Polemics of St. Anastasius Sinaite with the theopasichites and bearers of the triadological errors of monophysitism

The author is a candidate of physical and mathematical sciences, candidate of theology, teacher at the Moscow Theological Seminary, Secretary of the Academic Council of the Moscow Theological Academy. “The Guide” (Οδηγός, Latin name - Viae dux, end of the 7th century) 1 of St. Anastasius Sinaite (7th - beginning of the 8th century) is one of the first attempts in Orthodox theology to place in a single work both the theological and philosophical apparatus and the systematic description itself (albeit rather in a polemical, namely anti-Monophysite form) of the Christology of the Church. In this sense, this voluminous treatise (24 chapters) can be called the Orthodox “sum of Christology,” and St. Anastasius can be called the predecessor of St. John of Damascus with his “Source of Knowledge.” Polemicizing with various theological misconceptions of Monophysitism, the Monk Anastasius in the “Guide” pays attention to both theopaschism, inherent to one degree or another in all Monophysitism, and various triadological misconceptions characteristic of individual Monophysit movements. Theopaschytic expressions are a special case of the doctrine of the communication of natural properties (άντιμεθίστασις τών όνομάτων, communicatio idiomatum) of the Divinity and humanity of Christ. The Christological era itself began with disputes about the communication of properties, namely with disputes about the term “Theotokos” (Φεοτόκος). According to Nestorius, such names of our Savior as “Christ,” “Son,” “Lord,” signify both of His natures. The names “God”, “Word” mean only His Divine nature, and the names “man”, “baby” - only human. The first names include all the facts from the life of Christ, and the second and third names include only one part (each has its own) of facts and names. Therefore, we can say that Christ is eternal, that Christ died, but we cannot say: “The Eternal Child,” “God is crucified.” From the point of view of Nestorius, the term “Theotokos” was also theologically unacceptable, since “Mary did not give birth to the Divinity.” The term “mother of man” (άνθρωποτόκος), proposed by presbyter Anastasius, according to Nestorius, was, of course, accurate, but he proposed the terms “mother of Christ” (Χριστοτόκος) and “receiver of God” (Φεοδόχος). So, Nestorianism in principle rejects the communion of properties, admitting only that due to the fact that Christ is the God-man, communication was established between His two (Divine and human) natures, two hypostases and two persons within the so-called “person of unity”, denoting the unity of the dignity, honor and worship of Christ 2. The Monophysites categorically did not accept the presence of a human nature in Christ, for, as it seemed to them, the duality of natures introduced a duality of hypostases into the one Christ. Nevertheless, the majority of Monophysites, including Sevier of Antioch (465–538), said that the God-Man contained within Himself complete humanity and was thereby consubstantial with us. In the teachings of Sevier, this perfection of Christ in humanity was expressed in His presence of all the natural properties of human nature. But Sevier does not have a strict connection between a natural property and nature, which was necessarily thought by his opponents (both the Orthodox followers of Chalcedon and opponents within Monophysitism - for example, the Aphthartodocetes). According to Sevier, the One Subject Christ, His one nature-hypostasis, corresponds to a single property. However, it is not monolithic. It includes private – Divine and human – properties in their entirety. Although some of the properties are of a Divine nature, and some are of a human nature, the distinction between them is conditional; they do not constitute two natures. Moreover, because of the unity of Christ, they cannot be characterized as either purely Divine or purely human. The Divine can be called human, and the human - Divine. Thus, in a very specific way, that is, as a direct transfer of the properties of one nature to another, Sevier and his followers understood the “communion of properties.” Thus, according to Sevier, in Christ the Divine nature, which became complex at the Incarnation, took on the properties of human nature 3. This understanding of the communication of the Divine and human properties of Christ as the perception of His Divine nature by the properties of the flesh emerged during the period of theopaschytic disputes in Constantinople in the first years of the 6th century under the Patriarch of Macedonia (495–511). The text of the Trisagion Song, which was also sung at the Council of Chalcedon, was changed by the Monophysite Patriarch of Antioch Peter Gnatheos, or Knafeos (Γναθεύς, Κναθεύς (for St. Anastasius) - fuller, fuller). He added to the Trisagion hymn before the words “have mercy on us” the words “crucified for us” (σταυρωθείς ύπέρ ήμών - “Holy God, Holy Mighty, Holy Immortal, crucified for us, have mercy on us,” which caused confusion among the people. Since