Adolf Harnack · 6 of 19

2. To the Death of Constantius.

2. TO THE DEATH OF CONSTANTIUS.

Never again in the history of the Church has there been a victory so complete and so quickly secured as that at Nicæa, and no other decision of the Church approaches it in importance. The victors had the feeling that they had set up for all ages a “warning notice against all heresies” (στηλογραφία κατὰ πασῶν αἱρέσεων), and this estimate of the victory has continued to be the prevailing one in the Church. The grand innovation, the elevation of two unbiblical expressions to the rank of catchwords of the Catholic Faith, insured the unique nature of this Faith. At bottom not only was Arianism rejected, but also Origenism; for the exclusive Ὁμοούσιος separated the Logos from all spiritual creatures and seemed thus to do away with scientific cosmology in every form.

But it was just because of this that the strife now began. The Nicene Creed effected in the East a unprecedented concord, but this was amongst its opponents, while its friends, on the other hand, felt no genuine enthusiasm for its subtle formulae. The schismatic Meletians of Egypt made common cause with the Arians and Origenists; those of the bishops who were indifferent or stupid were induced to oppose it by the bugbear of Sabellianism and by the unbiblical shape in which the new faith was formulated. Society was still for the most part , and this heathen society openly sided with the anti-Nicenes; the Jews too, who were still influential, ranged themselves on this side. The clever sophist Asterius was able, as “travelling professor”, to interest large numbers in “the one Unbegotten”. But, above all, the two Eusebiuses sought again to be masters of the situation. The one necessarily strove in the first instance to regain his seat, the other to make the weight of his untouched personal authority once more felt in theology also. What their mutual relationship was is not clear; in any case they marched separately and struck unitedly. The Nicomedian always thought first of himself and then of his cause; the Bishop of Cæsarea saw science and theology disappear in the movement which received its impulse from Alexandria. Both, however, had made up their minds not to part company with the Emperor if they could not otherwise succeed in managing him. The great mass of the bishops always were, in accordance with this policy, purely “imperial”. With regard to the strict Arians, however, it must be admitted to their credit that during the whole controversy they were as little willing to accept as authoritative the decisions of the Emperors in matters of faith as were Athanasius, Hilary, and Lucifer.

When Constantine interfered in the great controversy, he had only just come to the East. He was under the guidance of Western bishops, and it was Western Christianity alone with which he had hitherto been acquainted. And so after an abortive attempt to compose the controversy, he had accomplished the “work of peace” at Nicæa in accordance with Western views. But already during the years which immediately followed he must have learned that the basis upon which he had reared it was too narrow, that, above all, it did not meet the requirements of the “common sense” of the East. As a politician he was prudent enough not to take any step backward, but, on the other hand, as a politician he knew that every law gets its meaning quite as much from the method in which it is carried out as from the letter of it. Feeling this—to which has to be added the presence of Arian influences at the Court—he had since about the year 328 resolved, under cover of the Nicene Creed, to reinstate the broader doctrinal system of older days whose power he had first got to know in Asia, in order to preserve the unity of the Church which was endangered. But Constantine did not get the length of doing anything definite and conclusive. He merely favoured the anti-Nicene coalition to such an extent that he left to his sons a ruptured Church in place of a united one. The anti-Nicene coalition, however, had already become during the last years of Constantine’s life an anti-Athanasian one. On the eighth of June, 328, Athanasius, not without opposition on the part of the Egyptian bishops, had mounted the Episcopal throne in Alexandria. The tactics of the coalition were directed first of all towards the removal of the main defenders of the Nicene faith, and it was soon recognised that the youthful bishop of Alexandria was the most dangerous of these. Intrigues and slanders of the lowest kind now began to come into play, and the conflict was carried on sometimes by means of moral charges of the worst kind, and sometimes by means of political calumnies. The easily excited masses were made fanatical by the coarse abuse and execrations of the opponents, and the language of hate which hitherto had been bestowed on heathen, Jews, and heretics, filled the churches. The catchwords of the doctrinal formula, which were unintelligible to the laity and indeed even to most of the bishops themselves, were set up as standards, and the more successful they were in keeping up the agitation the more surely did the pious-minded turn away from them and sought satisfaction in asceticism and polytheism in a Christian garb. In every diocese, however, personal interests, struggles about sees and influence, were mixed up with the controversy, and this was the case in the West too, especially in Rome, as we may gather from the events of the year 366. Thus a series of bloody town-revolutions accompanied the movement.

