Synodal Letter to the Bishops of Africa

1Of the ninety bishops of Egypt and Libya and of the blessed Athanasius, against the Arians, to the most honored bishops in Africa. What was written by our beloved fellow-minister Damasus, bishop of great Rome, and by the many bishops gathered with him, is sufficient; and no less sufficient are the acts of the other councils held in Gaul and in Italy concerning the sound faith, which Christ granted, the apostles preached, and the Fathers handed down—those who assembled at Nicaea from all the inhabited world known to us. For so great was the zeal at that time because of the Arian heresy, that those who had fallen into it might be pulled up, and those who had devised it might be exposed. At least by this means the whole world long ago agreed, and now, with many councils having been held, all those in Dalmatia, Dardania, Macedonia, Epirus, Greece, Crete, and the other islands, Sicily, Cyprus, Pamphylia, Lycia, Isauria, all Egypt and the Libyas, and very many in Arabia have recognized it. And they marveled at those who signed, because, even if any trace had remained among them—a bitterness growing up from the root of the Arians, I mean Auxentius, Ursacius, Valens, and those who think as they do—through these letters they were cut out and left behind.

What was confessed at Nicaea is sufficient and adequate, as we said before, both for the overthrow of every impious heresy and for the security and benefit of the church's teaching. But since we have heard that some, wanting to fight against it, attempt to name a certain council as having taken place at Ariminum, and contend that this one rather than that one should prevail, we considered it necessary to write and remind you, so that you may not tolerate such people. For this is nothing other than an offshoot of the Arian heresy again. For those who reject the council held against it—that is, the one held at Nicaea—what else do they want but for the teachings of Arius to prevail? What then are such people worthy of, but to be called Arians and to share the same penalty as those men? They neither feared God, who says, "Do not move the ancient boundary stone that your fathers set up" (Proverbs 22:28), and "Whoever curses his father or his mother shall be put to death" (Exodus 21:17); nor did they respect the Fathers, who commanded that those who think contrary to their confession be anathema.

For this reason the council at Nicaea became ecumenical, when three hundred eighteen bishops assembled concerning the faith because of the Arian impiety, so that splits might no longer occur piecemeal under the pretext of faith, but even if they are held, they might not prevail. For what does that council lack, that anyone should seek newer things? It is full of piety, beloved; it has filled the whole world. The Indians recognized it, and all those among the other barbarians who are Christians. Therefore the labor of those who have often attempted against it is vain. For such people have already made ten or more councils, changing their position at each one, taking away some things from the earlier ones, and altering and adding other things in the later ones.

2And they have profited nothing up to now by writing, erasing, and using force, not knowing that "Every plant that the heavenly Father has not planted will be rooted out" (Matthew 15:13), but the word of the Lord that came through the ecumenical council at Nicaea remains forever. For if someone compares number with number, those at Nicaea are more than the partial ones, just as the whole is greater than the part. And if someone wishes to discern the reason for the council at Nicaea and for the many councils that came after it from these people, he would find that the one at Nicaea had a reasonable cause, while the others were assembled out of hatred and rivalry by violence. For the one was gathered because of the Arian heresy and because of the Passover, since those in Syria, Cilicia, and Mesopotamia were in disagreement with us and were celebrating at the same time as the Jews. But thanks be to the Lord, just as concerning the faith, so also concerning the holy feast there came to be agreement. And this was the reason for the council at Nicaea. But the ones after it were beyond number, and they were devised against the ecumenical council. Since these things are so clearly shown, who will accept those who name Ariminum or another council alongside the one at Nicaea? Or who would not hate those who reject the things of the Fathers and prefer the newer things composed at Ariminum out of rivalry and violence? Who would wish to assemble with these men, who do not even accept their own decisions? For in their own ten or more councils, as we said before, they wrote different things at different times, and they are clearly becoming accusers of each one of them. They suffer something like what the traitors among the Jews suffered then. For as those men, abandoning the only fountain of living water, dug for themselves broken cisterns that cannot hold water—and this is written in the prophet Jeremiah (Jeremiah 2:13)—so these men, fighting against the one ecumenical council, dug for themselves many councils, and all of them appeared among them as empty, like a sheaf with no strength. Let us not, then, put up with those who name Ariminum or another council alongside the one that took place at Nicaea. For even those who name Ariminum seem not to know what was done there; otherwise they would have been silent. For you know, beloved, having learned also from those who came from you to Ariminum, that Ursacius and Valens, Eudoxius and Auxentius—and Demophilus was there with them—were deposed when they wanted to write things other than those at Nicaea. When they were required to anathematize the Arian heresy, they refused and preferred to be its champions. But the bishops who were truly genuine servants of the Lord and believed rightly—there were about two hundred of them—wrote that they were satisfied with Nicaea alone and sought or thought nothing more or less than that. They made this clear also to Constantius, who had ordered the council to take place. But those who were deposed at Ariminum went to Constantius and caused insults to occur and threats to be made that those who had voted against them would not return to their own districts, and they caused those bishops to suffer violence in Thrace in the dead of winter, so that they would put up with the innovations made by the deposed men.

