Letters on the Arian Controversy 1.1–1.10

To his most honored brother and fellow-minister of one soul, Alexander, Alexander sends greeting in the Lord. The ambitious and avaricious purpose of wicked men is by nature always to plot against the dioceses that seem greater, such people attacking the church's piety under various pretexts. For, goaded by the devil who works in them toward the pleasure set before them, they leap away from all reverence and trample on the fear of God's judgment. Concerning them it was necessary for me, the one who suffers, to inform your reverence, so that you may be on your guard against such people, lest any of them dare to set foot in your dioceses too, either in person (for these impostors are able to play a part for the purpose of deceit) or by letters falsely embellished and able to snatch away one who holds to a simple and guileless faith. Arius and Achillas, then, having lately formed a conspiracy, have emulated the ambition of Colluthus, far worse than he. For he, accusing these very men, found a pretext for his own wicked purpose. But they, seeing his traffic in Christ, no longer endured to remain subject to the church; but, building for themselves dens of robbers, they hold assemblies in them without ceasing, night and day practicing slanders against Christ and against us. Accusing all the pious apostolic doctrine, they have, after the Jewish manner, set up a workshop fighting against Christ, denying the divinity of our Savior and proclaiming him equal to all. And picking out every expression of his saving dispensation and of his humiliation for our sake, they try from these to gather together the proclamation of their own impiety, turning away from the words that speak of his divinity from the beginning and of his unspeakable glory with the Father. Strengthening, then, the impious opinion of Greeks and Jews about Christ, they hunt as much as possible for praise from them, pursuing everything that is laughed at among them against us, and stirring up seditions and persecutions against us every day. On the one hand they convene law courts through the petitions of disorderly women whom they have deceived; on the other they bring Christianity into disrepute by having the younger women among them run about every street indecently. Moreover, they have dared to rend the seamless tunic of Christ, which the executioners did not decide to divide. We, therefore, having become aware of these things belatedly because they were hidden, things befitting both their life and their unholy undertaking, by a unanimous vote expelled them from the church that worships the divinity of Christ.

They have attempted, using circuits against us, to make their way to fellow-ministers of like mind, putting on the pretense of a request for peace and union, but in truth eager by smooth talk to sweep some of them into their own disease; and asking them for rather wordy letters, so that by reading these out to those they have deceived they may make them impenitent for the errors into which they fell, hardened in impiety, as though they had bishops voting with them and of like mind. They do not confess to them what they wickedly taught and did among us, for which they were also expelled; but they either pass it over in silence or deceive, overshadowing it with fabricated words and writings. Concealing, then, their destructive teaching in persuasive and buffoonish talk, they sweep away anyone exposed to deceit, not refraining even from slandering our piety before everyone. Whence it also happens that some, by signing their letters, receive them into the church; and the greatest reproach, I think, lies upon the fellow-ministers who dare this, because the apostolic canon does not permit it, and besides they inflame the devilish activity against Christ in them. For this reason, beloved, I have roused myself without delay to make known to you the unbelief of such men, who say: “There was once when the Son of God was not; and he who did not exist before came into being later, having become, when he did at some time come into being, such as every human being is by nature.” For, they say, “God made all things out of things that are not,” including the Son of God in the creation of all rational and irrational beings. Consistently with this they also say that he is of a changeable nature, capable of virtue and of vice; and by their supposition of “out of things that are not” they also do away with the divine Scriptures that speak of his being always, which signify the unchangeableness of the Word and the divinity of the Wisdom, of the Word, which is Christ. “We too, then,” say these accursed men, “can become sons of God, just as he did. For it is written: ‘I have begotten sons and raised them up.’” But when they are confronted with what follows in the text, “But they have rejected me,” which is not natural to the Savior, since he is of an unchangeable nature, stripping themselves of all reverence they say that God, knowing by foreknowledge and foresight concerning him that he would not reject him, chose him out of all. For he did not choose him as having anything by nature or by distinction above the other sons (for, they say, “neither is anyone son of God by nature, nor does he have any special relation to him”), but as being himself also of a changeable nature, yet not turning to the worse through care for his conduct and through discipline.

