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The Alleged Second Session of the Council of Nicaea

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  25 March 2011

Colm Luibhéid
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Extract

Was there a second session of the Council of Nicaea? To that question – first posed and affirmatively answered by Otto Seeck – there have been numerous responses, mostly in the form of bald assertions of one kind or another. Occasionally there have been lengthier discussions of the matter, but with no emerging consensus, and it is still the case that opposite views continue to surface in discussions of the aftermath of the first ecumenical council. Furthermore, among the statements accepting or rejecting the fact of a second session, it is regularly unclear whether the problem at issue is that of a reassembly at Nicaea of all the bishops who had gathered there in 325, a reassembly of these same bishops at some other unspecified place, or a reunion somewhere of only some of those who had participated at the major gathering.

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Articles
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The Journal of Ecclesiastical History , Volume 34 , Issue 2 , April 1983 , pp. 165 - 174
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Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1983

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References

1 Seeck, O., ‘Untersuchungen zur Geschichte des Nicänischen Konzils’, Zeitschrift für Kirchengesckichte, xvii (1896)Google Scholar, 1–71, 319–62.

2 Cf., for example, E. Schwartz, ‘Zur Geschichte des Athanasius, 8’, Nachrichtcn der Kgl. Gesch. d. Wiss. zu Göltingen, Phil. hist. Kl. 1911, 380–6; Opitz, H.-G., ‘Die Zeitfolge des arianischen Streites’, Zeitschrift für neulestamentliche Wissenschaft, xxxiv (1935), 131–59Google Scholar; Schneemelcher, W., ‘Zur Chronologie des arianischen Streites’, Theologische Literaturzeitung, vii/viii (1954), 394–400Google Scholar; Piganiol, A., L'Empire chrétien, Paris 1972Google Scholar.

3 ‘… Contrairement à Schwartz et Opitz qui s'appuyaient sur ce texte pour en induire une 2e session de Nicée, position qui, aujourd'hui n'est plus admise par personne…” Thus, Annik Martin in ‘Athanase et les Mélitiens’, Politique et théologie chez Athanase d'Alexandrie, ed. C. Kannengiesser, Paris 1974, 37 n. 13. But cf. ‘La lettre de Constantin à Athanase n'était rien moins que l'ordre impérieux de réintegrer les ariens dans la communion ecclésiale, consequence peut-être d'une seconde session du concile de Nicée en 327…’ L. W. Barnard, ‘Athanase, Constantin et Constance’, ibid., 131–2.

4 This is the point made, for example, by Jones, A. H. M., Constantine and the Conversion of Europe, New York 1962, 148Google Scholar.

5 Cf. Theodoret, Historia Ecclesiastica 1.7; Socrates H.E. 1–8; Sozomen, H.E. 1–21.

6 Theodoret, H.E. 1.19–20. Philostorgius (H.E. 1.10) states that Eusebius was ordered into exile three months after the council. Although opponents chose to depict them as of one heretical mind, Arius and Eusebius actually differed on some questions of fundamental importance. Cf. Colm Luibhéid, ‘The Arianism of Eusebius of Nicomedia’, The Irish Theological Quarterly, xliii (1976), 3–23Google Scholar.

7 Socrates H.E. 1–8; Sozomen H.E. 1.21. How the bishops could prevent the return to Alexandria is not stated.

8 Cf. the letter from the bishops at Nicaea, Socrates H.E. 1.8 = Urkunde 23 in H.-G. Opitz, Athanasius Werke 3.1, Berlin 1934. See also Constantine's letter denouncing Arius, commanding the burning of his books and ordaining the death penalty for anyone found to have concealed the writings of the heresiarch. Socrates H.E. 1.9 = Opitz, Urkunde 33.

9 Socrates, H.E. 1.9. Socrates adds that he omitted these letters from his history because of their length. And for similar denunciations of Eusebius, see the letter of Constantine to the Nicomedians, Theodoret H.E. 1.20 = Opitz, Urkunde 4.

10 Sozomen, H.E. 2.16.

11 ‘… since it has seemed good to your piety to be kind and to recall the one accused in this matter'. This remark in the joint letter of Eusebius and Theognis from exile implies that Arius was first to be recalled. Theodoret H.E. 1.14 = Urkunde 31. Although Arius is not named here, it is difficult to imagine who else could be meant.

12 Socrates, H.E. 1.23; Sozomen, H.E. 2.16.

13 Only a few of the details cited thus far are found in the relevant pages of Theodoret.

14 He did so with the help of a presbyter sympathetic to Arius and formerly in the entourage of the emperor's sister, Constantia.

