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This chapter argues that Eustathius of Antioch’s deposition took place in autumn 327 as a result of real or faked evidence of sexual misdemeanour, triggering a reversal by Constantine of his previous ecclesiastical policy. It is suggested that Marcellus wrote his Against Asterius partly in response to this event and to the subsequent return of Eusebius of Nicomedia. It is argued that Marcellus, like Athanasius, was trapped by a summons to the Synod of Tyre in 335 when he refused to accept Arius’ reception back into communion at Jerusalem, despite Constantine’s orders. Marcellus’ trial is examined from the accounts of Sozomen and Eusebius of Caesarea, and his innocence established of the theological charges brought.

The church historian Sozomen believed that those who had emulated the monks of Egypt in the practice of philosophy by scraping a raw existence off the mountains, near the Persian frontier, were the first monks of Syria. They had no homes, did not eat bread and meat, and drank no wine. These monks constantly dwelt in the mountains and keep praising God with prayers and hymn according to the law of Church, and at mealtime, they would just take a sickle and wander in the mountains. They also avoided artificial shelter and clothing. Syrian monks furthermore rejected the ordinary labors by which the majority of human beings obtained their food. This strict philosophy they followed had been introduced to Syria by a monk named Aones.

This chapter examines how bishop Eusebius of Caesarea influenced Sozomen in writing Ecclesiastical History. It states that Sozomen dedicated this particular work to the Eastern Roman Emperor Theodosius II. The Ecclesiastical History attempted to cover the time of the third consulship of the Caesars Crispus and Constantine up to the seventeenth year of reign of Theodosius II. This chapter argues that Sozomen used methods established by Eusebius, such as his research method of recording conversations with eye-witnesses of events, as well as following Eusebius' practice in making summaries of historical documents.

The controversy over the theology of Arius was really over how to imagine a connection between a wholly transcendent God and the present world. Arius saw in Jesus a mediator, divinely generated to connect the world with God. The bishops at Nicaea asserted that this Son of God is of one substance with God his Father. Marcellus of Ancyra insisted that Father and Son cannot be numerically distinct agents, but different historical personifications of one transcendent being. Eusebius of Caesaraea, originally sympathetic to Arius, continued after Nicaea to insist that the Son is divine only by a privileged participation in God’s life, linking God to creation by taking an intermediate position between them. Athanasius developed and nuanced the position of Nicaea, emphasizing that only because the Son is fully God, yet personally present in the created order, can he be a source of life and incorruptibility for humanity.