For when the barbarians had fled in discomfiture, while none was pursuing them, and the Emperor was mightily heartened to engage in thought for his empire, and the city was mightily filled with encouragement, they found none other cause of [this] sudden change----because there was none else doing this: to discomfit the one and encourage the other ----except only the cross, which had been set up, of him who was crucified in nature and in truth, that is, [of] the bodily frame which had been crucified naturally. And it is known unto us that we should not be ashamed to say that he died, and not God who made mighty the bodily frame, weak and passible and mortal, which suffered and died by lifting up [upon the cross]. For this reason also the wood whereon he was crucified was [a means] to salvation. For, as though for one that believed not and repudiated the crucifixion of the mortal body which can save, he commanded to make the cross of wood, to effect thereby salvation such as this in the city and amidst the barbarians, in such wise that it is not doubted that it is a crucifixion of the body which has given life to all the world, and not of God who by the lifting up of the body and the cross has effected such a miracle as this.
/ But because they had feigned themselves wise in this, as though the divinity was crucified and not the body, they were still left in opposition to the pious, who were saying that the crucifixion was not of the divinity but of the body of the divinity and [that] for this reason he saved us through the cross. Again God raised up anew the vehemence of the barbarians and earthquakes against this Pharaonic intention. And again, because he sought to restrain them from [the persecution of] the pious and from [inflicting upon them] the sufferings which they caused them to bear----for then only were they revived and set free----by both of them he taught [them] that the impious thought, wherein was [contained] the confession of [his] death, was not pleasing unto him. |368 For, although they supposed that that which [had been caused] by the barbarians was death [caused] by men, yet they could not suppose this of that which was being [caused] by the earthquake. But, after they had not even so come to a perception of the glory of God incorruptible, and were imputing death and suffering and weakness unto him in manliness and immortality such as this, he had then taught them by the words themselves not to impute blemish and decay unto God, because he is holy and free from all sufferings and even without weakness, he who by a weak cross quitted himself manfully like a man and was [endowed] with all manliness. So then impute not death / unto him who is alone immortal and by our own death has proved that he is immortal by means of the confession of the holy and of the mighty and of the immortal.
But because they abode not by what they had been forced to confess and had not believed in God the mighty and immortal, who is able to make even wars to cease, they had [not only I become the slaves of the barbarians and been subjected unto slavery to tribute unto them by the confession of written documents, but were also giving [it] unto those who were warring on his side. And there was naught that he, who showed the barbarian [to be] master and the Romans slaves, did not. And thus the supremacy had changed over unto the barbarians, as though the Romans themselves had not God who [is] over all, holy and mighty and immortal. For this reason the rest also of the peoples fled unto him but fled from the Romans, so that they were not even able to rescue themselves. And because they had thus set up the supremacy, as though they had no urgent need for divine aid and had not come to themselves, they remembered not even the very confession of the holy one and the mighty and the immortal which they had taken into their mouths; but contrariwise they were again maintaining the sufferings of the divinity, by means of which they were showing that not one of these [attributes] was his. For with the sufferings and the death this also was assumed: that he was neither holy / by |369 nature nor immortal by nature nor mighty by nature, until God had again restored [some] of them, whether they wanted or whether they wanted [it] not, for the reputation of their impiety and for the defence of those who had suffered wrongfully and for the instruction of those who in anticipation were praying unto Flavian and Eusebius, whom they would have killed. Because men made compensation unto God, having confessed him [to be] both holy and mighty and immortal, both by law and by commands and by penalties they confirmed [their actions] against those who confessed God the Word [to be] holy and mighty and immortal and [punished them] with despoilment and exile and death, until Theodosius, who had raised himself up against God, was taken from [their] midst; and the mouth [of every man] was opened to confess and to glorify and to adore God the holy and mighty and immortal, speaking without fear. For not he who calls Christ God passible and mortal confesses Christ [to be] God, but he who speaks of Christ in his divinity which he is in his nature and confesses God impassible and immortal and mighty and holy in his nature but passible in his humanity, in that he confesses that he is by nature man.
