"Anti-Heretical" Heretics

 

"ANTI-HERETICAL" HERETICS

by Nikolaos Mannis

 

Many people today, in a time when the pan-heresy of Ecumenism is troubling the Church, hold the view that all those who oppose Ecumenism are truly Orthodox, and that their internal conflicts are merely about insignificant differences. However, this is not true. Not all of the so-called Anti-Ecumenists are truly Orthodox. On the contrary, many who fight against this heresy have fallen into another heresy themselves. And this is not happening for the first time.

It is well-known from church history that whenever a heresy appeared within the Church, there were always objections raised against it. However, these objections were not always Orthodox, nor were those who voiced them. In some cases, the effort to combat a heretical view led to the creation of another heretical view. Thus, many heresies were born as reactions to earlier ones. This happened because those who expressed these views lacked the illumination of God, which, as the Church teaches, comes from humility.

Let’s look at some examples from church history:

A. The well-known views of Arius were a product of his anti-heretical rhetoric against Sabellius, a heretic who claimed that the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit were not the three Persons of the One Triune God, but rather three masks (personae) of God, who supposedly has only one Person. In his effort to combat this heresy, Arius attempted to present the Father as being of a different substance (heteroousios) from the Son and superior to Him, thereby becoming the leader of the well-known heresy that deeply troubled the Church in the 4th century.

B. In their efforts to refute the teachings of Arius, the once-Orthodox "anti-Arians" Apollinaris, Marcellus of Ancyra, and Lucifer fell into other heresies.

Apollinaris of Laodicea, in his attempt to combat the Arians, particularly the extreme faction known as the Anomoeans, expressed highly heretical views regarding the Incarnation of Christ. As a result, he was ultimately condemned as a heresiarch at the Second Ecumenical Council, along with the group of Arian-minded opponents he was fighting against.

Marcellus of Ancyra, although a great zealot and defender of the First Ecumenical Council and an ally of Saint Athanasius the Great, fell into errors in his effort to combat Arianism. He claimed that the Godhead was initially a Monad, which gradually expanded into a Triad, viewed as three distinct Energies but not Persons. He also asserted that Christ pre-existed within God the Father and only became the Son at the Incarnation. Marcellus was condemned as a heretic by the Second Ecumenical Council.

Lucifer of Cagliari was also a courageous fighter against Arianism and a defender of Saint Athanasius the Great. He even defied an entire Arian-leaning council convened by Emperor Constantius, who ultimately exiled him. After being recalled from exile, Lucifer disagreed with Saint Athanasius on the issue of the return to Orthodoxy of those who had communed with the Arians. The Council of Alexandria (362), convened by Saint Athanasius, accepted bishops who had communed with the Arians but had repented and confessed faith in the Nicene Creed, without any additional process. Lucifer, refusing to recognize divine Grace and valid Sacraments in them, refused to accept the repentant bishops in their rank, recognizing them only as laymen. He then went to Antioch, where he communed with one of the two factions of the Orthodox there and consecrated Paulinus as bishop, not recognizing Saint Meletius, the leader of the other faction, as bishop because Meletius had been consecrated by Arian sympathizers. Since the other Fathers (Saint Athanasius the Great, Eusebius of Vercelli, etc.) did not accept his extreme positions, Lucifer ultimately broke communion with the Church, becoming the leader of a schism, while his followers canonized him.

C. Nestorius of Constantinople, who was once a fervent Orthodox, fell into another heresy while refuting the heresies of the Apollinarians and the Docetists. He believed that the Virgin Mary could not have given birth to God because she is not a goddess, and since like begets like, she only gave birth to the human Christ, with whom the Logos united after His birth. Consequently, he rejected the term "Theotokos" (Mother of God) and used "Christotokos" (Mother of Christ) instead. He was condemned by the Third Ecumenical Council.

D. A faction of fervent anti-Nestorians was not satisfied with the Orthodox teachings expressed by Saint Cyril of Alexandria and fell into the opposite extreme of error. In contrast to Nestorianism, Eutyches, the founder of Monophysitism, taught the false doctrine that the human nature of our Lord was absorbed like a drop by His divine nature. He, his heresy, and his unrepentant followers were condemned by the Fourth Ecumenical Council.

Therefore, from the above, it becomes clear that the darkness of heresy cannot be fought with another darkness, but only with the light of Orthodoxy!

"For what fellowship has light with darkness?" (2 Corinthians 6:14).

Translation from original Greek source: https://krufo-sxoleio.blogspot.com/2018/05/blog-post_24.html