Hence neither do we say that which they likewise stated in their oft-mentioned book—which was inscribed with the false title of his name—namely, that the bishop Ibas, before the judges Photius and Eustathius, denied that letter to be his own. This itself too is plainly false; and even if we wished to speak against conscience, we are likewise refuted by those very men who sowed these lies, who afterward said: 'Show us the very words of his denial, if he said: This letter which is brought forward against me is not mine; I did not write it, I did not dictate it. Show us also the rejoinders of his accusers, by which they strove to convict him when he denied this matter, as in other charges also:
show also what witnesses they brought forward to prove this against him. Show the sentence of the judges by which they pronounced that they absolved him for this reason: that it could not be proved that it was his, which he denied to be his. And what answer is there for those who demand these things? Is any such thing contained in those acts held before Photius, Eustathius, and Uranius? Or, when all these things fail us, shall we make that inept reply against them which they set down in their book, saying: 'But in those same acts held before Photius and Eustathius there is also adduced the satisfaction of Ibas, who to this said that after the union of the Orientals and of holy Cyril he committed no injury against him.' And they add:
'If, then, he means the impious letter after the time of the union, but Ibas says that after the union he did holy Cyril no injury, it is plainly shown that Ibas denied the letter to Maris.' Furthermore, this contrivance is altogether feeble and worthy of derision. For although, before the letter against him was produced in the judgment of the venerable bishops Photius, Eustathius, and Uranius, the most reverend Ibas had this dispute about the name of blessed Cyril with his accusers, yet after his own letter was produced against him, he is shown to have offered no word of denial against it; nevertheless, not as these men, to obscure the truth, have either composed or attenuated the words, are they contained in those acts:
where, when his accuser Maras the presbyter objected to him and said: 'Did you not say, when it was demanded in secret: We held Cyril of good memory as a heretic, and did not receive him until he had anathematized his own chapters?'—the same most reverend bishop Ibas answered: 'Truly I do not remember; but if indeed I did say it, it was because the Oriental council truly received him after he had revised his own chapters.' And again, when the aforesaid Maras said that he had said concerning the said blessed Cyril: 'We held him a heretic until he had anathematized his own chapters'—the same most reverend bishop Ibas said: 'After he interpreted his own chapters, I so far refrain from the anathema of the man:
for I both received letters from him, and directed letters to him, and he was in communion with me, and I with him.' Ibas therefore did not deny that he had once thought him to have been a heretic, but he said this: that after the unity was made, he refrained from the anathema of the man, which that letter also makes plain. But it is not the same thing that the bishop Ibas said: 'After he interpreted his own chapters, I so far refrain from the anathema of the man,' and what these men set down as his having said: that after the union of the Orientals and of holy Cyril he did him no injury,
as though it followed that, because Ibas had already refrained from the anathema of blessed Cyril, therefore he could neither have believed before, nor said afterward, that he had once fallen—the man whom he had rather falsely supposed to have turned from his error. And for this reason we ourselves spontaneously reject this fabrication too, the better that it be refuted afterward by our own confession than by those very men by whom it was contrived. But if you seek, Augustus, to learn that, not by these obscure and captious contrivances, but of its own accord by conspicuous and evident documents, the denial which was truly made is demonstrated;
attend, I pray, to what sort was Ibas's denial concerning another chapter in the same controversy, what sort too was the contrary rejoinder of the accusers, what sort the interlocution of the judges. Wherefore I have thought it necessary to transfer from those same acts certain things into this book by way of example, where the aforesaid Maras, one of the accusers of the bishop Ibas himself, said: «What do you have to bring up concerning the faith? Maras, addressing him, said: I do not envy Christ who was made God; for in so far as he himself was made God, I too am made God. The most reverend bishops said: Let the most reverend Ibas confess whether these things were uttered by him. The most reverend bishop said: Anathema to him who said it, and to him who slanders me, for I did not say it. Samuel said:
There are witnesses to us of this matter, among whom these are present: we ask that these men, summoned by you, be received, and that they testify with their own voice whether they heard him saying these things. The most reverend bishop Ibas said: Ten thousand times would I rather suffer to be cut in pieces than to say this word: far be it from me even to think this word; but I know that each man is saved by confession. The most reverend bishops said: Do you say that the most reverend bishop Ibas said these things in the church? Samuel said: It is the custom on the holy day of Pascha, or before the day, for him to give certain things from his hand to the clerics for the festival: thereupon, when he was about to give these things, he first addresses them, and so gives.
