Refutation of All Heresies 5.19.15

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: The mind, a divine spark from the light above, is born of water into human bodies and seeks release.

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Greek text · Duncker–Schneidewin, 204

Ἐπὰν δὲ τοῦτο τὸ ὑπὸ τοῦ ἀνέμου κῦμα ἐκ τοῦ ὕδατος ἐγερθὲν καὶ ἔγκυμον εἰργασμένον τὴν φύσιν γέννημα θηλείας εἰλήφῃ ἐν ἑαυτῷ, κατέχει τὸ κατεσπαρμένον φῶς ἄνωθεν μετὰ τῆς τοῦ πνεύματος εὐωδίας, τουτέστι νοῦν μεμορφωμένον ἐν τοῖς διαφόροις εἴδεσιν, ὅ ἐστι τέλειος θεός, ὃς ἐξ ἀγεννήτου φωτὸς ἄνωθεν καὶ πνεύματος κατενηνεγμένος εἰς ἀνθρωπίνην φύσιν, ὥσπερ εἰς ναόν, φορᾷ φύσεως καὶ ἀνέμου κινήματι, γεννηθεὶς ἐξ ὕδατος, συγκεκραμένος καὶ καταμεμιγμένος τοῖς σώμασιν οἱονεὶ ἅλας τῶν γενομένων ὑπάρχων καὶ φῶς τοῦ σκότους, ἀπὸ τῶν σωμάτων σπεύδων λυθῆναι καὶ μὴ δυνάμενος τὴν λύσιν εὑρεῖν καὶ τὴν διέξοδον ἑαυτοῦ· καταμέμικται γὰρ σπινθήρ τις ἐλάχιστος ἀπ.

English · Claude translation

And when this wave, raised from the water by the wind and having made nature pregnant, has received in itself the offspring of the female, it holds the light sown from above together with the fragrance of the spirit, that is, mind shaped in the various forms, which is perfect God, who, brought down from unbegotten light above and from spirit into human nature as into a temple, by the course of nature and the motion of the wind, born of water, blended and mingled with bodies, as being the salt of the things that have come to be and the light of the darkness, hastens to be released from the bodies and cannot find release and its way out; for a certain smallest spark from …

About this passage

Source

Duncker–Schneidewin, 204 · 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.

Scripture

Matt 5:13–14 · echo, medium confidence

Topics

Heresy

Notes

Translation notes

The section breaks off in a damaged passage.

Cite this passage

Hippolytus, Haer. 5.19.15 (trans. Sophia Scriptura, https://sophiascriptura.com/fathers/hippolytus-refutatio/5/19/15/).

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Plain text

Hippolytus, Haer. 5.19.15 (trans. Sophia Scriptura, https://sophiascriptura.com/fathers/hippolytus-refutatio/5/19/15/).

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