Monasticism

TENNY THOMAS

The term “monasticism” refers to a form of life involving separation from the world for the purpose of ascetical dedication to prayer, with a view to achieve perfect obe­dience to the gospel life. In the Eastern Christian tradition, monasticism is under­stood as full discipleship of Jesus Christ and traced back to the New Testament example of St. John the Baptist, to Jesus’ own virginal celibacy, and to the many calls for renunci­ation (e.g., Mt. 10.37; Mk. 10.21). Itis often called the “barometer of the spiritual life of the church.” So great has the influence of and appreciation for this way of life been, that its existence and status have been equated with those of the church as a whole: as flourishes the monastic life, so flourishes the church.

Monasticism is not just a part ofthe greater scope of Eastern Christian life; it is the very center and heart ofthe church. The monastics (both men and women) choose to follow with singular devotion and obedience the call of Christ. They are thus the models in which the church sees one of her most radiant icons: a communion of souls wholly living the life in Christ. Monasticism refers to that ascetic movement characterized by anachoresis, or withdrawal from the Christian community and the rest of society. Monasticism does not have a monopoly on asceticism, as this is a characteristic of all Christians following the gospel prescripts; thus all monasticism is ascetic, while all asceticism is not necessarily monastic. What distinguishes monasticism from the broader category of Christian asceticism is monasticism’s emphasis on withdrawal, on solitude. The Greek word for “monk,” monachos, meant, in its origins, “a solitary.”

Two classic forms of monasticism emerged from early times: the anchoritic, or solitary life or the hermit, and the coenobitic (the Greek koinos bios means “common life”), that is, a life within a structured (and often secluded) community. Monastic life required from the outset stark renuncia­tions: of family, property, marriage, and career. Early monks typically joined together ascetical disciplines (fasting, vigils, poverty, and lifelong celibacy) with a life of manual labor.

Egypt has often been called the birthplace of Christian monasticism, though this is only a partial truth. Scholars now recognize that other early Christian regions – espe­cially Syria, Palestine, and Asia Minor – had their own ascetical traditions, as old as

Egypt’s. Christian monasticism put down visible roots in the early 4th century, though there were individuals and communities living austere, solitary, and ascetic lives long before this time. Nonetheless, it was in this era that St. Antony of Egypt lived and had his story recorded by Athanasius, bishop of Alexandria, in the classic text, the Life of St. Antony of Egypt. This book recorded the saint’s departure into the sol­itary deserts of Egypt to live a life wholly devoted to God, modeled on a daily routine of prayer and manual labor born of the scriptural call to follow the Lord. What Antony did for the solitary (eremitic) life so did Pachomius for the communal (coenobitic) monastic way. They were two symbolic founders: manifestations of a life that soon spread throughout the Christian world. Within the lifetimes of these two founders, thousands of men and women began fleeing the cities for the solitude of the desert, and the recognizable conception of the Christian monastic life was born.

TYPES OF MONASTICISM

Monasticism can thus be broadly distin­guished in its two major prototypes: the anchoritic (the word means “withdrawn” apart), which is also known as the eremitic (the word means “in the desert”) and the coenobitic (based on common life around a common table and shared church service).

Anchorites

First, there is the unmitigated life of with­drawal and seclusion: the eremitic life. This is found especially in Lower Egypt, as well as in Palestine and Syria, after the 5th century. The great founding father of this form of monasticism is St. Antony. At about 20 years of age (ca. 269), he heard Christ’s words, “Go, sell all you have and give to the poor and come and follow me” (Mt. 19.21), as they were read aloud in the church. The text struck his heart. He thus freed himself of the burden of his posses­sions, although not without first securing a stable existence for his sister, for whose care he was responsible at the time. He is said to have entrusted her to a Christian community of virgins (a Parthenon), show­ing that community life for Christian women already existed in Alexandria in his day. He then followed Christ into the desert. His withdrawal was a gradual one: he moved further and further away from human society until, by circa 285, he had reached the deep desert by the Red Sea, the outer mountain at Pispir, where he struggled day and night to liberate his true self from the delusions of the passions and the demons. Around 305, having attracted a number of followers who were inspired by his discipline and holiness, he came out of his seclusion to advise others in their own struggles.

