Aëtius (theologian)
Aëtius of Antioch (
Aëtius Antiochenus, fl.
350), surnamed "the Atheist", founder of an extreme sect of
Arians, was a native of Coele-Syria. After working as a vine-dresser and then as a goldsmith, he became a travelling doctor, and displayed great skill in disputations on medical subjects; but his controversial power soon found a wider field for its exercise in the great theological question of the time. He studied successively under the Arians, Paulinus, bishop of
Antioch, Athanasius, bishop of
Anazarbus, and the presbyter Antonius of
Tarsus. In 350 he was ordained a
deacon by Leontius of Antioch, but was shortly afterwards forced by the orthodox party to leave that town. At the first
synod of
Sirmium he won a dialectic victory over the
homoiousian bishops, Basilius and Eustathius, who sought in consequence to stir up against him the enmity of
Constantius Gallus. In 356 he went to
Alexandria with
Eunomius in order to advocate Arianism, but he was banished by
Constantius II.
Julian recalled him from exile, bestowed upon him an estate in
Lesbos, and retained him for a time at his court in
Constantinople. Being consecrated a
bishop, he used his office in the interests of Arianism by creating other bishops of that party. At the accession of
Valens (364), he retired to his estate at Lesbos, but soon returned to Constantinople, where he died in 367. The
Anomoean sect of the Arians, of whom he was the leader, are sometimes called after him
Aetians. His work
De Fide has been preserved in connection with a refutation written by
Epiphanius (
Haer. lxxvi. 10). Its main thought is that the
homoousia,
i.e. the doctrine that the Son (therefore the Begotten) is essentially
God, is self-contradictory, since the idea of unbegottenness is just that which constitutes the nature of God.
* A. Harnack,
History of Dogma, vol iv,
passim*
Aetian