In the midst of all this Athanasius alone in the East stood like a rock in the sea. If we measure him by the standard of his time we can discover nothing ignoble or mean about him. The favourite charge of hierarchical imperiousness has something naïve about it. His stern procedure in reference to the Meletians was a necessity, and an energetic bishop who had to represent a great cause could not be anything else but imperious. It is certainly undeniable that for years he was formally in the wrong, inasmuch as he would not admit the validity of his deposition. He regarded it as the task committed to him, to rule Egypt, to regulate the Church of the East in accordance with the standard of the true faith, and to ward off any interference on the part of the State. He was a Pope, as great and as powerful a one as there ever has been.

When the sons of Constantine entered upon the inheritance of their father, the heads of the Nicene party in the East had been deposed or exiled; Arius, however, was dead. The exiled bishops in accordance with a resolution come to in common by the Emperors, were free to return as a body. This was the case in the latter part of the autumn of 337. But as soon as Constantius became master in his own domain he continued the policy of his father. He wished to rule the Church as the latter had done; he perceived that this was possible in the East only if the Nicene innovation, or at least the exclusive application of it, were got rid of, and he did not feel himself bound to the Nicene Creed as his father had done. One cannot but admit that the youthful monarch shewed statesmanlike insight and acted with energy, and with all his devotion to the Church he never allowed churchmen to rule as his brother did. He had not, however, the patience and moderation of his father, and though he had indeed inherited from the latter the gift of ruling, he had not got from him the art of managing men by gentle force. The brutal trait which Constantine knew how to keep in check in himself, appeared in an undisguised fashion in his son, and the development of the Emperor into an Oriental despot advanced a stage further in Constantius. First of all, Paul of Constantinople was deposed for the second time; Eusebius of Nicomedia at last secured the seat he had so long striven after. Eusebius of Cæsarea died, and his place was taken by a man deserving of little respect, Acacius, a friend of the Arians. The tumults which took place in Egypt after the return of Athanasius made it easier for his enemies, who regarded him as deposed and once more pronounced the sentence of deposition at a Synod in Antioch, to move the Emperor to proceed against him. His energetic conduct in his diocese and the violence of his Egyptian friends (Apol. c. Arian. 3-19) aggravated the situation. Constantius listened to the Eusebians, but did not sanction the choice of Bishop Pistus whom they had set apart for Alexandria. He decreed the deposition of Athanasius, and sent as bishop to Alexandria, a certain Gregory, a Cappadocian who had nothing to commend him save the imperial favour. Athanasius anticipated a violent expulsion by leaving Alexandria—in the spring of 339. He betook himself to Rome, leaving his diocese behind him in a state of wild uproar.

The Eusebians were now masters of the situation, but just because of this they had a difficult task to perform. What had now to be done was to get the Nicene Creed actually out of the way, or to render it ineffective by means of a new formula. This could only be done in conjunction with the West, and it would have to be done in such a way that they should neither seem to be giving the lie to their own vote in Nicæa—and therefore they would have to make it appear that they were attacking only the form and not the contents of the confession—nor seem to the Church in the West to be proclaiming a new faith. It is in the light of these facts that we are to regard the symbols of Antioch and the negotiations with Julius of Rome. They found themselves shut up in a position from which they could not escape without a certain amount of evasion. The faith of Athanasius must not be attacked any more than that of the Westerns. The condemnation of the great bishop had thus always throughout to be based on personal accusations. As regards the doctrinal question, the whole stress had to be laid on getting the Homousios put quietly aside, on the ground that it was unbiblical and gave an inlet to Sabellianism. In this respect the doctrine of Marcellus of Ancyra was very welcome to the Eusebians, for they sought, not without justice, to shew from it to what destructive results a theology which based itself on the Homousios must lead. But the Roman bishop was not to be corrupted, he did not even sacrifice Marcellus; and the creeds of Antioch which were not actually heterodox, but which were not sincere, did not at all meet with his approval. He did not concern himself with the attempt, justifiable from the point of view of the Orientals and of Constantius, to create for the East a doctrinal form of expression which was more in accordance with the of the majority. The most important result of the operations of the Eusebians at Antioch, and the one which was of the greatest consequence, was that they had to bring themselves to renounce Arianism in order to gain over the West. Arianism was now condemned on all sides in the Church; nevertheless the Eusebians did not attain their aim.