Plate 42 Romanian nun carrying basket of Paschal painted eggs. Bogdan Cristel/Reuters/Corbis.

Plate 43 Romanian monastery of Simbata de Sus: a key monastery in the history of the national revival of Romania, and recently rebuilt after its destruction by Habsburg cannons. Photo by John McGuckin

Each practitioner of the life of the hermit typically lives alone or with one or two attendant disciples nearby, in a rigorous ascetic lifestyle, practicing sexual abstinence, fasting, and engaging in mortifications of various kinds, praying constantly, and engaging in light work, with a view to ward off all external influences and demonic passions, so as to achieve perfect penitence and discipleship.

Coenobites

In many ways, the anchoritic life is the most powerful form of monasticism, yet, precisely for this reason, can be the most dangerous, with great spiritual risks involved. An alter­native form of monasticism, possessing great inherent safeguards against delusion, is the communal life under the guidance of elders, especially the chief monastic leader of a household known as the higumen or abbot. In this style of monasticism a group of monks lives together, under a common rule and sharing a common house, table and church, mutually supporting and encouraging one another. There are two great founding fathers of this form of monastic life in the Orthodox world: St. Pachomius of Egypt (286–346) and St. Basil the Great (ca. 330–79). They have the status that St. Benedict has for western monks.

The coenobitic monastery often took the form of a walled compound in which the community followed a uniform lifestyle built around common meals, set hours of prayer, and prescribed dress. This more tightly organized form replaced the looser colony ofhermits gathered in a valley, meet­ing only for Sunday prayers (Lavriotic monasticism), and an abbot with strong central authority replaced the more infor­mal and charismatic authority of the early spiritual leaders. Light work was replaced by obligatory group work, with a set allocation of tasks (called “obediences”) according to the needs of the whole community. Individ­uals no longer handled the minimum resources they needed themselves, for prop­erty belonged now to the monastery, a com­mon form of life which allowed individual members to renounce all their possessions, and yet still be secure. Instead of an indi­vidual pursuit ofthe highest possible ascetic achievement, unconditional obedience became the norm. Koinonia (fellowship) became a key concept for this style of monastic life. Coenobitic monasticism became common primarily in Egypt and Asia Minor. It was especially popular in Upper Egypt, a part of the country less remote than St. Antony’s area by the Red Sea. Pachomius’ communities were found around Tabennisi in the Thebaid, near the Nile. Pachomius himselfattracted a number of followers. At his death he was ruling higumen over nine monasteries for men and two for women.

Shenoute of Atripe (334–450) was abbot of the famous White Monastery at Sohag in Upper Egypt. He governed his coenobitic monastery with somewhat harsher rules than those of Pachomius. He was heavily involved in the wider community of Upper Egypt and struck out violently against the remnants of Egyptian pagan culture, using his monks as a missionary force. His par­ticipation in the Council of Ephesus (431) underscores the growing monastic influence in the church at large. As an author, Shenoute marks the highest devel­opment of Coptic literature. But because he wrote at a time when Coptic Christianity was becoming increasingly isolated from most of wider Christianity, his works were never translated into Greek, and as a result his history and significance have been largely forgotten outside of Egypt. Today, he is increasingly being recognized as one of the preeminent figures in Coptic Chris­tianity. Shenoute was the first monastic leader to require a written profession from his monastics.

