Historical Fragments 2.2.6.1–2.6.1.6

Since it is established that we earlier, by our letters, insinuated many grave things against the name of Bishop Athanasius, and, when summoned by the letter of Your Holiness, did not give an account of the matter we had reported, we profess before Your Holiness, in the presence of all the presbyters our brothers, that everything that had earlier come to our ears against the name of the aforesaid man was false to us, insinuated, and wholly without force; and therefore we most gladly embrace communion with the aforesaid Athanasius, especially since Your Holiness, in your innate kindness, has deigned to pardon our error. We profess also that if at any time the Easterners, or Athanasius himself, should wish

with ill intent to summon us to a case, we will not appear without your knowledge. And the heretic Arius, and also his followers, who say, "There was a time when the Son was not," and who say that the Son is from nothing, and who deny that the Son of God existed before the ages, we profess by this our hand with which we have written that we have anathematized, as in our earlier statement which we presented at Milan, now and always. And again we say that we have condemned for ever the Arian heresy, as we said above, and its authors. And in the hand of Ursacius: I, Ursacius, bishop, have subscribed to this our profession.

Narrative text. This letter was sent two years after the heresy of Photinus was condemned by the Romans.

Likewise a copy of another letter of Valens and Ursacius, which they sent some time later from Aquileia to Bishop Athanasius, after they had sent the one above from Rome. To the lord brother Athanasius, Ursacius and Valens. The occasion has offered itself of our brother and fellow presbyter Moyses coming to Your Love, dearest brother, through whom we send you the most abundant greeting from the city of Aquileia, and we pray that you may read our letter in good health. For you will give us confidence if you too repay us in writing back. Know indeed that we have peace and ecclesiastical communion with you, by this letter know it. May the divine goodness keep you, brother.

By the letter above, then, pardon is granted to those who begged it, and a return to the catholic faith with communion is given, especially since the very letter of those begging pardon contained the truth of the synod of Serdica. But meanwhile a meeting is held at Sirmium. Photinus, found out as a heretic, long since pronounced guilty and long since cut off from the communion of unity, could not even then be removed because of the faction of the people. … But the same Athanasius separated from his communion Marcellus, who, after the reading of the book he had written and published (for we too have it), had been restored to the episcopate by the sentence of the synod of Serdica, when he perceived that he was mixing in some new things and seeking, by ambiguous preachings, a way for the doctrine into which Photinus burst forth; he did so before Photinus was accused, showing that it was the plan of a corrupt will, anticipated by his judgment, and not condemning him from the publication of the book. But because good easily becomes evil, this gave authority not to what had earlier been done against Marcellus, but to what was to be done against Photinus.

It ought to be known to all that no synod was ever afterwards assembled against Marcellus except the one dissolved by the judgments of Serdica, nor, when a decree about Photinus was made by the Westerners and reported to the Easterners, was any judgment expressed against him; but that men crafty in mind, subtle in wit, stubborn in malice, sought an occasion to reopen the judgment dissolved by Athanasius's acquittal, and in writing back about Photinus added mention of Marcellus as the teacher of such doctrines, so that the novelty of the case might rouse again into public memory the question about Athanasius, already dead with time and buried with him by the judgment of truth, and, creeping in through the condemnation of Photinus, might bring in the name of Marcellus. It stands in the body of the letter above that Marcellus was condemned by the Arians together with Athanasius on account of the book he had published on the subjection of the Lord Christ. It is also shown that by the reading of the same book he was found innocent. The evidence of the book, still extant, proves the falsehood of the Arian judgment. But about Photinus only, as custom required, letters are written to the Easterners, not to extort assent by injury, as is now done, but by the custom of informing the knowledge of all.

But why is Athanasius written back as guilty of refusing communion to Marcellus? Was Marcellus kept away because of a fault in his book? They themselves are witnesses that Photinus took the beginnings of his perversity from his teaching. For when communion was refused him by Athanasius, Marcellus abstained from entering the church. So communion entered into with him teaches the faith about the subjection (and) handing over of the kingdom; refused again, it shows the depravity of another doctrine. And thus both judgments of this man are free of fault, since in granting communion he followed the assent of the synod, and in refusing it Marcellus himself withdrew, without any authority of a synod. But this whole question belongs to another case and grief. And though their hatreds, long conceived against Athanasius, may be satisfied, so great a scheme proceeds to a greater degree of crime.

