Page:Dictionary of Christian Biography and Literature (1911).djvu/899

 that sin was not inherited. Marius Mercator says that it was this Rufinus who instilled into the mind of Pelagius the views known as Pelagian (Mar. Merc. Lib. Subnotationum in Verba Juliani, c. 2).

[W.H.F.]

Sabas (2), a Gothic martyr under Athanaric, king of the Goths towards the end of 4th cent. His Acts seem genuine, and contain many interesting details of Gothic life in the lands bordering on the Danube. Thus village life, with its head men and communal responsibility, appears in c. ii. After various tortures he was drowned in the Musaeus, which flows into the Danube. The Acts are in the form of an epistle from the Gothic church to that of Cappadocia, whither Soranus, who was "dux Scythiae," had sent his relics (Ruinart. Acta Sincera, p. 670; AA. SS. Boll. Apr. ii. 88; Ceill. iv. 278; C. A. A. Scott, Ulfilas, Apostle of the Goths, 1885, p. 80). The topography of the region where he suffered is exhaustively treated in the Sitzungsberichte der Wiener Akad. 1881–1882, t. xcix. pp. 437–492, by Prof. Tomaschek, of Graz University.

[G.T.S.]

Sabas, (6), St., abbat in Palestine and founder of the laura of St. Sabas; born in 439, near Caesarea in Cappadocia. When 8 years old he entered a neighbouring monastery, and at 18 went a pilgrimage to the holy places at Jerusalem, where he entered the monastery of St. Passarion. At 30 he established himself as an anchorite in a cavern in the desert. Several persons joining him, he laid the foundations of his monastery on a rock on the Kidron river, where it still remains. (Cf. Murray's Handbook for Syria, p. 229.) He was ordained priest by Sallustius, patriarch of Constantinople, in 491. Several Armenians united themselves soon after to this community, which led to Sabas ordaining that the first part of Holy Communion should be said in Armenian, but the actual words of consecration in Greek. In 493 the monastery had increased so much that he built another at a short distance. He was sent as an ambassador to Constantinople in 511, by the patriarch, to counteract the influence of Severus and the Monophysites with the emperor Anastasius; and again by Peter, patriarch of Jerusalem, in 531, to ask from the emperor remission of the taxes due by Palestine and help to rebuild the churches ruined by invasion. He died Dec. 5, 531, aged 91 years. His Life was written by Cyril of Scythopolis. [ (13).] Copious extracts from it are in Ceillier, xi. 274–277, and Fleury, H. E. lib. vii. §§ 30–32. The whole Life is in Coteler, Monument. t. iii.

[G.T.S.]

Sabbatius (2), ordained by Marcianus as Novatianist bp. of Constantinople, seceded, before 380, from the main body of that sect, with two others, Theoctistes and Macarius, maintaining that Easter ought to be celebrated on the same day and in the same manner as by the Jews. He also complained that unworthy persons were admitted to the Novatianist communion, thus finding the same fault with the Novatianists that they did with the church. He became bishop of a small sect, called after him Sabbatiani, whose baptism was recognized in the 7th canon of the 2nd general council. Sozomen (H. E. vii. 18) gives a long account of his secession.

[G.T.S.]

Sabellianism, the Eastern name for the movement designated Patripassianism in the West. It formed a portion of the great Monarchian movement, and can only be rightly understood in connexion therewith. We can trace its rise back to the age of Justin Martyr. In his Apol. i. § 63 he refers to those "who affirm that the Son is the Father," and condemns them—a condemnation which he repeats in his Dialogue with Trypho, § 128 (cf. Bull's Defence of Nic. Creed, t. i. 138, t. ii. 626 ; Judgm. Cath. Ch. iii. 198). The 2nd cent. was the age of Gnosticism, of which one of the essential principles was the emanation theory, which places a number of aeons, emanations from the Divine Being, intermediate between God and the Creation. The champions of Christian orthodoxy were led, in opposition, to insist strenuously upon the Divine Monarchy, God's sole, independent, and absolute existence and being. Thus we find Irenaeus writing a treatise περὶ μοναρχίας c. 190, addressed to a Roman presbyter, Florinus, who had fallen away to Gnosticism. Asian Gnosticism regarded the Son and the Holy Ghost as aeons or emanations (cf. Tertull. cont. Prax. c. 8). Christians had to shew that the existence of the Son and the Holy Ghost could be reconciled with the Divine Monarchy. Some therefore adopted the view which Dorner calls Ebionite Monarchianism, defending the Monarchy by denying the deity of Christ. Others identified the Persons of the Godhead with the Father, a theory which was called Sabellianism, though that name is not derived from the original inventor of this view. Sabellianism, in fact, was one of the mistakes men fell into while groping their way to the complete Christological conception. It was in the 2nd cent. an orthodox reaction against Gnosticism, as in the 4th cent. the Sabellianism of Marcellus of Ancyra was a reaction against Arianism. Tertullian expressly asserts, in the opening of his treatise against Praxeas, that this heresy had sprung out of a desire to maintain orthodoxy. The Roman church was one of the chief stages whereon the controversial struggle was waged. The visit of Origen to Rome, some time in 211–217, must have introduced him to the controversy, as abundant references to it and refutations of it are in his writings. The materials for tracing the development of Sabellian views during the 3rd cent. are very defective. Novatian on the Trinity (cc. 12, 18, 21, 22) treats it as an acknowledged heresy, using the same Scripture arguments as Justin Martyr in his ''Dial. cum Tryph.'' §§ 126–129. Novatian is the earliest author who distinctly calls this view the Sabellian heresy. The controversy next emerges into the full light of day in N. Africa c. 260. It permeated very largely the district of Pentapolis in Libya, under the leadership of two bishops of that district, Ammon and. Dionysius of Alexandria wrote against their teaching, whereupon he was accused of heresy to Dionysius of Rome. The documents bearing on the dispute between