todocetic doctrine of the incorruptibleness of Christ's body (5G-1), threatened to involve the Church in fresh troubles ; but his death soon afterwards, in 505, put an end to these fruitless and despotic plans of union. His successor, Justin II, in 5G5 issued an edict of tolera- tion, which exhorted all Christians to glorify the Lord, without contending about persons and syllables. Since that time the history of the Wonophysites has been distinct from that of the Catholic Church. A nu- merous body of jMonophysitcs of Alexandria seceded from the communion of the patriarch of that city ap- pointed by the emperor, and chose another spiritual chief; and thus tliey continue to the present day, un- der the name of C'ojtts. The Ethiopian or Abyssinian Church was always in connection with them. The Christians in Armenia and Georgia, among whom also monophysitism had early gained acceptance, openlj' declared themselves in favor of this doctrine ; and thus the Armenian and Georgian churches continue at this time, separated from tlie other monophysite churdics merely by peculiar customs. In Syria and Mesopota- mia the Monophysites had nearly become extinct, in consequence of persecution and the want of ministers, when Jacob Barada-us, an obscure monk, was the in- strument of reviving them : after him the Syrian Mo- nophysites are called Jacoliles (q. v.). An attempt to reconcile the Monophysites with the orthodox party in the 7th century led to a modified form of the doc- trine, and a new sect, the Monoihelites, who attempted to compromise between the two factions by the liy- pothesis that after the union of the divine and human natures in Christ, though there continued to be two distinct natures, yet there was but one will. The only effect of this was to increase the controversy. See MoxoTiiEi.iTES. Monophysitism still continued to be held in some parts of the East, and even by the Mar- onites (q. v.) until their final reconciliation with the Church of Kome in 1182, when it was renounced by them. The doctrine that Jesus Christ possesses only one simple nature, being not trulj- man, but the divine Spirit in a human body, has recently been revived by Henrj' Ward Beeclier in his Life of Christ, and is also maintained bj' the Swedenborgians. See New Jeru- SALE.M Church. Tlie union of the divine and human natures in Christ is maintained by Dr. Hovey {God With Us). See the Acta, in Mansi, vol. vii-ix ; ^Mai, Scripiorum reterum nova collectio e Vaticanis codicibus edita (vol.vii); Gieseler, Commentat. qua Monojihijsila- rum veterum varue de Christi persona opiniones inprimis ex ijisomm effatis recens edltis, iUustrantur (1835-1838); Assemani, De Monophys. (in Bill. Or. vol. ii) ; Lc Quien, Oriens Ckn^tiunus in JV pcdrianhatus digest us (Par. 1740); Renaudot, Jlist. Patriarchanim Alex. Jacolita- ritm (Par. 1743) ; Makrizii IJist. Coptorum Chi-ist..ATa\>. et Lat. ed. Wetzer (Solisbaci, 18-28); Walch, Ktlzer- historie, vol. vi, vii, viii) ; Baur, Trinitdtslehre. ii. 37-'JG; Dorner, Lehre v. d. Person Chiisti (2d ed.). vol. ii, pt. i ; Hefele, ConciUengeschichte, ii, 545 sq. ; Gfrorer, AUg. Klrchengesch. vol. ii, pt. ii; Schroekh, Klrchrngisch. xviii, 433-6.'56 ; Neander. Ch. Hist, ii, 524 sq. ; and his Dogma, i, 337 ; Ebrard, Ilandbuch der Kircheii- ii. Jfog- mengesch. i, 2G3 sq. ; Schaff, Ch. IJist. iii, 143-115; Neale, Ilist. East. Church (patriarchate of Alexandria), i, 278 sq. ; ii, 3 sq. ; Stanley, Lect. East. Ch. p. It2 sq. ; Ilagenbach, Hist. Doctrines, i, 277 sq. ; ^lilman. Hist. Latin Chi-istianity, p. 312sq. ; Princeton Review, xxxviii, 507 sq. ; Princeton Peposilon/, (January, 18G7), art. iii. Compare also Cureton's edition of tlie Kcc/es. I/ist. of John, Bishop of Ephesus (Oxf. 1853). pt. iii. See Chris-
TOI.OCV; IXCARXATIOX. (J.II.W.)
Monotheism (from /(oror, one, and ^n'>r, God) is the belief in and worship of one only (Jod, in opposition to polytluism, which acknowledges a plurality of gods. All the different mythologies have, among tlie host of gods with which they people heaven and earth, some superior or supreme deity, more or less defined, but in evcrj' case distinguis-hetl above the others; ami in the
MONOTHEISM
511
MONOTHELISM
history of all the different nations where polytheism has obtained we may trace a period when the idea of one God was more or less prevalent. The most ancient tra- ditions concur with the testimony of sacred Scripture in representing this as the primary and uncorrupted re- ligion of mankind. M. Renan, in his Ilistoire Generale et Systeme compare des Langues Semitiques (Par. 1858, 2d ed.), and Nouvelles Considerations siir le caractere general des Peuples Semitiques et en particulier sur leur tendance an Monothekme (Par. 1859), takes the ground that the Shemitic nations of the world are the propa- gators of the doctrine of the imity of God — indeed, that "of all the races of mankind, the Shemitic race alone was endowed with the instinct of monotheism ... a religious instinct analogous to the instinct which led each race to the formation of its own language" (p. 73). Max Muller, however, takes exception to this position, and insists upon it that the primitive in- tuition of God was in itself neither monotheistic nor polytheistic, hut consisted solely in that simplest ar- ticle of faith — that God is God. "This must have been the faith of the ancestors of mankind previousl}' to any division of race or confusion of tongues. ... It is too often forgotten by those who believe that a poly- theistic worship was the most natural unfolding of re- ligious life, that polytheism must everywhere have been preceded b}^ a more or less conscious theism. In no language does the plural exist before the singular. No humiui mind could have conceived the idea of gods without having previously conceived the idea of a god. . . . There are, however, in reality two kinds of one- ness which, when we enter into metaphysical discus- sions, must be carefully distinguished, and which for practical purposes are well kept separate bj- the defi- nite and indefinite articles. ... If an expression had been given to that primitive intuition of the Deity, which is the mainspring of all later religion, it would have been, 'There is a God,' but not yet 'There is but one God.' The latter form of faith, the belief in one God, is properh^ called monotheism, whereas the term henotheism would best express the faith in a sin- gle God" {Chips, i, 348-50). This kind of monothe- ism, according to Mliller, "forms the birthright of every human being. ... In some form or other, the feeling of dependence on a higher power breaks through in all the religions of the world, and explains to us the meaning of St. Paul, 'that God, though in ; times past he suffered all nations to walk in their own ways, nevertheless left not himself without witness, in that he did good, and gave us rain from heaven and fruitful seasons, filling our hearts with food and glad- ness.' This primitive intuition of God, and this in- eradicable feeling of dependence on God, could only have been the result of a primitive revelation, in the truest sense of that word" (p. 346-8, see also p. 363, 374 ; comp. Gould, Origin of Religious Belief, i, 267- 277). In this respect Judaism, Christianity, and Mo- hammedanism agree.