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Schreiben an die Antiochier (BKV)

10.

Nachdem nun dieses Schreiben von den obengenannten so unterzeichnet und von Alexandrien abgefertigt worden war, unterzeichneten nachher auch die Antiochier auf folgende Weise:¹

Ich Paulinus denke so, wie ich es von den Vätern erhalten habe: Es sey und subsistire ein vollkommener Vater, und es subsistire ein vollkommener Sohn, und es subsistire ein vollkommener heiliger Geist. Daher gebe ich der oben niedergeschriebenen Erklärung in Betreff der drei Hypostasen oder der Einen Hypostase oder Substanz, so wie jenen, welche so denken, meinen Beifall; denn es ist fromm, die heilige Dreieinigkeit in Einer Gottheit zu denken und zu bekennen. Hinsichtlich der Menschwerdung des Wortes des Vaters zu unserm Heile denke ich, wie geschrieben steht, daß, nach Johannes, das Wort Fleisch geworden sey, nicht aber, wie einige sehr gottlose Menschen sagen, daß dasselbe eine Veränderung erlitten habe, sondern daß es unsertwegen Mensch geworden und aus der heiligen Jungfrau Maria, und dem heiligen Geiste geboren worden sey. Denn der Heiland hatte nicht einen Leib ohne Seele, ohne Gefühl und ohne Verstand; denn es war nicht möglich, daß, da der Herr unsertwegen Mensch wurde, sein Leib ohne Verstand war. Und daher belege ich diejenigen mit dem Fluche, welche den zu Nicäa bekannten Glauben geringschätzen, und läugnen, daß der Sohn aus der Wesenheit des S. 325 Vaters sey und mit dem Vater dieselbe Wesenheit habe. Ich spreche auch über diejenigen den Fluch aus, welche sagen, der heil. Geist sey ein von dem Sohne gemachtes Geschöpf. Ferner verdamme ich auch die Ketzerei des Sabellius und des Photinus, und jegliche Ketzerei, und stimme dem nicäischen Glaubensbekenntnisse und allem oben Geschriebenen bei.²


Ich Carterius wünsche, daß ihr wohl lebet.

Translation Hide
Tome or Synodal Letter to the People of Antioch

10. The ‘Tome’ signed at Antioch.

And after this Tome was sent off from Alexandria, thus signed by the aforesaid, [the recipients] in their turn signed it:

I Paulinus hold thus, as I received from the fathers, that the Father perfectly exists and subsists, and that the Son perfectly subsists, and that the Holy Spirit perfectly subsists. Wherefore also I accept the above explanation concerning the Three Subsistences, and the one Subsistence, or rather Essence, and those who hold thus. For it is pious to hold and confess the Holy Trinity in one Godhead. And concerning the Word of the Father becoming Man for us, I hold as it is written, that, as John says, the Word was made Flesh, not in the sense of those most impious persons who say that He has undergone a change, but that He has become Man for us, being born of the holy Virgin Mary and of the Holy Spirit. For the Saviour had a body neither without soul, nor without sense, nor without intelligence. For it were impossible, the Lord being made Man for us, that His body should be without intelligence. Wherefore I anathematise those who set aside the Faith confessed at Nicæa, and who do not say that the Son is of the Father’s Essence, and coessential with the Father. Moreover I anathematise those who say that the Holy Spirit is a Creature made through the Son. Once more I anathematise the heresy of Sabellius and of Photinus ¹, and every heresy, walking in the Faith of Nicæa, and in all that is above written. I Karterius ² pray for your health.

Appendix

P. 487 The fragment which follows, containing an interesting report of a story told by Athanasius to Ammonius, Bishop of Pachnemunis, is inserted here as furnishing undesignedly important details as to the movements of Athanasius in 363. See Prolegg. ch. v. §3 h, also ch. ii. §9. It is excerpted by Montfaucon from an account of the Abbat Theodore, written for Theophilus, Bishop of Alexandria (385–412) by a certain Ammon (Acta SS. Maii,Tom. iii. Append., pp. 63–71). The writer was at that time a bishop (see unknown): he was born about 335, as he was seventeen years old when he embraced the monastic life a year ‘and more’ after the proclamation of Gallus as Cæsar (Mar. 15, 351). About the time of the expulsion of Athanasius by Syrianus he retired to Nitria, where he remained many years, and finally returned to Alexandria, where he appears (infra) as one of the clergy; the date of his elevation to the Episcopate cannot be fixed, but it obviously cannot be as early as 356–7 (so D.C.B. i. 102 (2), and probably is much later even than 362, in which year he would still be hardly twenty-eight. (He mentions the objections to the election of Athanasius, who was probably 30 in 328, on the ground of his youth.) Accordingly (apart from the different form of his name) he cannot ³ be identified with either of the Ammonii referred to inTom. ad. Ant.1, note 3;Hist. Ar.72, &c. The elder of the two does not concern us here: the younger (supr.pp. 483, 486), is the Ammonius to whom Athanasius told the story in the hearing of Ammon, and was now dead. Of Hermon, Bishop of Bubastis, mentioned as present along with Ammonius, Theophilus, and Ammon when the story was told, nothing is known (except that the date D.C.B. iii. 4 (2) is over 25 years too early). As he is not ‘of blessed memory,’ he was possibly still living during the Episcopate of Theophilus and Ammon. (There is nothing to identify him with the bishop ofTanesinTom. Ant.1, 10.)

