the Week of Proper 28 / Ordinary 33
free while helping to build churches and support pastors in Uganda.
Click here to learn more!
Bible Encyclopedias
Paul of Samosata
Cyclopedia of Biblical, Theological and Ecclesiastical Literature
or a noted Eastern ecclesiastic of the 3d century, was a native of Samosata, and must have been born shortly after the opening of the century. Very little is accessible as to his early personal history. He was elevated to the bishopric of Antioch in A.D. 260. His original calling seems to have been that of a sophist; how he obtained admittance into the clerical order is unknown; his elevation, or at least his continuance in the see, he owed to the celebrated Zenobia, to whom his literary attainments and his political talents may be supposed to have recommended him. The charge that his personal character was not all that could be desired for the episcopal office seems groundless, when we consider the silence of the ecclesiastical writers of that period, who, if they had had the opportunity, would have gladly laid hold of anything to his disadvantage; and we should rather think that his character must have been remarkably pure and worthy to have led to his being raised from an originally obscure condition to the highest dignity in the Church. After his elevation he was apparently less scrupulous and humble, and it may be reasonably inferred from what his enemies say of him — and they are the only ones who have written about Paul of Samosata — that he manifested in the episcopal office great rapacity, arrogance, and vanity. The encyclical letter issued by the council which deposed him (see below) was published at the time of his condemnation (A.D. 269), and if the charges had been capable of refutation or denial, Paul would not have suffered them to go unanswered. He obtained, while holding his bishopric, the secular office of procurator decenarius (so called from the holder of it receiving a yearly salary of two hundred sestertia), and is said to have loved the pomp and state of his secular calling better than the humbler and more staid deportment which became his ecclesiastical office; and it was probably by the exercise, perhaps the abuse of his procuratorship, that he amassed the immense wealth which, contrasted with his original poverty, so scandalized his opponents.
He was led also by his habits of secular grandeur, and the pride they inspired, to introduce into the Church a greater degree of pomp than had as yet been allowed, erecting for himself an episcopal tribunal (βῆμα ) and a lofty seat (θρόνον ὑψηλόν ), and having this seat placed in a recess screened from public observation, in imitation of the higher judges and magistrates (see Eusebius, Hist. Eccles. 7:30). When abroad he assumed all the airs of greatness, being attended by a numerous retinue, and affecting to read letters and to dictate as he went, in order to inspire the spectators with an idea of the extent and pressing character of his engagements. The decencies of public worship he also violated. He encouraged his admirers of both sexes to manifest their approval by waving their handkerchiefs and rising up and shouting, as in the theatres, and rebuked and insulted those whom a sense of propriety restrained from joining in these applauses. His style of preaching tended to aggravate the disaffection which his general deportment inspired. He was equally unsparing in his strictures on those former teachers of the Church whose memory was held in reverence, and in his praises of himself, "after the manner rather of a rhetorician or a mountebank than of a bishop" (Eusebius). He allowed and excited women to sing his praises publicly in the church, amid the solemnities of Easter, and encouraged his flatterers among the neighboring bishops to praise him in their discourses to the people, and extol him "as an angel from heaven." To these charges of open and ascertainable character, his accusers add others of more secret and therefore of more dubious nature, resting in fact on mere suspicion. But it is very probable that these offensive traits would have excited less animadversion had they not been connected with heretical theological opinions. Indeed, his accusers admit that, "though all groaned and lamented his wickedness in secret," they feared his power too much to provoke him by attempting to accuse him; but the horror excited by his heresy inspired a courage which indignation at his immorality had failed to excite; and they declare that, when he set himself in opposition to God, they were compelled to depose him and elect another bishop in his place (Eusebius). Mosheim, who is inclined to take the most favorable view of Paul's failings, says:
"That Paul was publicly lauded by women, and by neighboring bishops and presbyters, I can believe without much difficulty; but that he was so infatuated and so greedy of praise as boldly to urge forward these proclaimers of his virtues, I cannot believe so easily. I suspect that Paul, after the controversy arising from his novel opinions had become warm, and the people had become divided into factions and parties, persuaded some bishops and presbyters to defend and support his cause in public discourses; and, through his satellites, he encouraged some women, on Easter-day, when the people were all assembled, suddenly to shout forth his praise, in order to conciliate popular favor to him, and to check the rising storm of opposition. He allowed his presbyters and deacons, among other wrong things, to keep the so-called sub-introduced (συνεισάκτας , subintroductas) women: and he himself kept two young women, and carried them with him when he traveled. This was not contrary to the custom of the priests of that age, of which I have spoken elsewhere. But the bishops do not accuse Paul of any illicit intercourse with these women; whence it appears that, though a luxurious liver, he was not altogether regardless of the laws of chastity and decorum.
