Claiming the Mantle of Cyril
Cyril of Alexandria and the Road to Chalcedon
By (author) P.T.R. Gray
Everyone knows the series of events that comprised the Nestorian Controversy, but who knows, leaving aside divine agency, how and why events unfolded as they did? In this book an answer is proposed in terms of normal human behavior. There are occasional noble acts, and banal activities, but also, as here, one finds a tangled web of plots, counter-plots, and downright lies that even sainted bishops might employ to defend what they held dear. Texts left by the participants, when closely examined, provide rich evidence of this.
Everyone knows the series of events that comprised the Nestorian Controversy, but who knows, leaving aside divine agency, how and why events unfolded as they did? In this book an answer is proposed in terms of normal human behavior. There are occasional noble acts, and banal activities, but also, as here, one finds a tangled web of plots, counter-plots, and downright lies that even sainted bishops might employ to defend what they held dear. Texts left by the participants, when closely examined, provide rich evidence of this. For instance there is the show trial of Eutyches; papal ultimata; fake capitulations; intentional late arrival; a universal council that never happened, etc. What drove events forward most of all was the defensive strategy Antiochene controversialists developed and refined. They could, they realized, use select texts of Cyril’s to co-opt Cyril’s authority. They could, that is, claim the mantle of Cyril.
- By (author) P.T.R. Gray
"Gray slows down the story and presents a detailed and lively narrative of every step along the way, beginning with the theotokos controversy of 428 involving Nestorius and Cyril of Alexandria. Drawing upon a voluminous number of council reports, doctrinal statements, letters and responses to those letters, Gray connects the personalities, motives, controversies, and conniving on the long and winding road of twenty-three years." Kitchen, Robert A., Church History, July 28, 2023
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Other Titles in this Series
New Themes, New Styles in the Eastern Mediterranean
Christian, Jewish, and Islamic Encounters, 5th-8th Centuries
Volume 16
Inside and Out
Interactions between Rome and the Peoples on the Arabian and Egyptian Frontiers in Late Antiquity
Volume 8
Apocalypticism and Eschatology in Late Antiquity
Encounters in the Abrahamic Religions, 6th-8th Centuries
Volume 17
L’ecriture de l’histoire en syriaque
Transmissions interculturelles et constructions identitaires entre hellenisme et islam. Avec des repertoires des textes historiographiques en annexe
Volume 12
Empire, Church and Society in the Late Roman Near East
Greeks, Jews, Syrians and Saracens (Collected Studies, 2004-14)
Volume 10
En Route to the Confessions
The Roots and Development of Augustine's Philosophical Anthropology
Volume 6
The Ladder of Prayer and the Ship of Stirrings
The Praying Self in Late Antique East Syrian Christianity
Volume 22
New Approaches to Sidonius Apollinaris
With Indices on Helga Köhler, C. Sollius Apollinaris Sidonius: BriefeBuch I
Volume 7
Writing to Survive. A Commentary on Sidonius Apollinaris, Letters Book 7. Volume 2
The Ascetic Letters 12-18
Volume 14
Writing to Survive. A Commentary on Sidonius Apollinaris, Letters Book 7. Volume 1
The Episcopal Letters 1-11
Volume 2
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