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SOZOMEN

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Originally appearing in Volume V25, Page 525 of the 1911 Encyclopedia Britannica.
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SOZOMEN , the name of a famous 5th-See also:

century See also:church historian. See also:Hermias Salamanes (Salaminius) Sozomenus (c. 400-443) came of a wealthy See also:family of See also:Palestine, and it is exceedingly probable that he himself was See also:born and brought up there—in See also:Gaza or the neighbourhood. What he has to tell us of the See also:history of See also:South Palestine was derived from oral tradition. His grandfather, he tells us, lived at See also:Bethel, near Gaza, and became a See also:Christian, probably under See also:Constantius, through the See also:influence of See also:Hilarion, who had miraculously healed an acquaintance of the grandfather, one Alaphion. Both men with their families became zealous Christians. The historian's grandfather became within his own circle a highly esteemed interpreter of Scripture, and held fast his profession even in the See also:time of See also:Julian. The descendants of the wealthy Alaphion founded churches and convents in the See also:district, and were particularly active in promoting See also:monasticism. Sozomen himself had conversed with one of these, a very old See also:man. He tells us that he was brought up under monkish influences and his history bears him out. As a man he retained the impressions of his youth, and his See also:great See also:work was to be also a See also:monument of his reverence for the monks in See also:general and for the disciples of Hilarion in particular. After studying See also:law in See also:Beirut he settled down as an See also:advocate in See also:Constantinople, where he wrote his EKKkrlaLavrLKrl 'Ivropia about the See also:year 440.

The nine books of which it is composed begin with See also:

Constantine (323) and come down to the See also:death of See also:Honorius (423); but according to his own statement he intended to continue it as far as the year 439 (see the See also:Dedication of the work). From Sozomen himself (iv. 17), and statements of his excerptors Nicephorus and See also:Theophanes, it can be made out that the work did actually come down to that year, and that consequently it has reached us only in a mutilated See also:condition, at least See also:half a See also:book being wanting (Giildenpenning, Theodoros von Kyrrhos, p. 12 seq., holds that Sozomen himself suppressed the end of his work). A flattering and bombastic dedication to See also:Theodosius II. is prefixed. When compared with the history of the ecclesiastical historian See also:Socrates (q.v.), it is plainly seen to be a See also:plagiarism from that work, and that on a large See also:scale. Some three-fourths of the materials, essentially in the same arrangement, have been appropriated from his predecessor without his being named, the other See also:sources to which Sozomen was indebted being expressly cited. But it is to his See also:credit that he has been himself at the trouble to refer to the See also:principal sources used by Socrates (See also:Rufinus, See also:Eusebius, See also:Athanasius, Sabinus, the collections of epistles, Palladino), and has not unfrequently supplemented Socrates from them; and also that he has used some new authorities, in particular sources See also:relating to See also:Christianity in See also:Persia and to the history of Arianism, monkish histories, the Vila See also:Martini of Sulpicius, and See also:works of See also:Hilarius. The whole of the ninth book is See also:drawn from See also:Olympiodorus. It is probable that Sozomen did not approve of Socrates's freer attitude towards See also:Greek See also:science, and that he wished to See also:present a picture in which the See also:clergy should be still further glorified and monasticism brought into still stronger prominence. In Sozomen everything is a shade more ecclesiastical —but only a shade—than in Socrates. Perhaps also he wrote for the monks in Palestine, and could be sure that the work of his predecessor would not be known.

Sozomen is an inferior Socrates. What in Socrates still betrays some vestiges of See also:

historical sense, his moderation, his reserve in questions of See also:dogma, his impartiality—all this is wanting in Sozomen. In many cases he has repeated the exact words of Socrates, but with him they have passed almost into See also:mere phrases. The See also:chronological scrupulosity of the earlier writer has made no impression on his follower; he has either wholly omitted or inaccurately repeated the chronological data. He writes more wordily and diffusely. In his characterizations of persons, borrowed from Socrates, he is more dull and colourless. After Socrates he has indeed repeated the caution not to be too rash in discerning the See also:finger of See also:God ; but his way of looking at things is throughout mean and rustic. Twosouls inhabit his book; one, the better, is borrowed from Socrates; another, the worse, is his own. See also:Evidence of a boundless credulity with regard to all sorts of monkish fables is to be met with every-where. It must, however, be noted that for the See also:period from Theodosius I. onward he has emancipated himself more fully from Socrates and has followed Olympiodorus in See also:part, partly also oral tradition ; and here his statements possess greater value. Sozomen also wrote an See also:Epitome of History from the See also:Ascension of See also:Christ to the defeat of See also:Licinius (323) which is not now extant (see his History, i. I).

For bibliography see the See also:

article on the church historian, SOCRATES. Most of the See also:editions and discussions named there See also:cover Sozomen as well (the See also:volume of Hussey's edition containing Sozomen appeared in 186o). The latest See also:English See also:translation, revised by Hartranft, is published in the Nicene and See also:Post-Nicene Fathers, and See also:series, vol. ii. In addition see Nolte in the See also:Tithing. Quartalschr. (1861), p. 417 sqq.; C. de Boor, " Zur Kenntniss der Handschriften der Griech. Kirchenhistoriker," in Zeitschrift See also:fur Kirchengeschichte, vi. 478 sqq.; See also:Sarrazin, " De Sozomeni historia num integra sit," in the Commentationes philologae jenenses, i. 165 sqq.; Rosenstein, " Krit. Untersuchungen fiber d. Verhaltniss zwischen Olympiodor, See also:Zosimus and Sozomen," in Borsch. z. deutschen Gesch., vol. i.; Batiffol, " Sozomene et Sabinos," in Byzant.

Zeitschr. vii. 265 sqq. (A. HA.; A. C.

End of Article: SOZOMEN

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