EUSEBIUS OF EMESA

Bishop and writer; b. Edessa, c. a.d. 300; d. Antioch, before 359. He was educated in Edessa, Scythopolis, Caesarea of Palestine, Alexandria, and Antioch. Eusebius was chosen by the Arians to rule the See of Alexandria in 340; but knowing the popular attachment to the exiled Athanasius, he declined. Shortly afterward he became bishop of emesa (Homs), capital of Lebanese Phoenicia and ancient center of pagan sun worship. There he was accused of astrology and later, of sabellianism. Resigning his see, he accompanied the Emperor Constantius on an expedition against the Persians c. 348, some years before his death.

St. Jerome credits Eusebius with considerable eloquence and mentions his writings against the Jews, pagans, and Novatians, as well as a commentary on Galatians and homilies on the Gospels (Vir. ill. 91), but Jerome exaggerates his attachment to arianism (Chron. an. 347). Eusebius' writings, the subject of intensive contemporary research (29 discourses in an old Latin version have recently been restored to him), indicate that he was a moderate semi-Arian, dependent on eusebius of caesarea in his christology and Trinitarian theology, more prone to the literal exegesis of Antioch than to Alexandrian allegorism.

Bibliography: j. quasten, Patrology 3:348–351. É. m. buytaert, Eusèbe d'Émèse: Discours conservés en latin, 2 v. (Spicilegium sacrum Lovaniense 26–27; 1953–57); L'Héritage littéraire d'Eusèbe d'Émèse (Louvain 1949); "On the Trinitarian Doctrine of Eusebius of Emesa," Franciscan Studies 14 (1954) 34–48. d. amand de mendieta, "La Virginité chez Eusèbe d'Émèse et l'ascétisme familial dans la première moitié du IV^e siècle," Revue d'histoire ecclésiastique 50 (1955) 777–820.

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