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Monophysites and
Monophysitism
(451 A.D. and 6th century onwards)The history of this sect and of its ramifications has been summarized under EUTYCHIANISM (the nickname somewhat unfairly given by Catholic controversialists). The theology of Monophysitism has also been described under the same heading. Two points are discussed in the following article: first, the literary activity of the Monophysites both in Greek and Syriac; secondly, the question whether they can be exculpated from material heresy in their Christology.
LITERARY
HISTORY
From
many points of view the Monophysites are the most important of early
heresies, and no heresy or related group of heresies until the
sixteenth century has produced so vast and important a literature. A
large portion of this is lost; some remains in manuscript, and of late
years important publications have brought much of this material to the
light of day. Nearly all the Greek literature has perished in its
original form, but much of it survives in early Syriac translations,
and the Syriac literature itself is extant in yet greater amount. The
scientific, philosophical, and grammatical writings of Monophysites
must for the most part be passed over here. Ecclesiastical history and
biography, as well as dogmatic and polemical writings will be described
for the fifth and sixth centuries, together with a few of the chief
works of the centuries immediately following. Dioscurus
has left us but a few fragments. The most important is in the “Hist.
Misc.”, III, i, from a letter written in exile at Gangra, in which
the banished patriarch declares the reality and completeness of our
Lord’s Human Body, intending evidently to deny that he had approved the
refusal of Eutyches to admit Christ’s consubstantiality with us. Timothy
Ælurus (d. 477) who had
been ordained priest by St. Cyril himself, and preserved a profound
attachment to that saint, published an edition of some of his works. He
accompanied Dioscurus to the robber Council of Ephesus in 449, as he
says himself “together with my brother the blessed priest
Anatolius” (the secretary of Dioscurus, promoted by him to the See
of Constantinople). It is not necessary to infer that Timothy and
Anatolius were brothers. When the death in exile of Dioscurus
(September 454) was known, Timothy assumed the leadership of those who
did not acknowledge the orthodox Patriarch Proterius, and demanded a
new bishop. He had with him four or five deprived bishops. The riots
which followed were renewed at the death of the Emperor Marcian, and
Proterius was murdered. Even before this, Timothy had been consecrated
patriarch by two bishops. Eusebius of Pelsium and the famous Peter the
Iberian, Bishop of Maïuma, the latter not even an Egyptian. At
Constantinople Anatolius was scarcely his enemy; the minister Aspar was
probably his friend; but the Emperor Leo certainly desired to acquiesce
in the demands for Timothy’s deposition addressed to him by the
orthodox bishops of Egypt and by Pope St. Leo, and he punished the
murderers of Proterius at once. Meanwhile Ælurus was expelling from
their sees all bishops who accepted the Council of Chalcedon. it was
not, however, till Anatolius was dead (3 July, 458) and had been
succeeded by St. Gennadius, that the Emperor put into effect the
opinion he had elicited from all the bishops of the East in the “Encyclia”,
by exiling Ælurus first to Gangrus in Paphlagonia, and then in 460 to
the Cheronesus. During the reign of Basilicus he was restored, at the
end of 475, and Zeno spared his old age from molestation. Under
EUTYCHIANISM
something has been said of his theology, and more will be found below.
Of his works a fragment on the Two Natures, is in Migne (P.G., LXXXVI,
273). The unpublished Syriac collection of his works (in British Mus.,
MS. Addit. 12156, sixth cent.) contains
A translation
into Latin of patristic testimonies collected by Ælurus was made by
Gennadius Massil, and is to be identified with the Armenian collection.
A Coptic list of Timothy’s works mentions one on the Canticle of
Canticles. The “Plerophoria” (33, 36) speak of his book of “Narrations”, from which Crum (p. 71) deduces an
ecclesiastical history by Timothy in twelve books. Lebon does not
accept the attribution to Timothy of the Coptic fragments by which Crum
established the existence of such a work, but he finds (p. 110) another
reference to a historical work by the patriarch in MS. Addit. 14602
(Chabot, “Documenta”, 225 sqq.). Peter
Mongus of Alexandria was
not a writer. His letters in Coptic are not genuine; though a complete
Armenian text of them has been published, which is said to be more
probably authentic. Peter Fullo of Alexandria similarly left no
writings. Letter addressed to him exist, but are certainly spurious. Timothy
IV, Patriarch of
Alexandria (517-535), composed “Antirrhetica” in many books.
This polemical work of his was lost; but a homily of his remains and a
few fragments. Theodosius, Patriarch of Alexandria (10-11 February,
535, and again July, 535- 537 or 538) has left us a few fragments and
two letters. The Severians of Alexandria were called Theodosians after
him, to distinguish them from the Gaianites who followed his
Incorruptibilist rival Gaianus. The latter left no writings. Severus:
The most famous and the most fertile of all the Monophysite writers was
Severus, who was Patriarch of Antioch (512- 518), and died in 538. We
have his early life written by his friend Zacharias Scholasticus; a
complete biography was composed soon after his death by John, the
superior of the monastery where Severus had first embraced the monastic
life. he was born at Sozopolis in Pisidia, his father being a senator
of the city, and descended from the Bishop of Sozopolis who had
attended the Council of Ephesus in 431. After his father’s death he was
sent to study rhetoric at Alexandria, being yet a catechumen, as it was
the custom in Pisidia to delay baptism until a beard should appear.
Zacharias, who was his fellow-student, testifies to his brilliant
talents and the great progress he made in the study of rhetoric. He was
enthusiastic over the ancient orators, and also over Libanius.
Zacharias induced him to read the correspondence of Libanius with St.
Basil, and the works of the latter and of St. Gregory of Nazianzus, and
he was conquered by the power of Christian oratory. Severus went to
study law at Berytus about the autumn of 486, and he was followed
thither by Zacharias a year later. Severus was alter accused of having
been in youth a worshiper of idols and a dealer in magical arts (so the
libellus of the Palestinian monks at the council of 536), and Zacharias
is at pains to refute this calumny indirectly, though at great length,
by relating interesting stories of the discovery of a hoard of idols in
Menuthis in Egypt and of the routing of necromancers and enchanters at
Berytus; in both these exploits the friends of Severus took a leading
part, and Zacharias asks triumphantly whether they would have consorted
with Severus had he not agreed with them in the hatred of paganism and
sorcery. Zacharias continued to influence him, by his own account, and
induced him to devote the free time which the students had at their
disposal on Saturday afternoons and Sundays to the study of the
Fathers. Other students joined the pious company of which an ascetic
student named Evagrius became leader, and every evening they prayed
together in the Church of the Resurrection. Severus was persuaded to be
baptized. Zacharias refused to be his godfather, for he declared that
he did not communicate with the bishops of Phoenicia, so Evagrius stood
sponsor, and Severus was baptized in the church of the martyr, Leontius,
at Tripolis. After
his baptism Severus renounced the use of baths and betook himself to
fasting and vigils. Two of his companions departed to become monks
under Peter the Iberian. When the news of the death of that famous monk
(488) arrived, Zacharias and several others entered his monastery of
Beith-Aphthonia, at the native place of Zacharias, the port of Gaza
(known also as Maïuma), where Peter had been bishop. Zacharias did not
persevere, but returned to the practice of the law. Severus intended to
practise in his own country, but he first visited the shrine of St.
