Theology
The Christology of Diodore was condemned as heretical by later generations, most explicitly at a local synod in Constantinople in 499 which described Diodore's views as Nestorian. Certainly a similarly negative view of Diodore was held by Cyril of Alexandria. However, in his own generation Diodore was seen as someone who supported the orthodoxy of Nicaea, and in his official decree ratifying the actions of the First Council of Constantinople, Emperor Theodosius I described Diodore as a "champion of the faith."
The specifics of Diodore's theology are difficult to reconstruct, as all that remains of his works are fragments of uncertain provenance. Much of Diodore's theology has been inferred from the later statements of his students and the intellectual heirs of the Antiochene School.
Like many other theologians affiliated with the Antiochene School, Diodore appears to have been a Christian universalist. Under the concept of Apocatastasis, which is to believe that all people would eventually receive salvation. Saloman, Bishop of Bassorah, clearly proclaimed the salvation of all men and cited the opinions of both Diodore and Theodore of Mopsuestia in support of the view. Regarding divine punishment Diodore wrote:
For the wicked there are punishments, not perpetual, however, lest the immortality prepared for them should be a disadvantage, but they are to be purified for a brief period according to the amount of malice in their works. They shall therefore suffer punishment for a short space, but immortal blessedness having no end awaits them, the penalties to be inflicted for their many and grave sins are very far surpassed by the magnitude of the mercy to be showed them. The resurrection, therefore, is regarded as a blessing not only to the good, but also to the evil.
According to J. W. Hanson Diodore believed that God's mercy would punish the wicked less than their sins deserved, inasmuch as his mercy gave the good more than they deserved and he denied that God would bestow immortality for the purpose of prolonging or perpetuating suffering.
Diodorus according to Joseph Simon Assemani Bibliotheca Orientalis (1728)
— "For the wicked there are punishments, not perpetual, however, lest the immortality prepared for them should be a disadvantage, but they are to be purified for a brief period according to the amount of malice in their works. They shall therefore suffer punishment for a short space, but immortal blessedness having no end awaits them, the penalties to be inflicted for their many and grave sins are very far surpassed by the magnitude of the mercy to be showed them. The resurrection, therefore, is regarded as a blessing not only to the good, but also to the evil.",
Read more about this topic: Diodorus Of Tarsus
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