Arianism a heresy with regard to the person of Christ which spread widely in the church from the fourth to the seventh centuries. It took its name from Arius, a presbyter of Alexandria, said to have been a Libyan, and a man of subtle, but not profound mind. The most probable account is that he was educated in the school of Lucian the martyr at Antioch; and the doctrinal position of Lucian (scientifically nearer to the subsequent doctrine of Arius than of Athanasius) helps to explain not only how Arius’s view arose, but also how it happened to be so widely received (comp. Dorner, Person of Christ, div. 1, vol. 2, p. 490; Socrates, Hist. Eccl. 2, 10; Sozomen, Hist. Eccl. 3, 5). He is said to have favored Meletius (q.v.), who was deposed A.D. 306; but it appears that Peter, bishop of Alexandria, the great enemy of Meletius, ordained Arius deacon (Sozom. Hist. Eccl. 1:15) about A.D. 311, but soon, on account of his turbulent disposition, ejected him. When Peter was dead, Arius feigned penitence; and being pardoned by Achillas, who succeeded Peter, he was by him raised to the priesthood, and entrusted with the church of Baucalis, in Alexandria (Epiphan. Haeres, 68, 4). It is said that on the death of Achillas, A.D. 313, Arius was greatly mortified because Alexander was preferred before him, and made bishop, and that he consequently sought every occasion of exciting tumults against Alexander; but this story rests simply on a remark of Theodoret (Hist. Eccles. 1, 2) that Arius was envious of Alexander.
1. First Period: to the Council of Nice. — The eloquence of Arius gained him popularity; and he soon began to teach a doctrine concerning the person of Christ inconsistent with His divinity. When Alexander had one day. been addressing his clergy, and insisting that the Son is co-eternal, co- essential, and co-equal with the Father (ὁμότιμον τοῦ Πατρός, καὶ τὴν αὐτὴν οὐσίαν ἔχειν,Theod. 1:11), Arius opposed him, accused him of Sabellianism, and asserted that there was a time when the Son was not (῏ην ὅτε οὐκ ῏ην ὁ ὑιός), since the Father who begot must be before the Son who was begotten, and the latter, therefore, could not be eternal (Socrat. Hist. Eccl. 1, 5). Such is the account, by the early writers, of the origin of the controversy. But if it had not begun in this way, it must soon have began in some other. The points in question had not arrived at scientific precision in the mind of the church; and it was only during the Arian controversy, and by means of the earnest struggles invoked by it, carried on through many years, causing the convocation of many synods, and employing some of the most acute and profound intellects the church has ever seen, that a definite and permanent form of truth was arrived at (Dorner, Person of Christ, div. 1, vol. 2, p. 227). SEE ATHANASIUS. At length, Alexander called a council of his clergy, which was attended by nearly one hundred Egyptian and Libyan bishops, by whom Arius was deposed and excommunicated (Sozom. Hist. Eccl. 1, 15). This decision was conveyed to all the foreign bishops by circulars sent by Alexander himself (A.D. 321). Arius retired to Palestine, where by his eloquence and talents he soon gained a number of converts. Eusebius, bishop of Nicomedia, who had also studied under Lucian, and doubtless held his opinions, naturally inclined to favor Arius, who addressed to Eusebius a letter, still extant (Epiphanius, Haeres. 69. 6, and in Theodoret, Hist. Eccl. 1, 5), from which we derive our knowledge of the first stage of Arian opinion.: It runs thus: “We cannot assent to these expressions, ‘always Father, always Son;’ ‘at the same time Father and Son;’ that ‘the Son always co-exists with the Father;’ that ‘the Father has no pre-existence before the Son, no, not so much as in thought or a moment.’ But this we think and teach, that the Son is not unbegotten, nor a part of the unbegotten by any means. Nor is he made out of any pre-existent thing; but, by the will and pleasure of the Father, he existed before time and ages, the only begotten God, unchangeable; and that before He was begotten, or made, or designed, or founded, he was not. But we are persecuted because we say that the Son has a beginning, and that God has no beginning. For this we are persecuted; and because we say the Son is out of nothing. Which we therefore say, because he is not a part of God, or made out of any pre-existent thing” (διδάσκομεν, ὅτι ὁ υἱὸς οὐκ ἔστιν ἀγέννητος, οὐδὲ μέρος ἀγεννήτου κατ᾿ οὐδένα τρόπον, οὐδὲ ἐξ ὑποκειμένου τινός· ἀλλ᾿ ὅτι θελήματι καὶ βουλῇ ὑπέστη πρὸ χρὸνων καὶ πρὸ αἰὼνων πλὴρης θεός, μονογενής, ἀναλλοίωτος, καὶ πρὶν γεννηθῇ, ἤτοι κτισθῇ, ἢ ὁρισθῇ, ἢ θεμελιωθῇ, οὐκ ῏ην· ἀγέννητος γὰρ οὐκ ῏ην· διωκόμεθα ὅτι εἴπαμεν, ἀρχὴν ἔχει ὁ υἱός, ὁ δὲ θεὸς ἄναρχός ἐστι . . . . καὶ ὃτι εἴπαμεν, ὃτι ἐξ οὐκ ὄντων ἐστίν· οὕτω δὲ εἴπαμεν καθότι οὐδὲ μέρος θεοῦ οὐδὲ ἐξ ὑτοκειμένου τινός). Voigt (in his Lehre des Athanasius von Alexandrien) gives this letter, with critical emendations, which elucidate the development of the opinions of Arius (see transl. from Voigt, by Dr. Schaeffer, in Bibliotheca Sacra, 21, 138). The second direct source of our knowledge of the. opinions of Arius is a letter addressed by him to Alexander (preserved in Epiphanius Haeres.
69, 7, and in Athanasius, De Synod. 16), in which he states his positions plausibly and cautiously, and claims that they are the traditional opinions of the church. “We believe that there are three Persons, the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost. God, the cause of all things, is alone without beginning. The Son, begotten of the Father before time, made before the ages were founded, was not before he was begotten. Nor is he eternal, or co-eternal, or begotten at the same time with the Father.” In these two letters Arius teaches that the Father alone is God, and that the Son is his creature. He still regards the Son, however, “as occupying a unique position among creatures; as unalterable and unchangeable; and as bearing a distinctive and peculiar likeness to the Father” (Dorner, l. c. p. 236). He terms the Son “a perfect creature of God, but not as one of the creatures; an offspring, but not as one of those who are generated” (Ep. ad Alex.). Alexander now wrote a letter to Alexander of Constantinople (Theod. 1, 4), in which he charges Arius with teaching not only that the Son is less than the Father, but also that he is “liable to change,” notwithstanding that Arius, in the epistles cited above, speaks of the Son as “unalterable and unchangeable” (ἀναλλοίωτος, ἄτρεπτος). But Arius abandoned these terms, and set forth the changeableness of the Son without reservation in his Thalia (Θάλεια), the latest of his writings known to us (written during his stay at Nicomedia). It is partly in prose and partly in verse, and obviously addressed to the popular ear. What we have extant of it is preserved in Athanasius (cont. Arianos, 1, 5-9; De Synod. 15; see citations from all the remains of Arius in Gieseler, Ch. History, 1, § 79).
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Author: McClintock and Strong Cyclopedia
Keywords: Arianism
Source: John McClintock and James Strong, Cyclopedia of Biblical, Theological, and Ecclesiastical Literature.
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