Leontius of Tripolis, the head of St. John Baptist at Emea, and then
the holy places of Jerusalem, with the result that he joined Evagrius
who was already a monk at Maïuma, the great austerities there did not
suffice for Severus, and he preferred the life of a solitary in the
desert of Eleutheropolis. Having reduced himself to great weakness he
was obliged to pass some time in the monastery founded by Romanus,
after which he returned to the laura of the port of Gaza, in which was
the convent of Peter the Iberian. Here he spent what his charities had
left of his patrimony in building a monastery for the ascetics who
wished to live under his direction. His quiet was rudely disturbed by
Nephalius, a former leader of the Acephali, who was said to have once
had 30,000 monks ready to march on Alexandria when, at the end of 482,
Peter Mongus accepted the Henoticon and became patriarch. Later on
Nephalius joined the more moderate Monophysites, and finally the
Catholics, accepting the council of Chalcedon. About 507-8 he came to
Maïuma, preached against Severus, and obtained the expulsion of the
monks from their convents. Severus betook himself to Constantinople
with 200 monks, and remained there three years, influencing the Emperor
Anastasius as far as he could in the support of the Henoticon, against
the Catholics on the one hand and the irreconcilable Acephali on the
other. He was spoken of as successor to the Patriarch Macedonius who
died in August 511. The new patriarch, Timotheus, entered into the
views of Severus, who returned to his cloister. In the following year
he was consecrated Patriarch of Antioch, 6 November 512, in succession
to Flavian, who was banished by the emperor to Arabia for the
half-heartedness of his concessions to Monophysitism. Elias of
Jerusalem refused to recognized Severus as Patriarch, and many other
bishops were equally hostile. However, at Constantinople and Alexandria
he was supported, and Elias was deposed. Severus exercised a most
active episcopacy, living still like a monk, having destroyed the baths
in his palace, and having dismissed the cooks. He was deposed in
September, 518, on the accession of Justin, as a preparation for
reunion with the West. He fled to Alexandria. In
the reign of Justinian the patronage accorded to the Monophysites by
Theodora raised their hopes. Severus went to Constantinople where he
fraternized with the ascetical Patriarch Anthimus, who had already
exchanged friendly letters with him and with Theodosius of Alexandria.
The latter was deposed for heresy by Pope Agapetus on his arrival in
Constantinople in 536. His successor Mennas held a great council of
sixty-nine bishops in the same year after the pope;s departure in the
presence of the papal legates, solemnly heard the case of Anthimus and
reiterated his deposition. Mennas knew Justinian’s mind as was
determined to be orthodox: “We, as you know”, said he to the
council, “follow and obey the Apostolic See, and those with whom
it communicates we have in our communion, and those whom it condemns,
we condemn.” The Easterns were consequently emboldened to present
petitions against Severus and Peter of Apamea. It is from these
documents that we have our main knowledge of Severus from the point of
view of his orthodox opponents. One petition is from seven bishops of
Syria Secunda, two others are from ninety-seven monasteries of
Palestine and Syria Secunda to the emperor and to the council. Former
petitions of 518 were recited. The charges are somewhat vague (or the
facts are supposed known) of murders, imprisonments, and chains, as
well as of heresy. Mennas pronounced the condemnation of these heretics
for contemning the succession from the Apostles in the Apostolic See,
for setting at nought the patriarchal see of the royal city and its
council, the Apostolic succession from our Lord in the holy places
(Jerusalem), and the sentence of the whole Diocese of Oriens. Severus
retired to Egypt once more and to his eremitical life. He died, 8
February, 538, refusing to take a bath even to save his life, though he
was persuaded to allow himself to be bathed with his clothes on.
Wonders are said to have followed his death, and miracles to have been
worked by his relics. He has always been venerated by the Jacobite
Church as one of its principal doctors. His
literary output was enormous. A long catalogue of works is given by
Assemani. Only a few fragments survive in the original Greek, but a
great quantity exists in Syriac translations, some of which has been
printed. The early works against Nephalius are lost. A dialogue, “Philalethes”,
against the supporters of the Council of Chalcedon was composed during
the first stay of Severus at Constantinople, 509-11. It was a reply to
an orthodox collection of 250 extracts from the works of St. Cyril. An
answer seems to have been written by John the Grammarian of Caesarea,
and Severus retorted with an “Apology for Philalethes”
(remains of the attack and retort in Cod. Vat. Syr. 140 and Cod. Venet.
Marc. 165). A work “Contra Joannem Grammaticum” which had a
great success, and seems to have long been regarded by the Monophysites
as a triumph, was probably written in exile after 519. Severus was not
an original theologian. He had studied the Cappadocians and he depended
much on the Apollinarian forgeries; but in the main he follows St.
Cyril in every point without conscious variation. A
controversy with Sergius the Grammarian, who went too far in his zeal
for the “One Nature”, and whom Severus consequently styles a
Eutychian, is preserved in MS. Addit. 17154. This polemic enabled
Severus to define more precisely the Monophysite position, and to guard
himself against the exaggerations which were liable to result from the
habit of restricting theology to attacks on Chalcedon. In his Egyptian
exile Severus was occupied with his controversy with Julian of
Halicarnassus. We also hear of works on the two natures “against
Felicissimus”, and “Against the Codicils of Alexander”.
Like all Monophysites his theology is limited to the controversial
questions. Beyond these he has no outlook. Of the numerous sermons of
Severus, those which he preached at Antioch are quoted as “Homilae
cathedrales”. They have come down to us in two Syriac
translations; one was probably made by Paul, Bishop of Callinicus, at
the beginning of the sixth century, the other by Jacob Barandai, was
completed in 701. Those which have been printed are of astonishing
eloquence. A diatribe against he Hippodrome may be especially noted,
for it is very modern in its denunciation of the cruelty to the horses
which was involved in the chariot races. A fine exhortation to frequent
communion is in the same sermon. The letters of Severus were collected
in twenty-three books, and numbered no less than 3759. The sixth book
is extant. It contains theological letters besides many proofs of the
varied activities of the patriarch in his episcopal functions. He also
composed hymns for the people of Antioch, since he perceived that they
were fond of singing. His correspondence with Anthimus of
Constantinople is found in “Hist. Misc.”,
IX, xxi-xxii. Julian,
Bishop of Halicarnassus, joined with Severus in the intrigue by which
Macedonius was deposed from the Patriarchate of Constantinople in 511.
