MONOGENES

MONOGENES. This Greek term means “only-begotten” and is used of Christ, “the only-begotten Son,” in Jn 1:18. In this connection it played an important role in the Syriac-speaking church (q.v.) of the 2nd c.–4th c. There the ascetic “sons and daughters of the covenant” were also called ihidaye, “only ones,” i.e., assimilated through virginity or the renunciation of the marriage bed to the likeness of the unique “Only-Begotten.” The word also begins a hymn sung in the Eucharist of the Byzantine rite (qq.v.) since ca. 535. Tradition says the hymn was composed by the Emperor Justinian, and it certainly expresses the latter’s program of Christology (qq.v.): insistence on theopaschism as key to the interpretation of the Council of Chalcedon (q.v.).