§ 81. THE WORSHIP OF MiJlY. MARIOLOGr. 421
took offence at tlie predicate BeoroKot;, saw in it a relapse into the heatlien mythology, if not a blasphemy against the eternal and unchangeable Godhead, and preferred the expression Xo ca-TOTo Ko^ , mater Christi. Upon this broke out the violent controversy between him and the bishop Cyril of Alexandria, which ended in the condemnation of Nest ori an ism at Ephesus in 431.
Thenceforth the BeoroKo^; was a test of orthodox Christology, and the rejection of it amounted to the beginning or the end of all heresy. The overthrow of ]!!s^estorianisin was at the same time the victory of Mary-worship, "With the honor of the Son, the honor also of the Mother was secured. The opponents of Nestorius, especially Proclus, his successor in Constaritinople (t 447), and Cyril of Alexandria (f 444), could scarcely find predicates enough to express the transcendent glory of the mother of God. She was the crown of virginity, the indestructible temple of God, the dwelling place of the Holy Trinity, the paradise of the second Adam, the bridge from God to man, the loom of the incarnation, the sceptre of orthodoxy ; through her the Trinity is glorified and adored, the devil and demons are put to flight, the nations converted, and the fallen creature raised to heaven.' The people were all on the side of the Ephesian decision, and gave vent to their joy in boundless enthusiasm, amidst bonfires, processions, and illuminations.
With this the worship of Mary, the mother of God, the ipeen of heaven, seemed to be solemnly established for all time. But soon a reaction appeared in favor of Nestorianism, and the church found it necessary to condemn the opposite extreme of Eutychianism or Monophysitism. This was the oflice of the council of Chalcedon in 451 : to give expression to the element of truth in Nestorianisiu, the duality of nature in the one divine-human person of Christ. Nevertheless the
' Comp. Cyril's Encom. iu S. M. Deiparam and Homil. Ephes., and the Orationea of Proclus in Gallandi, vol. ix. Similar extravagant laudation had already been used by Ephraim Syrus (f 878) in his work, De laudibus Dei genetricis, and in the cmlection of prayers which bore his name, but are in part doubtless of later origin, in the 3d volume of his works, pp. 524-552, ed. Benedetti and S. Assemani.
422 THUiD PEKIOD. A.D. 311-590.
^ot6/co<; was expressly retainec^., though it originated in a rather monophysite view.'
§ 82. Mariolatry.
Thus much respecting the doctrine of Mary. Now the corresponding practice. From this Mariology follows Mariolatry. If Mary is, in the strict sense of the word, the mother of God, it seems to follow as a logical conseipience, that she herself is divine, and tlierefore an object of divine worship. This was not, indeed, the meaning and purpose of the ancient church ; as, in fact, it never asserted that Mary was the mother of the essential, eternal divinity of the Logos. She was, and continues to be, a created being, a human mother, even according to the Roman and Greek doctrine. But according to the once prevailing conception of her peculiar relation to deity, a certain degree of divine homage to Mary, and some invocation of her powerful intercession witli God, seemed unavoidable, and soon became a imiversal practice.
The first instance of the formal invocation of Mary occurs in the prayers of Ephraim Syrus (f 379), addressed to Mary and the saints, and attributed by the tradition of the Syrian church, though perhaps in part incorrectly, to tiiat author. The first more certain example appears in Gregory Naziamjen (t 389), who, in his eulogy on Cyprian, relates of Justina that she besought the virgin Mary to protect her threatened virginity, and at the same time disfigured her beauty by ascetic self-tortures, and thus fortunately escaped the amours of a youthful lover (Cyprian before his conversion)." But, on the other hand, the numerous writings of Atlianasius, Basil, Chrysostom, and Augustine, furnish no example of an invocation of Mary. Epiphanius even condemned the adoration of Mary, and calls the practice of making ofierings to her by the Golly-
' 'E»{ Vlapias TTJy irapbivov, t^$ ^(otSkov.
' Tt)!/ irap^fv tv Mupiar iKfTtvovaa Porj^Tjvui (Vir^nem Maria»» supples ob«eoraiM) irapbffo) Kiv^uffvovcTT). Orat. XV JL de St. Cypriano, torn. i. p. 2'% ed. Paiia. Th*. earlier and authentic accounts wspecting Cyprian know nothing r>f any 8ucb oo*m^ Blup of Cyprian and intercession af Mary.