Phantasiasts
Phantasiasts (from Greek
Greek and Syriac writings mainly to refer to extreme forms of Miaphysitism.[1] The term evokes the second-century heresy of Docetism. Both movements were accused of denying the full reality of Jesus's humanity.[2]
The first targets of the label were the
Dyophysites and moderate Miaphysites indicates the extreme nature of the position relative to orthodox theologies.[3]
In the middle of the sixth century, the term Phantasiasts was applied to the Aphthartodocetae, the followers of Julian of Halicarnassus, the theological foe of Severus of Antioch. It was in this sense that Patriarch Sergius I of Antioch used the term in the late 550s when writing to the Miaphysite bishops of Persia about receiving back those who had lapsed into the "heresy of Julian the Phantasiast". The poet George of Pisidia also describes Phanatasiasts in his poem celebrating the emperor Heraclius's campaign of 622 against the Persians.[1]
The term was also applied to the Gaianites (latter-day Aphthartodocetae) and in this sense was used into the ninth century.[4]
References
- ^ a b c Sergey Minov, "Date and Provenance of the Syriac Cave of Treasures: A Reappraisal"[dead link], Hugoye: Journal of Syriac Studies 20,1 (2017): 129–229, esp. at 141–145.
- The Catholic Encyclopedia, Vol. 5 (Robert Appleton Company, 1909).
- ^ Aloys Grillmeier and Theresia Hainthaler, Christ in Christian Tradition, Volume 2: From the Council of Chalcedona (451) to Gregory the Great (590–604), Part 4: The Church in Alexandria, with Nubia and Ethiopia after 451 (Westminster John Knox Press, 1996), p. 23.
- ^ Grillmeier and Hainthaler (1996), p. 48.