Early Arianism: A View of Salvation
Robert C. Gregg and Dennis E. Groh
Number of quotes: 27
Book ID: 76 Page: 6
Section: 3C1
His existence was fully and uncompromisingly dependent upon the totally free will of the Creator.The derivative character of the Son’s existence was indicated to the Arians by a number of Gospel passages which emphasized the “received” character of the Son’s authority and function. Thus Jesus’ ἑξουσία is his not by nature but by gift of the Father (Matt. 28:18); his role as judge has the same derivative character (John 5:22). In a similar vein the Arians observed that all things are given (δέδωκεν) into the Son’s hand for believing on him (John 3:35). Continuing to select those texts whose verbs and meaning were in the δίδωμι and παραδίδωμι family, the Arians cited also Matt. 11:27 and John 6:37 and concluded from all these texts . . .
If he was, as you say, Son according to nature (κατὰ φύσιν), he had no need to receive (λαβείν), but he possessed (εἶχε) [these things] according to nature as a Son. {29}
For the Arians the creaturely character of Jesus portrayed in the Gospels even meant that he stood in need of God’s empowering Holy Spirit. Therefore, they seemed to have insisted that the Son, as other persons, received the Spirit for empowerment in his life of obedience to the Father.
Quote ID: 2090
Time Periods: 4
Book ID: 76 Page: 26
Section: 3C1
The Arians appear to have described the unity of the Son with the Father as an agreement (συμφωνία, σύμφωνος) with God, an agreement in the sense of harmony with him rather than identity; and this is the way they explain John 10:30, “I and the Father are one.”For they say “since what the Father wills (θέλει), these things the Son also wills (θέλει), and is contrary neither in thoughts (νοήμασιν) nor in judgments, but is in all respects concordant (σύμφωνος) with him, declaring doctrines which are the same and a word consistent and united with the Father’s teaching, therefore it is that he and the Father are one [John 10:30]”; and some of them have dared to write as well as say this. {47}
Quote ID: 2091
Time Periods: 4
Book ID: 76 Page: 49
Section: 3C1
The Arians did not, as Athanasius’ own discussion reveals, baptize in the name of the Father alone, nor did they reserve the use of the word “God” to the Father alone. {27} As we have shown in the opening chapter, Arian Christians spoke of an advancing, not a demoted, Son. They understood the divinity of the Son differently from the orthodox.. . . .
Apart from objection to particular understandings and conceptualizations of fatherhood and sonship, we have no substantial evidence of Arian reticence to revere and honor the Son.
Quote ID: 2092
Time Periods: 4
Book ID: 76 Page: 50
Section: 3C1
The foundation of Arius’ Christianity is both implicit and explicit in the declaration that the Son is creature, one among the beings made and sustained by the will of God. {32}
Quote ID: 2093
Time Periods: 4
Book ID: 76 Page: 53
Section: 3C1
Nowhere does Arius, Eusebius, or Asterius suggest that the Son’s beginning was marked by the birth (or baptism) of Jesus of Nazareth. According to them, the one called “Word” and “Son” was created before all ages.
Quote ID: 2094
Time Periods: 4
Book ID: 76 Page: 65
Section: 3C1
The persistent accusations of the Alexandrian episcopate are best ignored: Arians neither organized a conspiracy against the divinity of the Christian savior nor did they work to diminish his centrality in the consciousness and action of people within the church. Far from it.Pastor John notes: John’s note: hard to believe they thought such
Quote ID: 2095
Time Periods: 4
Book ID: 76 Page: 66
Section: 2C
The Father’s work of creation and salvation being completed by the Word, however, “men, redeemed from sin, no longer remain dead, being deified (θεοποιηθέντες).”{98}
Quote ID: 2096
Time Periods: 34
Book ID: 76 Page: 68
Section: 2B1
Irenaeus:There is none other called God by the scriptures except the Father of all, and the Son, and those who possess the adoption. {104}
[Footnote 104] Iranaeus Adv. Haer. 4, Preface. See Ps. 82:6 and John 10:34ff., and Hans von Campenhausen, The Formation of the Christian Bible (Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1972), p. 56 and n. 199.
Quote ID: 2097
Time Periods: 2
Book ID: 76 Page: 77
Section: 3C1
If there has been broad scholarly agreement about the centrality of the doctrine of God and cosmological concerns in Arian circles, however, sharp disagreements have surfaced as soon as attempts are made to place Arius and his companions in particular philosophical and ecclesiastical traditions. The question of the origins of Arian Christianity was not long ago declared to be “wide open.” {3}
Quote ID: 2098
Time Periods: 4
Book ID: 76 Page: 79
Section: 3C1
A bewildering array of precursors have been postulated for Arian doctrine by modern scholarship: Aristotle, Plato (and Platonists like Atticus and Albinus), Philo, Origen, Lucian, Paul of Samosata, and the exegetes of the “schools” in Alexandria and Antioch. {9}
Quote ID: 2099
Time Periods: 4
Book ID: 76 Page: 81
Section: 3C1
One of Arius’ major objections to the theology voiced by the bishop of Alexandria turned on its uses of such phrases as “always a Father, always a Son.”. . . .