For the third point allows me to show that the faith which they set at the beginning of their letter is fraudulent, heretical, and suffused with inner poison under flattering words. For they profess thus: that there is one unbegotten God the Father and one only Son of his, God from God, light from light, firstborn of all creation; and adding as third the Holy Spirit the Paraclete; so that, when the security of the readers or the simplicity of the unlearned had been caught by such soft beginnings, they might pass, by one and the same assent of a subscription drawn out of them, to the punishment of Photinus, to the guilt of Athanasius, and to the condemnation of the catholic faith. And I hope that the synod of Serdica has brought no small part of the knowledge of this matter, where it is shown that all the crimes against Athanasius were invented by the persecution of the Arians, and that force was used on the people of God to make them pass into connivance with a pestilent and deadly doctrine. Yet, since the case demands it, I will tell the whole matter briefly.

It was always the care and business of apostolic men, by a constant and public preaching of the perfect faith, to suppress all the attempts of barking heresy and, by setting forth the truth of the Gospels, to extinguish the perversity of erring doctrine, (lest) it should infect the minds of hearers, staining them with some blemish, by the contagion of a clinging vice. So they diligently and often and fully set forth in various letters what opinion there should be of God the Father, what knowledge of the Son of God, what sanctification in the Holy Spirit, so that God the Son might be known from God the Father, and God the Father in God the Son, and God the Son in God the Father. And so, according to the definition of him who says, "I and the Father are one," and again, "As you, Father, are in me and I in you," our faith is contained in one God in the names and persons of the Father and the Son. For neither the envy of the Jews, nor the hatred of the pagans, nor the fury of the heretics has been roused against us for any other cause than that we confess the eternity, power, and name of the Son in the Father. But the perversity of heretics has always arisen from impious faith. For while, occupied with vices and turned away from the works of innocence, they entangle themselves in the difficulties of useless questions, having become disreputable in life, will, and judgment, they seek to please by novelty of doctrine, after they have lost the knowledge of truth.

When, then, our fathers had learned that the Arii had arisen as preachers of a most profane faith, and that not merely the opinion but the judgment of this stain had stretched further, they flew together from all parts of the world and ran to Nicaea, so that, the faith being set out to the peoples and the way of divine knowledge being directed in the light of understanding, the seeds of the emerging evil might be killed within their own authors. The Arii taught such things: that God the Father begot the Son for the purpose of founding the world, and by his power made, from nothing, into a new and other substance, a new and other God; profane toward the Father, thinking that something like him could be begotten from nothing; blasphemous toward Christ, stripping him of the infinity and nobility of the Father; so that, having learned from the person of the Father, "There is no other God besides me," and from the Son, "I am in the Father and the Father in me," and, "I and the Father are one," they broke the bond of holy unity in both, giving to the Son of God our Lord Jesus Christ the substance of a creation that did not exist, a beginning in time, an origin from nothing, a name from another.

So, to suppress this evil, three hundred or more bishops gather at Nicaea. Condemnation as heretics is decreed against all the Arians with the assent of all, and, the gospel and apostolic teachings being unrolled, the perfect light of catholic unity is brought forth. What was expressed, the faith itself, as it was set out, commends.

We believe in one God, the Father almighty, maker of things visible and invisible.

And in one Lord Jesus Christ, the Son of God, born of the Father, that is, of the substance of the Father, God from God, light from light, true God from true God, born, not made, of one substance with the Father, which the Greeks call homoousion, through whom all things were made, whether in heaven or on earth; who for us men and for our salvation came down, was made flesh,

was born, was made man, suffered, and rose on the third day, ascended into heaven, and will come to judge the living and the dead. And in the Holy Spirit. But those who say, "There was when he was not," and "Before he was born he was not," and that he was made from nothing existing, which the Greeks call ex ouk onton, or say that the Son of God is of another substance, changeable and convertible, these the catholic and apostolic church anathematizes.

A creed compared with a creed exposes the falsehood of the intention. For that which was ordained at Nicaea is full and perfect, and, all the entrances by which heretics usually creep in being barred on every side, it is bound together by the inviolable solidity of eternal unity between the Father and the Son. But this one flatters by its simplicity, first asserting that we believe thus, which God forbid of anyone. The faith of the Westerners, built on the gospel teachings, confesses the Father in the Son and the Son in the Father, the Father unbegotten, the Son eternal by the substance of eternity; that is, that as the Father is always, so the Son too is always in the Father, and is God born of God, not conceived, that is, always in him from whom he is.

