The Third Ecumenical Council - A.D. 431

Edited from a variety of translations (mentioned in the preface) by H. R. Percival

THE ECUMENICAL COUNCILS Resources Online and in Print

Icon of the Christ and New Testament Reader

62 Pages

Page 20

It is no part of my duty to defend the truth of either the Catholic or Nestorian proposition--each has found many adherents in most ages since it was first started, and probably what is virtually Nestorianism is to-day far more widely held among persons deemed to be orthodox than is commonly supposed. Be this as it may, Nestorianism is clearly subversive of the whole Catholic Doctrine of the Incarnation, and therefore the importance of the word Theotokos cannot be exaggerated.

I shall treat the word Theotocos under two heads; (1) Its history (2) its meaning, first however quoting Bp. Pearson's words on its Conciliar authority. (Pearson, Exp. of the Creed, Art. III., n. 37). "It is plain that the Council of Ephesus which condemned Nestorius confirmed this title Theotokos; I say confirmed it; for it is evident that it was before used in the Church, by the tumult which arose at the first denial of it by Anastasius [Nestorius's presbyter]; and so confirmed it as received before, because they approved the Epistles of St. Cyril, who proved it by the usage of those Fathers which preceded him."

(1) History of Word Theotokos.

It has not been unfrequently assumed that the word Theotocos was coined to express the peculiar view of the Incarnation held by St. Cyril. Such however, is an entire mistake. It was an old term of Catholic Theology, and the very word was used by bishop Alexander in a letter from the synod held at Alexandria in a.d. 320, [248] to condemn the Arian heresy (more than a hundred years before the meeting of the Council of Ephesus); "After this, we receive the doctrine of the resurrection from the dead, of which Jesus Christ our Lord became the first-fruits; who bore a body in truth, not in semblance, which he derived from Mary the Mother of God (ek tes Theotokou Marias)." [249] The same word had been used by many church writers among whom may be mentioned St. Athanasius, who says, "As the flesh was born of Mary, the Mother of God, so we say that he, the Word, was himself born of Mary" (Orat. c. Arian., iij., 14, 29, 33; also iv., 32). See also Eusebius (Vit. Const., iij., 43); St. Cyril of Jerusalem (Cat., x., 9); and especially Origen, who (says Bp. Pearson) "did not only use, but expound at large the meaning of that title Theotokos in his first tome on the Epistle to the Romans, as Socrates and Liberatus testify." [250] (Cf. Origen in Deut. xxii., 23; vol. ij., p. 391. A; in Luc. apud Galland, Bib. Patr., vol. xiv., append., p. 87, D). A list is given by Dr. Routh, in his Reliquiae Sacrae. Vol. ij., p. 215 (1st Ed.), 332 (2d Ed.).

[248] The date is not certain, it may have been a year or so different.

[249] Theod., Hist. Eccl., I., 4.

[250] Pearson, An Expos. of the Creed, Art. III., n. 36.

Previous Page / First / Next Page of The Third Ecumenical Council

Home Page of the Ecumenical Councils Ecumenical Councils in Print

Learned Freeware