How Illness and Heresy Became Entangled in Christianity

06/04/2022 31 min
How Illness and Heresy Became Entangled in Christianity

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Episode Synopsis

An Interview with Dr. Jennifer Barry The dramatic story of Bishop John Chrysostom’s two exiles and subsequent death (in the 4th century) is tangled up with the Empress Eudoxia and her miscarriages. It was known that diseases spread the same way internal corruption spreads through communities rather quickly, so uncertainty of not knowing who is heretical and who has a disease made the easy association between heresy and disease. Therefore Eudoxia’s suffering and death became the scapegoat for Chrysostom’s theological missteps.