During the following years Constantius’ hands were tied by the Persian war, and he was forced to keep on good terms with his brother so as to avoid having trouble on the western boundary of his kingdom also. At the same time, just after the death of Eusebius of Nicomedia, which took place in the autumn of 342, the party amongst the conservatives of the East who, partly no doubt for political reasons, were actually set on coming to an agreement with the West, gained the lead. A general Council which was summoned by Constans to meet at Sardica in the summer of 343 and was approved of by Constantius, was to restore the unity of the Church. But the Western bishops, about a hundred in number, rejected the preliminary demand of the Eastern bishops for the deposition of Athanasius and Marcellus, both of whom were present in Sardica; pronounced sentence of deposition upon the leaders of the Orientals after the exodus of the latter; after an investigation declared the bishops attacked to be innocent, that is to say, orthodox; avowed their belief in the Nicene Creed, and under the guidance of Hosius took up the most rigid attitude possible on the doctrinal question. In opposition to this the bishops, who met together in the neighbouring Philippopolis, framed a circular letter, dated from Sardica, in which they set forth the illegality of the procedure of their opponents, and confessed the faith in terms essentially identical with those of the fourth formula of Antioch.

The endeavours of Constantius to give efficacy to the resolutions of his bishops fell through; in fact, the shameless attempt to set a trap for the two Western bishops sent as a deputation from Sardica to Constantius and provided with a letter of introduction from Constans, and who were to try and effect the recall of the banished bishops, turned out to their advantage. Constantius, so at least it seems, had not for a while any real confidence in his own party; or was it that he was afraid to rouse his brother? In a long-winded formula drawn up at Antioch in the summer of 344 they once more sought to hint to the West their orthodoxy and to suggest the minimum of their demands. The Church in the West, it is true, rejected at both the Councils held at Milan in the years 345 and 347, the teaching of Photinus of Sirmium, who, in a surprising fashion, had developed an Adoptian doctrinal system out of the doctrine of Marcellus, but otherwise remained firm; and the ship of the Eusebians already appeared to be in so great danger that its two chief pilots, Ursacius and Valens, preferred to go over to the opposite party and to make their peace with Athanasius. Constantius, very sorely pressed by the Persians, sought to have peace in the Church at any price and even granted the prayer of his brother’s protégé, Athanasius, and allowed him to return to Alexandria (in October 346), where Gregory meanwhile had died (in June 345). The bishop got an enthusiastic welcome in his city. The protest of the Eastern Council at Sirmium—the first Council of Sirmium—had no effect. A large number of the Eastern bishops were themselves tired of the controversy, and it almost looked as if the refusal of the West to condemn Marcellus together with the word ὁμοούσιος, now virtually constituted the only stone of offence.

But the death of Constans in 350 and the overthrow of the usurper Magnentius in 353 changed everything. If in these last years Constantius had been compelled by the necessities of the situation to submit to the bishops, his own subjects, who had ruled his deceased brother, now that he was sole he was more than ever resolved to govern the Church and to pay back the humiliations which he had undergone. Already in the year 351 the Easterns had at Sirmium—the second Council—again agreed upon taking common action, and Ursacius and Valens promptly rejoined them. The great thing now was to humiliate the stubborn West. Constantius set about the task with wisdom, but what he wanted done he carried out by the sheer force of terror. He demanded only the condemnation of Athanasius, his mortal enemy, as a rebel, and purposely put the doctrinal question in the background. He forced the Western bishops, at Arles in 353 and at Milan in 355, to agree to this, by terrorising the Councils. The moral overthrow of the Westerns was scarcely less complete than that of the Easterns at Nicæa. Though the great majority were unaware of the struggle and were not forced to adopt a new confessional formula, still the fact could not be concealed from those who better understood the state of things, that the projected condemnation of Athanasius meant something more than a personal question. The few bishops who refused were deposed and exiled. The order for his deposition was communicated to Athanasius in February 356. Yielding only to force, he made his escape into the desert where the Emperor could not reach him. Egypt was in a state of rebellion, but the revolt was put down by the Emperor with blood. The unity of the Church was restored; above all, it was once more brought under the imperial sway. And now, forsooth, the orthodox bishops who had formerly secured so much by the help of Constans began to recollect that the Emperor and the State ought not to meddle with religion. Constantius became “Antichrist” for those who would have lauded him as they had his father and his brother, if he had given them the help of his arm.

