Monophysites...

[Guest EENS]

May the Peace of christ be with you,

are any Monophysites part of the Catholic church (ie. Their own right?)

thanks

and God Bless

sam

[cappie]

Monophysitism, Christian schismatic sect of the 5th and 6th centuries which maintained that Christ had only one (divine) nature, thereby opposing the orthodox doctrine that he was both divine and human. The Monophysites were mainly confined to the Eastern Church and gained little strength in the West. At the directive of Pope Leo I, the Council of Chalcedon in 451 attempted to steer a middle course between the orthodox and Monophysite views. The resulting edict did not satisfy the Monophysites, and the controversy continued, the Monophysites being supported by the Copts and the Eutychian sect. The Eastern Church, in an effort to suppress the heresy, in the first half of the 6th century excommunicated the Monophysites, who thereupon formally seceded from the parent Church. The Monophysites split into two factions over controversies regarding the incorruptibility of Christ's body. After 560 a third faction, the Tritheists, arose; they interpreted the three persons of the Deity as three separate gods and hence were regarded by the other factions as heretics.

In Egypt, Syria, and Mesopotamia the Monophysite congregations remained strong throughout the controversy. Although finally condemned in 680-681 at the sixth ecumenical council, Monophysitism continues in some Churches to this day. The modern Abyssinian Church, Armenian Church, Coptic Church, and Jacobite Church are all Monophysitic bodies.

[b]Armenian Church[/b], one of the oldest branches of the Christian faith. The earliest authentic accounts of the introduction of Christianity into Armenia date from the apostolic work of St Gregory the Illuminator, who, in 303, converted King Tiridates III and members of his court. Christianity was strengthened in Armenia by the translation of the Bible into the Armenian language by the Armenian monk and scholar St Mesrob. Following the ecclesiastical controversy concerning the twofold nature of Christ, the Armenian Christians refused to accept the decisions of the Council of Chalcedon and formed a separate Church, sometimes referred to as the Gregorian Church. In 1439 a union with the Roman Catholic Church was accepted by some members of the Armenian Church. This was later repudiated, but a group of Armenian Catholics accept papal supremacy and the authority of the Catholic Armenian patriarchate of Sis or Cilicia (in Beirut, Lebanon), which was set up in 1742. They use an Armenian rite.

[b]Coptic Church[/b], the major Christian Church in Egypt, the name of which, derived from the Greek word for “Egyptian” (Arabic, qubt, Westernized as Copt), points to its national origins. Unsubstantiated tradition attributes to the apostle Mark the initial preaching of Christianity in Egypt. Recent scholarship suggests that the origins of Egyptian Christianity are to be found among the Jews living in Alexandria in the 1st century ad. By the end of the 2nd century the Christian catechetical school in Alexandria, the major city of Hellenistic Egypt, headed by Clement of Alexandria had already acquired great fame. Origen, the founder of Greek Christian theology and biblical science, followed Clement as head of the school. In the 4th and 5th centuries, two great bishops of Alexandria defended Christian orthodoxy—St Athanasius, against Arianism, and St Cyril, against Nestorianism.

Some Egyptian Christians, however, refused to follow the decrees of the Council of Chalcedon (451), which defined the person of Jesus Christ as being “one in two natures”. The doctrine of “two natures” appeared to them to imply the existence of two Christs, divine and human, and was therefore tainted with Nestorianism. They upheld the terminology of St Cyril, who had spoken of “one incarnate nature of God the Word”. Those Egyptian Christians who rejected the Council of Chalcedon—a council accepted both in Constantinople and in Rome—faced charges of Monophysitism, the belief that Christ has only one nature rather than two.

A part of the Coptic Church made their submission to Rome whilr retaining their liturgy and theology.

[b]Jacobite Church[/b], an ancient Christian group, named after James (Iakub) Bar Adai, who, in Syria, led the Monophysite opposition Monophysitism to the affirmation of the two natures of Christ by the Council of Chalcedon (451). Officially persecuted by the Roman Empire, the Monophysites received some sympathy from Empress Theodora, who in 543 arranged for the secret consecration of James as bishop of Edessa and as ecumenical metropolitan. This title implied that he assumed the task of perpetuating an initially illegal Monophysite hierarchy in Syria. Supported by a substantial part of the population, the Jacobite Church survived Byzantine persecution, Muslim occupation, and conquest by the Crusaders. During the medieval period, a number of Jacobites became well known in the Muslim world, particularly as medical doctors and historians.

Headed by a patriarch of Antioch, who actually resides in Damascus, Syria, the Church is sometimes designated as Syrian Orthodox. The term Jacobite is also applied to the ancient Christian Church of Malabar, in India, which affiliated itself with the Syrian Church in the 16th century but is independent today. In Syria, Lebanon, and Iraq, the Jacobite faithful number approximately 100,000.

Officially, the Jacobite Church, maintaining its opposition to the Council of Chalcedon, confesses the “one divine-human nature” of Christ (Monophysitism). It is separated from both Roman Catholicism and Orthodoxy but is in communion with the other Non-Chalcedonian, or Oriental Orthodox, Churches—the Armenian, the Coptic, and the Ethiopian. It uses Syriac as its liturgical language and keeps the ancient liturgical tradition of the Church of Antioch. Its entire membership speaks Arabic.