Asserting that their own reading of scripture disallowed this doctrine, Arian spokesmen scored their opponents for teaching two unbegotten first principles (δύο ἀγέννητα), strongly suggesting that they believed Alexander’s formulas traceable to emanationist ideas of the Gnostics and the modalist theology of the Sabellians. {14}
Pastor John notes: John’s note: ‘first principles’= beings
Quote ID: 2100
Time Periods: 4
Book ID: 76 Page: 82/83
Section: 3C1
…the Son has subsisted by will and pleasure before times and ages. And before he was begotten or made or appointed or formed, he was not.. . .the Son has a beginning, but God is without beginning.
. . . .
. . .[the Son] did not exist before being begotten…being begotten apart from time before all things.
The Unbegun made (ἔθηκε) the Son a beginning (ἀρχήν) of the creatures (τῶν γενητῶν).
. . .the monad was, but the dyad (δυάς) was not before it came to be.
There was when the Son of God was not, and he was begotten later who previously did not exist.
The Word of God was not forever, but he came to be from the nonexistent (ἐξ οὐκ ὄντων). For God, who is, made (πεποίηκε) him who was not out of the nonexistent.
The Son was not always; for all things were made from the nonexistent, and all existing creatures and works were made, so also the Word of God himself was made from the nonexistent, and there was when he did not exist, and he was not before he was made, but he also had a beginning of creation. {19}
Quote ID: 2101
Time Periods: 4
Book ID: 76 Page: 83
Section: 3C1
Arius’ Thalia contains the statement that “…when the Son does not exist, the Father is God,” and he writes, similarly, to Eusebius that “God precedes in existence the Son.” {21} Arius’ meaning is unambiguous: prior to the Son’s creation, God is God, not Father. Thus one must say that God, rather than the Father, precedes the Son in existence. Arians objected to the sempiternity not of God but of God as Father. This was clearly recognized by Alexander, whose encyclical epistle preserves the Arian teaching that “God was not always (a) Father, but there was when God was not (a) Father.” {22}In Arian usage, the term “Father” signifies a relationship which God has to the Son, not an attribute which he has in himself. This is attested by the care with which Arius distinguishes between God and Father. God only receives the name Father, he argues, upon the creation of the Son.
Quote ID: 2102
Time Periods: 4
Book ID: 76 Page: 83
Section: 3C1
When the orthodox insisted that if the Son is not eternal we creatures should be called the Son’s sons, the Arians retorted, not entirely tongue in cheek, that by the reckoning of their opponents, Christ should be called God’s brother, not his Son. {24}Pastor John notes: John’s note: of course; ha!
Quote ID: 2103
Time Periods: 4
Book ID: 76 Page: 88/89
Section: 3C1
Rehearsing the faith which he received from his forebears (and which he claims to have learned from his antagonist Alexander, to whom he writes), Arius asserts, “We confess one God, alone unbegotten, alone eternal, alone unbegun, alone true, alone having immortality, alone wise, alone good, alone sovereign, judge, orderer and governor of all, unchanging and unalterable, just and good, God of the law and prophets and the New Testament…” {47}. . . .
When Arius speaks of God as “alone true” (μόνον ἀληθινόν), he echoes the prayer of Jesus in John 17:3 (τὸν μόνον ἀληθινὸν θεόν). The phrase “alone wise” (μόνον σοφόν) corresponds with doxological language of Rom. 16:27 (μόνῳ σοφῳ θεῳ), and reference to the Deity as “alone good” evokes the statement by Jesus in Mark 10:18 (οὐδεὶς ἀγαθὸς εἰ μὴ εἷς ὁ θεός). The remaining two phrases containing μόνον are taken from an eschatological passage in 1 Timothy, …
[footnote 7] Arius Ep. ad Alex. (Opitz3, Urk. 6.2, p. 12, lines 4-7.)
