Sophia Scriptura

Refutation of All Heresies 5.13.1

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 begins to show that the Peratae took their teaching from the astrologers, who divide the cosmos into the fixed sphere of the zodiac and the sphere of the planets.

Greek text · Duncker–Schneidewin, 178

Μάθωμεν οὖν πρῶτον, πῶς ταύτην τὴν διδαχὴν παρὰ τῶν ἀστρολόγων εἰληφότες ἐπηρεάζουσι Χριστόν, ἐργαζόμενοι φθορὰν τοῖς ἑπομένοις αὐτοῖς ἐν τῇ τοιαύτῃ πλάνῃ. Οἱ γὰρ ἀστρολόγοι ἕνα τὸν κόσμον εἰρηκότες διαιροῦσιν αὐτὸν εἰς τὰ ἀπλανῆ τῶν ζωδίων μέρη δώδεκα, καὶ καλοῦσι τὸν κόσμον τῶν ζωδίων τῶν ἀπλανῶν ἕνα κόσμον ἀπλανῆ· ἕτερον δὲ εἶναι τὸν τῶν πλανωμένων καὶ δυνάμει καὶ θέσει καὶ ἀριθμῷ κόσμον λέγουσιν, ὅς ἐστι μέχρι σελήνης.

English · Claude translation

Let us learn first, then, how, having taken this teaching from the astrologers, they abuse Christ, working ruin for those who follow them in such error. For the astrologers, having said that the cosmos is one, divide it into the twelve fixed parts of the zodiac signs, and they call the cosmos of the fixed zodiac signs one fixed cosmos; and they say that the other cosmos is that of the wandering stars, in power, position, and number, which reaches as far as the moon.

About this passage

Source
Duncker–Schneidewin, 178 · 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 Peratae, a Gnostic group, are described in Book 5 chapters 12–18; Hippolytus argues their system is astrology renamed.

Cite this passage

Hippolytus, Haer. 5.13.1 (trans. Sophia Scriptura, https://sophiascriptura.com/fathers/hippolytus-refutatio/5/13/1/).

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Plain text
Hippolytus, Haer. 5.13.1 (trans. Sophia Scriptura, https://sophiascriptura.com/fathers/hippolytus-refutatio/5/13/1/).

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