But this unbelief, not faith, saying "God from God", commending "firstborn", and setting up the name of Trinity, obscures its poison under the modesty of religious moderation: saying "God from God, light from light", so that, by occasion of this confession, he might have come to exist as God and light made by God from God and light, not begotten from God, that is, not from the substance of the Father's eternity; and so the Son too would be cheapened, to the insult of the Father, if God arose from nothing. And in confessing "firstborn" they assign a certain order from his origin to the things of the world to be created, so that, because the world is from time, Christ too, though prior to the world, would be from time, and there would be in him not eternity (before) times but an order in time with created things; and by this something would be left that is before him who began to exist from time; (and) all that is God would be dissolved in Christ, since in him the origin of a Mary who once did not exist would be from time.

Moreover, men empty of all good hope stretch apostolic authority to the occasion of so great a danger, because it was said of him, "firstborn of all creation"; but, withdrawing the preceding and following sentence, they build under the Apostle's name an opportunity suited to their doctrines. For the order of the words is this: "who is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of all creation, because in him were established all things in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or principalities or powers; all things were founded through him and in him, and he is before all." So the image of the invisible God, I suppose, is from nothing and began in time! Or, because he is the firstborn of all creation, a certain order of creation joined (and) co-born in him is expressed! But does not "because in him were established all things in heaven and on earth" follow "firstborn of all creation", that is, in him the matter of all the elements, visible and invisible, was founded and established, and therefore all things are through him and in him? Therefore he is the firstborn of all creation, because in him already from the beginning all the beginnings of the generations of all that he was to make existed. And so he is not first in number in the order of creatures that were established in order, but he himself, the image of the invisible God, abiding always in himself by the power of making, holds himself as firstborn of the things that were to be created through him, visible and invisible, in heaven and on earth.

Moreover, the weaving of their falsehood in naming the Trinity is not unlike. For when, with impious and slanderous mouth, they have split the Son from the Father by different substances, and authority stands in the two separated, a third is counted in the Spirit; so that, whereas the Father is in the Son and the Son in the Father and the Holy Spirit receives from both, in that the inviolable unity of this holy (Trinity) is expressed in the Spirit, the Trinity, pronounced in a heretical way, gives birth to division.

But the careful and perfect language of the Nicene decree shut in all the devices of the heretics with the tightest prescription of truth, setting it down thus: "We believe in one God the Father and in one Jesus Christ his Son." Both are one and each is one: one in the personal name of the Father and in that of the Son, because the one is from both. "True God from true God" teaches both the power and the name common in each with equal truth, and that nothing other is to be thought in the other, since, as God from God and true from true, each is one. But since there is (one) in both, "born, not made" refers to the property of birth and origin; because being made from nothing is subject to creatures, but being born from the Father is proper, and those born have no other form or power than that of their origin. What is made comes into existence from a work, so as to be made. And so it was not a making that began in him from nothing, but a birth (from) the parent. And "of one substance with the Father", which the Greeks call homoousion, is thus: eternity alone is like itself, and what is always is in God. So, lest any stain of heretical depravity should fall upon the Lord Jesus Christ, the truth of essence is set forth in him. For essence is named from that which always is. And because it never needs help from outside to hold itself together, it is also called substance, because it subsists within itself as that which always is, and in the power of its eternity. And so, as he says, "I and the Father are one," and, "He who has seen me has seen the Father also," and again, "I am in the Father and the Father in me," and that, "I came forth from the Father": equal in both, that is, in God who is unbegettable and in God (who is begotten), one and the same substance of eternity is fulfilled in both. And in that he came down, was made flesh, was made man, rose on the third day, ascended into heaven, and will come to judge the living and the dead, the mysteries of our salvation are contained. But the Son of God is unchangeable and unconvertible for this reason, that in assuming man he brought glory to corruption rather than a stain to eternity. And the anathema against those who say he was made from nothing, which the Greeks call ex ouk onton, and who say, "There was when he was not," and, "Before he was born he was not," designates under a curse the condemnation of a violation of eternity in Christ, that is, of the Father's deity.

Of this faith, then, to be made known to all, Athanasius, a deacon at the synod of Nicaea and afterwards bishop of Alexandria, had been a vehement champion, and, holding firmly to the truth, had conquered the Arian plague in all Egypt; and for this reason, with testimonies conspiring against him, a falsehood of crimes was contrived. The matter was afterwards decided by the faithful judgments of the judges. But it will greatly help understanding to learn what the address of the synod of Serdica to the emperor Constantius was, after the acquittal of Athanasius. The end.