15 The statement of belief presented by Arius and Euzoius is in Socrates H.E. 1.26 = Opitz, Urkunde 30. Constantine's letter to Arius summoning him to his presence i s dated 25 November and must have been written either in 326 or 327. Opitz settles for the latter date. Cf. the fragment of a letter from Constantine to Alexander in which he states that Arius had accepted the decisions of the Council of Nicaea. Gelasius, H.E. 3.15.1.

16 Having quoted the letter of Eusebius and Theognis in which the authors remark that Arius was recalled before they were, Sozomen says that the emperor summoned the heresiarch to the meeting ‘from exile'. H.E. 2.16.

17 Sozomen, H.E. 2.27 and 2.29. Cf. Socrates, H.E. 1.37–8.

18 It is not clear if this is the same statement of belief as that mentioned by both Socrates and Sozomen. If it is, then the Alexander referred to as having ejected Arius is likely to be the bishop of Alexandria. If Alexander of Constantinople is meant, the implication is that Arius had at least twice to present a written declaration of belief to the emperor, something not inherently improbable.

19 Theodoret, H.E. 1.14. Theodoret does not quote the text presented by Arius to Constantine. And it should be noted here that he does not say anything about the exile of Arius after Nicaea, about the recall by the emperor, nor about the imperial permission t o return to Alexandria.

20 Socrates, H.E. 1.14. The letter is presented as Urkunde 31 by Opitz, who also assumes that it was addressed to ‘the Second Synod of Nicaea’.

21 ‘They owed their restoration to a document which they had presented to the bishops containing a retraction of their sentiments.’ Sozomen, H.E. 2.16.

22 Cf. the descriptions of Eusebius in the letter written by Alexander prior to the Council of Nicaea to his fellow bishops. Socrates, H.E. 1.6.

23 Theodoret, H.E. 1.14.

24 Gelasius, H.E. 3.15.1. It is worth remarking that Constantine informs Alexander that the examination of the document submitted by Arius took place ‘with many people in attendance’.

25 Thus, cf. Theodoret, H.E. 1.7.

26 ‘… one cannot help noting that the human nature of ancient and modern councils i s the same – much controversy and more or less absenteeism but all present at dinner'. Footnote in A Select Library of .Nicene and post-Nicene Fathers, New York 1840, 524.

27 Eusebius, Vita Constantini, 3.21.

28 Ibid., 23.

29 Cf. Martin, ‘Athanase et les Melitiens’, 31–61, but especially 36–8.

30 Opitz, Urkunde 23.10.

31 Thus, for example, cf. Piganiol, L'Empire chrétien, 45.

32 His determination to compel some measure of ecclesiastical peace is in fact well documented.

33 Athanasius, Apol. contra arianos, P.G., xxv. 327. This, presumably, is the source of the same statement in Theodoret, H.E. 1.26.

34 The first of the festal letters of Athanasius was issued in 329, thereby assuring 328 as the year in which Alexander died.

35 Gelasius, H.E. 2, 37, 38. Cf. also Philostorgius, H.E. 2.7.

36 This latter interpretation is supported by, among others, Gustave Bardy in the third volume of the Fliche-Martin Histoire de l'Église, Paris 1950, 99Google Scholar, notes.

37 When strictly interpreted Athanasius seems to be saying that the council – whose conclusion was followed five months later by the deat h of Alexander – condemned the Arians but restored the Meletians. These latter, however, began once more to cause trouble. But Athanasius nowhere suggests that the Nicene council lasted three years or that there were two sessions, with the second session coming to an end five months before the death of Alexander. Such an omission by someone who, like Eusebius of Caesarea, was closely involved with the council must of itself cause some doubts about the reality of the second session, as envisaged by Seeck and Opitz.

38 Philostorgius, as mentioned earlier, says that Eusebius was sent into exile some three months after the council. If the council lasted until 327 then the three months after that would yield a timescale for the exile and recall of Eusebius which would be reconciled only with difficulty with what we are told by the sources mentioned above. Hence some further doubt about Gelasius's note.

39 Athanasius, Apol. contra Arianos, P.G., xxv. 284–5.

40 The so-called Council of Antioch is a case in point.

41 For instance,' Let there be a second meeting of the bishops each year.' Thus the Canones Apostolorum, 37.

42 A bias towards tidiness might inspire the thought that it was at the further synod, referred to by Eusebius (Vita Constantini, 3.7) that Arius and Eusebius were rehabilitated. This, however, raises too many difficulties, including the question of how Alexander could have been prevailed upon to agree.