Sophia Scriptura

Refutation of All Heresies 4.3.8

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: Because the seed's path varies, astrologers cannot fix the time of conception.

Greek text · Duncker–Schneidewin, 54

Ἀγνοοῦντες οὖν τὴν ποσότητα τοῦ χρόνου κατὰ τὸ ἀκριβὲς οἱ Χαλδαῖοι οὐδέποτε τὴν σύλληψιν καταλήψονται. τοῦ σπέρματος ὁτὲ μὲν εὐθυβολουμένου καὶ αὐτοῖς προσπίπτοντος ὑφʼ ἓν τοῖς εὐφυῶς ἔχουσι πρὸς σύλληψιν τῆς μήτρας [τόποις, ὁτὲ δὲ πολυσπόρως ἐμπίπτοντος, ὑπʼ αὐτῆς δὲ τῆς ἐν τῇ μήτρᾳ δυνάμεως εἰς ἕνα τόπον συνάγεσθαι] δυναμένου· τῶν ἀγνώστων τὸ πότε γίνεται τὸ πρῶτον καὶ πότε τὸ δεύτερον, πόσος τε ὁ εἰς ἐκείνην τὴν σύλληψιν ἀναλισκόμενος χρόνος καὶ πόσος [ὁ] εἰς ταύτην· ἀγνοουμένων δὲ τούτων ἦρται καὶ ἡ πρὸς ἀκρίβειαν τῆς συλλήψεως κατάληψις.

English · Claude translation

Not knowing the length of time precisely, then, the Chaldeans will never grasp conception. For the seed is sometimes cast straight and falls all at once upon the places of the womb well suited for conception, [and sometimes falls scattered, able to be gathered into one place by the power in the womb itself]. It is unknown when the first happens and when the second, and how much time is spent on the one conception and how much on the other; and when these are unknown, a precise grasp of conception is also taken away.

About this passage

Source
Duncker–Schneidewin, 54 · 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.

Notes

Translation notes

  • The square brackets are the editor's.

Cite this passage

Hippolytus, Haer. 4.3.8 (trans. Sophia Scriptura, https://sophiascriptura.com/fathers/hippolytus-refutatio/4/3/8/).

The SBL abbreviation for this work has not been checked yet.

Plain text
Hippolytus, Haer. 4.3.8 (trans. Sophia Scriptura, https://sophiascriptura.com/fathers/hippolytus-refutatio/4/3/8/).

Download citation:BibTeX ·RIS (Zotero, EndNote)

Whole work:BibTeX ·RIS ·Markdown text

Report an error in this passage