In the seventeenth century the survival of the fledgling Chaldean Catholic Church, which had broken away from the ancient Church of the East, was still in doubt, but in Amid (Diarbekir) it produced one of its great theologians, Joseph Ma'aruf (1693-1713). He was appointed Metropolitan of Amid in 1693, and in 1701 received from Pope Clement XI the title of Patriarch of Babylon. His most widely read Syriac works are ‘The Magnet’, and ‘The Shining Mirror’, but in 1693 he produced (via an Arabic translation of the Latin) this Syriac compendium of eleven key ecumenical councils acknowledged by the Catholic Church, as an aid for his clergy and educated laypeople. It is still read today, by Syriac-speaking Christians of all confessions who wish to have a concise introduction to the theological decrees and canons of these great church councils which defined Catholic faith.