Sophia Scriptura

Refutation of All Heresies 6.32.7

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 Demiurge arose from Sophia's fear; he is fiery and is called Place, Hebdomad, and Ancient of Days.

Greek text · Duncker–Schneidewin, 280

Ὁ δημιουργὸς ἀπὸ τοῦ φόβου· τουτέστιν ὃ λέγει, φησίν, ἡ γραφή· Ἀρχὴ σοφίας φόβος κυρίου. Αὕτη γὰρ ἀρχὴ τῶν τῆς σοφίας παθῶν· ἐφοβήθη γάρ, εἶτα ἐλυπήθη, εἶτα ἠπόρησε, καὶ οὕτως ἐπὶ δέησιν καὶ ἱκετείαν κατέφυγεν. Ἔστι δὲ πυρώδης, φησίν, ἡ ψυχικὴ οὐσία, καλεῖται δὲ καὶ τόπος [(??)] ὑπʼ αὐτῶν καὶ ἑβδομὰς καὶ παλαιὸς τῶν ἡμερῶν· καὶ ὅσα τοιαῦτα λέγουσι περὶ τούτου, ταῦτα εἶναι τοῦ ψυχικοῦ, ὅν φασιν εἶναι τοῦ κόσμου δημιουργόν· ἔστι δὲ πυρώδης.

English · Claude translation

The Demiurge is from fear; that is what, he says, Scripture says: “The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom.” For this was the beginning of Sophia's passions: she feared, then grieved, then was perplexed, and so fled to supplication and entreaty. And the psychic substance, he says, is fiery, and it is also called by them Place […], Hebdomad, and Ancient of Days; and whatever such things they say about him belong to the psychic one, whom they say is the Demiurge of the world; and he is fiery.

About this passage

Source
Duncker–Schneidewin, 280 · 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
  • Prov 1:7 · quotation, high confidence
  • Ps 111:10 (110:10 LXX) · quotation, medium confidence
  • Dan 7:9 · allusion, high confidence
Topics
Heresy

Notes

Translation notes

  • A word after “Place” is unreadable in the digital text.

Cite this passage

Hippolytus, Haer. 6.32.7 (trans. Sophia Scriptura, https://sophiascriptura.com/fathers/hippolytus-refutatio/6/32/7/).

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Plain text
Hippolytus, Haer. 6.32.7 (trans. Sophia Scriptura, https://sophiascriptura.com/fathers/hippolytus-refutatio/6/32/7/).

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