Hippolytus

“ A man, therefore, even though he will it not, is compelled to acknowledge God the Father Almighty, and Christ Jesus the Son of God, who, being God, became man, to whom also the Father made all things subject, Himself excepted, and the Holy Spirit; and that these, therefore, are three. But if he desires to learn how it is shown still that there is one God, let him know that His power [46] is one. As far as regards the power, therefore, God is one. But as far as regards the economy there is a threefold manifestation, as shall be proved afterwards when we give account of the true doctrine. ”

“ There is, brethren, one God, the knowledge of whom we gain from the Holy Scriptures, and from no other source. For just as a man, if he wishes to be skilled in the wisdom of this world, will find himself unable to get at it in any other way than by mastering the dogmas of philosophers, so all of us who wish to practise piety will be unable to learn its practice from any other quarter than the oracles of God. [49] Whatever things, then, the Holy Scriptures declare, at these let us look; and whatsoever things they teach, these let us learn ”

“ For the word are [38] is not said of one person, but it refers to two persons, and one power. [39] He has Himself made this clear, when He spake to His Father concerning the disciples, “The glory which Thou gavest me I have given them; that they may be one, even as we are one: I in them, and Thou in me, that they may be made perfect in one; that the world may know that Thou hast sent me.” [40] What have the Noetians to say to these things? Are all one body in respect of substance, or is it that we become one in the power and disposition of unity of mind? ”

“ In these things, however, which are thus set forth by us, we are at one. For there is one God in whom we must believe, but unoriginated, impassible, immortal, doing all things as He wills, in the way He wills, and when He wills. What, then, will this Noetus, who knows [47] nothing of the truth, dare to say to these things? And now, as Noetus has been confuted, let us turn to the exhibition of the truth itself, that we may establish the truth, against which all these mighty heresies [48] have arisen without being able to state anything to the purpose. ”

“ For His sake the sun is darkened, the day has no light, the rocks are shattered, the veil is rent, the foundations of the earth are shaken, the graves are opened, and the dead are raised, and the rulers are ashamed when they see the Director of the universe upon the cross closing His eye and giving up the ghost. ”

“ If then, Noetus ventures to say that He is the Father Himself, to what father will he say Christ goes away according to the word of the Gospel? But if he will have us abandon the Gospel and give credence to his senselessness, he expends his labour in vain; for “we ought to obey God rather than men.” ”

“ The Scriptures speak what is right; but Noetus is of a different mind from them. Yet, though Noetus does not understand the truth, the Scriptures are not at once to be repudiated. For who will not say that there is one God? Yet he will not on that account deny the economy (i.e., the number and disposition of persons in the Trinity) . ”

“ In this way, then, they choose to set forth these things, and they make use only of one class of passages; [12] just in the same one-sided manner that Theodotus employed when he sought to prove that Christ was a mere man. But neither has the one party nor the other understood the matter rightly, as the Scriptures themselves confute their senselessness, and attest the truth. See, brethren, what a rash and audacious dogma they have introduced, when they say without shame, the Father is Himself Christ, Himself the Son, Himself was born, Himself suffered, Himself raised Himself. ”

“ For who is Jacob His servant, Israel His beloved, but He of whom He crieth, saying, “This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased: hear ye Him?” [23] Having received, then, all knowledge from the Father, the perfect Israel, the true Jacob, afterward did show Himself upon earth, and conversed with men. And who, again, is meant by Israel [24] but a man who sees God? and there is no one who sees God except the Son alone, the perfect man who alone declares the will of the Father. For John also says, “No man hath seen God at any time ”

“ We too know in truth one God; [6] we know Christ; we know that the Son suffered even as He suffered, and died even as He died, and rose again on the third day, and is at the right hand of the Father, and cometh to judge the living and the dead. ”

“ If, then, all things run up into one, even according to Valentinus, and Marcion, and Cerinthus, and all their fooleries, they are also reduced, however unwillingly, to this position, that they must acknowledge that the One is the cause of all things. Thus, then, these too, though they wish it not, fall in with the truth, and admit that one God made all things according to His good pleasure. ”

“ He manifested His word in the times determined by Him, and by Him He made all things. When He wills, He does; and when He thinks, He executes; and when He speaks, He manifests; when He fashions, He contrives in wisdom. For all things that are made He forms by reason and wisdom—creating them in reason, and arranging them in wisdom. ”

“ This is Jesus of Nazareth, who was invited to the marriage-feast in Cana, and turned the water into wine, and rebuked the sea when agitated by the violence of the winds, and walked on the deep as on dry land, and caused the blind man from birth to see, and raised Lazarus to life after he had been dead four days, and did many mighty works, and forgave sins, and conferred power on the disciples, and had blood and water flowing from His sacred side when pierced with the spear. ”

“ Not according to our own will, nor according to our own mind, nor yet as using violently those things which are given by God, but even as He has chosen to teach them by the Holy Scriptures, so let us discern them.
10. God, subsisting alone, and having nothing contemporaneous with Himself, determined to create the world. And conceiving the world in mind, and willing and uttering the word, He made it ”

“ Against the Heresy of One Noetus. [1]
1. Some others are secretly introducing another doctrine, who have become disciples of one Noetus, who was a native of Smyrna, [2] (and) lived not very long ago. [3] This person was greatly puffed up and inflated with pride, being inspired by the conceit of a strange spirit. He alleged that Christ was the Father Himself, and that the Father Himself was born, and suffered, and died. Ye see what pride of heart and what a strange inflated spirit had insinuated themselves into him. ”

“ Now he quotes the words, “Egypt has laboured, and the merchandise of Ethiopia and the Sabeans,” and so forth on to the words, “For Thou art the God of Israel, the Saviour.” And these words he cites without understanding what precedes them. For whenever they wish to attempt anything underhand, they mutilate the Scriptures. But let him quote the passage as a whole, and he will discover the reason kept in view in writing it. For we have the beginning of the section a little above ”

“ Hæret Fab., c. iii., and Damascenus, sec. lvii. (who is accustomed to follow Epiphanius) ; and yet in Epiphanius, Hæres., 57, we read that Noetus was an Asian of the city of Ephesus ( ̓Ασιανον τῆς ̓Εφέσου πόλεως) . (Fabricius.) ↑ Epiphanius says that Noetus made his heresy public about 130 years before his time (οὐ πρὸ ἐτῶν πλειόνων ἀλλ ̓ ὡς πρὸ χρόνου τῶν τουτων ἑκατὸν τριάκοντα, πλείω ἢ ἐλάσσω) ; and as Epiphanius wrote in the year 375, that would make the date of Noetus about 245. He says also that Noetus died soon after (ἔναγχος) , along with his brother. ”

“ See the passages in Petavius, De S. S. Trinitate, lib. vi. c. 8, § 21, and vii. 12, § 12. [Dubious.] ↑ From this passage it is clear that Hippolytus taught the doctrine of one God alone and three Persons. A little before, in the eighth chapter, he said that there is one God, according to substance or divine essence, which one substance is in three Persons; and that, according to disposition or economy, there are three Persons manifested. By the term economy, therefore, he understands, with Tertullian, adversus Praxeam. ”