Archbishop Of Nisibis

The Metropolitanate of Nisibis was an East Syriac metropolitan province of the Church of the East, between the fifth and seventeenth centuries. The ecclesiastical province of Nisibis (Syriac: Nisibin, , often abbreviated to Soba, ) had a number of suffragan dioceses at different periods in its history, including Arzun, Beth Rahimaï, Beth Qardu (later renamed Tamanon), Beth Zabdaï, Qube d'Arzun, Balad, Shigar (Sinjar), Armenia, Beth Tabyathe and the Kartawaye, Harran and Callinicus (Raqqa), Maiperqat (with Amid and Mardin), , Qarta and Adarma, Qaimar and Hesna d'Kifa. Aoustan d'Arzun and Beth Moksaye were also suffragan dioceses in the fifth century.

Background

In 363 the Roman emperor Jovian was obliged to cede Nisibis and five neighbouring districts to Persia to extricate the defeated army of his predecessor Julian from Persian territory. The Nisibis region, after nearly fifty years of rule by Constantine and his Christian successors, may well have contained more Christians than the entire Sassanian empire, and this Christian population was absorbed into the Church of the East in a single generation. The impact of the cession of Nisibis on the demography of the Church of the East was so marked that the province of Nisibis was ranked second among the five metropolitan provinces established at the synod of Isaac in 410, a precedence apparently conceded without dispute by the bishops of the three older Persian provinces relegated to a lower rank. The metropolitan of Nisibis ranked below the metropolitan of , but above the metropolitans of Maishan, Adiabene and Beth Garmaï.Chabot, 272–3

The bishop of Nisibis was recognised in Canon XXI of the synod of Isaac as 'metropolitan of Arzun, of Qardu, of Beth Zabdaï, of Beth Rahimaï, of Beth Moksaye, and of the bishops to be found there', and the bishops Daniel of Arzun, Samuel 'of Arzun for Baita d'Aoustan', Daniel of Beth Moksaye, and Abraham of Beth Rahimaï were confirmed as his suffragans.

Ecclesiastical history

The bishop of Nisibis was recognised in 410 as the metropolitan of Arzun (), Qardu (), Beth Zabdaï (), Beth Rahimaï () and Beth Moksaye (). These were the Syriac names for Arzanene, Corduene, Zabdicene, Rehimene and Moxoene, the five districts ceded by Rome to Persia in 363. The metropolitan diocese of Nisibis () and the suffragan dioceses of Arzun, Qardu and Beth Zabdaï were to enjoy a long history, but Beth Rahimaï is not mentioned again, while Beth Moksaye is not mentioned after 424, when its bishop Atticus (probably, from his name, a Roman) subscribed to the acts of the synod of . Besides the bishop of Arzun, a bishop of 'Aoustan d'Arzun' (plausibly identified with the district of Ingilene) also attended these two synods, and his diocese was also assigned to the province of Nisibis. The diocese of Aoustan d'Arzun survived into the sixth century, but is not mentioned after 554.

During the fifth and sixth centuries three new dioceses in the province of Nisibis were founded in Persian territory, in (the hinterland of Nisibis, between Mosul and the Tigris and Khabur rivers) and in the hill country to the northeast of Arzun. By 497 a diocese had been established at Balad (the modern Eski Mosul) on the Tigris, which persisted into the fourteenth century. By 563 there was also a diocese for Shigar (Sinjar), deep inside , and by 585 a diocese for 'Beth Tabyathe and the Kartawaye', the country to the west of Lake Van inhabited by the Kartaw Kurds.Fiey, ''POCN'', 134 David was the bishop of the Kurds of Kartaw during or immediately after the reign of Hnanisho I (686–698).

The famous School of Nisibis was an important seminary and theological academy of the Church of the East during the late Sassanian period, and in the last two centuries of Sassanian rule generated a remarkable outpouring of East Syriac theological scholarship.

Probably during the Umayyad period, the East Syriac diocese of Armenia was attached to the province of Nisibis. The bishop Artashahr of Armenia was present at the synod of in 424, but the diocese was not assigned to a metropolitan province. In the late thirteenth century Armenia was certainly a suffragan diocese of the province of Nisibis, and its dependency probably went back to the seventh or eighth century. The bishops of Armenia appear to have sat at the town of Halat (Ahlat) on the northern shore of Lake Van.

The Arab conquest allowed the East Syriacs to move into western Mesopotamia and establish communities in Damascus and other towns that had formerly been in Roman territory, where they lived alongside much larger Syriac Orthodox, Armenian and Melkite communities. Some of these western communities were placed under the jurisdiction of the East Syriac metropolitans of Damascus, but others were attached to the province of Nisibis. The latter included a diocese for Harran and Callinicus (Raqqa), first attested in the eighth century and last mentioned towards the end of the eleventh century, and a diocese at Maiperqat, first mentioned at the end of the eleventh century, whose bishops were also responsible for the East Syrian communities in Amid and Mardin. Eleventh- and thirteenth-century lists of dioceses in the province of Nisibis also mention a diocese for the Syrian town of (). is a plausible location for an East Syriac diocese at this period, but none of its bishops are known.