"Respecting the impiety of Paul of Samosata, scarcely any writer since the 3d century, who has treated of the trinity of persons in God, and of Christ, either formally or incidentally, is silent; and the writers on heresies, one and all, place him among the worst corrupters of revealed truth, and vehemently inveigh against him: so Epiphanius, Theodoret, Augustine, Damascenus, and the rest. Moreover, some of the public documents of the proceedings against him have reached us, a circumstance which has not occurred in regard to most of the other heretics. For there is extant (1) a great part of the epistle of the bishops by whose decision he was condemned in the council at Antioch, addressed to all the bishops of Christendom, to make it manifest that they had good reasons for what they had done (in Eusebius, Hist. Ecclesiastes 1. vii, c. 30, p. 279, etc.). But it is to be regretted that Eusebius has preserved only that part of the epistle which recounts the vices and delinquencies of the man, omitting the part which stated his doctrines or errors. If the latter had been preserved, we could more confidently and more definitely determine what were his principles. There is extant (2) a copy of one of the epistles of the bishops of the council, addressed to Paul, relating to the controversy with him (in the Bibliotheca Patrum Parisiensis [ed. Paris], 1644, fol., 11:302). In this epistle, six of the bishops state their own opinions respecting God and Christ, and inquire of him whether he disagrees with them. There is extant (3) an epistle of Dionysius of Alexandria to Paul of Samosata, in which the writer chides and confutes him (in the same Bibliotheca Patrum, 11:273). Though it is true that some, and for reasons worthy of consideration, deny that this epistle was written by Dionysins (q.v.), it is as unquestionably true that the epistle is very ancient. It was probably addressed to Paul by some bishop or presbyter, whose name being omitted in the early copy, some person, recollecting that Dionysius was an opposer of Paul, ascribed the epistle to him. There are extant (4) ten questions of Paul of Samosata, addressed to Dionysius of Alexandria, and the answers of the latter to these questions (in the same Bibliotheca Patrum, 11:278). But this unequalled abundance of documents relative to Paul's heresy has not prevented a great diversity in opinion, both among the ancients and the moderns, respecting his real sentiments. For the ancients speak, sometimes obscurely, sometimes inconsistently, and sometimes they mistake, either from passion or prejudice; and hence the moderns differ widely, some criminating and some vindicating the man. We collect together all that can be learned respecting Paul's sentiments from these ancient documents, and compare with these statements whatever has reached us from other ancient sources.
"I. The bishops by whom Paul was condemned, in their epistle, preserved by Eusebius say: First, That he denied his God and Lord: τὸν θεὸν ἑαυτοῦ καὶ Κύριο ἀρνουμένου (p. 280). Secondly, That before the bishops, assembled in council, he would not acknowledge that the Son of God descended from heaven: τὸν υἱὸν τοῦ θεοῦ ἐξ οὐρανοῦ καταλελυθέναι. Thirdly, That he distinctly said Jesus Christ originated on earth: Λέγει Ι᾿ησοῦν Χριστὸν κάτωθεν . Fourthly, That he went over to the abominable heresy of Artemas. What the heresy of Artemas was, with which they tax Paul, is a question of doubt and uncertainty. I shall therefore pass by this charge, and consider only the others; in which, doubtless, the chief error of Paul was included, and that error which was the cause of so much odium against him. From these charges it is evident that he would not acknowledge Jesus Christ to be both God and man; or he denied that Jesus Christ was a person — if I may so say — compounded of God and man. For when he said the Son of God did not descend from heaven, but originated on the earth, what could he mean but that Christ was a mere man, though divinely begotten of the Virgin Mary? And what could the bishops mean, when they taxed him with denying his God and Lord, but that he divested Christ of his divinity, or denied that a divine person received the man Christ into union with himself? From the same charges it also appears that he called the man Christ the Son of God; and this, undoubtedly, because he was supernaturally produced from the Virgin Mary. For he denied that the Son of God descended from heaven; and as this, most certainly, must be understood as referring to Christ, it is manifest that he applied the title Son of God to the man Christ. This alone is a sufficient refutation of the error of those who believe what Marius Mercator asserts (De Anathematismis Nestorii, in his Opp. 2:128), that Paul of Samosata represented Christ as being a man, born like other men of two parents.