But some will say: 'What participation hast thou with Flavian and with what has been done against him and on his account? For / thee every man has anathematized and denounced, and what thou addest after this thou toilest to thine [own] evil name and to thine [own] accusation and not to a simple and just defence.' That which I say unto him above and below and always is that it concerns me not to |370 have mercy upon any man such as these, but to be very anxious whether through my own anathema they are rescued from blasphemy and [whether] those who are rescued confess God holy and mighty and immortal, without changing the image of God who is incorruptible unto the image of man who is corruptible and mixing paganism in the midst of Christianity, but confessing God himself as is his image and confessing man as is his image, in such wise that the passible and also the immortal arc confessed in the image of their natures, so that Christianity confesses not a change of God nor yet a change of man, [after] the likeness of the impiety of paganism. But let yea be yea and nay nay in truth, so that Christ in truth and in nature may be confessed to be the saviour and the saved, God and man, who is in nature immortal and impassible as God and mortal and passible in nature as man. He is not God in both the natures nor yet man in both the natures. Therefore my own aim and my zeal is that God may be blessed and glorified even on earth as in heaven. / But may Nestorius be anathematized; but may they say what I pray them to say concerning God. For I am of those who [are] with God and not of those who [are] against God, who scorn God himself in the schema of piety and make void [the fact] that he is God. For he was for the things [for] which I war, and they that war with me against him; and for this reason on his account I am pledged to endure and to suffer everything, so that by my own anathema would that every man might be [ready] enough to be reconciled unto God, because there is naught greater or more precious unto me than this. Nor would I have declined to say the contrary of what I used to say, if I had known that they were wanting [me] to say the contrary of these things which I used to say in everything whatsoever and [that] they were of God, and [that] I should thereby be honoured before God on account of the [attributes] of God which I have regarded as God and not as man. . . .
But otherwise again [it is the case ] that I have not merely said the things touching Flavian, but I have cited them for a proof of what was done against me with impiety and with |371 injustice, in such wise that certain men arc not deceived by the name 'Council ' but seek [to learn] the things which took place with all truth and judge [some] of them before God, although they took place otherwise. For Satan is disguised in the schema of an angel of light and deceives / men [in order] to remove them afar from God. But further, since I have judged in my mind that to hide the dispensation which came about through the might and the wisdom of God without showing and revealing them unto all men is a great peril and [fraught] with all impiety and ingratitude----for he had done them on their account, that he might undo the schemes of them that were confirming their impiety and causing it to shine forth, and expose them bare, while I was not believed in what I was saying, whereas they were doing and had also done this in their assembly in the Council----all of which [it was] that I was suffering, and they believed me not. But it was not possible to refute and to undo these things which had been done in the Council, but the will to impiety was [stronger] than the will of God, by means of which the impious were convicted of being impious and the pious of being pious; and they contended unto death and preserved that sincerity of mind which was owing unto God. For when the time [was] not that under discussion which came by the patience of God [and] wherein some suffered and others caused them to suffer, the impious were not revealed [as] impious nor they that were worthy of such forethought as this [as worthy thereof, forethought] which had turned them aside from the contest against God, in which operations he was warring and fighting against them and restraining them from kicking against / the pricks of God; and yet not even so were they converted from their iniquity, while the pious had not been dispersed nor yet discouraged, while God was patient, from suffering throughout their whole lives, having adhered unto the purpose of |372 God. For this reason one finds that diligence and aid have been relaxed by those who had taken it up, and they have neglected what has been [entrusted] to them and diligence has been [only shown] by them in making pretence without knowledge concerning what ought to have been corrected, things which were disregarded and set aside by them. For it would have been right to cut short the things which were wrongly [done] and not to hide them. Those things then which [came about] as for correction were of God; what concealed them was not of God but of those who were undoing his [work].
