Jane Westerman

St. Mary’s College

Why Was Arius Condemned At Nicaea in 325?

This essay will consider events leading up to Nicaea and the development of early thinking on the relationship between the Father and the Son. It will look at the information we have on Arius’ belief and why these beliefs led to him being condemned.

The first ecumenical church council was held in Nicaea in 325AD. It was called by the emperor Constantine who was concerned with the unity of the empire. Constantine had defeated Licinius in 324 to become the sole ruler of the empire. He then discovered that there were divisions between the Eastern and Western churches. The purpose of the council was to bring Eastern and Western bishops together and try to achieve unity. One of the main areas for division was the relationship between the Son and the Father.

The early roots of the debate can be found in the writings of Philo. Philo saw the λογος as having two stages of existence, partly divine and partly created¹. However Philo can be read metaphorically and his language about the λογος can be confusing². Clement believed God to be remote and beyond our knowledge. The λογος is the way that God presents himself to us. In some sense the λογος is distinct from God the Father, whilst also in some sense being identical to God³. Origen was the first person to use the concept of ουσια in relation to the trinity⁴. He believed that catholic belief taught that the trinity was three substances (ουσια). However, the Father and the Son are one in like-mindedness, harmony and identity of will⁵. Origen may have avoided the term όμοούσιος becaue it was first used by the Gnostics. The Gnostics believed that those spirits destined for salvation had come from God and were of the same kind as God. This implies that the divine substance is divisible and material⁶. At the beginning of the fourth century there was a great deal of confusion about the meaning of όμοούσιος and about how the Father related to the Son.

Origen and the others would have influenced the thinking of a priest in Alexandria called Arius. Arius’ ideas would eventually lead him into conflict with his bishop Alexander, and the rest of the western Christian church. The evidence for what Arius thought has to be approached carefully. We have only three complete texts written by Arius himself⁷. In 321 Arius wrote to his bishop, Alexander of Alexandria, giving a statement of faith. In this Arius claims to have learnt what he teaches from both the bishops and tradition. The letter is strongly monotheistic, however, it describes the son and the spirit as being distinct from the father and created. The son is not co-eternal with the father and not of the same substance. In this letter Arius understands begotten as meaning the same as created⁸. The lack of consensus in the meaning of begotten and created led to confusion in the discussion on the relationship between the father and the son.

Arius also wrote a letter around 321/2 to his supporter Eusebius of Nicomedia⁹. In this Arius argues that God must exist before the son. If not then the son is a part of God, and this would be too close to Gnostic ideas to be acceptable. The Son was brought into existence by Gods free will before time began. The son has a beginning, as only God can be without beginning. He was created first, and, like all creation, he was created out of nothing¹⁰. This says clearly that Arius believed the son to be created. This would become a major issue in the controversy of Nicaea.

Extracts of some other writings of Arius have been preserved by other writers. However, these must be treated with caution as they were often used in criticism of Arius and may be quoted in ways that distort the true meaning that Arius intended. One of these is the Thalia, which is written in a poetical form. This is quoted by Athansius in his De Synodis and Contra Arianos¹¹. The Thalia again talks of the fact that God existed before the word, and that the word himself was created from non-existence. It also suggests that there are two wisdoms, one that is with God from the start and one that is part of the created word. The son is only the word and the son through Gods grace. The Thalia also claims that the son’s nature is alterable. The word, like all created things, is different to the Fathers substance and can not know the father¹².

The other sources of information we have on Arius’ teaching is what other people wrote about him. Like the extracts mentioned above, this is often written by people who were anti Arian and is therefore biased against Arius. In about 319 Alexander wrote an encyclical explaining his reasons for deciding to ex-communicate Arius. The main points of Arius‘ thought that Alexander picks out are that God was not always the Father, the son is a created creature and not like substance with the Father and that the son is mutable and changeable¹³. Alexander also wrote to another Alexander who was bishop of Thessalonica. This letter outlines the arguments that Arius’ supporters have been using and their response to Alexander’s counter arguments¹⁴.

We can use these sources to try and understand the thinking of Arius and why it proved so controversial. Arius believed that God was so divine that he was beyond suffering. That meant that Christ when he suffered on the cross could not be fully divine. Arius developed three key points in his theology. Firstly, the son is a creature, a product of Gods will, Secondly, the term son is a metaphor used to speak of the second hypostasis of the trinity. Thirdly, the son’s status and existence depends on Gods will. Arius based his arguments in scripture. Arius interpreted scripture in a way that was different to other church leaders. He used a metaphorical method similar to Origen. He also considered scripture as whole. Athanisus objected to the way Arius read the scriptures. He considered it to be based too much on Arius’ personal and independent interpretation. Arius’ teaching was seen as being at odds with what the church taught and based on no authority but his own¹⁵. Doing this would put Arius on a collision course with the church hierarchy which would result in his excommunication at Nicaea.

The teaching of Arius that caused the most controversy was his ideas on the trinity and specifically the relationship between God the Father and God the Son. Apart from one mention of ‘three hypostases’ there is no explicit trinitarin doctrine in any of the complete writings we have from Arius himself¹⁶. The only information we have comes from the extracts from the Thalia quoted by Athansius, as mentioned above, these have to be approached with caution as he may have deliberately used quotes which distort Arius’ view. According to the information we have from the Thalia, Arius’ view of the trinity was of three distinct and separate beings. The son and the spirit were both created by the original monad that is God. The different parts of the trinity also had different powers. This hierarchal view was similar to some of the writings of Origen. The idea of the son being subordinate to the father was also not an uncommon one in the pre-Nicaea period¹⁷. To a certain extent it can be seen that Arius’ ideas were not that different to what other people were thinking and writing at the time in both the East and the West.

