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The Devil is in the Detail: The Origins of Heresies in Socrates's ‘Historia Ecclesiastica’

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  18 December 2015

G. I. YOUNG-EVANS
G. I. YOUNG-EVANS*
Affiliation:
Department of Ancient History, Faculty of Arts, Macquarie University, NSW 2109, Australia; e-mail: genevieve.young@mq.edu.au
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Abstract

A broad consensus exists among modern scholars that the role of the devil in Socrates's ‘Historia Ecclesastica’ is limited and that he explains the origins of religious controversy in terms of human causation. This paper argues that the modern consensus requires revision based on the devil's role in chapter i.22 on Manichaeism and on the correspondences between that chapter and the presentation of heresies elsewhere in the ‘History’. If this interpretation of those correspondences is accepted, it should further nuance perceptions of Socrates's approach to heresies and his reputation for ‘tolerance’, while also highlighting his use of religious polemic.

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Type
Research Article
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The Journal of Ecclesiastical History , Volume 67 , Issue 1 , January 2016 , pp. 1 - 22
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2016 

In 1963 Arnaldo Momigliano sought to encapsulate Eusebius' vision of his new Ἐκκλησιαστικὴ ἱστορία:

The Christians were a nation in his view. Thus he was writing national history. But his nation had a transcendental origin … Such a nation was not fighting ordinary wars. Its struggles were persecutions and heresies. Behind the Christian nation there was Christ, just as the devil was behind its enemies. The ecclesiastical history was bound to be different from ordinary history because it was a history of the struggle against the devil, who tried to pollute the purity of the Christian Church as guaranteed by the apostolic succession.Footnote 1

Momigliano's statement aptly reflects Eusebius' focus on heresies and their demonic inspiration.Footnote 2 As a broader statement about ecclesiastical history, however, it captures only up to a point the approaches of Eusebius' immediate extant successors writing in Greek – Socrates, Sozomen, Theodoret and Evagrius.

In his very first chapter Theodoret describes how the devil, thwarted in his ambitions to advance ‘pagan’ worship, attacks Christianity from within by means of Arius.Footnote 3 Evagrius places the Nestorian controversy in a similar context.Footnote 4 The devil is, however, not associated with the origins of doctrinal controversy outside the context of documents in Sozomen's History.Footnote 5 With regard to Socrates, who wrote a continuation of Eusebius' History to ad 439 in the early 440s,Footnote 6 Theresa Urbainczyk responds directly to Momigliano's statement, arguing that Socrates ‘certainly does not fit Momigliano's description of ecclesiastical history’.Footnote 7 Urbainczyk exemplifies a broad consensus among modern scholars about the ‘relatively restrained’ role of the devil in Socrates's History and his very human explanation of religious controversy.Footnote 8 It is generally agreed that Socrates ascribes the origins of heresiesFootnote 9 to human failings – love of controversy, ambition, misuse of logic, ignorance.Footnote 10 The statement closest to suggesting otherwise is made by Hartmut Leppin, who likewise contrasts Socrates's and Sozomen's profane explanations of heresies with the demonic inspiration found in Eusebius and Theodoret, but also suggests that the two approaches may be complementary.Footnote 11

The following treatment will argue that the modern consensus about Socrates's explanation of heresies requires reassessment based on the role of the devil in chapter i.22 and the relationship of that important chapter to the treatment of religious controversy elsewhere in the work. Given the heresiological antecedents of demonic causationFootnote 12 its apparent absence in Socrates's History may seem to add weight to the continuing perception of his more moderate approach to the doctrinal conflicts of his era.Footnote 13 Consequently, if the reading of chapter i.22 offered in this paper is accepted, it should further nuance our perception of Socrates's so-called tolerance. While there is a great deal of material treating evidence for Socrates's ‘tolerance’ and his inclusive sense of homoousian Christianity,Footnote 14 there is less discussion about how his history seeks to persuade us of the ‘truth’ of homoousian Christianity and the error of its opponents.Footnote 15 The following discussion treats aspects of Socrates's religious polemic and suggests that his subtle approach to persuasion deserves closer attention.

I

Reconsidering the presentation of heresies in Socrates's History requires us to revisit the significance of his chapter i.22, on Manichaeism. Modern scholars have hitherto concentrated on this chapter's importance for understanding Socrates's methods as a historian – his use of biblical citations and written sources, the intended scope and subject matter of his History, his presentation of historical causation and assertions of impartiality.Footnote 16 The latter subjects especially touch on Socrates's treatment of heresies, but generally the role of i.22 in understanding the overall approach to and presentation of doctrinal controversy in the History has attracted less attention.Footnote 17 This is perhaps because of the chapter's singularity, which sets it apart from Socrates's treatment of fourth-century heresies. A summary of i.22 will help to highlight both the unusual nature of the chapter, while also laying the groundwork for demonstrating its relationship to the broader treatment of heresies in the History.

The beginning of i.22 proffers a maxim that recalls Matthew xiii. 24–30 and probably passages in Eusebius' Vita Constantini: ‘In this midst of the good wheat the weeds are accustomed to spring up. For Envy is wont to lie in wait for the good.’Footnote 18 Turning to the time before Constantine Socrates speaks of a ‘hellenising Christianity’ that sprang up beside the ‘true Christianity’, making a comparison, with further New Testament allusions, to false prophets and apostles growing up beside (true) prophets and apostles.Footnote 19 Only then is this much maligned form of Christianity identified as the ‘doctrine of Empedocles’ which ‘feigned Christianity through the agency of Manichaeus’.Footnote 20 Before providing more information about Mani himself, Socrates justifies his inclusion of the chapter, which falls before the stated chronological scope of his History. It is, he claims, the lack of detail with which his predecessor Eusebius treated Mani that has prompted the inclusion of the chapter. He deems it necessary to tell the reader ‘who Manichaeus was and for what reason he attempted such boldness’.Footnote 21 What follows is an account of Mani's life, a summary of his doctrines, and a damning description and explanation of his death. The brief biography is focused primarily on the origins of Mani's beliefs, traced back to one Scythianus, a student of Egyptian knowledge, who ‘introduced the doctrine of Empedocles and Pythagoras into Christianity’.Footnote 22 It is Scythianus' student Bouddas, earlier called Terebinthus, who writes down his master's teachings in four books.Footnote 23 Bouddas is associated with the region of Babylon, talks many marvels about himself including his virgin birth, and dies while performing religious rites after being thrown down by a spirit. The woman with whom Bouddas/Terebinthus resided buries him and inherits his four books, passing them on to the slave boy Cubricus, whom she purchases, teaches and frees.Footnote 24 The freedman Cubricus journeys to Persia where he changes his name to Mani and farms out the books of Bouddas or Terebinthus as his own ‘to those led astray by him’.Footnote 25 Socrates declares that the ‘premises of these books were Christian in expression, but Greek in doctrines’.Footnote 26 After ascribing certain beliefs to Mani and linking them again to Egyptian knowledge, Empedocles and Pythagoras, the historian declares it all to be ‘foreign to the Orthodox Church’.Footnote 27 Mani's death, declared to be a ‘worthy judgement of such fallacy’, is described in all its gruesome detail.Footnote 28 The king of Persia learns about Mani and thinking his ‘marvels to be truths’ believes that he might cure his son's illness. The prince dies in Mani's care and the king seeks vengeance. Mani escapes to Mesopotamia only to be caught, flayed, stuffed with chaff and displayed before the entrance to the city. Winding up the chapter Socrates avows the truth of his account with reference to his source, the Acts of Archelaus.Footnote 29 Alluding to Matt. xiii again Socrates ponders the inevitability of such weeds emerging among the wheat, declares the investigation of doctrine and providence not tasks for the historian, and states his intention to return to the times of the proposed history.Footnote 30

The concluding methodological statement on doctrine and providence makes i.22 stand out,Footnote 31 as does its unusual focus on the pre-Constantinian period.Footnote 32 Similarly striking is the chapter's polemical content and its distinctiveness compared to Socrates's treatment of more contemporary religious controversy. Considering the presentation of Manichaeism itself, the appearance of ὀρθόδοξoς is remarkable. It is one of only two examples in the History.Footnote 33 Similarly notable is Socrates's somewhat equivocal attribution of the term Christian to Mani's religious tradition. The contrast between Manichaeism and ‘true Christianity’, and between Mani's doctrines and those of the Orthodox Church, finds almost no parallels elsewhere in the History where Socrates discusses those who adhere to homoousian and non-homoousian doctrine. It is also worth pointing out that while Socrates will attack the poor education of various non-Nicene leaders, this chapter on Manichaeism is the only one in which lowly social origins and foreignness are really underscored.Footnote 34 Likewise, while Socrates will digress on the misuse of logic by various opponents of Nicaea and their failure to understand the ancient writers whom they utilise, he will not suggest the ‘pagan’ nature of those doctrines or imply that they masquerade as Christianity.Footnote 35 In a chapter already marked by its unusual focus on the pre-Constantinian period and the historian's methodological concerns, the historian employs more standard heresiological tropes and topoi in his treatment of Manichaeism than anywhere else in his History.Footnote 36

