In his chapter ‘Why the third fell out: Trinitarian dissent’, Thomas C. Pfizenmaier identifies William Whiston as an Arian:
The classical definition of Arianism involved two loci. Speaking of the second person of the Trinity, the Logos, Arius had held, ‘that there was a time when he was not’ (ὁτι ήν ποτε ουκ ήν) and that, while part of the spiritual creation, the Son was nevertheless a creature (κτίσμα) and made out of nothing (έξ όυκ όντων), and thus not part of the Deity. According to these criteria, there can be no doubt that Whiston was an Arian.
William Whiston truly believed that Arianism represented the teaching of the early church, and that Athanasius had corrupted that teaching at the Council of Nicaea. Whiston was an avowed and public Arian.Footnote 1
Most scholars would not raise an eyebrow over Pfizenmaier's assessment of William Whiston's Arianism.Footnote 2 For example, Eamon Duffy states that ‘To Whiston, rather than to Samuel Clarke, belongs the dubious credit of having revived the Arian heresy in England.’Footnote 3 Richard Westfall writes about Whiston and Clarke that ‘Before long, both became notorious as the two leading Arians in England, or at least the two leading known Arians.’ Furthermore, Whiston's ‘Arianism appears virtually identical to Newton's’.Footnote 4 Steven Snobelen's assessment is more nuanced than that of Pfizenmaier, Duffy or Westfall. None the less, he concludes that ‘The generally Arian Christology that Whiston arrived at, which saw the Father as the only true God and held that the Son was subordinate to the Father, is essentially the same as that held by Newton.’Footnote 5
The purpose of this article, however, is indeed to ‘raise an eyebrow’ in relation to Whiston's so-called Arianism. It will be demonstrated that Whiston consistently and repeatedly distanced himself from Arius of Alexandria and that he referred to his own Christological beliefs with the term ‘Eusebian’ rather than ‘Arian’. After more than three hundred years, therefore, William Whiston should no longer be called an Arian.
What is an Arian?
There has been a significant methodological shift among patristic scholars, which was prefigured by Whiston himself, in relation to the definition of ‘Arianism’. The days when Athanasius' accounts of fourth-century Christological debates were taken at face value are in the past. Rather than naive trust, it is now commonplace to find Athanasius' character on trial. In his The early episcopal career of Athanasius of Alexandria, Duane Arnold demonstrates this fundamental shift. He compares scholarly views of Athanasius among scholars of the modern era with those of the nineteenth century. Nineteenth-century scholars, such as J. A. Moehler, John Henry Newman, John Mason Neale and Henry Melvill Gwatkin, held a positive (sometimes even glowing) view of Athanasius. Scholars of the more modern era such as Otto Seeck, Eduard Schwartz and Hans-George Opitz held a negative (sometimes even despairing) view of Athanasius' character.Footnote 6 The wake left by earlier scholars over Athanasius' character continues to be felt today. Arnold himself concludes that ‘it must be admitted that the more vituperative critics of Athanasius have failed to provide clear and convincing evidence for a revisionist portrait of the bishop of Alexandria’.Footnote 7 In contrast, Timothy Barnes concludes that although Athanasius ‘cuts an impressive historical figure … he could not have cut such an impressive figure had he not been conspicuously lacking in the Christian virtues of meekness and humility’.Footnote 8
While Barnes's statements represent an extreme position, more recent Athanasian scholarship falls more in line with him than with Arnold. For example, Rowan Williams concludes that Arianism ‘as a coherent system, founded by a single great figure and sustained by his disciples, is a fantasy –more exactly, a fantasy based on the polemic of Nicene writers, above all Athanasius’.Footnote 9 David Gwynn credits Athanasius with sincerity in relation to his beliefs about his theological opponents. However, Athanasius' presentation of his enemies ‘is a rhetorical device … and the polarization that he constructs cannot be assumed to represent the actual teachings of the men upon whom it is imposed’.Footnote 10
Even so, Arnold's treatment of scholarly views of Athanasius is helpful. He is misguided, however, when he states that the charge of forgery was first made against Athanasius by Otto Seeck in 1896.Footnote 11 In 1711, almost two centuries before Seeck, Whiston put forth seventeen ‘Suspicions concerning Athanasius’, in the first volume of his Primitive Christianity reviv'd. In suspicion seventeen Whiston says that
Athanasius relates so many Stories that are almost incredible; and produces so many pretended Letters and Monuments which are wholly unsupported by any other Original Testimonies; and sometimes but ill agree with Chronology, that there is the greatest Reason in the World to suspect many of them to be direct Forgeries.Footnote 12
A year later, in 1712, Whiston removed the word ‘suspicion’ in his Athanasius convicted of forgery.Footnote 13 Indeed, Whiston's own writings concerning the fourth century prefigured the now commonplace understanding that Athanasius' writings should be read with a cautious eye.
