Memnon, Bishop of Ephesus

ANNO DOMINI CDXXXV-CDXLIV

MEMNON, BISHOP OF EPHESUS

NOTICE.

The memory of Memnon, bishop of Ephesus, is celebrated in the fasti of the Church, for under his presidency the general council of Ephesus was held in the year 431, and Nestorius the heretic was proscribed. And since he and Cyril of Alexandria were the principals in that holy assembly, he incurred the hatred of the bishops of the Oriental diocese, and all the more so because, as they were estranged from the legitimate council, he had granted them no church in his city in which they might celebrate the divine mysteries. They alleged against him that he had brought bishops to Ephesus—thirty, or rather forty from Asia, and eleven from Pamphylia—partly by craft and partly by fear. For this reason, they declared in a published sentence that Memnon, like Cyril, had been deprived of his priesthood; but the holy council deemed this act null and void and immediately rescinded it. They petitioned the Ephesian senate and common people that another prelate be chosen in place of Memnon: but they achieved nothing. They did obtain this one thing from the emperor, that some consideration be given to the sentence they had passed; but when the matter was better understood, the prince issued letters dissolving the council and ordered Cyril and Memnon to be restored to their own churches. Memnon survived the council for many years. In the Acts of the Council of Chalcedon, Philip, a presbyter of Constantinople, stated that Memnon had been confirmed by the Constantinopolitan throne. Bassianus, who at that time was contending against Stephen for the Ephesian see, claimed that violence had been brought against him by Memnon, for the sake of having him consecrated bishop of Evaza, so that he might be kept far from Ephesus, where he was beloved by all. Nothing more is known about Memnon.

MEMNON'S EPISTLE TO THE CLERGY OF CONSTANTINOPLE

^A Copy of an epistle written by Memnon, bishop of Ephesus, to the clergy of Constantinople.

What we suffer daily in the city of the Ephesians because of the true and orthodox faith of God, it is impossible to explain in words. For turbulence follows turbulence without any intermission. Yet the power and confession of the faith add great strength to us, that we may endure these things manfully. For the most magnificent Count Candidian sometimes stirs up the soldiers against us and fills the whole city with tumults, and at the same time, through the guard, deprives us of the importation of all the necessities of life. He also permits many to rain insults upon us and the holy council, those dwelling at the Zeuxippus who guard the deposed Nestorius with a great crowd of rustic people, who are fed for this purpose from the money of the Church, and through whom reproaches are hurled. This insolence and temerity, and the daily impostures of the most magnificent Count Irenaeus, by which he circumvents the simpler folk, were then followed by the arrival of the bishop of Antioch. For when the holy synod understood that his arrival was imminent, it wished to honor [him], ^B

^A paying the deference due to the priesthood and fulfilling what was owed, and it sent some of the most God-beloved bishops, along with most reverend clerics, to meet him. It did this for two reasons: both to fulfill the honor owed him and to make it clear that he ought to refrain from any meeting with Nestorius, seeing that he had been deposed by the holy synod on account of the impiety which he had devised. But though they were prevented by the soldiers accompanying him from speaking to him on the road, they followed him nonetheless and reached the lodging where he had stopped; and having waited there for many hours and not being allowed to have a meeting with him, they remained there, enduring insults. After many hours, when it seemed good to him, he summoned the most God-beloved bishops and most reverend clerics, introducing them through the soldiers. But when they had made known to him the injunctions of the holy synod, he allowed the most magnificent Count Irenaeus, and the bishops and clerics who were with him, to inflict intolerable ^B blows upon our fellow ministers and clerics, so that they were brought even into danger of their lives. When these things had therefore been done, the most God-beloved bishops who had been sent to him, returning to the holy synod and showing the wounds inflicted upon them and explaining what had happened, moved the holy synod to indignation while the holy Gospel was set before them for the recording of the proceedings; and curbing his insolence a little, they excommunicated him, and this excommunication was also announced to him. For we have learned that a certain anonymous and unsigned document ^C was posted in a certain part of the city, demonstrating his disorderliness and uncanonical judgment; and he summoned the venerable senate and the most illustrious citizens to him every day, and with great importunity demanded that, by their votes, another [bishop] be ordained in my place, so that all the orthodox inhabitants of the city might occupy the houses of prayer and remain there, lest his temerity and nefarious daring—being publicly proposed (as was rumored among the common people)—should take effect. Hence, he even went up to the basilica of the holy evangelist John, and by giving out that he was going to hold an ordination there, he stirred up sedition and tumult in that place. For he went up accompanied by such a multitude of insolent armed men that he left some of the beggars there half-dead; and as if he had been injured by those who were found there, he complained solely to stir up envy against the holy synod. ^D Therefore, most holy men, I beseech you to exert every effort to make public the insane and rash judgment of John and those with him, and that the most magnificent counts, who disturb the city and the faith every day, may depart from here, lest by their cunning subreption the things of the faith should happen to be adulterated.