Sophia Scriptura

Refutation of All Heresies 5.13.6

Hippolytus of Rome · Refutation of All Heresies · ca. 222–235 · Rome · Read in context

Authorship disputed: The work names no author. Book 1 was long printed among Origen's works as the Philosophumena; after books 4–10 were found in a manuscript from Mount Athos (published 1851), it was assigned to Hippolytus, the usual view today, though some scholars ascribe it to another Roman writer of the same circle. Books 2 and 3 are lost, and book 4 lacks its beginning.

Summary: Signs alternate male and female, which Hippolytus thinks led the Pythagoreans to call odd numbers male and even numbers female.

Greek text · Duncker–Schneidewin, 180

Ἀρρενικὰ μὲν οὖν ἐστὶν ἤ θηλυκά, ἅπερ συνεργὸν ἔχει φύσιν πρὸς ἀρρενογονίαν [ἢ θηλυγονίαν]· Κριὸς γὰρ ἀρρενικόν ἐστι ζώδιον, Ταῦρος δὲ θηλυκόν, καὶ τὰ λοιπὰ κατὰ τὴν αὐτὴν ἀναλογίαν ἃ μὲν ἀρρενικά, ἃ δὲ θηλυκά. Ἀφʼ ὧν οἴομαι οἱ Πυθαγορικοὶ κινηθέντες τὴν μὲν μονάδα ἄρρεν προσαγορεύουσι, τὴν δὲ δυάδα θήλυ, τὴν δὲ τριάδα πάλιν ἄρρεν· καὶ ἀναλόγως τοὺς λοιποὺς τῶν τε ἀρτίων καὶ περισσῶν ἀριθμῶν.

English · Claude translation

Masculine or feminine, then, are those which have a nature that cooperates in the birth of males [or of females]. For the Ram is a masculine sign, the Bull feminine, and the rest in the same alternation, some masculine and some feminine. Moved by these, I suppose, the Pythagoreans call the monad male, the dyad female, and the triad male again, and the rest of the even and odd numbers correspondingly.

About this passage

Source
Duncker–Schneidewin, 180 · Ludwig Duncker and F. G. Schneidewin, eds., S. Hippolyti episcopi et martyris Refutationis omnium haeresium librorum decem quae supersunt (Göttingen: Dieterich, 1859); section divisions from Paul Wendland, ed., Hippolytus Werke 3: Refutatio omnium haeresium, GCS 26 (Leipzig: Hinrichs, 1916) · Greek text: L. Duncker and F. G. Schneidewin, Refutationis omnium haeresium (Göttingen, 1859), digitized by the Perseus Digital Library; section divisions from P. Wendland (GCS 26, 1916), digitized by the First Thousand Years of Greek project (Open Greek and Latin); both CC BY-SA 4.0
Text
As printed in Duncker–Schneidewin. Manuscript variants and the editor's apparatus are not reproduced; no textual problem is noted in this passage.
Translation
Claude translation (claude-opus-5-5), 2026-09-27 · Translated by Claude from the Greek text of Duncker–Schneidewin; made independently of existing English translations.
Compare
Ante-Nicene Fathers, vol. 5 (1886) (an older public-domain English translation, whole volume at CCEL; checked against ours only after ours was made) · Its chapter numbers differ from the standard (Wendland) numbering used here.

Notes

Translation notes

  • The bracketed words are the editor's supplement.

Cite this passage

Hippolytus, Haer. 5.13.6 (trans. Sophia Scriptura, https://sophiascriptura.com/fathers/hippolytus-refutatio/5/13/6/).

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Plain text
Hippolytus, Haer. 5.13.6 (trans. Sophia Scriptura, https://sophiascriptura.com/fathers/hippolytus-refutatio/5/13/6/).

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