other · 371 · Antioch
Sozomen tells it without malice: Theodore was filled with admiration for the ascetic mode of life and condemned city life, and then changed his mind, cited examples from ancient history to justify the change, and went back. What is unusual is that the argument survives on both sides. John wrote to him — Sozomen calls the letter more divine in language and thought than the mind of man could produce, which is a strong thing for a historian to say about a text he is summarising — and Theodore gave up his possessions and abandoned the marriage. The two of them stayed friends for life. It is a small domestic episode and it is one of the very few places in this dataset where a decision is recorded, reversed, and reversed again with the document that did it still in existence.
To go back to a career, a business and a marriage after deciding the ascetic life was a mistake.
He changed his mind again, and the letter that changed it is still extant.