3So if some people appeal to Ariminum, let them first show the deposition of the men named above, and what the bishops wrote when they said they sought nothing more than what the Fathers had confessed at Nicaea and recognized no other council besides that one. But they hide these things and put forward what was done by force in Thrace. By this they show themselves to be hypocrites of the Arian heresy and strangers to the sound faith. And if someone wanted to compare that great council with theirs side by side, he would find piety in the one and unreason in the other. Those who gathered at Nicaea did not gather as deposed men; rather, they confessed that the Son is of the substance of the Father. But these men, deposed once, twice, and a third time at Ariminum itself, dared to write that one should not say that God has substance or actual being. From this you can see, brothers, that the men at Nicaea breathe the Scriptures, since God himself says in Exodus, "I am who I am" (Exodus 3:14), and through Jeremiah, "Who has stood in his actual being and seen his word?" (Jeremiah 23:18), and a little later, "If they had stood in my actual being, they would have heard my words" (Jeremiah 23:22). Now actual being is substance, and it signifies nothing other than that which is. Jeremiah calls this existence when he says, "They did not hear the voice of existence" (Jeremiah 9:10). For actual being and substance are existence: it is and it exists. Paul understood this and wrote to the Hebrews, "He is the radiance of his glory and the imprint of his actual being" (Hebrews 1:3). But these men who think they know the Scriptures and call themselves wise refuse to speak of actual being in God—for this is what they wrote at Ariminum and in their other councils. How were they not justly deposed, when they themselves say, like the fool in his heart, "There is no God" (Psalm 14:1)? Again, the Fathers taught at Nicaea that the Son, the Word, is not a creature or a thing made, since they read, "All things came into being through him" (John 1:3), and, "In him all things were created and hold together" (Colossians 1:16-17). But these men, who are Arians rather than Christians, have dared in their other councils to call him a creature and one of the things made—things of which the Word himself is the maker and creator. For if all things came into being through him, and he himself is a creature, then he would be creating himself. How can what is created create? Or how can the creator be created? But they are not ashamed even when they say such things, for which they are hated by everyone. They simply name Ariminum, but they are shown to have been deposed even there. And as for what was written at Nicaea, that the Son is consubstantial with the Father—this is the very thing for which they pretend to fight against the council, and they buzz around the word everywhere like gnats. Either they do not understand it and stumble over it, like those who stumble over the stone of stumbling placed in Zion (Isaiah 8:14), or they do understand it, and that is why they fight and constantly grumble: because it is truly the precise condemnation of their heresy.