He was exiled on the accession of Justin in 518, and retired to the
monastery of Enaton, nine miles from Alexandria. He was already of
advanced age. Here he wrote a work “Against the Diphysites”
in which he spoke incorrectly according to Severus, who nevertheless
did not reply. But Julian himself commenced a correspondence with him
(it is preserved in the Syriac translation made in 528 by Paul of
Callinicus, and also partially in the “Hist. Misc.”, IX,
x-xiv) in which he begged his opinion on the question of the
incorruptibility of the Body of Christ. Severus replied, enclosing an
opinion which is lost, and in answer to a second letter from Julian
wrote a long epistle which Julian considered to be wanting in respect,
especially as he had been obliged to wait for it for a year and a
month. Parties were formed. The Julianists upheld the incorruptibility
of the Body of Christ, meaning that Christ was not naturally subject to
the ordinary wants of hunger, thirst, weariness, etc., nor to pain, but
that He assumed them of His free will for our sakes. They admitted that
He is “consubstantial with us”, against Eutyches, yet they
were accused by the Severians of Eutychianism, Manichaeism, and
Docetism, and were nicknamed Phantasiasts, Aphthartodocetae, or
Incorrupticolae. They retorted by calling the Severians Phthartolotrae
(Corrupticolae), or Ktistolatrae, for Severus taught that our Lord’s
Body was “corruptible” by its own nature; that was scarcely
consistent, as it can only be of itself “corruptible” when
considered apart from the union, and the Monophysites refused to
consider the Human Nature of Christ apart from the union. Justinian,
who in his old age turned more than ever to the desire of conciliating
the Monophysites (in spite of his failure to please them by condemning
the “three chapters”), was probably led to favour Julian
because he was the opponent of Severus, who was universally regarded as
the great foe of orthodoxy. The emperor issued in edict in 565 making
the “incorruptibility” an obligatory doctrine, in spite of
the fact that Julian had been anathematized by a council of
Constantinople in 536, at which date he had probably been dead for some
years. A commentary by Julian on the Book of Job, in a Latin version, was printed in an old Paris edition of Origen (ed. Genebrardus, 1574). A MS. of the original Greek is mentioned by Mai. It is largely quoted in the catena on Job of Nicetas of Heraclea. The great work of Julian against Severus seems to be lost. Ten anathematisms remain. Of his commentaries, one on Matthew is cited by Moses Barkepha (P.G., CXI, 551). It is to be hoped that some of Julian’s works will be recovered in Syriac or Coptic translations. An anti-Julianist catena in the British Museum (MS. Addit. 12155) makes mention of Julian’s writings. We hear of a treatise by him, “Against the Eutychianists and Manichaens”, which shows that Julian, like his great opponent Severus, had to be on his guard against extravagant Monophysites. Part of the treatise which Peter of Callinicus, Patriarch of Antioch (578-591), wrote against the Damianists is extant in Syriac MSS. (See Assemani’s and Wright’s catalogues).
Tritheist
sect
The writers of the Tritheist sect next demand our attention. The chief among them John Philoponus, of Caesarea, was Patriarch of the Tritheists at Alexandria at the beginning of the sixth century, and was the principal writer of his party. He was a grammarian, a philosopher, and an astronomer as well as a theologian. His principal theological work, Diaitetes e peri henoseos, in ten books, is lost. It dealt with the Christological and Trinitarian controversies of his age, and fragments of it are found in Leontius (De sectis, Oct. 5) in St. John Damascene (De haer., I, 101-107, ed. Le Quien) and in Niceph. Call., XCIII (see Mansi, XI, 301). A complete Syriac translation is in Brit. Mus. and Vat. manuscripts. Another lost theological work, peri anastaseos, described the writer’s theory of a creation of new bodies at the general resurrection; it is mentioned by Photius (cod. 21-23), by Timotheus Presbyter and Nicephorus. As a philosopher Philoponus was an Aristotelian, and a disciple of the Aristotelian commentator Ammonius, son of Hermeas. His own commentaries on Aristotle were printed by Aldus at Venice (on “De generatione et interitu”, 1527; “Analytica posteriora”, 1534; “Analytica priora”, 1536; “De nat. auscult.”, I-IV, and “De anima”, 1535; “Meteorologica”, I, 1551; “Metaphysica”, 1583). He also wrote much against the Epicheiremata of Proclus, the last great Neoplatonist: eighteen books on the eternity of the world (Venice, 1535), composed in 529, and peri kosmopoitas (printed by Corderius, Vienna, 1630, and in Gallandi, XII; new ed. by Reichert, 1897), on the Hexaemeron, in which he follows St. Basil and other Fathers, and shows a vast knowledge of all the literature and science accessible in his day. The latter work is dedicated to a certain Sergius, who may perhaps be identified with Sergius the Grammarian, the Eutychianizing correspondent of Severus. The work was possibly written as early as 517 (for 617 in the editions is evidently a clerical error). A “Computatio de Pascha”, printed after this work, argues that the Last Supper was on the 13th of Nizan, and was not a real passover. A lost theological work (entitled tmemata is summarized by Michael the Syrian (Chronicle, II, 69). A book against the Council of Chalcedon is mentioned by Photius (cod. 55). A work “Contra Andream” is preserved in a Syriac manuscript. Another work “Against the Acephali” exists in manuscript, and may be the work Philoponus is known to have written in controversy with Severus. In grammar his master was Romanus, and his extant writings on the subject are based upon the katholike of Herodian (tonika paraggelmata, ed. Dindorf, 1825; peri ton diaphoros tonoumenon, ed. Egenolff, 1880).
This
sixth century Monophysite is to be distinguished from an earlier
grammarian, also called Philoponus, who flourished under Augustus and
Tiberius. Of his life little is known. On account of his Tritheistic
opinions he was summoned to Constantinople by Justinian, but he excused
himself on account of his age and infirmity. He addressed to the
emperor a treatise “De divisione, differentia, et numero”,
which seems to be the same as a treatise spoken of as “De
differentia quae manere creditur in Christo post unionem”; but it
is lost. He addressed an essay on Tritheism to Athanasius Monachus, and
was condemned on this account at Alexandria. At a disputation held by
the emperor’s order before the Patriarch of Constantinople John
Scholasticus, Conon, and Eugenius represented the Tritheists; John
condemned Philoponus, and the emperor issued an edict against the sect
(Photius, cod. 24). In 568 Philoponus was still alive, for he published
a pamphlet against John, which Photius describes with great severity
(cod. 75). The style of Philoponus, he says, is always clear, but
without dignity, and his argumentation is puerile.
