Œuvres Athanase d'Alexandrie (295-373) Epistolaes (CCEL) The Letters of Athanasius
From Letter XXXIX .—(For 367.) Of the particular books and their number, which are accepted by the Church. From the thirty-ninth Letter of Holy Athanasius, Bishop of Alexandria, on the Paschal festival; wherein he defines canonically what are the divine books which are accepted by the Church.

1.

They have 1 fabricated books which they call books of tables 2, in which they shew stars, to which they give the names of Saints. And therein of a truth they have inflicted on themselves a double reproach: those who have written such books, because they have perfected themselves in a lying and contemptible science; and as to the ignorant and simple, they have led them astray by evil thoughts concerning the right faith established in all truth and upright in the presence of God.

  1. This section is preserved in the Coptic (Memphitic) Life of S. Theodore (AmélineauAnn. du Musée Guimet.xvii. p. 239). Its contents and the context in which it is quoted appear decisive for its identification as part ofLetter39. But the Letter from which the fragment comes is stated in the context to have been received by Theodore in the spring previous to his death. If Theodore died in 364, as seems probable on other grounds (see p. 569, note 3), the speech from which our fragment comes must have been written for him by his biographer. This is not unlikely, nor does it throw any suspicion on the genuineness of the fragment itself.  ↩

  2. Copt. ἀπογράμμων : astrological charts or tables appear to be meant. ↩

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The Letters of Athanasius
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