this song was always perceived as an appeal to the Holy Trinity, the Orthodox suspected the Monophysites of professing the suffering of the Three Persons of the Trinity, or the Divine nature, that is, they were theopaschites 4 . The Monk Anastasius calls them that: “theopaschites.” Thus, in one of the disputes with the Monophysites described in the tenth chapter of the Guide, which took place in Alexandria “in the presence of Augustus 5 and a large crowd,” Sinaite gave his opponents a confession: “I, Anastasius the monk of the holy Mount Sinai, confess that God the Word Himself, born of God the Father before all ages, Himself was crucified, was beaten, suffered and was resurrected,” and “with cunning” promised to join their church and serve with them if they sign this papyrus. Having signed it, they immediately received accusations of theopaschism from the Monk Anastasius: “Having taken the papyrus after signing, going up to the wisest of them who was considered and lightly touching his beard with my hand, I said: “Christ suffered for us in the flesh 6, theopaschites, and not in the Divine; He suffered in the flesh, as the Apostle Peter theologizes, and not in the Divinity, as Sevier blasphemes and as you now signed. For, wishing to expose all the slander in your soul, I wrote, indicating in the papyrus the naked Divinity of God the Word, without remembering either the flesh, or the incarnation, or the Nativity of the Holy Virgin."" A more detailed polemic with the Monophysites regarding the theopaschism of the Monophysites, or more precisely, regarding their insertion into the Trisagion, St. Anastasius places in the twelfth chapter of the "Guide." Sinaite gives the argument of the Monophysites: they They justified the insertion of “crucified for us” into the Trisagion by the fact that they attributed this hymn to God the Word, and by the fact that such theopaschytic expressions were firmly established in the Holy Tradition of the Church. The Monk Anastasius cites some of these expressions: “They would not have crucified the Lord of glory” (1 Cor. 2:8), Saint Ignatius the God-Bearer: “Let me imitate the sufferings of my God,” Saint Melito of Sardis: “God suffered at the hands of Israel”, Saint Gregory the Theologian: “Small drops of God’s blood sanctified the whole world” and Saint Cyril of Alexandria: “passion of God”, “Cross of God”, “death of God”, “resurrection of God”. However, the Monk Anastasius reminds the Monophysites that the Trisagion has always been understood in many churches as a hymn addressed to the Trinity, and not only to the incarnate Word: “and the expression “passion of God” must be taken with all caution, since there may be some bad understanding, blasphemous in relation to God and the Father, similarly in relation to the Holy Spirit, since the Holy Spirit is God, like the Father and the Son.” But even if we agree that the Trisagion is addressed only to the incarnate Word, then even then the Monophysites, in the opinion of St. Anastasius, are worthy of reproach. The Holy Father says that Monophysites understand theopaschist expressions in the sense that the Divine nature, having perceived humanity, also perceived the properties of human nature and therefore became passionate. Indeed, from the teaching of Sevier about particular properties included in the single properties of Christ, corresponding to His single complex nature, such a conclusion stems. The Monk Anastasius uses a polemical technique, which he called evidence “from reason” (πραγματικό), as opposed to direct quotation of Scripture or the holy fathers. Having depicted the Honest Cross on the tablet, he wrote above it: “God the Word, the rational soul and body” and asked the Monophysites a question: “Which of these three perished, died, became inactive and motionless?” When they answered that the body perished, but the Word and soul remained immortal, the Monk Anastasius accused his opponents of calling the soul of Christ immortal, and making God the Word, that is, the Divine nature of the Savior, passionate, which follows from their Trisagion Song. Archpriest John Meyendorff sees in such accusations a Nestorian bias in the division of natures, a misunderstanding of their hypostatic union, and believes that the insertion, carried out by Peter Gnatheus, of “an expression borrowed from the Nicene-Constantinopolitan Creed, was intended to reveal an essential point in the theology of St. Cyril. Since the Word is the only “subject” in Christ, He is also the subject of death “in the flesh,” which was “His own.” It is obvious that the Trisagion was interpreted as a hymn to the incarnate Word, and the expanded version of the hymn was formally Orthodox” 7 . However, accusations of misunderstanding the essence of the doctrine of the hypostatic union of natures and the resulting Orthodox understanding of theopaschytic expressions cannot be attributed to the Monk Anastasius. He immediately formulates the correct understanding of these expressions. It consists in the fact that the properties of human nature are assimilated and attributed to the Divine nature, and