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HISTORY
We
now turn to the historians. Zacharias of Gaza, brother of Procopius of
Gaza, the rhetorician, Zacharias Scholasticus, Zacharias the Rhetorician,
Zacharias of Mitylene, are all apparently the same person (so Kugener’s latest
view, Kruger, and Brooks). Of his early life we have a vivid picture in his
memoirs of Severus, with whom he studied at Alexandria and at Berytus. His home
was at the port of Iberian. To the latter he was greatly devoted, and believed
that Peter had prophesied his unfitness for the monastic life. He in fact did
not become a monk, when his friends Evagrius, Severus, and others did so, but
practised law at Constantinople, and reached eminence in his profession. Of his
writings, a dialogue “that the world did not exist from eternity” was
probably composed in youth while he lived at Berytus. His “Ecclesiastical
History” is extant only in a Syriac epitome which forms four books (III-VI)
of the “Historia Miscellanea”. It begins with a short account from a
Monophysite point of view of he Council of Chalcedon, and continues the history,
mainly of Palestine and Alexandria, until the death of Zeno (491). From the same
history is derived a curious statistical description of Rome in “Hist. Misc.”, X, xvi. The very interesting life of Severus carries the
author’s
recollections up to the accession of his hero to the See of Antioch in 512. It
was written subsequently to the history, as the cubicularius Eupraxius,
to whom that work was dedicated, was already dead. His recollections of Peter
the Iberian and of Theodore, Bishop of Antinoe, are lost, but his biography of
Isaias, an Egyptian ascetic, is preserved in Syriac. A disputation against the
Manichaeans, published by Cardinal Pitra in Greek, was probably written after
the edict of Justinian against the Manichaeans in 527. He seems to have been
still a layman. Up to the time he wrote the life of Severus he was a follower of
the Henoticon; this was the easy course under Zeno and Anastasius. It would seem
that he found it paid to revert to orthodoxy under Justin and Justinian, for he
was present as Bishop of Mitylene at the Council of Mennas at Constantinople in
536, where he was one of the three metropolitans who were sent to summon
Anthimus to appear. His name does not appear in the incomplete printed list of
subscriptions to that patriarch’s deposition, but Labbe testifies that it is
found in some MSS. (Mansi, VIII, 975); it is absent from the condemnation of
Severus in a later session. Zacharias was dead before the ecumenical council of
553. An
important historical work in anecdotal form in the “Plerophoria” of John
of Maïuma, composed about 515; it contains stories of Monophysite worthies
up to date, especially of Peter the Iberian, whose life was also written by
Zacharias, but is now lost. A later life of Peter has been printed, which
contains curious information about the Iberian princes from whom the Monophysite
bishop descended. The life of the ascetic Isaias by Zacharias accompanies it.
The interesting “Historia Miscellanea”, often referred to as Pseudo-Zacharias, was composed in Syriac in twelve books by an unknown author who seems to have lived at Amida. Though the work was completed in 569, he seems to have used part of the history of John of Ephesus, which was finished only in 571. Certain parts were written earlier (or are borrowed from older writers), VII, xv before 523; X, xii in 545; XII, vii in 555; XII, iv in 561. The first book contains a quantity of legendary matter form Greek sources which are still extant; a few words are added on the Syriac doctors Isaac and Dodo. Book II has the story of the Seven Sleepers. History begins in II, ii, with an account of Eutyches, and the letter of Proclus to the Armenians follows. The next four books are an epitome of the lost work of Zacharias Rhetor. The seventh book continues the story from the accession of Anastasius (491), and together with general ecclesiastical history it combines some interesting details of wars with the Persians in Mesopotamia.
A
curious chapter gives the Prologue of Moro, or Mara, Bishop of Amida (a Syriac
writer whose works appear to have been lost), to his edition of the four Gospels
in Greek, to which the writers appends as a curiosity the pericope of the
woman taken in adultery (John, viii) which Moro had inserted in the 89th canon; “it is not founded in other MSS.” Book VIII, iii, gives the letter of
Simeon of Beit-Arsham on the martyrs of Yemen, perhaps an apocryphal document.
Book XI is lost, with most of X and XII. Some of X has been restored by Brooks
from the “Chronicle” of Michael the Syrian (died 1199). It is
necessary to mention the “Chronicle of Edessa”, from 495 to 506, which
is embedded in the “chronicle” attributed to Joshua the Stylite
(who seems to have been a Catholic); this latter is included in the second book
of the “Chronicle” attributed to the Patriarch of Antioch, Dionysius
of Tell-Mahre, a compilation which has a fourth book (from the end of the
sixth century to 775) which is an original work by the compiler, who was in
reality a monk of Zonkenin (north of Amida), possibly Joshua the Stylite
himself.
Some
small chronicles of the sixth, seventh, eighth, and ninth centuries have been
published as “Chronica minora” in the “Corpus Script. Or.”
Of later histories, those of Bar Hebraeus (died 1286) must be noted. His “Chronicon Syriacum” is an abridgment of Michael with a continuation;
the “Chronicon ecclesiasticum” contains the ecclesiastical history
first of Western Syria and then of Eastern Syria, with lives of the patriarchs
of Antioch, of the Jacobite missionary bishops (called maphrians) and of
the Nestorian patriarchs. The “Chronicle” of Elias of Nisibis
to 1008 is important because it mentions its sources, but it is very defective
in the early period through the loss of some pages of the manuscript. Masil
the Cilician and John of \Ægea are counted as Monophysite writers by
Ehrhard (in Krumbacher, p. 53), but Photius clearly makes them out Nestorians
(cod. 41, 55, 107), and it is by a slip that he conjectures Basil to be the
author of a work against Nestorius.
Syriac
Writers
Of
the Syriac Monophysite writers none is more important than Philoxenus,
otherwise Xenaias, who was Bishop of Mabug (Hierapolis) from 485. For his
life and the version of Scripture which was made by his order, see PHILOXENUS.
His dogmatic writings alone concern us here. His letter to the Emperor Zeno,
published by Vaschalde (1902) is of 485, the date of his episcopal consecration
and of his acceptance of the Henoticon. His treatises on the Incarnation date
perhaps before 500; to the same period belong two short works, “A
Confession of Faith” and “Against Every Nestorian”. He wrote also
on the Trinity. A letter to Marco, lector of Anazarbus, is attributed to
515-518. After he had been exiled by Justin to Philippolis in Thrace in 518, he
attacked the orthodox patriarch, Paul of Antioch, in a letter to the monks of
Teleda, and wrote another letter of which fragments are found in MS. Addit.
