Arianism and the First Nicene Council – 7

Today’s installment concludes Arianism and the First Nicene Council,
the name of our combined selection by Johann L. Von Mosheim and Arthur P. Stanley. The concluding installment, is by Arthur P. Stanley.

If you have journeyed through all of the installments of this series, just one more to go and you will have completed seven thousand words from great works of history. Congratulations!

Previously in Arianism and the First Nicene Council.

Time: 325
Place: Nicaea (now Iznik in Turkey)

If any of the distant orientals had hoped to catch a sight of the bishop of the “Imperial City,” they were doomed to disappointment. Doubtless had he been there his position as prelate of the capital would have been, if not first, at least among the first. But Sylvester was now far advanced in years; and in his place came the two presbyters, who, according to the arrangement laid down by the Emperor, would have accompanied him had he been able to make the journey. In this simple deputation later writers have seen — and perhaps by a gradual process the connection might be traced — the first germ of legati a latere. But it must have been a very far-seeing eye which in Victor and Vincentius, the two unknown elders, representing their sick old bishop, could have detected the predecessors of Pandulf or of Wolsey. With them, however, was a man who, though now long forgotten, was then an object of deeper interest to Christendom than any bishop of Rome could at that time have been. It was the world-renowned Spaniard, as he is called by Eusebius; the magician from Spain, as he is called by Zosimus; Hosius, bishop of Cordova. He was the representative of the westernmost of European churches; but, as Eusebius of Cæsarea was the chief counsellor of the Emperor in the Greek Church, so was Hosius in the Latin, as shown in the darkest and most mysterious crisis of Constantine’s life.

It was probably by degrees that these different arrivals took place and the lapse of two or three weeks must be supposed for the preparatory arrangements before the council was formally opened. This interval was occupied by eager discussions on the questions likely to be debated. The first assemblage had been, as we have seen, within the walls of a public building. But the other preliminary meetings were held, as was natural, in the streets or colonnades in the open air. The novelty of the occasion had collected many strangers to the spot. Laymen, philosophers, heathen as well as Christians, might be seen joining in the arguments on either side, orthodox as well as heretical. There were also discussions among the orthodox themselves as to the principle on which the debates should be conducted. The enumeration of the characters just given shows that there were two very different elements in the assembly, such indeed as will always constitute the main difficulty in making any general statements of theology which shall be satisfactory at once to the few and to the many. A large number, perhaps the majority, consisted of rough, simple, almost illiterate men, like Spyridion the shepherd, Potammon the hermit, Acesius the puritan, who held their faith earnestly and sincerely but without conscious knowledge of the grounds on which they maintained it, incapable of arguing themselves or of entering into the arguments of their opponents. These men, when suddenly brought into collision with the acutest and most learned disputants of the age, naturally took up the position that the safest course was to hold by what had been handed down, without any further inquiry or explanation.

A story somewhat variously told is related of an encounter of one of these simple characters with the more philosophical combatants, which, in whatever way it be taken, well illustrates the mixed character of the council and the choice of the courses open before it. As Socrates describes the incident, the disputes were running so high, from the mere pleasure of argument, that there seemed likely to be no end to the controversy, when suddenly a simple-minded layman, who by his sightless eye or limping leg bore witness of his zeal for the Christian faith, stepped among them and abruptly said, “Christ and the apostles left us not a system of logic nor a vain deceit but a naked truth to be guided by faith and good works.” “There has,” says Bishop Kaye in recording the story, “been hardly any age of the Church in which its members have not required to be reminded of this lesson.” On the present occasion the bystanders, at least for the moment, were struck by its happy application. The disputants, after hearing this plain word of truth, took their differences more good-humoredly and the hubbub of controversy subsided.

The tradition grew in later times into the form which it bears in all the pictures of the council and which is commemorated in the services of the Greek Church. Aware of his incapacity of argument he took a brick and said: “You deny that three can be one. Look at this: it is one and yet it is composed of the three elements of fire, earth and water.” As he spoke the brick resolved itself into its component parts; the fire flew upward, the clay remained in his hand and the water fell to the ground. The philosopher, or, according to some accounts, Arius himself was so confounded as to declare himself converted on the spot.

These tales represent probably the feeling of a large portion of the council — the sound, unprofessional, untheological, lay element which lay at the basis of all their weakness and their strength. The historian Socrates is very anxious to prove that the assembly was not entirely composed of men of this kind and he points triumphantly to the presence of such men as Eusebius of Cæsarea. No proof was necessary. The subsequent history of the council itself is a sufficient indication that, however small a minority might be the dialecticians and theologians, yet they constitute the life and movement of the whole. Socrates dwells with evident pleasure on the circumstance that the ultimate decisions were only made after long inquiry and that everything was stirred to the bottom.

We may wish with Bishop Jeremy Taylor and Bishop Kaye that it had been otherwise. But there is a point of view in which we may fully sympathize with the course that was taken. All the elements which go to make up the interest of theology were involved: love of free inquiry, desire of precision in philosophical statements, research into Christian antiquity, comparison of the texts of Scripture one with another. Traditional and episcopal authority was regarded as insufficient for the establishment of the faith. The well-known clause of the Twenty-first Article does but express the principle of the Nicene Fathers themselves: “Things ordained by them as necessary for salvation have neither strength nor authority unless it may be declared that they are taken out of Holy Scripture.” The battle was fought and won by quotations, not from tradition but from the Old and New Testaments. The overruling sentiment was that even ancient opinions were not to be received without sifting and inquiry. The chief combatant and champion of the faith was not the bishop of Antioch or of Rome, nor the pope of Alexandria but the deacon Athanasius. The eager discussions of Nicæa present the first grand precedent for the duty of private judgment and the free, unrestrained exercise of biblical and historical criticism.

This ends our selections on Arianism and the First Nicene Council by two of the most important authorities of this topic. This blog features short and lengthy pieces on all aspects of our shared past. Here are selections from the great historians who may be forgotten (and whose work have fallen into public domain) as well as links to the most up-to-date developments in the field of history and of course, original material from yours truly, Jack Le Moine. – A little bit of everything historical is here.

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