In A.D. 325 a very important council called the Council of Nicaea took place, in Nicaea (you guessed it!). There were a number of topics, but the most important one was about what the proper terminology is for referring to what is the same about God the Father and God the Son, and what is different about those two. The previous heresy, Sabellianism, upheld that there was one God, but denied that there were three distinct persons (to put it simply). This is comparable to another Heresy called Modalism. If you will permit us to use a somewhat crass metaphor, Modalists say that God is just ‘putting on different hats’ when he manifests as the Father or the Son or the Spirit. Just one guy, keeping up appearances. Have you ever seen two of them in the same room? Huh? (Mark 1:10-11 exists, so actually yeah we have seen them all there together at once).
So, in the wake of rejecting Sabellianism, the big group of Bishops hanging out in Nicaea were in a bit of a Stalemate about what to say about Jesus. Do we say there are three distinct persons, and that each of them is God? Doesn’t that make three different Gods? Or what if we said that there is certainly only one God? Does that make God a kind of Hydra, with three different heads? Before you judge them, ask yourself how you might have tried to describe this biblically, without placing your foot squarely in heretic territory. Try it, you will quickly find yourself umming and ahhing as the elders hang a big gaudy sign around your neck that reads ‘HERETIC’.
Enter Arius. Arius didn’t want to make any of the above mistakes, so he made his own mistake. At least he was original. Most people today keep recycling Modalism instead (Yes, your ice-water-steam allegory is modalim. The three-leaf clover allegory is partialism, and so is the eggshell, egg-white and egg-yolk allegory. It’s like a buffet of careless theology, just waiting to fascinate and mislead younger Christians). Arius said that Christ was the Son of God, but that he was not co-eternal with the Father, meaning that God always existed, but Jesus didn’t (which contradicts John 1:1). Arius held that at a time in the past, God begat Jesus, making him of a similar essence/substance but distinct and subordinate.
So, the debate came down to two greek words. The first one, ‘homoousios’, meant same-substance. The second one, ‘homoiousios’, meant similar-substance. These two words were being used to argue whether Christ was ‘homoousios’ as the Father (the same substance, the same essence, the very same God), or whether he was ‘homoiousios’ as the Father (a similar substance, a similar essence, but not the same God, rather created by God, and subordinate to him).
At this point, you may be thinking, ‘so what! It’s such a tiny difference, and does it really matter? I mean, nobody really argues about this stuff, and it doesn’t change how you live your life. Isn’t Arius’ explanation pretty much just as good?’
Dear reader, it is not an exaggeration to say that this doctrine strikes at the very core of the Christian faith. To reject the deity of Christ in this manner is to reject Christ. It was literally one letter difference, but oh so significant. As Kevin DeYoung said at a conference this author attended a few years ago, ‘the Deity of Christ rested on a Greek Diphthong’.
There is a rather famous church tradition associated with this argument that Arius the Heretic had at Nicaea. Though historically doubtful, the story goes that Arius, a bishop from Egypt, was making his case for what is now called Arianism (as we explained before the idea of homoiousious, that Christ is similar in substance but not the same substance as God). They say that Bishop Nicholas (oh yes, Saint Nicholas, the very same!) became enraged at how irreverently he was talking about the persons of the Trinity. Storming across the floor, he walked right up to Arius and ‘boxed him across the ears’. Even though this may not have happened, this story is very useful for interrupting the dreary argument of ‘is it pagan to enjoy Santa’ and ‘is Santa really just Satan hiding behind a disguise’. Punching heretics is far more interesting! (disclaimer: dear reader, please do not punch any heretics this Christmas, or in the following months).
So there you have it. A heartwarming Christmas tale and some key Christological doctrine, just what you knew you were getting yourself into when you started reading this blog post. Cherished reader, thank you very much for reading these, and we hope that you enjoy your time here. Have a Merry Christmas, and remember, homoousios.
Distilled Orthopraxy 