The Concise Oxford Dictionary of World Religions (1533 page)

 
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Meshed
:

see
MASHHAD
.

 
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see
SHALI’A
.

 
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(361–439).
Armenian Christian
father
. He succeeded Sahak as patriarch in 440 but died in less than six months. He invented the Armenian alphabet
c.
406. Thereafter, gathering around him a band of scholars, he directed a programme of theological translations into Armenian, starting with the Bible (
c.
410–44). This activity succeeded in starting a national literature, and helped free the Armenian Church from dependence on Greek and Syriac institutions.

 
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Messalians
.

A Christian sect of the 4th–7th cents. Their name derives from Syriac
m
allyane
, ‘praying people’; they were also known by the cognate Gk. name
Euchites
. They lived ascetically and by begging, in order to give themselves entirely to prayer. The Messalians were attacked by
Orthodox
writers including
Epiphanius
, and were condemned finally at the Council of
Ephesus
in 431.

 
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