Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 2, Vol. 3 (Theodoret, Jerome, Gennadius, Rufinus)

While still in his swaddling clothes, little Theodoret began to receive training appropriate for his high career,¹ and—as he himself tells us with the pardonable exaggeration of enthusiasm—he began to learn the apostolic teachings as soon as he was weaned. Among his earliest impressions were the lessons and exhortations of Peter of Galatia, to whom his mother owed so much, and of Macedonius "the barley eater," who had helped save the people of Antioch during the troubles involving the statues.² Theodoret quotes the earnest charges of the latter³ to live a holy life, and, in his modesty, expresses his sorrow that he had not profited better from the solitary’s solemn entreaties. However, if Macedonius was indeed completely ignorant of the Scriptures,⁴ it may have been well that the boy’s education was not placed entirely in his hands. It is possible that he may have had a childish recollection of Chrysostom, who left Antioch in 398. He used to pay a weekly visit to Peter and records⁵ how the holy man would take him on his knees and feed him with bread and raisins. A treasure long preserved in the household of Theodoret’s parents was half of Peter’s girdle, woven of coarse linen, which the old man had one day wound around the boy’s loins. Frequently proven to be an unfailing remedy in various cases of family illness, its reputation eventually led to its loss, as all the neighbors borrowed it to cure their own complaints, and at last an unkind or careless friend failed to return it.⁶

As a youth, Theodoret was blessed by the hand of Aphraates the monk, about whom he relates an anecdote in his Ecclesiastical History,⁷ and when his beard was just beginning to grow, he was also blessed by the ascetic Zeno.⁸ By this time, he was already a lector⁹ and was therefore likely over the age of eighteen. His general education would have been considered more or less complete, and to these early years we can trace the acquaintance he shows with the writings of Homer, Thucydides, Plato, Euripides, and other Greek classics. Lighter literature would not have been excluded from his reading, provided we accept the authenticity of the famous letter on the death of Cyril,¹⁰ and we might infer that the dialogues of Lucian were more likely to have amused the leisure hours of a lad at school and college than to have intruded upon the genuine piety and marvelous industry of the Bishop of Cyrus.

Theodoret was familiar with Greek, Syriac, and Hebrew, but is said to have been unacquainted with Latin.¹¹ I presume this is an inference from a passage in one of his works¹² in which he says: "The Romans indeed had poets, orators, and historians, and we are informed by those skilled in both languages that their arguments are closer than those of the Greeks, and their sentences more concise. In saying this, I have not the slightest intention of disparaging the Greek language, which is, in a sense, my own,¹³ or of making an ungrateful return to it for my education. Rather, I speak so that I may, to some extent, silence those who boast too much about it, and teach them not to ridicule a language illuminated by the truth." However, it is not clear from these words that Theodoret had no acquaintance with Latin. His admiration for orthodox Western theology, as well as his natural literary and social curiosity, would have led him to learn it. In the Ecclesiastical History (III. 16) there is a possible reference to Horace.

Theodoret’s chief instructor in theology was the great light of the school of Antioch, Theodorus, known by the name of the see to which he was appointed in 392: "Mopsuestia," or "the hearth of Mopsus," in Cilicia Secunda. He also refers to his obligations...

¹ Ep. LXXXI.
² Ecclesiastical History v. 19, p. 146.
³ Religious History, 1215.
⁴ cf. Ecclesiastical History, p. 146.
⁵ Religious History, 1188.
⁶ Theodoret’s confidence in the wonder-working powers of half of Peter’s girdle may be taken as a crucial instance of what detractors of both the individual and the age would call his foolish credulity. However, an unsound process of reasoning from post hoc (after this) to propter hoc (because of this) is not confined to any particular period, and it is possible that scientists of the thirty-fourth century may smile malevolently at some of the cherished remedies of the nineteenth.
⁷ Cf. p. 127.
⁸ Religious History, 1203.
⁹ See note p. 34.
¹⁰ See p. 346. To what is said there, one might add the following remarks from Dr. Salmon's Infallibility of the Church, p. 303, n.: "The letter from which these passages are taken was read as Theodoret’s at the fifth General Council (fifth Session) and accepted as his. But on questions of this kind, Councils are not infallible; and the letter contains a sign of spuriousness in claiming to be addressed to John, bishop of Antioch, who died before Cyril. I admit that the suggestion that we ought to read 'Domnus' instead of 'John' does not suffice to remove my suspicion. It is solely for the reason just stated that I feel no confidence in accepting the letter as Theodoret’s. Newman’s opinion that it is incredible that Theodoret could have written so 'atrocious' a letter is amazing to anyone familiar with the controversial civilities of that time. Our modern urbanity is willing to bury party animosities in the grave, but in the fifth century, Swift’s translation of the maxim De mortuis nil nisi bonum ('of the dead, say nothing but good') would be thought the only proper one: 'When scoundrels die, let all bemoan them.' Certainly, the man who, half a dozen years after Chrysostom’s death, spoke of him as Judas Iscariot had no right to expect to be treated politely after his own death by one whom he had relentlessly persecuted." Glubokowski, whose great work on Theodoret is currently in progress—though unfortunately a sealed volume to most readers because it is written in the author’s native Russian—is of the opinion that the letter is spurious. See also Schröckh Kirchengeschichte xviii. 370. I am myself unable to see the force of the internal evidence of spuriousness. It may have been half-playful and never intended for publication.
¹¹ Cf. Can. Venables, Dictionary of Christian Biography iv. 906.
¹² Græcarum affectionum curatio (The Cure of Greek Maladies), 843.
¹³ To a Syrian, it would not literally be the mother tongue, but was possibly acquired in infancy.