For for what reason do you suppose that they who possessed the inhabited world [as] their home became the spoil of the barbarians? Was it not because they made not use of the supremacy which was given unto them as was right, that the peoples might know the grace which was given unto them, in such wise that they might learn as slaves what was required, because they learnt not as masters? For what reason again heard they the word of the Gospel, not from the orthodox but from the worshippers of creatures? They were / brought into subjection neither to the supremacy of the Empire nor yet under the religion wherein they were, that they might know that, when they took the supremacy of the Empire, they preserved not even in the Empire the supremacy of their religion in God; for this reason also they were not supreme in aught else, in that the supremacy changed over to [their] enemies. For whereby they neglected the Gospel, by these very things were they rejected from the supremacy; and they took part also in the faith of the worshippers of creatures and were distinct [only] in name and in the use of the term 'consubstantial'. As these confess the created and the uncreated and say 'consubstantial' in one way as if in praise and attribute the nature in another way by the distinction of the created and of the creator, thus also those |373 attribute the nature in one way unto the passible and unto the impassible, the created and the uncreated, and say 'consubstantial ' in another way in name alone as something [said] in praise, since they hold supremacy and religion in opposite senses without straightforwardly confessing the nature. For until even the [term] 'in nature' is freed from suspicion and has taken away the supremacy from the fear and the fear from the supremacy, [the supremacy] being supported by God, so that he may be glorified in heaven and on earth and [that there may be] glory in heaven and peace on earth in the government of the affairs thereof, God ceases not to guide us and to teach us, just as those / who teach children, making use of plagues and of protests which ought to teach us and to convince us that we err, and defending the silent and proving their victory.
For what have I done of these things which have happened as they have happened and not God himself? For because they have betrayed the tradition of the Fathers and have closed the mouth[s] of those who exacted the rights of the Fathers, so for this reason [some] of them have inclined unto Arianism according to what has been confessed [by them], and [others] of them unto Manichaeism, and [others] of them unto Judaism, and [others] of them unto other [errors, both] new and old. God has raised up of them and among them their own [judges], as he used to raise up judges from among the Jews, to confute them for their transgression against God, that is Flavian, who was representing me [in that] whereby he ought to have been my enemy, as indeed he was unto me both unwittingly or for some other reason, and Eusebius, who used to war against me. They have confessed without any cause for alarm, having warred against the adherents of Cyril, who were blaspheming and seeking to gain their ends. And God abandoned them not until they showed hostility unto Cyril; since these indeed were citing his words against those, and those again were choosing those things / which were opposed to these and setting them against |374 them; and they were mutually disputing, the one [side] with the other. And these were saying that they were Manichaeans since they referred all things, even the properties of the flesh, unto God the Word. But these too were accusing those of holding my opinions, since I too say these [same] things, and of referring the properties of God to the nature of the divinity and the properties of the humanity to the humanity; and they admitted that the union took place in prosôpon and not in the nature. And every man was within a very little of disputing with his neighbour, protesting against him on my account, as though I was surely calumniated. And these my [words] were quoted with all zeal; and these were refuting them that were saying that I predicate two sons, as indeed was never said by me; and those were confuting them that were predicating one nature for calling God himself passible, as I was saying that they said.
Who was it that constrained them to say these [same] things as I, when through the commands [of the Emperor] their reading was prohibited, since they were warring of themselves to discuss them with all zeal? And, when I was silent, and the authority to say them [had been] taken away from me, and I was not believed, God raised up those [men], who were believed when they said these [same] things as I, / which were the truth, without there being any suspicion therein of their having said these things out of friendship or out of love for me. And God brought not these things about on my account. For who is Nestorius? Or what is his life? Or what is his death in the world? But [he has brought them to pass] because of the truth which he has given unto the world, which was suppressed from deceitful causes, while he has also confuted the deceivers. And because they were [filled] with suspicion about me and were not believing what I was saying, as one that dissembles the truth and represses exact speech, God appointed for this [purpose] a preacher who was guiltless of this suspicion, Leo, who used to preach the truth undaunted. And, because the anticipation of the Council caused many to wonder and even the Romans |375 themselves, [so] that they believed not the things which I was saying and which were left without examination, God allowed these things to come to pass contrariwise, that he might cause the bishop of Rome, who was exercising the direction of the plotting of the Council in Ephesus against me, to pass away, and [that] he might make him agree with and confirm what was said by the bishop of Constantinople.