The association of Mani and his doctrines with the devil is a key part of the heightened polemic. The opening lines of chapter i.22 foreground this association:

But in the midst of the good wheat the weeds are also accustomed to spring up; for envy is wont to lie in wait for the good. For a short while before the times of Constantine a hellenising Christianity sprang up beside the true Christianity, just as also false prophets sprang up beside prophets and false apostles beside apostles. For at that time the doctrine of Empedocles, the philosopher among the Greeks, feigned Christianity through the agency of Manichaeus.Footnote 37

The initial maxim begins with what has been understood as an allusion to Matt. xiii. 24–30, the parable of the weeds.Footnote 38 In Matt. xiii the enemy (ἐχθρός) has sown (ἐπέσπειρεν) weeds (ζιζάνια) in the midst of (ἀνὰ μέσον) the wheat. Socrates focuses on the emergence of the weeds (ζιζάνια) rather than their sowing, but retains the emphasis on weeds growing in the midst of wheat through the use of μεταξύ. The second clause of the maxim implies that ϕθόνος is the cause of the weeds' growth, making it practically identical with the enemy (ἐχθρός) in the Matt. xiii passage, who is later identified as the devil (διάβολος) at xiii.39. The biblical passage was interpreted in relation to doctrinal error and its demonic origins by several Church Fathers, but also in relation to moral laxity within a particular Christian community.Footnote 39 In the context of Socrates's History doctrinal error is clearly implied through the association of Mani and his doctrines with false Christianity, prophets and apostles.

The second clause of the maxim that introduces Envy also recalls passages in Eusebius' Vita Constantini. In chapters ii.61 and iii.59, which present the origins of the Arian and Antiochene controversy respectively, Envy (ϕθόνος) lies in wait (ἐϕεδρεύω) for the beautiful (καλοί).Footnote 40 Given Socrates's use of the Vita Constantini, and these two passages in particular, the corresponding and complementary vocabulary seems difficult to ignore.Footnote 41 Φθόνος features regularly in the Vita Constantini on its own or in combination with additional terms associated with the devil and demons,Footnote 42 although it inspires general disharmony rather than preying on the foibles of specific individuals.Footnote 43 This focus on indiscriminate discord fits well with Socrates's emphasis on ϕιλονικία among the ranks of all clergy during the fourth century, but not his treatment of Manichaeism. Mani is not a wayward participant in internecine squabbles, but rather a low born, foreign and fraudulent figure who resembles the heresiarchs of old in Eusebius' HE.

Although the eclectic maxim substitutes ϕθόνος for ἐχθρός and avoids the clearer epithets for demons and the devil accompanying Eusebius' broader usage in the Vita Constantini, it may still be capable of conjuring a demonic force. The term ϕθόνος describes a human emotion, but was a quality associated over centuries with the envy of the gods, the envy of tyche, and the envy of the devil.Footnote 44 The idea that the good, the beautiful or successful suffer as a result is one that spans that long history. While ϕθόνος is often qualified by words that indicate the source of envy, it may also be personified and given agency.Footnote 45

Φθόνος is not a term used frequently in Socrates's History. When we do meet it elsewhere, the historian does tend to personify the expression and describe how ϕθόνος attacked individuals or groups, primarily in the context of ecclesiastical controversy.Footnote 46 Yet some examples seem to be associated with individual emotions.Footnote 47 Others describe Envy's involvement in events from the perspective of opposing participants in contemporary disputes.Footnote 48 The latter examples that see Envy associated with Athanasius and banished from the Church or linked to the Roman episcopate and attacking Novatians might suggest a levelling of all divisive acts whether they concern doctrine or discipline, homoousian or non-homousian antagonists. Such a reading could arguably add to a sense of Socrates's even-handedness. The overall tendency to personify Envy throughout the History sets up a level of correspondence. Nevertheless, with its recycling of the weeds parable and Eusebius' Vita Constantini passage, chapter i.22 seems to represent something quite different, and something with more marked demonic implication. This conclusion is further suggested by the substitution of hellenising Christianity and then more particularly false apostles and prophets for weeds that grow up beside their true counterparts. False apostles are the Devil's servants in 2 Corinthians xi and associated with the devil elsewhere in the New Testament.

The explicit statement on divine providence toward the end of i.22 also seems to continue the chapter's flirtation with divine causation:

Envy is wont to lie in wait, as I have said, for the good when they flourish. What the reason is, through which the good God assents to this happening, whether wishing to test the good aspects of doctrines or eradicate from the church the arrogance which attaches to the faith, or however it happens to be, the explanation is difficult and long, and not convenient to explain now.Footnote 49

This section is usually understood in relation to other passages about causation in the History. The reference to the ‘good God’, however, should alert us to its specificity. Socrates never uses this expression again, but it is found in the Acts of Archelaus where Archelaus is presented in dialogue with Mani and challenges his conception of good and evil.Footnote 50 Socrates's statement is probably a further stab at the Manichaeans, but it is also the ‘pair’ for the opening passage. The later passage on the ‘good God’, together with repeated use of Socrates's maxim, foreground otherworldly powers even if Socrates refuses to enlarge upon the issues raised.

The inspiration for weeds and wheat, false apostles and prophets, is ostensibly the Acts of Archelaus. The idea that Mani was a false prophet, teacher or apostle is repeated at various junctures in the Acta and relatively long quotations from 2 Cor. xi and Matt. xxiv make these claims stand out in the earlier work.Footnote 51 The parable of the weeds seems to represent greater embellishment on Socrates's part given that at least in the extant version of the Acta the reminiscences are much more oblique.Footnote 52 The chapter as a whole shows additional points of correspondence and elaboration. The emphasis on Mani's unoriginality as the inheritor of doctrines and texts taught and written by others corresponds closely to the Acta's biographical section. The close identification of Greek philosophers with the doctrines of Mani, although not new, is given increased attention. In the extant Acta Pythagoras is referred to once in the biographical data on Scythianus, Bouddas and Mani.Footnote 53 In Socrates's much shorter account the ‘pagan’ nature of Mani's teaching is mentioned at three junctures. Manichaeism is identified as a ‘hellenising Christianity’ in the opening remarks, and Pythagoras is associated with Mani's doctrines in sections 3 and 8 along with Empedocles, who makes no appearance in the Acta.Footnote 54 The selection, arrangement and elaboration of polemical motifs not only concentrate the already highly pejorative content of the Acta but also focus attention on a familiar yet distinctive maxim that laments the role of the devil.

The potential for demonic causation in chapter i.22 has been alluded to by Peter Van Nuffelen, who nevertheless maintains that Socrates looks to love of controversy in order to explain divisions within Christianity.Footnote 55 One could be forgiven for asking how the erstwhile indications of demonic causation might disturb the overwhelming consensus that Socrates posits the origins of church groups in human folly. It is in part the subtle correspondences in vocabulary between Socrates's chapter on Manichaeism and the beginnings of heresies elsewhere in the History that warrant revisiting Socrates's approach to the origins of heresies generally.

II

Φύω and its compound παραϕύω are marked terms in chapter i.22. Together they are used four times to describe weeds springing up among wheat, hellenising Christianity springing up beside true Christianity, false apostles and prophets springing up beside [true] apostles and prophets, and lastly the ‘religion of the Manichaeans’ springing up before the time of Constantine in the concluding statements of the chapter.Footnote 56 Given the cumulative force of the ϕύω terminology in i.22, later uses of the compounds ἐπιϕύω and παραϕύω become significant and have the potential to recall the complex maxim at the start of i.22, and perhaps the demonic causation that it introduces, if not also the pejorative tone of the chapter as a whole.

In i.22 weeds, hellenising Christianity, false apostles and by implication Manichaeism grow up beside or in between what is true and authentic. The ϕύω terminology plays a role in that process of diminishing Manichaeism. The first two instances of παραϕύω take the dative, indicating the active force of the παρα- element; Manichaeism grows up beside true Christianity, just as false prophets and apostles grow up beside true prophets and apostles. The first and only use of ϕύω in i.22 uses μεταξύ to express a similar idea; weeds grow up ‘between’ the wheat. The final and third instance of παραϕύω in i.22 forms part of the conclusion: ‘In this way therefore a little before the time of Constantine the religion of the Manichaeans grew up beside.’Footnote 57 This final example does not state explicitly what Manichaeism might grow beside but read with the entire chapter in mind the idea that Manichaeism grows in addition to, and is not, true Christianity seems clear, if also implicit.

