Sophia Scriptura

Refutation of All Heresies 6.28.2

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: Fire and earth, joined by air, make up the body of the universe, which the sun numbers and measures.

Greek text · Duncker–Schneidewin, 268

Πῦρ γάρ ἐστιν ἥλιος ὡς ψυχή, σῶμα δὲ γῆ. Χωρισθὲν δὲ πυρὸς οὐδὲν ἄν ποτε ὁρατὸν γένοιτο, οὐδὲ ἁπτὸν ἄνευ τινὸς στερεοῦ, στερεὸν δὲ οὐκ ἄνευ γῆς. Ὅθεν ἐκ πυρὸς καὶ γῆς ἀέρα τε ὁ θεὸς ἐν μέσῳ θέμενος τὸ τοῦ παντὸς ἐδημιούργησε σῶμα. Ἀριθμεῖ δὲ, φησί, καὶ γεωμετρεῖ τὸν κόσμον ὁ ἥλιος τοιοῦτόν τινα τρόπον.

English · Claude translation

For the sun is fire, as the soul, and earth is body. Apart from fire nothing would ever be visible, nor tangible without something solid, and nothing is solid without earth. Hence God, placing air in the middle between fire and earth, fashioned the body of the universe. And the sun, he says, numbers and measures the world in some such way as this.

About this passage

Source
Duncker–Schneidewin, 268 · 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.
Extrabiblical texts
  • Plato, Tim. 31b–32b (Plato (works)) · allusion, high confidence

Notes

Translation notes

  • Compare Plato, Timaeus 31b–32b.

Cite this passage

Hippolytus, Haer. 6.28.2 (trans. Sophia Scriptura, https://sophiascriptura.com/fathers/hippolytus-refutatio/6/28/2/).

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Plain text
Hippolytus, Haer. 6.28.2 (trans. Sophia Scriptura, https://sophiascriptura.com/fathers/hippolytus-refutatio/6/28/2/).

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