CYRIL OF ALEXANDRIA

CYRIL OF ALEXANDRIA, patriarch, theologian, St. (?–444). Patriarch from 412 to 444, Cyril was the extraordinarily energetic and capable-not to say ruthless-theological and political opponent of Nestorius of Constantinople (qq.v.). The theological question turned around the unity of Christ’s person. The political issue was the new prominence of Constantinople at the expense of Alexandria (q.v.).

Cyril objected vehemently to Nestorius’s denial that Mary the Virgin (q.v.) be called Theotokos, literally, “she who gives birth to God.” The Constantinopolitan patriarch argued for the title, Christotokos, on the seemingly reasonable ground that God could not be said to have been born of a woman, but that the man, Jesus, could. Cyril replied that to make such a distinction was effectively to divide Christ into a committee of two, God the Word and Jesus of Nazareth. His arguments drew particularly on his great predecessor on the throne of Alexandria, Athanasius, and focused especially on the question of theosis (qq.v.). If, Cyril said, Christ was not truly God become man-“one nature of the Incarnate Word,” to quote his favorite formula-then human beings could hope for no true communion with God (q.v.).

The argument was powerful, and one must note that it was delivered from the depths of Cyril’s own personal conviction, as is evidenced in the eloquence and power of his voluminous and non-polemical commentaries on the Scriptures (q.v.). Thus it was Cyril who prevailed at the Third Ecumenical Council (q.v.) at Ephesus in 431. The violence with which he accomplished his victory, however, together with the lack of flexibility many of his followers had with regard to theological formulas, were at the root of the schisms of the Persian (“Nestorian”) Church and, after the Council of Chalcedon (q.v.) twenty years later, of the “monophysite” churches as well.