The final use of παραϕύω in i.22 is echoed later in book ii when Socrates observes, regarding Photinus, that ‘another heresy sprang up (ἐπεϕύη) at Sirmium’, with reference to Aetius that ‘another heresiarch sprang up’ (ἐπεϕύη), and introducing the chapter on Apollinarius ‘at that time also another heresy sprang up (παρεϕύη) from the following cause’.Footnote 58 In the first two examples ἐπιϕύω seems to act as a practical synonym for παραϕύω. This is suggested by the similar phrasing used in all three examples and the potential for ἐπι- to suggest outgrowth and addition.Footnote 59 The latter is important. Given the marked use of ϕύω terminology in i.22 and the clear role which the compound παρα- plays in qualifying the nature of growth in addition to true Christianity, apostles and prophets, it seems difficult to believe that subsequent uses of either παραϕύω or ἐπιϕύω to describe the emergence of heresies in later chapters do not carry the same implication.

The idea that heresies ‘grow’ or ‘spring up’ is certainly part of intra-Christian polemic. Both the simplex and compound forms of ϕύω are used in Eusebius and Theodoret, and also in contemporary polemicists like Epiphanius.Footnote 60 On the one hand this familiar usage demonstrates an interesting correspondence between Socrates's vocabulary choices and those of more stridently polemical writers. On the other hand it begs the question whether Socrates's usage simply reflects a commonplace vocabulary item for religious controversy that is somewhat bleached of its polemical force. The marked use of the ϕύω terminology in i.22 suggests otherwise. The fact that Socrates's near contemporary church historian Sozomen – also one of Eusebius' successors – chose not to utilise such expressions indicates that there were certainly other ways of introducing the subject of new religious groups into one's narrative.Footnote 61

Further correspondences between the language of i.22 and the presentation of heresies elsewhere in the History are observable and may strengthen the idea that Manichaeism was a recurring reference point for Socrates's treatment of more contemporary heresies. The term παρεισάγω, ‘lead in by one's side’, but also (with a notion of secrecy) ‘introduce’, ‘admit’, is used to describe the way in which Mani introduced the doctrines of Greek philosophers into Christianity.Footnote 62 In the chapter immediately following that on Mani, Socrates claims that the Eusebians intrigued against Athanasius to bring Arius to Alexandria ‘for in this way only were they able to throw out the homoousian faith and introduce (παρεισαγαγεῖν) the Arian’.Footnote 63 In book ii Socrates asserts with reference to Apollinarius and his supporters that, as no one paid attention to them, they introduced (παρεισάγουσι) a form of religion.Footnote 64 The term πλανάω is used to describe the later impact of Mani's teachings. In i.22 Mani farms out the books of Bouddas or Terebinthus as his own to those ‘who were led astray (πλανηθεῖσιν) by him’.Footnote 65 Later Aetius will ‘deceive’ (πλανῶν) the emperor.Footnote 66 Lastly there is Mani's daring. When Socrates discusses the necessity of treating Eusebius' deficient presentation of Manichaeism he declares that ‘it will be known who Manichaeus was and for what reason he attempted such boldness (τολμᾶν)’.Footnote 67 Later in i.22 Socrates states that Mani ‘dared (ἐτόλμησεν) to name himself an apostle in his letters’.Footnote 68 Τόλμα, τολμάω and related words can have positive connotations, but the instances in Socrates's History are predominantly negative and associated with religious controversy.Footnote 69 In documents, or in beliefs or speech specifically ascribed to individuals, those who ‘dare’ to think or act in unacceptable ways may be on varying sides of the fourth-century debates.Footnote 70 There are a considerable number of examples in Socrates's own prose though that refer to individuals who dare to believe in ways that are clearly presented as wrong.Footnote 71

The terms παρεισάγω, πλανάω and τόλμα all have a connection with the presentation of false prophets and teachers in the New Testament. In 2 Peter ii.1 reference is made to the false prophets and teachers who ‘will introduce (παρεισάξουσιν) destructive heresies’.Footnote 72 The false prophets of Matt. xxiv.11 will ‘mislead’ (πλανήσουσιν) many. A little later, at Matt. xxiv.24, it is explained that false Christs and prophets ‘will perform great signs and wonders, to deceive (πλανῆσαι)’.Footnote 73 There is again a connection with the false apostles of 2 Pet. ii who, as overbold (τολμηταί) individuals, do not fear blaspheming the glorious.Footnote 74 This vocabulary seems to intensify the identification of Mani with false prophets and apostles. The reappearance of such vocabulary items in Socrates's presentation of religious leaders like Arius, Aetius and Macedonius may be subtle, but does set up a degree of comparison between such later figures and Mani in the History.

When the emergence of Manichaeism is presented in chapter i.22 the idea of demonic causation is flashed before us. What relatively subtle lexical correspondences between chapter i.22 and the later discussion of heresies can potentially convey is definitely open to interpretation. However, given the marked nature of the ϕύω terminology, subsequent uses of ἐπιϕύω and παραϕύω seem eminently capable of recalling the striking image of weeds among wheat, of false apostles and feigned Christianity found in i.22. Additional vocabulary items that echo the treatment of Manichaeism, and have curious connections with the biblical passages evoked in Socrates's presentation of Mani, seem at the very least capable of resonating with the polemical content of i.22. Lexical correspondences can seem slight. It is important to remember that they do encompass key figures in Socrates's treatment of the fourth-century debates such as Photinus, Apollinarius, Arius, Aetius, Eunomius and Macedonius. It also seems important to remember that the devil was not necessarily an ever-present force in histories that are more frequently recognised as ascribing the origins of heresies to the devil.Footnote 75 The position of i.22 and the apparently programmatic nature of statements made within it certainly indicate that the chapter on Manichaeism should have wide-ranging significance in the context of the History.

III

To this point Socrates's use of Matt. xiii has been discussed in relation to demonic inspiration and a more pejorative tone in the History's presentation of doctrinal controversy. There is another, not mutually exclusive, possibility. The parable of the weeds illustrated the need to leave the weeds among the wheat until God deemed their removal fitting so that the wheat would not be harmed. It could thus be used to recommend religious toleration, or perhaps more precisely the forbearance of heresies with a view towards eventual unity of belief.Footnote 76 The conciliatory potential of Matt. xiii was not necessarily straightforward in its application. John Chrysostom taught that Matt. xiii allowed repression of all sorts barring murder.Footnote 77 Augustine quoted it in the midst of advocating the use of coercion to effect doctrinal unity.Footnote 78 Forbearance, however construed, need not even be the thrust of arguments which alluded to the parable. Theodoret would seem to allude to the sowing of weeds (ζιζάνια) to embellish his treatment of the demonic origins and the development of Arianism.Footnote 79 The maxim that begins the highly disparaging chapter on Manichaeism and later allusions back to it, whether to a particular group ‘springing up at the side’ or to being ‘introduced at the side’, seem most akin to the latter, but the concluding statements of i.22 do raise the spectre of forbearance:

Envy is wont to lie in wait, as I have said, for the good when they flourish. What the reason is, through which the good God assents to this happening, whether wishing to test the good aspects of doctrines or eradicate from the church the arrogance which attaches to the faith, or however it happens to be, the explanation is difficult and long, and not convenient to explain now. For it is not proposed for us to test doctrines or to question the impenetrable arguments concerning the providence and judgement of God, but as far as possible to set out in detail the history of the things that happened concerning the church. How therefore a little before the time of Constantine the religion of Manichaeus sprang up, let the things said be sufficient. Let us return to the times of the proposed history.Footnote 80

This conclusion to i.22 is far from straightforward.Footnote 81 Socrates does suggest that the trial of heresies should be left to God's judgement, but only to the extent that the historian should not put them to the test. Almost as if demonstrating his intention to adhere to this stricture Socrates breaks off his account of why God allows heresies to exist, but not before he has given us some distinct possibilities. We might imagine that full theorisation is contrasted with a summary explanation of how divine providence figures in relation to the emergence of heresies, but the precise explanations provided are surely an example of praeteritio. The claim that God permits heresies and the idea that they may perform a function in ascertaining correct doctrine are familiar from various early Christian and late antique writings that make explicit reference to 1 Cor. xi. 19: ‘for there must be heresies among you, in order that those who are approved may become manifest among you’. Αἵρεσις in 1 Cor. xi. 19 need not entail doctrinal division but was certainly used in the context of speaking about it.Footnote 82 The passage from 1 Cor. xi. 19 was sometimes cited, at least ostensibly, in arguments countering non-Christian attacks on the multiplicity of Christian groups.Footnote 83 In these works and others stress might be laid on the role of heresies in discerning right thinking or acting peopleFootnote 84 or in the discernment of right belief.Footnote 85 The discussion of 1 Cor. xi. 19 accompanied injunctions to stand firm in one's faith and accept the inscrutability of God,Footnote 86 but is also seen in writings that emphasise the necessity of investigating doctrines and the good intentions of those who question points of doctrine even to the point of falling into error.Footnote 87 The brevity of the statements in i.22 leaves a lot to the imagination but their immediate focus is impersonal. Heresies are permitted and the result is that they put good doctrine to the test, or eradicate from the Church the arrogance that attaches to the faith.Footnote 88 While Socrates's ‘ἢ … ἤ’ presents the reasons why God allows heresies as alternatives, we need to consider whether the two possibilities actually cited are in fact two faces of the same coin. While the historian ostensibly rejects the elaboration of God's purpose as not a task for the historian, the idea that heresies play a role in the refinement and disclosure of right belief has been allowed to escape.

