171 This encyclical is probably of the same date as the preceding.
176 There appears to be nothing in this letter or in Letter CII. also addressed to bishop Basil to identify the recipient. Basil bishop of Seleucia in Isauria was at the Latrocinium and at Chalcedon. Basil, bishop of Trajanopolis was also present at the same councils.Garnerius is in favour of the former, and notes the date as 448.
179 Ps. cxx. 6 and Ps. cxx. 7. Ps. Ixx.
180 This important letter may be placed between the sentence of deposition issued by Dioscorus in Feb. 448 and the imperial edict of March 449; probably before November 448, when Eutyches was arraigned before the Synod of Constantinople presided over by Flavian.
181 cf. Letter LX, written probably not long after the consecration of Dioscorus in 444.
182 i.e. in Constantinople in 381. The second Canon of the Council is referred to, - confining each bishop to his own "diocese," i.e. a tract comprising more than one province. So the bishop of Alexandria was restricted to Egypt.
183 The immediate cause of this enactment by the Constantinopolitan Fathers was the interference of Peter of Alexandria in the appointment to the see of Constantinople, when the orthodox party nominated Gregory of Nazianzus. cf. p. 136.
184 The third Canon of Constantinople had enacted that henceforth the see of the new capital should rank next after Rome. In the text the precedence of Antioch before Alexandria is based on association with St. Peter. "The so-called Cathedra Petri, which is kept in a repository of the wall of the apse of the Vatican Basilica," and was "exhibited in 1866" "is probably a throne made for or presented to Charles the Bold in 875." Dict. Christ. Ant. ii. 1960. For the connexion of St. Peter with Antioch see Routh Rell. Sac. i. 179.
185 Domnus of Apamea is to be distinguished from Domnus II, bishop of Antioch the recipient of Letters XXXI, CX, CXII and CLXXX. He was present at Chalcedon in 451. This letter may be placed in 448-9.
186 Romans xii. 15. Observe the inversion.
187 The action of the Osrhoene clergy here referred to is their accusation of Theodoret's friend Ibas of Edessa. The "sentence" was that of excommunication delivered by Ibas. The leaders of the cabal against him were instigated by Uranius, bishop of Himeria, one of Ibas's suffragans. cf. note on p. 291.
189 Garnerius dates Letters LXXXVIII-CIX in 447. They belong rather to 448-449.
190 Florentius, Praefect of the Imperial Guard, and already six times Praefect of the East, was present as a lay commissioner at the trial of Eutyches in 449 and at Chalcedon in 451.
191 i.e., magister officiorum, one of the great state officers under the Constantinian constitution. He had control over posts, police, arsenals, and the imperial correspondence and, from his authority in the palace, was a kind of "comptroller," or "master of the household." cf. Rufinus, p. 123.
194 This appears to be merely a figurative description of the inconsistency of the charges, for there was no question of Theodoret's being a "digamos."
196 Seven Letters are addressed to Anatolius; viz., XLV, LXXIX, XCII, CXI, CXIX, CXXI, and CXXXVIII.
198 Protogenes was Praefect of the East and Consul in 449 and was present at the Council of Chalcedon.
199 Antiochus was Consul in 431.
200 cf. Letters LVIII and LXXXI. Nomus the consul and Nomus the patrician are distinguished in Schulze's Index to the Letters, but there seems no reason to doubt their identity. Nomus the powerful minister of Theodosius II. was consul in 445 and patrician in 449, to which year this third letter may be referred.
203 Il. ix. 256. cf. pp. 104 and 255.
205 Sporacius or Asporacius was present at Chalcedon in 451, as comes domesticorum, or one of the two commanders of the body guard. It was at his request that Theodoret wrote his Hoereticarum fabularum compendium which he dedicates "To the most magnificent and glorious lord Sporacius my Christ-loving son." To Sporacius was also addressed the short treatise "adversus Nestorium" of which some editors have doubted the genuineness. The present letter may be dated in 449.