14533, in which he argues that it is sometimes wise to admit baptisms and
ordinations by heretics for the sake of peace; the question of sacramental
validity does not seem to have occurred to him. Fragments of his commentaries on
the Gospel are found in MSS. Thirteen homilies on religious life have been
published by Budge. They scarcely touch upon dogma. Of his three liturgies two
are given by Renaudot. Out of the great mass of his works in MS. at Rome, Paris,
Oxford, Cambridge, London, only a fraction has been published. He was an eager
controversialist, a scholar, and an accomplished writer. His Syriac style is
much admired. His sect had no more energetic leader until Jacob Baradaeus
himself. He was president of the synod which elevated Severus to the See of
Antioch, and he had been the chief agent in the extrusion of Flavian. He was an
energetic foe of Catholicism, and his works stand next in importance to those of
Severus as witnesses to the tenets of their party. He was exiled by Justin in
519 to Philippolis and then to Gangra, where he died of suffocation by smoke in
the room in which he was confined.
James
of Sarugh(451-521) became
periodeutes, or visitor, of Haura in that district about 505, and bishop of its
capital, Batnan, in 519. Nearly all his numerous writings are metrical. We are
told that seventy amanuenses were employed to copy his 760 metrical homilies,
which are in Wright’s opinion more readable than those of Ephraem or Isaac of
Antioch. A good many have been published at various times. In the Vatican are
233 in MSS., in London 140, in Paris, 100. They are much cited in the Syriac
Liturgy, and a liturgy and baptismal rite are ascribed to him. Numerous letters
of his are extant in Brit. Mus., MSS. Addit. 14587 and 17163. Though his feast
is kept by Maronites and even by some Nestorians, there is no doubt that he
accepted the Henoticon, and was afterwards in relation with the leading
Monophysites, rejecting the Council of Chalcedon to the end of his life. Stephen
bar Soudaili was an Edessene Monophysite who fell into Pantheism and Origenism.
He was attacked by Philoxenus and James of Sarugh, and retired to Jerusalem. The
confession of faith of John of Tella (483-538; bishop, 519-521) is
extant, and so is his commentary on the Trisagion, and his canons for the clergy
and replies to the questions of the priest Sergius-all in MSS. in the British
Museum. The great James Baradaeus, the eponymous hero of the Jacobites,
who supplied bishops and clergy for the Monophysites when they were definitively
divided from the Eastern Catholics in 543, wrote but little; a liturgy, a few
letters, a sermon, and a confession of faith are extant. Of Syriac translators
it is not necessary to speak, nor is there need to treat of the Monophysite
scientist Sergius of Reschaina, the writer on philosophy, Ahoudemmeh, and many
others.
John
of Ephesus, called also John of
Asia, was a Syrian of Amida, where he became a deacon in 529. On account of
the persecution of his sect he departed, and was made administrator of the
temporal affairs of the Monophysites in Constantinople by Justinian, who sent
him in the following year as a missionary bishop to the pagans of Asia Minor. He
relates of himself that he converted 60,000, and had 96 churches built. He
returned to the capital in 546, to destroy idol worship there also. But on the
death of Justinian he suffered a continual persecution, which he described in
his “History”, as an excuse for its confusion and repetitions. What
remains of that work is of great value as a contemporary record. The style is
florid and full of Greek expressions. The lives of blessed Easterns were put
together by John about 565-566, and have been published by Land. They include
great men like Severus, Baradaeus Theodosius, etc. George,
bishop of the Arabians (b. about 640; d. 724) was one of the chief writers of
the Assyrian Jacobites. He was a personal follower of James of Edessa, whose
poem on the Hexameron he completed after the death of James in 708. In this work
he teaches the Apocatastasis, or restoration of all things, including the
destruction of hell, which so many Greek Fathers learned from Origen. George was
born in the Tehouma in the Diocese of Antioch, and was ordained bishop of the
wandering Arabs in November, 686; his see was at Akoula. He was a man of
considerable learning. His translation, with introduction and commentary, of
part of the “Organon” of Aristotle (“Catagories”, “De
Interpretatione”, and “Prior Analytics”) is extant (Brit. Mus.,
MS. Addit. 14659), as is the collection he made of scholia on St. Gregory
of Nazianzus, and an explanation of the three Sacraments (Baptism, Holy
Communion, and consecration of chrism, following Pseudo-Dionysius). His letters
of 714 till 718 are extant in the same MS. as this last work (Brit. Mus., MS.
Addit. 12154). They deal with many things; astronomical, exegetical, liturgical
questions, explanations of Greek proverbs and fables, dogma and polemics, and
contain historical matter about Aphraates and Gregory the Illuminator. His poems
included one in dodecasyllables on the unpromising subject of the calculations
of movable feasts and the correction of the solar and lunar cycles, another on
the monastic life, and two on the consecration of the holy chrism. His works are
important for our knowledge of Syriac Church and literature. His reading was
vast, including the chief Greek Fathers, with whom he classes Severus and
Pseudo-Dionysius the Areopagite; he knows the Pseudo-Clementines and Josephus,
and of Syriac writers he knows Bardesanes, Aphraates, and St. Ephraem. His
correspondence is addressed to literary monks of his sect. The canons attributed
to George in the “Nomocanon” of Bar Hebraeus are apparently extracts
from his writings reduced to the form of canons.
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ORTHODOXY
Were
the Monophysites really heretics or were they only schismatics? This
question was answered in the affirmative by Assemani, more recently by the
Oriental scholar Nau, and last of all by Lebon, who has devoted an
important work, full of evidence from unpublished sources, to the
establishment of this thesis. It is urged that the Monophysites taught
that there is but one Nature of Christ, mia physis, because they
identify the words physis and hypostasis. But in just the
same way the Nestorians have lately been justified. A simple scheme will
make the matter plain: Nestorians:
One person, two hypostases, two natures. It
is urged by Bethune-Baker that Nestorius and his friends took the word
hypostasis in the sense of nature, and by Lebon that the Monophysites took
nature in the sense of hypostasis, so that both parties really intended
the Catholic doctrine. There is a prima facie argument against both
these pleas. Granted that for centuries controversialists full of odium
theologicum might misunderstand one another and fight about words
while agreeing as to the underlying doctrines, yet it remains that the
words person, hypostasis, nature (prosopon, hypostasis, physis) had
received in the second half of the fourth century a perfectly definite
meaning, as to which the whole Church was at one. All agreed that in the
Holy Trinity there is one Nature (physia or physis) having
three Hypostases of Persons. If in Christology the Nestorians used hypostasis
and the Monophysites physis in a new sense, not only does it follow
that their use of words was singularly inconsistent and inexcusable, but
(what is far more important) that they can have had no difficulty in
seeing what was the true meaning of Catholic councils, popes, and
theologians, who consistently used the words in one and the same sense
with regard both to the Trinity and the Incarnation. There would be every
excuse for Catholics if they misunderstood such a strange “derangement of epitaphs” on the part of the schismatics, but
the schismatics must have easily grasped the Catholic position. As a fact
the Antiochene party had no difficulty in coming to terms with St. Leo;
they understood him well enough, and declared that they had always meant
what he meant. How far this was a fact must be discussed under NESTORIANISM.