The brief statement on the potential function of heresies needs to be taken into account when considering the presentation of doctrinal conflict and its participants in the rest of the History,Footnote 89 but its immediate context seems to illustrate Socrates's claim that he will not test doctrine nor stir up questions about divine providence and judgement; that he will just say what happened. Scholars often discuss this section in relation to Socrates's approach to providence in the History Footnote 90 and point out at the same time, or separately, that the historian is stating his reluctance to treat theological questions or discussions.Footnote 91 Martin Wallraff has indicated that the passage may also relate to the historian's presentation of church groups, or more precisely to their designation.

Wallraff describes the statement that it is ‘not for us to test doctrine’ as a programmatic one, linking it to Socrates's terminology for church groups, including but not limited to his avoidance of terms like ὀρθόδοξος and more restrained use of αἵρεσις.Footnote 92 Socrates does explicitly discuss his use of other key terms in the preamble to book vi where, anticipating criticism, he defends his decision to avoid the superlatives of θεοϕιλής and ἅγιος when discussing bishops, and the superlative of θεῖος and the title δεσπότης when discussing emperors. Although such reverential titles may appear in the documents that he cites he is faithful to the style that he imposes upon himself.Footnote 93 If we understand i.22 as programmatic with regard to Socrates's vocabulary choices he was apparently less attentive to his polemical vocabulary than to his laudatory nomenclature. For example, ὀρθόδοξος does appear occasionally, and αἵρεσις is not entirely stripped of potentially negative connotations in every instance.Footnote 94 Nevertheless, Wallraff's suggestion crucially draws our attention to the relationship between i.22 and the representation of heresies, to the relationship between i.22 and the rest of the History.

While concluding sections of i.22 are often excerpted and discussed in relation to additional claims about impartiality and divine providence, the overall function of i.22, raised less frequently, has been the subject of disagreement. Wallraff identifies chapter i.22 as one of twelve digressions,Footnote 95 but while he emphasises the argumentative and purposeful nature of most of these digressions he also claims that ‘Ohne deutliches Motiv schiebt Sokrates im ersten Buch einen Exkurs über den Manichäismus ein, dessen erklärte Absicht es ist, die Darstellung dieser Häresie bei Euseb zu ergänzen und zu korrigieren.’Footnote 96 Van Nuffelen disagrees with the identification of i.22 as a digression,Footnote 97 arguing instead that the chapter ‘interrompt le récit des bienfaits du règne de Constantin et introduit les quatorze chapitres suivants qui traitent des péripéties d'Athanase’.Footnote 98 Regardless of whether the chapter functions as a digression or not,Footnote 99 Van Nuffelen has raised the important issue of its relationship to the surrounding chapters.

Van Nuffelen suggests that i.22 introduces the following fourteen chapters of book i, yet only hints at how that introductory function is effected and does not explain why the recollection of Manichaeism may be called on to perform such a task.Footnote 100 The following attempts to build on Van Nuffelen's observations and suggest a function based on the analysis of contrasts and correspondences between i.22 and later chapters.

Chapter i.21 concludes with reference to Anthony, who is described as one of many good people who flourished during the reign of Constantine, ‘but’ (ἀλλά), chapter i.22 begins, ‘weeds are accustomed to spring up among the wheat’. Mani and Mani's doctrines are soon identified as the weeds among the wheat prior to the reign of Constantine. Yet ἀλλά implies that weeds also grow in the reign of Constantine among the likes of Antony. When Socrates returns to the times of the proposed history in chapter i.23 it is Eusebius and Theognis who immediately come into view. They are accepted back by Constantine as those who have returned from error (κακοδοξίας) to truth (ἀλήθειαν) or orthodoxy (ὀρθοδοξίαν),Footnote 101 but who nevertheless cause ever-greater disruptions inspired by their Arian doctrines and their hatred of Athanasius.Footnote 102 Eusebius plots to remove Athanasius, confident that this is the only way to throw out the homoousian and introduce (παρεισαγαγεῖν) the Arian.Footnote 103 The beginning of i.23 evokes some of the language and even the mood of the chapter on Manichaeism. Chapter i.22 may not just introduce the chapters that follow, but provide a transition that conceptualises some aspects of, or parties within, contemporary doctrinal controversy by reference to the past.

Chapter i.22 seems to be connected with its immediate context but also, through the overlaps in vocabulary discussed above, with the presentation of heresies elsewhere in the History. There are, however, also considerable differences between i.22 and what follows. Some of the polemical themes explored in i.22 are unique in the History, as is certainly their accumulation in one unusually aggressive chapter.Footnote 104 However i.22 is understood in relation to the History, both the contrast and comparison that it sets up must be taken into account.

Wallraff views the statement ‘it is not for us to test doctrine’ as a programmatic one with regard to the vocabulary used of and around church groups. I would like to suggest that we broaden this idea out to think about the chapter's polemical content as a whole. Chapter i.22 is uncharacteristically vehement. That vehemence is conveyed in part by the polemical vocabulary employed, but also by the variety of techniques used to hold up doctrine and leader to scrutiny, including their association with demonic inspiration. Later chapters never see the accumulation of these techniques, but a scattering of terms and tropes reminiscent of the chapter remain. On this basis I would argue that Socrates invites the reader to notice his professed impartial and historical treatment of the origins of heresies in later chapters, but does not necessarily suggest that the reader understand these later divisions any differently from Manichaeism which is presented with all the vitriol of an Athanasius or Theodoret.Footnote 105 Indeed Socrates seems to suggest that the reader should compare and identify non-homoousian groups with Manichaeism. This would be particularly appropriate in the fourth century given the increasing role of Manichaeism as an archetypal heresy which, already condemned, could function as a point of reference with which to defame more contemporary targets by association.Footnote 106

Manichaeism is hardly a straightforward template for Socrates's treatment of non-homoousian church groups. Given that the only explicit reference to wheat and weeds occurs in i.22, Wallraff reasonably corrects Harnack's bald statement that ‘Orthodoxie und Häresie verhalten sich auch für Sokrates einfach wie Weizen und Unkraut’.Footnote 107 Nevertheless the correspondences between i.22 and later chapters on non-homoousian groups suggest that wheat and weeds, and more specifically the chapter on Manichaeism, need to play a larger role in any treatment of heresies in Socrates's History.

Chapter i.22 should make us think further about how the origins of heresies are conceptualised in the History, but also how church groups are presented. Socrates's debt to the highly polemical rhetoric of his predecessors and sources tends to go unnoticed or be downplayed because it accompanies seemingly more sober language. While examples of the historian's ‘tolerance’ are often given, how we perceive partisanship in the History receives less attention. Scholars may acknowledge, and cite passages demonstrating Socrates's commitment to an orthodoxy linked to the councils of Nicaea and Constantinople.Footnote 108 It is worth considering how the more polemical and apparently more ‘even-handed’ aspects of Socrates's History combine and to what end, but also what impact subtle allusions made on contemporary audiences potentially well versed in the types of causation and polemic popular in heresiological literature and ecclesiastical histories: indeed, in those writers like Eusebius and Theodoret with whom Socrates may have been too readily contrasted.

There is no denying that the lexical choices discussed in this paper work at a subtle level. One might argue that they reflect a world so steeped in, and conversant with, polemical language and literature that echoes are understandable if not difficult for contemporary writers to escape; that we should stress the contrast that Socrates's History represents rather than the comparison that it rarely, albeit reasonably, allows. Leaving aside the difficult question of intention, what meaning is made and created anew when the language of the polemicist and heresiologist meets the rationalising rhetoric of a historian promising only ‘the history of the things that happened’ is important to explore, especially in a work which has apparently enveloped its vituperation so well.

