On Ecclesiastical Theology
c. 337–339
De ecclesiastica theologia
Eusebius’s systematic treatise against Marcellus of Ancyra, setting out his account of Father, Son, and Spirit. Study English translation from the Klostermann Greek text.
Translated by Claude Opus 5.5 (study translation from Greek)
Greek: Erich Klostermann, Eusebius Werke IV (Leipzig: Hinrichs, 1906), pp. 60–182. Digital Greek via Open Greek and Latin / Interlinea (CC BY-SA 4.0). English: study translation by Claude Opus 5.5 for BWAB Library—not the copyrighted CUA Press (Spoerl/Vinzent 2017) text. Technical terms and contested passages may be revised.
Contents
- Book 1: Preface
- Book 1, Chapter 1: That Marcellus vainly abused Sabellius while holding the same opinions
- Book 1, Chapter 2: That the grace of Christ granted the Church a special knowledge of Father and Son
- Book 1, Chapter 3: That the heterodox went astray in various ways concerning the Son
- Book 1, Chapter 4: That those who deny the Son’s subsistence vainly call themselves Christians
- Book 1, Chapter 5: How Marcellus denied the Son of God, imitating Sabellius’s heresy
- Book 1, Chapter 6: How the Church of God believes
- Book 1, Chapter 7: How the heterodox variously fell away from the theology of the Son
- Book 1, Chapter 8: A statement of sound and ecclesiastical orthodoxy
- Book 1, Chapter 9: That the Son did not come into being as the many creatures do
- Book 1, Chapter 10: That, alone begotten from the Father, he alone is rightly called God and Only-begotten Son
- Book 1, Chapter 11: How the Church knows one God, while receiving the Son as God from God
- Book 1, Chapter 12: That his generation from the Father is ineffable
- Book 1, Chapter 13: That the Son’s governance is necessary and saving for all
- Book 1, Chapter 14: That the Church rightly rejected Marcellus for holding the same as Sabellius
- Book 1, Chapter 15: With what words Marcellus attacked Sabellius, pretending not to share his views
- Book 1, Chapter 16: How he is caught, by his own words, holding the same opinions as Sabellius
- Book 1, Chapter 17: How he denied with bare head the hypostasis of the Son
- Book 1, Chapter 18: How he said that before the incarnation the Son was nothing but Word alone, like human speech
- Book 1, Chapter 19: How the divine Scriptures, even before the incarnation, named the Son of God not only Word but a myriad of other titles
- Book 1, Chapter 20: Selections and partial interpretations of the proofs from divine Scripture, in thirty headings
- Book 2, Chapter 1: How Marcellus renewed Sabellius’s opinion
- Book 2, Chapter 2: How he is also convicted of Judaizing in his opinion
- Book 2, Chapter 3: How he defined the Word of God in God as without beginning and unbegotten
- Book 2, Chapter 4: How he said that the Word and God are one and the same
- Book 2, Chapter 5: That in saying these things he denied the Son
- Book 2, Chapter 6: How the Church theologizes the Son
- Book 2, Chapter 7: How the Church proclaims the monarchy of the Father
- Book 2, Chapter 8: With what words Marcellus denied the Son of God
- Book 2, Chapter 9: A refutation of the man’s false doctrine
- Book 2, Chapter 10: That he did not rightly take “In the beginning was the Word”
- Book 2, Chapter 11: That he sometimes called him the uttered Word of God, sometimes the internal Word, as among humans
- Book 2, Chapter 12: That the evangelist did not set out the theology of the Word as Marcellus supposed
- Book 2, Chapter 13: In how many ways the meaning of the term “Word” is understood
- Book 2, Chapter 14: How one must interpret the evangelical teaching about the Word
- Book 2, Chapter 15: Citations of Marcellus’s own words by which he clearly denied the Son of God, calling him uttered and internal Word
- Book 2, Chapter 16: A refutation of the man’s false doctrine
- Book 2, Chapter 17: An interpretation of the true sense of the Word
- Book 2, Chapter 18: Why the evangelist, beginning his writing, named the Son “Word”
- Book 2, Chapter 19: How Marcellus, citing Old Testament texts about one God, denied the Son of God like the Jews
- Book 2, Chapter 20: Why Moses and the prophets did not hand down the theology of the Son nakedly to the Jews
- Book 2, Chapter 21: That it was the Son of God who spoke to Moses and to Abraham
- Book 2, Chapter 22: That in the prophets also the Father was theologized through the Son
- Book 2, Chapter 23: That the Church does not proclaim two gods
- Book 2, Chapter 24: How Marcellus likened the Only-begotten Word to God’s words of practical command
- Book 2, Chapter 25: How he wrote things contrary to himself
- Book 3, Chapter 1: How Marcellus dared to interpret the divine Scriptures distortedly
- Book 3, Chapter 2: How “The Lord created me the beginning of his ways” and what follows are to be understood, and how Marcellus transferred the same to the Saviour’s flesh
- Book 3, Chapter 3: A refutation of his unsound comments on these passages, and a sound interpretation of the same
- Book 3, Chapter 4: How Marcellus, not understanding the Scriptures, defined one hypostasis of Father and Son and Holy Spirit
- Book 3, Chapter 5: How the Saviour taught concerning the Holy Spirit
- Book 3, Chapter 6: How the Church hands down what to think concerning Father and Son and Holy Spirit
- Book 3, Chapter 7: How Marcellus affirmed that the image of the invisible God is the flesh
- Book 3, Chapter 8: How he declared that the Saviour’s flesh is of no benefit
- Book 3, Chapter 9: How he dared to say that at the end of the universe the Saviour’s flesh would be left deserted by the Word
- Book 3, Chapter 10: What the divine Scriptures teach about the Saviour’s flesh, and how Marcellus held the opposite
- Book 3, Chapter 11: How, not understanding the evangelical saying, he said that the Saviour’s flesh scandalizes and is of no benefit
- Book 3, Chapter 12: An interpretation of the evangelical expression
- Book 3, Chapter 13: How he affirmed that Christ’s kingdom began about four hundred years ago and will end at the consummation, making distorted interpretations of the divine Scriptures
- Book 3, Chapter 14: Explanations of the sound sense of the readings
- Book 3, Chapter 15: How it is said that all things will be subjected to the Son, and he to the Father
- Book 3, Chapter 16: How the Apostle said, “Then shall God be all in all”
- Book 3, Chapter 17: How the divine Scriptures present the unending kingdom of our Saviour, and how Marcellus declared with bare head that his kingdom will cease
- Book 3, Chapter 18: How in the Son’s kingdom all who are counted worthy of that blessedness will become one
- Book 3, Chapter 19: That just as the Father and the Son are said to be one, so also will all the saints be
- Book 3, Chapter 20: That as the Father is in the Son and the Son in the Father, so also he will be in all the saints
- Book 3, Chapter 21: How one must understand “He who has seen me has seen the Father”