But the Monophysites always withstood the Catholic doctrine, declaring it
to be Nestorian, or half Nestorian, and that it divided Christ into two. Lebon
urges that Severus himself more than once explains that there is a
difference in the use of words in “theology” (doctrine of the
Trinity) and in “the economy” (Incarnation): “admittedly
hypostasis and ousia or physis are not the same in theology;
however, in the economy they are the same” (P.G., LXXXVI, 1921), and
he alleges the example of Gregory of Nazianzus to show that in a new
mystery the terms must take new significations. But surely these very
passages make it evident that Severus distinguished between physis
and hypostasis. Putting aside the Trinity and the Incarnation,
every physis is a hypostasis, and every hypostasis is
a physis -- in this statement all Catholics and Monophysites agree.
But this means that the denotation of the words is the same, not that
there is no difference of connotation. Physis is an abstraction,
and cannot exist except as a concrete, that is to say, as a hypostasis.
But “admittedly” in the Trinity the denotation as well as the
connotation of the words is diverse, it is still true that each of the
three Hypostases is identified with the Divine Nature (that is, each
Person is God); but if each Hypostasis is therefore still a physis
(the one physis) yet the physis is not one by three
Hypostases. The words retain their old sense (connotation) yet have
received a new sense in a new relation. It is obvious that this is the
phenomenon to which Severus referred. Catholics would add that in the
Incarnation conversely two natures are one hypostasis. Thus the meanings
of physis (abstract=ousia) and hypostasis (subsistent
physis, physis hyphestosa or enhypostatos) in the Holy
Trinity were a common possession; and all agreed further that in the
created universe there cannot exist a nature which does not subsist,
there is no such thing as a physis anhypostatos.
Yet
the Monophysites were far from being Apollinarians, still less were they
Arians; they were careful from the beginning that Christ is perfect Man,
and that He assumed a complete Human Nature like ours. Dioscurus is
emphatic on this point in his letter to Secundinus (Hist. Misc., III, i)
and with need, since he had acquitted Eutyches who had denied our Lord’s
“consubstantiality with us”. Ælurus is just as clear in the
letters by which he refuted and excommunicated Isaias of Hermopolis and
Theophilus as “Eutychians” (hist. Misc., IV, xii), and Severus
had an acute controversy with Sergius the Grammarian on this very point.
They al declared with one voice that Christ is mia physis, but ek
duo physeon, that His Divine Nature is combined with a complete Human
Nature in one hypostasis, and hence the two have become together the One
Nature of that one hypostasis, howbeit without mixture or confusion or
diminution. Ælurus insists that after union the properties of each nature
remain unchanged; but they spoke of “the divine and human
things”, divina et humana, not natures; each nature remains in its
natural state with its own characteristics (en idioteti te kata physin)
yet not as a unity but as a part, a quality (poiotes physike), nor
as a physis. All the qualities of the two natures are combined into
one hypostasis synthetos and form the one nature of that one
hypostasis. So far there is no heresy in intention, but only a wrong
definition: that one hypostasis can have only one nature. But
however harmless the formula “one nature” might look at first
sight, it led in fact immediately to serious and disastrous consequences.
The Divine Nature of the Word is not merely specifically but numerically
one with the Divine Nature of the Son and the Holy Ghost. This is the
meaning of the word homoousios applied to the Three Persons, and if
Harnack were right in supposing that at the Council of Constantinople in
384 the word was taken to imply only three Persons of one species, then
that Council accepted three Gods, and not three distinct but inseparable
Persons in one God. Now if the Divine and Human Natures are united in the
Word into one Nature, it is impossible to avoid one of two conclusions,
either that the whole Divine Nature became man and suffered and died, or
else that each of the three Persons had a Divine Nature of His own. In
fact the Monophysites split upon this question. Ælurus and Severus seem
to have avoided the difficulty, but it was not long before those who
refused the latter alternative were taunted with the necessity of
embracing the former, and were nicknamed Theopaschites, as making God to
suffer. Vehemently Severus and his school declared that they made the
Divinity to suffer not as God, but only as man; but this was insufficient
as a reply. Their formula was not “The Word made flesh”, “the Son of God made man”, but
“one Nature of the Word made
flesh”;-the Nature became flesh, that is the whole Divine Nature.
They did not reply: “we mean hypostasis when we say nature, we do not
mean the Divine Nature (which the Word has in common with the Father and
the Holy Ghost) but His Divine Person, which in the present case we call
His physis”, for the physis tou Theou Logou, before the
word sesarkomene has been added, is in the sphere of “theology” not of
“the economy”, and its signification
could not be doubted. Just
as there were many “Eutychians” among the Monophysites who
denied that Christ is consubstantial with us, so there were found many to
embrace boldly the paradox that the Divine Nature has become incarnate.
Peter Fullo added to the praise of the Trinity the words “who was
crucified for us”, and refused to allow the natural inference to be
explained away. Stephen Niobes and the Niobites expressly denied all
distinction between the Human and the Divine Natures after the union. The
Actistetae declared that the Human Nature became “uncreated” by
the union. If the greatest theologians of the sect, Severus and Philoxenus,
avoided these excesses, it was by a refusal to be logically Monophysite. It
was not only the orthodox who were scandalized by these extreme views. An
influential and very learned section of the schism rebelled, and chose the
second of the two alternatives — that of making the Divine Nature
threefold, in order to ensure that the Human Nature in Christ was made one
with the Nature of the Son alone and not with the whole Divine Nature.
John Philoponus, the Aristotelian commentator, therefore taught that there
are in the Trinity three partial substances (merikai ousiai) and
one common substance (mia koine), thus falling into Polytheism,
with three, or rather four gods. This Tritheistic party was treated with
leniency. It split into sections. Though they were excommunicated at
Alexandria, the Patriarch Damian held a view not far different. He so
distinguished between the Divine ousia and the three Hypostases
which partake (metechousin) in it, that he conceded the ousia
to be existent of Itself (enyparktos), and his followers were
nicknamed Tetradatites. Thus Peter Fullo, the Actistetae, and the Niobites
on the one hand, and the Tritheists and Damianists on the other, developed
the Monophysite formulae in the only two possible directions. It is
obvious that formulae which involved such alternatives were heretical in
fact as well as in origin. Severus tried to be orthodox, but at the
expense of consistency. His “corruptibilist” view is true
enough, if the Human Nature is considered in the abstract apart from the
union (see EUTYCHIANISM),
but to consider it thus as an entity was certainly an admission of the Two
Natures. All change and suffering in Christ must be (as the Julianists and
Justinian rightly saw) strictly voluntary, in so far as the union gives to
the Sacred Humanity a right and claim to beatification and (in a sense) to
deification. But Severus was willing to divide the Natures not merely “before” the union (that is, logically previous to it) but even
after the union “theoretically”, and he went so far in his
controversy with the orthodox John the Grammarian as to concede duo
physeis en theoria. This was indeed an immense concession, but
considering how much more orthodox were the intentions of Severus than his
words, it is scarcely astonishing, for St. Cyril had conceded much more.
