Broschiertes Buch

On the Incarnation of Christ

Against the Heretic Nestorius

Herausgeber: Bertram, Jerome

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St John Cassian's little treatise on the Incarnation is of a very different character his better-known works of spirituality, the Institutes and the Collations. Cassian wrote the De Incarnatione in 429, at the request of Leo, Archdeacon of Rome, as part of the build-up to the condemnation of Nestorius at the Synod of Rome in 430 and the general Council of Ephesus in 431. Leo was himself to become Pope in 440, and intervene conclusively in the next Christological crisis, the Monophysite over-reaction to Nestorianism, settled at the Council of Chalcedon in 451. The great divisions which afflicted Christendom in the sixteenth century left the doctrine of the nature of Christ largely intact, so that Catholics, Orthodox and Protestants could at least agree on the conclusions of the first four General Councils. That all changed in the twentieth century, when the 'modernist' or 'liberal' movement in theology gained control over most Protestant and many Catholic writers. Many moderns, who still claim to be Christians, have consciously or unconsciously revived all the erroneous opinions which Cassian nicely terms the 'weeds' in the garden of God. This makes Cassian's work all the more relevant to Christians in the twenty-first century. A refutation of the heresy we know as Nestorianism, it also deals effectively with many other erroneous ideas on the nature of Christ - those of Ebion, Carinthus, Marcion ,Sabellius, Arius, and Pelagius, the last of whom is specifically attacked in the fifth book of the treatise. Nestorius himself, as Patriarch of Constantinople, became notorious when he publicly denied that it was appropriate to call the Virgin Mary 'Theotokos' - the one who brought God to birth, or simply 'Mother of God'. Now all these ancient heresies, Ebionism, Cerinthianism, Marcionism, Sabellianism, Arianism, Pelagianism and Nestorianism, can be found happily ensconced in the common rooms of our great universities. Cassian teaches the fundamental Catholic principle of ongoing revelation through both Scripture and Tradition, and the authority of the living Church. In support of his work he quotes the Fathers, the great writers who have been accepted as authoritative by Orthodox and Catholic alike, although of course here they are his own actual or near contemporaries, and shows how the true interpretation of the Bible leads only to a Catholic conclusion. Jesus Christ is true God and true Man.

Weniger Details

A monk and ascetic writer of Southern Gaul, and the first to introduce the rules of Eastern monasticism into the West. Born probably in Provence about 360, he was the son of wealthy parents and received a good education. In Bethlehem Cassian became a monk, but, desiring to acquire the science of sanctity from its most eminent teachers, the Desert Fathers and Mothers, with the permission of his abbot he left with a companion for the Egyptian deserts. They did not see Bethlehem again for seven years. During their absence they visited the solitaries most famous for holiness in Egypt, and so attracted were they by the great virtues of their hosts that after obtaining an extension of their leave of absence at Bethlehem, they returned to Egypt, where they remained several years longer. It was during this period of his life that Cassian collected the materials for his two principal works, the Institutes and Conferences. From Egypt the companions came to Constantinople, where Cassian became a favorite disciple of St. John Chrysostom. The famous bishop of the Eastern capitol elevated Cassian to the diaconate, and placed in his charge the treasures of his cathedral. After the second expulsion of St. Chrysostom, Cassian was sent as an envoy to Rome, where he was ordained to the priesthood. From this time Germanus is no more heard of, and of Cassian himself, for the next decade or more, nothing is known. About 415 he was at Marseilles where he founded two monasteries, one for men, over the tomb of St. Victor, a martyr of the last Christian persecution under Maximian (286-305), and the other for women. The remainder of his days were passed at, or very near, Marseilles. His personal influence and his writings contributed greatly to the diffusion of monasticism in the West. Although never formally canonized, St. Gregory the Great regarded him as a saint, and it is related that Urban V (1362-1370), who had been an abbot of St. Victor, had the words Saint Cassian engraved on the silver casket that contained his head. At Marseilles his feast is celebrated, with an octave, July 23, and his name is found among the saints of the Greek Calendar. -From the Catholic Encyclopedia