And he who was able | to do] everything, that is Dioscorus, bishop of Alexandria, was reckoned as naught. I say indeed, as naught, since he had recourse to flight and was looking out [means] not to be deprived and banished into exile. [These things took place] that through what they suffered / they might believe also what had been committed against me by the Egyptian in the former Council. And, because of the sham friendship of the Emperor and of the chiefs of the imperial household [toward me], I was suspected of constraining the Council, which stirred me not to be remiss in the truth, and of being constrained to agree with the Emperor because of what was committed against me, since, because they had held no examination about the truth, they suspected me of being a blasphemer. But God, in order that he might prove that the love which the Emperor had for me was treacherous, and [that it was felt by him] not for the truth but for the sake of [my] possessions, proved it by his aid in [the affair of] Eutyches and in [that of] Flavian, whereby it was seen that he gave not [permission] for an assembly to be held, and those who were assembled permitted not aught to be said except what they were commanded [to say]; but they condemned themselves also in fear and in ignominy.
Again, because they supposed that my [doctrine] had been summoned to examination and to judgement, but [that] I was surely trifling [in saying] that they [had] summoned me not to judgement but to deposition and to a snare of destruction |376 and of death, God, in protesting against them as being murderers, [even] God allowed Flavian to enter the Council and to suffer what he suffered at their hands; for it is evident that these were those things which the other had also committed against me aforetime. And, because it was supposed that those who had been bishops were disposed / to do naught outside the judgement which was pleasing unto them, either on account of the Emperor or out of fear or because of disturbances, God again exposed them as doing the contrary and confuted them before every man; and they let nothing be to which they bore not witness, but by all of them he had refuted the causes of error and preached them upon the roofs in such wise that there was not even a single excuse [left open] to those who feigned themselves without knowledge. Yet, just as Pharaoh was confuted by God by means of all things, and remained without excuse for not having been willing to be convinced either by the logic of words, or by the deeds themselves, or by the protest[s] of men, or again by the things of God, and for having died in his blasphemy, so also they remained without excuse. . . .
When therefore I had seen that these things were brought to pass by God, would you have wished that I should be silent and hide such a dispensation of God as all this? .... The prophets of God, who had been cursed as lying prophets by lying prophets as if by [true] prophets, would not have been distinguished [from the latter], unless they [had] consented to be cursed by lying prophets for the sake of God; the sons of those men would not have been worthy of the glory and the instruction of the prophets if they [had] kept agreement with the lying prophets. Nor would those of the Jews who became / Christians have been saved and rescued if they had kept to the oppressive judgement of their fathers against Christ as if [it had been delivered] by holy and righteous men. They would not have become the apostles of Christ if they had adhered 'to the whole crowd of Jews and to the priests and to the teachers of the law and to the chiefs as [unto true] teachers of the law and prophets. They would not have believed in Christ nor even have died |377 for Christ, if they had supposed death and contempt [to be] not honour but contempt, nor yet would they have now been honoured by the crowds and by chiefs and by lords, if they had not endured death and shame at the hands of chiefs and peoples; they would not have been worthy of such as this on the part of emperors and chiefs and of powers, if they had kept the commands and the laws of emperors and of judges and of chiefs. Our fathers would not have been reckoned orthodox in this and doctors, if they had sought to flee from the condemnation of the Council of the heretics and to say the things which they were saying, and had been hypocrites. We should not have been worthy of the instruction resulting from the labours of these men, if we had accepted without examination the agreement [which was reached], as if by a Council, against them.
And, that I may speak briefly, Meletius and Eustathius would not have been bishops of Antioch, if they had accepted the choice and the judgement / of the Council of the heretics against them, nor would Athanasius be bishop of Alexandria if he were to accept the judgement of those who deprived him without hesitation and as [if it proceeded ] from the orthodox. John would not be bishop of Constantinople, if he were to accept the judgement and the deprivation which was [promulgated] against him without examination as [if it proceeded] from a Council; nor again would Flavian have been bishop of Constantinople, if he were to agree to the pronouncement of the Oecumenical Council which deprived him as a pronouncement [proceeding] from an [Oecumenical] Council. Every one, of whatsoever city it may be, who has suffered therein on my account, would not be giving light, even as the sun, if I |378 had looked towards my accusers and not towards God and [if] also I had not been deemed worthy to be [given a share] in those things, every single one of which had been [brought to pass] by God; for this affair was not mine but Christ's who made me mighty. But every man will give account unto God concerning the things which he has said or brought to pass or done to cause scandal, or [wherein] he has been zealous with all zeal to make scandals to cease; but if, when a man does everything, he who is scandalized is not to be persuaded, let him be scandalized on his own account and not on account of him who says and cries out unto him and is not heard by him.