Egyptian monasticism spread to all areas of Christianity through personal acquain­tance and literary testimonies such as Palladius’ Historia Lausiaca, Athanasius’ Vita Antonii, and other compendium texts such as The Lives of the Desert Fathers, the Apophthegmata Patrum, and the Rule of Pachomius. In Egypt a variation, something halfway between eremitical and common life monasticism, also appeared. The great centers of this semi-eremitic life were Nitria and Scetis, colonies just south of Alexan­dria; which by the end of the 4th century had produced many outstanding monks – Ammon the founder of Nitria, saints Macarius of Egypt and Macarius of Alexan­dria, Evagrius of Pontus, and Arsenius the Great. Nitria was the nearer of the two to Alexandria and formed a natural gateway to Scetis. It was a meeting place between the world and the desert where visitors, like John Cassian, could make first contact with the traditions of the desert. Here, a more Greek-influenced type of monasti- cism evolved around an educated minority, of whom Evagrius Ponticus is an outstand­ing example. This lifestyle would grow to influence the Lavriotism we find in Palestine. Not all early monasticism, how­ever, was an offshoot of Egypt’s traditions, and other parts of the early Eastern Chris­tian world show significant variations on a common theme of ascetical endeavor.

ASIA MINOR

The beginning of monasticism in Asia Minor was the movement initiated by Eustathius (ca. 300-after 377), bishop of Sebaste in Pontus. He was a teacher for St. Macrina and for St. Basil the Great in his early life. The extreme program of this group called for complete rejection of marriage and property and was (probably) condemned at the Council of Gangra in Paphlagonia around 341 for causing dissen­sion among the churches. St. Basil moder­ated Eustathius’ rigorism, and combining Egyptian and Syrian influences he set up monasteries in Pontus and Caesarea. He strongly encouraged this form of coenobitic monasticism as being more suitable for most people than the eremitical lifestyle. Basil also closely associated his monks with the daily life of the Church. When he was elected as archbishop of Cappadocian Caesarea it was an important symbol of how episcopacy and monasticism were growing closely intimate. Basil feared that the detachment involved in the eremitic life could perhaps lead to a neglect of the evan­gelical call to charity and philanthropy, and so his monasteries were also concerned directly with issues of social justice. Basil added to the existing mystical and inner concerns of monasticism, a strong stress on external acts of charity and philanthropy. He also insisted on monastic obedience as a check on the excess, the competitiveness, and the ostentation of histrionic individuals who were bringing the monastic movement into disrepute. St. Basil was also careful to insist that monks remain mindful of the normal liturgical life of the church and that they remain connected with, and obedient to, the local bishop.

With the organizations and rules that he composed, St. Basil laid the foundations for monasticism throughout the Orthodox Church. Basil preferred to hold up only the coenobitic form, for he believed that true Christian living was possible only in a community. The bedrock of this style of monasticism was perfect obedience to the leader who is the spiritual father or mother, the teacher and physician of the soul of the brothers or sisters. As a therapeutic tool St. Basil developed the practice of the con­fession of sin (the opening of the thoughts of the heart) to the elder. For monastic life he prescribed a fixed rhythm of prayer, Bible reading, common worship, and work. Pursuing his ideal, Basil established a monastery in his own city of Caesarea and allotted to it social tasks on behalf of both church and society (including a lepers’ hos­pital, a school, and a center for the relief of the poor).

CONSTANTINOPLE

Towards the end of the 4th century, monasticism came into Constantinople, the impe­rial capital, and new foundations followed constantly in the city until the fall of the empire in 1453. A new type of city monasticism was born here. Many monks worked in the imperial service. Many looked to St. Gregory the Theologian’s conception of the monk as “quiet in the midst of the city.” Most important was the Studios Monastery, with its reforming of coenobitic life along the lines of a highly liturgical community schedule, and a family of monks bonded in strong obedience to a single higumen. The example of the Studios community, espe­cially under its dynamic leader St. Theodore the Studite (d. 816), became the basis for foundations all over the Orthodox world. Not least among them was the Studite inspired foundation in 961 of the first mon­astery at Mount Athos, later known as the Great Lavra, which marked the beginning of the rise of Athos as a center of Orthodox monasticism. Athos combined all forms of monasticism: coenobitic, eremitical, and small communities (Sketes) of loosely orga­nized semi-hermits. The great spiritual movement known as Hesychasm, which flourished on Athos in the 13th and 14th centuries, gave spiritual expression to the upsurge and renewal of the anchorite ideal in Orthodox monastic life.

