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St Photius the Great, tr. Freese, 1920; selections
Codex 24: Acts of a Disputation Between Tritheites and Hesitators
Read a volume containing the Acts of a disputation held before John,1 bishop of the queen city, during the reign of Justin, in which Conon and Eugenius the Tritheites took part on the one side, and Paul and Stephen,2 the Hesitators,3 on the other. Conon and Eugenius appear to have sided with Philoponus; for when Paul and Stephen demanded that they should anathematize Philoponus, they were unwilling to do so. On the other hand, they brought forth arguments to prove that his views were in harmony with those of Severus4 and Theodosius, their own teachers. They indeed in many respects uphold the orthodox views----that the Trinity is consubstantial and of the same nature, that God is one, that the Godhead is one; but they are guilty of blasphemy in asserting that the Father and the Son and the Holy Ghost are partial substances, and have special divinities and natures, thus being at variance with themselves and the truth. Many other opinions of theirs are equally foolish and nonsensical.
Notes
- John III Scholasticus (the lawyer), bishop of Constantinople (565-577). He was the author of a Nomocanon, a digest of canonical law.
2 Justin II (emperor 565-578).
3 Paul the Black, “Jacobite” patriarch of Antioch (c. 550-578). - “Jacobite “ bishop of Cyprus.
- They partly accepted, and partly rejected, the decisions of the council of Chalcedon.
- Monophysite patriarch of Antioch (512-519).