St. Athanasius

St. Athanasius was Bishop of Alexandria from 328 to 373 and the leading defender of the divinity of Christ during the Arian crisis of the fourth century. He attended the Council of Nicaea in 325 as a young deacon, held his see for forty-five years, and spent about seventeen of them in exile after being deposed and banished five separate times by four different emperors. His treatise On the Incarnation and his Life of Antony are among the most influential Christian books ever written.

His feast is 2 May, the day of his death at Alexandria in 373. Pius V named him one of the four great Doctors of the Greek Church in 1568.

Athanasius Contra Mundum

St. Athanasius (c. 296-373) was the Bishop of Alexandria and the great champion of the Nicene Faith. He is known as the "Father of Orthodoxy" for his lifelong battle against Arianism, a heresy that claimed Jesus was a created being and not truly God.

At times, it seemed like the whole world had turned Arian, with emperors and bishops exiling Athanasius for his refusal to compromise. This earned him the title Athanasius contra mundum ("Athanasius against the world"). He was exiled five times, spending over 17 years in flight, often living with desert monks.

The Latin phrase itself is later shorthand rather than something Athanasius or his contemporaries said, and it describes a real situation. In the decades after Nicaea, imperial policy swung repeatedly against the Nicene party. Councils held at Sirmium, Rimini and Seleucia in the 350s produced creeds that avoided the word the Council of Nicaea had used, bishops across the empire signed them under pressure, and Jerome afterwards wrote that the whole world groaned and was astonished to find itself Arian. Athanasius was deposed, condemned by synods of bishops, and hunted by imperial officers.

Two qualifications keep the picture honest. He was never alone: he had the support of successive bishops of Rome, of the Egyptian episcopate and of the desert monks, and the West stood with him at the Council of Sardica in 343. And he was capable of hard tactics himself, denouncing opponents in ferocious language and mobilising Alexandrian opinion in ways his enemies found intimidating. He was not a mild man, and the fight was not clean.

The Incarnation of the Word

As a young deacon at the Council of Nicaea (325), Athanasius helped formulate the Nicene Creed we say today ("begotten, not made, consubstantial with the Father"). His classic work, On the Incarnation, argues that only God could save humanity from sin and death; therefore, Jesus must be fully God.

"God became man," he famously wrote, "so that man might become god" (referring to our participation in the divine nature, or theosis).

On the Incarnation is the second half of a pair, the first being Against the Pagans, and it was written early, probably while he was still a young man. Its argument is one continuous chain and it can be summarised without distorting it. Human beings were made for incorruption and turned to nothing through sin. God could not simply overlook it, because he had spoken. Repentance alone could not undo corruption, because corruption is a condition of human nature and repentance stops at the trespass. Only the one through whom everything was made could remake it. So the Word took a body capable of death, gave it over to death on behalf of all, and destroyed death from inside it.

He then reads the whole of Christ's life through that argument, including his death in public, on a cross, in the open, which Athanasius insists was necessary so that nobody could claim the death had been faked or the body substituted.

The sentence quoted above appears at the end of the treatise, in section 54, and the Catechism of the Catholic Church quotes it at paragraph 460: the Son of God became man so that we might become God. It has to be read with what the Church means by it. Catholic teaching holds that human beings are made partakers of the divine nature (2 Peter 1:4) by grace and adoption, and that the creature never becomes God by nature. The Eastern churches call this theosis, divinisation. Our page on the Trinity sets out the doctrine at stake, and our page on salvation covers what the Church holds is accomplished by it.

Biography of St. Anthony

During his exiles, Athanasius befriended St. Anthony of the Desert. He wrote the Life of Antony, a biography that became an instant bestseller in the ancient world. It introduced monasticism to the West and inspired countless people, including St. Augustine, to pursue a life of holiness.

Antony of Egypt died in 356, at a great age, and Athanasius wrote the Life within a few years, probably around 360 and probably during his third exile among the monks. It was translated into Latin by Evagrius of Antioch and circulated across the empire with remarkable speed.