Yet we have a better witness for confuting this error in Paul himself, who distinctly says (Questio V in the Biblioth. Patr. 11:286), Ι᾿ησοῦς ὁ γεννηθεὶς ἐκ πνέυματος ἁγίου καὶ Μαρίας τῆς παρθένου . — That the bishops, whose charges we are considering, did him no injustice, he himself makes manifest. For all his ten questions now extant, whether addressed to Diounsius or to another person, have one sole aim, namely, to evince, by means of various texts of Scripture brought together, that Christ was a mere man, and destitute of any divinity; or, what amounts to the same thing, to confute the belief that the divine and human natures united in Christ produced one person. It is therefore not necessary to produce the testimony of others among the ancients to the same point. Yet I will add that of Simeon Betharsamensis, a celebrated Persian, near the beginning of the 6th century, whose testimony I regard as of more value than that of all the Greek and Latin fathers. In his epistle on the heresy of the Nestorians (in Jos. Sim. Assemlani's Bibliotheca Oriental. 1:347) he says: Paulus Samosatenus de beata Maria haec dicebat: "udum hominem genuit Maria, nec post partum virgo permansit. Christunm autem appellavit creatunm, factum, mortalem et filium (Dei) ex gratia." De se ipso vero dicebat: "Ego quoque si voluero, Christus ero, quum ego et Christus unius, ejusdemque simnus nature."' These statements accord perfectly with the allegations of the bishops, and with the character of Paul, who was rash and extravagant. Epiphanius also (Hoeres. 65:617) says of him that he gave himself the appellation of Christ; a declaration which is elucidated by the quotation from the Persian Simeon.
"II. The six bishops of the Council of Antioch, in their letter to Paul before sentence was pronounced upon him, while they state their own doctrine respecting God and Christ, condemn some errors of their adversary. In the first place, they say it could not be endured that he should inculcate υἱὸν τοῦ θεοῦ θεὸν μὴ ειναι πρὸ καταβολῆς κόσμον, and δύο θεοὺς καταγγέλλεσθαι, ἐὰν ὁ υἱὸς τοῦ θεοῦ θεὸς κηρύσσηται (Biblioth. Patr. 11:303). The bishops speak less definitely than could be wished; in consequence, perhaps, of the studied obscurity of Paul, who did not wish his real sentiments to be distinctly known. Yet it is not difficult to see whither tend the sentiments they attribute to him. First, he acknowledged that there is something in God, which the Scriptures call the Son of God. He therefore supposed that there are two Sons of God — the one by grace, the man Christ; the other by nature, who existed long before the other Son. Secondly, He denied that the latter Son of God was God anterior to the creation of the world. Thirdly, Consequently he held that this Son of God became God at the time the world was created. These statements appear confused, and very different from the common apprehensions; but they will admit of elucidation. Paul meant to say that the energy — or, if any prefer it, the Divine energy which he denominated the Son of God, was hidden in God, before the creation of the world; but that, in a sense, it issued out from God, and began to have some existence exterior to God, at the time God formed the created universe. Fourthly, Hence he inferred that (p. 710) those profess two Gods (or speak of two as in the place of the one God) who proclaim the Son of God to be God; but undoubtedly, considering what precedes, the limitation should be added, before the creation of the world. His belief was that they divide the one God into two Gods, who make the Son of God to have existed as a person, distinct from the Father, before the foundation of the world. He did not deny, as we have seen, that the Son of God was, in some sense, made God at the time the world was created. From all this we learn that Paul denied the eternal generation of the Son of God, and also his personal distinctness from the Father; and he supposed that when God was about to create the world he sent out from himself a certain energy, which is called the Son of God, and also God, although it is nothing distinct from God. These ideas may be further illustrated by the subsequent charge of the bishops; in which they not obscurely tax Paul with representing God the Father as creating the world by the Word (ὡς δἰ ὀργάνου καὶ ἐπιστήμης ἀνυποστάτου ) as by an instrument, and by intelligence, having no separate existence or personality.
