Arians of the Fourth Century
Overview
John Henry Newman was on the translation team for the collected works of Athanasius that appear in volume four of Philip Schaff's Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers. Newman's familiarity with the writings of Athanasius gave him great insight into the historical context of the Arian Controversies. Newman's survey of Arianism during the fourth century begins with a systematic overview of each major Christian center or school of thought in regards to their treatment of major Arian doctrines. Newman addresses key evidence for an accepted Trinitarian theology prior to 300 A.D. and argues for a normalized Apostolic doctrine of the Trinity prior to the Council of Nicea.
- Extensive studies on Church history from an author burdened for the Church of Jesus Christ
- Logos edition provides integrated access to Scripture references, instantly linking to English and original text versions of the Bible
Top Highlights
“Sozomen expressly says, that Arius was the first to introduce into the Church the doctrine of the ἐξ οὐκ ὄντων, and the ἦν ποτὲ ὅτε οὐκ ἦν, the creation and non-eternity of the Son of God.” (Page 218)
“What I have said about the method of teaching adopted by the Alexandrian, and more or less by the other primitive Churches, amounts to this; that they on principle refrained from telling unbelievers all they believed themselves, and further, that they endeavoured to connect their own creed with theirs, whether Jewish or pagan, adopting their sentiments, and even language, as far as they lawfully could.” (Page 99)
“We shall have a more correct notion, then, of the heresy of Paulus, if we consider him as the founder of a school rather than of a sect, as encouraging in the Church the use of those disputations, and sceptical inquiries, which belonged to the heathen academies, and scattering up and down the seeds of errors, which sprang up and bore fruit in the generation after him.” (Page 6)
“The reasonings of the Arians, so to call them, had now conducted them thus far; to maintain that our Lord was a creature, advanced, after creation, to be a son of God. They did not shrink from the inference which these positions implied, viz. that he was tried as other moral agents, and adopted on being found worthy; that his holiness was not essential, but acquired.” (Page 226)
“‘(1) If the Father begat the Son, He who was begotten has a beginning of existence (ἀρχὴν ὑπάρξεως); (2) therefore once the Son did not exist (ἦν ὅτε οὐκ ἦν); (3) therefore He is formed from what once was not (ἐξ οὐκ ὄντων ἔχει τὴν ὑπόστασιν) 1.’” (Page 222)
The quality of his literary style is so successful that it succeeds in escaping definition. The quality of his logic is that of a long but passionate patience, which waits until he has fixed all corners of an iron trap. But the quality of his moral comment on the age remains what I have said: a protest of the rationality of religion as against the increasing irrationality of mere Victorian comfort and compromise.
The philosophical and theological thought and the spirituality of Cardinal Newman, so deeply rooted in and enriched by Sacred Scripture and the teachings of the Fathers, still retain their particular originality and value.
—Pope John Paul II
Newman placed the key in our hand to build historical thought into theology, or much more, he taught us to think historically in theology and so to recognize the identity of faith in all developments.
—Joseph Cardinal Ratzinger (Pope Benedict XVI)
- Title: Arians of the Fourth Century
- Author: John Henry Newman
- Publisher: J. G. and F. Rivington
- Publication Date: 1833
- Pages: 425
John Henry Newman (February 21, 1801–August 11, 1890) was a priest and Cardinal in the Roman Catholic Church. His father was a banker and his mother's family was French Huguenot. Newman was raised in a strict Calvinist home and received his primary education at the famous Ealing School. John Henry Newman graduated from Trinity College, Oxford in 1821 and was elected to a fellowship at Oriel College, Oxford in the following year. On June 13, 1824 he was ordained into the Anglican priesthood. From the early 1830's until 1845, Newman was a leading figure in the Oxford Movement, a group of Anglican priests and scholars from Oxford who sought to restore the rites of the Anglican church to their Apostolic roots in the Early Church. Between 1842 and 1845, during a time of solitude and the completion of Essay on the Development of Christian Doctrine, Newman underwent a process conversion to Roman Catholicism. Newman also published the Oxford Conservative Journal during this time period as a platform for retracting any negative remarks he previously assailed towards the Roman Church.
He was officially received into the Catholic Church on October 9, 1845. The conversion of John Henry Newman to Catholicism was the result of a life's long struggle to reconcile the historic faith handed down from the Apostles with his own Anglican tradition. Frustrated with the errors inherent in both Protestantism and Roman Catholicism, Newman abandoned his search for the via media (or, middle way) of Anglicanism and converted to the Roman Catholic Church. In 1848, Newman founded the Birmingham Oratory at Maryvale and began ministering to the Catholic population of the city. In 1851, the Bishops of Ireland elected to start a Catholic university in Dublin and they appointed Newman to be the founder and first rector of the institution. Maintaining his ministry at the Birmingham Oratory, Newman established what would become University College, Dublin. His Idea of a University was prepared for founding faculty of the university at Dublin. On May 12, 1879 Pope Leo XIII appointed Newman to the college of Cardinals. John Henry Cardinal Newman died on August 11, 1890. Cardinal Newman is currently under consideration by the Vatican for sainthood.