school” in the city had done much to inculcate on his pupils the doctrines of Theodore of Mopsuestia. But the feeling against the Nestorian party grew in strength, till on the death of Ibas in 457 the leading Nestorian teachers were driven out of Edessa. The Persian school continued to exist for another 32 years, but was finally closed and destroyed by order of the emperor Zeno in 489. The Nestorian teachers then started a great school at Nisībis (which had been under Persian rule since Jovian's humiliating treaty of 363). By the energetic efforts of Barṣāumā, bishop of that city, practically the whole church of Persia was won over to the Nestorian creed. Western Syria, on the contrary, had partaken with Alexandria in the reaction from Nestorianism which finally crystallized in the Monophysite doctrine, that spread so widely through Egypt and Western Asia towards the end of the 5th century.
At the beginning of this century one of the most able and influential men in the Syriac-speaking church was Mārūthā, bishop of Maiperḳaṭ or Martyropolis. Without entering on the details of his ecclesiastical activity,[1] we may note that he was twice associated with embassies from the Roman emperor to Yazdegerd I. (399-420); that along with Isaac, patriarch of Seleucia (390-410), he obtained from the Persian monarch a concordat which secured a period of religious toleration; and that he arranged for and presided at the Council of Seleucia in 410, which adopted the full Nicene creed and organized the hierarchy of the Persian Church. As a writer he is chiefly known as the reputed author of a collection of martyrologies which cover the reigns of Sapor II., Yazdegerd I. and Bahram V.[2] By his history of the Council of Nicaea he made a great contribution to the education of the Persian Church in the development of Christian doctrine.
Rabbūlā, the powerful and energetic bishop of Edessa who withstood the beginnings of Nestorianism, and who gave currency to the Peshitta text of the four Gospels, abolishing the use of the Diatessaron, is dealt with in a separate article.
The next bishop of Edessa, Ibas, who succeeded in 435 at the death of Rabbūlā, proved himself a follower of the Nestorian doctrine (see above). As a teacher in the Persian school of Edessa he had translated, probably with the help of his pupils, certain works of “the Interpreter,” i.e. Theodore of Mopsuestia. Among these may have been the commentary on St John of which the complete Syriac version was published by Chabot in 1897. He may possibly have translated a work of Aristotle.[3] To the Nestorian movement in Persia he rendered useful service by his letter to Mārī of Bēth Hardashēr, in which he maintained the tenets of Diodore and Theodore, while allowing that Nestorius had erred.[4] On the ground of his writings he was condemned and deposed by the “robber synod” of Ephesus (449), but was restored by the Council of Chalcedon (451), after he had anathematized Nestorius. His death in 457 was followed by a strong anti-Nestorian reaction at Edessa, which led to the expulsion of many of the leading teachers.
On Isaac of Antioch, “one of the stars of Syriac literature,” see the special article. In spite of his over-diffuseness, he is one of the most readable of Syriac authors.
A Nestorian contemporary of Isaac, Dādhīshō‘, who was catholicus of Seleucia from 421 to 456, composed commentaries on Daniel, Kings and Ecclesiasticus. His chief importance in the history of the Persian Church lies in his having induced a synod of bishops to declare that church independent of the see of Antioch and of the “Western Fathers” (Labourt, p. 122 sqq.).
The most powerful missionary of Nestorianism during the 2nd half of the 5th century was Barṣāumā of Nisībis, whom his opponents called “the swimmer among the reeds,” i.e. the wild boar. Born probably between 415 and 420 he imbibed Nestorian doctrine from Ibas at the Persian school of Edessa, but was driven out in 457 on the death of his master, and went to be bishop of Nisībis. In a succession of missionary journeys he succeeded, partly by persuasion and partly (if his enemies are to be believed) by violence, in attaching to Nestorianism nearly all the Christian communities of Persia, with the exception of Taghrīth, which was always strongly Monophysite. He had many quarrels with his ecclesiastical superior the catholicus of Seleucia, but finally made peace with Acacius soon after the accession of the latter in 484. Among other severities towards the Monophysites, he persuaded the Persian king Pērōz (457-484) to banish many of them into the Roman dominions. One of his great aims was to secure for the Nestorian clergy freedom to marry, and this was finally sanctioned by a council at Seleucia in 486 (Labourt, op. cit., chap. vi.). Barṣāumā must have been bishop of Nisībis for nearly 40 years, but was dead by 496. His writings seem to have been chiefly liturgical: he gave the first set of statutes to the school of Nisībis, which was founded during his bishopric.