PALESTINE

The eremitic monasticism of Egypt had a direct influence on Byzantine Palestine, where notables such as saints Silvanus, Hilarion of Gaza, Sabas, and Epiphanius of Salamis all built monasteries. This became the site for the semi-eremitic form of monasticism, where the monks did not live in complete separation, like the hermits; nor in complete community, like coenobitic monks. Rather, there existed a number of independent groups of monks, each of which varied greatly in size, but which would all come together for a Saturday vigil in common, the dawn divine liturgy, and a shared meal, on Sunday. This style often involved a small colony of monks living very secluded lifestyles during the week, perhaps all associated along the same desert valley. Their respective separate dwelling places were linked by a small path (Lavra, or lane) along which they would have some commu­nication, and by which they would all gather for the Saturday vigil services; returning to their hermitages on Sunday evenings. Lavriotic monasticism thus developed, even when the original separate dwellings came to be enclosed in one surrounding wall. Some of the greatest Russian and Greek monasteries today are known as Lavras.

This semi-eremitic model could also be found in Jerusalem, which became a great monastic center later in the 5th century. In the Judean wilderness, and especially around the desert of Gaza, there were great spiritual fathers of the Egyptian tradition. Indeed, in the 5th and 6th centuries, lead­ership in the monastic movement shifted to Palestine through the influence of such fig­ures as St. Euthymius the Great (d. 473) and his disciple St. Sabas (d. 532). Judea espe­cially became the home of the Lavra. This style of monasticism preserved a greater level of solitude than was common in a coenobium. Another difference between the semi-eremitic and the coenobitic models was that the semi-eremitic arrange­ment often functioned as a preparatory phase for the anchoritic life, and seemed tacitly to presume that the anchoritic life was the superior.

RUSSIA AND THE BALKANS

With the coming of Christianity, monasti- cism also entered the Slavic Balkans and Russia. The coenobitic cave monastery at Kiev came into being in about 1050 under the influence of Athos. The Mongol hoard destroyed most Russian monasteries in the 13th century. The flight of many monks and the restoration in the 14th century led to new monastic regions in the wilder parts of northern Russia and the area around Moscow. Here we find coenobitic, eremitic, and mixed forms alongside one another. Among the great Russian monastic founders and heroes are St. Sergius of Radonezh (Sergei Posad near Moscow); St. Daniel the Hermit (Danilovsky Monastery at Moscow); St. Joseph of Volokolamsk (d. 1515) who strongly represented the coenobitic form; and St. Nil Sorskii (d. 1508) who defended the eremitic life. Secularization in the 18th century reduced the number of Russian monasteries consid­erably. The 19th century, however, brought a new upsurge. St. Seraphim of Sarov and the Optina monastic elders represent a flowering of the monastic life comparable to the ancients. The 1917 Revolution left only a few monasteries intact, which were put under strict state control.

The communist collapse opened the door to the revival of monastic life throughout Russia and the former Soviet zones. Monas- ticism in Romania spread out extensively from the 15th century onwards, and dissem­inated Hesychastic spirituality throughout the country. St. Paisy Velichovsky in the 18th century brought the patristic traditions of prayer to the Slavic world from his printing house at Neamt in Romania: the birthplace of the Russian Philokalia. His movement did so much to revive and ren­ovate Orthodox monasticism from the 19th century to the present despite all outward reversals.

SYRIA

In order to understand the history of monasticism in Syria, we must consider two distinct phases in Syrian monasticism. The first we may call “proto-monasticism,” which is the period prior to the 5th century, and differs considerably from Egyptian monastic traditions. The second phase is one that receives the most attention from modern historians, no doubt because it is also the time in which all the remark­able accounts of stunning acts of self­mortification are to be found. This second phase reflects a fundamental shift of the Syrian Church towards the Egyptian model, which had gained an irresistible prestige and momentum throughout the Eastern Christian world. Syria tends to press the model to an extreme, however.

