dore was never arraigned by any of the orthodox. But in a letter to Nestorius (ib. x. 2) John begs him to retract, urging the example of Theodore, who, when in a sermon at Antioch he had said something which gave great and manifest offence, for the sake of peace and to avoid scandal, after a few days as publicly corrected himself. Leontius tells us (Migne, lxxxvi. 1363) that the cause of offence was a denial to the Blessed Virgin of the title θεοτόκος. So great was the storm that the people threatened to stone the preacher (Cyril. Alex. Ep. 69; Migne, lxxvii. 340). The heretical sects attacked by Theodore shewed their resentment in a way less overt, but perhaps more formidable. They tampered with his writings, hoping thus to involve him in heterodox statements (Facund. x. 1).
Theodore's last years were perplexed by a new controversy. When in 418 the Pelagian leaders were deposed and exiled from the West, they sought in the East the sympathy of the chief living representative of the school of Antioch. The fact is recorded by Marius Mercator, who makes the most of it (Praef. ad Symb. Theod. Mop. 72). With Theodore they probably remained till 422, when Julian returned to Italy. Julian's visit was doubtless the occasion upon which Theodore wrote his book Against the Defenders of Original Sin. Mercator charges Theodore with having turned against Julian as soon as the latter had left Mopsuestia, and anathematized him in a provincial synod (op. cit. 3). The synod can hardly be a fabrication, since Mercator was a contemporary writer; but it was very possibly convened, as Fritzsche suggests, without any special reference to the Pelagian question. If Theodore then read his ecthesis, the anathema with which that ends might have been represented outside the council as a synodical condemnation of the Pelagian chiefs. Mercator's words, in fact, point to this explanation.
A greater heresiarch than Julian visited Mopsuestia in the last year of Theodore's life. It is stated by Evagrius (H. E. i. 2; Migne, lxxxvi. 2425) that Nestorius, on his way from Antioch to Constantinople (a.d. 428), took counsel with Theodore and received from him the seeds of heresy which he shortly afterwards scattered with such disastrous results. Evagrius makes this statement on the authority of one Theodulus, a person otherwise unknown. We may safely reject it, so far as it derives the Christology of Nestorius from this single interview. The germ of the Nestorian doctrine was in the teaching of Diodore and in the earliest works of Theodore; it could not have been new to Nestorius, as a prominent teacher of the church of Antioch.
Towards the close of 428 (Theodoret, H. E. v. 39) Theodore died, worn out by 50 years (Facund. ii. 2) of literary and pastoral toil, at the age of 78, having been all his life engaged in controversy, and more than once in conflict with the popular notions of orthodoxy; yet he departed, as Facundus (ii. 1) triumphantly points out, in the peace of the church and at the height of a great reputation. The storm was gathering, but did not break till he was gone.
II. Posthumous History.—The popularity of Theodore was increased by his death. Meletius, his successor at Mopsuestia, protested that his life would have been in danger if he had uttered a word against his predecessor (Tillem. Mém. xii. p. 442). "We believe as Theodore believed; long live the faith of Theodore!" was a cry often heard in the churches of the East (Cyril. Alex. Ep. 69). "We had rather be burnt than condemn Theodore," was the reply of the bishops of Syria to the party eager for his condemnation (Ep. 72). The flame was fed by leading men who had been disciples of the Interpreter: by Theodoret, who regarded him as a "doctor of the universal church " (H. E. v. 39); by Ibas of Edessa, who in 433 wrote his famous letter to Maris in praise of Theodore; by John, who in 429 succeeded to the see of Antioch. Yet Theodore's ashes were scarcely cold when in other quarters men began to hold him up to obloquy. As early perhaps as 431 Marius Mercator denounced him as the real author of the Pelagian heresy (Lib. subnot. in verba Juliani, praef; Migne, Patr. Lat. xlviii. 110); and not long afterwards prefaced his translation of Theodore's ecthesis with a still more violent attack on him as the precursor of Nestorianism (ib. pp. 208, 1046, 1048). The council of Ephesus, however, while it condemned Nestorius by name, contented itself with condemning Theodore's creed without mentioning Theodore; and the Nestorian party consequently fell back upon the words of Theodore, and began to circulate them in several languages as affording the best available exposition of their views (Liberat. Brev. 10). This circumstance deepened the mistrust of the orthodox, and even in the East there were not wanting some who proceeded to condemn the teaching of Theodore. Hesychius of Jerusalem, about 435, attacked him in his Ecclesiastical History; Rabbûlas, bp. of Edessa, who at Ephesus had sided with John of Antioch, now publicly anathematized Theodore (Ibas, Ep. ad Marin.). Proclus demanded from the bishops of Syria a condemnation of certain propositions supposed to have been drawn from the writings of Theodore. Cyril, who had once spoken favourably of some of Theodore's works (Facund. viii. 6), now under the influence of Rabbûlas took a decided attitude of opposition; he wrote to the synod of Antioch (Ep. 67) that the opinions of Diodore, Theodore, and others of the same schools had "borne down with full sail upon the glory of Christ"; to the emperor (Ep. 71), that Diodore and Theodore were the parents of the blasphemy of Nestorius; to Proclus (Ep. 72), that had Theodore been still alive and openly approved of the teaching of Nestorius, he ought undoubtedly to have been anathematized; but as he was dead, it was enough to condemn the errors of his books, having regard to the terrible disturbances more extreme measures would excite in the East. He collected and answered a series of propositions gathered from the writings of Diodore and Theodore (Migne, xxvi. 1438 seq.), a work to which Theodoret replied shortly afterwards. The ferment then subsided for a time, but the disciples of Theodore, repulsed in the West, pushed their way from Eastern Syria to Persia. Ibas, who succeeded Rabbûlas in 435, restored the school of Edessa,
