Church History 4.30.1 · Sophia Scriptura

Summary: In Mesopotamia Bardesanes wrote Syriac dialogues against Marcion and others, later translated into Greek.

Greek text · Dindorf 4:181

Ἐπὶ δὲ τῆς αὐτῆς βασιλείας πληθουσῶν τῶν αἱρέσεων ἐπὶ τῆς μέσης τῶν ποταμῶν Βαρδησάνης, ἱκανώτατός τις ἀνὴρ, ἔν τε τῇ Σύρων φωνῇ διαλεκτικώτατος, πρὸς τοὺς κατὰ Μαρκίωνα καί τινας ἑτέρους διαφόρων προϊσταμένους δογμάτων διαλόγους συστησάμενος, τῇ οἰκείᾳ παρέδωκε γλώττῃ τε καὶ γραφῇ, μετὰ καὶ πλείστων ἑτέρων αὐτοῦ συγγραμμάτων· οὓς οἱ γνώριμοι (πλεῖστοι δὲ ἠσαν αὐτῷ δυνατῶς τῷ λόγῳ παρισταμένῳ) ἐπὶ τὴν Ἑλλήνων ἀπὸ τῆς Σύρων μεταβεβλήκασι φωνῆς

English · Claude translation

In the same reign, when heresies were multiplying in the region between the rivers, Bardesanes, a most able man and most skilled in dialectic in the Syriac language, composed dialogues against the followers of Marcion and some others who led various doctrines, and committed them to writing in his own language, together with very many other writings of his; and his acquaintances (and he had very many, since he stood forth powerfully in argument) translated them from the Syriac into Greek.

About this passage

Source

Dindorf 4:181 · Wilhelm Dindorf, ed., Eusebii Caesariensis Opera, vol. 4: Historiae ecclesiasticae libri I–X (Leipzig: Teubner, 1871) · Greek text: W. Dindorf, Eusebii Caesariensis Opera 4 (Leipzig: Teubner, 1871), digitized by the First Thousand Years of Greek project (Open Greek and Latin), CC BY-SA 4.0

Text

As printed in Dindorf, Eusebii Opera 4. Manuscript variants and the editor's apparatus are not reproduced; no textual problem is noted in this passage.

Translation

Claude translation (claude-opus-5-5), 2026-09-27 · Translated by Claude from the Greek text of Dindorf, Eusebii Caesariensis Opera 4 (Teubner, 1871); made independently of existing English translations.

Compare

Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, series 2, vol. 1 (1890) (an older public-domain English translation, whole volume at CCEL; checked against ours only after ours was made)

Topics

Heresy

Cite this passage

Eusebius, Hist. eccl. 4.30.1 (trans. Sophia Scriptura, https://sophiascriptura.com/fathers/eusebius-historia/4/30/1/).

Plain text

Eusebius, Hist. eccl. 4.30.1 (trans. Sophia Scriptura, https://sophiascriptura.com/fathers/eusebius-historia/4/30/1/).