Its effect on Augustine is documented in Augustine's own words. In Book VIII of the Confessions he describes a visitor named Ponticianus finding a copy of Paul's letters on his table and telling him and his friend Alypius about Antony, and about two imperial officials at Trier who had read the Life and abandoned their careers on the spot. Augustine says that hearing this turned him back on himself and forced the crisis that ended in the garden a few hours later. One book about an Egyptian hermit therefore stands behind the conversion of the most influential theologian in Western history. Our page on St. Augustine tells that story from his side, and our page on St. Anthony covers the man himself.

The Life is also a piece of argument. Athanasius presents Antony as a man of unlettered orthodoxy who refused to speak with the Arians, which was useful to Athanasius and may be why he wrote it. Historians read it accordingly, as a work with a purpose as well as a portrait. It created the genre of the saint's life and set the pattern that hagiography followed for a thousand years.

Quotable Wisdom

"If the world is against the truth, then I am against the world."

This sentence is widely attributed to Athanasius and does not appear in that form in his surviving works. It is a later crystallisation of his reputation, of a piece with the Latin tag contra mundum. It states his position accurately, and it should be quoted as a summary of him rather than as his own words.

What he did write is available and is stronger. From On the Incarnation: the Word of God came in his own person, because it was he alone, the Image of the Father, who could recreate man made after the Image. And from the same book, on the effect of the resurrection: death is trampled on daily by those who believe, so that people who were terrified of it before Christ came now step over it as nothing.

Who Athanasius Was

He was born at Alexandria in Egypt around 296, into a Greek-speaking city that was the intellectual capital of the eastern Mediterranean and the second or third city of the empire. He also knew Coptic, the language of the Egyptian countryside and of the monks, which is part of why he could count on rural Egypt when the imperial court turned against him.

He was educated in the Alexandrian church and became a deacon and secretary to Bishop Alexander, whom he accompanied to the Council of Nicaea in 325. He was in his late twenties and had no vote there. He was elected to succeed Alexander in 328, at about thirty, an election his opponents contested at the time on grounds of his age and the manner of the vote.

He then held the see for forty-five years under the emperors Constantine, Constantius II, Julian, Jovian and Valens. His enemies included the Arian party and also the Melitians, an Egyptian schismatic group with its own grievances, and the two combined against him repeatedly. He died in his own city, in possession of his see, on 2 May 373, roughly eight years before the Council of Constantinople of 381 completed the settlement he had fought for.

Arianism, and What Nicaea Decided

Arius was a presbyter of Alexandria, an able preacher with a following, and it is worth stating his position as he held it rather than as a caricature. He taught that the Son is the first and greatest of all creatures, made by the Father before all ages, through whom everything else was made, and that there was a point at which the Son did not exist. The Son was therefore not eternal and not of the same being as the Father. Arius thought he was defending the absolute uniqueness and unchangeableness of God, and he had a scriptural case, resting above all on Proverbs 8:22, where Wisdom says the Lord created me at the beginning of his work, together with texts in which Christ speaks of the Father as greater than he.

The Council of Nicaea in 325 rejected it and used a word that is not in Scripture, homoousios, meaning of one being or one substance with the Father, translated in the English Mass as consubstantial. That choice was deliberate and controversial. It was chosen precisely because no Arian could sign it, and many bishops disliked it for exactly that reason: it was a new word, it had a difficult history, and it seemed to some to blur the distinction between Father and Son.

Athanasius's argument for it was not primarily philosophical. It was about salvation. If the Son is a creature, then a creature is being worshipped, which is idolatry; and if the Son is a creature, then what happened on the cross does not reach the root of the problem, because only the Creator can remake creation. The whole of Christian worship and the whole of Christian hope, he argued, already presuppose the answer, and Nicaea was stating what the Church was already doing.

The fight lasted the rest of his life and beyond. The Council of Constantinople in 381 confirmed the Nicene faith and extended it to the Holy Spirit, producing the creed recited at Mass on Sundays. Modern groups that deny the divinity of Christ reopen the same question, and our page on nontrinitarian churches sets out where they stand.

