Philip Schaff (ed.) · 260 of 518

Sozomen as Author. · Part 4

Eudoxius, bishop of Germanicia, works............................................................ iii. 14.

Acacius, bishop of Cæsarea, works................................................................. iii. 14.

Cyril, bishop of Jerusalem, works..................................................................... iii. 14.

Didymus, works.............................................................................................. iii. 15.

Lucifer, bishop of Calaris, works...................................................................... iii. 15.

Hilary, bishop of Pictavium, works................................................................... iii. 15, v. 13.

Aëtius, works.................................................................................................. iii. 15.

Ephraim Syrus, works and translations............................................................. iii. 16.

Bardasanes, poems.......................................................................................... iii. 16.

Harmonius, poems........................................................................................... iii. 16.

Photinus, a work before Constantius, and many works..................................... iv. 6.

Acacius, literary works.................................................................................... iv. 23.

Apolinarius, works, with those against him........................................................ v. 18, vi. 27.

Julian, Misopogon............................................................................................ v. 19.

Eunomius, works, especially Exercises for the Mind,

with those against him................................................................................ vi. 27, vii. 17.

Evagrius, works............................................................................................... vi. 30.

Themistius, oration, outline............................................................................... vi. 36.

Ulfilas, translation of Bible into Gothic.............................................................. vi. 37.

Sisinnius, bishop of the Novatians in Constantinople, works.............................. viii. 1.

Diodorus, bishop of Tarsus, works................................................................... viii. 2.

Theodore, bishop of Mopsuestia, works.......................................................... viii. 2.

Chrysostom, Ep. to Theodore.......................................................................... viii. 2.

——on Eutropius............................................................................................ viii. 7.

——Vices of females...................................................................................... viii. 16.

——Extempore discourse after his return......................................................... viii. 18.

——About the Silver Statue............................................................................ viii. 20.

Origen, works; especially the one from which Bishop Theotimus read............... viii. 14.

An unecclesiastic but ancient Hebrew document............................................... ix. 17.

(d) Hymns of which a line or thought is given.

Refrain of the odes at Antioch.......................................................................... iii. 20.

At procession of Babylas, Antioch................................................................... v. 19.

To Dionysos, by Epiphanius the Sophist........................................................... vi. 25.

Arian hymns.................................................................................................... viii. 8.

Unmentioned Authorities.

Sozomen has refrained in large measure from indicating directly his chief authorities for political or ecclesiastical affairs; he has indicated, indeed, some minor springs, as we have seen, but the major ones are passed by. He imitated neither Eusebius, nor Socrates, nor Evagrius in this omission. He does abound in phrases indicative of authorities; thus of the forms of λέγω, λέγουσι, λέγονται, ἔλεγον, ἐλέγετο are used somewhat sparingly, while λέγεται occurs over eighty times, and λόγος about twenty; of φήμι, ἔφησεν and φήμη occasionally, while φησί or φασί introduces about thirty statements; εἰρήσθω and εἰρήται also appear in a few cases. One has no assurance of either the method or the validity of the sources from such vague terms, and it is this uncertain and incautious manner that has so often led critics to impeach his general worth, and it must be conceded with some degree of justice; the endless iteration of such words savors of gossip rather than history; this obscurity is not diminished by his persistent οἶμαι and less frequent εἰκάζω.

1. In the discussion of his unmentioned authorities, the first to be considered is Socrates. He is nowhere hinted at, unless under an indefinite “some say,” when Sozomen presents a group of opinions.

Socrates preceded Sozomen by a few years, writing his history not long after 439. Sozomen undoubtedly produced his record later, as we have already seen, and it would be just as likely that Socrates should be in the hands of Sozomen as that Philip of Side’s contemporary Christian History should have been open to the criticism of Socrates; indeed, the predecessor’s work was quite probably an incentive to the task proposed by Sozomen to himself. The internal evidence makes the use sure. We have only to note how Socrates derived his statements about the Novatians from members connected with that body of believers; these very facts are reproduced by Sozomen as Socrates gives them, with the slightest of differences; there is no refutation of this possible. Socrates, therefore, manifestly preceded, and Sozomen employed the material thus amassed.

