church"! Now, Leo III does appear to have been opposed to changing the Nicene Creed to include the filioque (at least when read in churches). But this opposition clearly didn't come from any belief it was heretical.
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