Although subsequent scholarship has proved Whiston erroneous on significant issues such as the authenticity of the Ignatian long recension as well as the Apostolic constitutions, in other areas of fourth-century scholarship he was well ahead of this time.Footnote 14 In addition to Whiston's concern to read Athanasius critically, modern scholarship also concurs with Whiston's call for more precise terminology in relation to non-Nicene Christologies. Both Whiston and modern scholars agree that all non-Nicene Christologies should not be lumped together into one group called ‘Arian’. Setting aside for the moment the need for more precision, Sara Parvis, for example, is illustrative in relation to modern scholarship and the origin of the term ‘Arian’. With a similar understanding to those of Williams and Gwynn, in her Marcellus of Ancyra and the lost years of the Arian Controversy, 325–345, she writes that
After Marcellus and Athanasius spent their year together in Rome, however, a new animal emerges in the writings of both: the full-blown Arian heresy, modelled on the constructs of the old heresiologies, with its diabolical initiative, its roots in previous heresies or philosophies, and its single male heresiarch with his malignant followers, who propagate theological perversions with great vigour, persecute the orthodox, and, most important of all, have been clearly condemned by the Church.Footnote 15
In the words of R. P. C. Hanson, ‘It might be said that at the Council of Serdica in 343 one half of the Church accused the other of being “Arian”, while in its turn that half accused the other of being “Sabellian”. But these were wild unsubstantiated pieces of propaganda.’Footnote 16 If Hanson is correct that the term ‘Arian’ was ‘wild unsubstantiated … propaganda’ in its original historical context, then it is likely that the term was used in the same manner within the historical contexts of the Trinitarian debates of Whiston's day.Footnote 17
Thus, if Whiston as well as modern scholars are correct that Athanasius was wrong to label all non-Nicenes with the pejorative term ‘Arian’, and that more precision is needed when discussing non-Nicene Christologies, what then is an ‘Arian’?Footnote 18 I would suggest, in a similar manner to Pfizenmaier,Footnote 19 that the term Arian should be restricted to those persons and groups, past and present, who fundamentally agree with what Arius himself taught: that there was a time when the Son was not, and that the Son is not homoousios with the Father.Footnote 20 Whiston explicitly rejected the first Arian teaching. In relation to the second, he was able to accept homoousios, even if with reservation, via the interpretation of homoousios put forth by Eusebius of Caesarea.Footnote 21 In this strict sense, Whiston should no longer be called an Arian, as his own writings demonstrate.Footnote 22
William Whiston and Arius of Alexandria
Upon his death in 1692, Robert Boyle endowed a lectureship with the purpose of defending Christianity against its critics.Footnote 23 In 1707 William Whiston delivered the Boyle lectures under the title The accomplishment of Scripture prophecies.Footnote 24 Shortly afterwards he was asked ‘by a Friend or two’ to propose a method for the study of divinity in order to bring about unity among Christians and ‘the Restoration of the Primitive Faith and Practice’.Footnote 25 Since Whiston now had a little time on his hands, he obliged. It could be said then that it was his desire to assist his friends that led to his troubles, as he was being asked to put in print what previously he had only expressed in conversation. Whiston describes his method of research for this project. Like others before him, such as Paul Best (1590–1657) and John Biddle (1616–62), Whiston suspected that the doctrine of the Trinity upheld by the established Church was not in accord with that of the Christian writers of the first two centuries.Footnote 26 However, he needed