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THEONAS, the-o'nas (THEON): Arian bishop of Marmarica, in the Egyptian province of Cyrenaica, in the fourth century. He is- mentioned in the synodal letter of Bishop Alexander (given in Athanasius, Select Works and Letters, in NPNF, 2 ser., iv. 69 sqq.) as an adherent of Arius. He and Secundus of Ptolemais were the only two Egyptian bishops who sided with Arius; and it is probable that their line of conduct was regulated by political rather than by theological reasons. At all events, they absolutely refused at the Council of Nimes, (325) to condemn Arius, and were consequently deposed and banished.

in NPNF, 2 eer., iii. 438; Socrates, Hid. eccl.; i. ix., Eng. transl., ut sup., ii. 12-17; Epiphaniua, Hor., lma. 8: Tillemont, Mftoirea, vi. 2.

THEOPASCHITES, the-o-pns'koita: A term designating in its widest sense all Christians who recognize as correct the formula " God has suffered " or " God has been crucified." In very early, times (Ignatius, Ad Eph., i. 1, Ad Rom., vi. 3; Tertullian, De carne Christi, v.) naive expressions like the " blood of God," the " suffering of God " were used. Then came Modalism (q.v.) and Patripassianism (see CHRIBTOLOOY, IL, §§ 1-2; MONARCAIANIaM), and finally theopaschitic terms became suspicious to pious ears since they could be used in a Sabellian sense. They had some attractiveness, however, for those who spoke of Mary as theotokos; if God could be born, why could he not die? What from the standpoint of the Trinity was unendurable was not so from a christological point of view. As an ecclesiastical matter occasion for controversy came from Peter the Fuller's (see MONOPHYBITEB, §§ 4 aqq.) addition to the Trisagion (q.v.), making it read " Holy God, Holy the Mighty One, Holy the Immortal One who was crucified for us." The Patriarch Calandion attempted to relieve the baldness of the expression by preceding it with the words " O Christ the King." Of the preceding events in Antioch no reports have come down, since the letters of Felix from Rome, of Acazius from Constantinople, and of other bishops, to Peter are falsified, though they have value as showing how in certain circles the new expression was decided; the situation both with reference to the Trinity and to incarnation was missed. The history of the Monophysitic controversy shows that the unionists decided otherwise, and they are justified from the point of view of the Henoticon (q.v.). But Harnack is right in asserting (Dogma, iv. 231) " That attempt (to extend the Trisagion in a theopaschitic sense) was rejected because it involved an innovation in worship and because it could be interpreted in a Sabellian sense."

After the death of Anastasius the theopaschitic controversy broke out again. At the beginning of the year 519 there appeared in the capital many monks (called in the sources Scythic monks, who in the great schism between Rome and Constantinople had held with Rome) with the motto " one of the Trinity has suffered in the flesh," which seems to have called forth opposition. But they found support for their formula in the sentences of the Henoticon. At Constantinople at that time all