Sophia Scriptura

Refutation of All Heresies 5.20.6

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: Hippolytus describes a painting at Phlius of a winged old man pursuing a dark woman, which he links to Sethian doctrine.

Greek text · Duncker–Schneidewin, 208–210

Ἔστι δὲ παστὰς ἐν αὐτῇ, ἐπὶ δὲ τῆς παστάδος ἐγγέγραπται μέχρι σήμερον ἡ πάντων τῶν εἰρημένων λόγων ἰδέα. Πολλὰ μὲν οὖν ἐστὶ τὰ ἐπὶ τῆς παστάδος ἐκείνης ἐγγεγραμμένα, περὶ ὧν καὶ Πλούταρχος ποιεῖται λόγους ἐν ταῖς πρὸς Ἐμπεδοκλέα δέκα βίβλοις. Ἔστι δʼ ἐν τοῖς πλείοσι καὶ πρεσβύτης τις ἐγγεγραμμένος πολιὸς πτερωτὸς ἐντεταμένην ἔχων τὴν αἰσχύνην, γυναῖκα ἀποφεύγουσαν διώκων κυανοειδῆ.

English · Claude translation

There is a portico there, and on the portico there is painted to this day the form of all the doctrines mentioned. Many things are painted on that portico, about which Plutarch also discourses in his ten books against Empedocles. And among most of them there is painted an old man, gray-haired, winged, with his member erect, pursuing a fleeing woman of dark-blue color.

About this passage

Source
Duncker–Schneidewin, 208–210 · 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.
Topics
Heresy

Notes

Translation notes

  • Plutarch's work on Empedocles in ten books is lost.

Cite this passage

Hippolytus, Haer. 5.20.6 (trans. Sophia Scriptura, https://sophiascriptura.com/fathers/hippolytus-refutatio/5/20/6/).

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Plain text
Hippolytus, Haer. 5.20.6 (trans. Sophia Scriptura, https://sophiascriptura.com/fathers/hippolytus-refutatio/5/20/6/).

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