Page:Nestorius and his place in the history of Christian doctrine.djvu/114

102 contents, which did not suit the Cyrillian point of view, was practically put aside. The eastern church, while under the Henotikon, on the whole enjoyed peace—the Antiochian tradition having been put into the background—, but between it and the western church a schism arose. When in 519 a settlement was reached, the Henotikon being at the same time abrogated, the question as to how the decree of Chalcedon, then reacknowledged, was to be interpreted, came again to the fore in the East.

This time it did not remain long without an answer, for at the same time the activity of the so-called Scythian monks began, and this was important just because they developed a theology wholly along the lines of Cyril, which nevertheless could do justice to all requirements of the Chalcedonian definition. It was scholastic arguing, creation of terms and logical distinctions, which brought into existence this Cyrillian-Chalcedonian orthodoxy. Only one of these saving terms need be mentioned, namely. This term allowed the assertion that the human nature of Christ, although it had no of its own, nevertheless was not without, the  of the Logos becoming that of the human nature, too. By the help of this term the twofold operation of the natures, spoken of in Leo's letter, could be accepted,