藥箱（駁八十異端） 第 1 章 第 55/82 段

Hence the whole affair was altogether ridiculous—amazement at so great and such a piece of stage-craft, and perplexity as to what one could say about the accusers, about the accused, and about all the others—matters which, were I willing to relate in detail, would consume much time.

After Constantine died, when Pope Athanasius was living in Rome and throughout all Italy with great freedom of speech, in high esteem and favor, and enjoying the good will of the emperor himself and of his sons Constantius and Constans, he was sent for by the two emperors after the death of the great Constantine—Constantius being then at Antioch and consenting through his own written letters—as we learned from letters sent by the three emperors to the Alexandrians and to Pope Athanasius himself.

And he sat once more upon the throne, after the man who had succeeded him—Gregory, sent in by the Arians—during the time when Athanasius had been in exile.

Again a conspiracy was hatched against him before Constantius by the partisans of Stephen, and he was driven out.

And after that yet another conspiracy was hatched by the partisans of Leontius the mutilated, and those together with them.

Thus it came about that he was cast out and brought back in again.

For George was sent by Constantius, and Athanasius withdrew, hiding for some time, until George was put to death, at which time Julian became emperor and turned to Hellenism after the death of Constantius.

Those who had been lying in wait for George killed him, and having burned him and reduced him to ashes, scattered him to the winds.

When Julian died in Persia and the blessed Jovian succeeded to the empire, writing to bishop Athanasius with great honor and trustworthy letters, summoning him, embracing him, and sending him back to his own throne, so that the holy church again received back her bishop and was consoled for a little while—yet when Jovian died, the blessed Athanasius was again swept about amid the same persecutions, rumors, and disturbances.

Nevertheless he was not removed from the church or the throne; for the Alexandrians interceded on his behalf, and the whole city made its request—even after Lucius, the one who is even now in office, the Arian, had been appointed bishop of Alexandria while still abroad, apparently at Antioch, and had repeatedly entreated the emperor Valens to be sent to the throne of Alexandria—yet Valens himself, on account of the disturbance among the people, was unwilling to expel Athanasius.

At last, then, when Pope Athanasius died, Lucius was sent, and he did much evil to the church, to the city, to the people, to the bishops, to the clergy who had been under Athanasius and had received him in each church, and to Peter, who had been appointed his successor after Athanasius in Alexandria.

These things have been done up to the present day: some—bishops, presbyters, and deacons—having been exiled; others having suffered capital punishment at Alexandria; others having been thrown to fight with beasts; consecrated virgins having been put to death; and many others having perished.

In the midst of all this, even to this day, the church of God is still being tossed about, owing to the aforementioned affair of the Meletians and the Arians, who through such means found the occasion and the pretext for strengthening that same system of false doctrine—I mean, of the Arians.

In the refutation against Arius we shall relate everything in minute detail.

I shall pass over this subject as well, and proceed to the very heresy of the Arians, calling upon God as my helper as I draw near to do battle with this fearsome, many-headed serpent.

Against the Arian Madmen: [Heresy] 49 [in this book], but 69 in the overall sequence.

These times of Meletius and his followers, and of the holy Peter, bishop of Alexandria, are followed in succession by Arius and the Arians descended from him, who flourished in the times of the holy bishop Alexander, the successor of Peter, who deposed this same Arius after much agitation and by a great council.

For he removed him and cast him out of the church and out of the city, as a great evil that had befallen ecclesiastical life.

They say he was Libyan by race, and that he had become a presbyter in Alexandria, presiding over the church called 'Baucalis.'

For as many churches of the catholic church as there are in Alexandria under a single archbishop, presbyters are individually assigned to each of them, on account of the ecclesiastical needs of the inhabitants living near each of their churches—these localities being popularly called by the inhabitants of the city of Alexandria either 'amphoda' or 'laurai.'

All men know that Constantine, the father of Constantius, Constans, and Crispus, was renowned in Christianity and in the apostolic and prophetic faith of the fathers—a faith which, up until the time of Arius himself, had not been corrupted in the churches.

It so happened that this man caused a multitude to break away.

And from him there was kindled a fire—no ordinary one—which has seized almost the whole of the Roman world, especially the regions of the East, so that even to this day his heresy has not ceased warring against the true faith and the church.

At that time Arius was reputed to be a presbyter, and there came to be many fellow-presbyters of his in each church.

There are, then, quite a number of churches in Alexandria, counting also the one recently built called the 'Caesareum,' which had formerly been a temple of Hadrian, and afterward became the gymnasium, or rather the palace, of Licinius.

