Isaacus
5. Surnamed SYRUS, because he was a native of Syria, was first monk and afterwards priest at Antioch, and died about A. D. 456.
Works
He wrote in Syriac, and perhaps also in Greek, different works and treatises on theological matters, several of them to oppose the writers of the Nestorians and Eutychians.
His principal work is De Contemtu Mundi, de Operatione Corporali et sui Abjectione Liber.
Editions
This was published in the second edition of the Orthodoxographi, Basel, 1569; in the Bibl. Patr. Colon. vol. vi.; in the B. P. Paris, vol. v.; in the B. P. Novissima Lugdun, vol. xi.; and in Galland. Bibl. Patr. vol. xii.
In all these collections it is printed in Greek, with a Latin translation, but the Greek text also seems to be a translation from the Svriac.
Uncertain which Isaac wrote this work
It is very doubtful whether this work was written by Isaac, the subject of this notice, or by another Isaac, the subject of the following article. Neither Trithenius nor Gennadius (De Script. Eccles.) attribute the work to our Isaac.
De Cogitationibus
There is more reason to believe that he wrote De Cogitationibus.
Editions
The Greek text, with a Latin translation, was published by Petrus Possinus, in his Ascetica.
Other works in MS.
Several other productions of Isaac are extant in MS. in the library of the Vatican and in other libraries.
Further Information
Cave, Hist. Lit. vol. i. p. 434-435; Fabric. Bibl. Graec. vol. xi. p. 214, &c.
From William Smith (ed.), Dictionary of Greek and Roman Biography and Mythology. Text provided under a CC BY-SA license by Perseus Digital Library, http://www.perseus.tufts.edu, with funding from the National Endowment for the Humanities and Tufts University. Data accessed from https://github.com/PerseusDL/canonical-pdlrefwk/ on 17 October 2026.