the properties of the Divine nature are attributed to the human nature according to the Economy and by virtue of being together within one hypostasis: “Therefore, as soon as you hear: the Lord of glory is crucified 8, or “God suffered at the hands of Israel,” or “Let me imitate the suffering of my God,” or “Drops of God’s blood,” or “God’s death, the tomb and the Cross,” Do not in any way say that the passion and death of God the Word were by nature, but that they were by His flesh, united by hypostasis. For just as the flesh, due to the ineffable and inseparable union with God the Word, is assimilated into the divine, so often the human, passionate and mortal is assimilated to the God Word who is in it; having assimilated to Himself, in a certain respect, by the economy and by the common existence of the passions of His own flesh, He, being God, by nature and in truth remains impassive and immortal.” The Monophysites’ incorrect understanding of the doctrine of the communication of properties led them not only to theopaschism, but also to the emergence of some gross triadological heresies within Monophysitism. The controversy with one of them is reflected by the Monk Anastasius in the fifteenth, sixteenth, seventeenth and last - twenty-fourth chapters of the Guide. The heresy of the Sevirian Patriarch of Alexandria Damian was a response to the current of tritheism that emerged within Monophysitism, which, in turn, is a consequence of the terminological inconsistency of Monophysite Christology. The Monophysites, identifying the terms “nature” and “hypostasis” in Christology, left behind them, following the terminology of the Cappadocian fathers, different meanings in triadology. Most Monophysites came to terms with this contradiction, but a small sect of Tritheites still formed. Leontius of Byzantium considers the following incident to be the reason for the emergence of this sect. In a debate with the Orthodox, the Monophysites, as usual, accused them of Nestorianism, since if there are two natures in Christ, then in Him there are two hypostases, two Persons, for there is no non-hypostatic nature. The Orthodox responded, as St. Anastasius does in the Guide, that there are three Persons in the Trinity, but She has one nature, which means that nature and hypostasis are not the same thing. The Monophysites, in the interests of self-defense, were forced to admit that in a certain sense one could speak of three natures, of three beings in the Trinity 9 . The heresy of tritheism in the bosom of monophysitism is a completely logical consequence of Sevier’s Christology. If the Orthodox said that God the Word assumed a common human nature, and not a particular nature (that is, hypostasis), and, accordingly, the common Divine nature was entirely, but only in the Hypostasis of the Word, embodied in Christ, then Sevier says that in both cases we must talk about a private nature (hypostasis). Regarding Christology, this teaching of Sevier is an identification of Monophysitism. But in triadology, the assumption of any other than the complete union of the Divine essence with humanity directly leads to tritheism. It became a natural consequence of Sevirov’s view of the triadological aspect of Christology and appeared no more than forty years after Sevirov. Around 585, the Sevirian Patriarch of Alexandria Damian published an essay against the Tritheites, and the Sevirian Patriarch of Antioch Peter of Callinicus first came out with cautious criticism and eventually (after Easter 588) announced a severance of Eucharistic communion. Damian argued that the three hypostases of the Trinity differ in reality only as three hypostatic properties. To do this, he identified the properties of ungeneracy, birth and originality with the hypostases of the Father, Son and Holy Spirit, respectively. Thus, Damian denied the reality of the distinction between hypostases (that which has independent existence - in contrast to properties that have existence only “in another”). Peter tried to defend the traditional theology of the Cappadocian fathers, while simultaneously distancing himself from the tritheism of which Damian accused him. Although the dispute was formally resolved in Peter's favor at the Council of Alexandria of the Sevirian Church in 616 (however, without condemning Damian), the heresy of Damianism triumphed among the Monophysites, at least in Egypt after the Islamic conquest in 641 10. This is precisely evidenced by the polemics with her by the Monk Anastasius of Sinaite, described in the “Guide”. In the fifteenth chapter of the Guide, the Monk Anastasius polemicizes with the two Paschal Epistles of the Sevirian Patriarch of Alexandria John III (680–689), who clearly professes the teaching of Damian 11. Sinaite quotes the words of these “Egyptian in mind” (οί αίγυπτιάζοντες τόν νούν) heretics: “Everything that is said about Christ is said about the Father and the Holy Spirit,” or rather, “only what in Christ concerns the essence (τά ούσιωδώς), applies equally to the whole Trinity." “Egyptian in mind” followers of Damian, in support of their teaching about