§ 143. THE MONOPHTSITE CONTEOA EESIE8. 763
divine, but nevertheless held firmly to the doctrine of one nature in Christ ; and on this account, from the time of the Chalccdonian council they were called Monojjyhy sites ^ while they in return stigmatized the adherents of the council as Dyophysites and Nestorians. They conceded, indeed, a composite nature (^t/a c^yo-i? gvv^^.to'^ or ixla <^vai^ Slttt]^, but not two natures. They assumed a diversity of qualities without corresponding substances, and made the humanity in Christ a mere accident of the immutable divine substance.
Their main argument against Chalcedon was, that the doctrine of two natures necessarily led to that of two persons, or subjects, and thereby severed the one Clirist into two Sona of God. They were entirely at one with the Nestorians in their use of the terms " nature " and "person," and in rejecting the ortliodox distinction between the two. They could not conceive of human nature without personality. From this the Nestorians reasoned that, because m Christ there are two natures, there must be also two independent hypostases ; the Monophysites, that, because there is but one person in Christ, there can be only one nature. They regarded the nature as something common to all individuals of a species (koivov), yet as never existing simply as such, but only in individuals. According to them, therefore, <f)vaL<i or ovala is in fact always an individual existence.*
The liturgical shibboleth of the Monophysites was : God Kas heen crucified. This they introduced into their public worship as an addition to the Trisagion : " Holy God, holy Mighty, holy Immortal, who hast teen crucified for us, have mercy upon us." ' From this they were also called Theopaschites.* This formula is in itself orthodox, and forms the requisite counterpart to ^eoroKo^, provided we understand by God the Logos, and in thought supply : " according to the
* 'UlavotpvaiTai, from ix6vi) or ^la, (pvais. They conceded the ex 5uo (pvaeoiv (aa eren Eutychea and Dioscurua 1 ad done), but denied the iv 5yo <pvai(nv aflerthe ecotfiriy.
* *l5t«oV.
*''hyios S @ehi, ayios Xcrxvpo^, ayios aSiavaros^ 6 <TTavpwd(\\ 5t' ^^ua}, ^Aci^crii hfivts. An extension of the seraphic ascription, Isa. tL 3.
* 0eO7ro(rx'^a'-
764 THIRD TEKIOD. A.D. 311-590.
flesh," or " according to the liuman nature." In this qualified Bense it was afterwards in fact not only sanctioned by Justinian in a dogmatical decree, but also by the fifth ecumenical council, though not as an addition to the Trisagion. For the the- &nt\no])ic person of Christ is the subject, as of the nativity, so also of tiie passion ; his human nature is the seat and the organ {sensorium) of the passion. But as an addition to the Trisagion, whicli refers to the Godhead generally, and therefore to the Father, and the Holy Ghost, as well as the Son, the formula is at all events incongruous and equivocal. Theopaschitism ia akin to the earlier Patripassianism, in subjecting the impassible divine essence, common to the Father and the Son, to the passion of the God-Man on the cross ; yet not, like that, by confounding the Son with the Father, bnt by confounding person with nature in the Son,
Thus from the council of Chalcedon started those violent and complicated Monophysite controversies which convulsed the Oriental cliurch, from patriarchs and emperors down to monks and peasants, for more than a hundred years, and which have left their mark even to our da^'. They brought theology little appreciable gain, and piety much harm ; and they present a gloomy picture of the corruption of tlie church. The intense concern for practical i-eligion, which animated Athanasius and the Nicene fathers, abated or went astray ; theological speculation sank towards baiTen metaphysical refinements ; and party watchwords and empty formulas were valued more than real truth. "We content ourselves with but a summary of this wearisome, though not unimportant chapter of the history of doctrines, which has recently received new light from the researches of Gieseler, Baur, and Dorner.'
The external history of the controversy is a history of outrages and intrigues, depositions and banishments, commotions, divisions, and attempted reunions. Immediately after the council of Chalcedon bloody fights of the monks and the rabble broke out, and Monophysite factions wf at ofi' in schis-
* The external history of Monophysitism is related with wearisome niinntencis by Walcli in three large volumes (vi.-viii.) of his Entwurf ciner voUstandigen Hieto rie der Ketzereien, etc., bia auf die Zciten dor Reformation.