His fellow-worker Narsai, whom the Jacobites called “the leper,” but the Nestorians “the harp of the Holy Spirit,” apparently accompanied Barṣāumā from Edessa to Nisībis, where according to Barhebraeus he lived for 50 years. Barṣāumā appointed him head of the new school, where he taught rigidly Nestorian doctrine. He was a copious writer, especially in verse. Many of his poems have now been published.[5] His theological position is clearly defined in a homily on the three doctors—Diodore, Theodore and Nestorius—published by the Abbé Martin in the Journal asiatique for July 1900.
On the less important companions of Barṣāumā and Narsai-Mārī, Acacius and Mīkhā, see Wright (op. cit. pp. 59 seq., 63 seq.). The M‘anā who accompanied them and became bishop of Rēwardashēr in Persia was not, as Barhebraeus supposed, the catholicus of Seleucia who held office in 420, but a much younger man. Like Ibas he had been employed at Edessa in translating the commentaries of Theodore.
Among the early Monophysites were two of the best of Syriac writers—Jacob of Sĕrūgh and Philoxenus of Mabbōgh, who have been treated in special articles. The one wrote mainly in verse, the other in prose. See also Joshua the Stylite.
Another early Monophysite was Simeon of Bēth Arshām, who by a series of journeys and disputations within the Persian empire did all he could to prevent the triumph of Nestorianism among the Persian Christians. He had considerable success at the time, but the ground he had won was soon reconquered by his opponents, except at Taghrīth and the surrounding district. It was after a successful disputation in presence of the Nestorian catholicus Bābhai (497-502/3) that Simeon was made bishop of Bēth Arshām, a town near Seleucia. He made several journeys to Constantinople, where he enjoyed the favour of the empress Theodora. It was there he died, probably about 532-533. His biography was written by John of Asia in the collection of lives of eastern saints which has been edited by Land (Anecd. syr. vol. ii.). His literary productions consist only of a liturgy and two exceedingly interesting letters. The one has for its subject Barṣāumā and the other Nestorian leaders in Persia, and gives a highly malicious account of their proceedings. The other, which has been often edited,[6] is an account of a severe persecution which the Himyarite Christians of Najrān in south-west Arabia underwent in 523, at the hands of the king of Yemen. As Simeon had repeatedly visited al-Ḥirah and was in touch with the Arab kingdom which centred there, his letter is a document of first-rate historical importance.
Mention should be made of two other early Monophysite leaders who suffered persecution at the hands of the emperor Justin I. (518-527). The one is John of Tellā, author of 538 canons,[7] answers to questions by the priest Sergius, a creed and an exposition of the Trisagion. His life was written by his disciple Elias, and also by John of Asia. The other, John bar Aphtōnyā, was the founder of the famous monastery of Ḳenneshrē, opposite
- ↑ See Labourt, op. cit., especially pp. 87-90, 92-99.
- ↑ Some of these refer to events so late that they cannot be from his pen.
- ↑ See Duval, Litt. syr.3, p. 247.
- ↑ Labourt, op. cit. p. 254 sqq.
- ↑ See Feldmann, Syrische Wechsellieder von Narses (Leipzig, 1896); Mingana, Narsai, homiliae et carmina (2 vols., Mosul, 1905); and other editions of which a list is given by Duval, p. 344 seq. Four of the homilies which deal with liturgical matters have been given in an English translation, accompanied with valuable notes, by R. H. Connolly (Cambridge, 1909).
- ↑ The best edition is Guidi's La Lettera di Simeone Vescovo di Bēth-Arśām sopra i martiri omeriti (Rome, 1881).
- ↑ Edited by Kuberczyk (Leipzig, 1901).