As if, should Paul and Peter also strive for this, their sonship would differ in nothing from his. In support of this deranged teaching they also abuse the Scriptures, citing the saying in the Psalms about Christ, which runs: “You have loved righteousness and hated iniquity; therefore God, your God, has anointed you with the oil of gladness above your fellows.” Now, that the Son of God was neither made from things that are not, nor was there ever when he was not, John the evangelist is sufficient to teach, writing thus about him: “The only-begotten Son, who is in the bosom of the Father.” For the divine teacher, taking care to show two realities inseparable from one another, the Father and the Son, named him as being in the bosom of the Father. And indeed that the Word of God is not numbered with the things made from nothing, the same John says, that all things came into being through him. For he showed his distinctive hypostasis when he said: “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. All things came into being through him, and without him not one thing came into being.” For if all things came into being through him, how was the one who granted being to the things that came into being himself at some time not? For the Word, the maker, is in no way defined as being of the same nature as the things that came into being, since he himself was in the beginning, while all things came into being through him, and he made them from things that are not. For what is seems to be opposed to and far removed from the things that came into being from things that are not. The one shows that there is no interval between the Father and the Son, since the soul cannot even imagine this in any thought; but the fashioning of the world from things that are not has a coming-into-being that is later and more recent than his hypostasis, all things having received such a mode of being from the Father through the Son. The most reverent John, then, seeing that the “was” of the Word of God is far off and transcends the understanding of begotten beings, did not deign to speak of his generation and making, not daring to name the maker with the same syllables as the things that come into being: not that he was unbegotten (for one is unbegotten, the Father), but because beyond the thought of the evangelists, and perhaps even of the angels' …

… comprehension is the indescribable hypostasis of the only-begotten God. I do not think those who dare to inquire into these things should be reckoned among the pious, because of their disobedience to the saying: “Do not seek what is too hard for you, and do not examine what is too high for you.” For if the knowledge of many other things, incomparably slighter than these, is hidden from human understanding (as in Paul: “What eye has not seen, nor ear heard, nor has it entered the heart of man, what God has prepared for those who love him”; and God also says to Abraham that he cannot count the stars; and again, “Who will number the sand of the seas and the drops of rain?”), how could anyone inquire curiously into the hypostasis of the Word of God, unless he happened to be seized by a melancholy disposition? Concerning it the prophetic Spirit says: “Who will declare his generation?” And our Savior himself, doing good to the pillars of all things in the world, I mean the God-speaking apostles, was eager to relieve them of the burden of knowledge about these things, saying that the understanding of it is not natural to any of them, and that the knowledge of this most divine mystery is reserved to the Father alone: “For no one knows who the Son is,” he says, “except the Father, and no one knows the Father except the Son.” Concerning this I think the Father too says: “My mystery is for me.” That it is madness to think that the Son came into being from things that are not, having a beginning in time, is shown at once by the phrase “from things that are not,” even if the fools do not recognize the madness of their own expression. For the “was not” must be placed either in times or in some interval of an age. If, then, it is true that all things came into being through him, it is clear that every age and time and interval and the “when,” in which the “was not” is found, came into being through him. And how is it not incredible to say that he who made times and ages and seasons, in which the “was not” is mixed up, himself at some time did not exist? For it is senseless and full of all ignorance to say that the cause of something is himself later than its coming into being. For according to them that interval, in which they say the Son had not been begotten by the Father, precedes the Wisdom of God that fashions the universe; and according to them the Scripture that proclaims him “firstborn of all creation” also lies. In agreement with this the most loud-voiced Paul also cries out, saying of him:

