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Semi-Arianism. When Constans died (350), and his Semi-Arian brother was left supreme, the persecution of Athanasius redoubled in violence. By a series of intrigues the Western bishops were persuaded to cast him off at Arles, Milan, Ariminum.
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Semi-Arianism When Constans died (350), and his Semi-Arian brother was left supreme, the persecution of Athanasius redoubled in violence. • By a series of intrigues the Western bishops were persuaded to cast him off at Arles, Milan, Ariminum. It was concerning this last Council of Ariminum (359) that St. Jerome wrote, "the whole world groaned and marveled to find itself Arian". • The Latin bishops were driven by threats and chicanery to sign concessions which at no time represented their genuine views. • Councils were so frequent that their dates are still matter of controversy. Personal issues disguised the dogmatic importance of a struggle which had gone on for thirty years.
Semi-Arianism Homoeans & Homoiousians The cause of this groaning was to be found in the intrigues of the Homoeans, Valens in the West, Eudoxius and Acacius in the East. • Nicaea was chosen by Constantius for the venue of the great Synod. • But Basil, then in high favour, suggested Nicomedia, and there the bishops were summoned. • Before they could meet, the city was destroyed by an earthquake, and the venue was changed to Nicaea again.
Semi-Arianism Homoeans & Homoiousians Now the Homoeans saw their opportunity. Their one chance of escaping disaster was in the principle `divide et impera.' • The Council was divided into two: • the Westerns were to meet at Ariminum, • the Easterns at Seleucia in Cilicia, a place with nothing to recommend it excepting the presence of a strong military force. Hence also the conference of Homoecan and Semi-Arian bishops at Sirmium, who drew up in the presence of Constantius, on Whitsun-Eve, the famous `dated' or `third Sirmian' Creed.
Semi-Arianism Homoeans & Homoiousians The Pope of the day, Liberius, brave at first, undoubtedly orthodox, was torn from his see and banished to the dreary solitude of Thrace • signed a creed, in tone Semi-Arian (compiled chiefly from one of Sirmium), • renounced Athanasius • but made a stand against the so-called "Homoean" formulae of Ariminum. • This new party was led by Acacius of Caesarea, an aspiring churchman who maintained that he, and not St. Cyril of Jerusalem, was metropolitan over Palestine. The Homoeans, a sort of Protestants would have no terms employed which were not found in Scripture, and thus evaded signing the "Consubstantial".
Semi-Arianism Homoeans & Homoiousians Acacius of Caesarea One of the most influential bishops in the large middle party which opposed the Nicene Creed during the Arian controversy. He was the disciple of Eusebius, and his successor in the bishopric of Csesarea. • He took part in the Eusebian synod at Antioch in the spring of 341, and in another at Philippopolis in 343. • By the orthodox council of Sardica in the same year he was regarded as one of the heads of the opposing party, and was threatened with deposition. • Common opposition to the Nicene doctrine held the party together until about 356. On the death of Maximus of Jerusalem (350 or 351), Acacius helped to get the vacant see for Cyril, who belonged rather to the opposite wing of the party, the later Homoiousians.
Semi-Arianism Homoeans & Homoiousians He fell out with Cyril and procured his deposition (357 or 358) This was due partly to jealousy between the two sees, partly to the changed attitude of parties under Constantius (351-361). • The two wings fell apart, and Acacius became the leader of the court party, the later Homoians, in the East. • In 355 he seems to have been one of the few Easterns who represented the emperor at the Council of Milan • According to Jerome, his influence with Constantius was so great that he had much to do with setting up Felix as pope in the place of the banished Liberius. After the so-called Second Council of Sirmium (357) had avoided the controverted terms altogether and said nothing about the ousia ("substance"), it was undoubtedly Acacius who at the Council of Antioch (358) influenced Eudoxius to accept this compromise for the East.
Semi-Arianism Homoeans & Homoiousians At the Synod of Seleucia (359) he took a prominent part. • In obvious concert with the imperial delegates, he seemed to favor what Ursacius and Valens tried to carry in the Synod of Rimini, the acceptance of the so-called third Sirmian formula ("similar [homoios] according to the Scriptures . . . similar in all things"). • He and his party, it is true, expressly condemned the anomoios ("dissimilar") theory, but they omitted the "in all things," which agreed as little with the real views of Acacius as with those of the Western Homoians. • The council ended in a schism; the Homoiousian majority, in a separate session, deposed Acacius and other leading Homoians. At the discussions in Constantinople which continued those of Seleucia, the imperial wishes, represented by Acacius, Ursacius, and Valens, prevailed.
