By drawing more specifically from the works of Arius, Asterius, and Eusebius, a more detailed look at the doctrines of Arianism can be pieced together. Before proceeding, however, one more note of caution is in order. As mentioned above, the literary sources of Arianism are few and far between, and therefore may not completely or accurately reflect Arian doctrine. What must also be taken into consideration, however, is the fact that not all Arian writers necessarily agreed with each other on every "fundamental theological and Christological proposition."[17] Nevertheless, in following the works of Hanson, the unique doctrines of Arianism can, with some degree of certainty, be summed up in four points.

1. God Seperate from the World

First of all, one of Arius' central doctrines revolved around the fact that God was completely and utterly separate from the world. So far removed and unapproachable, in fact, that He could not directly create the matter of the universe Himself. Demophilius, the last Arian Archbishop of Constantinople, commented that "[God] would have been under the necessity of either making everything gods to be worthy of Him, or else everything would have disintegrated by contact with Him."[18] Therefore it was necessary for God to create the World through an intermediary, namely the Son. Once this mediating Being came into existence, the rest could be created.[19] Soteriologically, it would be incorrect, however, to say that the Arians believed in a demi-God mediator between man and God. Rather, as according to 1 Timothy 2:5, the mediator between God and man was the man Jesus Christ. The Orthodox questioned first of all the need for God to create an intermediary in creation. Athanasius rather mockingly stated that God was neither so spent from creating the Son that he needed further assistance to create the rest of creation, nor was he so vane as to not merely condescend himself rather than send an aide. Second of all, Athanasius questioned whether this Arian doctrine of God really allowed for the creation of a creaturely Son. If all of creation could not stand the direct presence of God, how could a single being? As well, how could a creature bring into creation other creatures?[20]

2. The Son is Created 'Ex Nihilo'

Second of all, since the Son had a beginning and was created by the Father, he must have been created out of nothing like the rest of creation. As scandalous as this may have sounded to Arius' opponents, Arius was firm in his declaration that the Son "having not existed, attained existence by the Father's will."[21] The Logos was the 'son' of God, not in the sense of biological generation, but in the extended meaning of the word in designation of all believers, or adoptive sons of God. The term has this meaning in Arian proof texts such as Deuteronomy 14:1, "You are children of the Lord your God," and John 1:12, "But to all who received [the Son], who believe in his name, he gave power to become children of God." The relationship between the redeemer and God was "by participation in the Spirit," "by a participation of grace," "a certain grace and habit of virtue," "by adoption," "by free gift of God," "named Word and Son according to grace," "grace by acquisition," "grace as an accident," and so on. [22]

Indeed, it seems that the Arians believed that there were many different Words and Powers and Wisdoms of God, and that Christ was in no sense the only one. For the Arians to maintain that the Son was the true Word or Wisdom of God would have been to capitulate to the entire Alexandrian substantialist viewpoint. If Christ was the true Word of God, then he would necessarily share in the divine essence. The true or essential Word, Power, and Wisdom of God, according to the Arians, was to be found completely and solely within the nature of God alone. These were, in other words, God's intrinsic attributes that He could give to no other. The Son as Word and Wisdom could only be described as a derivative of the eternal divine Word and Wisdom.

Having the distinct honor of being directly created by the Father (while the rest of creation was created 'through' the Son), Christ was, however, not completely similar to the other creatures. Arius himself describes the Son as being the "only-begotten God, and he is different from any other."[23] Beyond his ontological position within creation, Christ's unwavering obedience, for the Arians, also placed him in a position far above the other creatures. While Christ was in many regards like the other "brothers" who are "partakers in the heavenly calling," to no other creature were the same tittles applied.[24]

Yet, at the heart of the Arian view of Christ was the image of an obedient servant. The term 'son' and 'servant' were often times interchangeable in Arian biblical exegesis. It is not so much in Arianism that the Son's will is that of the Father's, but rather that the Son chose to follow the Father's will, and in doing so was obedient throughout his life, even (and especially) unto his death. This was in precise opposition to the Orthodox view of the Father and Son as homoousius . In orthodox thought, the Son can do no other than the will of the Father, since in essence they are the same. As Robert Gregg notes: "as the very hypostasis of the Father's will, there can be no split in [the Son] between hearing and doing."[25]

The essential difference between the Arian and the Orthodox viewpoint can here be described, then, as the difference between 'being' and 'will.' The Orthodox saw reality in terms of static being. The Son has the being of the Father, and as such, is eternally co-equal and co-substantial with the Father. The Arians saw reality, not in terms of static being, but in terms of event and will. The Son is the Word and Wisdom of God due to his following of the divine will. It is the event of following, rather than an inherited essence or nature, that brings about his distinction from the rest of creation.[26]

3. The Son is not Omniscient

Third, since the Son was created out of nothing, he cannot have complete knowledge of a Being, namely the Father, who is uncreated.[27] This doctrinal statement was particularly unpopular among the readers of Arius' works, but Arius was nevertheless rather blunt in his assertion that "God is mysterious to the Son."[28] In fact, it was thought by the Arians that the Son learned from the Father through inquiry even before his earthly ministry. The Father taught the Son how to fashion the cosmos, whereupon the whole created order was made. Arius stated further that:

