Sophia Scriptura

Refutation of All Heresies, Book 1, preface 8

Hippolytus of Rome · Refutation of All Heresies · ca. 222–235 · Rome · Read in context

Authorship disputed: The work names no author. Book 1 was long printed among Origen's works as the Philosophumena; after books 4–10 were found in a manuscript from Mount Athos (published 1851), it was assigned to Hippolytus, the usual view today, though some scholars ascribe it to another Roman writer of the same circle. Books 2 and 3 are lost, and book 4 lacks its beginning.

Summary: Hippolytus will first set out Greek philosophy, to show that the heresies come from it rather than from Scripture.

Greek text · Duncker–Schneidewin, 6

Ἵνα οὖν, καθὼς φθάσαντες εἴπομεν, ἀθέους αὐτοὺς ἐπιδείξωμεν καὶ κατὰ γνώμην καὶ κατὰ τρόπον καὶ κατὰ ἔργον, ὅθεν τε τὰ ἐπιχειρήματα αὐτοῖς γεγένηται, καὶ ὅτι μηθὲν ἐξ ἁγίων γραφῶν λαβόντες ταῦτα ἐπεχείρησαν, ἤ τινος ἁγίου διαδοχὴν φυλάξαντες ἐπὶ ταῦτα ὥρμησαν, ἀλλʼ ἔστιν αὐτοῖς τὰ δοξαζόμενα ἀρχὴν μὲν ἐκ τῆς Ἑλλήνων σοφίας λαβόντα, ἐκ δογμάτων φιλοσοφουμένων καὶ μυστηρίων ἐπικεχειρημένων καὶ ἀστρολόγων ῥεμβομένων· δοκεῖ οὖν πρότερον ἐκθεμένους τὰ δόξαντα τοῖς τῶν Ἑλλήνων φιλοσόφοις ἐπιδεῖξαι τοῖς ἐντυγχάνουσιν ὄντα τούτων παλαιότερα καὶ πρὸς τὸ θεῖον σεμνότερα·

English · Claude translation

In order, then, as we said before, to show them godless in opinion, in manner, and in deed, and whence their arguments came to them, and that they undertook these things taking nothing from the holy Scriptures, nor keeping the succession of any holy man did they rush into them, but that what they hold took its beginning from the wisdom of the Greeks, from philosophical doctrines, from mysteries they have tried their hand at, and from wandering astrologers: it seems best, therefore, first to set out the opinions of the Greek philosophers and show the readers that these are older than the heresies and more reverent toward the divine;

About this passage

Source
Duncker–Schneidewin, 6 · Ludwig Duncker and F. G. Schneidewin, eds., S. Hippolyti episcopi et martyris Refutationis omnium haeresium librorum decem quae supersunt (Göttingen: Dieterich, 1859); section divisions from Paul Wendland, ed., Hippolytus Werke 3: Refutatio omnium haeresium, GCS 26 (Leipzig: Hinrichs, 1916) · Greek text: L. Duncker and F. G. Schneidewin, Refutationis omnium haeresium (Göttingen, 1859), digitized by the Perseus Digital Library; section divisions from P. Wendland (GCS 26, 1916), digitized by the First Thousand Years of Greek project (Open Greek and Latin); both CC BY-SA 4.0
Text
As printed in Duncker–Schneidewin. 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 Duncker–Schneidewin; made independently of existing English translations.
Compare
Ante-Nicene Fathers, vol. 5 (1886) (an older public-domain English translation, whole volume at CCEL; checked against ours only after ours was made) · Its chapter numbers differ from the standard (Wendland) numbering used here.
Topics
Heresy, Scripture and canon

Notes

Notes on the original text

  • Digital text corrected (wrong breathing in the digital text): Ἴνα οὖν → Ἵνα οὖν.

Cite this passage

Hippolytus, Haer. 1.0.8 (trans. Sophia Scriptura, https://sophiascriptura.com/fathers/hippolytus-refutatio/1/0/8/).

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Plain text
Hippolytus, Haer. 1.0.8 (trans. Sophia Scriptura, https://sophiascriptura.com/fathers/hippolytus-refutatio/1/0/8/).

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