the perception by the entire Trinity (which, in their opinion, is a single nature-hypostasis) of the natural properties of Christ’s humanity, referred to His words: “I am not alone, for the Father is with Me” (John 16:32), “The Spirit of the Lord is on Me; for He has anointed Me” (Luke 4:18) and especially to the words of the Apostle Paul about the Savior: “in Him dwells all the fullness of the Divinity bodily” (Col. 2:9): “If the Holy Trinity has one nature, and this very nature in the contemplated Hypostasis of the Son is separately contemplated as perfect and immaculate, and the Son is incarnate, then it turns out that all the fullness of the Divinity is certainly incarnate according to what was said: “in Him dwells all the fullness of the Divinity bodily.” So, we see that among the Monophysites, in response to the tritheism that arose there, the old heresy of Sabellius was actually resurrected, who taught about the one incarnate God, changing only the mask faces (the Father - at Sinai, the Son - at the incarnation and the Spirit - on the day of Pentecost). Therefore, the Monk Anastasius rightly calls their teaching the “Sabellian fusion.” If Sabellius spoke of a single nature, a single hypostasis and three faces (modes, masks) of God, then the Damianites, speaking of three hypostases, thought of them only as properties. Thus, the transfer of Christological Monophysite terminology to triadology leads either to tritheism or to the heresy of Damian, that is, in fact, to the heresy of Sabellius. “Those who are Egyptian in their minds,” as St. Anastasius calls the Damianites, having not learned the sacrament of the Incarnation, did not know the sacrament of the Holy Trinity. The Orthodox speak the same language, the language of the Cappadocian Fathers, both about Christ and the Trinity. And although the Cappadocians themselves did not transfer their triadological terminology to the doctrine of Christ, this transfer can be deduced from the First Epistle to Presbyter Clidonius of St. Gregory the Theologian. There is a place in it where the saint speaks in the same figurative language about both triadology and Christology: “In the Savior there is something else and another, because the invisible is not identical with the visible and the pre-temporal with that which is under time; but the Other and the Other have no place in Him. - This will not happen! For both are together—God became human, and man became deified... When I say “other and other,” I understand this differently than how the Trinity should be understood. There is Another and Another, so as not to merge the Hypostases, and not another and another, for the Three Hypostases in Divinity are one and identical.” The Monk Anastasius repeats this passage almost verbatim: “After all, in the Trinity there is Another and Another, but in Christ there is no Other and Another, but there is another and another, but in the Trinity there is no other and another.” In response to triadological errors within Monophysitism, St. Anastasius clearly formulates the Orthodox triadology formulated by the Cappadocian Fathers, and the consequences of the hypostatic union of the natures of Christ in relation to intra-Trinitarian relations. It is necessary to clearly understand the differences in the natural and hypostatic properties of the Persons of the Trinity: “In the Word’s own Hypostasis the integrity of the Trinity being is not contemplated, as Savelli’s fusion asserts. For the Word is neither unbegotten, nor begetting, nor uncaused, has neither one who sits on His right hand 12 nor one who exists in His bosom 13 like the Father, has no procession of the Spirit and none of the other hypostatic properties of the Father and the Holy Spirit, for the Son is not unbegotten like the Father, the Son is not a Parent like the Father; again, the Son is not without cause, not coming forth.” Therefore, the incarnation, in which the fullness of the Divine nature, but in the hypostasis of only the Word, and not the Father and not the Spirit, was unfused and invariably united with the fullness of human nature, did not change the relationship between the Persons of the Trinity: “And therefore the Hypostasis of the Son is incarnate, neither the ungeneracy of the Father nor the outgoing Hypostasis of the Holy Spirit is incarnate with Him. But since all the natural properties of the Trinity, that is, originlessness, uncreatedness, unlimitedness, immutability, goodness, life-giving and all the like, without changing and remaining of the same nature, just as in the Father and in the Holy Spirit, are contemplated in the Son, therefore it is said: in Him dwells all the fullness of the Divinity bodily 14 and therefore it is said that Christ is perfect in the Divinity.” The other Persons of the Trinity participated in the incarnation “by the common will, that is, by favor and overshadowing.” The Father is pleased and sends the Son into the world, and the Holy Spirit assists and overshadows Him. The Son becomes Christ, that is, the Anointed One, “whose anointing is done by the Father, and whose anointing is the Holy Spirit.” In this collaboration there is manifested the one will and one action of the Anointing One (the Father), the Anointed One (the Son) and the Anointing One (the Spirit). Note that a similar error in not accurately distinguishing the natural (general) and hypostatic (particular) properties of the Persons of the Trinity also exists in the Catholic teaching about the procession of the Holy Spirit not only from the Father, but also from the Son (Filioque). The Monk Anastasius of Sinaite, in the above words that “the Word <...