ABSTRACT
A survey on the controversies concerning Trinitarian doctrine and Christological debates is offered together with a brief description of the doctrinal development in the first centuries. The development of Christian doctrine in the Syriac churches, especially after Chalcedon, with its definition of the teaching of two natures in the one person (prosopon, parsṣopa) of Christ, met resistance among the followers of the one nature (mia physis) formula. The resulting controversies included Philoxenus against H?abib (representing Edessene Theodorians), Jacob of Sarug against the doctrine of the two natures; Simeon of Beth Aršam, the so-called Persian debater, against the East Syrian theology; Severus of Antioch against Chalcedon and the teaching of two natures in Christ, as well as his struggle against Julian of Halicarnassus (Julianism) and against Sergius Grammaticus. The question about Christ’s knowledge or ignorance (agnoetae) was also controversial. The Tritheist movement of the mid-sixth century led to a schism between Antioch and Alexandria. The followers of the mia physis formula also divided following of the debate on the Resurrection body of Christ (John Philoponus). A dispute between Severan monks and former miaphysites joining the Chalcedonian field because of philosophical concepts, Probus and John Barbur, is preserved. Among the East Syrians there was as debate in the school of Nisibis on Ḥenana’s approach to the issue of whether Theodore is the only teacher. In the seventh century, the teaching of Babai the Great became the leading doctrine, and Martyrius/Sahdona (with his one qnoma teaching) was finally excommunicated by catholicos Išoyahb III.
