Maruthas of Tagrit

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MARUTHAS OF TAGRIT

First maphrian or archmetropolitan of the Persian Monophysite church (629); b. Surzaq, near Balad in modern Iraq, c. 565; d. Tagrit (Taghrith), in modern Iraq, May 2, 649. He was a monk and teacher in the monastery of Mar Mattai near Nineveh in 605. Patriarch Athanasius I Gammàlā consecrated him bishop of Tagrit, the only Monophysite community among the Nestorians of Sassanid Persia, when the Persians began to bring back Monophysites from Byzantine lands. He influenced the Syriac Jacobite liturgy and extended his jurisdiction over 12 suffragan sees to Azerbaijan, Herat, and Segestan. Of his writings an anaphora and fragments of homilies have been preserved. His biography was written by his successor, Denhā (see monophysitism).

Bibliography: e. hammerschmidt, Lexikon für Theologie und Kirche 2 7:140. o. rÜhle, Die Religion in Geschichte und Gegenwart 3d ed., 4:785. denhĀ, Histoire de Marouta, ed. and tr. f. nau (Patrologia orientalis 3; 1909) 5296. m. kmosko, "Homilia in Dominicam novam, " Oriens Christianus 3d ed., (1903) 384415. e. renaudot, Liturgiarum Orientalium collectio, 2 v. (2d ed. Frankfurt a.M. 1847) 2:260268. a. baumstark, Geschichte der syrischen Literatur (Bonn 1922) 245. Patrologia syriaca ed. r. graffin 163164.

[f. x. murphy]