“Whom he appointed heir of all things, through whom he also made the ages.” And again: “In him all things were created, in the heavens and on the earth, visible and invisible, whether principalities or authorities or dominions or thrones; all things were created through him and for him, and he is before all things.” Since, then, the supposition “from things that are not” has been shown to be most impious, the Father must always be Father. And he is Father because the Son is always present, on account of whom he is called Father. And since the Son is always present with him, the Father is always perfect, lacking nothing in goodness, having begotten the only-begotten Son not in time, nor after an interval, nor from things that are not. What then? Is it not unholy to say that the Wisdom of God once did not exist, which says: “I was beside him, fitting things together; I was the one in whom he delighted”? Or that the Power of God did not once exist, or that his Word was once mutilated, or the other things from which the Son is known and the Father is characterized? For to say that the radiance of the glory does not exist does away with the original light too, of which it is the radiance. And if the image of God did not always exist, it is clear that neither does the one whose image it is always exist; and by the nonexistence of the imprint of God's hypostasis, he too who is fully expressed by it is done away with. From this one can see that the sonship of our Savior has not even one point in common with the sonship of the others. For just as his ineffable hypostasis has been shown to transcend, by an incomparable superiority, all things to which he himself granted being, so also his sonship, being by nature of the Father's divinity, differs by an unspeakable superiority from those who through him have been adopted as sons by appointment. For he is of an unchangeable nature, being perfect and in need of nothing in any respect; but they, being subject to turning in either direction, need help from him. For what progress could the Wisdom of God make, or what could Truth itself, or God the Word, receive in addition? How could Life or the true Light be improved? And if so, how much more contrary to nature is it that Wisdom should ever become capable of folly, or that the Power of God should be joined to weakness, or that the Word should be darkened by irrationality, or that darkness should be mingled with the true Light?

For the Apostle says plainly: “What fellowship has light with darkness? Or what agreement has Christ with Beliar?” And Solomon says that it would be impossible even in thought to find the ways of a serpent upon a rock, which, according to Paul, is Christ. But those who are his creatures, both men and angels, have received blessings so as to progress, exercising themselves in virtues, and lawful commandments so as not to sin. For this reason our Lord Jesus Christ, being Son of the Father by nature, is worshiped by all. But those who have put off the spirit of bondage, having received the spirit of adoption by brave deeds and progress, receiving benefits through the one who is Son by nature, become sons by appointment. His genuine, distinctive, natural, and preeminent sonship Paul declared thus, saying of God: “Who did not spare his own Son, but gave him up for us,” clearly meaning those who are not sons by nature. For in distinction from those who are not his own, he said that he is his own Son. And in the Gospel: “This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased.” And in the Psalms the Savior says: “The Lord said to me, You are my Son.” Showing his genuineness, it signifies that there are no other genuine sons of his besides him. And what of this: “From the womb before the morning star I begot you”? Does it not directly indicate a natural sonship from the Father's bringing to birth, which he obtained not by care for conduct and exercise in progress but by the property of nature? Hence the only-begotten Son of the Father has a sonship that cannot be lost; but the adoption of rational beings, not belonging to them by nature but by fitness of conduct and the gift of God, Scripture knows to be capable of being lost: “The sons of God, seeing the daughters of men, took wives for themselves,” and so on; and “I have begotten sons and raised them up, but they have rejected me,” we have been taught that God said through Isaiah. Having much to say, beloved, I pass it over, thinking it burdensome to remind at greater length teachers who are of like mind. For you yourselves are taught by God, not ignorant that the teaching which has lately risen up against the church's piety is that of Ebion and Artemas, and an emulation of Paul of Samosata at Antioch, who was cast out of the church by the synod and judgment of the bishops everywhere; whose successor Lucian remained out of communion under three bishops for many years.