To our dearest brothers and fellow bishops, all established throughout the East, Liberius, bishop of the city of Rome, eternal greeting. Striving for the peace and concord of the churches, after I received the letter of Your Love written about Athanasius and the others to Julius, bishop of good memory, I followed the tradition of our elders and sent presbyters of the city of Rome, Lucius, Paul, and Helianus, from my side to Alexandria to the aforesaid Athanasius, that he should come to the city of Rome, so that what was established by church discipline might be decided about him in his presence.

I also gave him a letter through the aforesaid presbyters, which said that, if he did not come, he should know that he was a stranger to the communion of the Roman church. The presbyters, returning, reported that he would not come.

Following, then, the letter of Your Love which you gave us about the aforesaid Athanasius, know by this letter, which I have given to Your Unanimity, that I have peace with all of you and with all the bishops of the catholic church, but that the aforesaid Athanasius is a stranger to my communion, or that of the Roman church, and to the fellowship of church letters.

What in this letter is not of holiness, what does not come from the fear of God? But Potamius and Epictetus, while they rejoice to condemn the bishop of the city of Rome, as is contained in the synod of Ariminum, would not hear these things.

Moreover, Bishop Fortunatianus, sending the same letter again to various bishops, achieved nothing. But that in refusing communion to Athanasius he made himself rather a burden and put the whole matter in danger for himself, so long as he took nothing away from the synod of Serdica, in which Athanasius was acquitted and the Arians condemned, letters sent from all Egypt and Alexandria warned; since, as letters had been written to Julius earlier (about) restoring communion to the exiled Athanasius, such letters have now been given to Liberius about defending it, as will be understood from what is appended. The end.

He who comes to his senses blots out the fault of ignorance. This can be observed from the holy Scriptures too: we read that godliness is useful for all things, to which bodily exercise yields, although it too keeps the fruits of usefulness. The reckoning of the present time also demands that we pursue it. For if perhaps someone of those who bear this zeal should think, with a too severe censure, to destroy shamelessly what was provided by reason, and to innovate what is already fortified by apostolic authority concerning godliness, saying that there must be no sparing of those who acted in ignorance at Ariminum, for whom not knowing was unlawful … severity is not therefore to be rejected. But it befits me to weigh all things with moderation, especially since all the Egyptians and the Greeks, following this judgment, have received many: that those of whom we treated above should be spared, but the authors condemned, who with crooked and malicious subtlety of darkness offended the minds of the innocent, by which they drew a veil over the truth, claiming darkness as light and light as darkness.

If, then, anyone, coming to his senses from the captivity of ignorance by the most gentle pleading of our word, had experienced in himself that pestilent, crafty, and hidden poison of the Arian dogma, let him, restored, drain it out, condemn it, and rage more vehemently against its authors, whom he experienced as violent against himself, and let him give himself wholly anew to the apostolic and catholic faith as far as the meeting of the synod of Nicaea; by which profession, even if it seems light and lax to some, let him recover what he had lost of rightness through cunning. But if anyone should be found of so stupid a mind, which I do not believe, as not only to refuse to be converted by taking the antidote of health, (but) also to think he should claim the poison and harmful venom for himself, he will both be overcome by reason and, being reckoned hopelessly with the author of unbelief, will be punished by the spiritual vigor of the catholic church. The end.

It is the grace of a divine gift that, according to the Apostle, we have all begun to think one thing and to confess one thing. As far as Italy is concerned, it has long since returned to the faith of the fathers, that is, that written at Nicaea, recognizing the fraud it suffered at Ariminum. We rejoice that God has looked with a gentle nod on Illyricum too, and we congratulate it that, casting off the fellowship of unbelief by which it was weighed down, it has begun to approve what belongs to right judgment. Receive, then, dearest brothers, our one and the same judgment, made firm by subscription. We keep the decrees of the Nicene decision against Arius and Sabellius, whose partial inheritance condemns Photinus. We rightly rescind, with the consent of all the provinces, the decisions of the council of Ariminum, corrupted by the evasion of certain men. We have resolved to send copies of these too, so that there may seem to be no disagreement either in keeping the faith or in refuting the council of Ariminum. Whoever, then, wishes to have the fellowship of our unanimity, whoever desires to have undivided peace with us, let him hasten to approve what belongs to our judgment, sending without ambiguity his subscription to the faith mentioned to us and to the rescinding of the council of Ariminum. This we certainly ask, which we ourselves offer with the consent of the majority of these provinces. But it is plain that the authors of the Arian or Aetian heresy, Valens and Ursacius and their other associates, were condemned not now, and not because they began to be exposed in Illyricum, but long ago. The end.

