the south. Armenians and Copts to this day adhere to the Monophysite theology. In Syria and Mesopotamia the number of its adherents has been on the decrease ever since Islam became the dominant power in those lands.
Another offshoot of the ancient Syrian church was the Maronite, named after its patron saint, an ascetic monk who lived east of Antioch, where he died in 410. Maron's disciples erected a monastery on the Orontes in his memory. In the early sixth century, after clashing with their Jacobite neighbours, they sought and found in northern Lebanon a safer refuge. Thence they spread to become the largest and most influential sect in Lebanon.
Even aside from the struggle against heresy and schism, confusion marked the intellectual life of Byzantine Syria in its early period. Polemics between Christian and non- Christian Greek and Latin writers were carried on for years after Constantine's profession of the Christian faith. Neo- Platonism was far from dead, though its great century had been the third. Church Fathers were inching their way to the front as leaders of thought. Sophists and rhetoricians were retreating though not quite disappearing.
The writings of a fourth-century Syrian rhetorician named Libanius, who was educated at Antioch and Athens and taught at Constantinople, give a vivid picture of the times and places in which he lived. They also open before us a small window through which we may gain a glimpse of the educational methods of the day. At Antioch courses extended over the winter and spring months; summer was taken up with festive activities. Classes began early and lasted till noon. Some students were as young as sixteen. Higher education was in the hands of rhetoricians, who were elected in the cities by the local senate, in the small towns by the communities at large. The rhetors taught, declaimed by way of example and were responsible for discipline. For their services they received pay from the cities and the students. Greek classics formed the core of the curriculum.
