Refutation of All Heresies 7.32.8

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: Some souls finish all sins in one life; the sect brands its disciples' ears and keeps portraits of Christ said to be made by Pilate.

Greek text · Duncker–Schneidewin, 402–404

Τινὲς δὲ φθάσασαι ἐν μιᾷ παρουσίᾳ ἀναμιγῆναι πάσαις ἁμαρτίαις οὐκέτι μετενσωματοῦνται, ἀλλὰ πάντα ὁμοῦ ἀποδοῦσαι τὰ ὀφλήματα ἐλευθερωθήσονται τοῦ μηκέτι γενέσθαι ἐν σώματι. Τούτων τινὲς καὶ καυτηριάζουσι τοὺς ἰδίους μαθητὰς ἐν τοῖς ὀπίσω μέρεσι τοῦ λοβοῦ τοῦ δεξιοῦ ὠτός. Καὶ εἰκόνας δὲ κατασκευάζουσι τοῦ Χριστοῦ λέγοντες ὑπὸ Πιλάτου τῷ καιρῷ ἐκείνῳ γενέσθαι.

English · Claude translation

But some souls, having managed in a single coming to mingle with all sins, are no longer reincarnated, but having paid all their debts at once will be freed from being in a body any more. Some of these also brand their own disciples on the back of the lobe of the right ear. And they make images of Christ, saying they were made by Pilate at that time.

About this passage

Source

Duncker–Schneidewin, 402–404 · 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. 7.32.8 (trans. Sophia Scriptura, https://sophiascriptura.com/fathers/hippolytus-refutatio/7/32/8/).

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

Plain text

Hippolytus, Haer. 7.32.8 (trans. Sophia Scriptura, https://sophiascriptura.com/fathers/hippolytus-refutatio/7/32/8/).