Arius and two gods

Discussion about the New Testament, apocrypha, gnostics, church fathers, Christian origins, historical Jesus or otherwise, etc.
Clive
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Arius and two gods

Post by Clive »

Arius, pastor of the influential Baucalis Church in Alexandria, Egypt, taught that Christ was more than human but something less than God. He said that God originally lived alone and had no Son. Then he created the Son, who in turn created everything else. The idea persists in some cults today.
http://www.christianitytoday.com/histor ... xAFRBdl%2F
Into it they inserted an extremely important series of phrases: “True God of true God, begotten not made, of one substance with the Father.…”
I wonder how much assertions like that above have warped and hidden understanding of what actually went on.
"We cannot slaughter each other out of the human impasse"
iskander
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Re: Arius and two gods

Post by iskander »

Clive wrote:
Arius, pastor of the influential Baucalis Church in Alexandria, Egypt, taught that Christ was more than human but something less than God. He said that God originally lived alone and had no Son. Then he created the Son, who in turn created everything else. The idea persists in some cults today.
http://www.christianitytoday.com/histor ... xAFRBdl%2F
Into it they inserted an extremely important series of phrases: “True God of true God, begotten not made, of one substance with the Father.…”
I wonder how much assertions like that above have warped and hidden understanding of what actually went on.
What is your understanding of what actually went on?
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DCHindley
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Location: Ohio, USA

Re: Arius and two gods

Post by DCHindley »

iskander wrote:
Clive wrote:
Arius, pastor of the influential Baucalis Church in Alexandria, Egypt, taught that Christ was more than human but something less than God. He said that God originally lived alone and had no Son. Then he created the Son, who in turn created everything else. The idea persists in some cults today.
http://www.christianitytoday.com/histor ... xAFRBdl%2F
Into it they inserted an extremely important series of phrases: “True God of true God, begotten not made, of one substance with the Father.…”
I wonder how much assertions like that above have warped and hidden understanding of what actually went on.
What is your understanding of what actually went on?
Isk,

IMHO, it was just Christians of that period trying to reconcile popular Greek cosmological speculation (basically some variation of Plato's concept of first/eternal principals, ranging from one to several) and what the church was now saying god was like. The account of the Debate with Adamantius shows that folks in the 4th century at least were interested in such things, probably in reaction to popular understandings of Marcion's concept of the nature of things.

However, I do not think that the Arian debate was thinking of Marcion anymore. I think that Western and Eastern spheres of the Christian movement had come to terms with Marcion in somewhat different ways, and the Arian debate was the way the matter further worked itself out.

Constantine wanted a unified Christian movement, so the organizers of the Council if Nicaea went out of their way to talk the participants into coming to some sort of negotiated solution that everyone could, in good conscience although not happily, adopt. Perhaps this is why it seems, now, so convoluted.

DCH
Roger Pearse
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Re: Arius and two gods

Post by Roger Pearse »

I think that the implications of Arius' position were not clear to anyone at the Council of Nicaea, not even to himself. For instance Arius wrote to Eusebius of Nicomedia in 321 that the Son was "fully God", for instance. But Arianism became trendy with church bureaucrats after Nicaea, amid endless politics; which in turn encouraged extreme Arian positions to be taken up. It is these later positions that are what we tend to think of as Arianism today, if I understand correctly, and these did indeed involve the position that the Son was less than the Father. Eventually there was a reaction, and Arianism burnt itself out, to be execrated for a millennium after.

I don't think we should see the formula "homoousios" as some form of pagan idea imported in at Nicaea. The Fathers were quite willing to use the tools supplied by Greek philosophy to analyse what the scriptures said, while rejecting paganism. Rather, the council definition was really about rejecting the idea that the Son was NOT of the same substance (ousia) as the Father, by way to rejecting the idea that the Son was different from the Father; and homoousios had that consequence.