Quote ID: 2104
Time Periods: 4
Book ID: 76 Page: 90/91
Section: 3C1
Consider on its own terms and in the light of its own evident sources, Arius’ statement about God and his attributes does not compel the interpretation frequently given to it. It distinguishes in unambiguous language the sovereign God from the uniquely begotten Son, who subsists by the Father’s will, is preeminent among creatures, and as perfect creature shares immutability with his Maker. Of a purposeful depreciation, demotion, or assault upon the honor and status of the Son there is no real evidence—at least no more than can be found in 1 Tim. 2:5.Pastor John notes: John’s note: not necessarily; they were forced
Quote ID: 2105
Time Periods: 4
Book ID: 76 Page: 91
Section: 3C1
The cardinal principle of the Arians, as we remarked earlier, applies with equal force to the Jesus of history and to the preexistent Son. It is that all creatures, including the Son and redeemer, are ultimately and radically dependent upon a Creator whose sole means of relating to his creation is by his will (βούλησις) and pleasure (θέλησις). {55} The derivative character of the power and authority manifest in Jesus’ ministry was traced by Arian exegetes from a series of biblical texts which spoke of the things bestowed upon him by his Father. These assertions are in complete harmony with what is claimed about the Son created before all ages—both the mode of his origination and his role in God’s purposes for the cosmos.
Quote ID: 2106
Time Periods: 4
Book ID: 76 Page: 92
Section: 3C1
“Unless,” the Arians maintain, “he the Son has by will come to be, then God had a Son by necessity and against his good pleasure.” {57}[footnote 57] Athanasius Or. c. Ar. 3.62 (Bright, p. 215).
Quote ID: 2107
Time Periods: 4
Book ID: 76 Page: 96
Section: 3C1
The third, and for the Arians the all-important, point is already intimated in the reference to God’s creation of “a certain one.” It is stated in provocative language in the Thalia: The Unbegun made (or instituted—ἔθηκε) the Son as a beginning (or office of power/sovereignty—ἀρχήν) of the other things made (τῶν γενητῶν) and raised (ἤνεγκεν) him for a Son to himself, adopting him (τεκνοποιήσας). {73}
Quote ID: 2108
Time Periods: 4
Book ID: 76 Page: 101
Section: 3C1
Eusebius reminds Paulinus of others called “begotten” in scripture; they too were called into relationship with God by his will, and they no less than the Son, their fellow creature, may demonstrate obedience to him by their “disposition” and “power.”
Quote ID: 2109
Time Periods: 4
Book ID: 76 Page: 102
Section: 3C1
The bishop Athanasius is at his rhetorical best in these jousting with Arian pronouncements, which he quotes selectively, connects together as his agenda of ridicule dictates, and (not infrequently) pushes to conclusions which we may be sure the Arians themselves would have disowned. It is argument by misrepresentation, …Pastor John notes: John’s note: the text actually reads ‘The bishop’ and Athanasius was circled earlier in the text as a note as to which bishop the text is referring to here
Quote ID: 2110
Time Periods: 4
Book ID: 76 Page: 115
Section: 3C1
No ambiguity whatever surrounds Asterius’ conception of the Son’s identity as student:He is a creature and belongs to the things made. But he has learned (μεμαθήκε) to frame (δημιουργεῖν) as if at the side of a teacher and artisan (παρὰ διδασκάλου καὶ τεχνίτου), and thus he rendered service (ὑπηρέτησε) to the God who taught (διδάξαντι) him. {158}
The Son depends upon the Father for training whereby he will fashion the cosmos. It is learning which is acquired rather than natural, and the Arians presumably had no difficulty in thinking of increase in the Son’s expertise.
Quote ID: 2111
Time Periods: 4
Book ID: 76 Page: 116
Section: 3C1
The basis of the attack is Athanasius’ conviction that a creature is incapable of creating another creature since none of the things brought to be is an efficient cause. {163} The retort of the Arians is most provocative. They say,Behold, through Moses [God] led the people out of Egypt, and through him he gave the law, and yet he was man—so that it is possible for the like (τὰ ὅμοια) to be brought into being (γίνεσθαι) through the like (διὰ τοῦ ὁμοίου). {164}
Arians liken the creative activity of the Son to the work of Moses, the one under divine orders.
