What Arius Taught, and How He Died

Now Bishop Alexander, of blessed memory, cast Arius out of the church for holding and maintaining the following opinions: “God was not always a Father. The Son was not always. Since all things were made out of nothing, the Son of God too was made out of nothing. And since all things are creatures, he too is a creature and a thing made. And since all things once were not, but were made afterward, there was a time when the Word of God himself was not; and he was not before he was begotten, but he had a beginning of existence. For he came into being at the moment God chose to produce him. For he too is one among the rest of his works. “And since he is by nature changeable, and stays good only because he chooses to by his own free will, he is capable of being changed, as all other things are, whenever he wishes. And so God, foreknowing that he would be good, gave him in advance the glory he would have won afterward by his virtue; and he has now become good by his works, which God foreknew.” [a]

Accordingly they say that Christ is not truly God, but that he is called God because he shares in God’s nature, as all other creatures do. And they add that he is not that Word which is in the Father by nature and belongs properly to his substance, nor is he the Father’s own wisdom by which he made this world. Instead, they say, there is another Word which is properly in the Father, and another Wisdom which is properly in the Father, and by this Wisdom he also made this Word. The Lord himself, they say, is called the Word (that is, Reason) in our way of thinking, because of things endowed with reason, and is called Wisdom in our way of thinking, because of things endowed with wisdom. In fact they say that, just as all things are in substance separate from the Father and foreign to him, so he too is in every respect separate from the Father’s substance and foreign to it, and belongs properly to things made and created, and is one of them; for he is a creature, a thing made, and a work. Again, they say that God did not create us for his sake, but him for our sake. For they say: “God was alone, and the Word was not with him. But afterward, when he wanted to produce us, then he made him; and from the time he was made, he called him the Word, and the Son, and the Wisdom, so that he might create us through him. And just as all things came to exist by the will of God and did not exist before, so he too was made by the will of God and did not exist before. For the Word is not the proper and natural Offspring of the Father, but has himself come into being by grace. For God, who existed, made by his will the Son, who did not exist; and by that same will he also made all things, and produced and created them, and willed them to come into being.” Moreover, they also say that Christ is not the natural and true power of God; but just as the locust and the cankerworm are called a power, so he too is called the power of the Father. Furthermore, Arius said that the Father is hidden from the Son, and that the Son can neither see nor know the Father perfectly and exactly. For since he has a beginning of existence, he cannot know the One who is without beginning; what he knows and sees, he knows and sees in a measure suited to his own measure, just as we too know and see in proportion to our powers. And he added that the Son not only does not know his own Father exactly, but does not even know his own substance.

For holding these opinions and others like them, Arius was declared a heretic. As for me, while I have merely been writing them down, I have been cleansing myself by thinking of the opposite teachings and by holding fast to the sense of the true faith. For the bishops who gathered from every part of the world at the Council of Nicaea stopped their ears at these statements, and all with one voice condemned this heresy because of them and anathematized it, declaring it alien and estranged from the faith of the church. It was no compulsion that led the judges to this decision; they all chose freely to defend the truth, and they did so justly and rightly. For unbelief is coming in through these men, or rather a Judaism contrary to the Scriptures, with pagan superstition close behind it, so that whoever holds these opinions can no longer even be called a Christian, for they are all contrary to the Scriptures. John, for instance, says, “In the beginning was the Word”; but these men say, “He was not before he was begotten.” And again he wrote, “And we are in him who is true, in his Son Jesus Christ; this is the true God and eternal life”; but these men, as if to contradict this, claim that Christ is not the true God, but is only called God, as other creatures are, because he shares in the divine nature. And the apostle blames the pagans because they worship the creatures, saying, “They served the creature more than God the Creator.” But if these men say that the Lord is a creature, and worship him as a creature, how are they different from the pagans? If they hold this opinion, is not this passage against them too? And does not the blessed Paul write as one who blames them? The Lord also says, “I and my Father are one,” and, “Whoever has seen me has seen the Father.” And the apostle who was sent by him to preach writes, “Who, being the brightness of his glory and the exact image of his person.” But these men dare to separate them, and to say that he is foreign to the substance and eternity of the Father, and impiously to represent him as changeable. They do not see that by speaking this way they make him one, not with the Father, but with created things. Who does not see that the brightness cannot be separated from the light, but belongs to it by nature, exists together with it, and is not produced after it? Again, when the Father says, “This is my beloved Son,” and when the Scriptures say that he is the Word of the Father, by whom “the heavens were established,” and, in short, “All things were made by him,” these inventors of new teachings and fictions claim that there is another Word and another Wisdom of the Father, and that he is called the Word and the Wisdom only in our way of thinking, because of things endowed with reason. And they do not see how absurd this is. [d]

