A Source Book for Ancient Church History Part 59

XI. If any one shall not confess that the flesh of the Lord is life-giving, and belongs to the Word of G.o.d the Father as His very own, but shall pretend that it belongs to another who is united to Him according to worthiness, and who has served as only a dwelling for the Divinity; and shall not rather confess that that flesh is life-giving, as we say, because it has been made the possession of the Word who is able to give life to all; let him be anathema.

XII. If any one shall not confess that the Word of G.o.d suffered in the flesh, and that He was crucified in the flesh, and that likewise He tasted death in the flesh, and that He is become the first-born from the dead [Col. 1:18], for as G.o.d He is the life and life-giving; let him be anathema.

(_b_) Council of Ephesus, A. D. 431. _Condemnation of Nestorius_. Mansi, IV, 1211.

The text may also be found in Hefele, 134, under the First Session of the Council.

The holy synod says: Since in addition to other things the impious Nestorius has not obeyed our Citation and did not receive the most holy and G.o.d-fearing bishops who were sent to him by us, we were compelled to proceed to the examination of his impieties. And, discovering from his letters and treatises and from the discourses recently delivered by him in this metropolis, which have been testified to, that he has held and published impious doctrines, and being compelled thereto by the canons and by the letter of our most holy father and fellow-servant Celestine, the Roman bishop, we have come, with many tears, to this sorrowful sentence against him: Our Lord Jesus Christ whom he has blasphemed, decrees through the present most holy synod that Nestorius be excluded from the episcopal dignity and from all priestly communion.

(_c_) Council of Ephesus, A. D. 431, _Ep. ad Celestinum_. Mansi, IV, 1330-1338.

The letter is very long and gives an almost complete history of the council. It may be found complete in PNF, _loc. cit._, p. 237.

It is of special importance in connection with the Pelagian controversy, as it states that the Council of Ephesus had confirmed the Western deposition of the Pelagians.

The letters were read which were written to him [Nestorius] by the most holy and reverend bishop of the church of Alexandria, Cyril, which the holy synod approved as being orthodox and without fault, and in no point out of agreement, either with the divinely inspired Scriptures, or with the faith handed down and set forth in the great synod by the holy Fathers who were a.s.sembled some time ago at Nica, as your holiness, also rightly having examined this, has given witness.

When there had been read in the holy synod what had been done touching the deposition of the irreligious Pelagians and Celestinians, of Celestius, Pelagius, Julia.n.u.s, Prsidius, Florus, Marcellinus, and Orontius, and those inclined to like errors, we also deemed it right that the determinations of your holiness concerning them should stand strong and firm. And we all were of the same mind, holding them deposed.

(_d_) Council of Ephesus, A. D. 431, _Canons_, Bruns, I, 24.

The text may be found also in Hefele, 141.

Whereas it is needful that they who were detained from the holy synod and remained in their own district or city for any reason, ecclesiastical or personal, should not be ignorant of the matters which were decreed by the synod; we therefore notify your holiness and charity that

I. If any metropolitan of a province, forsaking the holy and ec.u.menical synod, has joined the a.s.sembly of apostasy [the council under John of Antioch], or shall join the same hereafter; or if he has adopted, or shall adopt, the doctrines of Celestius,(185) he has no power in any way to do anything in opposition to the bishops of the province because he is already cast forth by the synod from all ecclesiastical communion, and is without authority; but he shall be subjected to the same bishops of the province and to the neighboring bishops who hold the orthodox doctrines, to be degraded completely from his episcopal rank.

II. If any provincial bishops were not present at the holy synod, and have joined or attempted to join the apostasy; or if, after subscribing to the deposition of Nestorius, they went back to the a.s.sembly of apostasy, these, according to the decree of the holy synod, are to be deposed completely from the priesthood and degraded from their rank.

(_e_) Council of Ephesus, A. D. 431, _Manifesto of John of Antioch and his council against Cyril and his council_. Mansi, IV, 1271.