4For it is not the words themselves that grieve them, but the condemnation of them that took place in those words. And again they themselves have been the cause of this, and even if they want to hide it, though they know it, it is fitting for us to say it, so that from these things too the exactness with truth of the great council may be shown. For when the assembled bishops wanted to abolish the words of impiety invented by the Arians—the phrase “from nothing,” and calling the Son a creature and a thing made, and “there was when he was not,” and that he is of a changeable nature—and to write instead the words acknowledged from the Scriptures, that the Word is by nature the only-begotten from God, the power, the only wisdom of the Father, true God, as John said, and as Paul wrote, the radiance of his glory and the imprint of the Father’s actual being, the followers of Eusebius, dragged along by their own evil opinion, were saying to one another: “Let us agree. For we too are from God. For there is one God, from whom are all things (1 Corinthians 8:6), and, The old things have passed away; behold, all things have become new (2 Corinthians 5:17). And all things are from God.” They also considered what is written in the Shepherd: “First of all believe that there is one God, who created and ordered all things, and made them from what is not into being.” But the bishops, seeing their cunning and the evil craft of their impiety, expressed “from God” more clearly, and wrote that the Son is from the substance of God, so that created things, because they do not exist from themselves without a cause but have a beginning of coming into being, may be said to be from God, while the Son alone is proper to the Father’s substance. For this is proper to the only-begotten and true Word in relation to the Father. And this was the reason for writing “from the substance.”

Again, when the bishops were asking those who seemed to be few whether they would say that the Son is not a creature but the power, the only wisdom of the Father, and an eternal image, in all things unvarying from the Father, and true God, the followers of Eusebius were caught signaling to one another that these things also reach to us. “For we too,” they said, “are called the image and glory of God, and about us it is said, For we who live are always (2 Corinthians 4:11). And there are many powers. And all the power of the Lord went out from the land of Egypt. And the caterpillar and the locust are called a great power. And, The Lord of the powers is with us; the God of Jacob is our protector (Psalm 46:7 LXX (cf. "hosts" in Hebrew)). But we have the fact that we are God’s own, not simply, but because he also called us brothers. And if they say the Son is true God, it does not grieve us. For having come to be, he is true God.” This is the corrupted mind of the Arians. But here too the bishops, seeing their deceit, gathered from the Scriptures the radiance, the fountain and the river, and the imprint in relation to the actual being, and, In your light we shall see light (Psalm 36:9), and, I and the Father are one (John 10:30).

5And so at last they wrote more clearly and concisely that the Son is consubstantial with the Father; for all that had been said before carries this meaning. And their grumbling that these words are unwritten is shown by their own conduct to be empty, since they committed impiety from unwritten words. For 'from nothing' and 'there was when he was not' are unwritten, yet they complain that they were condemned from unwritten words understood with reverence. They, as being from dung, truly spoke from the earth; but the bishops did not invent the words for themselves—they had the testimony from the Fathers, and so they wrote. For ancient bishops of great Rome and of our own city, writing nearly one hundred and thirty years before, censured those who said the Son was a thing made and not consubstantial with the Father. And Eusebius, who became bishop of Caesarea, knew this: formerly he sided with the Arian heresy, but later he signed at the council in Nicaea itself, and he wrote to his own people affirming that we know that some of the ancient learned and distinguished bishops and writers used the term 'consubstantial' for the divinity of the Father and the Son.

Why then do they still name Ariminum, where they were deposed? Why do they reject the council in Nicaea, where their own Fathers signed and confessed that the Son is from the substance and consubstantial with the Father? Why do they run about? For they are fighting not only against the bishops who gathered at Nicaea, but also against their own great bishops, and against their own people at last. Whose heirs and successors are they then? How can they call those men Fathers whose confession, written so well and in apostolic fashion, they do not accept? For if they think they can contradict it, let them speak—or rather, let them answer, so that they may be caught in their own trap and exposed—whether they believe the Son when he says, 'I and the Father are one' (John 10:30), and, 'Whoever has seen me has seen the Father' (John 14:9). Yes, they might say, since it is written, we believe.