One late act deserves mention because it cuts against the image of an unbending controversialist. At a council held in Alexandria in 362, Athanasius worked to reconcile bishops who hesitated over homoousios but held the same faith in different words, accepting that the vocabulary could differ where the meaning did not. That decision did as much to end the crisis as the polemics did.

The Five Exiles

The five exiles were not one long persecution but five distinct episodes with different causes and different emperors.

335 to 337, to Trier

A synod at Tyre in 335, dominated by his opponents, deposed him on a series of charges. The church historians record among them the accusation that he had murdered a bishop named Arsenius and cut off his hand for use in magic; the story they tell is that Athanasius produced Arsenius alive at the synod with both hands attached. Constantine nevertheless banished him to Trier in Gaul, and he returned only when Constantine died in 337.

339 to 346, to Rome

Driven out again, he went west and spent years in Rome, where Pope Julius I received him, examined the charges and declared him innocent. The Council of Sardica in 343 supported him. These years put the case for Nicaea in front of the Latin Church and made him a figure in the West as well as the East.

356 to 362, to the desert

The longest and most dangerous exile, under Constantius II, who was firmly in the Arian interest. Soldiers came for him during a night vigil in a church at Alexandria; he escaped and disappeared into the Egyptian desert, where the monks hid him for six years while imperial officers searched. This period produced much of his major writing, including the Life of Antony and the great Orations against the Arians.

362 to 364, under Julian

The emperor Julian, who had renounced Christianity, at first recalled the exiled bishops and then expelled Athanasius again, reportedly judging him too effective.

365 to 366, under Valens

A brief final exile of a few months under the emperor Valens, ended when the authorities judged that removing him was causing more trouble in Egypt than leaving him alone. He spent his last seven years in his own city.

The Letter That Listed the New Testament

Each year the Bishop of Alexandria sent a Festal Letter to the churches of Egypt announcing the date of Easter and adding pastoral instruction. The thirty-ninth of these letters, sent in 367, contains something of permanent importance: a list of the books to be read as Scripture, and that list names the twenty-seven books of the New Testament as they stand today, no more and no fewer.

It is the earliest surviving list that matches the New Testament canon exactly. Earlier writers had produced lists that disputed particular books, above all Hebrews, James, 2 Peter, 2 and 3 John, Jude and Revelation. Athanasius settles them and warns against apocryphal writings circulating under apostolic names.

Two things follow, and both matter for how Christians should think about the Bible. The canon was recognised by the Church over centuries, in letters like this one and in councils at Hippo in 393 and Carthage in 397, rather than dropping ready-made out of the first century. And the man who fixed the New Testament list is the same man who was five times deposed by councils of bishops. Our page on the Bible covers the formation of the canon in detail, and our page on the deuterocanonical books covers the Old Testament side of the question, where Athanasius, like Jerome after him, held a narrower view than the Church settled on.

What He Did Not Write

The Athanasian Creed, known from its opening words as the Quicumque vult, is a long statement of Trinitarian and christological faith used in Western liturgy for centuries and printed in Anglican and Lutheran books as well as Catholic ones. Athanasius did not write it.

The evidence is straightforward. It was composed in Latin, and Athanasius wrote in Greek. It uses technical terms that belong to a later stage of the argument, including formulations shaped by the fifth-century controversies about the two natures in Christ, which happened after his death. No Greek writer mentions it, and it appears in the West, most probably in southern Gaul, some time in the fifth or sixth century. Scholarship has been agreed on this since the seventeenth century.

The creed is a sound statement of the faith, written by somebody else. Attaching his name to it was a way of honouring him, which is how a great deal of pseudonymous ancient literature came about. Saying so plainly is part of taking him seriously.

