Page:Dictionary of Greek and Roman Biography and Mythology (1870) - Volume 2.djvu/1186

Rh 1172 NESTORTUS. sequent history. The deposition of Nestorius was ultimately confii-med, though he at last agreed for peace* sake to withdraw his objection to the word &€orcK05 : many of the bishops of his party deserted him at once ; and although John of Antioch and a number of the Eastern bishops held out for a time, ultimately John and Cyril were reconciled, and both retained their sees. But the deposition of Nestorius, and the recon- ciliation of John and Cyril, neither suppressed the opinions of Nestorius, nor healed the dissensions which they had occasioned. Other teachers arose, who held and taught the same views, and diffused them among the Christians of the East, within and beyond the frontier of the empire toward Persia. The Nestorian communities, as they have con- tinued to be called by their opponents, separated from the communion of the orthodox church, and were, doubtless for political reasons, patronized by some of the Persian kings [Barsumas] : and the Mahometan conquests in the seventh century, by the overthrow of the orthodox supremacy, gave scope to the spread of the Nestorians. Under the denomination of Chaldaean Christians, which is the designation they gave themselves, they still exist and are numerous in the East, having their own hierarch}' of patriarchs, bishops, and inferior clergy ; and retaining their characteristic tendency to distinguish carefully between the two natures of Christ, and their objection to the title " Mother of God." After a vain attempt of Nestorius to gain the support of Scholasticus, one of the eunuchs about the court, he was ordered to retire to the monas- tery, apparently that of Euprepius, in the suburbs of Antioch, in which he had dwelt before his election to the patriarchate. . Here he remained four years, being treated, according to his own statement (apud Evagr. H. E. i. 7), with kindness and respect. As, however, he persisted in main- taining his opinions, or as his opponents called it, his blasphemy, he was sentenced to perpetual ban- ishment in the Greater Oasis in Upper Egypt, probably in A. D. 435 ; at the instigation of his former supporter, John of Antioch [Joannks, No. 9], who was aggravated by his persistence, and by that of a few of the bishops who adhered to him. [Meletius, No. 7.] In this remote and painful exile, his spirit remained unbroken. He wrote a work, addressed to some Egyptian, on the subject of his wrongs, and addressed various memorials to the governor of the Thebaid. After an interval of uncertain length, he was carried off by the Blemmyes, who ravaged the Oasis with fire and sword : their compassion, however, released him, and he returned to the Thebaid. But the vin- dictiveness of his enemies was not satisfied : he was harshly hurried from one place of confinement to another, and at last died miserably from the effects of a fall. The story of his dying from some disease, in which his tongue was eaten by worms, which Evagrius had read in a certain work, was probably an invention springing from the mistaken notion that, in the retributive judgment of God, the member which had sinned should bear the punishment. The time of his death is not settled : he was living in A. D. 439, when Socrates wrote his history (Socrat. H. E. viL 34), and probably died before A. D. 4.50. His death did not abate the bitterness of his enemies ; Evagrius records, with apparent satisfaction {H.E. i. 7, ad fin.), that NESTORIUS. he passed from the sufferings of this world to sharper and more enduring woe in the world to come. It is impossible either to deny or justify the violent treatment of Nestorius by the council of Ephesus. Neither can we, without compassion, read his touching appeal to his persecutors (apud Evagr. ibid.), that his past sufferings might be counted sufficient. But our compassion is mate- rially checked by the consideration that he reaped as he had sown ; and that there is little reason to think that success would have been more mildly used by him and his partizans, had they been victorious. Gennadius {De Viris Illustrihus^ c. 53) mentions only one work of Nestorius, which he describes as being " quasi de Incarnatione Domini, and adds that the Haeresiarch supported his opinion by per- verting sixty-two places of Scripture. The work has perished, except that some passages, cited from the writings of Nestorius by Cyril of Alexandria, in his Adversus Nestorii Blasphemias Coutradictionum, Lihri V. [Cy rill us St. of Alexandria] are thought to be from it. Nestorius, however, produced other works beside that mentioned by Gennadius. Of his Ilomiliae, thirteen are preserved in the works of Marius Mercator [Mercator], vol. ii. in the edition of Gamier, who has diligently collected from the Concilia and the works of Cyril various fragments in Greek of the original homilies, and of the other writings of Nestorius. Several of his Epistolae are preserved, some in Greek in the Concilia, others in a Latin version in the Concilia, or in the works of Mercator. His Anaihematismi duo- decim, in reply to Cyril, are contained, in a Latin version, in the Concilia. Alii duodeeiin Anathe- matismi are extant in a Syriac version, and were published, with a Latin version, from the Syriac, in the Bihliotheca Orientalis of Assemani, vol. iii. pars ii. p. 199. Nestorius, also, wrote a his- tory of his disputes with his opponents, which he appears to have entitled "^/ie Tragedy; and which is probably the work mentioned by Evagrius [H. E. 1. 7), as addressed, in the form of a dialogue, to a certain Egyptian. It is mentioned by Ebedjesu the Syrian, in a catalogue of works ascribed to Nestorius. Of the Liber Heraclidis, mentioned also by Ebedjesu, nothing seems to be known. A Syriac Liturgy, ascribed to Nestorius, is men- tioned hy Ebedjesu, and is extant. It was pub- lished in the original, with several similar works at Rome a. d. ] 592 ; and is given in a Latin version in the Liturgiae Orienlales of Eusebiug Renaudot, vol. ii. p. 626. 4to. Paris, 1716. A memorial of Nestorius, on his sufferings, is also cited by Evagrius (//. E. i. 7). The following works are conjecturally ascribed to him : — 1. Two Homiliae L>e Resurrectiorie et Ascensione Christi, which Combefis, in his Atic- tarium Nonum, had ascribed to Athanasius. 2. An Epistle, written before the council of Chalcedon, from a Syriac version of which Assemani gives two extracts in his Dibliotlieca Orientalis, vol. iii. pars i. p. 36, note 5. 3. A Liturgy, still in use among the Nestorians, and different apparently from that already mentioned. 4. A Confession of Faith, ex- tant in Greek, and of which a Latin version is given by Mercator, and in the Concilia : but this con- fession is more probably the work of Theodore of Mopsuestia. The original and the version are both given by Gamier, Mercatoris Opera, vol. ii. p. 251. Various fragments of the works of Nesto- rius are cited in the Ada Concilii Epiwsini, in the