The holy synod a.s.sembled in Ephesus, by the grace of G.o.d and at the command of the pious emperors, declares: We should indeed have wished to be able to hold a synod in peace, according to the canons of the holy Fathers and the letters of our most pious and Christ-loving emperors; but because you held a separate a.s.sembly from a heretical, insolent, and obstinate disposition, although, according to the letters of our most pious emperors, we were in the neighborhood, and because you have filled both the city and the holy synod with every sort of confusion, in order to prevent the examination of points agreeing with the Apollinarian, Arian, and Eunomian heresies and impieties, and have not waited for the arrival of the most religious bishops summoned from all regions by our pious emperors, and when the most magnificent Count Candidia.n.u.s warned you and admonished you in writing and verbally that you should not hear such a matter, but await the common judgment of all the most holy bishops; therefore know thou, O Cyril, bishop of Alexandria, and thou, O Memnon, bishop of this city, that ye are dismissed and deposed from all sacerdotal functions as the originators and leaders of all this disorder and lawlessness, and those who have violated the canons of the Fathers and the imperial decrees. And all ye others who seditiously and wickedly, and contrary to all ecclesiastical sanctions and the royal decrees, gave your consent are excommunicated until you acknowledge your fault and reform and accept anew the faith set forth by the holy Fathers at Nica, adding to it nothing foreign or different, and until ye anathematize the heretical propositions of Cyril, which are plainly repugnant to evangelical and apostolic doctrine, and in all things comply with the letters of our most pious and Christ-loving emperors, who require a peaceful and accurate consideration of the dogma.

(_f_) Creed of Antioch A. D. 433. Hahn, 170.

This creed was probably composed by Theodoret of Cyrus, and was sent by Count Johannes to the Emperor Theodosius in 431 as expressing the teaching of the Antiochian party. The bitterest period of the Nestorian controversy was after the council which is commonly regarded as having settled it. The Antiochians and the Alexandrians attacked each other vigorously. At last, in 433, John, bishop of Antioch, sent the creed given below to Cyril of Alexandria, who signed it. The creed expresses accurately the position of Nestorius. In this way a union was patched up between the contending parties. But the irreconcilable Nestorians left the Church permanently. This creed in the form in which it had been presented to the Emperor was at the beginning and the end worded somewhat differently, _cf._ Hahn, _loc. cit._, note.

We therefore acknowledge our Lord Jesus Christ, the Son of G.o.d, the only begotten, complete G.o.d and complete man, of a rational soul and body; begotten of the Father before the ages according to His G.o.dhead, but in the last days for us and for our salvation, of the Virgin Mary, according to the manhood; that He is of the same nature as the Father according to His G.o.dhead, and of the same nature with us according to His manhood; for a union of the two natures has been made; therefore we confess one Christ, one Son, one Lord. According to this conception of the unconfused union, we confess that the holy Virgin is Theotokos, because G.o.d the Word was made flesh and became man, and from her conception united with Himself the temple received from her. We recognize the evangelical and apostolic utterances concerning the Lord, making common, as in one person, the divine and the human characteristics, but distinguis.h.i.+ng them as in two natures; and teaching that the G.o.dlike traits are according to the G.o.dhead of Christ, and the humble traits according to His manhood.

90. The Eutychian Controversy and the Council of Chalcedon A. D. 451

What is known as the Eutychian controversy is less a dogmatic controversy than a struggle between the patriarchs of the East for supremacy, using party theological differences as a support. Few pa.s.sages in the history of the Church are more painful. The union made in 433 between the Antiochian and Alexandrian parties lasted fifteen years, or until after the death of those who entered into it. At Antioch Domnus became bishop in 442, at Alexandria Dioscurus in 444, and at Constantinople Flavian in 446. Early in 448 Dioscurus, who aimed at the domination of the East, began to attack the Antiochians as Nestorians. In this he was supported at Constantinople by Chrysaphius, the all-powerful minister of the weak Theodosius II, and the archimandrite Eutyches, the G.o.dfather of the minister. Eusebius of Dorylum thereupon accused Eutyches, who held the Alexandrian position in an extreme form, of being heretical on the doctrine of the Incarnation.

Eutyches was condemned by Flavian at an endemic synod [_cf._ DCA, I. 474].

