CHAPTER III
NESTORIANISM
Nestorius was not an East Syrian. He was a Greek-speaking Antiochene, who proclaimed his heresy at Constantinople. He had nothing whatever to do with Edessa or Persia; there is no evidence that he could even speak Syriac.[1] It seems, then, strange that his ideas, denounced and rooted out in their home, should become the official form of East Syrian Christianity for so many centuries. What is the special attraction of Nestorianism for East Syrians? Is there any inherent tendency towards "dividing Christ" in the Edessene mind? Hardly. We shall see reasons for this phenomenon as we go on. Meanwhile, here are two points to note at once and remember throughout: (1) the acceptance of Nestorianism in the East and in Persia was very largely a corollary of its rejection by the Empire; (2) Monophysism, the extreme contrary heresy, began almost as soon as Nestorianism. A great deal of East Syrian Nestorianism is at first only a vehement denial of Monophysism. In Syria these two often seemed the only alternatives between which a man must choose. During the centuries of discussion that come before crystallization in two lifeless heresies, while these were burning questions and not (as now) the mere shibboleths of rival "nations," a Nestorian considered all his opponents Monophysites, a Monophysite called his contradictor a Nestorian. So in Syria the two heresies struggled and argued, while far away to the West the decrees of Chalcedon obtained without question, and Rome
- ↑ He speaks and writes Greek always.