There are three views of the connection: (1) that Sozomen, excepting a few and not very valuable additions of his own, plagiarized Socrates; (2) that he used the same authorities as Socrates independently, and the points of identity arose from the language of the original in the hands of both; (3) that Socrates was his guide to the chief writers from whom he drew directly with more or less freedom; and when no other light presented itself or was to be found, he would use his path-finder. There is scarcely a more fascinating and genuine field for analytical criticism than this. It should be remarked at the outset that we cannot justly apply this term plagiarism, in its modern sense, to the use of material current in these earlier days of history. There was no more intention to appropriate the work of another in Sozomen, than there was in Socrates, when he fails to note his authority, and yet very evidently has followed him closely; or when Theodoret has taken his stuff from Sozomen, and says nothing about the original. To assail Sozomen as if he were a deliberate thief, and stigmatize him as a feeble reviser of Socrates, is wholly unfair and unwarranted by the general usage of his day and by the facts of the case. In no way can it be proved that Sozomen was a general plagiarist in the opprobrium and iniquity conveyed by the modern use of that term. That Socrates was the finer mind, that he had larger sympathies, that he was concerned to reproduce documents in an ampler degree, that he follows the development of the Church with a sharper and brighter criticism, no one can doubt; he is conspicuously superior in almost every quality of a historian, and confined himself more nearly to the modern idea of which the science should aim to do; but that does not set aside the distinct and supplemental value of Sozomen and his fullness in lines, however zigzag, which had been neglected by others. The acknowledged precedence of Socrates does not warrant us in assailing the fidelity of the lesser light. Since the notes are designed to indicate the relationship between the two, the passages need not be anticipated here. (2) The second view, that Sozomen made an independent use of the same source which Holzhausen revived, Stäudlin supported, Hefele and Nolte have espoused, seems less tenable than the first. The Novatian material cannot, under any possible conditions, be so explained; the arrangement of the details in eight of the books will not permit view. The very corrections of that arrangement require us to be convinced that Socrates was in the corrector’s eye; the close resemblance of language in many places where he might easily have expanded from the originals, but preferred to confine himself to the equally meagre tracings of his predecessor, leave no basis for this solution. (3) The third explanation of the interrelation seems thus far the most accurate. Sozomen took Socrates for a guide in the main, (a) as to consecution of events, (b) as to sources, much as students would use a Church history to base their own studies upon. Socrates was a director to the authorities; these Sozomen would use freely; when they failed him, he would take the facts given by Socrates, precisely as he did those which Eusebius or Sabinus furnished, because he had nothing better, and in spite probably of his own inquiries; for let us remember how he insists that he has investigated the originals, and that he had been conscientious in his researches. Now it must be said in further modification of this statement:

(a) That some of the sources obviously consulted by both were doubtless known to Sozomen without Socrates to point them out. Rufinus and Eusebius and Sabinus were known to everybody. In all such cases we may concede an independent reading of those authors, and yet the order in which the subject-matter is arranged is at times more that of his guide-book than of his original.

(b) Moreover, he introduces many new outlines and abstracts, particularly in the transactions of the synods.

(c) He also has independent sources of biography.

(d) His ninth book is wholly unique and entirely out of the leading-strings of the master, for unexplained reasons.

The notes also try to indicate in a measure these more independent traits.

2. The next unmentioned source is Rufinus, in his continuation of Eusebius in two books; this Sozomen certainly read independently of Socrates, very likely in a Greek translation. That author’s Historia Monachorum also was sifted for a few of the monastic biographies; in these cases there is a closer resemblance to Rufinus than to the parallel sketches of Palladius.

3. Eusebius’ Life of Constantine is a primary source for Books i. and ii. In all the events pertaining to that emperor, it is drawn upon freely, just as freely as Socrates employs it, or as Sozomen handles Socrates.

4. Athanasius is also used independently, although in collocating the events, Socrates is followed. There is direct reference to one work only (v. 12), as we have seen. The unmentioned are as follows:—

The Life of St. Antony: Antonii Vita.

Epistola de Synodis Arimini in Italia et Seleuciæ in Isauria celebratis.