But if he is called the Word and the Wisdom by a fiction, for our sake, they cannot tell what he really is. For if the Scriptures declare that the Lord is both of these, and yet these men will not allow him to be so, it is plain that in their godless opposition to the Scriptures they would deny that he exists at all. The faithful can draw this truth from the voice of the Father himself, from the angels who worshiped him, and from the holy men who have written about him. But these men, since they do not have a pure mind and cannot bear to hear the words of divine men who teach about God, may be able to learn something even from the demons, who resemble them. For the demons spoke of him, not as though there were many others besides, but as knowing him alone, when they said, “You are the Holy One of God,” and, “the Son of God.” And the one who suggested this heresy to them, when he was tempting him on the mountain, did not say, “If you too are a son of God,” as though there were others besides him, but, “If you are the Son of God,” as being the only one. But just as the pagans, having fallen away from the idea of one God, have sunk into the worship of many gods, so these wonderful men, not believing that the Word of the Father is one, have come to adopt the idea of many words. They deny the one who is really God and the true Word, and have dared to think of him as a creature, without seeing how full of impiety the thought is. For if he is a creature, how is he at the same time the Creator of creatures? Or how is he the Son, and the Wisdom, and the Word? For the Word is not created but begotten; and a creature is not a son but a product. And if all creatures were made by him, and he is also a creature, then by whom was he made? Things that are made must of necessity come into being through someone, as in fact they have come into being through the Word, because he was not himself a thing made, but the Word of the Father. And again, if there is another wisdom in the Father besides the Lord, then Wisdom has come into being in wisdom; and if the Word of God is the Wisdom of God, then the Word has come into being in a word; and if the Son is the Word of God, then the Son must have been made in the Son. [f]

How is it that the Lord has said, “I am in the Father, and the Father in me,” if there is another in the Father, by whom the Lord himself also was made? And how is it that John passes over that other and tells of this one, saying, “All things were made by him, and without him nothing was made”? If all things that were made by the will of God were made by him, how can he himself be one of the things that were made? And when the apostle says, “For whom are all things, and by whom are all things,” how can these men say that we were not made for him, but he for us? If that were so, he ought to have said, “For whom the Word was made.” But he does not say that; he says, “For whom are all things, and by whom are all things,” and so proves these men to be heretical and false. Further, since they have had the boldness to say that there is another Word in God, and since they cannot bring any clear proof of this from the Scriptures, let them show just one work of his, or one work of the Father that was done without this Word, so that they may seem to have at least some ground for their own idea. The works of the true Word are plain to all, so that he can be contemplated from them by analogy. For just as, when we see the creation, we think of God as its Creator, so when we see that nothing in it is without order, but that all things move and continue with order and providence, we infer a Word of God who is over all and governs all. The Holy Scriptures testify to this too, declaring that he is the Word of God, and that “all things were made by him, and without him nothing was made.” But of that other Word they speak of, they have neither word nor work to show. Indeed, even the Father himself, when he says, “This is my beloved Son,” signifies that besides him there is no other. [g]