to examine his supposition closely ‘that so afterwards I might either go on with Assurance, if I should find my former Opinion fully confirm'd; or else might meddle no farther’.Footnote 27 Therefore, Whiston ‘ran over, on purpose, the New Testament, as now own'd for Canonical among us, twice’ and ‘the known Catholick Books and Fragments, till near the conclusion of the second Century’.Footnote 28 Herein lies the heart of Whiston's method for achieving unity and restoring primitive Christianity: the primacy of primary texts over ‘Modern Writers, and the darling Notions of any Church or Party whatsoever’.Footnote 29 Whiston concluded that the ‘Testimonies for Arianism were vastly superior in Number, Plainness, and Antiquity, to those which are commonly suppos'd to be for the Athanasian Doctrine’.Footnote 30
Here is the early mistake, made by Whiston, which has contributed to him being mistakenly defined as an Arian. Later, as he was waiting for the ruling against his heretical beliefs by the Convocation of Canterbury, he wrote to the archbishop of Canterbury, Thomas Tenison.Footnote 31 In this letter, dated 5 April 1711, copies of which were sent to the archbishop of York, John Sharp, as well as to the Prolocutor of the lower house and others not specified, Whiston acknowledges that
As to the Imputation of Arianism, which I confess I have not been sufficiently careful to avoid, I do declare it never was my Intention to assert the Arian Heresy, strictly so called; or to revive the Heresy of Arius, and of his peculiar Followers, as it was condemn'd at the Council of Nice. I guarded against this expressly in my Historical Preface, p.2. by a particular Declaration, that by that Arianism which I speak of, I ever mean the Doctrine of that Part of the Church which was call'd Arian in the Fourth Century; and not the doctrine of Arius himself only, with a few of his particular Followers.Footnote 32
On the one hand, it is clear that Whiston was ahead of his day. Sounding much like today's patristic scholars, he distinguished between those called Arians and Arius of Alexandria himself. On the other hand, Whiston acknowledged that he had not been quick enough to distance himself from the term ‘Arianism’, therefore giving the impression that he considered Arius' doctrine most closely to represent that of Jesus and his Apostles.
None the less, close attention to the place in the Historical preface to which Whiston is referring shows that Whiston did indeed distinguish between Arius' teachings and those teachings that were called Arian by Nicene proponents:
In short, I therein plainly own'd that the Original Doctrine in that important Matter was very different from the common Opinion, and was most certainly nearer that of the Arians, than of the Athanasians, and present Orthodoxy: Tho’ I had not then examin'd the Matter so exactly as to know whether the Doctrine of that Part of the Church, which was called Arian in the Fourth Century, (for those I always mean by the Arians; not Arius himself only, with a few of his particular Followers) was entirely the same as to this Point, with that deliver'd and believ'd in the first times of the Gospel, or not.Footnote 33
Here, as Whiston reflected on the early stages that led to his discovery that primitive Christianity was fundamentally different from the orthodox Anglicanism of his day, he admitted the need for further study. However, even at this early stage, Whiston stated that by ‘Arians’ he did not mean Arius himself; rather, he meant that part of the Church that was called Arian in the fourth century.
Although Whiston naively accepted the term ‘Arian’ for his Christological beliefs, support for Arius of Alexandria's beliefs are to be found nowhere in Whiston's extant writings. Rather, the opposite: William Whiston consistently and regularly condemned the teachings of Arius and agreed with the Council of Nicaea's decision to rule Arius' Christological beliefs out of bounds.