November 22, 448. Both Eutyches and Flavian [_cf._ Leo the Great, _Ep._ 21, 22] thereupon turned to Leo, bishop of Rome. Leo, abandoning the traditional Roman alliance with Alexandria, on which Dioscurus had counted, supported Flavian, sending him June 13, 449, a dogmatic epistle (the _Tome, Ep._ 28) defining, in the terms of Western theology, the point at issue. A synod was now called by Theodosius at Ephesus, August, 449, in which Dioscurus with the support of the court triumphed. Eutyches was restored, and the leaders of the Antiochian party, Flavian, Eusebius, Ibas, Theodoret, and others deposed. Flavian [_cf._ Kirch, nn. 804 _ff._], Eusebius, and Theodoret appealed to Leo, who vigorously denounced the synod as a council of robbers (Latrocinium Ephesinum). At the same time the situation at the court, upon which Dioscurus depended, was completely changed by the fall of Chrysaphius and the death of Theodosius. Pulcheria, his sister, and Marcian, her husband, succeeded to the throne, both adherents of the Antiochian party, and opposed to the ecclesiastical aspirations of Dioscurus. A new synod was now called by Marcian at Chalcedon, a suburb of Constantinople. Dioscurus was deposed, as well as Eutyches, but Ibas and Theodoret were restored after an examination of their teaching. A definition was drawn up in harmony with the _Tome_ of Leo. It was a triumph for Leo, which was somewhat lessened by the pa.s.sage of canon 28, based upon the third canon of Constantinople, A. D. 381, a council which was henceforth recognized as the Second General Council.

Leo refused to approve this canon, which remained in force in the East and was renewed at the Quinis.e.xt Council A. D. 692.

Additional source material: W. Bright, _Select Sermons of S. Leo the Great on the Incarnation; with his twenty-eighth Epistle called the ____Tome___, Second ed., London, 1886; Percival, _The Seven Ec.u.menical Councils_ (PNF); Evagrius, _Hist. Ec._, II, 1-5, 18, Eng. trans., London, 1846 (also in Bohns _Ecclesiastical Library_); also much material in Hefele, 170-208.

(_a_) Council of Constantinople, A. D. 448, _Acts_. Mansi, VI, 741 _ff._

The position of Eutyches and his condemnation.

Inasmuch as Eutyches was no theologian and no man of letters, he has left no worked-out statement of his position. What he taught can be gathered only from the acts of the Council of Constantinople A. D. 448. These were incorporated in the acts of the Council of Ephesus, A. D. 449, and as his friends were there they may be regarded as trustworthy. The acts of the Council of Ephesus, A. D. 449 were read in the Council of Chalcedon, A. D.

451, and in this way the matter is known.

The following pa.s.sages are taken from the seventh sitting of the Council of Constantinople, November 22, 448.

Archbishop Flavian said: Do you confess that the one and the same Son, our Lord Jesus Christ, is consubstantial with His Father as to His divinity, and consubstantial with His mother as to His humanity?

Eutyches said: When I intrusted myself to your holiness I said that you should not ask me further what I thought concerning the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost.

The archbishop said: Do you confess Christ to be of two natures?

Eutyches said: I have never yet presumed to speculate concerning the nature of my G.o.d, the Lord of heaven and earth; I confess that I have never said that He is consubstantial with us. Up to the present day I have not said that the body of our Lord and G.o.d was consubstantial with us; I confess that the holy Virgin is consubstantial with us, and that of her our G.o.d was incarnate.

Florentius, the patrician, said: Since the mother is consubstantial with us, doubtless the Son is consubstantial with us.

Eutyches said: I have not said, you will notice, that the body of a man became the body of G.o.d, but the body was human, and the Lord was incarnate of the Virgin. If you wish that I should add to this that His body is consubstantial with us, I will do this; but I do not understand the term consubstantial in such a way that I do not deny that he is the Son of G.o.d.

Formerly I spoke in general not of a consubstantiality according to the flesh; now I will do so, because your Holiness demands it.

Florentius said: Do you or do you not confess that our Lord, who is of the Virgin, is consubstantial and of two natures after the incarnation?

Eutyches said: I confess that our Lord was of two natures before the union [_i.e._, the union of divinity and humanity in the incarnation], but after the union one nature. I follow the teaching of the blessed Cyril and the holy Fathers and the holy Athanasius, because they speak of two natures before the union, but after the union and incarnation they speak not of two natures but of one nature.

Condemnation of Eutyches.