But the political victory of the Eastern bishops directly led to their disunion; for it was only under the tyranny of the West and in the fight against Athanasius and the word “ὁμοούσιος” that they had become united. Above all, Arianism in its rigid, aggressive form again made its appearance. Aëtius and Eunomius, two theologians of spirit who had been trained in the Aristotelian dialectic, and were opponents of Platonic speculation, expressed its tenets in the plainest possible way, would have nothing to do with any mediation, and had no scruple in openly proclaiming the of religion into morality and syllogistic reasoning. The formula which they and their followers, Aëtians, Eunomians, Exukontians, Heterousiasts, Anomœans, defended, ran thus: “ἑτερότης κατ᾽ οὐσίαν”, “ἀνόμοιος καὶ κατὰ πάντα καὶ κατ᾽ οὐσίαν” (“different in substance”, “unlike in everything and also in substance”). If they allowed that the Son perfectly knows the Father, this was not in any way a concession, but an expression of the thought that there is no kind of mystery about the Godhead, which on the contrary can be perfectly known by every rightly instructed man. And so too the statement that the Logos had his superior dignity from the date of his creation, and did not first get it by being tested, was not intended at all as a weakening of the Arian dogma, but as an expression of the fact that God the Creator has assigned its limit to every being. The great majority of the Eastern bishops, for whom the Origenistic formula in very varied combinations were authoritative, were opposed to this party. The old watchword, however, “the unchangeable image”, which was capable of different interpretations, now received in opposition to Arianism, in its strict form, and on the basis of the formula of Antioch, more and more a precise signification as implying that the Son is of like nature with the Father in respect of substance also, and not only in respect of will (ὅμοιος κατὰ πὰντα καὶ κατὰ τὴν οὐσίαν), and that his begetting is not an act at all identical with creation. The likeness of the qualities of Son and Father was more and more recognised here; on the other hand, the substantial unity was disallowed, so as to avoid getting on the track of Marcellus; i.e., these theologians did not, like Athanasius, advance from the unity to the mystery of the duality, but, on the contrary, still started from the duality and sought to reach the unity by making Father and Son perfectly co-ordinate. They therefore still had a Θεὸς δεύτερος, and in accordance with this excluded the idea of full community of substance. The leaders of these Homoiousians, also called semi-Arians, were George of Laodicea, Eustathius of Sebaste, Eusebius of Emesa, Basilius of Ancyra, and others.

