Chapter V. The Heresy of Macedonius.
The Arians, having effected the death of Paulus, or rather having despatched him to the kingdom of heaven, promoted Macedonius 1 in his place, who, they imagined, held the same sentiments, and belonged to the same faction as themselves, because he, like them, blasphemed the Holy Ghost. But, shortly after, they deposed him also, because he refused to call Him a creature Whom the Holy Scriptures affirm to be the Son of God. After his separation from them, he became the leader of a sect of his own. He taught that the Son of God is not of the same substance as the Father, but that He is like Him in every particular. He also openly affirmed that the Holy Ghost is a creature. These circumstances occurred not long afterwards as we have narrated them.
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On the vicissitudes of the see of Constantinople, after the death of Alexander, in a.d. 336, vide Soc. ii. 6 and Soz. iii. 3. Paulus was murdered in 350 or 351, and the “shortly after” of the text means nine years, Macedonius being replaced by Eudoxius of Antioch, in 360. On how far the heresy of the “Pneumatomachi,” called Macedonianism, was really due to the teaching of Macedonius, vide Robertson’s Church Hist. II. iv. for reff. ↩