Epistola ad Serapionem, de morte Arii.

Synodicon; lost.

Tomus ad Antiochenses.

Epistola ad Episcopos Ægypti et Libyæ; ep. encyclica contra Arianos.

Epistola Encyclica ad Episcopos.

Historia Arianorum ad Monachos.

Apologia contra Arianos.

Apologia ad Constantium imperatorem.

Epistolæ heortasticæ.

5. Philostorgius: Historia Ecclesiastica, also furnished occasional material, as even the excerpts remaining to us indicate.

6. Sabinus: Collection of Synods (Συναγώγη τῶν συνόδων), which is lost; this book was written in the Macedonian and Arian interest; the author is mentioned by Socrates and criticised for his partiality. We can observe how Sozomen used it, where he adds to the statements of Socrates, which the latter had borrowed from that work. These additions are quite frequent in the transactions of the synods; and again a few records of councils, otherwise unknown, are thus preserved for us. We have here a proof of how Sozomen improved on his guide in the details.

7. Philippus of Side; the Christian History (χριστιανικὴ ἱστορία); a few fragments are preserved; Socrates criticises him severely.

8. For the laws, outside of the records alluded to, he probably used the Codex Gregorianus and the Codex Hermogenianus, his old text-books, and not unlikely the Codex Theodosianus (438).

9. Basil the Great: the limited use is indicated by the notes.

10. Gregory Nazianzen: Orationes contra Julianum. Other occasional citations are indicated in the notes.

11. Sulpicius Severus: vita S. Martiniwas undoubtedly the source, possibly through a Greek translation of the same, for the summary of that saint’s life in iii. 14.

Historia sacra: sometimes there is a hint as if this work had been before him.

12. Palladius: Historia Lausica was not so constant a companion as some have suggested; Sozomen has rather borrowed from the sources out of which the bishop of Helenopolis gathered his sketches of the monks.

Dialogus de vita S. Joannis Chrysostomi was used in narrating the incidents of John’s life in Book viii. There is no indication of any large draught of Chrysostom’s own writings: they may have been used for a few suggestions, contained in the orations before mentioned.

One does not feel sure that Hieronymus or Orosius came under his eye.

He does not seem to have made any direct use of Ammianus Marcellinus (Res gestæ), nor of the earlier Latin chroniclers. The points of resemblance with Eutropius (Breviarium Historiæ Romanæ) are very doubtful in my judgment; Eunapius (ex historia excerpta et fragmenta) seems to have been used in his full form; Zosimus (Historia) pretty surely; and for the ninth book, hardly with a doubt the full Olympiodorus, of whom fragments only remain, and yet in that same ninth book there are entirely independent political chapters whose source cannot yet be determined.

The Ninth Book.

The most curious feature of all is Book ix., in the entire change of its method; even were the ecclesiastical affairs to have been presented, he has given here in remarkable excess the events affecting the Western state; he has done it nowhere else; to be sure, he proposes it as a demonstration of the value of imperial piety, and of the ever-present Divine grace, but nowhere else has he done this in so cumulative a form. Some wonderful change came over his purpose, whether that were a fuller view of the relation between state and church, or the desire to deepen the impression of his philosophy of history; or did some imperial domestic catastrophe make him reluctant to dwell upon the sad events which darkened the court he had so glorified?

The grave question arises, Is anything of Book ix. lost?