For it hence appears that by the Son or Word of God, he understood the divine wisdom (ἐπιστήμην ); which, before the world was created, had been at rest in God, and hidden during numberless ages: but now, when the supreme God formed the purpose of creating the world, it exhibited its powers, and, as it were, came out from the bosom of the Father; or, in other words, it manifested its presence by discriminating, acting, and operating. From that time onward it is called, though figuratively, the Son of God, because it proceeded forth from God, just as a son does from his parents; and also God, because it is essentially God, and can be conceived of as separate from him only by an abstraction of the mind. In perfect accordance with these views are the statements of other ancient writers. Thus Epiphanius (inceres. 65:608) states the sentiments of Paul: God the Father, Son, and Spirit are one God. The Word and Spirit are ever in God, as reason is in man; the Son of God has no separate existence, but he exists in God.... νἱὸς ἐν τῷ πατρί, ὡς λόγος ἐν ἀνθρώρῳ. The Son is in the Father, as reason (not speech, sermo, as Petavitls rendered it; but ἐπιστήμη, as the bishops term it) is in man. Elpiphanius, who as an author as not distinguished for his accuracy and research, has not stated all that Paul held, but what he has stated is very well. I omit similar citations from Athanasius and others, that the discussion may not be too prolix.
"III. Dionysius, or whoever wrote the epistle bearing his name (in the Biblioth. Patr. 11:273, 274), says that Paul taught: δὐο (esse) ὑποστάσεις καὶ δύο πρόσωπα τοῦ ἑνὸς ἡμῶν Χριστοῦ, και δύο Χριστους, καὶ δύο υἱούς, ἕνα φύσει τὸν υἱὸν τοῦ θεοῦ προϋπάρχοντα, καὶ ἕνα κατ᾿ ὁμοννυμίαν Χριστὸν καὶ υἱὸν τὃῦ Δαβίδ. Whether Paul so expressed himself, or whether Dionysius so inferred from the language of Paul, there is nothing here disagreeing with the opinions of Paul. For since he declared Christ to be a mere man, born of Mary; and denied that the Wisdom of God, combined with the man Christ, constituted one person; and yet asserted that the eternal Son of God, by whom the world was created, dwelt in the man Christ; and as he also called the man Christ the Son of God, and applied the same appellation, Son of God, to that power of the divine Wisdom which projected the world — it must necessarily be that, in some sense, he recognized two distinct and separate things in Christ, two forms, two Sons, two Christs. Here it should be noticed that the word ὑπόστασις, in the language of Dionysius, is not to be understood in our sense of the term, but in a broader acceptation. From the questions of Paul (Quast. vii, p. 280) it appears that he used the word ὑπόστασις in a broad sense, as applicable to anything that is or exists, whether it subsists by itself or only in something else. The eternal Son of God, which Paul acknowledged to exist in Christ, he could not have regarded as truly an ὑπόστασις or person. For, if he had so regarded it, he would have admitted the very thing which he denied, namely, that the Son of God is a person distinct from the person of the Father. In this same epistle (p. 274) Dionysius blames Paul for saying, ἄνευ τῆς ἀσκητικῆς καὶ ἐπιπόνου δικαιοσύνης
He therefore admitted that God, in the sense before explained, i.e. as being the Wisdom of God, dwelt in Christ. But he added that God dwelt in Christ, sine laborios ajustitioe exercitatione. This well explains the views of Paul, and in part confirms my former remarks. For Paul's meaning is that Christ, while obeying the commands of the law, and suffering its penalties, acted and suffered alone; nor did God, as present with him, either act or suffer along with the man Christ. Hence it appears that Paul rejected altogether the union of the divine and human natures in Christ. In this manner Dionysius correctly understood him, as appears from the conftation he subjoined, in which he endeavors to show, by many proofs, that God was born in Christ, and suffered the penalties, and died. More passages of a similar character might be drawn from this epistle; but they are not needed.
