Nestorianism

The teaching condemned at Ephesus in 431 in the person of Nestorius, Archbishop of Constantinople, who would not call the Virgin Theotokos, Mother of God, but only Christotokos, mother of Christ. St Cyril of Alexandria saw in it a Christ divided into two subjects, a man and the Word who dwelt in him, and insisted that the one born of the Virgin, who suffered and died, is the Word of God Himself in the flesh. Nestorius was deposed and died in exile. Whether he held the doctrine that bears his name is still argued, and the Church of the East, which honours him, was never party to the council. The Orthodox Church keeps the council’s judgment, and every time it calls the Virgin Theotokos it confesses what Ephesus defended: one Christ, God made man, and not a man God came to live in.