It appears, then, that as far as these teachings go, these wonderful men have now joined themselves to the Manichaeans. For the Manichaeans also confess that there is a good God, as far as the mere name goes, but they cannot point to any of his works, visible or invisible. And since they deny the one who is truly and really God, the Maker of heaven and earth and of all things invisible, they are mere inventors of fables. And this seems to me to be the case with these evil-minded men. They see the works of the true Word, who alone is in the Father, and yet they deny him and make for themselves another Word, whose existence they cannot prove either by his works or by the testimony of others. Unless perhaps they have adopted a fabulous notion of God: that he is a composite being like a man, speaking and then changing his words, and exercising understanding and wisdom as a man does. They do not see what absurdities such an opinion drives them to. For if God has a succession of words, they must surely think of him as a man. And if those words come from him and then vanish, they are guilty of a greater impiety, because they reduce to nothing what comes from the self-existent God. If they think that God begets at all, it would surely be better and more reverent to say that he is the begetter of one Word, who is the fullness of his Godhead, in whom are hidden the treasures of all knowledge, and that this Word exists together with his Father, and that all things were made by him; rather than to suppose that God is the Father of many words that are nowhere to be found, or to represent him who is simple in his nature as made up of many, and as subject to human passions and changeable. Next, whereas the apostle says, “Christ the power of God and the wisdom of God,” these men count him as only one among many powers. Worse still, transgressors that they are, they compare him with the cankerworm and other creatures without reason, which he sends to punish men. Next, whereas the Lord says, “No one knows the Father except the Son,” and again, “Not that anyone has seen the Father except he who is from the Father,” are not those who say that the Father is neither seen nor known perfectly by the Son truly enemies of God? If the Lord says, “As the Father knows me, so I know the Father,” and if the Father does not know the Son only in part, are they not mad to say idly that the Son knows the Father only in part, and not fully? Next, if the Son has a beginning of existence, and all things likewise have a beginning, let them say which is prior to the other. But in fact they have nothing to say, and with all their cunning they cannot prove any such beginning of the Word. For he is the true and proper Offspring of the Father, and “in the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.” As for their claim that the Son does not know his own substance, it is needless to reply to it except to condemn their madness. For how can the Word not know himself, when he gives all people the knowledge of his Father and of himself, and blames those who do not know themselves? [h]

“But it is written,” they say, “‘The Lord created me in the beginning of his ways, for his works.’” You ignorant and senseless people! In the Scriptures he is also called “servant,” and “son of a maidservant,” and “lamb,” and “sheep”; and it is said that he suffered toil and thirst, was beaten, and suffered pain. But there is plainly a reasonable ground and cause why the Scriptures speak of him this way. It is because he became man and the Son of Man, and took on himself the form of a servant, which is human flesh. For “the Word,” says John, “became flesh.” And since he became man, no one ought to stumble at such expressions; for it belongs to man to be created, born, and formed, to suffer toil and pain, to die, and to rise again from the dead. Being the Word and Wisdom of the Father, he has all the attributes of the Father: his eternity, his unchangeableness, and being like him in all respects and in all things. He is neither before nor after the Father, but exists together with him; he is the very form of the Godhead; and he is the Creator, and is not created. For since he is like the Father in substance, he cannot be a creature, but must be the Creator, as he himself said, “My Father is working until now, and I am working.” In the same way, having been made man and bearing our flesh, he is necessarily said to be created and made, and that belongs to all flesh. These men, however, like the Jewish wine-sellers who mix their wine with water, debase the Word and subject his Godhead to their notions of created things. [j]

That is why the fathers were rightly and justly indignant, and anathematized this most impious heresy, which these people are now careful about and keep hidden, because it is easy to refute and unsound in every part. The arguments I have set down are only a few of those that condemn their teachings. But if anyone wants to go more fully into the case against them, he will find that this heresy is not far from paganism, and that it is the lowest of all the other heresies, their very dregs. Those others go wrong either about the body or about the incarnation of the Lord, falsifying the truth, some in one way and some in another; or else they deny that the Lord has come to dwell here at all, as the Jews mistakenly suppose. But this heresy alone, more madly than the rest, has dared to attack the very Godhead, and to assert that the Word does not exist at all, and that the Father was not always a father. So one might reasonably say that that psalm was written against them: “The fool has said in his heart, ‘There is no God.’ They are corrupt, and have become abominable in their doings.”

