John IX bar Shushan

John IX bar Shushan was the Patriarch of Antioch, and head of the Syriac Orthodox Church from 1063 until his death in 1072.

Biography

John was born in the eleventh century in Melitene as Yeshu, where he studied philology, religious and philosophical sciences and later became a monk at a neighbouring monastery. Here he studied under Patriarch John VIII and became well known for his piety and eloquence.

In 1058, John was consecrated Patriarch of Antioch after the installation of Athanasius V Haya at Amid and assumed the name John. However, John abdicated and was reinstalled after Athanasius' death in 1063. During his tenure, John ordained ordained seventeen metropolitans and bishops.

The Patriarchs of Antioch and the Pope of Alexandria had for many years kept in close touch with one another. More than once their relations were strained, as happened particularly in the time of Patriarchs John IX bar Shushan, and Christodulus, when they fell out over the proper presentation of the Eucharistic oblations, in which the Lyrian Syrians were in the habit of mingling a little oil and salt (Neale, Patriarchate of Alexandria, II, 214). Christodulus insultingly rejected the practice, and John of Antioch wrote in its defence. In 1169 a new controversy, about the use of auricular confession severed the once friendly relations between the two communions.

References

• The Scattered Pearls: A History of Syriac Literature and Sciences - Ignatius Aphrem I Barsoum. 

 This article incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain: Herbermann, Charles, ed. (1913). Catholic Encyclopedia. Robert Appleton Company.