Refutation of All Heresies 7.29.10

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, 386

περὶ ὧν ὁ Ἐμπεδοκλῆς ὅτι ἐστὶν ἀθάνατα δύο καὶ ἀγέννητα καὶ ἀρχὴν τοῦ γενέσθαι μηδέποτε εἰληφότα, ἀλλαχοῦ λέγει τοιοῦτόν τινα τρόπον· ἦ γὰρ καὶ πάρος ἦν τε καὶ ἔσσεται, οὐδέ ποτʼ, οἴω, τούτων ἀμφοτέρων κενεώσεται ἄσπετος αἰών. Τίνων τούτων; τοῦ νείκους καὶ τῆς φιλίας· οὐ γὰρ ἤρξαντο γενέσθαι, ἀλλὰ προῆσαν καὶ ἔσονται ἀεὶ διὰ τὴν ἀγεννησίαν φθορὰν ὑπομεῖναι μὴ δυνάμενα. Τὸ δὲ πῦρ [καὶ τὸ ὕδωρ] καὶ ἡ γῆ καὶ ὁ ἀὴρ θνήσκοντα καὶ ἀναβιοῦντα.

English · Claude translation

concerning which Empedocles says elsewhere, that the two are immortal and unbegotten and have never received a beginning of coming to be, in some such way as this: “For truly they were before and will be, nor ever, I think, will boundless time be emptied of these two.” Of which two? Of Strife and Love. For they did not begin to come into being, but existed before and will always be, being unable to undergo corruption because they are unbegotten. But fire [and water] and earth and air die and live again.

About this passage

Source

Duncker–Schneidewin, 386 · 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.

Extrabiblical texts

Empedocles, frag. 16 (Empedocles (fragments)) · quotation, high confidence

Notes

Translation notes

Empedocles, fragment 16. The bracketed words are an editorial supplement.

Notes on the original text

Digital text corrected (wrong breathing: ἦ (Empedocles fr. 16)): ἧ γὰρ → ἦ γὰρ.

Cite this passage

Hippolytus, Haer. 7.29.10 (trans. Sophia Scriptura, https://sophiascriptura.com/fathers/hippolytus-refutatio/7/29/10/).

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

Plain text

Hippolytus, Haer. 7.29.10 (trans. Sophia Scriptura, https://sophiascriptura.com/fathers/hippolytus-refutatio/7/29/10/).