Bonosus (bishop)
Encyclopedia
Bonusus was a Bishop of Sardica in the latter part of the fourth century, founder of the heresy, known after him as Bonosians.

History

Against the common teaching of the Catholic Church he held that, after Jesus
Jesus
Jesus of Nazareth , commonly referred to as Jesus Christ or simply as Jesus or Christ, is the central figure of Christianity...

, Mary
Mary (mother of Jesus)
Mary , commonly referred to as "Saint Mary", "Mother Mary", the "Virgin Mary", the "Blessed Virgin Mary", or "Mary, Mother of God", was a Jewish woman of Nazareth in Galilee...

 had several other children. The Council of Capua in 391, before which the matter was brought, did not pass any judgment on it, but referred it to the Metropolitan
Metropolitan bishop
In Christian churches with episcopal polity, the rank of metropolitan bishop, or simply metropolitan, pertains to the diocesan bishop or archbishop of a metropolis; that is, the chief city of a historical Roman province, ecclesiastical province, or regional capital.Before the establishment of...

 Anysius of Thessalonica and the other bishops of Illyria
Illyria
In classical antiquity, Illyria was a region in the western part of the Balkan Peninsula inhabited by the Illyrians....

. They condemned Bonosus and tried to exclude him from his church. In a letter to the same bishops Pope Siricius
Pope Siricius
Pope Saint Siricius, Bishop of Rome from December 384 until his death on 26 November 399, was successor to Damasus I and was himself succeeded by Anastasius I....

 approves the sentence and also condemns the opinion that Mary did not always preserve her virginity
Virginity
Virginity refers to the state of a person who has never engaged in sexual intercourse. There are cultural and religious traditions which place special value and significance on this state, especially in the case of unmarried females, associated with notions of personal purity, honor and worth...

.

Notwithstanding his condemnation, and the prudent advice of his study friend St. Ambrose to submit, Bonosus continued to exercise the episcopal
Episcopal polity
Episcopal polity is a form of church governance that is hierarchical in structure with the chief authority over a local Christian church resting in a bishop...

 functions, to consecrate bishop
Bishop
A bishop is an ordained or consecrated member of the Christian clergy who is generally entrusted with a position of authority and oversight. Within the Catholic Church, Eastern Orthodox, Oriental Orthodox Churches, in the Assyrian Church of the East, in the Independent Catholic Churches, and in the...

s and ordain priest
Priest
A priest is a person authorized to perform the sacred rites of a religion, especially as a mediatory agent between humans and deities. They also have the authority or power to administer religious rites; in particular, rites of sacrifice to, and propitiation of, a deity or deities...

s. According to two letters of Pope Innocent I
Pope Innocent I
-Biography:He was, according to his biographer in the Liber Pontificalis, the son of a man called Innocens of Albano; but according to his contemporary Jerome, his father was Pope Anastasius I , whom he was called by the unanimous voice of the clergy and laity to succeed -Biography:He was,...

, one to Martian of Naïssa in 409 and the other to the bishops of Macedonia in 414, those ordained by Bonosus before his condemnation were to be received in the Church without a new ordination, those ordained since Bonosus's condemnation, especially if they had themselves sought to be ordained by him, were to be deprived of their dignity. As Innocent speaks of Bonosus as no longer living, we may infer that he died at the end of the fourth, or the beginning of the fifth century. The baptism conferred by the his followers, the Bonosians, was by some declared valid and by others invalid.

Whether, besides denying Mary's perpetual virginity, Bonosus also denied Christ's divinity cannot be determined with certainty, but it is certain that the Bonosians, to whom we find references in the councils and in ecclesiastical writers up to the seventh century, denied this dogma
Dogma
Dogma is the established belief or doctrine held by a religion, or a particular group or organization. It is authoritative and not to be disputed, doubted, or diverged from, by the practitioners or believers...

. On this point they were at one with the Photinians
Photinus
Photinus was a Christian heresiarch and bishop of Sirmium in Pannonia, best known for denying the incarnation of Christ. His name became synonymous in later literature for someone asserting that Christ was not God.- Life :...

. As a consequence, they affirmed the purely adoptive divine filiation
Divine filiation
Divine filiation is a Christian concept of becoming a "child of God". The concept implicates a share in the life and role of Jesus Christ. Divine filiation refers to the relationship between Jesus and God, specifically as the second person of the Trinity, "God the Son"...

 of Christ. However, they differed from the Adoptionists in rejecting all natural sonship, whereas the Adoptionists, distinguishing in Christ the God and the man, attributed to the former a natural, and to the latter an adoptive sonship.
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