“But,” they say, “we are strong, and able to defend our heresy by our many devices.” They would have a better answer to give if they could defend it, not by artifice or the sophistries of the pagans, but by the simplicity of their faith. If, however, they are confident in it, and know it agrees with the teachings of the church, let them say openly what they think. For no one who has lit a lamp puts it under the basket, but on the lampstand, and so it gives light to all who come in. If, then, they can defend it, let them put in writing the opinions charged against them above, and lay their heresy bare to the sight of all, as they would a lamp. Let them openly accuse Bishop Alexander, of blessed memory, of having unjustly expelled Arius for professing these opinions, and let them blame the Council of Nicaea for putting forth a written confession of the true faith in place of their impiety. But they will not do this, I am sure. They are not so ignorant of the evil nature of the notions they have invented and are eager to sow abroad. They know well enough that, although at first they may lead the simple astray by empty deceit, their imaginings will soon be put out, “as the light of the ungodly,” and they themselves will be branded everywhere as enemies of the truth. So although they do everything foolishly and speak as fools, in this at least they have acted wisely, as “the children of this world”: they hide their lamp under the basket, so that it may be supposed to give light, and so that it may not be seen, and condemned, and put out. [l]

That is what happened when Arius himself, the author of the heresy and the associate of Eusebius, was summoned through the influence of Eusebius and his party to appear before the emperor Constantine Augustus, of blessed memory, and was required to present a written statement of his faith. The crafty man wrote one, but kept out of sight the peculiar expressions of his impiety, and pretended, as the devil did, to quote the simple words of Scripture just as they are written. And when the blessed Constantine said to him, “If you hold no other opinions in your mind besides these, take the Truth as your witness; the Lord is your avenger if you swear falsely,” the unfortunate man swore that he held no others, and that he had never said or thought anything other than what he had now written. But as soon as he went out he dropped down, as though paying the penalty of his crime, and “falling headlong, burst open in the middle.”

Death, it is true, is the common end of all people, and we ought not to insult the dead, even if he was an enemy, for it is uncertain whether the same thing may not happen to ourselves before evening. But the end of Arius was not of the ordinary kind, and so it deserves to be told. When Eusebius and his party threatened to bring him into the church, Alexander, the bishop of Constantinople, resisted them; but Arius trusted in the violence and threats of Eusebius. It was the Sabbath, and he expected to join in communion the next day. So there was a great struggle between them, the others threatening, Alexander praying. But the Lord, judging the case, decided against the unjust party. For the sun had not set when the needs of nature compelled Arius to go to that place, where he fell down, and was at once deprived both of communion with the church and of his life. The blessed Constantine, hearing of this at once, was struck with wonder to find him convicted of perjury in this way. And indeed it then became clear to all that the threats of Eusebius and his party had been of no use, and that the hope of Arius had come to nothing. It was shown, too, that the Arian madness was rejected from communion by our Savior, both here and in the church of the firstborn in heaven. Who, then, will not wonder at the unrighteous ambition of these men, whom the Lord has condemned? Who will not wonder to see them defending the heresy which the Lord has declared excommunicate (since he did not allow its author to enter the church), not fearing what is written, but attempting impossible things? “For the Lord of hosts has purposed it, and who will undo it?” And whom God has condemned, who will declare him in the right? [n]