Afterward, in the days of Constantius, it was determined that this building should be made into a church, begun under Gregory the Meletian and Arian, and finished by the blessed Athanasius, the father of orthodoxy; it was burned down under Julian, and again rebuilt by that same blessed bishop Athanasius.

In one of these churches there was a certain Colluthus; in another, Carpones; in another, Sarmatas; and this Arius already mentioned held one of the aforesaid churches.

Each of these men, clearly, in teaching the people entrusted to him at the customary assembly, introduced through his own expositions a certain strife among the people.

Some inclined toward Arius, others toward Colluthus, others toward Carpones, others toward Sarmatas.

So as each one expounded differently in his own church—one thing here, another there—out of this partisanship and the praise given by their respective followers, some called themselves Colluthians, others Arians.

For indeed Colluthus too taught certain perverse things, but his sect did not endure, but was immediately scattered.

Would that the deranged faith of Arius—or rather, faithlessness, or rather still, evil belief—had likewise vanished.

For the old man, puffed up with arrogance, strayed from the matter at hand.

He was very tall in stature, downcast in appearance, fashioned like a cunning serpent, capable of stealing away every innocent heart through this same crafty outward bearing.

For such a man, always clad in a half-cloak and a sleeveless tunic, was sweet of speech, ever persuading and flattering souls.

Wherefore straightway—for what else could it be?—he drew away to his own party seven hundred consecrated virgins belonging to the church, and report has it that he also drew away with him seven presbyters and twelve deacons.

His poison quickly reached even as far as bishops.

For he persuaded Secundus of Pentapolis, along with others, to be carried away together with him.

Now these things were happening in the church while the blessed bishop Alexander remained unaware, until Meletius, the bishop of Egypt from the Thebaid, who himself also supposed himself to be an archbishop—the man I have already spoken of above (for the affair of Meletius had not yet reached the point of open, absurd enmity)—this Meletius, then, moved by jealousy (for he differed in nothing as regards the faith, but only in the outward pretense of self-assumed righteousness, on account of which he too committed a terrible act in his life, as I have already said concerning him)—reported into the ears of archbishop Alexander—this Meletius, self-styled archbishop over Egypt, though he was in fact supposed to be under the authority of Alexander.

This Meletius was a contemporary of the blessed Peter, bishop and martyr, as I have said.

So when he had reported everything concerning Arius—how he had stepped outside the truth, and how he had corrupted and destroyed many, leading astray from the right faith those who had been persuaded by him—the bishop then summoned Arius himself and asked him whether the things reported were indeed so.

But he neither hesitated nor was afraid; rather, from the very outset, with brazen effrontery, he vomited forth the whole of his false doctrine, as his own letters show, and as the examination that then took place concerning him demonstrates.

Having summoned those present, he conducted an inquiry and examination of him.

But since he was not persuaded by the truth, he expelled him from the church and had him publicly proclaimed excommunicate throughout the city.

Along with him, the aforementioned consecrated virgins, the aforementioned clergy, and a great many other people were drawn away as well.

This same Arius, then, causing schisms and stealthily drawing away each one, destroyed many.

But afterward, since he had been found out and brought to a public refutation in the city, and had been proclaimed excommunicate, he fled from Alexandria and set out on his journey to Palestine.

Having arrived there, he approached each of the bishops with flattery and cajolery, so as to win many to be his fellow-workers.

And some received him, while others rejected him.

Afterward the matter reached the ears of bishop Alexander, and he wrote circular letters—which are still preserved by lovers of what is good, numbering about seventy—to each of the bishops: to Eusebius at once, the one in Caesarea (for he happened to be there), and to Macarius of Jerusalem, to Asclepas in Gaza, to Longinus in Ascalon, to Macrinus in Jamnia, and to others; and in Phoenicia, to a certain Zeno, an elder man, in Tyre, and to others, together also with those in Coele-Syria.

So when the letters had been sent out, blaming those who had received him, each bishop wrote back to blessed Alexander in his own defense.

Some wrote with irony, others in earnest truth: some saying that they had not received him at all; others, that they had received him out of ignorance; still others, defending themselves by claiming that they had received him in order to win him over.

And there is a great deal of material to be said concerning these matters.

Afterward, when Arius learned that letters had been carried everywhere to the bishops, and that consequently he was being driven away from every quarter and no one any longer received him except his own fellow-workers—for Eusebius, the aged old man of Nicomedia, had a certain standing, having lived together with Lucian in Nicomedia; and likewise Leontius the mutilated in Antioch, not yet entrusted with the episcopate, and certain others—

Since, then, all these belonged to the very same faction of poison, Eusebius received him for a considerable time. It was from there that this same Arius, having written letters full of every kind of nonsense, containing the whole of his false doctrine, to Eusebius in Nicomedia—before he himself had yet arrived in Nicomedia—composed at that time nothing more than what he himself held, setting it down in these letters; of these, one that came into our own hands I have thought it necessary to append here, so that readers might see that we have said, and are saying, nothing against anyone out of slander.

