Refutation of All Heresies 5.12.2

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: The Peratae's three parts are the perfect Good, the infinite powers, and the particular world.

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Greek text · Duncker–Schneidewin, 176

Ἔστι δὲ τῆς τριχῆ διαιρέσεως παρʼ αὐτοῖς [τὸ μὲν ἓν μέρος] οἷον μία τις ἀρχὴ καθάπερ πηγὴ μεγάλη, εἰς ἀπείρους τῷ λόγῳ τμηθῆναι τομὰς δυναμένη. Ἡ δὲ πρώτη τομὴ καὶ προεχεστέρα κατʼ αὐτοὺς ἐστὶν ἡ τριάς, καὶ [τὸ μὲν ἓν μέρος] καλεῖται ἀγαθὸν τέλειον, μέγεθος πατρικόν· τὸ δὲ δεύτερον τῆς τριάδος αὐτῶν μέρος οἱονεὶ δυνάμεων ἄπειρόν τι πλῆθος ἐξ αὐτῶν γεγενημένων· τὸ τρίτον ἰδικόν.

English · Claude translation

Of the threefold division among them, [one part] is as it were a single principle, like a great spring, which can be cut in thought into infinite sections. The first and most prominent section, according to them, is the triad, and [one part] is called the perfect Good, the Fatherly Greatness; the second part of their triad is as it were an infinite multitude of powers begotten from themselves; the third is the particular.

About this passage

Source
Duncker–Schneidewin, 176 · 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

Notes

Translation notes

  • The square brackets are the editor's.

Cite this passage

Hippolytus, Haer. 5.12.2 (trans. Sophia Scriptura, https://sophiascriptura.com/fathers/hippolytus-refutatio/5/12/2/).

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Plain text
Hippolytus, Haer. 5.12.2 (trans. Sophia Scriptura, https://sophiascriptura.com/fathers/hippolytus-refutatio/5/12/2/).

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