Rather than repudiating the priest, Nestorius intervened on his behalf.

Following the exodus to Persia, scholars expanded on the teachings of Nestorius and his mentors, particularly after the relocation of the School of Edessa to the Persian city of Nisibis in 489 ( where it became known as the School of Nisibis ).

Cyril had both theological and political reasons for attacking Nestorius ; on top of feeling that Nestorianism was an error against true belief, he also wanted to denigrate the head of a competing patriarchate.

Cyril and Nestorius asked Pope Celestine I to weigh in on the matter.

Nestorius emphasized the dual natures of Christ, trying to find a middle ground between those that emphasized the fact that in Christ God had been born as a man, insisted on calling the Virgin Mary Theotokos ( Greek: Θεοτόκος, " God-bearer "), and those that rejected that title because God as an eternal being could not have been born.

Nestorius suggested the titleChristotokos ( Χριστοτόκος, " Christ-bearer "), but this proposal did not gain acceptance on either side.

Nestorius rejected this proposition, answering that, because the human soul was based on the archetype of the Logos, only to become polluted by the Fall, Jesus was " more " human for having the Logos and not " less ".

Before acting on the Pope's commission, Cyril convened a synod of Egyptian bishops which condemned Nestorius as well.

Despite Nestorius ' agenda of prosecuting Cyril, Theodosius intended for the council to focus strictly on the christological controversy.

Seeing the writing on the wall and anticipating his fate, Nestorius requested permission to retire to his former monastery.

Nestorius (; in Greek: Νεστόριος ; 386 – 451 ) was Archbishop of Constantinople from 10 April 428 to August 431 ( when the emperor Theodosius II confirmed his condemnation by the Cyrillian faction at Ephesus on 22 June ).

Nestorius tried to find a middle ground between those that emphasized the fact that in Christ God had been born as a man, insisted on calling the Virgin Mary Theotokos ( Greek: Θεοτόκος, " God-bearer "), and those that rejected that title because God as an eternal being could not have been born.

Nestorius suggested the title Christotokos ( Χριστοτόκος, " Christ-bearer "), but did not find acceptance on either side.

Cyril appealed to Celestine of Rome to make a decision on Nestorius ; and Celestine delegated to Cyril the job of excommunicating Nestorius if he did not change his teachings in ten days.

* " The lynching of Nestorius " by Stephen M. Ulrich, concentrates on the political pressures around the Council of Ephesus and analyzes the rediscovered Bazaar of Nestorius.

On the death of Sisinnius, the famous Nestorius succeeded as Archbishop of Constantinople ( 428 – 431 ), and early in 429, on a festival of the Theotokos ( Virgin Mary ), Proclus preached his celebrated sermon on the Incarnation, which was later inserted in the beginning of the Acts of the Council of Ephesus.

He engaged to publicly anathematize Nestorius and all who thought with him on his return, and declared the identity of his doctrine with that agreed upon by John and Cyril, and that he accepted the decrees of Ephesus equally with those of Nicaea as due to the inspiration of the Holy Spirit.

All the prelates agreed in this verdict, on the condition that he should anathematize Nestorius and Eutyches and accept the tome of Leo.

i. 2 ) that Nestorius, on his way from Antioch to Constantinople ( AD 428 ), took counsel with Theodore and received from him the seeds of heresy which he shortly afterwards scattered with such disastrous results.

In response to Nestorius ' attack on giving the title of Theotokos to the Virgin Mary, the Byzantines increased the use of the term in the liturgy, and now almost every string of hymns ends with one in her honour, called a Theotokion.

Nothing is known of his life, save what he tells us himself in the last of the biographies he wrote: " I, Gennadius, presbyter of Massilia, wrote eight books against all heresies, five books against Nestorius, ten books against Eutyches, three books against Pelagius, a treatise on the thousand years of the Apocalypse of John, this work, and a letter about my faith sent to blessed Gelasius, bishop of the city of Rome ".

Nestorius ' teachings brought him into conflict with some other prominent church leaders, most notably Cyril of Alexandria, who criticized especially his rejection of the title Theotokos (" Bringer forth of God ") for the Virgin Mary.

Originally the church of Sassanid Persia, the Church of the East declared itself independent of other churches in 424 and over the next century became affiliated with Nestorianism, a Christological doctrine advanced by Nestorius, Patriarch of Constantinople from 428 to 431, which had been declared heretical in the Roman Empire.

