The Living Tradition An Orthodox Archive of the Church Fathers and Early Church

Theme

The Theotokos

Why the title given to the Virgin Mary is first of all a statement about her Son.

  • Dogmatic definitionDefined by an ecumenical council or otherwise confessed by the Church as binding doctrine. Not every sentence a council wrote is a definition: its acts, letters and disciplinary canons are different things.
  • Liturgical witnessAttested in the Church's worship — in a hymn, a prayer, a rite or a commemoration. Liturgical language is theological rather than casual, but a hymn is not a canon.

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The Council of Ephesus confessed the Virgin Mary as theotokos, God-bearer. The argument was not about how much honour Mary should receive. It was about whether the one born of her is the eternal Son of God.

If the title is refused, then what was born of Mary is something other than God the Word — a man later joined to God, or a divided subject. The title is a fence around the incarnation.

Orthodox devotion to the Theotokos is intense and constant in the Church's worship. It is intercession and honour, not worship, and the tradition has always distinguished the two.

Follow this theme through the archive

  • The Council of Ephesus

    The council that confessed the Virgin Mary as Theotokos and condemned Nestorius. Its procedure was contested at the time, and its consequences included the first lasting division in the Church.

    Council

  • Cyril of Alexandria

    Archbishop of Alexandria and the decisive figure at Ephesus, whose insistence on the one incarnate subject of Christ became the Church's own; a great theologian whose conduct has been criticised since his own lifetime.

    Father or writer

  • The Theotokos, the saints and intercession

    Why Orthodox Christians ask the saints to pray, and what the distinction between honour and worship actually is.

    Lesson

Sources for this page

  1. Tier C The Seven Ecumenical Councils of the Undivided Church Henry R. Percival (ed.); Philip Schaff and Henry Wace (series eds.) The Seven Ecumenical Councils annotated edition of conciliar texts Source record

Tiers are explained in the methodology. No page on this site has been reviewed or approved by any bishop, priest, synod or seminary.