And he addressed this both in the presence of all and to the clerics present, that they might receive the things that are given for the festival: and he will be convicted by some of these clerics standing here, who heard this said by him. The most reverend bishops said: How long ago do you profess that the most reverend bishop Ibas said these things? Samuel said: It is three years, more or less, since they were said.» You observe, Augustus, in what manner the bishop Ibas was first questioned by the judges, whether that blasphemy was uttered by him; in what manner also the accusers asked that witnesses be produced against him;
in what manner the judges inquired of the accusers in what place, at what time, in whose presence they said he had uttered this blasphemy: and they, persistent, both designate the place, and recall the time, and name the witnesses, and how often these things were said, how often repeated, the rest of those very acts show well enough. What such thing could we have proved concerning that letter, so as to say that the aforesaid Ibas denied it to be his own—which even the judges themselves had already so far known to be his, that they thought he need not even be questioned whether it was his?
In vain, therefore, as I said, did the abettors of the heretics wish to lead us to say that Ibas denied that letter to be his own in the judgment of the bishops Photius, Eustathius, and Uranius. But if in their judgment Ibas is not shown to have denied that that letter was his, how, acquiescing in the persuasions of these men, shall we say that he afterward in the synod denied it to be his—which he had not done before—where rather the sentences are found to have been pronounced concerning it, and the same bishop Ibas is cleared by the re-reading of it? For this too they said thus in their book:
«But also in the holy Council of Chalcedon, Ibas, wishing to show himself free from the accusation of the letter, after its re-reading, presently with words of this kind said: Command that the letters of the Edessene clerics be re-read, that you may know that I am a stranger to the things brought against me, and that I have suffered violence: and the letter which was given by him, of the Edessene clerics, was re-read, in which they testified to him with an oath that they were privy to no accusation made against him, nor did they know him to have done anything contrary to the right faith.
In which words, this is first to be noticed: that they do not depart from their accustomed mockery, in that they call that writing—which the whole clergy of the city of Edessa offered on behalf of the said Ibas—a 'letter,' wishing, by the name of 'letter,' to turn to something else for us the sentence of the synod which was pronounced concerning the letter of Ibas himself: so that, believing that the synod pronounced orthodox that petition and supplication of the Edessene clergy, rather than the said letter, we might be led into his condemnation.
Next, how could the testimony of the whole Edessene clergy be sought for the denial of that very letter, since the accusers had lied that the Edessene clerics were witnesses, not of the letter written to Maris, but of that unimaginable blasphemy? In that chapter, therefore, it was necessary that their testimony be disclosed to the synod, in which they had been named by the accusers. Finally, not even they themselves testified concerning this letter, but only concerning that blasphemy. For let them show us, in that very petition and supplication, where they said that the bishop Ibas afterward denied in the synod that that letter—not denied in the judgment of the most reverend Photius, Eustathius, and Uranius—was his own.
Otherwise it will be apparent to all that they invented these things to mock us: so that, if we followed this lie, they might afterward convict and confound us from the manifest sentences of that very synod—which, even if we could prove them to belong not to all but to certain persons, concerning that same letter, if Ibas denied it to be his own. For it was said there, as we recalled above: 'We have learned from the sentence of the most reverend bishops that the most reverend bishop Ibas has been shown to be innocent: for when his letter was read, we recognized him to be orthodox, and this we decree, that both the honor of the episcopate and the Church from which he was unjustly and in his absence expelled be restored to him'; and other things which are similarly contained in those same acts.
How, then, are we not convicted of accusing as if insane the Fathers who had assembled at Chalcedon, if we say that they judged that on the merit of that letter—which Ibas had denied to be his own—he was to be restored both to the episcopate and to the Church? But let your Serenity observe in what manner they betray that they know the truth: that the bishop Ibas did not deny that letter to be his own. For they said this too in their book, which we mentioned in our second book: «One must look to the letter to Maris, which says everything indeed without God and impiously, showing well only this one thing: that from him Theodore was anathematized in the churches throughout the East»—which they would not say if they believed that the letter was denied by Ibas.
But let them answer us, by whose testimony they have used the claim that from him Theodore was anathematized in the churches throughout the East. For if Ibas denied that letter to be his, and they say it was fabricated against him by his accusers, then without doubt they used false witnesses in saying that from him Theodore was anathematized in the churches throughout the East. But if—which is rather to be believed—they deny that they used false witnesses, they again betray that they know that the bishop Ibas did not deny that letter to be his own, and that the synod pronounced it orthodox.
Finally, what need was there that a letter—not only private, and in no way pertaining to the synod, as they pretend, but even one whose author was uncertain—should recently be condemned by a sentence of the universal Church? If indeed it is to be called a sentence, where the subscriber disclosed not what he thought, but rather transcribed for himself the copy of a formula given to him. Hence, even if all the things said above had been lacking, they would sufficiently indicate, from the very manner of the deed alone, that they knew it had been received by the universal council. Otherwise they would not seek, except to the prejudice of that same council, that the universal Church should condemn it.
Let the abettors of the heretics, therefore, now cease—seeing they are caught and exposed—zealously to boast, in order to mock us, that the synod did not pronounce the letter of Ibas orthodox: lest they seem to wish to steal from us, not some thing from our eyes which we saw at midday, but the very eyes with which we see.