To my most beloved lord, a man of God, faithful and orthodox, Eusebius: Arius, who is unjustly persecuted by Pope Alexander on account of the all-conquering truth, which you too champion, sends greeting in the Lord.

Since my father Ammonius has come to Nicomedia, it seemed both reasonable and fitting for me to greet you through him, and at the same time to remind you of that innate love and disposition which you hold toward the brethren for God's sake and for the sake of his Christ—because the bishop is grievously ravaging and persecuting us, and setting every evil in motion against us, so as to drive us out of the city as godless men, on the ground that we do not agree with him when he publicly declares:

'Always God, always the Son; together the Father, together the Son; the Son co-exists with God in an unbegotten manner; ever-begotten, an unbegotten-begotten one; God precedes the Son by no interval, whether in thought or in any indivisible moment; always God, always Son; the Son is from God himself.'

And these impieties we cannot even bear to hear, even should the heretics threaten us with ten thousand deaths.

But what do we say, think, have taught, and do teach? That the Son is not unbegotten, nor a part of the Unbegotten in any manner whatsoever, nor formed out of any pre-existing substrate; but that by will and counsel he came into being before times and before ages, full and perfect God, only-begotten, unchangeable; and before he was begotten—that is, created, or determined, or established—he did not exist.

But we are persecuted, because we said:

'The Son has a beginning, but God is without beginning.'

On this account we are persecuted, and also because we said:

we said this, namely that he is neither a part of God, nor formed out of any pre-existing substrate.

I pray that you fare well in the Lord, remembering our afflictions, truly my fellow-Lucianist, Eusebius.

But we have also appended another letter, sent from Nicomedia to the most holy Pope Alexander, ostensibly as a defense, yet in fact even worse than his previous venomous letter, filled without exception with blasphemous words, and sent by him to Alexandria.

To Alexander, our blessed Pope and bishop, the presbyters and deacons send greeting in the Lord.

Our faith, received from our forefathers—which we have also learned from you, blessed Pope—is this:

We know one God—alone unbegotten, alone eternal, alone without beginning, alone true, alone possessing immortality, alone wise, alone good, alone sovereign, alone judge, ruler, and administrator of all things, unchangeable and unalterable, righteous and good—the God of the Law, the Prophets, and the New Testament; this God begat an only-begotten Son before eternal times, through whom he also made the ages and everything else; having begotten him not in mere appearance, but in truth, and having given him subsistence by his own will, unchangeable and unalterable, a perfect creature of God, yet not as one of the ordinary creatures; a thing begotten, yet not as one of the ordinary begotten things; not, as Valentinus taught, that the offspring of the Father is an emanation; nor, as Mani introduced, that the offspring is a consubstantial part of the Father; nor, as Sabellius—who divides the Monad—asserted, a 'Son-Father'; nor, as Hieracas held, a lamp lit from a lamp, or as it were a single torch divided into two; nor one who existed previously and was afterward begotten or created anew into a son, as you yourself, blessed Pope, in the midst of the church and in council, have many times condemned those who introduced such teachings; but rather, as we say, a Son created by the will of God before times and before ages, who has received both life and being from the Father, together with his glories, the Father having given him subsistence together with himself.

For the Father, in giving him the inheritance of all things, did not thereby deprive himself of possessing the unbegotten nature in himself.

So there are three hypostases: Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.

And God, being the cause of all things, is alone without beginning; but the Son, timelessly begotten by the Father and created and founded before the ages, did not exist before he was begotten, but, timelessly begotten before all things, came into being alone by the Father alone.

For he is not eternal, nor co-eternal, nor co-unbegotten with the Father;

Nor does he have his being together with the Father, as some speak of correlatives, introducing two unbegotten first principles; but, as the monad and the first principle of all things, so God exists before all things.

Therefore he also exists before Christ, as we have learned from you, since you have preached this in the midst of the church.

Insofar, then, as he has his being from God, who also furnished him life and glories and all things, in this respect God is his beginning.

For he rules over him, as being his God and having being before him, because he is from him.

And if the phrase 'from the womb' and 'I came forth from the Father and have come' is understood by some as meaning a part of the same substance and as an emanation, then the Father will be composite and divisible and mutable, and, according to them, a body, and, as far as it depends on them, the incorporeal God will suffer the things that follow upon a body.

