APOLLINARISTS

APOLLINARISTS, Apollinarians, ancient Heretics, who denied that Jesus Christ assumed true Flesh. Apollinaris of Laodicea, their Leader, fancied I know not what strange kind of Flesh, which he supposed to have existed from all Eternity——He distinguished between the Soul of Christ, and what the Greeks call νοῦς, Understanding; and from this Distinction took occasion to assert, that Christ assumed a Soul without its Understanding, and that this Defect was supplied by the Word: though some of his Followers held that Christ had no Soul at all.



Apollinaris further taught, that the Souls of Men were propagated by other Souls, as well as their Bodies —Theodoret charges him with confounding the Persons of the Godhead; and with giving into the Errors of Sabellius: and Basil accuses him of abandoning the literal sense of Scripture, and taking up wholly with the allegorical sense. This Heresy was very subtle; it was condemned in a Synod at Alexandria, under St. Athanasius, in the Year 362. It was subdivided into several different Heresies, the chief whereof were the Polemians and the Antidicomarianites. See ANTIDICOMARIANITE.

APOLLINARISTS