Let them, however, write what they please in defense of their own imaginings. But you, brothers, as “bearing the vessels of the Lord” and defending the teachings of the church, examine this matter, I beg you. If they write in other terms than those recorded above as the language of Arius, then condemn them as hypocrites who hide the poison of their opinions and, like the serpent, flatter with the words of their lips. For though they write in this way, they have taken into their company those who were rejected with Arius before, such as Secundus of Pentapolis and the clergy who were convicted at Alexandria; and they write to them in Alexandria. But what is most astonishing, they have caused us and our friends to be persecuted, although the most religious emperor Constantine sent us back in peace to our country and our church, and showed his concern for the harmony of the people. But now they have caused the churches to be handed over to these men, and so have proved to all that it was for their sake that the whole conspiracy against us and the rest has been carried on from the beginning.

Now, while this is how they act, how can they expect to be believed in what they write? If the opinions they have put in writing had been orthodox, they would have struck the Thalia of Arius off their list of books, and would have rejected the offshoots of the heresy, that is, the disciples of Arius and the partners of his impiety and of his punishment. But since they do not renounce these, it is plain to all that their views are not orthodox, though they write them out ten thousand times. That is why we must be on guard, in case some deception is slipped in under the cover of their phrases and they lead some away from the true faith. And if they venture to put forward the opinions of Arius when they see things going well for them, nothing remains for us but to speak with great boldness, remembering the predictions of the apostle, which he wrote to forewarn us of heresies like these, and which we ought to repeat. For we know that, as it is written, “in the latter times some will depart from the sound faith, giving heed to deceiving spirits and teachings of demons, that turn from the truth”; and, “all who want to live godly lives in Christ will suffer persecution. But evil men and deceivers will grow worse and worse, deceiving and being deceived.” But none of these things will prevail over us, nor “separate us from the love of Christ,” though the heretics threaten us with death. For we are Christians, not Arians. Would that they too, who have written these things, had not taken up the teachings of Arius! Yes, brothers, there is need now of such boldness of speech; for we have not received “the spirit of slavery again to fear,” but God has called us “to freedom.” And it would indeed be disgraceful for us, most disgraceful, if because of Arius, or of those who take up and champion his views, we were to destroy the faith we have received from our Savior through his apostles. Already a great many in these parts, seeing through the craftiness of these writers, are ready to resist their schemes even to the point of blood, especially since they have heard of your firmness. And since the refutation of the heresy has gone out from you, and the heresy has been drawn out of its hiding place like a serpent from its hole, the Child whom Herod sought to destroy is preserved among you, the truth lives in you, and the faith thrives among you. [r]

So I urge you: keep in your hands the confession of faith framed by the fathers at Nicaea, defend it with great zeal and confidence in the Lord, and be examples to the brothers and sisters everywhere. Show them that a struggle is now before us in support of the truth against heresy, and that the schemes of the enemy are many and varied. For the proof of a martyr does not lie only in refusing to burn incense to idols; to refuse to deny the faith is also a glorious testimony of a good conscience. And it was not only those who turned aside to idols who were condemned as strangers, but also those who betrayed the truth. So Judas was put out of the office of an apostle, not because he sacrificed to idols, but because he proved a traitor; and Hymenaeus and Alexander fell away, not by going over to the service of idols, but because they “made shipwreck concerning the faith.” On the other hand, the patriarch Abraham received the crown, not because he suffered death, but because he was faithful to God. And the other holy men Paul speaks of, Gideon, Barak, Samson, Jephthah, David and Samuel, and the rest, were not made perfect by shedding their blood, but were counted righteous by faith; and to this day we admire them as men who were ready even to suffer death for their devotion to the Lord. And if one may add an example from our own country, you know how the blessed Alexander fought against this heresy even to death, and what great afflictions and labors he endured, old man that he was, until in extreme old age he too was gathered to his fathers. And how many others besides have undergone great toil in their teaching against this impiety, and now enjoy in Christ the glorious reward of their confession! Therefore let us too consider that this struggle is for everything we have, and that the choice is now before us, either to deny the faith or to keep it. Let us make it our earnest care and aim to guard what we have received, taking as our instruction the confession drawn up at Nicaea. Let us turn away from novelties, and teach our people not to give heed to “deceiving spirits,” but to withdraw entirely from the impiety of the Arian madmen and from the alliance the Melitians have made with them. [t]