Having drunk down the dregs of their impiety, there have now sprung up among us these men “from things that are not,” the hidden offshoots of those men: Arius and Achillas and the assembly of those who join them in wickedness. And, I do not know how, three bishops ordained in Syria, by agreeing with them, inflame them to the worse. Let the judgment concerning them be referred to your examination. These men keep in memory the expressions about the Savior's passion, humiliation and emptying, and his so-called poverty, and the things which the Savior took upon himself for our sake as acquired, and cite them to set aside his supreme divinity from the beginning; but they have become forgetful of the words that signify his natural glory and nobility and his abiding with the Father, such as this: “I and the Father are one.” This the Lord says not proclaiming himself the Father, nor making clear that the two natures in hypostasis are one, but because the Son of the Father is such as to preserve exactly the likeness of the Father, having received by nature the impress of his likeness in all things, and being the unvarying image of the Father and the expressed imprint of the original. Hence also to Philip, who at that time longed to see, the Lord shows him without grudging; to him, when he says, “Show us the Father,” he says: “He who has seen me has seen the Father,” the Father being beheld as in a spotless and living mirror, his divine image. Similar to this is what the most holy men say in the Psalms: “In your light we shall see light.” Therefore also “he who honors the Son honors the Father,” and rightly. For every impious word that is dared to be spoken against the Son has its reference to the Father. And what further is surprising in what I am going to write, beloved, if I set out the false slanders against me and against our most pious people? For those who have arrayed themselves against the divinity of the Son of God do not refrain from uttering ungrateful drunken insults against us too; for they do not deign to compare any of the ancients with themselves, nor do they endure to be put on a level with the teachers with whom we associated from childhood; nor do they consider any of our fellow-ministers everywhere now to have any measure of wisdom, saying that they alone are wise, and free of possessions, and discoverers of doctrines, and that to them alone have been revealed things which it is not in the nature of anyone else under the sun to come to think of. O unholy arrogance, and measureless madness, and vainglory fitted to melancholics, and … mind that has grown hard in their unholy souls! The God-loving clarity of the ancient Scriptures has not shamed them, nor has the harmonious reverence of our fellow-ministers concerning Christ dimmed their audacity against him.

Not even the demons will endure their unholy deeds, for they guard against uttering a blasphemous word against the Son of God. Let these things, then, be raised by us according to our present ability against those who, with untrained matter, have covered themselves with dust for the contest against Christ and have set out to slander our piety toward him. For these inventors of silly myths say that we, turning away from their impious and unscriptural blasphemy against Christ, “from things that are not,” teach two unbegottens; the uneducated men say that one of two things must be: either to think that he is from things that are not, or else to speak of two unbegottens. The untrained men do not know how great the distance would be between the unbegotten Father and the things created by him from things that are not, rational and irrational; between which the only-begotten nature, through which the Father of God the Word made the universe from things that are not, mediates, and has been begotten from the very Father who is; as the Lord himself somewhere testified, saying: “He who loves the Father loves also the Son who was begotten of him.” Concerning these things we believe as seems good to the apostolic church. In one unbegotten Father, who has no one as the cause of his being, unchangeable and unalterable, always the same and in the same way, admitting neither progress nor diminution; giver of the law and the prophets and the Gospels; Lord of the patriarchs and apostles and all the saints. And in one Lord Jesus Christ, the only-begotten Son of God, begotten not from what is not but from the Father who is; not in the manner of the likenesses of bodies, by cuttings or by emanations from divisions, as Sabellius and Valentinus think, but ineffably and indescribably, according to the one who said, as we quoted above: “Who will declare his generation?” since his hypostasis is beyond the inquiry of every begotten nature, just as the Father himself is beyond inquiry, because the nature of rational beings cannot contain the knowledge of the Father's divine begetting. Men moved by the Spirit of truth need not learn these things from me, since the voice of Christ that went before on this matter sounds in our ears and teaches: “And no one knows who the Father is except the Son, and no one knows who the Son is except the Father.” We have learned that he is unchangeable and unalterable like the Father, without need, and the perfect Son, like the Father, falling short of him only in being unbegotten.