References

1 A. Momigliano, The conflict between paganism and Christianity in the fourth century, Oxford 1963, 90.

2 Eusebius, HE ii.13, in Eusèbe de Césarée, Histoire ecclésiastique, ed. G. Bardy, SC xxxi, xli, lx, lxxiii, Paris 1952–60. On the treatment of heresies in Eusebius' History see M. Verdoner, Narrated reality: the Historia ecclesiastica of Eusebius of Caesarea, Frankfurt 2011, 132–4.

3 Theodoret, HE i.2, in Theodoret Kirchengeschichte, ed. L. Parmentier, GCS, Leipzig 1911.

4 Evagrius, HE i.1; ii.5, in The Ecclesiastical history of Evagrius with the scholia, ed. J. Bidez and L. Parmentier, London 1898, repr. Amsterdam 1964.

5 Sozomen, HE ii. 30.1; vi.23.10; viii.26.18, in Sozomenus Kirchengeschichte, ed. G. C. Hansen, 2nd edn, GCS, Berlin 1995; P. Van Nuffelen, Un Héritage de paix et de piété: étude sur les histoires ecclésiastiques de Socrate et de Sozomène, Leuven 2004, 306–7.

6 On the dating of Socrates's History see H. Leppin, Von Constantin dem Grossen zu Theodosius II, Göttingen 1996, 274–9; T. Urbainczyk, Socrates of Constantinople: historian of Church and State, Michigan 1997, 20; M. Wallraff, Der Kirchenhistoriker Sokrates. Untersuchungen zu Geschichtsdarstellung, Methode und Person, Göttingen 1997, 210–12; and Van Nuffelen, Héritage, 12.

7 Urbainczyk, Socrates, 99 and n. 73. Her statement is elaborated further in her footnote: ‘It might be argued that Momigliano's statement could apply to Socrates if the latter thought that dissension is a manifestation of moral weakness and that this weakness is ultimately an expression of evil. But there are no indications that such a view lies behind Socrates's text.’

8 Van Nuffelen comments that ‘Contrairement à certains théologiens, qui accordent un grand poids au rôle du diable dans le monde, chez Socrate son rôle est relativement restreint’: Héritage, 301; cf. P. Maraval, Socrate de Constantinople, Histoire ecclésiastique, trans. P. Périchon and P. Maraval, SC cdlxxvii, 2004, 18; Wallraff, Kirchenhistoriker, 261.

9 In Socrates's History the plural of αἵρεσις is used to refer to all Christians regardless of their doctrinal affiliation. The singular is used to designate a number of individual Christian groups: for example HE ii.37.26 (Arian); ii.46.1 (Apollinarian); iii.9.6 (Luciferian); i.9.28 (Macedonian); vi.9.4 (Manichaen); i.27.7 (Melitian); ii.18.7 (Photinian); v.23.12 (Psathyrian) (Hansen edn), but does not directly identify either Novatians or Homoousians as a heresy. Wallraff has argued that the negative connotations of αἵρεσις in Socrates are not very pronounced; that where negativity is expressed it is more concerned with division in the Church than with false teaching and belief: Kirchenhistoriker, 36–7. Socrates is certainly concerned with division but his use of the singular as a form of designation seems suspiciously careful. This paper uses the terms ‘heresy’ and ‘heresies’ to mean something akin to ‘group’, and discusses potential pejorative connotations of wrong belief explicitly.

10 Urbainczyk, Socrates, 132 n. 74, 154–5; Van Nuffelen, Héritage, 300; Krivushin, I., ‘Socrates Scholasticus' church history: themes, ideas, heroes’, Byzantinische Forschungen xxii (1996), 99–100Google Scholar.

11 ‘Es ist ohne weiteres denkbar, daß auch Socrates und Sozomenus als Gläubige letzlich den Teufel, der sich der Menschen bediene …, für die Häresien verantwortlich machten, aber entscheidend ist, daß sie trotz des Vorbildes Euseb … die Häresien in der Kirchengeschichte nicht unter diesem Blickwinkel darstellen, sondern sich auf die profaneren Erklärungen beschränken’: Leppin, Von Constantin, 175 n. 64.

12 ‘the uniting of demonic inspiration with doctrinal error created the sharp spiritual and apocalyptic boundary between truth and heresy’: J. R. Lyman, ‘Heresiology: the invention of “heresy” and “schism”’, in A. Casiday and F. W. Norris (eds), The Cambridge history of Christianity, II: Constantine to c. 600, Cambridge 2007, 297.

13 Socrates's emphasis on Christian unity over doctrine, his more neutral use or indeed avoidance of some polemical terminology, as well as his perceived praise of non-homoousian clerics and concurrent censure of homoousian clergy have all been cited in support of such claims. See, for example, F. M. Young, From Nicaea to Chalcedon: a guide to the literature and its background, Philadelphia 1983, 24–5; Maraval, Socrate, SC cdlxxvii, 13; and W. Treadgold, The early Byzantine historians, New York 2007, 138–9. Note, however, that Van Nuffelen warns against mistaking Socrates's moderate tone for neutral observation: Héritage, 84; and that Wallraff argues against too modern an interpretation of toleration: Kirchenhistoriker, 257. Socrates's tendency to locate the origins of heresies primarily in the personal foibles of church leaders has been contrasted with the approach of church historians who emphasise demonic inspiration. See Van Nuffelen, Héritage, 83; A. Martin, ‘L'Origine de l'arianisme vue par Théodoret’, in B. Pouderon and Y.-M. Duval (eds), L'Historiographie de l’Église des premiers siècles, Paris 2001, 358–9; Leppin, Von Constantin, 174–5; and Krivushin, ‘Socrates Scholasticus’, 100–1. B. Grillet and G. Sabbah provide a parallel example when they discuss Sozomen and comment on his lack of hostility toward and even praise of heretics, while also contrasting his denunciation of heretics for human foibles with Eusebius' recourse to demonic motivation: Sozomèn, Histoire ecclésiastique, trans. A.-J. Festugière, SC cccvi, 1983, 51.

14 The selection and presentation of material in Socrates's History implies his support for those who adhere to the homoousian faith promulgated at the councils of Nicaea (325) and Constantinople (381). How Socrates presents homoousian or Nicene Christianity, however, has been the subject of discussion. The historian's tendency to identify right belief with Origen in the midst of the Origenist controversy and his clear sympathy, or even possible membership of the Novatian Church, has received considerable attention. For different views on Socrates's Origenism see G. Chesnut, The first Christian histories: Eusebius, Socrates, Sozomen, Theodoret and Evagrius, Macon 1986, 177–82; Urbainczyk, Socrates, 5; and Van Nuffelen, Héritage, 37–41. Wallraff provides a thorough discussion of the evidence for Socrates's membership of the Novatian Church. His treatment, which argues for Socrates's Novatianism, has convinced some, but not all: Kirchenhistoriker, 235–57. See Treadgold, Early Byzantine historians, 136; P. Maraval, Socrate de Constantinople, Histoire ecclésiastique, trans. P. Périchon and P. Maraval (SC cdxciii, 2005), 9 n. 1; Van Nuffelen, Héritage, 42–6; H. Leppin, ‘The church historians (I): Socrates, Sozomenus, and Theodoretus’, in G. Marasco (ed.), Greek and Roman historiography in late antiquity: fourth to sixth century A. D., Leiden 2003, 221–2.

15 This is not to pretend that there is no discussion of the topic. See, for example, P. Allen, ‘Use of heretics and heresies in the Greek church historians: studies in Socrates and Theodoret’, in G. Clarke (ed), Reading the past in late antiquity, Sydney 1990, 265–89, esp. p. 282. Allen compares rather than contrasts Socrates's and Theodoret's similarly ‘disingenuous use of the past … on the subject of Novatianism and the Arian background to the Antiochene schism’. There is a tendency, however, to dismiss or downplay apparent instances of pejorative language and presentation without considering their polemical function in the History. Urbainczyk, for example, focuses solely on how Socrates's description of Arianism as an ‘evil’ and a ‘fire’ (Socrates, HE ii.2.8–9) is unusual in the context of the History and more like Eusebius' treatment of heresies: Socrates, 154. See also n. 9 above.

16 On i.22 and Socrates's use of biblical citations and written sources see Urbainczyk, Socrates, 56, and Van Nuffelen, Héritage, 274. The methodological statement at i.22.14, which will be treated below, has attracted most attention in relation to Socrates's intended scope and subject matter (Wallraff, Kirchenhistoriker, 135, 140; Van Nuffelen, Héritage, 178), his approach to causation (Van Nuffelen, Héritage, 295–7, 302, 421) and presentation of his own impartiality (Urbainczyk, Sokrates, 45–6; Wallraff, Kirchenhistoriker, 41).

