Defence of the Nicene Definition (De Decretis)

Saint Athanasius the Great of Alexandria · c. 350 AD

Ante-Nicene Fathers (Roberts–Donaldson), Roberts, Donaldson, and Coxe (eds.), Ante-Nicene Fathers, Buffalo: Christian Literature Publishing, 1885–1887; digitized by CCEL.

Archbishop of Alexandria; the great defender of the Nicene faith during the long Arian controversy and the chief architect of the Orthodox understanding of the consubstantiality (ὁμοούσιος) of the Son with the Father. Exiled five times by Arianizing emperors. His On the Incarnation of the Word laid the foundation of all subsequent Christological reflection; his Discourses Against the Arians are the locus classicus of the Trinitarian and Christological argument against Arianism; his Life of Antony spread Egyptian monasticism throughout the Christian world. Numbered among the Three Holy Hierarchs and the Pillars of Orthodoxy.

Contents

1. Introduction. The complaint of the Arians against the Nicene Council; their fickleness; they are like Jews; their employment of force instead of reason.
2. Conduct of the Arians towards the Nicene Council. Ignorant as well as irreligious to attempt to reverse an Ecumenical Council: proceedings at Nicæa: Eusebians then signed what they now complain of: on the unanimity of true teachers and the process of tradition: changes of the Arians.
3. Two senses of the word Son, 1. adoptive; 2. essential; attempts of Arians to find a third meaning between these; e.g. that our Lord only was created immediately by God (Asterius's view), or that our Lord alone partakes the Father. The second and true sense; God begets as He makes, really; though His creation and generation are not like man's; His generation independent of time; generation implies an internal, and therefore an eternal, act in God; explanation of Prov. viii. 22.
4. Proof of the Catholic Sense of the Word Son. Power, Word or Reason, and Wisdom, the names of the Son, imply eternity; as well as the Father's title of Fountain. The Arians reply, that these do not formally belong to the essence of the Son, but are names given Him; that God has many words, powers, &c. Why there is but one Son and Word, &c. All the titles of the Son coincide in Him.
5. Defence of the Council's Phrases, “from the essence,” And “one in essence.” Objection that the phrases are not scriptural; we ought to look at the sense more than the wording; evasion of the Arians as to the phrase “of God” which is in Scripture; their evasion of all explanations but those which the Council selected, which were intended to negative the Arian formulæ; protest against their conveying any material sense.
6. Authorities in Support of the Council. Theognostus; Dionysius of Alexandria; Dionysius of Rome; Origen.
7. On the Arian Symbol “Unoriginate.” This term afterwards adopted by them; and why; three senses of it. A fourth sense. Unoriginate denotes God in contrast to His creatures, not to His Son; Father the scriptural title instead; Conclusion.