But if they are asked to say how they are one, and how the one who has seen the Son has also seen the Father, they will surely say, 'Through likeness'—unless they have completely collapsed into the company of those who think like them and are called Anomoeans. But if they are asked again, 'How is he like?' they will boldly say, 'By perfect virtue and harmony, in willing the same as the Father and not willing what the Father does not will.' But let them learn that one who is made like God by virtue and by willing has a choice that can also turn and change. The Word is not like that—unless he is like us only in part and in our manner, because he is not like according to substance. These things belong to us, created things whose nature is created. For we too, although we cannot become like God in substance, nevertheless, as we improve in virtue, we imitate God, since the Lord grants this and says, 'Be merciful, as your Father is merciful' (Luke 6:36), and 'Be perfect, as your heavenly Father is perfect' (Matthew 5:48). But no one would deny that created things are changeable: angels transgressed, Adam disobeyed, and all things need the grace of the Word.

6But a changeable thing cannot be like the unchangeable God, any more than a created thing can be like its creator. That is why the holy man, considering our condition, said, 'O God, who will be made like you?' (Psalm 82:2 (83:2)), and, 'Who is like you among the gods, O Lord?' (Exodus 15:11). He calls 'gods' those who were created but became partakers of the Word, as the Lord himself said: 'If he called them gods to whom the Word of God came' (John 10:35). But things that partake cannot be the same as, or like, the thing they partake of. About himself, then, he said, 'I and the Father are one' (John 10:30), because created things are not like that.

So let those who put forward Ariminum answer this: can a created substance say, 'Whatever I see the Father doing, these things I also do' (John 5:19)? For created things are made, and do not make; otherwise they would have made themselves. Indeed, if, as they say, the Son is a creature and the Father makes him, then the Son would certainly have made himself too, since he is able to do what the Father does, as he himself said. But such a thing is absurd and utterly incoherent, for no one can make himself.

Again, let them say whether created things can say, 'All things that the Father has are mine' (John 16:15). The Father has the creating, the fashioning, the eternal, the being almighty, the unchangeable. But created things cannot have the fashioning, for they are created; nor the eternal, for they have a beginning of being; nor the almighty and unchangeable, for they are ruled and of a changeable nature, as the Scriptures say. Therefore, if these things belong to the Son, they are his not from virtue, as we said, but clearly from his substance, as the council said: he is not from another substance, but from the Father's, whose own these things also are. And what belongs to the Father's substance, and is offspring from it—what could it be, or how could anyone name it, except consubstantial? For what one sees in the Father, one sees also in the Son; and in the Son not by participation, but according to substance. And this is what 'I and the Father are one' (John 10:30) means, and 'Whoever has seen me has seen the Father' (John 14:9).

Besides this, it is good to show their folly from another point as well. If likeness follows from virtue, from willing and not willing, and from improvement of character, then according to you the Son is like the Father. But these things belong to quality. Clearly, then, you are saying that God is composite, made of quality and substance. And who will put up with you saying these things? For God, who composed all things into being, is not composite, nor is he like the things that came into being through the Word—may it never be! His substance is simple, in which there is no quality, nor, as James said, 'any variation or shadow of turning' (James 1:17). Therefore, if it is shown that the Son's likeness is not from virtue—for there is no quality in God, nor in the Son—then clearly he belongs to the substance. And this you will certainly confess, unless understanding has utterly perished in you.

7But what would it be that is proper to and identical with the substance of God, and is by nature his offspring from that substance, if not again, in this very respect, consubstantial with the one who begot him? For this is the mark of Son in relation to Father. And whoever does not say this does not think that the Word is truly and by nature Son. The Fathers understood it this way, and so they wrote that the Son is consubstantial with the Father, and they anathematized those who say the Son is from another actual being. They did not fabricate words for themselves, but they too learned from the Fathers before them, as we have said.