17 See pp. 17–21 below for discussion of some current interpretations.

18 Socrates, HE i.22.1. See p. 8 and nn. 38 and 40 below.

19 Socrates, HE i.22.1. Van Nuffelen, Héritage (302 n. 421) suggests a specific allusion to the false apostles of 2 Cor. xi but see also 274, n. 269 and 458, which list additional passages on false prophets and apostles (Matt. xiii. 25; 2 Cor. xiii [sic.]; 2 Pet. ii. 1; and also Matt. vii. 15; xxiv.11, 24, and Mark xiii. 22).

20 Socrates, HE i.22.2.

21 Ibid. i.22.2–3; cf. Eusebius, HE vii.31.

22 Socrates, HE i.22.3.

23 Ibid. i.22.4–5.

24 Ibid. i.22.6.

25 Ibid. i.22.7.

26 Ibid. i.22.8.

27 Ibid.

28 Ibid. i.22.9–12.

29 Ibid. i.22.13.

30 Ibid. i.22.14–5.

31 Socrates provides several prefaces (to books i, ii, v and vi) discussing his methods.

32 Wallraff, Kirchenhistoriker, 251 and n. 179. Socrates may refer back to events, or people who lived, before the time of Constantine, but the only chapters which aim to consider such early material in detail are those on Manichaeism, the account of Gregory Thaumaturgus and the very sympathetic treatment of the Novatian schism: Socrates, HE i.22; iv.27, 28.

33 The second is found in book vii: Socrates, HE vii.3.2.

34 On the lack of education among non-Nicenes see, for example, ibid. ii.35.10; iv.26.10.

35 On the misuse of logic and tendency of non-Nicenes to misunderstand the texts that they use see, for example, ibid. ii.45.14; iv.7.6–9; v.7.8. For discussion of Socrates's attitude to Greek learning and the role of philosophy and logic in his presentation of religious controversy see P. Maraval, ‘Socrate et la culture grecque’, in B. Pouderon and Y.-M. Duval (eds), L'Historiographie de l’Église des premiers siècles, Paris 2001, 281–91; C. Eucken, ‘Philosophie und Dialektik in der Kirchengeschichte des Sokrates', in B. Bälber and H.-G. Nesselrath (eds), Die Welt des Sokrates von Konstantinopel, Leipzig 2001, 96–110; and R Lim, Public disputation, power, and social order in late antiquity, Berkeley 1995, 199–205.

36 For common heresiological tropes and topoi in the early Christian period see A. Le Boulluec, La Notion d'hérésie dans la littérature grecque, IIe–IIIe siècles, Paris 1985. For late antiquity and more specifically works against Manichaeism see also Lyman, ‘Heresiology’, 296–313, and Coyle, J. K., ‘Foreign and insane: labelling Manichaeism in the Roman Empire’, Studies in Religion/Sciences Religieuses xxxiii (2004), 217–34Google Scholar.

37 ‘ἀλλὰ μεταξὺ τοῦ χρηστοῦ σίτου εἴωθεν καὶ τὰ ζιζάνια ϕύεσθαι· ϕθόνος γὰρ τοῖς ἀγαθοῖς ἐϕεδρεύειν ϕιλεῖ. παρεϕύη γὰρ μικρὸν ἔμπροσθεν τῶν Κωνσταντίνου χρόνων τῷ ἀληθεῖ Χριστιανισμῷ έλληνίζων Χριστιανισμός, καθάπερ καὶ τοῖς προϕήταις ψευδοπροϕῆται καὶ ἀποστόλοις ψευδαπόστολοι παρεϕύοντο. τηνικαῦτα γὰρ τὸ Ἐμπεδοκλέουσ τοῦ παρ᾽ Ἕλλησι ϕιλοσόϕου δόγμα διὰ τοῦ Μανιχαίου Χριστιανισμὸν ὑπεκρίνατο’: Socrates, HE i.22.1–2.

38 Maraval seems to connect ζιζάνια in particular with the biblical passage: Socrate, SC cdlxxvii, 202. Cf. Hansen, Sokrates, 66, and Van Nuffelen, Héritage, 274 n. 269, 458. The latter lists Matt. xiii.25 though he focuses on the reference to pseudo-prophets and their connection with a range of New Testament passages.

39 Bainton, R. H., ‘The parable of the tares as the proof text for religious liberty to the end of the sixteenth century’, Church History i/2 (1932), 67–8Google Scholar; J. B. Russell, Satan: the early Christian tradition, Ithaca 1981, 36.

40 Eusebius, Vita Constantini ii.61.3 (‘τοῖς ἡμετέροις … καλοῖς’); iii.59.1 (‘τοῖς καλοῖς’), in Eusebius Werke: Über das Leben des Kaisers Konstantin, ed. F. Winkelmann, 2nd edn, Berlin 1975.

41 On Socrates's use of Eusebius' writings see F. Geppert, Quellen des Kirchenhistorikers Socrates Scholasticus, Leipzig 1972, 23–4.

42 Eusebius, Vita Constantini ii.73.1 (‘ϕθόνος τις καὶ πονηρὸς δαίμων’); iii.1.1(‘ὁ μὲν δὴ μισόκαλος ϕθόνος’); iii.4.1(‘τῆς τοῦ ϕθόνου βασκανίας’); iv.41.1(‘μισόκαλος δὲ κἀν τούτῳ ϕθόνος’).

43 On Eusebius' use of terms for the devil see Bartelink, G. J. M., ‘ΒΑΣΚΑΝΟΣ désignation de Satan et des démons chez les auteurs chrétiens’, Orientalia Chistiana Periodica il (1983), 395–7Google Scholar. The role of the devil, or envy, in dividing Christians in the Vita Constantini is quite different from that in the HE where it inspires a succession of heresiarchs. On the cautious presentation of the early fourth-century controversies in which Eusebius took part see A. Cameron and S. G. Hall, Eusebius, Life of Constantine, Oxford 1999, 258. On the demonic causes of heresies in the Historia ecclesiastica see Verdoner, Narrated reality, 132–5.

44 D. Konstan, The emotions of the ancient Greeks: studies in Aristotle and classical literature, Toronto 2006, 111–28; G. J. D. Aalders H. Wzn., ‘The hellenistic concept of the enviousness of fate’, in M. J. Vermaseren, Studies in hellenistic religions, Leiden 1979, 1–8; Bartelink, ‘ΒΑΣΚΑΝΟΣ’, 390.

45 M. Hinterberger, ‘Envy and nemesis in the Vita Basilii and Leo the Deacon: literary mimesis or something more?’, in R. Macrides (ed.), History as literature in Byzantium: papers from the Fortieth Spring Symposium of Byzantine Studies, Farnham 2010, 201; Bartelink, G. J. M., ‘Μισόκαλος, épithéte du diable’, Vigiliae Christianae xii/1 (1958), 40Google Scholar.

46 Socrates, HE i.8.13; i.33.2; vi.5.1; vii.11.4; vii.15.4; vii.36.2; vii.45.5.

47 Ibid. i.8.13; vi.5.1; vii.36.2.

48 Ibid. i.33.2; vii.11.4.

49 ‘τίς δὲ ἡ αἰτία, δι᾽ ἣν ὁ ἀγαθὸς θεὸς τοῦτο γίνεσθαι συγχωρεῖ, πότερον γυμνάσαι τὰ ἀγαθὰ τῶν δογμάτων βουλόμενος ἢ τῆς ἐκκλησίας τὴν ἐπὶ τῇ πίστει προσγινομένην ἀλαζονείαν ἐκκόπτειν, ἢ ὅπως ποτὲ ἔχει, δυσχερὴς μὲν καὶ μακρὰ ἡ ἀπόδοσις, οὐκ εὔκαιρος δὲ νῦν ἐξετάζεσθαι’: ibid. i.22.14.

50 Hegemonius, Acta Archelai, in Hegemonius, Acta Archelai, ed. C. H. Beeson, GCS Leipzig 1906, xxvii (xxiv).9–11, xxviii (xxv).10–11. On the presentation of Manichaean beliefs about good and evil as two principles with separate existence in the Acta see K. Kaatz, ‘The light and the darkness: the two natures, free will, and the scriptural evidence in the Acta Archelai’, in J. Beduhn and P. Mirecki (eds), Frontiers of faith: the Christian encounter with Manichaeism in the Acts of Archelaus, Leiden 2007, 103–18.

