New Evidence on the Philoxenian Versions of the New Testament and Nicene Creed

In the era after the Council of Chalcedon, the corpus of the 'Church Fathers' became a source-book for doctrinal elaboration and the authority attributed to their works rivaled that of the scriptures themselves. 1 This paradigm shift in matters of authority in intra-ecclesial disputes had begun already with Cyril of Alexandria who not only laid down in the seventh canon of the Ephesian Council of 431 that henceforth only the Creed of the 318 Fathers of Nicaea was to be permitted as the touchstone of orthodoxy, 2 but he also initiated the custom of quoting from the 1 For a fuller description of the phenomenon see, for instance, P.T.R.