Since these things are demonstrated in this way, their Ariminum is superfluous, and so is the other council they name concerning the faith. For the council at Nicaea is sufficient, since it agrees also with the ancient bishops, and in it their own Fathers subscribed—men whom these people ought to have revered, so that they might not be considered anything rather than Christians. But if after so much, after the testimony of the ancient bishops and after the subscription of their own Fathers, they pretend, as if ignorant, to fear the word 'consubstantial,' let them say and think more simply and truly that the Son is by nature Son, and let them anathematize, as the council commanded, those who say he is a creature, or a thing made, or from nothing, or 'there was when the Son of God was not,' and that he is changeable and alterable, and from another actual being. And so let them flee from the Arian heresy. And we are confident that, genuinely anathematizing these things, they immediately confess that the Son is from the substance and consubstantial with the Father.

For this reason the Fathers, having said that the Son is consubstantial, immediately added: 'But those who say he is a creature, or a thing made, or from nothing, or there was when he was not, the Catholic Church anathematizes.' They did this so that through these things people might recognize that this is what 'consubstantial' means. And the force of 'consubstantial' is known from the fact that the Son is not a creature or a thing made; and the one who says 'consubstantial' does not think the Word is a creature; and the one who anathematizes the things mentioned above at the same time thinks the Son is consubstantial with the Father; and the one who says 'consubstantial' says the Son of God is genuine and true. And the one who says 'genuine' understands: 'I and the Father are one' (John 10:30), and 'Whoever has seen me has seen the Father' (John 14:9).

It would have been fitting to write such things at greater length, but since we are writing to you who know, we have dictated briefly for this reason, praying that the bond of peace may be preserved among all, and that all those of the Catholic Church may say the same thing and think the same thing. And we are not writing as teachers but as those who remind. Nor are we the writers alone, but also all the bishops in Egypt and the Libyas, about ninety in number. For this is the one mind of all, and we always subscribe for one another if it happens that someone is absent.

Being so disposed, since it happened that we were assembled, we also wrote to our beloved Damasus, the bishop of great Rome, concerning Auxentius who intruded upon the church in Milan, relating the facts about him: that he is not only a sharer in the Arian heresy, but is also liable for many evils, having done these things with Gregory, the partner of his impiety. And we expressed amazement that until now he has not been deposed and cast out of the Church, and we gave thanks for the piety of Damasus himself and of those assembled in great Rome, because by casting out Ursacius and Valens and those who think the same things as they do, they preserved the unity of mind of the Catholic Church. And praying that this unity may be preserved also among you, we urge you not to tolerate, as we said before, those who put forward a crowd of councils under the pretext of the faith—the one in Ariminum, the one in Sirmium, the one in Isauria, the one in Thrace, the ones in Constantinople, and the many disorderly ones in Antioch.

8But let only the faith confessed at Nicaea by the Fathers hold sway among you. In that council, as we said before, all the Fathers were present—even those now fighting against it—and they signed. So the Apostle may say about us: “I praise you because you remember me in everything and hold firmly to the traditions just as I handed them on to you” (1 Corinthians 11:2). For this council at Nicaea is truly an inscription set up against every heresy. It also overthrows those who blaspheme against the Holy Spirit and call the Spirit a creature. For after the Fathers spoke about faith in the Son, they immediately added: “We believe also in the Holy Spirit,” so that by confessing a complete and full faith in the Holy Trinity they might make known in this the imprint of faith in Christ and the teaching of the Catholic Church. For it is clear both among you and among all people, and no Christian would hold a doubtful mind about this: our faith is not in creation, but in one God, the Father Almighty, maker of all things visible and invisible; and in one Lord Jesus Christ, his only-begotten Son; and in one Holy Spirit—one God known in the holy and perfect Trinity. Baptized into this Trinity and being joined to the divinity in it, we believe that we will also inherit the kingdom of heaven in Christ Jesus our Lord, through whom to the Father be glory and might forever. Amen.