In a footnote attached to his letter to Thomas Tenison, where Whiston states that ‘I do declare it never was my Intention to assert the Arian Heresy, strictly so called; or to revive the Heresy of Arius, and of his peculiar Followers, as it was condemn'd at the Council of Nice’, there is a clear dismissal of Arius' understanding of the relationship of the Son to the Father. Here Whiston refers to ‘those particular Novel Doctrines, and the like particular Novel Expressions, of Arius himself’ and ‘those rash and Novel Assertions and Expressions of Arius, which caus'd the Disturbances in the Church at the time, and were condemn'd by the Council of Nice’.Footnote 34 Whiston's treatment of the Council of Nicaea will be dealt with later; for now, it is imperative to note the teachings from Arius with which Whiston takes issue: firstly that ‘there was when he [the Son] was not’ (ἦν ὅτε οὐκ ἦν); secondly, that ‘before he [the Son] was begotten he was not’ (πρὶν γεννηθῆναι οὐκ ἦν); and thirdly that the Son was created ‘out of nothing’ (ἐξ οὐκ ὄντων ἦν).Footnote 35
In other words, Whiston disagreed with almost everything of Christological significance that emerges from Arius' extant writings. He had the same problems with Arius' teaching as he had with the Nicene shibboleth, homoousios. None of these statements – ‘there was when he was not’, ‘before he was begotten he was not’, ‘out of nothing’, nor homoousios – appear in the Scriptures or the earliest Christian writings. Whiston reminds us that he confines himself ‘to the much Ancienter and more Authentick Doctrines and Language of the Scripture and the most Primitive Writers'.Footnote 36
In this same footnote Whiston deals with the issue of the word ‘created’ (κτίσις) as it relates to the Son. At the time when he was writing, in 1711, Whiston had not yet come to the conclusion that ‘Tis true, in the Athanasian Copy of the Anathema's of the Council of Nice we are told that this Council condemn'd those that said Christ was Created: But … the assertion of that Clause has been fully demonstrated to be no better than a Forgery of Athanasius, and it is evident this Council never did condemn that Expression.’Footnote 37 At this point he simply states that ‘… that Council's Anathema against the use of the Word (κτίσις), created, concerning our Saviour, … seems to have been brought in under the Pretence that the Arians us'd it the very same sense of the Son, and of all the Inferior Creatures.’Footnote 38 Here Whiston says that the condemnation of the term ‘created’ in relation to the Son was in order to condemn Arius' opinion that the Son was a creature like all other creatures.Footnote 39
There are two noteworthy observations to be made at this point in relation to Pfizenmaier's definition of Arianism. First, it is true that Whiston believed the Son to be created by God because that proposition ‘was most certainly the Ancient and Original Language of the Scripture, and of the first Christians'.Footnote 40 However this does not mean, for Whiston, that the Son was created from nothing. Furthermore, for Whiston, the creation of the Son is elevated far above the rest of creation. Indeed, Whiston eventually concluded that the Council of Nicaea in fact issued no anathema against the Son's created status. In other words, the condemnation of the word ‘created’ was not a part of the condemnation of Arius. Once again, at this point, modern scholars concur with Whiston's conclusion that there was no anathema against the Son as created in the Nicene Creed of 325. J. N. D. Kelly writes that ‘The ban on describing the Son as “created (κτιστόν)”, though printed by many editors, is probably not authentic, being absent (inter alia) from the version of the creed read out at the second session of Chalcedon.’Footnote 41
William Whiston and the Council of Nicaea
Since William Whiston consistently and explicitly differentiated his own Christological views from those of Arius of Alexandria, why then has he been labelled an Arian for the past three hundred years or so, not only by his theological opponents past and present, but also by professionally trained historians? One answer to this question is to be found in his own acknowledged early, and naïve, acceptance of the term ‘Arian’ for his belief system. However, there is another possible answer: the minimal interaction with Whiston's ‘The Council of Nice vindicated from the Athanasian heresy’, which is to be found in Whiston's Three essays of 1713. In fact, this essay reveals that Pfizenmaier is simply wrong when he says that ‘William Whiston truly believed that Arianism represented the teaching of the early church, and that Athanasius had corrupted that teaching at the Council of Nicaea.’ It was not that the council itself had erred. Rather, Whiston argued, that Athanasius had corrupted its teaching after the event. This distinction is important. Whiston had no major qualms with Nicaea. Rather, it was the ‘Athanasian’ interpretation of Nicaea that caused Whiston great anxiety.