Arius, Aeithales, Achillas, Carpones, Sarmatas, Arius, presbyters;

deacons Euzoius, Lucius, Julius, Menas, Helladius, Gaius;

bishops Secundus of Pentapolis, Theonas the Libyan, Pistus;

whom the Arians appointed to Alexandria.

As matters were thus being stirred up, Alexander wrote to Constantine the emperor.

And the late emperor, of blessed memory, summoned Arius and certain bishops and examined them.

And he, having his fellow-initiates as his accomplices, at first denied it to the emperor's face, but inwardly kept working the conspiracy against the church.

So when the blessed Constantine had summoned him, being in part inspired even by the Holy Spirit, he addressed a word to him, saying: 'I have believed in God; if you have some hidden thing deceitfully, and deny it, the Master of all will very quickly convict you, especially concerning him by whom you swore.'

Whereupon he was also caught holding the same views, and was convicted to the emperor's face.

But again likewise he denied it, and many of his defenders interceded for him through Eusebius of Nicomedia.

But the emperor, stirred with zeal at the same time, wrote a great encyclical letter to the whole Roman world against Arius and his faith, full of all wisdom and true words;

and this letter is preserved even to this day among lovers of what is good, and it contains the following opening:

Constantine, the most august, to Arius and the Arians.

He is a wicked interpreter, in very truth the image and statue of the devil. Then, after other things, and after he had set forth against him a lengthy refutation from the divine oracles, he also quoted, out of lamentation, a line from Homer directed against him, which I have thought it necessary to set down here as well:

Come now, Ares—Arius: there is need of shields; do not do this, we implore you;

let, at any rate, the company of Aphrodite restrain you.

So then, when Arius wished to be received into communion in Constantinople, and Eusebius, who at that time had great influence with the emperor, was compelling this and harassing the bishop of Constantinople, while that bishop was unwilling to be joined with him or to come into communion with him, and struggled on and groaned, Eusebius said:

'If you are not willing of your own choice, then tomorrow, as the Lord's Day dawns, he will come in together with me — and what can you do about it?' But the most devout and God-fearing bishop Alexander — bishop of that same most excellent city, for he too bore the same name as the bishop in Alexandria — from the whole day after he heard this, and through the night, continued groaning and grieving, praying and beseeching God either to take his soul, so that he might not be defiled by communion with Arius, or else to do something extraordinary;

For when Arius, going out in the night, was pressed to relieve his needs, he went as far as the latrine, and was found sitting inside in that hidden place, burst open, and having expired.

And he who was thus overtaken in that foul-smelling place, paying his due end, just as he had also vomited forth his unclean false belief.

So when these things had come to pass, the emperor, taking counsel together with the church, because already many times many were at variance with one another and there were many schisms, convened an ecumenical council of three hundred and eighteen bishops, whose names are preserved even to this day;

and they anathematized the faith of Arius in the city of Nicaea, and confessed the orthodox and unswerving faith of the fathers, handed down from the apostles and the prophets.

And when the bishops had subscribed to this and had anathematized the Ariomaniac heresy, this is how it came about.

And at the same time, in that same council, they also established certain ecclesiastical canons;

and together they also determined concerning Pascha that there should be one union and unanimity in observing it on that holy, all-virtuous day of God, since it had been kept differently by various people;

for some observed it too early, others in the middle, and others celebrated it afterward.

and, simply put, there was much dissension at that time.

But God, for the sake of peace, brought about the correction of these matters through the late Constantine, of blessed memory.

So when Arius had been anathematized and these things had thus been accomplished, in that same year Alexander departed from life, and Achillas succeeded him.

And Theonas had also been appointed by the Melitians.

Then Achillas, who had served as bishop for three months, was succeeded by Athanasius of blessed memory, who was at that time a deacon of Alexander and had been sent by him to the imperial court (the comitatus), to whom Alexander, when about to die, had directed that the episcopate be given.

Now it is the custom in Alexandria for those who are to be appointed not to delay after the death of a bishop, but for it to take place at once, for the sake of peace, so that no frictions might arise among the people, with some wanting this man and others that man.

And because Athanasius was not present, they appointed Achillas out of necessity.

But the throne and the priesthood were being prepared for the one who was called by God and appointed by the late Alexander, of blessed memory.

So then, when Athanasius had come and been appointed — being exceedingly zealous concerning the faith and defending the church — since already assemblies were being held everywhere and the people were being torn away by those called Melitians, for the reason I have already set forth above in the account concerning Melitius, and since he wished to bring about the reunification of the church, he brought charges and threatened and admonished, and no one would submit.

