Sophia Scriptura

Refutation of All Heresies 9.10.4

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: Heraclitus says straight and crooked, up and down are the same, like the fuller's screw.

Greek text · Duncker–Schneidewin, 446

Καὶ εὐθὺ δέ, φησί, καὶ στρεβλὸν τὸ αὐτό ἐστι. Γναφέων, φησίν, ὁδὸς εὐθεῖα καὶ σκολιή — ἡ τοῦ ὀργάνου τοῦ καλουμένου κοχλίου ἐν τῷ γναφείῳ περιστροφὴ εὐθεῖα καὶ σκολιή· ἄνω γὰρ ὁμοῦ καὶ κύκλῳ περιέρχεται — μία ἐστί, φησί, καὶ ἡ αὐτή. Καὶ τὸ ἄνω καὶ τὸ κάτω ἕν ἐστι καὶ τὸ αὐτό· ὁδὸς ἄνω κάτω μίη καὶ ὡυτή.

English · Claude translation

And straight, he says, and crooked are the same. “The path of the fullers,” he says, “is straight and crooked” (the turning of the instrument called the screw in the fuller's shop is straight and crooked, for it goes up and round at once): it is, he says, one and the same. And up and down are one and the same: “The way up and down is one and the same.”

About this passage

Source
Duncker–Schneidewin, 446 · 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
  • Heraclitus, frag. 59 (Heraclitus (fragments)) · quotation, high confidence
  • Heraclitus, frag. 60 (Heraclitus (fragments)) · quotation, high confidence

Notes

Translation notes

  • Heraclitus, fragments 59 and 60.

Cite this passage

Hippolytus, Haer. 9.10.4 (trans. Sophia Scriptura, https://sophiascriptura.com/fathers/hippolytus-refutatio/9/10/4/).

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Plain text
Hippolytus, Haer. 9.10.4 (trans. Sophia Scriptura, https://sophiascriptura.com/fathers/hippolytus-refutatio/9/10/4/).

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