Refutation of All Heresies 4.28.8

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.

Greek text · Duncker–Schneidewin, 90–92

Ἔστι δὲ τοῦτο αὐτὸ ἀναγκαῖον, ἵνα τι παραθῇ τοῖς ὠσὶ τοῦ παιδὸς ὄργανον, διʼ οὗ πᾶν ἔστι σημᾶναι θέλοντα· ἠχεῖ δὲ τὸ πρῶτον ἵνα φοβηθῇ ὁ παῖς, καὶ δεύτερον ἐπιβομβεῖ, ἔπειτα τὸ τρίτον λαλεῖ διὰ τοῦ ὀργάνου, ἃ λέγειν τὸν παῖδα βούλεται, καὶ τὴν ἔκβασιν τοῦ πράγματος ὡς δοκεῖ, εἶτα τοὺς μὲν παρόντας ἡσυχάζειν ποιεῖ, τὸν δὲ ἃ παρὰ τῶν δαιμόνων ἤκουσε σημαίνειν ἀξιοῖ.

English · Claude translation

But this is itself necessary, that he may put to the boy's ears an instrument through which he can signal all he wishes. First it makes a noise to frighten the boy, second it hums, and then third he speaks through the instrument what he wants the boy to say, and the outcome of the matter as he sees fit; then he makes those present keep quiet, and bids the boy declare what he heard from the demons.

About this passage

Source

Duncker–Schneidewin, 90–92 · 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

Notes on the original text

Digital text corrected (wrong breathing in the digital text): ἴνα τι → ἵνα τι.

Cite this passage

Hippolytus, Haer. 4.28.8 (trans. Sophia Scriptura, https://sophiascriptura.com/fathers/hippolytus-refutatio/4/28/8/).

The SBL abbreviation for this work has not been checked yet.

Plain text

Hippolytus, Haer. 4.28.8 (trans. Sophia Scriptura, https://sophiascriptura.com/fathers/hippolytus-refutatio/4/28/8/).