Nestorius ' doctrine, Nestorianism, which emphasized the disunity between Christ's human and divine natures, had brought him into conflict with other church leaders, most notably Cyril, Patriarch of Alexandria.

According to McGuckin, several mid-twentieth century accounts have tended to " romanticise " Nestorius ; in opposition to this view, he asserts that Nestorius was no less dogmatic, uncompromising than Cyril and that he was fully just as prepared to use his political and canonical powers as Cyril or any of the other hierarchs of the period.

McGuckin points out that other representatives of the Antiochene tradition such as John of Antioch, Theodoret and Andrew of Samosata were able to recognize " the point of the argument for Christ's integrity " and concede the " ill-advised nature of Nestorius ' immoveability.

The translation of St. Cyril of Alexandria's synodical letter against Nestorius, and some other works long attributed to Dionysius are now acknowledged to be earlier and are assigned to Marius Mercator.

All other symbola or mathemata were excluded ; Eutyches and Nestorius were unmistakably condemned in an anathema, while the twelve chapters of Cyril of Alexandria were accepted.

Harmony being restored, John of Antioch and the other Eastern bishops wrote Maximian a letter of communion indicating their consent to his election and to the deposition of Nestorius.

He demanded of Macedonius a declaration of his faith in writing ; Macedonius addressed a memorandum to the emperor insisting that he knew no other faith than that of the Fathers of Nicaea and Constantinople, and that he anathematized Nestorius and Eutyches and those who admitted two Sons or two Christs, or who divided the two natures.

A controversy concerning his letter to Maris arose in the next century, in the notorious dispute about the " Three Chapters ," when the letter-was branded as heterodox ( together with the works of Theodore of Mopsuestia and Theodoret's writings in favour of Nestorius ) in the edict of Justinian, and was formally condemned in 553 by the fifth general council, which pronounced an anathema, in bold defiance of historical fact, against all who should pretend that it and the other documents impugned had been recognized as orthodox by the council of Chalcedon.

Nestorius was condemned and deposed by the First Council of Ephesus, which approved of the Second Epistle of Cyril to Nestorius ( which included a dogmatizing of " Theotokos "), and made no other dogmatic definitions.

1-3 in Bickell's edition = 62-64 in Bedjan ), in other and more important homilies ( such as Bickell 6, 8 = Bedjan 59, 61, and especially Bedjan 60 ) the doctrine is monophysite, even though Eutyches and Nestorius are equally condemned.

Among the other works within this category were against the Meletians, in regard to the multiple celebration of the Eucharist in one day ; against the Manichaeans, concerning the value of the Old Testament alongside the New Testament ; and against Nestorius in relations to the preexistence of Christ before His birth from the Virgin.

Nestorius developed his Christological views as an attempt to rationally explain and understand the incarnation of the divine Logos, the Second Person of the Holy Trinity as the man Jesus Christ.

Nestorius, a student of the Antiochene school of theology, taught that in the incarnation two distinct hypostases (" substances " or, as Nestorius ' critics such as John Cassian and Cyril of Alexandria employed the term, " persons ") were conjoined in Jesus Christ — one human ( the man ) and one divine ( the Word ).

There he provided the moral support that Saint Cyril needed to defeat the heresy of Nestorius, Bishop of Constantinople.

For example, Pulcheria supported the Roman-Alexandrian popes while the emperor and his wife supported Nestorius.

For example, John of Antioch wrote to Nestorius urging him to submit to the Pope's judgment and cease stirring up controversy over a word that he disliked ( Theotokos ) but which could be interpreted as having an orthodox meaning especially in light of the fact that many saints and doctors of the church had sanctioned the word by using it themselves.

One famous example is Nestorius, the Patriarch of Constantinople who so vigorously defended Jesus ' humanity that he undermined Jesus ' divinity ; A brief definition of Nestorian Christology can be given as: " Jesus Christ, who is not identical with the Son but personally united with the Son, who lives in him, is one hypostasis and one nature: human .".

However, not all churches affiliated with the Church of the East appear to have followed Nestorian Christology ; indeed, the modern Assyrian Church of the East, which reveres Nestorius, does not follow all historically Nestorian doctrine.