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In P.G. there are more fragments than complete writings.
Important collections are ASSEMANI, Bibliotheca Orientalis (Rome,
1719-28); CHABOT and others, Corp. Script. Christ. Orient., Script. Syri;
GRAFFIN and NAU, Patrologia Orient. (1905-, in progress); also DE LAGARDE,
Analecta Syriaca (Leipzig, 1858); LAND, Anecdota Syriaca (Leyden, 1870).
For the very numerous Monophysite writings contained in Syriac MSS. see
especially the following catalogues: ASSEMANI, Bibl. Medicaeae
Laurentianae et Palatinae MS. Orient. catal. (Florence, 1742); IDEM, Bibl.
Apost. Vatic. catal., part I, vol. II-III (Rome, 1758-9); WRIGHT, Catal.
of the Syriac MS. in the Brit. Mus. acquired since 1838 (London, 1870-2);
WRIGHT AND COOK, Catal. of Syriac MSS. of the Univ. of Cambridge
(Cambridge, 1901); SACHAU, Handschrift- Verzeichnisse der K. Bibl. zu
Berlin, XXIII, Syrische MSS. (Berlin, 1899), etc. On the literature in
general see ASSEMANI, op. cit., II, Dissertatio de Monophysitis: GIESELER,
Commentatio qua Monophysitarum veterum errores ex corum scriptis recends
editis illustrantur (Gottingen, 1835-8); WRIGHT, Syriac literature (Encyclop.
Brit., 9th ed., 1887; published separately as A Short History of Syriac
Lit., London, 1894); DUBAL, La litterature Syriaque (3rd ed., Paris,
1907); many excellent articles by KRUEGER in Realencyclopadie. On TIMOTHY ÆLURUS see CRUM, Eusebius and Coptic Church Hist. in Proc. of Soc. of Bibl. Arch. (London, 1902); TER-MEKERTTSCHIAN and TER-MINASSIANTZ, Tim. AElurus’ des Patriarchen von Alexandrien, Widerlegung der auf der Synode zu Chalcedon festgesetzten Lehre, Armenian text (Leipzig, 1908); LEBON, La Christologie de Tim. Ælure in Revue d’hist. ecc. (Oct. 1908); IDEM, Le Monophysisme severien (Louvain, 1909), 93-111. For French tr. of the letters of PETER FULLO se REVILLOUT in Revue des Questions Hist., XXII (1877), 83, and (in Coptic and French) AMELINEAU, Mon pour servir a l’hist. de l’Egypte chret. (Paris, 18888); the Armenian text in ISMEREANZ, The book of Letters, Armenian only (Tiflis, 1901); the letters to Peter Mongus are in Mansi, VII, 1109 sqq.; in favour of their genuineness see PAGI’s notes to BARONIUS, ad ann. 485, No. 15; against, VALESIUS, Observ. eccles., 4 (in his edition of EVAGRIUS, Paris, 1673; P.G., LXXXVI), and TILLEMONT, XVI. Greek fragments from the homilies of TIMOTHY IV in Cosmas Indicopleustes (P.G., LXXXVII), an entire homily in MAI, Script. vet. nova coll., V (1831), and P.G. LXXXVI. Fragments of THEODOSIUS in Cosmas (ibid.), and of letters to Severus in P.G., LXXXVI; se also Mansi, X, 1117 and 1121. A letter from Theodosius to Severus and one to Anthimus in Hist. Misc., IX, 24, 26. On SEVERUS see ASSEMANI; KRUGER in Realencycl. s.v.; VENABLES in Dict. Christ. Biog.; SPANUTH, Zacharias Rhetor, Das Leben des Severus (Syr. text, Gottingen, 1893); lives by ZACHARIAS and JOHN OF BEITH-APHTHONIA, followed by a collection of documents concerning Severus, edited by KUGENER in Patrol. Orient., II; The Conflict of Severus, by ATHANASIUS, Ethiopic text with English transl., ed. by GOODSPEED, together with Coptic fragments of the same work, edited by CRUM, in Patrol. Orient., III; DUVAL, Homelies cathedrales de Severe, 52-7, Syriac and French, in Patr. Orient., II; BROOKS, Sixth book of select letters of Severus in the Syriac version of Athanasius of Nisibis (Text and Transl. Soc., London, 1904); EUSTRATIOS, Seuneos ho Monophysites (Leipzig, 1894); PEISKER, Severus von Antiochien, ein Kritischer Quellenbetrag zur Geschichte des Monophysismus (Halle, 1903); and especially LEBON, Le Monophysisme severien, largely founded on the study of unpublished Syriac MSS. in the Brit. Mus. (Louvain, 1909). On JULIAN see FABRICIUS, CAVE, GIESELER, DORNER, HARNACK; also DAVIDS in Dict. Christ. Biog. (1882); KRUGER in Realencycl. (1901); LIETZMANN, Catenen (Freiburg, 1897); IDEM, Aus Julian von Hal. in Rheinisch. Mus., LV (1900), 321. ON JOHN PHILOPONUS see CAVE, FABRICIUS, ASSEMANI, DORNER, etc.; SCHARFENBERG, Dissert. de Joanne Philop. (Leipzig, 1768); DAVIDS in Dict. Christ. Biog.; NAUCK in Allgemeine Encycl.; STOCKL in Kirchenlex., s.v. Joannes Philoponus; GASS and MEYER in Realencyckl.; RITTER, Gesch. der Philos., VI; KRUMBACHER, Gesch. der byz. Litt. (2nd ed., 1897), 53 and 581, etc.; LUDWICH, De Joanne Philopono grammatico (Konigsberg, 1888-9). On ZACHARIAS see KUGENER, La compilation historique de Ps.-Zach. le rheteur in Revue de l’Orient Chret., V (1900), 201; IDEM, Observations sur la vie de l’ascete Isaie et sur les vies de Pierre l’Iv. et de Theodore d’Antinoe par Zach. le Schol. in Byzant. Zeitschr., IX (1900), 464; in these articles KUGENER distinguishes the Rhetor from the Scholastic, whom he identifies with the bishop; but he has changed his mind acc. to KRUGER, Zach. Schol., in Realencycl. (1908). See also below under Historia Miscellanea. The Plerophoria of JOHN OF MAIUMA are preserved in an abridgement in the Chronicle of MICHAEL SYR. A French translation by NAU, Les Plerophories de Jean, eveque de Maiouma in Revue de l’Orient chret. (1898-9, and separately, Paris, 1899). The life of PETER THE IBERIAN, RAABE, Petrus der Iberer (Leipzig, 1895); BROOKS, Vitae virorum apud Monophysitas celeberrimorum in Corp. Script. Orient., Script. Syri, 3rd series, 25, including the life of Isaias, which is also in LAND, III (Paris, 1907); a Georgian version of the biography publ. by MARR (St. Petersburg, 1896); KUGENER in Byzant. Zeitschr., IX (Leipzig, 1900), 464; CHABOT, Pierre l’Iberien d’apres une recente publication in Revue de l’Orient latin, III (1895), 3. The Historia Miscellanea of PSEUDO-ZACHARIAS was published by LAND, loc. cit., III, in Syriac; German tr. by AHRENS and KUGLER, Die sogennante Kirchengeschichte von Zach. Rh. (Leipzig, 1899); HAMILTON and BROOKS, The Syriac chronicle known as that of Zach. of Mitylene (London, 1899, English only); See KUGENER, op. cit. For MICHAEL THE SYRIAN, CHABOT, Chronique de Michel le Syrien (Paris, 1901-2, in progress). THere is an abridged Latin translation of the Chronicle of JOSHUA in ASSEMANI, loc. cit., I, 262-283; Syriac and French by MARTIN, Chronique de Josue le St. in Abhandlungen fur die kunde des Morgenlandes, VI (Leipzig, 1876), 1; in Syriac and English by WRIGHT, The Chronicle of J. the St. (Cambridge, 1882); Syriac and Latin (Chronicle of Edessa only) in Corpus Script. Orient., Chronica minora (Paris, 1902); HALLIER, Untersuchungen uber die Edessenische Chreonik in Texte und Unters., IX (Leipzig, 1892), 1; NAU in Bulletin critique, 25 Jan., 1897; IDEM, Analyse des parties inedites de la chronique attribuee a Denys de Tell-mahre in Suppl. to Revue de l’Orient chret. (1897); TULLBERG, Dionysii Tellmahrensis chronici lib. I (Upsala, 1851); CHABOT, Chronique de Denys de T., quatreme partie (Paris, 1895); BEDJAN, Barhebraei Chronicon syriacum (with Latin tr., Paris, 1890); ABBELOOS and LAMY, Barhebraei Chron. eccles. (With Latin tr., Louvain, 1872-7); LAMY, Elie de Misibe, sa chronologie (earlier portion, with French tr., Brussels, 1888). On PHILOXENUS see ASSEMANI, WRIGHT, DUVAL; KRUGER’s good article in Realencycl.; BUDGE, The Discourses of Philoxenus, Bishop of Mabbogh, Syriac and English, with introduction containing many short dogmatic writings, and a list of the works of Philoxenus, in vol. 2 (London, 1894); VASCHALDE, Three letters of Philoxenus Bishop of M., Syr. and Eng. (Rome, 1902); IDEM, Philoxeni Mabbugensis tractatus de Trinitate et Incarnatione in Corpus Script. Or., Scriptores Syri, XXVII (Paris and Rome, 1907); DUVAL, Hist. politique, religieuse et litteraire d’Edesse (Paris, 1892); GUIDI, La lettera de Filosseno ai Monaci di Tell Adda in Mem. dell’ Acad. dei Lincei (1886); see especially LEBON, op. cit., 111-118, and passim. On JAMES OF SARUG see ABBELOOS, De vita et scriptis S. Jacobi (with three ancient Syriac biographies, Louvain, 1867); ASSEMANI, WRIGHT, DUVAL, loc. cit.; Acta SS., 29 Oct.; BARDENHEWER in Kirchenlex.; NESTLE in Realencycl.; MARTIN, Un eveque poete au xxx et xxxx siecles in Revue des Sciences eccl. (Oct., Nov., 1876); IDEM, Correspondance de Jacques de Saroug avec les moines de Mar Bassus in Zeitschr. der deutschen Morganlandl. Gesellsch., XXX (1876), 217; Liturgy in Latin in RENAUDOT, Liturg. Or. coll., II, 356; ZINGERLR, Sechs homilien des h. Jacob von S. (Bonn, 1867); BEDJAN, 70 Homiliae selectae Mar Jacobi S. (Paris and Leipzig, 1905-6); single homilies are found in various publications; several in CURETON, Ancient Syriac Documents (1864). FROTHINGHAM, Stephen Bar Sudaili, the Syrian mystic, and the book of Hierotheos (Leyden, 1886). On JOHN OF TELLA, KLEYN, Het leven van Johannes van Tella (Leyden, 1882); another life in BROOKS, Vitae virorum, loc. cit.; his confession of faith is cited by LEBON, loc. cit. On GEORGE THE ARABIAN see ASSEMANI, WRIGHT, DUVAL, a good article by RYSSEL in Realencycl. (1899); IDEM, Ein Brief Georgs, Bischop der Ar. an den Presb. Josua aus dem Syrischen ubersetzt and erlautert, mit einer Einleitung uber sein Leben und seine Schriften (Gotha, 1888); IDEM, Georges des Araberbischofs Gedichte und Briefe (Leipzig, 1891), this work gives a German translation of all George’s authentic works, apart from the commentaries; Syriac of the letter to Josua in LAGARDE, Analecta; part of poem on chrism in CARDAHI, Liber thesauri de arte poetica Syrorum (1875); the whole, with that on the monastic life, ed. by RYSSEL in Atti della R. Acad. dei Lincei, IX (Rome, 1892), 1, who edited the astronomical letters also, ibi d., VIII, 1. On the question of orthodoxy, see ASSEMANI, II; NAU, Dans quelle mesure les Jacobites sont-ils Monophysites? in Revue de L’Orient chretien, 1905, no. 2, p. 113; LEBON, op. cit., passim. Compiled by John Chapman
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Arianism - through the centuries
Arius’ doctrines have been reinforced by numerous attempts by other Theologians’, Bishops’ and an Archbishop’s attempts to argue along similar grounds resulting the heresies of Apollinarianism (Apollinarius: c310 - c390), Nestorianism (428 A.D. - 14th Century), Monophysitism (451 A.D., 6th century onwards, see also Eutychianism), Monothelitism (681 A.D. onwards) and most recently in 18th century Britain when there was a strong Arian movement especially within the Church of England; its leading exponents, William Whiston and Samuel Clarke, were among the prominent scientists of the day and disciples of Sir Isaac Newton in both their scientific and their theological views. Accepting scripture as embodying divinely give truth, but interpreting it not so mush with the aid of tradition as with that of the reason, characteristic of the emerging scientific age, they found themselves impelled in a broadly Arian direction. A further examination of some of the key principles of the modern Arian Catholic Tradition can be viewed by clicking on: Arian Catholic Lore & Philosophy ...
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