SAHAK (Isaac) I, the Great. - Famous Armenian katholikos, b. around the middle of the 4th century and d. probably on 7 September 439. He was the son of the katholikos Nerses the Great and the true patriarch of Armenian letters. Under his protection and that of Mesrop, the "holy translators" produced the version of Sacred Scripture and of notable Greek and Syriac writings.
S. became katholikos of Armenia around 390 and remained so until 420, when he was deposed by the Persian emperor Yazdegerd I because of the orthodoxy maintained by S. both against paganism and against heresy. S., however, remained, as before, the spiritual head of Armenia. Some years later S. was warned by the bishop of Edessa, Rabbula, of the danger of the doctrine of Theodore of Mopsuestia, while other bishops recommended it to him. An Armenian national synod, probably in 435, decided to request precise information from Proclus of Constantinople, prompting his Tomus ad Armenios. S. replied to Proclus and to Acacius of Melitene, full of enthusiasm for orthodoxy and acknowledging for the Madonna the title of Theotokos. The Armenians venerate S. as a saint.
It seems that S. was not a very prolific author, although Koriun attributes to him "many biblical commentaries"; Moses of Khoren has preserved 3 letters of his (History of Armenia 3, 57). Those addressed to Proclus and to Acacius are found in the Book of Letters (Tiflis 1901); the one to Proclus was also edited by A. Vardinian, in Wiener Zeitsch. für die Kunde des Morgenlandes, 27 (1913), pp. 415-41. A canonical constitution attributed to S. (cf. F. C. Conybeare, The armenian Canons of St. S., in The American Journal of Theol., 2 [1898], pp. 838-48) probably contains an authentic core.
Bibliography3 works
Ignazio Ortiz de Urbina