There is very little direct information concerning the first, and quite different, phase of Syrian monasticism. The primary sources for this period are the early (4th century) Syrian fathers Aphrahat and Ephrem. To understand the distinctive characteristics of Syrian proto-monasticism, two phrases need to be understood: ihidaya (literally, “solitary,” “monk”) and Bnay Qyama (literally, “sons of the covenant”). Aphrahat especially uses these phrases almost interchangeably, but they do seem to convey different nuances. The ways in which they are used, primarily by Aphrahat, give us an important glimpse into the character of Syrian proto-monasticism.

The ihidaya refers to single persons who were committed to serving God. The ihidaye occupied a special status in the church. But while they could occasionally be found among the clerical orders (partic­ularly the lower ones), this was rare. They were primarily laypersons, whether male or female. The term ihidaye, more specifically, seems to have been used with three major senses in mind, and accordingly tells us three main things about the monastic movement: the first sense is that of monachos, conveying the sense of unmar­ried or celibate person; the second is that of monozonos or monotropos, conveying the idea of single-mindedness, that is the ascetic as a dedicated seeker after prayer; and third we find the term monogenes, conveying the idea of the ascetic’s union with the Monogenes (the Only-begotten Son), the Ihidaya par excellence.

The other important term that helps us understand native Syrian monasticism is the phrase Bnay Qyama. The word Qyama refers primarily to the idea of “covenant,” though it also connotes “station” and possibly “resurrection”; it was even used by Aphrahat to denote the whole church. Accordingly, the Bnay Qyama (Sons of the Covenant) refers to a group of celibates who took upon themselves a special “station” in the life of the community. They assumed this station by individual covenant, or solemn pledge, at their baptism, at which time they assumed the obligation of celi­bacy and became ihidaye (solitary ascetics). They also accepted to follow Christ’s lifestyle in a uniquely uncompromising way, and in so doing they were deliberately trying to manifest the form of life that would be lived in the “age to come,” the life to which all the baptized are finally called. Through their celibacy and uncom­promising pursuit of holiness, they stood among their community as anticipatory images of the resurrection to come.

It is difficult to say very much more about this movement. We can surmise that it was carried out neither in a strictly eremitic, nor in a coenobitic form, although there may have been a proto-rule that the Bnay Qyama followed. They seem to have existed as com­munities close to the churches and were an integral part of Syrian church life. But by the 5th century this ascetic tradition, what­ever its characteristics, quickly became displaced by the Egyptian variety of monas- ticism. However, the Syrians did not simply import Egyptian monasticism; they incor­porated it into their region in a creative way that reflected their own idiosyncrasies. We find that these idiosyncrasies were expressed in a range of behavior that might strike the modern reader as deeply disturbing, even inhuman. In Syria and Mesopotamia asceticism occasionally took bizarre forms. The majority of the monks were simple Syriac-speaking people, igno­rant of Greek. Violent forms of asceticism were common. A heavy iron chain as a belt was a frequently practiced austerity. A few adopted the life of animals and fed on grass, living in the open air without shade from the sun and with the minimum of clothing, and justifying their method of defying soci­ety by claiming to be “fools for Christ’s sake» Some Syrian ascetics manifested spe­cial feats of penance, such as going without sleep for long periods, being walled up, or spending a lifetime on exposed pillars (Stylites), among whom St. Simeon the Stylite (ca. 390–459) was the most famous. Syrian monasticism should therefore not be seen simply as a more extreme form of monasticism stemming from either a greater degree of dualism or intellectual simplicity, but rather as a form of monasti- cism stemming from a different theological emphasis.

From its beginning, therefore, Christian­ity involved a substantive call to self-denial, to a life shadowed by the cross; a life in the light of eschatological imperatives. The monks with their austerities were martyrs in an age when the martyrdom of blood no longer existed; they formed the counter­balance to an established and protected church. Monasticism, a formal life of inter­nally imposed self-renunciation, emerged in response to the diminishing presence of externally imposed deprivations. It has had an incalculable effect on the develop­ment and on the sustenance of Christianity, offering to the church most of its greatest leaders throughout history.