"IV. In the ten questions proposed by Paul to Dionysius, the sole aim of Paul is to prove that the man born of Mary had no community of nature or of action with God dwelling in him. Hence he brings forward the texts in which the soul of Christ is said to be troubled and sorrowful (John 12:27; Matthew 26:28). He then asks: Can the nature of God be sorrowful and troubled? (p. 712). He also lays before his antagonist the words of Christ to the Jews, Destroy this temple, etc. (John 1:19), and then demands, Can God be dissolved? This objection, so easy of solution, Dionysius answers miserably, by resorting to a mystical interpretation. For he would have Paul believe that by the temple which Christ represents as to be dissolved must be understood the disciples of Christ; because these the Jews actually dissolved, that is, dispersed and scattered. Some of the other answers are no better. In Question V (p. 286) Paul says: Luke tells us (ch. 2:40) that Christ grew. But can God grow? If, therefore, Christ grew, he was nothing but a man. With this argument the good Dionysius is greatly puzzled. But at length he finds his way out, and says: ‘ The boy who, as Luke tells us, grew and waxed strong, is the Church, so that Αὔξησις τοῦ θεοῦ εὶς τὴν ἐκκλησίαν ἐστί, the growth of God, relates to the Church: for it is recorded in the Acts that the Church increased daily and was enlarged, and that the Word of God increased every day.' How ingenious and beautiful! If all the bishops who opposed Paul were like this Dionysius for acuteness and genius, I do not wonder they could not refute him. And lest this fine response should lose its force and beauty, Dionysius closes it with exquisite taunts.
"But I will desist. Paul, undoubtedly, had wrong views, and views very different from those which the Scriptures inculcate. But his adversaries also appear to have embraced more than one error, and they had not sufficiently precise and clear ideas on the subject they discussed. These statements, derived from the best and most credible documents on the subject, if carefully examined and compared together, will give us easy access to the real sentiments of Paul of Samosata. The system he embraced, so far as it can be ascertained at the present day, is contained in the following propositions:
1. God is a perfectly simple unit, in whom there is no division into parts whatever!
2. Therefore, all that common Christians teach respecting different persons in God, an eternal Son of God, and his generation from eternity, is false, and should be corrected by the Holy Scriptures.
3. The Scriptures speak indeed of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. But those texts must be so understood as not to militate with the clearest and most certain doctrine of both reason and Scripture respecting the unity of the divine nature.
4. The Son of God mentioned in the Scriptures is merely the Reason (λόγος ) and Wisdom (ἐπιστήμη ) of God. Those who have translated the Greek writers concerning Paul into Latin (De Valois, Petavius, and others) commonly render the Greek word λόγος by the Latin word Verbum. This is wrong. From the epistle of the bishops at Antioch to Paul, it is clear that he understood by λόγος the divine Wisdom. Hence this Greek word is equivalent to the Latin word ratio. Marius Mercator, whom many follow (De Anathematisno L'estoriano, in his Opp. 2:128, ed. Garnerii), erroneously says: ‘ Verbum Dei Patris, non substantivum, sed prolativum, vel imperativum, sensit Samosatenus.' But Paul did not recognize the word προφορικόν (prolativum); and by the word λόγος he intended the Wisdom or the Reason of God, as is manifest from Epiphanius (p. 713), who, it must be confessed, is not always sufficiently accurate (uceres. 65:609): Λόγον νομίζουσι σοφίαν, οιον ἐν ψυχῇ ἀνθρώπου ἕκαστος ἔχει λόγον.
5. This Reason of God was at rest in him from eternity, and did not project or attempt anything exterior to God. But when God determined to create the visible universe, this Reason in a sense proceeded out from God, and acted exteriorly to God. On this account, in the Scriptures, it is metaphorically called the Son of God.