Whence all the things stirred up against him were done and contrived on account of the exceeding, God-given zeal that was in him;

so that he even endured exiles, through the most unjust excommunication of the Arians backed by power.

But let what has been said concerning Athanasius, of blessed memory, suffice up to this point.

For the details concerning him were related most minutely above, in the account concerning Melitius.

This Arius, then, was inspired by diabolical activity, and, carried along shamelessly with an unbridled tongue, lifted up his tongue against his own Master, professedly wishing from the outset to interpret the saying found in Solomon, in his Proverbs: 'The Lord created me the beginning of his ways.'

'Before the age he founded me in the beginning, before he made the earth, and before he made the depths, before the springs of the waters came forth, before the mountains were settled, and before all the hills he begets me.' From this the introduction of his error arose for him, and neither he nor his disciples were ashamed to call a creature the one who created all things — the Word begotten from the Father timelessly and without beginning.

And thereafter, driving his own perverse opinion from this one saying into many evil paths, he himself and his successors after him attempted to blaspheme against the Son of God and against the Holy Spirit in countless ways and beyond.

And they dissolved, so to speak, the solid unity and the unanimity of the holy and orthodox faith and church;

not through their own power or wisdom;

for few are those who inclined toward them and were deceived, but many are those who insinuate themselves in through hypocrisy, and many also, though not actually holding these views, become their associates through compulsion.

And no one of these is the true cause, but first of all the lack of discernment among the faithful, and secondly the patronage of emperors.

The beginning was with the emperor Constantius, who in all other respects was mild and good, being the son of the great and perfect Constantine, the God-fearing one who kept the right faith unswervingly, and Constantius himself being God-fearing and good in many respects;

but in this one respect alone he erred, in that he did not walk according to the faith of his father — not from a cause originating in himself, but because of those who are to give account on the day of judgment, those called bishops only in appearance, who corrupted the true faith of God;

it being their doing, while the peoples still to this day in the open country, so many tens of thousands of them, endure affliction — even on behalf of the late Constantius himself, of blessed memory, who was led astray by them and, in ignorance, failed to recognize the faith of orthodoxy, and yielded to them as priests out of ignorance, not knowing the error of blindness and false belief that had arisen among them from the devil's contrivance.

For since he received his baptism from him, it was by means of such a pretext that these men were able to stand their ground.

For otherwise, they would long ago have been refuted even by women and little children — I do not speak of the more accomplished, who know the whole precision of true piety and right faith, but even by those who know but a part, whatever it might chance to be, of the truth — and, being refuted, they would have been driven out by the ancients as blasphemers of the Master, and, as it were, second slayers of the Lord, and deniers of the divinely inspired perfection of our Lord Jesus;

but through the emperor's patronage — which is their protection — they undertake all the evils that have happened, and still happen through them, in Alexandria and in Nicomedia, in Mesopotamia, and in Palestine, under the patronage of that same emperor now present.

From this saying, then, written in the book of Proverbs, that 'the Lord created me the beginning of his ways for his works,' all the rest is then devised by them;

and they gather together, out of the scriptures, whatever passages can be consonant with that saying and equally balanced with it and can harmonize with it, although neither that saying itself nor the other sayings say any such thing concerning the deity of the Son of God.

But then also whatever is similar to these — the passage written in the Apostle: 'Consider the high priest of our confession, who was faithful to him who made him'; and the passage written in the Gospel according to John: 'This is he of whom I said to you, He who comes after me has come before me'; and the passage written in the Acts: 'Let all the house of Israel know for certain that this Jesus whom you crucified, God has made both Lord and Christ'; and other passages like these — these are gathered for the sake of watchfulness, for the warding off of enemies.

For they are truly enemies and plotters.

For perhaps it is written concerning them and those like them: 'Let God arise, and let his enemies be scattered.'

And they seem also to be members of the household — but nothing is worse than enemies of one's own household, for 'a man's enemies are all the members of his own house.'

And this too, perhaps, is fulfilled concerning them.

For they leap up like rabid dogs to ward off enemies, and one says:

'What do you say concerning the Son of God?' For these are their devices for introducing their poison to the simple.

And what is there left after this, after saying 'Son of God'? O you who are wise in your own eyes, and who seem discerning and knowledgeable in your own sight!

What more could one add to the name of Jesus, except to say that he is a genuine Son, being from the Father and not altered? Then straightway they leap up mockingly, saying:

'How can he be from God?' But when they are asked whether—

'Is he not the Son?'—they confess him to be Son in name, but in power and in thought they deny it, wishing to call him altogether illegitimate and not genuine.