In the fourth volume of his Primitive Christianity reviv'd, Whiston offers evidence from Christian writings ranging from ‘the Books of the New Testament … ‘till about A. D. 190’ for twenty-three articles of faith that he believes characterised earliest Christian belief.Footnote 42 In ‘The Council of Nice vindicated’, Whiston lists all twenty-three articles again. He then discusses the beliefs of three groups in relation to these articles of primitive Christian faith. His goal is to demonstrate the Nicene council's affirmation of his articles of faith, along with Arius and his followers' heterodoxy, as well as the erroneous interpretation of the conclusions of Nicaea by Athanasius' and his followers.
Before examining Whiston's understanding of Nicaea, and these groups, some basic observations are in order. Whiston takes very seriously Eusebius of Caesarea's letter to his diocese, written in order to explain why he eventually signed up to the Nicene Creed. He says that ‘Eusebius's own original Letter from the Council of Nice, preserv'd both in Athanasius, Socrates, and Theodrit, and inserted in the following collection, is much the most full and authentick Account now extant of the Debates in that Council’.Footnote 43 Whiston refers back to this letter time and time again.
Whiston's own conclusions about the Christological debates of the fourth century are in many instances in line with modern patristic scholarship. However, it is important to note that Whiston's acceptance of Eusebius of Caesarea's interpretation of Nicaea as well as Eusebius' interpretation of homoousios, is not one of those instances. Rather, Frances Young's view is commonplace: ‘Eusebius eventually signed the new creed, with its homoousion, presumably in deference to the emperor's wishes and for the sake of peace in the Church; but in his letter to his church, his embarrassment is evident.’Footnote 44 Whiston, however, saw no embarrassment in Eusebius' letter.
Whiston identifies three representative doctrines involved in the Nicene debates: the Athanasian, the Arian and the Eusebian.Footnote 45 The Athanasian doctrine consist of ‘those novel Doctrines and Language which Athanasius and his Followers introduc'd and maintain'd after the Council of Nice, in the latter half of the fourth Century; but this, as they were a long time afterward improv'd and explain'd in the Athanasian Creed’.Footnote 46 It is no surprise to find Whiston defining Arian doctrines as ‘only those novel Doctrines and Language which Arius himself, and his peculiar Followers, introduc'd; and which indeed were disapprov'd of both by the Eusebians and Athanasians'.Footnote 47 Whiston equates the Eusebian doctrine with ‘Christian Doctrines’ because the ‘Eusebian Creeds preserv'd by Athanasius’ consist of ‘those noble Remains of old Christianity’.Footnote 48 Whiston does not refer to these ‘true Doctrines’ as Eusebian because he approves ‘of any Names of particular Sects, or of all the Conduct of Eusebius of Nicomedia’ from whom the name was taken.Footnote 49 Rather, Whiston uses this term for authentic Christianity because Eusebian ‘was the Name originally bestow'd upon them’ and the name Eusebian is much more appropriate than ‘Arian; which they by no means either desir'd or deserv'd; but which was only made use of by their Enemies as a Name of Scandal and Reproach for them’.Footnote 50
Even though Whiston employed the term ‘Eusebian’ from a general rather than a more specific position, it is significant that Whiston saw a clear divide between the Christological understanding of Eusebius of Nicomedia and that of Eusebius of Caesarea. Whiston identifies Eusebius of Nicomedia as the individual from whom a group was first called ‘Eusebian’ in the fourth century. However, he also states that he was not pleased with some of Eusebius of Nicomedia's behaviour. Thus, in light of Whiston's affinity for Eusebius of Caesarea, it comes as little surprise to hear Whiston call Eusebius of Nicomedia the ‘head of the gross Arians' and Eusebius of Caesarea the ‘head of the genuine Eusebians’. Footnote 51
