Who he was
- One of the great leaders who defended the Christological formula of St. Cyril: “one incarnate nature of God the Logos.” A major Syriac writer and theologian of the 5th/6th century.
- Born in Persia in the province of Beth Garmai,seemingly
MABBUG 5th/6th Century d. 523
and suffering, for the accomplishment of man’s redemption.
- It followed that God the Word suffered and died and not merely a body distinct from, or, obedient to Him, or in which He dwelt. He affirmed a single will in Christ.
- This was the faith of him and his friend Severus who became patriarch of Antioch after Flavian, towards the close of 512.
What he wrote
- He sponsored a revision of the Syriac translation of the New Testament, bringing it closer into line with the current Greek text and is called the “Philoxenian Syriac version.”
- His writings fall into three main categories:
of Christian parents, he fled to Roman territory from Persia under the persecution of Yazdagird II (439-457).
- He studied at the famous theological school in Edessa known as the “Persian School” when Ibas was the bishop of that city. The school followed the Antiochian theological tradition, in particular that of Theodore of Mopsuestia, but it is clear that some students, Philoxenus among them, reacted against this and sided with Alexandrian tradition of St. Cyril.
- He was appointed bishop of Mabbug (to the north-east of Antioch) in 485.
- After the death of the Emperor Anastasius in 518, his successor Justin enforced on all bishops acceptance of the Council of Chalcedon and its controversial Definition of Faith; Philoxenus’ refusal to do so, resulted in his deposition and exile.
- He died five years later in Paphlagonia.
- He accepted the Henoticon and the Twelve Anathemas of St Cyril.
- He proved an active opponent of all Nestorianizers; he demanded that not only Nestorius but all who regarded as sympathizing with him, Diodorus, Theodorus, Theodoret, and many others, should be repudiated. His Theology
- He was an ardent opponent of the Christological definition of faith laid down at the Council of Chalcedon.
- He believed that the very personality of God the Word became man in the womb of the Virgin, personally without conversion. Neither the deity nor the humanity was absorbed one by the other, nor converted one into the other. It is one nature constituted out of two. The one person of the Incarnate Word was not a duality, but a unity. In all said, done, or suffered by Christ, there was only one and the same God the Word; who became man, and took on Himself voluntarily the condition of want
the water, he will never again put off, except for denial alone. For if it is through faith that he puts on the Spirit, it is only through denial that he can put him off, seeing that faith and denial are opposites, like darkness and light.
- He wrote a letter to a solitary, Patricius of Edessa on the passions of the soul and the commandments of Christ.