The story itself is given at second-hand, from Ammon’s recollection of a statement by Athanasius some 12 to 15 years (at least) before he wrote. The prophetic details about Jovian may therefore be put down to natural accretion (Letter56, note 2). But (apart from the fact that Julian’s death must have been rumoured long before the tardy official announcement of it, Tillem.Emp.iv. 449sqq.,Prolegg.ubi supr.) that Athanasius told of the φήμη of Julian’s death among the monks of the Thebaid need not be doubted. The story is one of a very large class, many of which are fairly authenticated. To say nothing of the φήμη at the battle of Mycale; we have in recent times the authority of Mr. R. Stuart Poole, of the British Museum, for the fact that on the night of the death of the Duke of Cambridge (July 9, 1850), Mr. Pooles’s brother ‘suddenly took out his watch and said, “Note the time, the Duke of Cambridge is dead,” and that the time proved to be correct;’ also the case of Mr. Edmonds who saw at Leicester, early in the morning of Nov. 4, 1837, an irruption of water into the works of the Thames tunnel, by which a workman was drowned; (other curious cases in ‘Phantasms of the Living’ vol. 2, pp. 367sqq.). The letter or memoir from which this ‘Narratio’ is taken, was published by the Bollandists from a Medicean ms. , and it bears every internal mark of genuineness. In what way it is integrally connected with theVita Antonii(Gwatkin,Studies,p. 101), except by the fact that it happens to mention Antony, I fail to see. On the subject of Theodore of Tabenne, the main subject of the memoir, see Amélineau’sS. Pakhôme(ut supra,p. 188), alsoinfr. Letter58, note 3.

“As I think your holiness was present and heard, when his blessedness Pope Athanasius, in the presence of other clergy of Alexandria and of my insignificance, formerly related in the Great Church something about Theodorus ⁴, to the Ammonius of blessed memory, bishop of Elearchia ⁵, and to Hermon, bishop of the city of Bumastica ⁶; I write only what is necessary to put your reverence in mind of what he said. When the famous bishops were wondering at the Blessed Antony, Pope Athanasius—for Antony was often with him—said to them:—

I saw also at that season great men of God, who are lately dead, Theodorus chief of the Tabennesian monks, and the father of the monks around ⁷ Antinoopolis, called Abbas Pammon. For when I was pursued by Julian, and was expecting to be slain by him—for this news was shewn me by good friends—these two came to me on the same day at Antinoopolis. And having planned to hide with Theodorus, I embarked on his vessel, which was completely covered in, while Abbas Pammon accompanied us. And when the wind was unfavourable, I was very anxious and prayed; and the monks with Theodore got out and towed the boat. And as Abbas Pammon was encouraging me in my anxiety, I said ‘Believe me when I say that my heart is never so trustful in time of peace as in time of persecution. For I have good confidence that suffering for Christ, and strengthened by His mercy, even though I am slain, I shall find mercy with Him.’ And while I was still saying this, Theodorus fixed his eyes on Abbas Pammon and smiled, while the other nearly laughed. So I said to them, ‘Why have you laughed at my words, do you convict me of cowardice?’ and Theodorus said to Abbas Pammon, ‘Tell him why we smiled.’ At which the latter said, ‘You ought to tell him.’ So Theodorus said, ‘in this very hour Julian has been slain in Persia’ for so God had declared beforehand concerning him: ‘the haughty man, the despiser and the boaster, shall finish nothing ⁸. But a Christian Emperor shall arise who shall be illustrious, but shall live only a short time ⁹. Wherefore you ought not to harass yourselves by departing into the Thebaid, but secretly to go to the Court, for you will meet him by the way, and having been kindly received by him, will return to your Church. And he soon shall be taken by God.’ And so it happened. From which cause I believe, that many who are well pleasing to God live unnoticed, especially among the monks. For those men unnoticed also, such as the blessed Amun and the holy Theodorus ¹⁰ in the mountain of Nitria, and the servant of God, the happy old man Pammon.”