in Book 7 of his History of the Church, Eusebius discusses several figures whom he regarded as heretics, among them Paul of Samosata, Sabellius, and Novatian (whom he calls Novatus). Do you agree with Eusebius' evaluation of these men? Are they truly heretics? If so, is false doctrine the central problem, or does something else seem to be involved? What techniques does the church seem to be using in dealing with the divisions caused by such men? Does the "surgery" in each case seem successful or not?
Monday, April 27, 2009
Eusebius on Heretics and Heresy
in Book 7 of his History of the Church, Eusebius discusses several figures whom he regarded as heretics, among them Paul of Samosata, Sabellius, and Novatian (whom he calls Novatus). Do you agree with Eusebius' evaluation of these men? Are they truly heretics? If so, is false doctrine the central problem, or does something else seem to be involved? What techniques does the church seem to be using in dealing with the divisions caused by such men? Does the "surgery" in each case seem successful or not?
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
14 comments:
Brian
It is possible that the men Eusebius mentions as heretics are exactly that. For example he mentions that Paul of Samosata was teaching that Christ was simply an ordinary man. If that was the case then yes I understand the charges of heresy.
But it also seems that there is something else going on. They accuse Paul of acting arrogant and proud, which might not be righteous but it is not heretical. There could be some jealousy or sectional rivalry going on.
The tatic they used to get rid of Paul was semi-effective. They first tried to expel him by appealing to higher church authorities, but he refused to give up his post so they appealed to the Roman authorities who ordered that he be subject to the will of the higher Church authorities.
While that might have worked in one instance the early Christians obviously could not rely on the Roman authorities to help them in every instance.
Ruth Wilson
Sebelius was certainly teaching heresy-- he had much unbelief in Jesus, wanted more proof of the Holy Spirit, something about the first born, which I dont quite understan and was sceptical about the Word becoming flesh. When your fighting to keep a religion alive, you cant allow teachers to teach disbelief. Scepticism is expected and drives people to find answers but those teachings arent fair to those new come to the faith. When a person is in doubt, I feel that they should take a break from teaching, get their stuff figured out and then go back to the job at hand.
By removing these men from office, only allowing them to come back when they saw the error of their ways and making them admit to them, the Church leaders showed restraint and hopefully love. It doesn't sound like the heritics were tossed out on their collective ears.
Eusebius 7
Joseph Adam
Eusebius, when he is writing a quote about Dionysius, says that heretical teachings are “polluting his soul”. In the quote though he says that the heretical teachings must be read so that they can be counter taught by the correct Christian teachings. I do agree with Eusebius in the fact that the men that he is talking about in this book are heretics. Such as Samosata saying that Christ was just a normal guy.
Paul of Samosata's view of Jesus as an ordinary man, I feel, is not complete heresy or blaspheme. If Jesus were not an ordinary man, then his death and suffering were not in vain. If Jesus was not ordinary, he could have made the crucifixion not painless. Jesus was the Son of God, sent to be with man, as a man (who could perform miracles through God, yes) to save mankind.
I think Jesus was also an ordinary man in the way he lived his life; the only thing with Jesus, is that he lived life as a man should; ever faithful to God and without shame or sin.
In the case that man is sinful and not perfect, Jesus was not an ordinary man. In terms of flesh and physicality, Jesus was an ordinary man. He did feel physical pain, and not just from his crucifixion: during his time in the desert when tempted by Satan, Jesus was very hungry.
For the most part, I don't consider Paul of Samosata's views as heresy.
Of course Eusebius is going to consider all of these men as heretics, especially considering the conservative leanings of the church. At this time, if you didn't ridgedly adhere to the law, you WOULD be considered a heretic, but fast forward to the world we live in today, these so called heretics would be viewed in an entirely different light.
What are we really looking at? These men, I think, are an accurate view of how society today is looking at organized religion. For those of us of faith, how many have ever doubted and questioned our belief in God?
Unfortunately, the church's answer to these questions and doubts was baptism. I don't know if I was reading the book right, but I never came across any surgeries.
If these men lived several centuries later, this kind of questioning would have been encouraged rather than stifled. For many people, nothing solidifies their faith more than when they are afforded the opportunity to critically look and question their beliefs. It is a shame they were labeled as heretics.