For he is the exact and unvarying image of the Father. For it is clear that the image is full of all things by which the greater likeness exists, as the Lord himself taught, saying: “My Father is greater than I.” And accordingly we believe that the Son is always from the Father. For he is the radiance of the glory and the imprint of the Father's hypostasis. But let no one take the “always” as a suggestion of unbegottenness, as those think whose soul's senses have been maimed. For neither the “was,” nor the “always,” nor the “before the ages” is the same as the unbegotten; nor does any name that human thought may strive to coin signify the unbegotten. So I believe you also understand it, and I am confident in the right purpose of all of you concerning everything, that in no way do these names signify the unbegotten. For these names seem to be, as it were, an extension of times, unable to signify worthily the divinity and, as it were, the antiquity of the Only-begotten; while the holy men, each according to his ability, forced themselves to make the mystery plain, and asked pardon of their hearers with a reasonable defense, saying: “To what we have attained.” But if these men expect something greater than human utterance through lips, saying that the things known in part to them are being done away, it is clear that the “was,” and the “always,” and the “before the ages” fall far short of what is hoped for; and whatever they may be, they are not the same as the unbegotten. Therefore to the unbegotten Father his proper dignity must be preserved, as we say that no one is the cause of his being; and to the Son the fitting honor must be assigned, as we attribute to him a generation from the Father without beginning; and, as we have already said, we give him reverence, only piously and reverently saying of him the “was,” and the “always,” and the “before the ages”; not refusing his divinity, but attributing to him an exact likeness in all things to the image and imprint of the Father; and holding that unbegottenness alone is the property belonging to the Father, since the Savior himself says: “My Father is greater than I.” And besides this pious opinion concerning the Father and the Son, as the divine Scriptures teach us, we confess one Holy Spirit, who renewed both the holy men of the Old Testament and the divine teachers of what is called the New.

One and only catholic, apostolic church, always indestructible, even if the whole world should plan to make war on her, and victorious over every most impious uprising of the heterodox, her Master having made us courageous by crying out: “Take courage, I have overcome the world.” After this we know the resurrection from the dead, of which our Lord Jesus Christ became the firstfruits, who bore a body truly and not in appearance, from Mary the God-bearer; who at the consummation of the ages came to dwell among the human race for the putting away of sin, was crucified and died, yet was not on this account made inferior in his own divinity; rose from the dead, was taken up into the heavens, and sits at the right hand of the Majesty. These things I have inscribed in part in this letter, thinking it burdensome, as I said, to write each point with exactness, because these things have not escaped your sacred diligence. These things we teach, these we preach; these are the apostolic doctrines of the church, for which we also die, caring little for those who try to force us to forswear them, even if they compel us by tortures, not turning away from the hope that lies in them. Having become opponents of these things, Arius and Achillas and those with them who are enemies of the truth have been driven out of the church, having become strangers to our pious teaching, according to the blessed Paul who says: “If anyone preaches to you a gospel contrary to what you received, let him be anathema,” even if he pretends to be an angel from heaven. And again: “If anyone teaches otherwise and does not agree with the sound words of our Lord Jesus Christ and with the teaching that accords with godliness, he is puffed up, understanding nothing,” and so on. Let none of you receive these men, anathematized by the brotherhood, nor tolerate what is said or written by them. For these impostors lie in everything; they will never speak the truth. For they go around the cities, eager for nothing else than, under the pretext of friendship and in the name of peace, to give and receive letters through hypocrisy and flattery, in order through these to lead astray the few “silly women laden with sins” whom they have deceived, and so on. These men, then, who have dared so much against Christ, who have publicly ridiculed Christianity and been ambitious to make a display of it in law courts, who as far as lay in them have stirred up persecution against us in time of peace, who have enervated the ineffable mystery of Christ's generation: turning away from them, beloved brothers of one soul, give your votes with us against their mad audacity, like our fellow-ministers who were indignant and wrote to me against them and signed the tome, which I have also sent to you by my son Apion the deacon: some from all Egypt and the Thebaid, others from Libya and Pentapolis, and Syria, and further Lycia and Pamphylia, Asia, Cappadocia, and the other neighboring regions; like whom I trust that I shall receive from you also. For while many remedies have been provided me for those who have been harmed, this too has been found a cure for the people deceived by them, that, persuaded also by the agreement of our fellow-ministers, they are eager through this to come to repentance. Greet one another, with the brotherhood among you. I pray that you may be well in the Lord, beloved; may I have joy of your Christ-loving soul. The heretics who have been anathematized are, of the presbyters, Arius; of the deacons, Achillas, Euzoius, Aithales, Lucius, Sarmates, Julius, Menas, another Arius, and Helladius.