RESOURCESDie Nestorianische Kirche. Handbuch der Orientalistik (Brill, 1961).
J. M. Fiey's lalons pour une histoire de l'eglise en Iraq, CSCO, Subsidia
36 (Louvain, 1970) covers the origins of Christianity in the East until
the end of the Sasanian dynasty.
Concerning the position of catholicos, see H. Leclercq, "Katholi-
cos," in Dictionnaire d'archeologie chretienne et de liturgie, 8 (1929),
cols. 686-89; P. W. de Vries, "Antiochen und Seleucia-Ctesiphon,
Patriarch und Katholikos?" in Melanges E. Tisserant (Studi e testi,
233, Rome, 1964), Ill: 429-50; J. M. Fiey, "Les etapes de la prise de
conscience de son identite patriarcale par l'eglise syrienne orientale,"
COrient Syrien 12 (1967): 3-22; W. Macomber, "The Authority of
the Catholicos Patriarch of Seleucia-Ctesiphon," Orientalia Christiana
Analecta 181 (1968): 179-200; and C.D.G. Miiller, "Stellung und
Bedeutung des Katholikos-Patriarchen van Seleukia-Ktesiphon im Al-
tertum," OC 53 (1969): 227-45.
The main primary source for the ecclesiastical structure of the Chris-
tian Church in Iraq in Sasanian and early Islamic times is the Synodicon
Orientale (Paris, 1902), which contains lists of bishops who signed
the church synods from the early fifth century until the late eighth
century. The Syriac text of two of the synods of Timothy I was pub-
lished with German translations by O. Braun in "Zwei Synoden des
Katholikos Timotheos I," OC 2 (1902): 283-311. This material was
used in G. Wiessner's "Zu den Subskriptionslisten dt:r iiltesten chris-
tlichen Synoden in Iran," in Festschrift fur Wilhelm Eilers (Wiesbaden,
1967), pp. 288-98.
The hierarchic nature of church organization is treated by D. H.
Marot in "Une example de centralisation ecclesiastique: L'ancienne
eglise chaldeene," Irenikon 28 (1955): 176-85. But by far the most
extensive work on the history of the ecclesiastical structure, bishoprics,
and monasteries in Iraq has been by J. M. Fiey in Mossoul chretienne
(Beirut, 1959), "Proto-Histoire chretienne du Hakkari Turc," COri-
ent Syrien 9 (1964): 443-72, Assyrie chretienne (Beirut, 1965-68) in
three volumes, and Nisibe, metropole syriaque orientale et ses suffra-
gants des origins Cl nos jours, CSCO, Subsidia 54 (Louvain, 1977).
R. Murray's treatment of the imagery used for the church before the
fifth-century schisms in Symbols of Church and Kingdom: A Study in
Early Syriac Tradition (London, 1975) mainly concerns a shared sym-
bolism of apostolic functions according to Ephrem and Aphrahat, but
the imagery of shepherd and flock is treated on pages 187 to 191 and
that of spiritual physician on pages 199 to 203. For the remains of