Eusebius was the first church historian. His beliefs at that time became part of the book. This belief will be more personal that factual so I do not believe in definitions as well as his figures as he defines as heretics.
Eusebius was wrong with the evaluation of Novatian. Novatian, was concerned with the nonbelievers at a time of great prosecution. He thought that they should be allowed back into the church even after they denounced God. It was all a smoke and mirror deal where money can bring you happiness.
This is all doctrine issues and I believe this is the start of purgatory in the Catholic Church. How did the church fix it? The heretics started their own churches and we will have an off shut of the Christian faith.
Will this work for a time? Everything will work for a time however; if things work better than they should somebody else might adopt the same practice. This is where doctrine starts to change.
Brett Newton
These people were def. using hersey could have been heretics. But in understanding what they said one must understand when they said it. At this time people challenging the faith and branching off was something not looked lightely on. Even today it is a very touchy subject to jump into. Its hard to understand where the line is drawn between expanding and interpretting.
This is a hard thing to battle even today. But sometimes strength can occur through adversity. With challengers and ones that expand, the faith only will become stronger.
Sabellius: not teh begotten son of God, the word made man.
Novatian: Has split the church, brings false teachings of Christ, disreagards the Holy Spirit.
These are obviously some reasons to regard the three as heretics, and I think Eusebius is just in calling them heretics. THey are bashing the core teachings of Christianity, with the most offensive being that of the charge against the Holy Spirit. They are presented as wanting to divide the church, and it is good that they are called out as heretics.
Paul of Samosata was definately a heritic. He did cause some division in the church with teachings that didn't go along with what the church was teaching.
I do agree with Diede that Christ was human and Paul shouldn't have been considered a heritic for that. However the way Eusebius tells it he didn't believe Christ was God, that he never decended from heaven. Paul also taught that their teacher was an angel from heaven according to eusebius.
I think the ecommunication was a successful method to get rid of Paul of Samosata. I do like the part of the story where he doesn't want to give up the church building and they have to take it from him in a court like situation.
Jon Hepola
In the cases of Paul of Samosata, I believe that he was guilty of heresey and false teachings. I think that what is so terrible about what he did, is that he doesn't appear to just have a difference of interpretation of Jesus, early teachings, the inspired word, etc. He seems to be twisting the religion and playing on people's emotions and sincere desire for religion, all for his own personal gain and glory.
Another heretic that I found interesting was Mani. I wonder was this guy posessed by demons and simply a very open puppet of Satan, was he very sincere in his beliefs and the message he pushed, or was he deranged or crazy or something like that, and in his mind actually believed that he was Christ.
If what Eusebius says, that Paul of Samosata held of low view of Christ – that he was a regular man, then yes I agree 100% with Eusebius. Yes, Paul of Samosata is truly a heretic if he is preaching that Jesus is just an ordinary man. We know that Jesus is not an ordinary man from the true teachings in the canon. False doctrine could be the problem, but I think it is men just trying to be full of themselves; to think that they can read and get a totally different conclusion than everybody else. They have an ego that is extremely large. It seems that the church first wants to summon Paul of Samosata to ask about his teachings, but when Paul finds this out he declines the invitation. Then the other church leaders flock to Paul’s hometown and confront him there. Yes, I believe that “surgery” worked very well. You kick one guy out and excommunicate him, so he cannot receive communion, and other people will be scared to be treated the same way.
Jon Adam
Sam Merkel
I do believe that Eusebius would of looked at these men as heretics. If people were not following the law than they were more than likely to be heretics. But yet these guys do give a certain view of how we look at a certain religion. The answer for all of these questions towards the church ended up to be baptism. For the people it makes them wonder whether or not their believes are correct or not. If these people would of been around in a different time than they wouldn't of been looked at in this manner I think.
Sam Merkel
The men that Eusebius says are heretics seem to be. Yet there seems to be some jealousy going on though as well. In the case of when Paul is accused of acting arrogant and proud. This does not show that he is heretical. They then resort to going to the Roman authorities to basically order Paul away. It seems to me that there definately was jealousy going on.
Post a Comment