Semi-Arianism Homoeans & Homoiousians He was able to celebrate his victory the next year at the Council of Constantinople, and commanded the situation in the East. • With the death of Constantius the day of this imperial orthodoxy was done • Under Jovian (363-364) Acacius succeeded in accepting the Nicene orthodoxy which was now that of the court. His name appears among the signatures of those who, at the Synod of Antioch presided over by Meletius (363), accepted the Nicene formula in the sense of homoios kat' ousian ("similar as to substance").
Semi-Arianism Homoeans & Homoiousians With the accession of the Arian Valens (364), the situation changed once more; and apparently Acacius changed with it. • He and his adherents were deposed by the Homoiousian Synod of Lampsacus (365), after which he is heard of no more; probably he soon died. Along with Eunomius and Aetius, Acacius may be said to have given dialectic completeness to Arianism. • In their polemics against the Nicene Symbol they laid chief stress on the fact that the Father was "unbegotten," depending for his being neither upon himself nor another, which could not be said of the Son. • They insisted also upon the complete comprehensibility of God.
Semi-Arianism Anomoeans A more extreme set following Aetius, were directed by Eunomius, bishop of Cyzicus (c.361) • His followers were called Eunomians or Anomoeans [Gr.,=unlike], from their denial of any substantial similarity between God the Father and God the Son. • Using Platonic arguments, Eunomius taught that by definition God was unbegotten and that the Son, begotten of the Father, could not therefore be equal to the Father. His learning and sophistication won many admirers. • They declared the Son to be "unlike" the Father, and made themselves powerful in the last years of Constantius within the palace. • The doctrine of Sabellius that there was but one person in the Trinity had infected their baptismal form. They began to baptize "in the death of Christ".
Semi-Arianism Anomoeans The Paulianists and Photinians two sects that sprang from Paul of Samosata, who denied Christ’s Divinity, likewise conferred invalid baptism. • Pope Innocent I (Ad. Episc. Maced., vi) declared that these sectaries did not distinguish the Persons of the Trinity when baptizing. • The Council of Nicæa (can. xix) ordered the rebaptism of Paulianists, • The Council of Aries (can. xvi and xvii) decreed the same for both Paulianists and Photinians. St. Basil the Great refuted Eunomius in his doctrinal work Against Eunomius (364). The Eunomians were later condemned at the First Council of Constantinople.
Arianism George of Cappadocia persecuted the Alexandrian Catholics. Athanasius retired into the desert among the solitaries. Hosius had been compelled by torture to subscribe a fashionable creed. George of Cappadocia, the turbulent Arian Bishop of Alexandria, was torn to pieces by the populace in 360, and revered as a saint by the opponents of Athanasius When the vacillating Emperor died (361), Julian, known as the Apostate, suffered all alike to return home who had been exiled on account of religion.
Arianism A momentous gathering, over which Athanasius presided, in 362, at Alexandria, united the orthodox Semi-Arians with himself and the West. • Four years afterwards fifty-nine Macedonian, i.e., hitherto anti-Nicene, prelates gave in their submission to Pope Liberius. Though the Emperor Valens, a fierce heretic, still laid the Church waste, the long battle was now turning decidedly in favor of Catholic tradition.
Apollinarianism The heresy of Apollinarianism is named after Apollinarius, bishop of Antioch 360AD. • His theory that Christ had no human soul or spirit, but a divine one, began to circulate among the Christian thinkers. • It was an attempt by Appolinarius to reason that Jesus was free of sin and thus purely divine. This led to a series of edicts by church councils which condemned Apollinarianism as heresy.
Apollinarianism It was decided that Apollinarius' idea of a Christ without a human soul, made Christ’s suffering meaningless, turned his prayers into a charade. • Only if Christ also possessed a human soul and spirit could he have suffered temptation, etc. Apollinarianism was not at all of the threat to traditional Christianity as Arianism was. The many edicts against it suppressed it early on and it merely survived until the AD 420's.