SEE ALSO: Elder (Starets); Greece, Orthodox Church of; Hesychasm; Mount Athos; Non­Possessors (Nil Sorskii); Pontike, Evagrios (ca.

345–399); Possessors (Joseph of Volotsk); Romania, Patriarchal Orthodox Church of; Russia, Patriarchal Orthodox Church of; St. Dorotheos of Gaza (6th c.); St. Isaac the Syrian (7th c.); St. Macarius (4th c.); St. Paisy Velichovsky (1722–1794); St. Sergius of Radonezh (1314–1392); Stylite Saints

REFERENCES AND SUGGESTED READINGS

Alfeyev, H. (2001) The Spiritual World of Isaac the Syrian. Cistercian Studies 175. Kalamazoo: Cistercian Publications.

Athanasius (1980) The Life of Antony, trans. R. C. Gregg. Classics of Western Spirituality. New York: Paulist Press.

Binns, J. (1994) Ascetics and Ambassadors of Christ: The Monasteries of Palestine, 314–631. Oxford Early Christian Studies. New York: Oxford University Press.

Brock, S. (1987) Syriac Fathers on Prayer and the Spiritual Life. Cistercian Studies 101. Kalamazoo: Cistercian Publications.

Brown, P (1988) The Body and Society: Men, Women, and Sexual Renunciation in Early Chris­tianity. New York: Columbia University Press. Chitty, D. (1997) The Desert A City. Crestwood, NY: St. Vladimir’s Seminary Press.

Cotelier, J. B. (ed.) (1647) Apophthegmata Patrum.

Alphabetical Collection. PG 65.

Dunn, M. (2000) The Emergence of Monasticism: From the Desert Fathers to the Early Middle Ages. Oxford: Blackwell.

Goehring, J. E. (1999) Ascetics, Society, and the Desert: Studies in Early Egyptian Monasticism. Harrisburg: Trinity Press International.

Harmless, W. (2004) Desert Christians: An Introduction to the Literature of Early Monasticism. New York: Oxford University Press. Johnston, W. W. (ed.) (2000) Encyclopedia of Monasticism, 2 vols. Chicago: Fitzroy Dearborn. Krawiec, R. (2002) Shenoute and the Women of the White Monastery: Egyptian Monasticism in Late Antiquity. New York: Oxford University Press. Patrich, J. (1995) Sabas, Leader of Palestinian Monasticism: A Comparative Study in Eastern Monasticism, Fourth to Seventh Centuries. Washington, DC: Dumbarton Oaks.

Pseudo-Macarius (1992) The Fifty Spiritual Homilies and the Great Letter, trans. George A. Maloney. Classics of Western Spirituality. New York: Paulist Press.

Rousseau, P. (1999) Pachomius: The Making of a Community in Fourth Century Egypt. Trans­formation of the Classical Heritage 6, revd. edn. Berkeley: University of California Press. Rubenson, S. (1995) The Letters of St. Antony: Monasticism and the Making of a Saint. Minneapolis: Fortress Press.

Vivian, T. (ed) (2004) Four Desert Fathers: Pambo, Evagrius, Macarius of Egypt and Macarius of Alexandria. Popular Patristics Series.

Crestwood, NY: St. Vladimir’s Seminary Press. Voobus, A. (1958) History of Asceticism in the Syrian Orient, 3 vols. Louvain: Secretariat du Corpus SCO.

Ward, B. (trans.) (1980) The Sayings of the Desert Fathers: The Alphabetical Collection. Cistercian Studies 59. Kalamazoo: Cistercian Publications.

Monophysitism (including Miaphysitism)

JOHN A. MCGUCKIN

In Byzantine and Latin Church usage the term Monophysitism (from the Greek: “Holding to One Nature”) historically des­ignated those who rejected the Christology of the Council of Chalcedon (451), with its insistence on two perfect natures (human and divine) harmonized without confusion or separation in the single (divine) person of the Christ. As the Chalcedonian theology was Di-Physite (two-nature) so, by implica­tion, the rival party were increasingly called Monophysites.

