Sophia Scriptura

Refutation of All Heresies 5.8.34

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: They derive "goatherd" from a word for turning, making the Man the mover of the cosmos.

Greek text · Duncker–Schneidewin, 160–162

Τὸν αὐτὸν δὲ τοῦτον, φησίν, οἱ Φρύγες καλοῦσιν αἰπόλον, οὐχ ὅτι, φησίν, ἔβοσκεν αἶγας καὶ τράγους, ὡς οἱ ψυχικοὶ ὀνομάζουσιν, ἀλλʼ ὅτι, φησίν, ἐστὶν αἰπόλος, τουτέστιν ὁ ἀεὶ πολῶν καὶ στρέφων καὶ περιελαύνων τὸν κόσμον ὅλον στροφῇ.

English · Claude translation

This same one, he says, the Phrygians call goatherd (aipolos), not, he says, because he pastured she-goats and he-goats, as the psychics name it, but because, he says, he is aipolos, that is, the one who always turns (polōn) and revolves and drives round the whole world in its rotation.

About this passage

Source
Duncker–Schneidewin, 160–162 · 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 Naassenes derive αἰπόλος from ἀεί "always" and πολεῖν "to turn".

Cite this passage

Hippolytus, Haer. 5.8.34 (trans. Sophia Scriptura, https://sophiascriptura.com/fathers/hippolytus-refutatio/5/8/34/).

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Plain text
Hippolytus, Haer. 5.8.34 (trans. Sophia Scriptura, https://sophiascriptura.com/fathers/hippolytus-refutatio/5/8/34/).

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