Refutation of All Heresies 4.48.3

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: If Adam obeys the Word he wins the Crown; if not, he shares the beast's fate.

Greek text · Duncker–Schneidewin, 118

Εἰ οὖν, φησίν, ἐξομολογούμενος ὁ Ἀδὰμ καὶ τὴν κεφαλὴν φυλάσσων τοῦ θηρίου κατὰ τὸ πρόσταγμα τοῦ θεοῦ ἐκμιμήσεται τὴν λύραν, τουτέστι κατακολουθήσει τῷ λόγῳ τοῦ θεοῦ, τουτέστι πειθόμενος τῷ νόμῳ, παρακείμενον αὐτῷ τὸν στέφανον λήψεται. Ἐὰν δὲ ἀμελήσῃ, συγκατενεχθήσεται τῷ ὑποκειμένῳ θηρίῳ, καὶ τὸ μέρος ἕξει, φησί, μετὰ τοῦ θηρίου.

English · Claude translation

If, then, he says, Adam, confessing and guarding the head of the beast according to God's command, imitates the lyre, that is, follows the Word of God, that is, obeys the law, he will receive the crown lying beside him. But if he neglects it, he will be carried down together with the beast below, and will have his portion, he says, with the beast.

About this passage

Source

Duncker–Schneidewin, 118 · 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

Cite this passage

Hippolytus, Haer. 4.48.3 (trans. Sophia Scriptura, https://sophiascriptura.com/fathers/hippolytus-refutatio/4/48/3/).

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

Plain text

Hippolytus, Haer. 4.48.3 (trans. Sophia Scriptura, https://sophiascriptura.com/fathers/hippolytus-refutatio/4/48/3/).