Quintessence of Religious Doctrines - Malankarasyriac Voice

84Heresies 167 168Quintessence of Religious Doctrinesconscience to teach that none of the mysterious ways of God isconcealed to him and that as he knew himself, he knew all thedivine ways.25. Narius:- The following is the summary of his heretical teaching.Although Trinity is One in nature, he attributed degrees of statusto the persons of Trinity. He coined words to articulate this.Thus he called the Father Great, Son to be the Greatest and theHoly Spirit Very Great. Eventhough the Word became flesh thesoul that he assumed was similar to vegetable or animal souland not a perfect one. Jesus did not possess consciousness;instead he had divinity. The body of Jesus was of ethereal type.His nature was a mixed one. Even after the resurrection of humanbeings they are confounded with the wants of eating and drinking.He authored one thousand Psalms and claimed them to hesuperior to those of David. It is gathered from some texts thatas regards the incarnation of the Son, he followed the theoryput forward by Sabellias.26. Eusebius of Urahah:- He had certain old disciples who usedto propagate that dreams as well as the activities of the evilspirits are actually the revealings of Holy Spirit. So naturallythose who approach them would receive the gift of the HolySpirit. Even if such people sleep with women they would nothave any blemish; the body that we bear will bring no good.27. Eutuchus:- He seems to have followed Ulithinose andApollinarius. Word the God did not take anything human fromthe Virgin. Instead the Word by itself became flesh. His bodywas not of our nature. His nature, rather, was a mixed one. Itwas interchangeable too.28. Julius of Haggag:- On account of the mixing of natures, thebody of our Lord got transformed into one of divine substance.So he was not of our nature. What all did he perform during hisearthly ministry as well as his crucifixion and resurrection wereall illusions.29. Tritheists:- This school of thinkers propagated the following.Trinity is not of three persons with one nature. Each one of thepersons of Trinity has rather separate and independent natures.So Trinity was constituted of three Persons of three natures.Therefore they may be called three deities. Hence the nameTritheists.30. Stephen the Son of Sudayli:- His teachings were as follows.There is no eternal punishment as there is an end to everypunishment. Therefore the sinners “will not be punished for ever”.Similarly mercy will be shown even to the devils. In the endeverything will return to God’s nature. In order to gainauthenticity for his teachings he authored a book and to createthe impression that it was by Hierothios the preceptor ofSt. Dionysius, he named it after Hierothios.All the above heresies entertain tenets which contravene theessential doctrines of the Church. In the beginning of these heresiesthey all gained some strength and many people rallied around them.But God has uprooted them all so that none of them is to be seentoday. Nestorians, the Greeks and the Church of England, upholdthe variables of the heresies of the above type. With regard to themixing up of the human and the divine natures in Christ and withregard to the procession of the Holy Spirit, these Churches followvarious other heresies as well. Some declare that the mixing up ofthe natures in Christ is volitinal and behavioural. For some others,the joining of natures is on the personal level; while for some it wasonly an apparent one as in the case of putting a different countenanceor face with the help of a mask, which is known ‘persupa’ in Greekterminology. Some others opine that His godliness and manliness,though inseparably mixed must be treated so differently and mustbe known, as of two natures. There are some who propagate thedouble procession of the Holy Spirit from the Father and the Son.Egyptian, Ethiopian and the Armenian Churches, however, agreewith the teachings of the Jacobite Syrians.*****