Certainly Constantine wanted a united church, and made that clear. But he did not interfere in church politics, unlike all of his successors. The desire of everyone present to reach some kind of agreement is obvious, I agree. Constantine even asked the Novatianists whether they would accept Nicaea, and in fact they were happy to do so (because their disagreement was practical rather than dogmatic). Nicaea is accepted quite widely, I notice, precisely because it was not like the subsequent councils, which tended to be dominated by church politicians.
iskander
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Re: Arius and two gods

Post by iskander »

DCHindley wrote:...
Isk,

IMHO, it was just Christians of that period trying to reconcile popular Greek cosmological speculation (basically some variation of Plato's concept of first/eternal principals, ranging from one to several) and what the church was now saying god was like. The account of the Debate with Adamantius shows that folks in the 4th century at least were interested in such things, probably in reaction to popular understandings of Marcion's concept of the nature of things.

However, I do not think that the Arian debate was thinking of Marcion anymore. I think that Western and Eastern spheres of the Christian movement had come to terms with Marcion in somewhat different ways, and the Arian debate was the way the matter further worked itself out.

Constantine wanted a unified Christian movement, so the organizers of the Council if Nicaea went out of their way to talk the participants into coming to some sort of negotiated solution that everyone could, in good conscience although not happily, adopt. Perhaps this is why it seems, now, so convoluted.

DCH
Jesus was made God by a process like the one you suggest, but why would anyone initiate that process?
There is nothing in the gospel of Mark to suggest that Jesus is God .Paul in Romans 9: 4-5 says Jesus is a man sent by God.
Romans 9:4
They are descendants of Israel, chosen to be God's sons; theirs is the glory of the divine presence, theirs the covenants, the law, the temple worship, and the promises.

Romans 9:5
The patriarchs are theirs, and from them by natural descent came the Messiah. May God, supreme above all , be blessed for ever! Amen.
The Oxford Study Bible

https://www.oxfam.org.uk/shop/books/ref ... 7QodT5QCOg
When did the making of God begin?.
iskander
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Re: Arius and two gods

Post by iskander »

Chapter IV.—The Letter of Arius to Eusebius, Bishop of Nicomedia
http://www.ccel.org/ccel/schaff/npnf203 ... i.i.v.html

"Chapter IV.—The Letter of Arius to Eusebius, Bishop of Nicomedia
“To his very dear lord, the man of God, the faithful and orthodox Eusebius, Arius, unjustly persecuted by Alexander the Pope320, on account of that all-conquering truth of which you also are a champion, sendeth greeting in the Lord.
...
We are persecuted, because we say that the Son has a beginning, but that God is without beginning. This is the cause of our persecution, and likewise, because we say that He is of the non-existent322. And this we say, because He is neither part of God, nor of any essential being323. For this are we persecuted;"

This latter appear to have been written in 321 AD .
iskander
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Re: Arius and two gods

Post by iskander »

Clive asked ,
Clive wrote:...

What is your understanding of what actually went on?
The letter of Arius to the Bishop of Nicomedia explains clearly the problem confronting early Christianity as the clerics struggled to understand the alien culture in which Jesus was raised.Arius wrote: " We are persecuted, because we say that the Son has a beginning, but that God is without beginning. This is the cause of our persecution, and likewise, because we say that He is of the non-existent322. And this we say, because He is neither part of God, nor of any essential being323. For this are we persecuted;"

What is " the Son" ? --This question is therefore a good start.

The attached files reconstruct the order of events between the outbreak of the Arian Controversy and the impostion of Licinius' ban. (The Search for the Christian Doctrine of God: The Arian Controversy, 318-381, page 134-5}
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iskander
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Re: Arius and two gods

Post by iskander »

part 2
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iskander
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Re: Arius and two gods

Post by iskander »

Constantine wanted a political solution that would bring the Christian religion into the service of the Roman Empire under the direction of his authority as holder of the office of Pontifex Maximus. For Constantine the difference between Arius and the pope Alexander was trivial and he demanded a quick solution to the squabble among the followers of the same god.


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iskander
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Re: Arius and two gods

Post by iskander »

The Christian God before Arius. see attached file .
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