For you see how, though they were once at odds with one another, they have now, like Herod and Pontius Pilate, come to agreement in order to blaspheme our Lord Jesus Christ. And for this they truly deserve everyone’s hatred, because they were enemies of one another on private grounds, but have now become friends and joined hands in their hostility to the truth and their impiety toward God. Indeed, they are content to do or suffer anything, however contrary to their principles, for the satisfaction of gaining their separate aims: the Melitians for the sake of preeminence and their mad love of money, and the Arian madmen for the sake of their own impiety. And so, by this alliance, they are able to help one another in their malicious designs. The Melitians put on the impiety of the Arians, and the Arians, out of their own wickedness, join in the baseness of the Melitians, so that by mixing their respective crimes together, like the cup of Babylon, they may carry on their plots against the orthodox worshipers of our Lord Jesus Christ. The wickedness and falsehood of the Melitians were plain to everyone even before this; so too the impiety and godless heresy of the Arians have long been known everywhere and to all, for they have not existed only a short time. The former became schismatics fifty-five years ago, and it is thirty-six years since the latter were declared heretics; and they were rejected from the church by the judgment of the whole Ecumenical Council. But by what they are doing now they have at last proved, even to those who seem to favor them openly, that from the very first they carried on their designs against me and the rest of the orthodox bishops solely to advance their own impious heresy. For see: what was long ago the great aim of Eusebius and his party has now been brought about. They have had the churches snatched out of our hands. They have banished, as they pleased, the bishops and presbyters who refused to hold communion with them. And the people who withdrew from them they have shut out of the churches, which they have handed over to the Arians who were condemned so long ago. So, with the help of the hypocrisy of the Melitians, they can pour out their impious language in those churches without fear, and prepare, as they think, the way of deceit for Antichrist, who sowed among them the seeds of this heresy. [v]

Let them, however, dream and imagine vain things in this way. We know that when our gracious emperor hears of it, he will put a stop to their wickedness, and they will not last long; but, in the words of Scripture, “the hearts of the impious will quickly fail them.” But let us, as it is written, “put on the words of Holy Scripture,” and resist them as apostates who would set up fanaticism in the house of the Lord. And let us not fear the death of the body, nor imitate their ways; but let the word of truth be preferred above all things. We too, as you all know, were once required by Eusebius and his party either to put on their impiety or to expect their hostility. But we would not commit ourselves to them; we chose rather to be persecuted by them than to imitate the conduct of Judas. And they have certainly done what they threatened. For, after the manner of Jezebel, they engaged the treacherous Melitians to help them, knowing how the Melitians had resisted the blessed martyr Peter, and after him the great Achillas, and then Alexander, of blessed memory. They did this so that the Melitians, being practiced in such things, might bring against us too whatever might be suggested to them, while Eusebius and his party gave them an opening to persecute me and to seek to kill me. For this is what they thirst for, and to this day they go on wanting to shed my blood. But I care nothing for these things. For I know and am persuaded that those who endure will receive a reward from our Savior; and that you too, if you endure as the fathers did, and show yourselves examples to the people, and overthrow these strange and alien inventions of impious men, will be able to glory and say, “We have kept the faith”; and you will receive the “crown of life,” which God “has promised to those who love him.” And God grant that I too, together with you, may inherit the promises, which were given not to Paul only, but also to all who “have loved the appearing” of our Lord and Savior and God and universal King, Jesus Christ; through whom be glory and dominion to the Father in the Holy Spirit, both now and forever and ever. Amen. [x]