jection of Christianity, or to a purer Christianity than that which Ebionism favoured.
The Patristic notices on the Ebionites will be found in the works referred to (cf. on their value, R. A. Lipsius, Die Quellen d. ältesten Ketzergeschichte, 1875). The literature on the subject is further collected by (int. al.) Schliemann, Die Clementinen (1844); Ritschl, Die Entstehung d. alt-katholischen Kirche (1857); Lightfoot, Galatians, Dissertation III. St. Paul and the Three (1876).
[J.M.F.]
Edesius (3) shared the romantic fortunes of his brother Frumentius, the first bp. of Auxumis (Axum), in the 4th cent. The biographical details at our disposal consist of a lengthy narrative, introduced, on the authority of Edesius, by Rufinus into his Ecclesiastical History (lib. i. 9). This narrative has been copied, with slight deviations, by Socrates (H. E. i. 19), Sozomen (ii. 24), and Theodoret (i. 23, 24). Cf. also Baronius (Ann. 327, viii. ix. x.). Frumentius and Edesius, the young relatives of Meropius, a Syrian philosopher (merchant), accompanied him on a voyage of adventure to India. On their return to Phoenicia by way of the Red Sea, they landed "at a certain port," where there was "a safe haven," and there suffered from the barbarous assault of the "Indians," who murdered all the ship's company except the two youths, who were conveyed as prizes to the king. He appointed Frumentius and Edesius as his treasurer and cup-bearer respectively. By their means Christianity was introduced among "the Indians." Their names in Ethiopian documents given by Ludolf (Hist. Eth. iii. 2) are Fremonatos and Sydvacus (cf. Gesenius, Aethiop. Kirche in Ersch and Gruber, and Hoffmann in Herzog's Encyc.). The word "India" is used with the same indefiniteness as are Ethiopia and Libya elsewhere. From the times of Aristotle to those of Eratosthenes and of Hipparchus, India and Africa were believed to unite at some unknown point S. of the Indian Ocean (Dict. Anc. Geogr. vol. ii. p. 45, art. "India"; Pliny, vi. 22-24). These "Indians" were Abyssinians, as we see from the subsequent career of Frumentius. The king, according to Ludolf's Ethiopian Codex, was called Abreha, and on drawing near his end, offered their liberty to the two youths. The queen-mother earnestly besought them to remain, to undertake the education of the young prince Erazanes, and to assist her in the regency during his minority. They consented, and lost no opportunity of diffusing a knowledge of Christ. They sought out Christian merchants trading in the country, gathered Christian disciples, and built houses of prayer, "that worship might be offered, and the Roman ecclesiastical routine observed" (Soz. l.c.). They were not in orders, and Frumentius went to Alexandria and asked for a bishop to be sent to Abyssinia. Athanasius consecrated Frumentius himself. Edesius remained at Tyre and became a presbyter of the church there, where Rufinus met him.
[H.R.R.]
Elagabalus. The short reign of this feeble and profligate emperor, though not coming into direct contact with the history of the Christian church, is not without interest as a phase of the religious condition of the empire.
Varius Avitus Bassianus, as he was named at his birth, was of Phoenician descent, and born at Emesa, in Syria, c. a.d. 205. His mother, Julia Soëmia, and aunt, Julia Mammaea, were devoted to the worship of El-gabal (=God the Creator, or, according to less probable etymology, God of the Mountains), and he and his cousin Alexander Severus were in early childhood consecrated as priests of that deity, and the young Bassianus took the name of the god to whom he ministered.
Julia Mammaea had eclectic tendencies, and by her invitation the great Origen came to Antioch (probably, however, after the death of Elagabalus), and was received with many marks of honour. Eusebius, who relates the fact (H. E. vi. 21), speaks of her as a woman of exceptional piety (γυνὴ θεοσεβεστάτη εἰ καὶ τις ἄλλη γεγονυία), and we may trace her influence in the character of her son Alexander Severus. [Severus (2).] After spending some time at Nicomedia, where he entered on his second consulship, Elagabalus proceeded in a.d. 219 (the year in which Callistus succeeded Zephyrinus as bp. of Rome) to the capital. His short reign there was a frenzy of idolatrous impurity. His jealousy and suspicion led him to imprison Alexander Severus, whose virtue attracted the admiration both of soldiers and people, and whom, at his mother's advice, he had adopted and proclaimed as Caesar soon after arriving in Rome. The troops rose and rescued their favourite. The two sisters, each with her son, appeared at the head of their supporters, and the followers of Severus were victorious. Soëmia and the boy-emperor were thrown into the Tiber (hence the epithet Tiberinus afterwards attached to him in derision), and the senate branded his name with eternal infamy. Dio. Cass. lxxvii. 30-41, lxxix.; Herodian, v. 4-23; Lamprid. Elagab.; Capitolin. Macrinus; Eutrop. viii. 13; Aurel. Victor, de Caes. xxiii., Epit. xxiii.)
[E.H.P.]
Elesbaan, a king, hermit, and saint of Ethiopia during the 6th cent. (Rome, Oct. 27; Ethiopia, Ginbot, xx. May 15; cf. Ludolphus, p. 415), whose exact story is difficult to trace. (Cf. Ludolphus, History of Ethiopia, ed. 1684, p. 167; Lebeau, Histoire du Bas Empire, ed. 1827 viii. 47, note 4; Walch, in Novi Commentarii Soc. Reg. Göttingen. t. iv.; Historia Rerum in Homeritide Saec. vi. Gestarum, p. 4.) The importance of the crusades on which his fame rests is attested by Gibbon, who asserts that, had their purpose been attained, "Mahomet must have been crushed in his cradle, and Abyssinia would have prevented a revolution which has changed the civil and religious state of the world" (Decline and Fall, c. xlii. sub fin.). The details of the saint's wars and character are drawn from the Acta S. Arethae, extant in two forms: the earlier and more authentic, found by Lequien in the Colbert Library (Oriens Christianus, ii. 428), is referred by the Jesuit author of the Acta Sanctorum to the 7th cent. at latest; the later is, at best, but the recension of Simeon Metaphrastes, in the 10th cent.
It was probably during the later years of Anastasius's reign that Elesbaan succeeded his father Tazena on the throne of Ethiopia. His kingdom was greatly dependent for its
