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86 Catholic word, because they abhor the teaching of Cyril the Egyptian and glory in their faithfulness to that of the blessed Mâr Nestorius, that we say they are Nestorians.

In this chapter we have considered the rise and spread of the Nestorian heresy. Nestorius of Constantinople taught the new theory that our Lord Jesus Christ was not one person, that Jesus was a man in whom dwelt the Word of God. So, consistently, he denied that our Lady is Mother of God. His opponent was St. Cyril of Alexandria. The third general council (at Ephesus in 431) condemned his heresy, affirmed our Lady's title, deposed and banished Nestorius. He died in exile, keeping his ideas to the end. For a time the Patriarch John of Antioch supported him and was an enemy of Cyril. Eventually John accepted the decrees of Ephesus and was reconciled. But Nestorius had left a party in Syria, chiefly because of the great influence of his masters Diodore of Tarsus and Theodore of Mopsuestia. This party, then, in schism against their patriarch (John of Antioch) and all the rest of Christendom, formed the beginning of the Nestorian sect. For a time they were strong at Edessa, and from Edessa already began to influence the Church of Persia. In 489 the Emperor Zeno closed their headquarters, the theological school of Edessa, and banished Nestorians from the empire. They then went over the frontier into Persia and spread their teaching there. Bar Sauma, Bishop of Nisibis, was the chief propagator of Nestorianism in Persia; at Nisibis the heresy made a new school and new headquarters. So step by step the Church of Persia (already in schism) fell a victim to this teaching. By the 7th century at latest it is officially committed to the doctrine of Diodore, Theodore and Nestorius. From that time what was once the Catholic Church of Persia has become the Nestorian sect. To estimate this it is not really necessary to discuss the exact meaning of obscure Greek and Syriac terms. These people are Nestorians