693
SEMIARIANS
in "Oriens christianus", I, 1137. The oldest known
is Theophilus transferred from Apamea (Socrates,
"Hist, eccl.", VII, xxxvi). We may mention before
the Schism: Romanus, 448, 451; Sergius, 80;
George, 692; Epiphanius, author of a lost work
against the Iconoclasts. Simeon assisted in 879 at
the Council of Constantinople which re-established
Photius. Under Michael Palseologus, the Metro-
politan of Selymbria, whose name is unknown, was
one of the prelates who signed a letter to the pope on
the union of the Churches. In 1347 Methodius was
one of the signatories at the Council of Constantinople
which deposed the patriarch John Calecas, the ad-
versary of the Palamites. The date of Ignatius, w^ho
wrote a "Life of Constantine and Helena" is un-
known, perhaps about 1431. Among the bishops
omitted by Le Quien must be mentioned Philotheus,
who lived about 136.5, the author of the panegyric
on St. Agathonicus, a martyr of Nicomedia who suf-
fered at Selymbria under Maximian, and of the pane-
gyric on Saint (?) Macarius, a monk of Constantinople
towards the end of the thirteenth century (Krum-
bacher, "Gesch. der byzant. Litteratur", Munich,
1897, 205).
Smith, Diet. Gr. and Rom. Geog., a. v.; Bouttras, Diet, of Hist, and Geog. (.Greek), VII, 509; Tomaschek, Zut Kunde der Hdmus- Halbinsel (Vienna, 1887), 23.
S. P6tridI;s.
Sem izt\ "name", "fame", "renown"; in Septua- gint, S^m; a. v., Shem), son of Noe ; according to Gen., X, 21, the eldest. His birth and generations are re- corded in Gen., v, 31; xi, lOsqq. (cf. I Par., i, 4, 17 sq.; Luke, iii, 36). He lived to be six hundred years of age. An incident, narrated Gen. , ix, 1 8 sqq . , discloses his filial reverence. His reward was a blessing of great import (cf. Ecclus., xlix, 19). Noe's prophetic words (ac- cording to Massor. Text), "Blessed be Yahweh, the God of Sem" (for the glory of a nation is its God), designate, in a special manner, Yahweh as the God of Sem and, consequently, Sem as the bearer of the Messianic promises. Ha\-ing enumerated the Semitic nations, whose habitat extended over the central por- tions of the then known world (Gen., x, 21-31), the Sacred Writer resumes (xt, 10 sqq.) the genealog>' of the descendants of Arphaxad, the direct ancestor of Abraham, David, and Christ.
HuMMELAUER, Comment, in Gcnesim (Paris. 1895), loc. cit., and Hagen, Lex. Bibl. (Paris, 1905-11), both in Cursus Scripture Sacrw; Strack, Genew (Munich, 1894), loc. cit. in Kurzgef. Kommentar z. d. hi. Schriflen .Alt. u. N. Test.; Hoberg, Die Gene- sis (Freiburg, 1908), loc. cit.; Maas, Christ in Type and Prophecy, I (New York), 212 sq.
Thomas Plassmann.