But, because many were blaming me many times / for not having written unto Leo, bishop of Rome, to teach him all the things which were committed, such as came to pass, and the change of faith, as if unto a man who is correct in his faith, especially when there had been given unto me, [even] unto me, a part of the letter relating to the judgement concerning Flavian and Eutyches, wherein it was revealed that [he feared]not the friendship of [his] majesty, for this reason I wrote not, not because I am a proud man and senseless, but so that I might not hinder from his running him who was running fairly because of the prejudice against my person. But I was content to endure the things whereof they accused me, in order that, while I was accused thereof, they might accept without hindrance the teaching of the Fathers; for I have no word [to say] concerning what was committed against me. And further I wrote not for the purpose that I, to whom for many years there was not one [moment of] repose nor human solace, might not be suspected of surely fleeing from the contest, fearing the labours [thereof]; for sufficient are the wrongs that have come upon the world [and] which are more able than I to make the oppression of the true faith shine forth in the eyes of every man.
But, because thou blamest me as though I have failed to say clearly the things which have occurred, O chief of the saints, / Sophronius, hear therefore also the things which thou |379 knowest and testifiest concerning the truth of the things which are said. For immediately, as indeed thou art persuaded, thou hast first seen that death has carried off the daughter of him who was then reigning, and thereafter, thou seest, that demon, the chief of adultery, who cast down the empress with insult and contumely. Again [thou seest] that the cities of Africa and of Spain and of Muzicanus and great and glorious islands----I mean Sicily and Rhodes and many other great ones----and Rome itself have been delivered over for spoil unto the barbarian Vandal. Yet there will however be in the first place and at no longer distance [of time] a second coming of the barbarian against Rome itself, during which also Leo, who has indeed held well to the faith but has agreed to the things which these have unjustly committed against me without examination and without judgement, will deliver up with his own hands the divine vessels of the sanctuary into the hands of the barbarians and will see with his [own] eyes the daughters of the emperor who is reigning at that time led into captivity. But I have endured the torment of my life and all my [fate] in this world as the torment of one day and lo! I have now already got me / to [the time of my] dissolution, and daily every day I beseech God to accomplish my dissolution, whose eyes have seen the salvation of God.
Conclusion. Rejoice for me, O desert, my beloved and my foster-parent and the home of my habitation, and my mother |380 [the land of] my exile, who even after my death will guard my body unto the resurrection by the will of God. Amen.
Finished is the writing of the book which is entitled the Bazaar of Heracleides, composed by [ him who is ] illustrious among the saints and all-blessed, my lord Nestorius, bishop of Constantinople, a witness every day and the pride of orthodoxy, a true preacher of the glorious Trinity. And unto Yahweh [ be ] unfailing glory. Amen.
[Selected footnotes]
1. Viz. Flavian.
2. Viz. Eutyches.
3. There is no new paragraph marked here in the Syriac text,
4. See B. J. Kidd, A History of the Church to ad. 461, iii. 202; Cyril, Adv. Nest. i. 5 (Migne, P.G.L. lxxvi. 41 d); and Evagrius, H. E. i. 9. For the text of Eusebius's alleged protest see Labbe (Mansi), iv. 1008.
5. Viz. Eutyches.
6. This is presumably the conversation to which Eusebius referred at Constantinople; see Labbe (Mansi), vi. 656 a. No other record of it seems to have survived.
7. Here clearly Eusebius ascribes to Nestorius the teaching commonly known as 'Nestorianism', and is shown to have been mistaken in so doing.
8. Viz. Eutyches.