Many Chalcedonians, past and present, have erroneously gone on from the basis of this pejorative and rather simplistic sum­mation of their opponents’ beliefs (includ­ing most of what today is termed the Oriental Orthodox or Non-Chalcedonian Orthodox churches) to presuppose that such an “imputed” single nature of the

Christ must, of necessity, be a hybrid or mingled nature of God-manhood. The implications of this, forcefully expressed in many earlier European patristic studies, are that Dyo-physite thought represents christological clarity, where the one divine person of the incarnated Logos presides directly over two distinct natures; whereas Monophysitism represents muddy thinking where deep piety (affirming Christ’s unquestioned divine status) underesti­mated the full authentic range of the incar­nate Lord’s human experiences. Some ofthe opponents of Chalcedon undoubtedly did follow a line of thought that paid less than sufficient attention to Christ’s human actuality. Following in varying degrees in the steps of Apollinaris of Laodicea, they sometimes believed that to affirm human limitation was a disservice to the divine Christ. Thinkers such as Julian of Halicar­nassus and Eutyches of Constantinople represented this kind of confused piety. There were other opponents of the Chalcedonian Christology, however, such as Philoxenus of Mabbug, Timothy Aeluros (“the Cat”), and Severus of Antioch, whose sophisticated theology cannot be reduced to this level.

The major argument, if hostile apologetics can be cleared away, turns around two closely related issues: first that St. Cyril of Alexandria (who had become a towering authority on Christology in the East) had used certain terms simultaneously in two senses. Chalcedon, for the sake of clarity, wished to move towards one agreed technical vocabulary and had vetoed some of his early expressions. His followers (not least the majority of the Egyptian Church) refused to accept such a veto. In his early writings, ten times St. Cyril had spoken of the seamless union of divine and human activity in a single Christ under the party slogan: “One Physis of the Word of God incarnate” (Mia Physis). It wasa phrase coined by Apollinaris, which mis­takenly in his archives had been attributed to St. Athanasius, and which he thus felt had the authentic stamp of patristic orthodoxy about it. Here Cyril applied physis in the antique sense of “one concrete reality,” which was more or less a synonym for the central idea of his (and later, Chalcedon’s) Christology that there was only “One hypostasis” in Christ. Unfortu­nately, even by his day the word physis was coming to be taken as a synonym for ousia, or nature understood not as a concrete real­ity (a subjective presence), but more as a set of (natural) properties or attributes (such as “human nature” and “divine nature”). Thus, to describe Christ as one single physis-nature, in this latter and modern sense, was generally taken by non-Cyrillians (such as the majority of Syrian theologians in the 5th century) to be advocating for a new form of hybrid nature (divino- human synthesis) in Christ; which would de facto be a mythical construct, and impute changeability to the deity. They thus regarded St. Cyril (actually a brilliant thinker) as either a pious ignoramus (Nes- torius underestimated him this way) or a deliberate resuscitator of Apollinarianism (Theodoret of Cyr regarded him in this way). For his part, St. Cyril felt such graphic language of physis unity was necessary, for he was worried that those parties who ostensibly wished to defend the authenticity of human experience in Christ, and the differentiated spheres of human and divine actions in his life (the two natures empha­sized by the Syrians under the term of “Two Sons”), had actually strayed into such a polarization that the incarnation had become artificial; a disunion rather than a union of God and man; and often loosely described by the Syrians as “Associ­ation” rather than “Union.”