Semiarians and Semiarianism, a name fre- quently given to the conservative majority in the East in the fourth century as opposed to the strict Arians. More accurately it is reserved (as by St. Epiphanius, "Ha>r.", Ixxiii) for the party of reaction headed by Basil of Ancyra in 358. The greater number of the Eastern bishops, who agreed to the deposition of St. Athanasius at Tyre in 335 and re- ceived the Arians to communion at Jerusalem on their repentance, were not Arians, yet they were far from being all orthodox. The dedication Council of Antioch in 341 put forth a creed which was un- exceptionable but for its omission of the Nicene "of One Substance". Even disciples of Arius, such as George, Bishop of Laodicea (335-47), and Eusta- thius of Sebaste (c. 35(>-80), joined the moderate party, and after the death of Eusebius of Nicomedia, the leaders of the court faction, Ursacius, Valens, and Germinius, were not tied to any formula, for Con- stantius himself hated Arianism, though he dis- liked Athanasius yet more. When Marcellus of Ancyra w'as deposed in 336, he was succeeded by Basil. Marcellus was reinstated by the Council of Sardica and the pope in 343, but Basil was restored
in 350 by Constantius, over whom he gained con-
siderable influence. He was the leader of a council
at Sirmium in 351 held against Photinus who had been
a deacon at Ancyra, and the canons of this synod
begin by condemning Arianism, though they do not
quite come up to the Nicene standard. Basil had after-
wards a disputation with the Arian Aetius. After
the defeat of Magnentius at Mursa in 351, Valens,
bishop of that city, became the spiritual director
of Constantius. In 355 Valens and Ursacius ob-
tained the exile of the Western confessors Eusebius,
Lucifer, Liberius, and that of Hilary followed. In
357 they issued the second Creed of Sirmium, or
"formula of Hosius", in which homoousios and
homoiousios were both rejected. Eudoxius, a violent
Arian, seized the See of Antioch, and supported
Aetius and his disciple Eunomius.
In the Lent of 358 Basil with many bishops was holding the dedicatory feast of a new church he had built at Ancyra, when he received a letter from George of Laodicea relating how Eudoxius had approved of Aetius, and begging Macedonius of Constantinople, Basil, and the rest of the assembled bishops to decree the expulsion of Eudoxius and his followers from Antioch, else that gi-eat see were lost. In con- sequence the SjTiod of Ajic>Ta published a long reply addressed to George and the other bishops of Phceni- cia, in which they recite the Creed of Antioch (341), adding explanations against the "unlikeness" of the Son to the Father taught by the Arians (Anomoeans, from dvdfioios), and showing that the very name of father implies a son of like substance (oyuotoiJo-tos, or 5/xoios /car' ovjiav) Anathematisms are appended, in which Anomoeanism is explicitly condemned and the teaching of "likeness of substance" enforced. The nineteenth of these canons forbids the use also of ofioovffios and rauTooi^crtos; this may be an after- thought due to the instance of Macedonius, as Basil does not seem to have insisted on it later. Legates were dispatched to the Court at Sirmium — Basil, Eustathius of Sebaste, an ascetic of no dogmatic principles, Eleusius of Cyzicus, a follower of Mace- donius, and Leontius, a priest who was one of the emperor's chaplains. They arrived just in time, for the emperor had been lending his ear to an Eudoxian; but he now veered round, and issued a letter (Sozomen, IV, xiv) declaring the Son to be "like in substance" to the Father, and condemning the Arians of Antioch.
According to Sozomen it was at this point that Liberius was released from exile on his signing three formulae combined by Basil; against this story see Liberius, Pope. Basil persuaded Constantius to sum- mon a general council, Ancyra being proposed, then Nicomedia; but the latter city was destroyed Ijy an earthquake. Basil, therefore, was again at Sirmium in 359, where the Arianizers had meanwhile regained their footing With Germinius of Sirmium, George of Alexandria, L^rsacius and Valens, and Marcus of Arethusa, he held a conference which lasted until night. A confession of faith, ridiculed under the name of the "dated creed", was drawn up by Marcus on 22 May (Hilary, "Fragment, xv"). Arianism was of course rejected, but the 6fj.oi.os /card riiv oixriav was not admitted, and the e.xpression Kara, wivra SiMioi, "like in all things", was substituted. Basil was disappointed, and added to his signature the ex- planation that the words "in all things" mean not only in will, but in existence and being (kotA ttjv ijirap^iv Kal (carcl t6 ehai). Not content with this, BasQ, George of Laodicea, and others published a joint ex-planation (Epiph., Ixxiii, 12-22) that "in all things" must include "in substance".
The court party arranged that two councils should be held, at Rimini and Seleucia respectively. At Seleucia (359) the Semiarians were in a majority, being supported by such men as St. Cyril of Jeru-
