On the Unity of Christ

In the early fifth century the Christian world was racked by one of the fiercest theological disputes it had known since the Arian crisis of the previous century. The center of debate turned on the nature of the personhood of Christ, and how divine and human characteristics could combine in Jesus without rendering his subjectivity hopelessly divided, or without reducing his authentic humanness to an insubstantiality. St Cyril is, arguably, the most important patristic theologian ever to deal with the issues of Christology. The text here translated is one of his most important and approachable writings, composed in the aftermath of the Council of Ephesus (431) to explain his doctrine to an international audience.

John A. McGuckin is a world-renowned scholar, the author of more than twenty-five books and over one hundred articles. He was Nielson Professor of Early Church History at Union Theological Seminary, and taught for over thirty years in numerous universities in Europe and America. He is a Fellow of the Royal Historical Society of Great Britain, and is the recipient of honorary doctorates from St Vladimir’s Orthodox Theological Seminary and Sibiu University. He is an archpriest of the Orthodox Church of Romania, and the recipient of the Romanian Order of St Stephen, the Gold Cross of Moldavia and Bukovina.