6. The Spirit is that power which God possesses of producing and animating all things at his pleasure. It first received the name of Spirit when it manifested itself in the creation of the world; and it is so called because it may be compared to the wind or the breath, which produces motions in the air. When it excites pious emotions in the souls of men, it is called the Holy Spirit.
7. Therefore, until God entered on the creation of the world, and operated externally, there was neither any Son of God nor any Holy Spirit. Yet both may, in a certain sense, be pronounced eternal, because they eternally existed in God.
8. When God would make known to men a way of salvation superior to that of Moses, he, by means of that eternal power of his, which gives life, and motion to all things, and which is called the Holy Spirit, begat, of the Jewish Virgin Mary, that very holy and most perfect man Jesus: and this man, because he was begotten by the power of God, without any intervening agency, is also called the Son of God; just as a house receives the name of its builder (see Dionysius, Epistle to Paul, ut sup. up. 274).
9. This extraordinary man, though he was more holy and more noble than any other mortal, yet lived and acted in the way and manner of other men, and was subject to all the wants and frailties which are incident to our nature. All the things which he either did or suffered prove clearly that he was a mere man.
10. But to enable him to perform the functions of a divine ambassador. without failure (for, as a man, he was liable to erl ors ani defects), that same divine Reason, which proceeded forth, as it were, from God at the time the world was created, joined itself to his soul, and banished from it all ignorance on religious subjects and all liability to failure. At what time, in the opinion of Paul, the divine Reason or Wisdom became associated with the soul of Christ, I do not find stated. I can suppose that the advent of the Reason or Word of God to be made Christ was delayed till the commencement of his public functions; because, previously, the man-Christ did not need the aid of this eternal Wisdom.
11. This presence of the divine Wisdom (which is nothing different from God himself) in the man Christ, makes it proper that this man should be, and he is, called God. Athanasius (De Synodis, in Opp. 2:739): Οἱ ἀπὸ Παύλου τοῦ Σαμωσατέως λέγονται, Χριστὸν ὕστερον (p. 714) μετὰ τὴν ἐνανθρώπησιν ἐκ προκοπῆς τοθεοποιῆσθαι, τῷ τὴν φύσιν ψιλὸν ἄνθρωπον γεγονέναι. 1
12. It will be no mistake, then, if we say there are two Sons of God, and that there were in Christ two. ὑποστάσεις, or two distinct separately existing things, two forms or πρόσωπα.
13. But we must be careful not to commingle and confound the acts of these two Sons of God. Each acts alone, and without the other. The divine Reason, with no co-operation of the man, speaks by Christ, instructs, discourses, sways the minds of the auditors, and performs the miracles. On the other hand, the man, with no cooperation of the divine Reason dwelling in him, is begotten, is hungry, sleeps, walks, suffers pain, and dies.
14. At length, when the man Christ had fulfilled his mission, the divine Reason left the man, and returned to God. Epiphanius (Haeres. lxv, § 1, p. 608): Φησὶ Παύλος Ε᾿λθών ὁ λόγος ἐνήργησε μόνος, καὶ ἀνῆλθε πρὸς τὸν πατέρα. This passage is miserably translated by Dion. Petaviu as are many other passages in Epiphanius) thus: ‘ Sed solum, inquit Paulus, adveniens verbum, totum illud administravit, et ad patrem revertit.' The true meaning of the passage is: The divine Reason came (to the man Christ, long after his birth, and when in mature life), and solely (without any community of action with the human nature) operated in him, and afterwards returned to God" (Mosheim, History of Christianity in the First Three Centuries, 2:228 sq.).