Changes in the formal and informal titles borne by the metropolitans of Nisibis reflect the shifts in the province's centre of gravity over the centuries. In 497 the metropolitan Hosea of Nisibis was styled 'metropolitan of the country of '.Chabot, 315 In the eleventh century the metropolitan of Nisibis, who became patriarch in 1074, was styled 'metropolitan bishop of Soba isibisand Beth Nahrin esopotamia. At the end of the thirteenth century the celebrated East Syriac writer , himself metropolitan of Nisibis, referred loosely to his province as 'Soba (Nisibis) and Mediterranean Syria'.Chabot, 619–20 Few Mesopotamian or Syrian dioceses still existed at this period, however, and was normally styled 'metropolitan of Nisibis and Armenia'. As far as is known, the title 'metropolitan of Nisibis and Armenia' was used by all of 's successors until 1610, when the East Syriac metropolitan province of Nisibis was abolished.

listed thirteen suffragan dioceses in the province of Nisibis at the end of the thirteenth century, in the following order: Arzun, Qube, Beth Rahimaï, Balad, Shigar, Qardu, Tamanon, Beth Zabdaï, Halat, Harran, Amid, and 'Adormiah' (Qarta and Adarma). It has been convincingly argued that was giving a conspectus of dioceses in the province of Nisibis at various periods in its history rather than an authentic list of late-thirteenth century dioceses, and it is unlikely that the dioceses of Qube, Beth Rahimaï, Harran and still existed at this period.

A diocese was founded around the middle of the thirteenth century to the north of the for the town of Hesna d'Kifa, perhaps in response to East Syriac immigration to the towns of the Tigris plain during the Mongol period. At the same time, a number of older dioceses may have ceased to exist. The dioceses of Qaimar and Qarta and Adarma are last mentioned towards the end of the twelfth century, and the diocese of Tamanon in 1265, and it is not clear whether they persisted into the fourteenth century. The only dioceses in the province of Nisibis definitely in existence at the end of the thirteenth century were Armenia (whose bishops sat at Halat on the northern shore of Lake Van), Shigar, Balad, Arzun and Maiperqat.

Archdiocese of Nisibis

The see of Nisibis was founded in AD300.. At the Synod of 410 in Seleucia-Ctesiphon, Nisibis was made the metropolitan see of Beth ʿArbaye.

* Babu (300–309)
* St Jacob or James of Nisibis (309–338 or 350), founder of the School of Nisibis and a signatory of the First Council of Nicaea
* ...
* Hosea (), signatory of the synods held by Isaac (410),Chabot, 272–4 Yahballaha I (420), and (424) The deacon and secretary Eliya was among the signatories of the acts of the synod held by Babaï in 497, on behalf of his bishop Hosea, "metropolitan of the country of ".
* ...
* Barsauma, metropolitan of Nisibis, headed the Synod of Beth Lapat in 484.
*...
* Paul (), signatory of the synod held by Joseph in 554.Chabot, 366
* ...
*Gregory (), previously bishop of Kashkar
* ...
* Isaac (646–?), attested under Maremmeh's successor III (r.649–59).
* ...
* (697), consecrated by I early in the year and died forty days laterMari, 64 (Arabic), 57 (Latin)
* of Balad (697–?)
* ...
* Ruzbihan (), a former superior of the monastery of Mar Awgin appointed by Sliba-zkha (r.714–28) who served for twelve years. Mari states that he was "of indifferent learning" but "very charitable towards the poor" and that he "restored the churches in his archdiocese".
* ...
* Cyprian (740/1–766/7)
* ...
* Yohannan or John (), returned to the diocese upon his release from prison in 776/7 and among the bishops who witnessed the monk Nestorius's retraction of the Messallian heresy made in 790 prior to his consecration as bishop of Beth NuhadraChabot, 608
* ...
* Qayyoma (), a disciple of Sargis (r.860–72) and former bishop of Tirhan.
* ...
* (.912/13)
* ...
* (.994/5)
* Yahballaha (994/5–1006/7), former bishop of Elijah of Nisibis, ''Chronography'', i. 107; Sliba, 94 (Arabic)
* Elijah, Elias, or Eliya of Nisibis (26December 1008Elijah of Nisibis, ''Chronography'', i. 110 and 112–18July 1046), former bishop of Beth Nuhadra and famed for his ''Chronography''
* ...
* (?–1074), who was elevated to patriarch (r.1074–90). Under his reign the patriarch Sabrisho III introduced the custom of allowing the metropolitan of Nisibis to participate in patriarchal elections.
* Giwargis (1074), a former bishop of Arzun who died a few days after his consecration
* Ibn Hammad (1074–?)Mari, 131 (Arabic), 114 (Latin)
* ...
* (), present at Yahballaha III's 1281 consecrationSliba, 124 (Arabic)
* ...
* (12851291–?), former bishop of Shigar and , present at the 1318 consecration of Timothy IIAssemani, ''BO'', iii. i. 567–80

Diocese of Arzun

East Syriac bishops of Arzun (near present-day Siirt) are attested between the fifth and thirteenth centuries. A twelfth-century reference to the diocese of 'Arzun and Beth Dlish' indicates that the bishops of Arzun may have sat at Bitlis