Whiston was able to accept the key Nicene term homoousios (ὁμοούσιος), via Eusebius of Caesarea's letter, even though he did not think the term was ideal given its absence from Scripture. Eusebius says that after Constantine proposed the addition of homoousios to the creed that was emerging from the Council of Nicaea, there was considerable discussion as to its meaning. Eusebius says then that homoousios means ‘that the Son of God bears no resemblance to the originated creatures, but that to His Father alone Who Begat Him’.Footnote 52 Whiston regurgitates Eusebius' interpretation in his discussion of article viii: ‘Jesus Christ the Word, and Son of God, is a divine Being or Person far Inferior to his Father, in Nature, Attributes and Perfections.’Footnote 53 He says that the purpose of homoousios – an ‘ambiguous Word’ – was to communicate that ‘he who was not made out of Nothing, as were ordinary Creatures, but was some way deriv'd from God himself, from the Essence or Substance of the Father, might better be said to be of the Same, or of a like Essence or Substance with him, than of the Same or of a like Essence or Substance with those Creatures'.Footnote 54
Furthermore, this time in agreement with Athanasius, Whiston believed that homoousios was included in the Nicene Creed in order to exclude Arius.Footnote 55 When contrasting the Athanasian doctrine with that of article iii: ‘Jesus Christ is in a peculiar Sense the Son, the only, the only begotten, and the most beloved Son of God, i.e. a Divine Person, in an extraordinary and singular Manner deriv'd from, and peculiarly near and dear to the Supreme God the Father’,Footnote 56 Whiston says that the Council of Nicaea did ‘venture to say, that the Son was deriv'd from the Essence, or Substance of God, in their Creed; but this was done, not in order to establish a strict philosophick Notion, but in opposition to Arius and his Followers, who said he was created or made, as the subordinate Creatures were, out of nothing’.Footnote 57 Whiston goes on to say that both the Athanasians and the Eusebians disagreed with such ‘Arian Rashness’.Footnote 58 However, the Eusebians took the higher ground because they resisted ‘uncertain, unscriptural and metaphysical Notions’.Footnote 59 Even here Whiston displays openness to homoousios. He continues ‘tho’ they did not properly deny the possibility of the same; as not pretending to enter into such Depths of the Divine Power, by determining how, or after what Manner the Son of God was deriv'd from the Father; but owning his Generation to be really unsearchable by Mankind’.Footnote 60 Here Whiston is once again condemning Arians for saying that the Son was made of out nothing as the other creatures were.
Even so, Whiston was not at all bashful about calling the Son a ‘created’ being. His article vi states that ‘Jesus Christ is the λόγος θεοῦ προαιώνιος, the first begotten of all Creatures, the beginning of the Creation, of God, i.e. a Divine Being or Person created or begotten by the Father before all Ages, or before all subordinate Creatures, visible and invisible.’Footnote 61 In contrast with Primitive Christian belief, Whiston defines the Athanasian doctrine as ‘The Majesty Co-eternal: –The Son Uncreate: – The Son Eternal: – The Son is neither Made, nor Created, but Begotten: – The whole three Persons are Co-eternal together.’Footnote 62 After contrasting these two doctrines Whiston states that ‘In this Article the Athanasians seem to me to have greatly mistaken the ancient Faith, and the Meaning of the Council of Nice.’Footnote 63
What then, according to Whiston, was the understanding of the Son's created status at the Council of Nicaea? In this work Whiston had concluded that the Nicene anathema against calling the Son created ‘has been fully demonstrated to be no better than a Forgery of Athanasius’.Footnote 64 This, therefore, constitutes the evidence that the council did not condemn calling the Son ‘created’. However, Whiston acknowledges that the Nicene Creed refers to the Son as ‘begotten, not made’.Footnote 65 Whiston also acknowledges the anathemas in the Nicene Creed against those who say that ‘there was a Duration when the Son was not’, ‘he was not before he was begotten’ and that ‘he was made out of Nothing’.Footnote 66 None the less, the Athanasian interpretation of these statements that make the Son ‘Uncreated, or a distinct Person or Being, properly Co-eternal with the Father, and this by a true eternal Generation’ is simply wrong.Footnote 67 For Whiston, the Son has to be created in some sense. If the Son is not created, then the Son is eternal. It is impossible to have two eternal figures.
