John Cassian (360 – 435)

Timeline for John Cassian
360 born in the region of Scythia Minor, which at that time straddled two empires: East-West, (now Dobruja in modern-day Romania and Bulgaria), thirteen years after the death of Anthony.

383? Monastic experience, John and his friend Germanus were received into a cell of the monastery of Bethlehem where he stayed for two years, young, about 17 or 18 years old.

385? Pilgrimage to Egypt, where he joined a group of Origenist monks and shared their fate when they were expelled.

399 Cassian and Germanus fled the Anthropomorphic controversy provoked by Theophilus, Archbishop of Alexandria, with about 300 other Origenist monks. John Cassian and Germanus went to Constantinople, where they appealed to the Patriarch of Constantinople, Saint John Chrysostom, for protection.

400 At Constantinople, having been expelled from Egypt, John and Germanus sought a refuge and a protector in John Chrysostom. Germanus was ordained a priest and Cassian a deacon. John fell foul of the emperor who sent him into exile.

405 Rome - Antioch - Rome, Cassian stayed a short while in Rome, then went to Antioch. The bishop there incorporated him into his clergy and ordained him priest against his will. That is why, in a passage in the Institutes, he quotes a saying of the Elders: "A monk must flee absolutely women and bishops".

Then the bishop sent him to Rome again as an ambassador. He returned there and made friends with the pope, Innocent I, who held him in high regard and confided in him. he also got to know a young deacon who later became Pope: St Leo the Great. It is more than likely that Germanus died in Rome because we hear nothing more of him after this.

421-426 John wrote the Conferences and Institutes

430 John wrote a treatise against Nestorius at the request of Pope Leo.

435 died in Marseille.

• John Cassian (Wikipedia)
• John Cassian...Conferences and Institutes
  "Cassian probably did more than anyone else to translate the desert experience for the West. Following his teacher, Evagrius Ponticus, he stressed wordless prayer and the mystical journey of the soul. St. Benedict, in his Rule, would make Cassian’s memoirs required reading in all his monasteries."...William Harmless
• A HISTORY OF MONASTIC SPIRITUALITY by Luc Brésard, of the abbey of Citeaux
  Appears to be a syllabus for a course study and contains some interesting information about monasticism as well as some details about key players in early Christian monasticism.
• The Semi-Pelagian Theology of John Cassian
  Semipelagianism emphasized the role of free will in that the first steps of salvation are in the power of the individual, without the need for divine grace. His thought has been described as a "middle way" between Pelagianism, which taught that the will alone was sufficient to live a sinless life, and the view of Augustine of Hippo, that emphasizes original sin and the absolute need for grace.
  
  The Latin Church condemned Semipelagianism in the local Council of Orange[1] in 529, but recognizes Cassian himself as a saint. Semipelagianism has never been condemned by Eastern synods or the Seven Ecumenical Councils...
• [1]The Council of Orange was an outgrowth of the controversy between Augustine and Pelagius. This controversy had to do with degree to which a human being is responsible for his or her own salvation, and the role of the grace of God in bringing about salvation. The Pelagians held that human beings are born in a state of innocence, i.e., that there is no such thing as a sinful nature or original sin.
  
  As a result of this view, they held that a state of sinless perfection was achievable in this life. The Council of Orange dealt with the Semi-Pelagian doctrine that the human race, though fallen and possessed of a sinful nature, is still "good" enough to able to lay hold of the grace of God through an act of unredeemed human will. The Council held to Augustine's view and repudiated Pelagius. The following canons greatly influenced the Reformed doctrine of Total Depravity.

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