Virgin is by nature mother of a man, but by manifestation Mother of God."[1]
Enough of these dogmatic discussions. We must go on to our proper subject, the history of the Nestorian sect. This rather long dogmatic excursus is inserted because of the discussion now going on as to whether after all Ephesus and the Catholic Church did not make a mistake from the beginning in excluding that sect. We have said perhaps enough to show that it is not so. Nestorius (one feels no animus against a respectable man whose cause, to us, is buried since fifteen centuries), in spite of the harsh treatment he received and his good qualities, taught a doctrine which cut away the very root of Christianity; namely, that God the Son himself, for us men and for our salvation, came down from Heaven, and was made flesh of the Holy Ghost from the Virgin Mary, and was made man; was crucified also for us under Pontius Pilate, suffered and was buried. Nestorius's doctrine had to be rejected; the man who persisted in it could not remain a Catholic: and the people who glory in the fact that they hold his doctrines are, at least implicitly, heretics."[2]
3. Nestorianism in Syria
We left St. Cyril, having gained his cause, returning to Alexandria from Ephesus. Nestorius was deposed and banished, his successor was ordained. But the quarrel between Cyril and John of Antioch was not yet healed. John had gone back, still a partisan of Nestorius, sore and angry with Cyril. There was enmity between the two chief Eastern sees. The Emperor was distressed about this. From now the great question was the reconciliation of the Pontiffs of Alexandria and Antioch. The
- ↑ P. 173. She is by nature mother of one person, who is God and man, though, of course, her motherhood comes only from that person's human nature. No Catholic ever imagined that she gave birth to the divine nature.
- ↑ Many more quotations from the Book of Heraklides will be found in M. Jugie's article: "Nestorius jugé d'après le Livre d'Héraclide," in the Échos d'Orient for 1911 (vol. xiv.), pp. 65–75. For his life in general see F. Nau: Nestorius d'après les sources orientales (Paris, Bloud, 191 1). Father Jugie has since examined the whole question in Nestorius et la controverse Nestorienne (in the "Bibliothèque de Théologie historique," Paris, 1912). See also J. P. Junglas: Die Irrlehre des Nestorius, Trier, 1912.