Whiston therefore relies on Constantine's interpretation of the anathema ‘he was not before he was begotten’, as preserved in Eusebius of Caesarea's letter to his diocese. Constantine said, according to Eusebius, that the Son ‘was in being even according to His divine generation which is before all ages, since even before He was generated in energy, He was in virtue with the Father ingenerately’. Because the Son had the potential to be in the Father, as Word or Wisdom, before the Father generated the Son, Whiston concludes that at the Council of Nicaea ‘it was not safe to say absolutely that he once had no Existence or Being at all’.Footnote 68 However, by way of implication, Whiston suggests that the council ‘had no traditionary Doctrine of any Being properly Co-eternal with the Father, yet had they no traditionary Doctrine neither that said Christ was made out of Nothing, or had no sort of Existence at all before he was begotten’.Footnote 69
Whiston offers eleven arguments against the Athanasian interpretation of Nicaea which maintains that the Son was not created and that the Son is co-eternal with the Father. One of these is that the anathema against the word ‘created’ is a ‘Forgery of Athanasius’. Taking examples from the remaining ten arguments, in argument i, Whiston contends that neither the Scriptures nor church tradition leading up to Nicaea held to the ‘very strange’ doctrine ‘of more than one eternal Being’.Footnote 70 In argument ii, Whiston believes that to say that the Son is a ‘deriv'd or begotten Being’ is ‘directly contrary’ to the Son's eternity.Footnote 71 In argument vii, Whiston cites Arius’ letter to Eusebius of Nicomedia in which Arius says that all the eastern bishops except three ‘own'd the Father's Existence prior to that of the Son, and this just before the Council of Nice’.Footnote 72 Whiston's point is that many of these same bishops were at the Council of Nicaea. In argument viii, Whiston observes that in their letter to Bishop Alexander, the presbyters and deacons of Alexandria state that they received from Alexander himself their teaching that the Father preceded the Son. Bishop Alexander, of course, ‘was a principal Bishop of the Council of Nice’.Footnote 73
Whiston's stance is clear. He believed the Son to be a creature but not as one of the creatures. He also believed that this was the teaching of the Council of Nicaea itself. The council ‘best approv'd of those Terms which did most certainly distinguish the origin of the Son from the origin of the inferior Creatures’.Footnote 74 Therefore, the council ‘liked the words Begat, Begotten and Generation’,Footnote 75 and was ‘suspicious of the words Create, Created and Creature’.Footnote 76 And the council ‘most of all disapproved of the word Made’ because it was ‘most directly capable of that Heretical or Arian Interpretation, Made out of Nothing, as were the other Creatures, which they abhorr'd and condemn'd, tho’ without the belief of the Co-eternity’.Footnote 77
Whiston, thus cannot be called an Arian on the grounds that he believed that the Son was a created being, because Whiston believed that the bishops at the Council of Nicaea believed the same. Therefore, Whiston concludes, ‘It has been almost all along believ'd by the Church of late; that the Council of Nice were on the Athanasian Side, whereas it was plainly on the Eusebian.’Footnote 78 In other words, Whiston believed that it was Eusebianism that prevailed at Nicaea. It was only subsequent to Nicaea that the Athanasian interpretation won the day.
No longer an Arian
How then should Whiston's religious beliefs be labelled, if indeed he has been mistakenly called an Arian for more than three hundred years? They should be defined as he defined them. Whiston embraced the Eusebian doctrine in his ‘The Council of Nice vindicated’ written in 1713. In his Memoirs, written towards the end of his life, he still identified himself as an Eusebian. Thus:
Some time in the summer this year, 1710, or rather the foregoing year, 1709, it must have been, when my best friends began to be greatly affrighted at what they heard I was going about, both as to the Eusebian Doctrine, which then was universally called the Arian Heresy, which I had embrac'd.Footnote 79
Nor so far as I can judge, ought any serious Eusebian, or primitive Christian, such as I owe myself to be, especially if he be also a Clergyman himself, as I am, to receive communion from such an Athanasian, who thus frequently and solemnly, though most unjustly, pronounces him accursed, and in a state of damnation.Footnote 80
As this article has demonstrated, William Whiston saw a reflection of his own Christological beliefs in those of Eusebius of Caesarea who found a way to embrace the Nicene CreedFootnote 81; Whiston never saw his own Christological beliefs reflected in those of Arius of Alexandria or even Eusebius of Nicomedia. Whiston should no longer be called an ‘Arian’ because he never was one.