That it is unfinished cannot be doubted; for (a) In the Proëmium he announces his purpose to carry it to the year a.d. 439, or the seventeenth consulate of Theodosius; but this is not done with any of his ordinary fullness, although his hints reach beyond, as we have seen. (b) In lauding Pulcheria (ix. 1) he remarks, “That new heresies have not prevailed in our time, we shall find to be due especially to her, as we shall subsequently see.” Here is the declared purpose of delineating the history of Nestorianism and its overthrow, but there is no appearance of the struggle in the record itself; he altogether passes by Nestorius, as bishop of Constantinople. (c) The record of the forty martyrs he purposely took out of its normal order, to illustrate the excellence of Pulcheria; a late event is anticipated, but the whole of what would have been its normal setting is not there. (d) One would naturally expect that a book which had thus far treated mainly of state difficulties would have the usual balance, at least, and that ecclesiastical affairs would have preponderated in the remaining chapters; but there is only an initial chapter. Seventeen chapters are not his usual tale for a book; there is an evident break; the discussion of Nestorianism is not written. Most of all would one expect some allusion to the restoration of Chrysostom under Proclus. (e) In ix. 16, he says, “Among other relics, those of Zechariah, the very ancient prophet, and of Stephen, who was ordained deacon by the Apostles, were discovered; and it seems incumbent upon me to describe the mode, since the discovery of each was marvelous and divine;” but he gives only the invention of Zechariah (c. 17). The story of Stephen fails us, and would doubtless have followed immediately. It was his purpose to narrate the story,—this story which Theophanes and Marcellinus mention and Lucianus wrote a book about. (f) In c. ix. 17, this is confirmed; for he says, “I shall first speak of the relics of the prophet”; to his second he does not come. (g) The close is abrupt; one feels instinctively that something is amiss. Hence the work, as we have it, is obviously not complete.

Did he finish it, and is the conclusion lost?

The mistake into which Gregory I. fell in ascribing to Sozomen the commendation of Theodore of Mopsuestia, with which Theodoret really closes his history, led Baronius to maintain that we did not have the whole of Sozomen; and others have asserted the same for reasons which are indeed sufficient to prove that the history is unfinished, but not that anything is lost. That we have all that Sozomen wrote is more likely, because the Tripartite History at x. 24 makes the last use of Sozomen at viii. 25; it would surely have gone further in its dependence upon him had the later controversy been treated of, since he had been already a chief authority. Nicephorus Callistus, Historia Ecclesiastica, xiv. 8, gives the account of the finding of Zechariah in c. 9; the story of Stephen in c. 10; then the story of the forty martyrs. His source beyond is Socrates, until Evagrius takes up the thread of affairs. If Sozomen had written the more recent events parallel with Socrates, Nicephorus would undoubtedly have followed him as before. Of Theophanes, one cannot speak so confidently. Moreover, we cannot help asking, since we have Socrates, Theodoret, and Evagrius complete, why should Sozomen, who was so admired an author, have suffered any loss? Now, if we have Sozomen entire so far as he wrote, why did he stop where he did? There are no sufficient subjective reasons to be offered. It could scarcely have been in any unfavorable criticism of his prince, for the work seems to have been accepted by his imperial patron; and there was certainly nothing as objectionable in Sozomen, as in Socrates or in Olympiodorus. Nor is it likely that the unhappiness which invaded the court, the domestic jealousies, which rent its religious as well as connubial peace, or the quarrels over Cyrus or Paulinus or Chrysaphius, in any way restrained him; for he was beyond some, if not all of these agitations, at the time of his writing, and he had deliberately chosen to ignore such noble personages as Anthemius, Troïlus, Synesius, Aurelianus, and Eudocia, so that we can argue little from his silence, save his manifest jealousy for Pulcheria, and his hostility to certain more liberal tendencies developed under Eudocia. The Nestorian controversy would have been a choice field wherein to exalt the influence of Pulcheria, as he himself suggested. On the whole, one is constrained to believe that Sozomen died before he had completed the record which he had proposed to himself. He must have been nearing his seventieth year when thus suddenly arrested in his chosen study.

The Major uses made of his Work.

The major uses of him subsequently were by:

(a) Epiphanius Scholasticus, who made a translation into Latin, which Cassiodorus abbreviated, polished, and incorporated in the Historia Tripartita.

(b) The deacon Liberatus, in his Historia Nestorianorum, used the Tripartita.

(c) Theophanes, in his Chronographia.

(d) Theodorus Lector in his Historia Tripartita.

(e) Nicephorus Callistus, in his Historia Ecclesiastica incorporating Theodorus’ Tripartita.

The Errors.

The errors are numerous, as already suggested by Possevin, on dogmatic grounds; Du Pin, and more recently by Harnack, for historic reasons. They are due to the lack of a systematic chronology, and the blind copying of his authority, especially Socrates, and occasionally to his attempts to correct the order given by his authority.