Biography
He was ordained by the Miaphysite bishop of Edessa (c. AD 541), with ecumenical authority over the members of their body throughout the East. By his indomitable zeal and untiring activity, this remarkable man rescued the Miaphysite community in Asia Minor and the East from the extinction (with which persecution by the Byzantine imperial power threatened it) through consecrating bishops, ordaining clergy, and uniting its scattered elements into an organization so well planned and so stable that it has endured through all the many political and dynastic storms in the Middle East. Materials for his life are furnished by two Syriac biographies by his contemporary, John of Ephesus, whom Jacobus ordained bishop of Ephesus, printed by Land, and by the third part of the Ecclesiastical History of the same author.
Read more about this topic: Jacob Baradaeus
Famous quotes containing the word biography:
“In how few words, for instance, the Greeks would have told the story of Abelard and Heloise, making but a sentence of our classical dictionary.... We moderns, on the other hand, collect only the raw materials of biography and history, “memoirs to serve for a history,” which is but materials to serve for a mythology.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)
“Had Dr. Johnson written his own life, in conformity with the opinion which he has given, that every man’s life may be best written by himself; had he employed in the preservation of his own history, that clearness of narration and elegance of language in which he has embalmed so many eminent persons, the world would probably have had the most perfect example of biography that was ever exhibited.”
—James Boswell (1740–95)
“There never was a good biography of a good novelist. There couldn’t be. He is too many people, if he’s any good.”
—F. Scott Fitzgerald (1896–1940)