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Theodoret

5th-century Byzantine theologian and bishop

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Biography

According to the historian Tillemont, he was born at Antioch in 393 and died about 458, either at Cyrrhus (an estimated eighty Roman miles east of Antioch) or at the monastery near Apamea (fifty-four Roman miles southeast of Antioch).

Information regarding his life is derived primarily from his Epistles and his Religious History (Philotheos historia). He was the child of a prosperous Antiochene couple. Encouraged after his mother was cured of a serious eye complaint and converted to a strict religious life by Peter the Galatian, an ascetic living in the locality, Theodoret's parents sought further help from local holy men, as she had been childless for the twelve years of her marriage. For years their hopes remained unfulfilled. Eventually, Theodoret's birth was promised by a hermit named Macedonius the Barley-Eater on the condition of the child's dedication to God, from which the name Theodoret ("gift of God") is derived.

Theodoret received an extensive education. Although his own writings suggest his training was exclusively religious, his literary output demonstrates that he also acquired a broad classical education, a common expectation for a child of prosperous parents in a city known as a centre of secular learning. He visited Peter the Galatian weekly, was instructed by Macedonius and other ascetics, and at an early age became a lector among the clergy of Antioch. He studied the works of Diodore of Tarsus and Theodore of Mopsuestia, having been raised in their theological tradition. His correspondents included the sophists Aerius and Isokasius. He understood Syriac as well as Greek, but knew neither Hebrew nor Latin. In his letters, he quotes from Homer, Sophocles, Euripides, Aristophanes, Demosthenes, and Thucydides. By the age of twenty-three, following the death of his parents, he divided his fortune among the poor and became a monk in the monastery of Nicerte, near Apamea, where he lived for about seven years.

In 423, he left the monastery upon his appointment as Bishop of Cyrrhus. The diocese covered approximately 1,600 square miles and comprised 800 parishes, with a small town as its see. Supported by the appeals of local hermits, and despite facing personal danger, Theodoret vigorously maintained his doctrinal positions. He converted more than 1,000 Marcionites in his diocese, in addition to many Arians and Macedonians. He removed more than 200 copies of Tatian's Diatessaron from the churches, erected new church buildings, and supplied them with relics.

His philanthropic and economic interests were extensive. He endeavoured to secure relief for people oppressed by taxation and, using his episcopal revenues, erected baths, bridges, halls, and aqueducts. He attracted rhetoricians and physicians to the city and reminded officials of their duties. He sent letters of encouragement to the persecuted Christians of Persian Armenia and provided refuge to Celestiacus, a Carthaginian who had fled the rule of the Vandals.

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