Quote ID: 2112
Time Periods: 4
Book ID: 76 Page: 117
Section: 3C1
So the designations of him as slave (δοῦλος), servant (διάκονος), minister (ὑπηρέτης), and the like are pointed declarations of their vision of the way in which the two persons are related: {167}. . .what the Father wills, the Son wills also, and does not oppose either the purposes or judgments of the Father. Rather, he is in all respects in accord (ἐν πᾶσιν ἐστι σύμφωνος) with him, declaring the very same doctrines and a word consistent and united with the Father’s teaching (διδασκαλιᾳ). It is in this way that he and the Father are one (cf. John 10:30). {168}
[footnote 168] Arterius, frg. XIV (Bardy, Lucien, p. 346). Vide Origen c. Cels, 8.12; Theodore Mopsuestia fr. in Jo. 5.19 (Migne PG 66 744B). The symbol of Antioch in 341 spoke of “three in hypostasis, but one in accord,” and the idea of συμφωνία figured at the Council of Sardica, as we learn from Theodoret (H.E. 2.8.45). Athanasius comments on John 10:30 and 14:9 in De Syn. 48: “Now as to its [i.e., the union] consisting in agreement of doctrines, and in the Son’s not disagreeing with the Father, as the Arians say, such an interpretation is a sorry one, for both the saints, and still more angels and archangels have such an agreement with God, and there is no disagreement among them” (NPNF translation). Asterius’ endorsement of this kind of moral union between Father and Son is attested also in frg. XXXII (Bardy, Lucien, p. 352), and in fragments 73 and 74 of Marcellus (GCS 4, pp. 198-200).
Quote ID: 2113
Time Periods: 4
Book ID: 76 Page: 141
Section: 3C1
After it is revealed to Antony that his death is imminent (he is, Athanasius reports, nearly 105), the revered monk delivers two farewell discourses. The speeches can be understood to function in the treatise as reiterations of the main lessons to be learned from the desert hero’s career. To the monks gathered in the outer mountain he encourages endurance in askēsis, reminding them “to live as though dying daily.” Finally, they are to have nothing to do with the Meletian schismatics, nor are they to have communion with the Arians, whose current favor with judges and whose fantasizing posture (φαντασία) will soon come to an end. {48} Identical advice is communicated to the two monks (Palladius gives their names as Macarius and Amatas) who attended the aged Antony in the inner mountain: the discipline is to be kept as if they were making a new beginning in the pursuit of virtue. Antony’s parting words again sound the alarm: “Let there be no fellowship between you and the schismatics, and have nothing at all to do with the heretical Arians. You know how I avoided them because of their Christ-battling and heterodox teaching.” {49} To Athanasius and Serapion, orthodox bishops, and to the two monks he bequeaths his few possessions and dies (it is related) with his feet in the air, as if in preparation for a journey from the earth. {50} The conclusion of the Life serves to underscore the point that Antony was the dedicated and persistent ally of those locked in conflict with the Arians. And if the alliance has some basis in fact, it is presented here not merely as report but in the undisguised form of propaganda. Apparently the political climate at the time of the work’s composition demanded it. The monks, for whom the work is primarily written, and the pagans who may read it are to be left in no doubt that Antony, “the man of God,” was under divine direction when his opposition to demonic forces compelled him to join the battle against the Arian blasphemy.
Quote ID: 2114
Time Periods: 4
Book ID: 76 Page: 153
Section: 3C1
. . .Athanasius makes no significant departure as he recounts the virtuous deeds of Antony, making him both a spokesman for orthodoxy and the model for sanctification according to the dynamic of orthodox soteriology. The great monk defends the eternity and full deity of the Logos whose descending grace works both his miracles and his own perfection.A carefully fashioned polemical weapon, the Antony presented by Athanasius stands as a sharp alternative to the Arian scheme of salvation and its attendant idea of discipleship. As symbol of ascetic greatness, the desert hero becomes also the vehicle for orthodoxy’s campaign to undo threatening (perhaps successful) Arian bids for monastic support.
Quote ID: 2115
Time Periods: 4
Book ID: 76 Page: 169
Section: 3C1
That the pagan as well as the Christian tradition allowed a progress in virtue which led one to deification and unchangeability has already been noted. {47} Contemporary pagan, like Christian, theology was ready to note that the deification one achieved by being brought to the divine state through virtue was based on a similarity of virtue between God and creatures and not on a change of natures. {48}The radical step taken by the Arians was in extending that kind of deity to the redeemer. In this, as we have seen, the Arians were aided and abetted by certain motifs in the Bible. Yet certain pagan traditions may be operative here also. The Pythagorean Sthenidas wrote an interesting passage in his Own Royalty in which he distinguished between the first God who is king, “by nature and essence” (φύσει καὶ [Ỡσίᾳ]) and the king (on earth) who is king “by birth and imitation” (γενέσει καὶ μιμάσει). {49} A king is wise (σοφόν) only as an imitator (ἀντίμιμος) and emulator (ζηλωτός) of the first God. The God who rules all possessed wisdom in himself (ἐν αὐτῳ κεκταμένος τὰν [sic] σοφίαν), whereas the king who exists in time has knowledge (ὁ δ᾽ ἐν χρόνῳ ἐπιστάμαν). {50}
Quote ID: 2116
Time Periods: 4
End of quotes