[1] See Land, _Joannes Bischof von Ephesos_, pp. 57 seq.
[2] Cf. Land's Appendix (_op. cit._ 172-193).
[3] See _Bulletin critique_, 15th June and 25th Aug. 1896, and 25th
Jan. 1897; _Journal asiatique_, 9th series, vol. viii. (1896) pp. 346
sqq. and vol. ix. (1897) p. 529; also _Revue de l'Orient chrétien,
Suppl. trimestriel_ (1897), pp. 41-54, 455-493; and compare Nöldeke
in _Vienna Oriental Journal_ (1896), pp. 160 sqq. The facts are
briefly stated in Duval's _Littérature syriaque_, p. 192. A full
analysis of this second part of John's history has been given by M.
Nau.
JOHN OF DAMASCUS (JOHANNES DAMASCENUS) (d. before 754), an eminent
theologian of the Eastern Church, derives his surname from Damascus,
where he was born about the close of the 7th century. His Arabic name
was Mansur (the victor), and he received the epithet Chrysorrhoas
(gold-pouring) on account of his eloquence. The principal account of his
life is contained in a narrative of the 10th century, much of which is
obviously legendary. His father Sergius was a Christian, but
notwithstanding held a high office under the Saracen caliph, in which he
was succeeded by his son. John is said to have owed his education in
philosophy, mathematics and theology to an Italian monk named Cosmas,
whom Sergius had redeemed from a band of captive slaves. About the year
730 he wrote several treatises in defence of image-worship, which the
emperor, Leo the Isaurian, was making strenuous efforts to suppress.
Various pieces of evidence go to show that it was shortly after this
date that he resolved to forsake the world, divided his fortune among
his friends and the poor, and betook himself to the monastery of St
Sabas, near Jerusalem, where he spent the rest of his life. After the
customary probation he was ordained priest by the patriarch of
Jerusalem. In his last years he travelled through Syria contending
against the iconoclasts, and in the same cause he visited Constantinople
at the imminent risk of his life during the reign of Constantine
Copronymus. With him the "mysteries," the entire ritual, are an integral
part of the Orthodox system, and all dogma culminates in image-worship.
The date of his death is uncertain; it is probably about 752. John
Damascenus is a saint both in the Greek and in the Latin Churches, his
festival being observed in the former on the 29th of November and on the
4th of December, and in the latter on the 6th of May.
The works of Damascenus give him a foremost place among the
theologians of the early Eastern Church, and, according to Dorner, he
"remains in later times the highest authority in the theological
literature of the Greeks." This is not because he is an original
thinker but because he compiled into systematic form the scattered
teaching of his theological predecessors. Several treatises attributed
to him are probably spurious, but his undoubted works are numerous and
embrace a wide range. The most important contains three parts under
the general title [Greek: Pêgê gnôseôs] ("The Fountain of Knowledge").
The first part, entitled [Greek: Kephàlaia philosophika], is an
exposition and application of theology of Aristotle's Dialectic. The
second, entitled [Greek: Peri aireseôn] ("Of Heresies"), is a
reproduction of the earlier work of Epiphanius, with a continuation
giving an account of the heresies that arose after the time of that
writer. The third part, entitled [Greek: Hekdosis akribês tês
orthodoxou pisteos] ("An Accurate Exposition of the Orthodox Faith"),
is much the most important, containing as it does a complete system of
theology founded on the teaching of the fathers and church councils,
from the 4th to the 7th century. It thus embodies the finished result
of the theological thought of the early Greek Church. Through a Latin
translation made by Burgundio of Pisa in the 12th century, it was well
known to Peter Lombard and Aquinas, and in this way it influenced the
scholastic theology of the West. Another well-known work is the _Sacra
parallela_, a collection of biblical passages followed by
illustrations drawn from other scriptural sources and from the
fathers. There is much merit in his hymns and "canons"; one of the
latter is very familiar as the hymn "The Day of Resurrection, Earth
tell it out abroad." John of Damascus has sometimes been called the
"Father of Scholasticism," and the "Lombard of the Greeks," but these
epithets are appropriate only in a limited sense.
The Christological position of John may be summed up in the following
description:[1] "He tries to secure the unity of the two natures by
relegating to the divine Logos the formative and controlling agency.
It is not a human individual that the Logos assumes, nor is it
humanity, or human nature in general. It is rather a potential human
individual, a nature not yet developed into a person or hypostasis.
The hypostasis through which this takes place is the personal Logos
through whose union with this potential man, in the womb of Mary, the
potential man acquires a concrete reality, an individual existence. He
has, therefore, no hypostasis of himself but only in and through the
Logos. It is denied that he is _non-hypostatic_ ([Greek:
anypostatos]); it is affirmed that he is _en-hypostatic_ ([Greek:
enypostatos]). Two natures may form a unity, as the body and soul in
man. So man, both soul and body, is brought into unity with the Logos;
there being then one hypostasis for both natures." There is an
interchange of the divine and human attributes, a communication of the
former which deifies the receptive and passive human nature. In Christ
the human will has become the organ of the divine will. Thus while
John is an adherent of Chalcedon and a dyothelite, the drift of his
teaching is in the monophysite direction. "The Chalcedonian
_Definition_ is victorious, but Apollinaris is not overcome"; what
John gives with the one hand he takes away with the other. On the
question of the Atonement he regards the death of Christ as a
sacrifice offered to God and not a ransom paid to the devil.
LITERATURE.--The _Life_ of John of Damascus was written by John,
patriarch of Jerusalem in the 10th century (Migne, _Patrol. Graec._,
xciv. 429-489). The works were edited by Le Quien (2 vols., fol.,
Paris, 1712) and form vols. 94 to 96 in Migne's Greek series. A
monograph by J. Langen was published in 1879. A. Harnack's _History of
Dogma_ is very full (see especially vols. iii. and iv.; on the
image-worship controversy, iv. 322 seq.), and so are the similar works
of F. Loofs-Seeberg and A. Dorner. See also O. Bardenhewer's
_Patrologie_, and other literature cited in F. Kattenbusch's excellent
article in Hauck-Herzog, _Realencyklopädie_, vol. ix.