|
COLLYRIDIANISM
Patrick Madrid
Dates
350-450
Founder
Unknown
Background to controversy
Most of the early heresies were Trinitarian and
Christological in
nature, but Collyridianism stood alone as a heresy
that sought to
deify the Blessed Virgin Mary. Little is known about the
movement's
theology. Not even the names of the group's leaders are
mentioned by
writers of the time. This sect's excessive Marian devotion
developed
into the idolatry of Mary worship. This aberration grew out
of the
Church's rightful veneration of Mary as ever-virgin, Mother of
God,
and powerful heavenly intercessor, but crossed the line of
orthodoxy
when certain Christians began to worship Mary as divine.
Details
about the Collyridians are scanty, but one of the few specifics
we
know of them is that at their liturgical service bread was offered
as
a sacrifice to Mary.
Principal errors
The heresy of the Collyridians was very simple: They
worshiped Mary.
This was in direct conflict with the Catholic Church's
condemnation
of idolatry, which had been condemned by God himself: "You
shall have
no other gods before me. You shall not make for yourself a
graven
image, or any likeness of anything that is in heaven above, or
that
is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth;
you
shall not bow down to them or serve them; for I the Lord your God
am
a jealous God" (Ex. 20:3-5; cf. Deut. 5:7 6:14; 1 Cor.
4:8-6,
10:19-20; Eph. 5:5). This proscription applies not just to
statue
worship, but to the worship of anything besides God.
Orthodox response
It is ironic that the most diligent opponent of the
Collyridians was
Epiphanius (315- 403), the bishop of Salamis. He was
widely renowned
for his learning and holy asceticism and was a close
friend of
Jerome, but he was also a rude and querulous man who garnered
many
enemies, some of whom were fellow bishops.
Though Epiphanius's efforts to quash the Collyridians
were laudable
and his theological and scriptural reasoning against
their idolatry
was sound, he himself was not free from error in the
area of honoring
God's friends. The vehemence of his opposition to the
Collyridians'
idolatry was rivaled by his fanatical opposition to
icons.
In a description that is reminiscent of certain
modern-day
Fundamentalist foes of Catholic Marian doctrines and of
venerating
icons and images, patristics scholar Aloys Dirksen,
C.P.P.S.,
describes Epiphanius as having a "fiery temperament and
unreasonable
impetuosity . . . that made the calm objectivity necessary
for
scholarly work impossible for him. His narrow-mindedness is
apparent
in the part he played in the Origenist controversy and the
violence
with which he attacked the veneration of images.
"He considered this idolatry, and in his testament he
anathematized
anyone who would even gaze upon a picture of the
Logos-God. His
temperament made him suspicious of heresy everywhere,
and he made
capital of even the smallest inaccuracy of statement. It
appeared
impossible for him to see any viewpoint but his own. Since he
lacked
critical acumen and was a poor, even a tiresome writer, his
works
would be of little value if it were not for his many quotations
[of
others]. He thus saved much that would otherwise have been lost
to
us" (Elementary Patrology [St. Louis: Herder, 1959], 117).
Epiphanius wrote against the Collyridians in his most
important
apologetic work, Panarion (Medicine Box [374-377]), a
tour-de-force
refutation of over eighty heresies known to him. He
refuted the two
extreme and diametrically opposed Marian heresies of
his day,
Collyridianism (which overly exalted Mary) and
Antidicomarianitism,
an Arabian movement that debased Mary's status and
virtues, to the
point of claiming "that holy Mary had intercourse with
a man, that is
to say, Joseph, after the birth of Christ" (Panarion
78:1).
The Collyridians were primarily women who developed a
syncretistic
combination of Catholicism and pagan goddess cult customs.
After
describing the "awful and blasphemous ceremony," in which they
adorn
a chair or a square throne and spread a linen cloth over it for
their
ritual, Epiphanius writes, "Certain women there in Arabia
have
introduced this absurd teaching from Thracia: how they offer up
a
sacrifice of bread rolls in the name of the ever-Virgin Mary, and
all
partake of this bread" ( 78:13). He emphasizes the
difference
between Mary and God: "It is not right to honor the saints
beyond their
due" (ibid. 78:23); "Now the body of Mary was indeed
holy, but it was
not God; the Virgin was indeed a virgin and revered,
but she was not
given to us for worship, but she herself worshiped
him who was born in
the flesh from her.... Honor Mary, but let the
Father, the Son, and the
Holy Spirit be worshiped, but let no one
worship Mary, . . . even
though Mary is most beautiful and holy and
venerable, yet she is not to
be worshiped" (ibid. 79:1, 4).
With Epiphanius we can say that anyone who worships
Mary or any other
creature is committing idolatry and must be rebuked.
We should look
to Scripture, at the case of the angel who rebuked John
for his
temptation to idolatry, to see how to admonish
modern-day
Collyridians: "At this I fell at his feet to worship him.
But he said
to me, 'Do not do it! I am a fellow servant with you and
with your
brothers who hold to the testimony of Jesus. Worship God!'"
(Rev.
19:10). No doubt, our Lady herself would say this to any who
would
seek to worship her.
Modern parallels
Collyridianism is seen today in various forms. Those
"hyper-Marian"
groups and writers who overly exalt Mary and focus on
her to the
exclusion (or near exclusion) of Christ are guilty of
something
approaching idolatry. Modern feminism is the source of a
recycled
Collyridianism that worships a "mother goddess" and seeks
to
"re-image" God in female terms.
This article was taken from the October, 1994 issue of
"This Rock,"
published by Catholic Answers, P.O. Box 17490, San Diego,
CA 92177,
(619) 541-1131, $24.00 per year.
-------------------------------------------------------------------
The
electronic form of this document is copyrighted.
Copyright (c) Trinity
Communications 1994.
Provided courtesy of:
The Catholic Resource Network
Trinity
Communications
PO Box 3610
Manassas, VA 22110
Voice:
703-791-2576
Fax: 703-791-4250
Data: 703-791-4336
The Catholic Resource Network is a Catholic online
information and
service system. To browse CRNET or join, set your modem
to 8 data
bits, 1 stop bit and no parity, and call
1-703-791-4336.
------------------------------------------------------------------- | 
