power and the promptings of a tyrannous self-will. The brutal treatment of Flavian, which he practically sanctioned, in which perhaps he personally took part, has made his memory specially odious; and his name is conspicuous among the "violent men" of church history. [Monophysitism.]
[W.B.]
Dioscorus (4), the eldest of four Nitrian monks, Dioscorus, Ammonius, Eusebius, and Euthymius, known from their stature as the "Tall Brethren," who became conspicuous in Chrysostom's early troubles. They were reluctantly induced by Theophilus, patriarch of Alexandria, to leave the desert and to submit to ordination. Eusebius and Euthymius became presbyters, and Dioscorus was consecrated bp. of Hermopolis. Weary of city life and uncongenial duties, and shocked by the avarice and other vices of Theophilus, Dioscorus and his brethren returned to their solitudes, though the indignant patriarch tried to deter them by violent menaces (Socr. H. E. viii. 12). As depositaries of dangerous secrets, they had become formidable to Theophilus, who resolved to wreak vengeance upon them. On the pretext of their adherence to the mystic views of Origen on the Person of the Deity, and their decided opposition to Anthropomorphism, which Theophilus had originally shared with them, Theophilus had them ejected from their monasteries and treated them with the utmost contumely and violence when they went to Alexandria to appeal (Pallad. p. 54). Having procured their condemnation at a packed synod at Alexandria, a.d. 401, Theophilus personally headed a night attack on their monastery, which was burnt and pillaged, and Dioscorus himself treated with violence and indignity (ib. p. 57). Driven from Egypt, the "Tall Brethren" took refuge in Palestine, but later resolved to appeal for protection to the emperor and to Chrysostom in person. Chrysostom manifested much sympathy, but contented himself with writing to Theophilus, urging his reconciliation with them. Theophilus's only reply was an angry remonstrance against his harbouring heretics and interfering with another see. He sent emissaries to Constantinople to denounce the brethren as magicians, heretics, and rebels. The monks then announced their intention of appealing to the secular power for a judicial investigation of the charges against them, and demanded that Theophilus should be summoned to answer for his conduct before a council. The superstitious reverence of the empress Eudoxia, all-powerful with the feeble Arcadius, secured them their desire, and Theophilus was ordered to appear at Constantinople. This appeal to the civil authority displeased Chrysostom, who declined to interfere further in the controversy. For the manner in which Theophilus turned the tables on Chrysostom, becoming the accuser instead of the accused, and securing his deposition, see Chrysostom; Theophilus (8). His main object having been accomplished in the overthrow of his great rival, Theophilus now made no difficulty about reconciliation with the Nitrian monks, who he publicly restored to communion on their simple petition. Dioscorus and Ammonius had, however, died not long before. Socr. H. E. vi. 16; Soz. H. E. viii. 17; Pallad. p. 157.
[E.V.]
Docetism, the very early heresy that our blessed Lord had a body like ours, only in appearance, not in reality. St. Jerome scarcely exaggerates when he says (adv. Lucif. 23): "While the apostles were still surviving, while Christ's blood was still fresh in Judea, the Lord's body was asserted to be but a phantasm." Apart from N.T. passages, e.g. Eph. ii. 9, Heb. ii. 14, which confute this assertion, but do not bear clear marks of having been written with a controversial purpose, it appears from I. John iv. 2, II. John 7, that when these epistles were written there were teachers, stigmatised by the writer as prompted by the spirit of Antichrist, who denied that Jesus Christ had come in the flesh, a form of expression implying a Docetic theory. Those who held that evil resulted from the inherent fault of matter found it impossible to believe that the Saviour could be Himself under the dominion of that evil from which He came to deliver men, and they therefore rejected the Church's doctrine of a real union of the divine and human natures in the person of our Lord, but our Lord's pre-existence and superhuman nature was regarded as so essential a part of Christianity that with two exceptions, or perhaps even only one (i.e. Justinus and perhaps Carpocrates), all the sects known as Gnostic ascribed to the Saviour a superhuman nature, some however separating the personality of that nature from His human personality, others reducing our Lord's earthly part to mere appearance. It is even doubtful whether we are not to understand in a technical sense the statement that he taught that "power" from the Father had descended on our Lord; that is to say, whether it was not his doctrine that one of the heavenly powers had united itself to the man Jesus. Teaching of this kind is unequivocally attributed to Cerinthus, whose other doctrines, as reported by Irenaeus, have great resemblance to those of Carpocrates. It is in opposition to the theory which makes our Lord's claim to be Christ date, not from his birth, but from some later period, that Irenaeus (iii. 16) uses the argument, shewing his belief in the inspiration of the gospels, that Matthew might have said, "the birth of Jesus was in this wise," but that the Holy Spirit, foreseeing and guarding against the depravation of the truth, said by Matthew "the birth of Christ was on this wise." Baur (Christliche Gnosis, p. 258) makes Docetism common to all the Gnostics, holding that the theory which has just been described is in a certain sense Docetic; inasmuch as while holding Jesus to be a real man, visibly active in the work of redemption, it teaches that this is but deceptive appearance, the work being actually performed by a distinct personality, Christ. But it is more usual and more natural to use the word Docetism only with reference to those other theories which refuse to acknowledge the true manhood of the Redeemer. For example, we are told (Iren. i. 23) that, according to the system of Simon, the Redeemer (who, however, is not Jesus,[1] but Simon himself)
- ↑ Perhaps it is not correct to say "not Jesus," for Simon held a theory of the transmigration of souls, and may have claimed to be identical with Jesus. If this were so, however, he must have been later than the Simon of the Acts.
