Five Books Of S Irenaeus

This work, which establishes Irenaeus as the most important of the theologians of the second century, is a detailed and effective refutation of Gnosticism, and a major source of information on the various Gnostic sects and doctrines. This volume contains Book One. +

This Translation of S. Irenæus' work against Heresies was finished by the Translator though not begun to be printed in his lifetime. One very remarkable feature in the work, the depth of S. Irenæus' fervent and loyal Love for his Master, as of one who all but remembered His earthly Life, amid the drearier exposure of the wild Gnostic Heresies, ever glowing forth;--the firm gentle lowly loyal mind of the Author of the Christian Year could best render into English. For correcting the Press, except the two first sheets, for the few notes signed E, as also for the Translation of the earlier Fragments, the son of the last surviving Editor of the Library of the Fathers is responsible. The Very Rev. Dr. Smith, Dean of Canterbury, kindly vouches for the accuracy of the fragments translated from the Syriac, and these last have been collated afresh with the Mss. from which they were printed. With regard to the genuineness of the fragments, Massuet the Benedictine Editor who had bestowed much pains in verifying those which his predecessors had collected from Catenae, &c., points out (i. 338) that they were of two kinds, those given by Eusebius and other ancient writers being undoubtedly genuine, those given by later writers or again by Catenae (whose compilers constantly condensed very considerably, whose transcribers sometimes put by mistake the wrong name) are of more doubtful authority. Massuet sums up, We give here all the fragments which have been collected by Feuardent, Halloix, Sirmond, Combefis, Grabe and others and those which ourselves have collected, yet not attaching to them more credit than they deserve. The first 13 fragments and the 6 Syriac ones, and again those marked 35 to 38 will probably be genuine, the 14th and again the last fragment from the Armenian almost certainly spurious; of the Catenae-fragments some rest on the authority of several Mss., (and for these the probability of the wrong name having been appended is very considerably diminished,) some again at present on that of one Ms. only, while fragment xxxix attributed to S. Irenæus by the Vatican Ms. 331 and one of the Mss. used by the editor of the Leipzig Catena, is by his other Ms. attributed to Diodorus, and probably also (since Muenter was the first to publish it) the 3 Paris Catenae consulted by Massuet attribute this fragment to Diodorus or some other writer. P. E. PUSEY. Oxford, Oct. 1. 1872.

Saint Irenaeus was the first great Christian theologian. Born in Asia Minor in about 130 A.D., he became Bishop of Lyons and died as a martyr early in the third century. His main work, Adversus Haereses (Against the Heresies), is as relevant today as it was eighteen hundred years ago. It is a critique of Gnosticism, the 'anti-body' heresy, which, far from dying out, continues to flourish as the main threat to the Christian faith in our own day. With serenity and good humor, Irenaeus unfolds the unity of God's purpose in creation and redemption, in Old and New Testaments. The flesh and blood which Gnosticism so despised has been assumed by God in the womb of the Virgin Mary, and glorified in the Resurrection and the Eucharist. In this book, quotations from Saint Irenaeus have been arranged thematically in order to show the unity of his Christian view of the world. The texts have been selected and are introduced by the late Hans Urs von Balthasar, who is widely regarded as one of the greatest Catholic theologians of this century. They are translated by John Saward. "Everything in Irenaeus is bathed in a warm and radiant joy, a wise and majestic gentleness. His words of struggle are hard as iron and crystal clear, ... so penetrating that they cannot fail to enlighten the unbiased observer." - Hans Urs von Balthasar

A full, contextual study of Irenaeus of Lyons, the first great theologian of the Christian tradition. John Behr sets Irenaeus both within his own context of the second century and our own contemporary context.