51 Hegemonius, Acta Archelai xxxix (xxxv).1, 6–7; xli.1; xlii (xxxviii).11; lxv (liv).8.

52 ‘Weeds’ appear only twice in the Acta in Mani's description of the devil as a ‘planter of weeds’ (‘zizaniorum seminatorem’) and in an expression that sees Archelaus acknowledge that Mani and his ilk will be ‘multiplied like weeds’ (‘multiplicari tamquam zizanis’): Hegemonius, Acta Archelai xv (xiii).7; xl (xxxvi).8, trans. M. Vermes, Turnhout 2001. The image of the wheat growing up among the weeds in Socrates's History would seem to be a more emphatic recollection of Matt. xiii.

53 Hegemonius, Acta Archelai lxii.3.

54 On the interpretation of ἑλληνίζων χριστιανισμός at i.22.1 see. Henrichs, A., ‘Mani and the Babylonian Baptists: a historical confrontation’, Harvard Studies in Classical Philology lxxvii (1973)Google Scholar, 52 n. 108, and Wallraff, Kirkenhistorker, 83–4. Socrates's approach to Greek education and learning is characteristically positive (see esp. HE iii.16 and n. 35 above). The expression ἑλληνίζων χριστιανισμός seems to convey a peculiarly religious focus as suggested by Socrates's later statement (HE i.22.8) that Mani's books ‘were Christian in expression, but Greek in doctrines. For Manichaeus taught the worship of many gods because he was an atheist’ (‘αἱ ὑποθέσεις χριστιανίζουσι μὲν τῇ ϕωνῇ, τοῖς δὲ δόγμασιν ἑλληνίζουσιν· καὶ γὰρ θεοὺς πολλοὺς σέβειν ὁ Μανιχαῖος προτρέπεται <αὐτὸς> ἄθεος ὤν’).

55 Van Nuffelen, Héritage, 300–3.

56 Socrates, HE i.22.1 (ϕύω); 1.22.1 (παραϕύω, bis); i. 22.15 (παραϕύω).

57 ‘ὅπως μὲν οὖν μικρὸν ἔμπροσθεν τῶν Κωνσταντίνου χρόνων ἡ Μανιχαίων παρεϕύη θρησκεία’: ibid. i.22.15.

58 Ibid. ii.18.7; ii.35.1; ii.46.1.

59 The use of ἐπιϕύω in descriptions of disease makes this sense of additional growth very clear. See especially Aristotle, Historia animalium 572a, 605a, in Aristote, Histoire des animaux, ed. P. Louis, Paris 1964–9; Polybius, i.81.7, in Polybii historiae, ed. T. Büttner-Wobst, Leipzig 1889–1905, repr. Stuttgart 1962–7.

60 Φύω terminology, used to describe the emergence of heresies, is well represented in, for example, Epiphanius, ed. K. Holl, Epiphanius, i, GCS, Leipzig 1915; ii–ii, ed. K. Holl, rev. J. Dummer, GCS, Berlin 1980, 1985 (xx.4.9; xxv.2.1; xxxi.2.1; xxxvi.4.2; li.1.1; lix.1.1; lxiii.1.1; lxix.63.1; lxxvii.1.1 and below), and sporadically in the church historian Eusebius (HE ii.14.3; iv.28.1; v.14.1; vi.37.1; vii.31.2). In these works there is no concentration of ϕύω or its compounds in any one chapter as is found in Socrates, HE i.22. Moreover, the polemical function of ϕύω vocabulary is not always the same. Epiphanius provides an interesting illustration. In his heresiological treatise ϕύω is regularly used with ἐκ, ἀπό, or the genitive alone to describe the growth of one doctrine from another: Panarion xxvi.1.1; xxvii.1.2; xxxv.1.1; lxiv.4.1; lxxiii.1.1, lxxiii.38.3).

61 Sozomen never uses ϕύω or its compounds in a similar way, despite his apparent, albeit unacknowledged, use of Socrates's History: Hansen, Sokrates, p. xlv. There is a large body of literature now that stresses the distinctiveness of Socrates's and Sozomen's histories. The expressions that Sozomen does use to introduce the subject of Photinus, Aetius and Apollinarius certainly resonate with his own language of prejudice, but also illustrate the kind of variation that was possible. Thus, ‘At this time Photinus … openly introduced his own doctrine’ (‘ἐν τούτῳ δὲ Φωτεινός…ἀναϕανδὸν τῷ οἰκείῳ συνίστατο δόγματι’): Sozomen, HE iv.6.1; ‘About this time Aetius taught openly the doctrine he held about god’ (‘περὶ δὲ τοῦτον τὸν χρόνον εἰς τὸ ϕανερὸν ἐδίδασκεν Ἀέτιος ἣν εἶχε περὶ θεοῦ δόξαν’): iv.12.1; ‘At this time Apollinarius openly presided over a heresy named after him’ (‘ἐν τούτῳ δὲ εἰς τὸ προϕανὲς προΐστατο Ἀπολινάριος τῆς ἀπ᾽ αὐτοῦ ὀνομαζομένης αἱρέσεως’): vi.25.1.

62 Socrates, HE i.22.3; cf. LSJ s.v. παρεισάγω.

63 Ibid. i.23.3.

64 Ibid. ii.46.9.

65 Ibid. i.22.7.

66 Ibid. ii.35.3.

67 Ibid. i.22.3.

68 Ibid. i.22.8.

69 For examples that do not fit this pattern see ibid. vii.26.5; vii.42.2; vii.43.4.

70 See, for example, the letters and documents associated with the Council of Nicaea (ibid. i.6.23, i.9.5), Sirmium (ii.30.11) and Ariminum (ii.37.45, 63).

71 Ibid. i.36.4; ii.21.6; ii.45.12; iv.7.12; vii.32.20; cf. i.38.6; ii.15.9; vii.5.3 on the ‘daring’ actions of Arius, Macedonius and Sabbatius.

72 2 Peter ii.1 (New International Version). It is widely accepted that most examples of αἵρεσις in the New Testament do not carry pejorative connotations of wrong belief (i.e. a sense of heresy with its opposite in orthodoxy). However, it is significant that 2 Pet. ii.1 is usually listed as an exception: Petramalo, J., ‘Heresy and orthodoxy’, Studia Antiqua vii/2 (2009), 7–8Google Scholar; M. Simon, ‘From Greek hairesis to Christian heresy’, in W. R. Schoedel and R. L. Wilken (eds), Early Christian literature and the classical intellectual tradition: in honorem Robert M. Grant, Paris 1979, 109.

73 Matt. xxiv. 24 (NIV).

74 ‘τολμηταὶ, αὐθάδεις, δόξας οὐ τρέμουσιν βλασϕημοῦντες’: 2 Pet. ii.10.

75 Theodoret, HE i.2, and Evagrius, HE i.1; ii.5, identify the devil as the author of the Arian and Nestorian controversies respectively, but the devil is not otherwise frequently referred to. For examples see M. Whitby, The Ecclesiastical history of Evagrius Scholasticus, Liverpool 2000, p. li.

76 On consequent uses and interpretations of the parable due to this instruction compare Bainton, ‘Parable’, 67–89 and J. B. Russell, Dissent and reform in the early Middle Ages, Berkeley 1965, 40. For discussion of the terms tolerance and forbearance see E. DePalma Digeser, The making of a Christian Empire: Lactantius and Rome, Ithaca– London 2000, 107–14, and M. Kahlos, Forbearance and compulsion: the rhetoric of religious tolerance and intolerance in late antiquity, London 2009, 6–8.

77 John Chrysostom, Homilia in Matthaeum 46, PG lviii.477.

78 Augustine, ep. xciii.16–17, 31–3, CSEL xxxiv.

79 Theodoret, HE i.2.7; v.7.1; Martin, ‘L'Origine’, 353.

80 ‘τοῖς γοῦν ἀκμάζουσιν ἀγαθοῖς, καθὰ ἔϕην, ἐϕεδρεύειν ὁ ϕθόνος ϕιλεῖ. τίς δὲ ἡ αἰτία, δι᾽ ἣν ὁ ἀγαθὸς θεὸς τοῦτο γίνεσθαι συγχωρεῖ, πότερον γυμνάσαι τὰ ἀγαθὰ τῶν δογμάτων βουλόμενος ἢ τῆς ἐκκλησίας τὴν ἐπὶ τῇ πίστει προσγινομένην ἀλαζονείαν ἐκκόπτειν, ἢ ὅπως ποτὲ ἔχει, δυσχερὴς μὲν καὶ μακρὰ ἡ ἀπόδοσις, οὐκ εὔκαιρος δὲ νῦν ἐξετάζεσθαι. οὐ γὰρ δόγματα πρόκειται γυμνάζειν ἡμῖν οὔτε τοὺς περὶ προνοίας καὶ κρίσεως τοῦ θεοῦ δυσευρέτους λόγους κινεῖν, ἀλλ᾽ ἱστορίαν γεγονότων περὶ τὰς ἐκκλησίας πραγμάτων ὡς οἷόν τε διηγήσασθαι. ὅπως μὲν οὖν μικρὸν ἔμπροσθεν τῶν Κωνσταντίνου χρόνων ἡ Μανιχαίων παρεϕύη θρησκεία, τοσαῦτα ἱστορείσθω· ἐπανέλθωμεν δὲ ἐπὶ τοὺς χρόνους τῆς προκειμένης ἱστορίας': Socrates, HE i.22.14–15.