The point of supreme importance with the Emperor necessarily was to maintain intact the unity between those who up till now had been united, but this was all the more difficult as the Homoiousians more and more developed their doctrinal system in such a way that their ideas came to have weight even with those Westerns who lingered in exile in the East and whose theology was on Nicene lines. Some bishops who were devoted to Constantius and who represented simply and solely the interests of the Emperor and of the Empire, now sought by means of a formula of the most indefinite possible character to unite Arians and semi-Arians. These were Ursacius, Valens, Acacius of Cæsarea, and Eudoxius of Antioch. If up till 356 the Nicene Creed had, strictly speaking, been merely evaded, now at last a Confession was to be openly brought forward in direct opposition to the Nicene Creed. Simple likeness of nature was to be the dogmatic catchword, all more definite characterisations being omitted, and in support of this, appeal was made to the insoluble mystery presented by the Holy Scriptures (ὅμοιος κατὰ τὰς γραφάς—like according to the Scriptures). This ingenious formula, along with which, it is true, was a statement expressly emphasising the subordination, left it free to every one to have what ideas he chose regarding the extent of the qualities of Father and Son, which were thus declared to be of like kind. The relative ὅμοιος did not necessarily exclude the relative ἀνόμοιος, but neither did it exclude the ὁμοιούσιος. Already at the third Council of Sirmium (357), after Constantius, on a visit to Rome, had overthrown his enemies, a formula was set forth by the Western bishops of as conciliatory a character so far as Arianism was concerned as could possibly be conceived. It was proclaimed in presence of the Emperor, who under the influence of his consort came more and more to have Arian sympathies. This is the second Sirmian formula. But the bishops assembled at Ancyra did not acquiesce in the move towards the Left (358). What a change! Easterns now defended purity of doctrine against Arianising Westerns! A deputation from this Council succeeded in paralysing the influence of the Arians with Constantius, and in asserting at the Fourth Council of Sirmium, in 358, their fundamental principles to which the Emperor lent the weight of his authority. But the triumph of the Homoiousians led by Basilius Ancyranus was of short duration. The Emperor saw that the Church could not be delivered up either to Nicæans, to semi-Arians, or to Arians. The alliance between the two first mentioned, which was so zealously pushed on by Hilary, was not yet perfect. A grand Council was to declare the imperial will, and Homoiousians and Arians vied with each other in their efforts to get influencing it. The Homœans alone, however, both in their character as leaders and as led, concurred with the Emperor’s views. They were represented by Ursacius, Valens, Marcus of Arethusa, Auxentius of Milan, and Germinius of Sirmium. The fourth Sirmian formula (359), an imperial cabinet-edict and a political masterpiece, was intended to embody what was to be laid before the Council. The latter was summoned to meet at Rimini and Seleucia because the circumstances in the East and West respectively differed so very much. In May 359 more than four hundred Western bishops assembled at Rimini. They were instructed to treat only of matters relating to the Faith and not to leave the Council till the unity aimed at had been attained. But the Emperor’s confidants failed to induce the great majority of the members to accept the Sirmian formula. The bishops, on the contrary, took their stand on the basis of the Nicene Creed which had been abandoned during these last years, rejected Arianism and declared its friends deposed. But when they sought by means of a Deputation to get the Emperor to give his sanction to their decisions, they did not get a hearing. The Deputation was not admitted to the Emperor’s presence, was at first detained and then conducted to Nice in Thrace, where the members at last shewed themselves docile enough to sign a formula—the formula of Nice—which was undoubtedly essentially identical with the Confession which the Westerns had themselves drawn up two years earlier at Sirmium, at the third Synod in 357—(“the Son is like the Father [κατὰ πάντα is omitted] according to the Scriptures”). Armed with this document Ursacius and Valens made their way to Rimini, taking the deputies with them, and by means of threats and persuasions finally induced the Assembly there to accept the formula into which one could indeed read the Homoiousia, but not the Homousia. In the autumn of 359 the Eastern Synod met at Seleucia. The Homoiousians, with whom some Niceans already made common cause, had the main say. Still the minority led by Acacius and Eudoxius, which defended the Sirmian formula and clung to the likeness while limiting it, however, to the will, was not an insignificant one. There was an open rupture in the Synod. The majority finally deposed the heads of the opposition-party. But as regards the East as well, the decision lay with the court. The Emperor, importuned on all sides, had resolved to abandon the strict Arians, and accordingly Aëtius was banished and his Homœan friends had to leave him, but he was also determined to dictate the formula of Nice to the Easterns too. Their representatives finally condescended to recognise the formula, and this event was announced at the Council of Constantinople in 360, and the Homœan Confession was once more formulated. Although the new Imperial Confession involved the exclusion of the extreme Left, this did not constitute its peculiar significance. Had it actually been what it appeared to be, a formula of union for all who rejected the unlikeness, it would not have been something to be condemned, from the standpoint of the State at all events. But in the following year it was recklessly used as a weapon against the Homoiousians. They had to vacate all positions of influence, and by way of making up for what had been done to the one Aëtius, who had been sacrificed, his numerous friends were installed as bishops. Under cover of the “likeness in nature” a mild form of Arianism was actually established in the Church, modified chiefly only by the absence of principle. In Gaul alone did the orthodox bishops once more bestir themselves after Julian had in January 360 been proclaimed Augustus at Paris. Constantius died in November 361, during the campaign against the rebels.