> does not have the procession of the Spirit,” clearly expresses his rejection of this teaching. So, the suspicions of the Orthodox supporters of the Council of Chalcedon towards the Monophysites in theopaschism were not groundless. This was expressed in the emergence within Monophysitism of such gross triadological heresies as tri-theism and Damianism, which actually revived the heresy of the monarchian modalists. Both of these intra-Monophysite triadological heresies are the logical development of Sevirian Christology. Only the Orthodox understanding of theopaschist expressions, based on the doctrine of the hypostatic (that is, within the framework of one hypostasis, and not one nature) union of natures, allows us to escape from theopaschism, that is, from the confession that the Divine nature became passionate at the Incarnation, and from triadological errors. 1. Anastasii Sinaitae. Sermones duo in constitutionem hominis secundum imaginem Dei, necnon Opuscula adversus monotheletas. / Cuius edionem curavit Karl-Heinz Uthemann. Turnhout, Leuven, 1985. CLXVIII, 200 p. (Corpus christianorum. Series graeca. V.12). 2. Anastasii Sinaitae. Viae dux. / Cuius edionem curavit Karl-Heinz Uthemann. Turnhout, Leuven, 1981. CCL, 464 p. (Corpus christianorum. Series graeca. V.8). 3. Grillmeier, Aloys. Christ in Christian Tradition. V. 2: From the Council of Chakedon (451) to Gregory the Great (590–604). Part 2: The Church of Constantinople in the sixth century. London, Louisville (Kentucky), 1995. XXV, 523. 4. Richard, Marcel. Anastase le Sinapte, l'Hodegos et le Monothelisme. // Revue des Etudes Byzantines 16 (1958). Paris, 29–42. 5. Bolotov V.V. History of the Church during the period of the Ecumenical Councils: History of theological thought. M., 2007. 6. Gratsiansky M.V. Guyan. // Orthodox encyclopedia. T.Ch. M., 2005. pp. 276–277. 7. Gregory the Theologian, St. Collection of works in two volumes. T.1. Minsk, M., 2000. 8. Gregory the Theologian, St. Collection of works in two volumes. T.2. Minsk, M., 2000. 9. Davydenkov Oleg, priest. Aphthartodocetism. // Orthodox encyclopedia. T.IV. M., 2002. pp. 193–194. 10. Davydenkov Oleg, priest. Christological system of Sevirus of Antioch: Dogmatic analysis. M., 2007. 11. Dionysius the Areopagite. Op. Maximus the Confessor, Rev. Interpretations. St. Petersburg, 2002. 12. John of Damascus, Rev. Source of knowledge. M., 2002. 13. Meyendorff John, prot. Christ in Eastern Orthodox theology. M., 2000. 14. Lurie V.M. Theology of “Egyptians with the mind”: http:// hgr.narod.ru/dami.htm. Critical ed.: Anastasii Sinaitae. Viae dux. / Cuius edionem curavit Karl-Heinz Uthemann. Turnhout, Leuven, 1981. CCL, 464 p. (Corpus christianorum. Series graeca. V.8). See: Bolotov V.V. History of the Church during the period of the Ecumenical Councils: History of theological thought. M., 2007. pp. 230–231. For more details see: Grillmeier, Aloys. Christ in Christian Tradition. V. 2: From the Council of Chakedon (451) to Gregory the Great (590–604). Part 2: The Church of Constantinople in the sixth century. London, Louisville (Kentucky), 1995, pp. 83–87; Davydenkov Oleg, priest. Christological system of Sevirus of Antioch: Dogmatic analysis. M., 2007. P. 209–218; Davydenkov Oleg, priest. The great mystery of piety: God appeared in the flesh. M., 2002. pp. 74–78. See: John Meyendorff, Prot. Christ in Eastern Orthodox theology. M., 2000. pp. 38–39. Αύγουστάλιος - imperial prefect of Egypt. Meyendorff John, Rev. Christ in Eastern Orthodox theology. P. 39. For more details, see: Bolotov V.V. History of the Church during the period of the Ecumenical Councils: History of theological thought. pp. 412–416. Lurie V. M. Theology of “Egyptians with the mind”: http:// hgr.narod.ru/dami.htm. It is the reference to these Messages that allows the researcher Richard (Richard, Marcel. Anastase le Sinapte, l’Hodegos et le Monothelisme. // Revue des Etudes Byzantines 16 (1958). Paris, 29–42.) and after him the publisher of the critical text of the “Guide” Uthemann to put an end to the centuries-old dispute about the dating of this work. We can talk about two editions of the Guide. The bulk of the work was compiled in the first years after the Alexandrian Patriarch Cyrus (631–641). The second edition, in which corrections, additions and scholia appeared, can be attributed to the time after the VI Ecumenical Council, namely to the period 686–689, since in this place of the fifteenth chapter of St. Anastasius speaks of the Epistle of John five years ago, and from the meaning of the scholium it is clear that John was still alive.