81 Van Nuffelen encourages the reader to compare the passage to Procopius' statements in the Wars (ii.10.4–5; ii.22.1) that defer explanation of events to God: Héritage, 295. Urbainczyk, remarks that the passage bears comparison to statements of impartiality common in histories: Socrates, 46. What follows does not offer an alternative reading but rather one which aims to explore the specificity of the passage in relation to the treatment of heresies.

82 On the idea of division rather than doctrinal error see John Chrysostom, Homilia in ep. primam ad Corinthios 27.3, PG lxi.225–8.

83 Justin Martyr, Dialogue with Trypho 35, PG vi.549B–553A; Clement, Stromata vii.15.89–90, in Clemens Alexandrinus, ed. O. Staehlin and L. Früchtel, GCS, Berlin 1970; Origen, Contra Celsum iii.12–3, in Origène Contre Celse, ed. M. Borret, SC cxxxvi, Paris 1968; Evagrius, HE i.11.

84 Clement, Stromata vii.15.89–90; John Chrysostom, De providentia dei 12, in Jean Chrysotome, Sur la providence de dieu, ed. A.-M. Malingrey, SC lxxix, Paris 1961; Tertulian, De praescriptione haereticorum i.5, in Tertullian, De praescriptione haereticorum, ed. E. Preuschen, Tübingen 1910, repr. Frankfurt 1968; Cyprian, De ecclesiae Catholicae unitate 10, CSEL iii/1.

85 Augustine, Confessiones vii.19.25, CSEL xxxiii; Tertullian, De praescriptione haereticorum, i.1; Evagrius, HE i.11; Cyprian, De ecclesiae Catholicae unitate 10.

86 See, especially, John Chrysostom, De providentia dei, 12.

87 Origen, Contra Celsum iii.12–13; Evagrius, HE i.11.

88 See alternative translation in Maraval, Socrate, SC cdxxlvii, 206–7, and additional comments on translation at pp. 11–12 n. 4.

89 Socrates, HE vii.6 focuses on Timothy and George, two leaders of contemporary Arianism. The chapter is cited as one that displays Socrates's willingness to praise individuals, regardless of their doctrinal affiliations, for their Greek learning: Maraval, ‘Socrate et la culture’, 282, cf. Urbainczyk, Socrates, 132, and Young, Nicaea, 24–5 n. 78. In the course of the chapter Socrates mentions Timothy and George's eloquence, and even their proficiency in reading Greek literature and Scripture. He also expresses his own surprise that they were so proficient and concludes at vii.6.9 that they ‘unawares, changed the Arian religion for the better’ (‘ἀλλ᾽ ὅμως τὴν Ἀρειανὴν θρησκείαν λεληθότως ἐπὶ τὸ κρεῖσσον μετέθεσαν’). The idea that heresies aid in the discernment of good doctrine is one that ultimately perceives their end and Socrates, HE vii.6, is a good example of how this idea might play out in the History.

90 Urbainczyk, Socrates, 45–6; Van Nuffelen, Héritage, 295–9.

91 Urbainczyk, Socrates, 46; Leppin, Von Constantin, 11 n. 43.

92 Wallraff, Kirchenhistoriker, 41 n. 85.

93 On the reference to honorifics in the preface to book vi see Urbainczyk, Socrates, 148. Socrates even avoids ἅγιος as a term to describe people almost entirely. Socrates only refers to the holiness (ἁγιότης) of the Egyptian monks (iv.23.77) and of the bishop of Chebron who is clearly mentioned for his ascetic life which Theodosius admires (vii.22.14). Only two superlatives of θεοϕιλής and εὐσέβεια turn up in Socrates's own prose and in regard to the Emperor Theodosius, not a bishop (vii.23.11: εὐσεβέστατος; vii.42.4: θεοϕιλεστάτῳ).

94 See n. 9 above.

95 Wallraff, Kirchenhistoriker, 179–84.

96 Ibid. 224, cf. 183–4.

97 Van Nuffelen, Héritage, 268–9.

98 Ibid. 427 n. 3.

99 There are several reasons why i.22 may retain its status as a digression. Van Nuffelen is critical of Wallraff's emphasis on deviation from chronology as a key factor distinguishing digressions, on the grounds that chronology is not the only organising principle in the work. Socrates is, however, concerned about the presentation of accurate chronology as suggested by the preface to book ii. Moreover, unacknowledged and calculated disruptions to the ordering of events seem very different to statements that alert the reader to the fact that something is outside the chronological scope of the proposed history as we see at the end of i.22. Both Van Nuffelen and Wallraff suggest that Socrates flags his digressions through introductory and concluding expressions. No one formula is apparent, but certain patterns of expression occur in chapters accepted as digressions by both scholars and are observable in the chapter on Manichaeism. When Socrates states at the end of i.22 that he will ‘return’ (‘ἐπανέλθωμεν’) to the times of the proposed history (‘τῆς προκειμένης ἱστορίας’), there is some overlap with his expression and sentiment at iv.23.80 (‘ἐπανέλθωμεν δὲ ὅθεν ἐξέβημεν’), v.22.81 (‘ἐπαναδράμωμεν δὲ εἰς τὸ προκείμενον’) and vii.37.18 (‘ἐπανέλθωμεν δὲ ὅθεν ἐξέβημεν’). Wallraff argues, with reference to the critique of Paul of Side's lost history (vii.27), that Socrates was interested in the usefulness of excursus, and points out how various digressions give clear reasons for the inclusion of supplementary material. Such explanatory comments emphasise the appropriateness (ii.21.1; v.22.1; vi.13.1: ‘οὐκ ἄκαιρον’), usefulness (vii.36.23: ‘χρήσιμον’), necessity (iv.27.1: ‘δεῖ εἰδέναι’) or profitability (vii.37.18: ‘οὐκ ἀχρείως’) of the material to be discussed. Such varied but complementary expressions can be reasonably compared to Socrates's assertion that he believes it necessary (i.22.3: ‘ἀναγκαῖον ἡγοῦμαι’) to revise Eusebius' treatment of Manichaeism.

100 See Van Nuffelen, Héritage, 427 n. 3: ‘Il interrompt le récit des bienfaits du règne de Constantin et introduit les quatorze chapitres suivants qui traitent des péripéties d'Athanase (cf. Socrates 1.22.1: ‘Ἀλλὰ μεταξὺ τοῦ χρηστοῦ σίτου εἴωθεν καὶ τὰ ζιζάνια ϕύεσθαι· ϕθόνος γὰρ τοῖς ἀγαθοῖς ἐϕεδρεύειν ϕιλεῖ’). C'est donc une sorte d'introduction à l'ensemble des chapitres 1.22–36.’

101 Socrates, HE i.23.1. Hansen substitutes ἀλήθειαν for ὀρθοδοξίαν on the strength of the Armenian manuscript asserting that Socrates does not use the latter: Sokrates, 69. Wallraff, however, suggests that the apparent wordplay between ὀρθοδοξίαν and κακοδοξίας is an important argument for retaining ὀρθοδοξίαν in this instance: Kirchenhistoriker, 35 n. 38.

102 The digression may actually start after the initial reference to wheat and weeds, perhaps even with the explanatory reference to Eusebius' botched account of Manichaeism in section 3.

103 See n. 63 above.

104 See pp. 5–7 above.

105 Cf. Wallraff who suggests that Socrates's Novatianism may lie behind his relative restraint in later chapters: Kirchenhistoriker, 257.

106 On the role of Manichaeism as an archetypal heresy see R. Lyman, ‘A topography of heresy: mapping the rhetorical creation of Arianism’, in M. R. Barnes and D. H. Williams (eds), Arianism after Arius: essays on the development of the fourth century Trinitarian conflicts, Edinburgh 1993, 45–62.

107 Wallraff, Kirchenhistoriker, 257 n. 213.

108 For example, ibid. 222 n. 53.