For neither perfectly nor accurately does the Logos know the Father, nor is he able to see him fully. And indeed the Son, as he is, does not even know his own essence.[29]

It is on the Son's knowledge of the Father in particular that one may catch a glimpse of Arius' thinking. The Alexandrian presbyter must have known the kind of response he would receive in saying that the Son has incomplete knowledge of the Father, but his concern does not seem to be with how his teachings were to be received. It seems that Arius' main concern was with taking a point of doctrine to its most logical conclusion. If the Son is created, obviously he can not fully know the uncreated Father

4. The Son is not Immutable

Last of all, since the Son is a creature, he would by definition have to be capable of moral change. Indeed, central to the Arian view of Christ as an obedient servant was the insistence upon the Son's free-will, and thus the changeable moral nature of the redeemer. A favorite Arian proof text was the Christological hymn of Philippians 2:6-9:

Who, though he was in the form of God,
did not regard equality with God as something to be exploited,
but emptied himself,
taking the form of a slave,
being born in human likeness.
And being found in human form,
he humbled himself
and became obedient to the point of death --
even death on a cross.
Therefore God also highly exalted him
and gave him the name that is above every name.

Here they stressed the rewards the Son received for being obedient. How could the Son advance in position, they asked, if he was fully God and incapable of change? The ramifications of such a doctrine are enormous. According to a Christian interpretation of Scripture, the devil had once held a position of great honor as one of the archangels, but as a creature, he had the opportunity to turn away from God, and indeed did just that. Arius' opponents were quick to point to the devil's fall from glory as a possible future for a 'creaturely' Son.[30] If Christ could turn away from God as the devil had done, and it is was through Christ that mankind is saved, our salvation , in a sense, is in danger of being nullified. Athanasius in particular, since he held that in God there is no free-will, did not give much credence to the Arian concepts of obedience and free response. For Athanasius, the Son's mission to earth was simply that of a free gift; his mission never in doubt, nor an alternate outcome possible.[31]

Although Athanasius' soteriological views seem rather rigid to the modern reader, the Arian view was not as open as it may at first seem. Arius himself was able to mitigate his stand somewhat in order to avoid the disturbing possibility of a potential loss of salvation due to the Son's disobedience. He stated that although the Son was capable of change, he was capable of change in principle only.[32] The Arians noted that, while it was possible that Christ could have sinned, he never did indeed do so. God would never have created a redeemer that would have rebelled. Indeed, God foresaw that the Son would not 'turn bad,' as it were, and therefore "exempted him from evil in advance."[33]

Conclusion

Between the Orthodox and the Arian view one can see more than the surface issues of a created versus an uncreated Son. The Orthodox view described grace as the entry into a stable order in which creation had reached a new redeemed existence. This was in harmony with a view of Christ as unchangeable and the eternal Son of God. The Arian view saw grace as the empowerment by which people might advance morally. This was in harmony with the Arian view of a created savior that had advanced himself, and was rewarded for his obedience. Therefore, how people lived their lives, in terms of salvation and holiness, was determined by these views, each essentially linked to its particular party's Christology. Bishops were confronted, then, with two systems that, although each had roots extending back into earliest Christianity, were essentially new and different from the Christianity of previous centuries, and offered very different interpretations of the Scriptures and reality.

Such, then, is early Arianism in its barest form. It was for Arius' opponents a horrible system of beliefs, and Arius' two chief opponents, Athanasius of Alexandria and Alexander of Alexandria, found no shortage of words in their opposition to it. Yet, even those who early on in the movement found fault in the teachings of Arius and his followers, would have to admit that Arianism had an appealing, rational logic to it. As can be ascertained from above, it did, to some extent, bring about a return of Christian doctrine to the Jewish notion of God as 'artisan.' Arius' doctrine of a 'created' Son certainly seemed to be in harmony with both the Old and New Testaments, which still showed an influence of a more distinctly Jewish notion of God. Arianism was popular because it had dramatically simplified the confusing Greek notion of God as 'begetter,' and put an end to the vague teachings of Origen that had predominated in the Church until Arius' day. Whether Arianism was biblically accurate or not is debatable; for the simple layman and the learned intellectual alike, however, it made sense.

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Early Arianism, Footnotes (continued)

note: All Bible verses taken from the NRSV.

17. Williams, 12.

18. Demophilius quoted in Hanson, 101.

19. Hanson, 100.

20. Gregg, 116-117.

21. Arius quoted in Hanson, 14.

22. Arius quoted in Gregg, 28.

23. Arius quoted in Hanson, 14.

24. Hebrews 2:14.

25. Gregg, 27.

26. Gregg 67-68.

27. Hanson, 22.

28. Williams, 15-16; Arius quoted in Hanson, 15.

29. Arius quoted in Gregg, 7.

30. Hanson, 21.

31. Gregg, 29

32. Williams, 10.

33. Hanson, 21.

34. Hillaire Belloc, The Great Heresies , (New York: 1968), 47.

35. James D. Tracy, "Erasmus and the Arians: Remarks on the Consensus Ecclesiae," The Catholic Historical Review , 67 (1981): 7.

36. Belloc, 48