However, there was one very important part of Arius’ theology that was different. Arius placed a very strong emphasis on the separate characters of Father, Son and Spirit. For Arius there was a time when God existed but the Father didn’t. Although Arius believed the son was created according to the Fathers will at a set point, he also sees the Son as being created before all time¹⁸.

Arius did not like the idea of the son as coming from the Father. If the son came from the Father, it meant the son was a consubstantial part of the Father. This would have meant the Father had to be divisible, mutable and possibly even corporeal. As far as Arius was concerned God could not be like this¹⁹.

Arius’ teachings disagreed with those of his bishop Alexander of Alexandria. Alexander believed the son to be of like substance with the Father and unchangeable. Alexander also believed that the Son had always existed alongside the father. He uses biblical texts to back up his arguments²⁰. Where Arius has taken a more academic approach to his understanding of the scriptural text, Alexander uses a more catholic approach. Arius accuses Alexander of misusing texts by quoting them out of context²¹.

As the arguments between the two schools of thought continued Alexander summoned a council of bishops to deal with it. Arius and his supporters were asked to sign a statement of Orthodoxy, which they refused to do. Alexander then excommunicates Arius along with the bishops that support him. Arius leaves Alexandria and travels to Palestine where he continues to gather support for his view. At Bithynia a council is held, which supports Arius, Arius then writes to Alexander asking to be restored, but gets no response. Another council is held in Palestine, which again upholds the views of Arius and demands Alexander to restore him to the church. Various supporters of Arius also write letters to Bishops and to Constantine, complaining of the treatment Arius has received. Things are then interrupted by Licinus imposing a ban on all meetings of Bishops²². Shortly before the council of Nicaea a group of anti-Arian bishops met in Antioch. This council expressed the view that Christ was the only begotten son, who comes from the Father, has always existed and is immutable and unalterable. The council also declared anathemas against the Arian views of the son being created, of there been a time when the son did not exist, and that he is mutable. This is the first known time that anathemas against a matter of doctrine had been declared by a church council. Although Alexander was not present at this meeting the results are clearly supportive of his theology. However, at this stage there is still no mention of the son being homoousios with the father²³. This council set the scene for the final showdown at the council of Nicaea.

We have very little evidence for what actually went on at the Council of Nicaea. We have only the creed and the twenty canons that the council decided on plus letters written afterwards by participants. It was the first ever general council of the church involving bishops from all over the empire. Constantine wanted to heal the breach and prevent schism in the church he had adopted as his own. In De Fide Ambrose talks about the council and tells us that a letter from Eusebius of Nicomedia, supporting Arius, was read out. The letter was against the view that the son was uncreated and referred to homoousios as a reductio ad absurdum. Ambrose claims that it was this that led the Fathers to place the word homoousios into the creed²⁴. This suggests that rather than seeking reconciliation, the anti Arian party wanted to produce a creed that it would be impossible for the Arians to sign. Athansius offers a slightly different reason for the inclusion of the word homoousios in the creed. When other phrases had been mentioned such as the son to be like the father, exactly as the father, immutable and always in the father, the Arians claimed that there were places in scripture where this was applied to creatures. Therefore, they could agree to that and still believe the son to be created²⁵.

The council at Nicaea formulated a creed, which can be seen as highly anti-Arian²⁶. However, we have a letter written by Eusebius of Caesera, a supporter of Arius, to his congregation explaining why he agreed to sign the creed. Eusebius understands homoousios as meaning that the son is like the father and has no other source than the father. The son is exactly like the Father in being, but not identical²⁷. Arius and two other bishops refused to sign the creed and were excommunicated.

What did Arius and his supporters say that had made the council so determined to produce a creed that they could not sign? At the start of the fourth century, orthodoxy was still only very loosely defined. The status of the relationship between the Father and the son had still not been defined in clear terms. There were many different ideas and interpretations of scripture being expressed at the time²⁸. Arius’ view was one among many. Arius saw the exegetical methods used by Alexander and other people as taking texts out of context and not solving the substantive doctrinal problems connected with scripture when read as a whole²⁹. When Alexander took the decision to excommunicate Arius, Arius’ views while extreme and drastic at their worst, were not seen as unacceptable by many in the church. Alexander’s action led to the council of Nicaea and the involvement of the whole church³⁰. Arius offered an alternative approach and understanding to that of his bishop. Alexander may have seen this as a threat to his position, authority and belief. In order to protect himself, Arius had to be removed. Arius saw himself as working within the traditions of Orthodoxy. He aimed to develop a belief that was biblically sound and rational. Unfortunately in trying to find the language that could best express for him the meaning of Orthodoxy; Arius comes perilously close to the Christological doctrines associated with heretics such as Paul of Samosata³¹.

Arius was condemned at Nicaea by a council that was seeking to establish a set form of Orthodoxy that defined the church’s position in a rapidly changing world. In an attempt to achieve unity, any view that was at the edges of what the church rulers considered Orthodoxy had to be condemned.

Bibliogrpahy:

Hall, S. Doctrine and Practice in the Early Church (Great Britain: SPCK, 1991)

Hanson, R.P.C. The Search for the Christian Doctrine of God (Edinburgh: T&T Clark, 1988)

Rankin, D. Arianism in P. Esler (ed.) The Early Christian World Vol.2 (London & New York: Routledge, 2000)

Stead, C. Divine Substance ( Oxford: OUP, 1977)

Studer, B. Trinity and IncarnationTrans. M. Westerheoff (Minnesota: T&T Clark, 1993)

Williams, R. Heresy and Tradition (2^nd ed) ( London: SCM, 2001)