When concern for hope and salvation presses, those who are concerned ought rather to be praised than to bear any reproach; and salvation and hope consist principally in the catholic faith.

And therefore, although, when admonished in a meeting by our lords, our brothers and fellow bishops Valens and Paul, you would not answer, most religious lord, to what rumor spreads about you, yet, because you have testified in your letter that you persevere in the same love and are ready to show unimpaired affection toward us, we, gathered together at Singidunum, again remind Your Holiness of these things: that, all occasion of evasion excluded, you deign to write back to us again; it is asked that you signify more openly that you will not depart, as you have already professed, from the catholic faith which was set forth and confirmed at Ariminum by the holy council, to which all the bishops of the East also consented.

And this is it, as it is provided in that creed: "We say that the Son is like the Father according to the Scriptures, not according to substance or in all things, but absolutely." For if this exposition is changed, the perfidious assertion of Basil, on account of which the synod was held, and which was also justly condemned, will plainly be revived.

Deign, then, to declare clearly in your letter what is asked: that you have not said, do not say, and will not say that the Son is like the Father in all things except unbegottenness; lest what the bearers of the letter, the deacon Jovian and the subdeacon Martyrius, asserted by word in their pleading before my aforesaid lords, our brothers and fellow bishops Valens and Paul, should seem more credible, namely that you profess that the Son is like the Father in all things.

For if you make clear by your writing that you think as we have wished, the complaint about the injury done by certain clerics of yours to Palladius and Gaius, our brothers and fellow bishops, which you would not investigate, as you were admonished at the first meeting, does not touch your reputation; they, of course, giving account for their own rashness.

We have sent this to Your Love through the presbyter Secundianus, the reader Pullentius, and the exorcist Candidianus, on the fifteenth day before the Kalends of January, in the consulship of the most noble Gratian and of Dagalaifus, keeping a copy with us.

We have learned from the report of Vitalis, a most distinguished man serving in the office of the exalted prefecture, that Your Holiness wishes it to be made known to you openly what it is in our faith that displeases Valens, Ursacius, Gaius, and Paul. I thought it necessary to make this plain to Your Holiness by this letter, and to say what I trust is in you yourselves from the beginning.

We hold what we received handed down from the fathers and from the divine Scriptures, what we once learned and daily teach: that Christ the Son of God, our Lord, is like the Father in all things except unbegottenness, God from God, light from light, power from power, whole from whole, perfect from perfect, begotten before the ages and before all things that can be understood or spoken, whose birth no one knows but the Father alone, as the Son himself asserts: "For no one knows the Son except the Father, nor does anyone know the Father except the Son, and he to whom the Son wills to reveal him."

Through whom all things were made, without whom nothing was made, according to the divine words of our Savior himself, the Son, saying: "My Father is working until now, and I am working"; and again: "For whatever the Father does, the Son also does likewise"; and again: "I and the Father are one"; and again: "He who has seen me has (seen) the Father also"; and again: "As the Father has life in himself, so he has given to the Son also to have life in himself"; and again: "As the Father raises the dead and gives life, so the Son also gives life to whom he will"; and again: "Believe in God and believe in me"; and again: "For the Father judges no one, but has given all judgment to the Son, that all may honor the Son as they honor the Father."

And again, to whom did the Father say, "Let us make man in our image and likeness"? He did not say "in your image" or "in my image", lest he show some unlikeness (in) the divinity of his Son; but therefore he joined them, "in our image and likeness", to show that his Son is God like himself in all things. Again the evangelist: "We saw his glory, glory as of the only-begotten from the Father, full of grace and truth." And the Apostle to the Corinthians: "In whom the god of this age has blinded the minds of unbelievers, so that the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ, who is the image of God, should not shine." And again the same Apostle: "And he transferred us into the kingdom of the Son of his love, in whom we have redemption, the remission of

sins, who is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of all creation." And again the same Apostle: "Have this mind in you which was also in Christ Jesus, who, being in the form of God, did not consider it robbery to be equal with God, but emptied himself, taking the form of a servant, made in the likeness of men." Who does not understand that, as in the form of a servant our flesh was true in Christ, so in the form of God the divinity of the Father is true in the Son? And again: "See that no one deceives you through philosophy and empty deceit, according to the tradition of men, according to the elements of this world, and not according to Christ,

for in him dwells all the fullness of the Godhead bodily." If, then, all the fullness of the Godhead dwells in Christ, they are no longer like in part and unlike in part, as those now assert who, going backward because of the contentiousness of their desire, have turned themselves away from us.