Cyril’s followers, alienated after the Council of Chalcedon by the condemnation and deposition of Dioscorus, his successor at Alexandria, were more and more labeled as Monophysites, and accused of teaching the doctrine of a confused hybrid of natures (Eutychianism). They themselves saw their defense of the “Union of Natures” (a union logically meaning a “making into one,” not an association of two disparates) as something far removed from Eutychianism (which may rightly be termed Monophysit­ism), and rather as a last stand for the belief in the deification of the human race that came from the dynamic of the incarnation of God. They identified their own position as advocating a truth about two perfect natures in Christ (Godhead and Manhood) that had mystically been rendered as “one concrete reality” without the destruction of either. This “rendering as one,” in their esti­mation, did not necessarily imply that it thus became a single thing, more a single factor: namely, “the one divine Christ with his flesh.” Such a position is better described as Miaphysitism, in acknowledgment of its indebtedness to that formula made current by St. Cyril: “One physis [concrete reality] of God the Word made flesh.” This position of St. Cyril was the one he had adopted before his agreement with the Syrians in the Formula of Reunion of 433. Thus to propa­gate it after the mid-5th century was a deliberate strategy on the part of anti- Chalcedonian theologians to “turn back the clock” and veto the objections the Roman and Syrian churches had expressed to taking Cyril’s christological corpus as a superior guide to ecclesial dogma than the conciliar formulations of Chalcedon in 451 and Constantinople in 553.

if they were generally classed as Monophysites, the radical anti-Chalcedonian Cyrillians in turn regarded the Chalcedonians as no better than defenders of Nestorianism. in this they were quite wrong; just as their opponents were wrong to caricature them as Eutychians, but widespread semantic confusions, and a certain lack of desire to give the opponent a fair hearing, made the controversy run on bitterly for many centuries. After the islamic seizure of syria and Egypt in the 7th century, the possi­bilities of reconciliation of the anti- chalcedonian Easterners (more and more commonly called Monophysites or Jaco­bites) with the Byzantine and Roman tra­ditions became increasingly slight. The best of the so-called Monophysite theologians actually represent the Mia Physis formula of st. cyril, which is theologically compatible with chalcedonian orthodoxy, if rightly understood as not synthesizing the natures into a tertium quid which is a hybrid, and if the physis is understood (as Cyril meant it) to signify “concrete reality” and not natureousia (as Eutyches seemed to have meant it). The anti-Chalcedonians, however, consis­tently rejected any Two-Nature language as both a betrayal of Cyril (hence of Ephe­sus 431) and of the belief that the incarna­tion was a dynamic of unity. As such they were increasingly prosecuted by the imperial government, and sadly failed to see Chalcedon itself, and even more so, Constantinople II (553), as a serious attempt to meet them half way in a shared expression of an agreed insight. it is one of the great tragedies of the patristic era that so many attempts to reconcile the Chalcedonian dissidents failed, when clearly the central issues (integrity of humanity and divinity in the Christ, who is but a single divine person, and who has dynamically brought the human and divine realities into a profound personal unity in himself as a paradigm for the salvation of all humanity) were things agreed on both sides. political and ethnic factors played a considerable part in this. in the late 20th century, tentative efforts between the orthodox and Non- Chalcedonian Churches to reopen the christological debate with clarity and cool­ness of exchange have revealed once more how much of the alienation was a result of unnecessary confusion over terms, but they have also shown the enduring problems still existing between churches who approach the conciliar record (that is, which councils have ecumenical status) so differently that the saints of one church can be anathema­tized as the heretics of the other.

SEE ALSO: Alexandria, Patriarchate of; Anti­och, Patriarchate of; Assyrian Apostolic Church of the East; Christ; Council of Chal- cedon (451); Council of Constantinople II (553); Council of Ephesus (431); Deification; Ecumenical Councils; Nestorianism; oriental Orthodox; St. Cyril of Alexandria (ca. 378–444); Syrian Orthodox Churches

REFERENCES AND SUGGESTED READINGS

Frend, W. H. C. (1972) The Rise of the Monophysite Movement. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Grillmeier, A. and Hainthaler, T. (1996) Christ in Christian Tradition, Vol. 2, part 4. London: Mowbray.

Luce, A. A. (1920) Monophysitism Past and Present: A Study in Christology. London: SPCK. Meyendorff, J. (1975) Christ in Eastern Christian Thought. New York: Fordham University Press.