The writers on the history of doctrines vary in their opinions respecting the relation in which Paul of Samosata stands, whether to Sabellianism or to the Unitarianism of the Artemonites (see Euseb. v. 28, ab init.); comp. Schleiermacher, p. 389 sq.; Baumgarten-Crusius, 1:204; Augusti, p. 59; Meier, Dogmengesch. p. 74, 70; Dorner, p. 510). The difference between Sabellius and Paul may be said to have consisted in this, that the former thought that the whole substance of the divine Being, the latter that only one single divine power had manifested itself in Christ. Trechsel (Geschichte des Antitrinitarismus, 1:81) agrees with this, calling Samosatianism "the correlate of Sabellianism, according to the measures of the mere understanding." The divine here comes only into an external contact with man, touches human nature only on the surface; while, on the other hand, the human element comes to its rights more than in the system of Sabelliuis. Dionysius of Alexandria, as we have seen, was the first to write against Paul, and afterwards assembled some councils against him at Antioch, about 264. In the last of these councils, which appears to have met in the year 269, one Malchion, a rhetorician, an acute and eloquent man, so skillfully drew Paul out of the subterfuges in which he had before lurked that his error became manifest to all. As he would not renounce his error, he was divested of the episcopal office, and excluded from the communion by common suffrage. This decision Paul resisted; and relying perhaps on the patronage of queen Zenobia, and on the favor of the people, he refused to give up the house in which the bishop resided, and in which the Church was accustomed to assemble. But when Zenobia was conquered by the emperor Aurelian, in the year 272, and the contest was taken before the emperor, the case was referred for arbitrament to the Romish and Italian bishops, who decided against Paul. It is probable that Paul, notwithstanding his deposition, continued to preach and to propagate his opinions. Nothing subsequent, however, is known of him. His followers, and he had many, formed themselves into a sect, and flourished under the name of Paulians (q.v.), or Paulianists, for some time after.
Paul does not seem to have written much. The ten questions and propositions extant under his name, and addressed, according to the existing title, to Dionysius of Alexandria, have been noticed. A Greek MS. work, ascribed by some to John of Damascus, contains a fragment of a work by Paul, entitled Οἱ πρὸς Σαβεανὸν λόγοι (Ad Sabianum Libri), and some fragments of this are cited in the Concilia (3:388, ed. Labbe). Vincentius Lirinensis, in his Conmonitorium, states that the writings of Paul abounded in quotations from the Scriptures both of the O.T. and the N.T. To introduce his Christology into the mind of the people, he undertook to alter the Church hymns, but was shrewd enough to accommodate himself to the orthodox formulas, calling Christ, for example, "God of the Virgin" (θεὸς ἐκ παρθένου ), and ascribing to him even homoousia with the Father, but of course in his own sense. See, besides the authorities already referred to, Eusebius, Hist. Ecclesiastes 7:27-29; Mansi, Coll. Conc. 1:1033 sq., especially Epistol. Episcopar. ad Paul. v. 393; Epiphanius, Hist. Eccles. 65, 1; Maji, Nov. Collect. 7:1, p. 68, 299 sq.; Fragments in Leont. Byz. Contr. Nestor. et Eutych. iii; Ehrlich, Diss rtatio de Errorib. Pauli Samos. (Leips. 1745, 4to), p. 23; Fuerlin, De Hceres. Pauli Samos. (Gotting. 1741, 4to); Schwab, De Pauli Samos. vita atq. Doctr. (Herbip. 1839); Cave, Hist. Litter. ad ann. 260, 1:135; Le Quien, Oriens Christianus, 1:705; Tillemont, Memoires, 4:289 sq.; Neander, Ch. Hist. 2:269 sq.; id. Diogenus, 1:169, 206; Schaff, Ch. Hist. 1:289 sq.; Pressense, The Early Years of Christianity (Heresy and Christian Doctrine), p. 131 sq.; Baur, Dreieinigkeitslehre, 1:293-335; Ha. genbach, History of Doctrines, vol. i; and his Erste drei Jahrh. etc., vol. 16; Hefele, Conciliengesch. 1:109 sq., 225, 411, 507; Smith, Dict. of Gr. and Rom. Biog. and Mythol. 3:149 sq.
These files are public domain.
McClintock, John. Strong, James. Entry for 'Paul of Samosata'. Cyclopedia of Biblical, Theological and Ecclesiastical Literature. https://www.studylight.org/encyclopedias/eng/tce/p/paul-of-samosata.html. Harper & Brothers. New York. 1870.