Feast Day, Patronage and Devotion

His memorial in the Roman calendar is 2 May, the date of his death. The Byzantine churches keep 18 January as a joint feast with Cyril of Alexandria, and also observe 2 May. The Coptic Orthodox Church, which traces its patriarchate directly through him, venerates him as Saint Athanasius the Apostolic, the twentieth Pope of Alexandria, and he is one of the very few figures honoured in common by the Catholic, Eastern Orthodox, Oriental Orthodox and most Protestant traditions. Our page on the Coptic Orthodox Church covers that communion.

He is a patron of theologians and is invoked by those who have to hold an unpopular position for a long time. Pius V named him one of the four great Doctors of the Greek Church in 1568, alongside Basil the Great, Gregory of Nazianzus and John Chrysostom.

The most accessible thing he wrote is still On the Incarnation, which is short, and his letter to Marcellinus on how to pray the Psalms, which is shorter and is one of the best things written on the subject in the early Church.

What a Reader Can Take From St. Athanasius

Majorities are not arguments. For long stretches the emperors, the court and a great many bishops were against him, and he turned out to be right. That is a reason to examine a claim rather than to count the people holding it.

One word can carry the whole thing. The fight was over homoousios, and the people who wanted to drop it were usually the people who wanted the substance dropped with it. Precision in doctrine is a form of honesty.

Doctrine exists for salvation. His argument was never abstract. If Christ is not God, then what he did on the cross does not reach us, and Christians have been worshipping a creature.

Forty-five years, seventeen in exile. The result was not achieved by a decisive moment. It was achieved by refusing to sign, repeatedly, over decades, at cost.

Give ground on words when the faith is safe. At Alexandria in 362 he accepted a different vocabulary from bishops who held the same faith, and that flexibility helped end the crisis that his firmness had kept alive.

Frequently Asked Questions

Who was St. Athanasius?

St. Athanasius was Bishop of Alexandria from 328 to 373 and the leading defender of the divinity of Christ during the Arian crisis. Born at Alexandria about 296, he attended the Council of Nicaea in 325 as a young deacon, held his see for forty-five years, and was deposed and exiled five times by four different emperors, spending about seventeen years in exile. He wrote On the Incarnation and the Life of Antony, and he is called the Father of Orthodoxy.

What was Arianism?

Arianism was the teaching of Arius, a presbyter of Alexandria, that the Son of God is the first and greatest of all creatures, made by the Father before all ages and through whom everything else was made, so that there was a point at which the Son did not exist and he is not of the same being as the Father. Arius believed he was defending the uniqueness and unchangeableness of God, and he argued from texts including Proverbs 8:22. The Council of Nicaea in 325 rejected it and declared the Son homoousios with the Father, of one being, translated in the English Mass as consubstantial.

Did St. Athanasius write the Athanasian Creed?

No. The Athanasian Creed, known from its opening words as the Quicumque vult, was composed in Latin, most probably in southern Gaul, some time in the fifth or sixth century, well after his death. Athanasius wrote in Greek, no Greek writer mentions the creed, and its technical vocabulary reflects the fifth-century controversies about the two natures in Christ. Scholars have agreed since the seventeenth century that he did not write it. It is a sound statement of the faith that was attributed to him as a way of honouring him.

How many times was St. Athanasius exiled?

Five times, for a total of about seventeen years out of the forty-five he held the see of Alexandria. He was sent to Trier from 335 to 337, to Rome from 339 to 346, into the Egyptian desert under Constantius II from 356 to 362 where the monks hid him from imperial officers, again under Julian from 362 to 364, and for a few months under Valens in 365 and 366. He spent his last seven years in his own city and died there on 2 May 373.

What did Athanasius mean by "God became man so that man might become God"?

The sentence comes from section 54 of On the Incarnation, and the Catechism of the Catholic Church quotes it at paragraph 460. It means that human beings are made partakers of the divine nature, in the words of 2 Peter 1:4, by grace and adoption through Christ's taking of human flesh. Catholic teaching holds that the creature never becomes God by nature. The Eastern churches call this theosis or divinisation.

Why is the Festal Letter of 367 important?

The thirty-ninth Festal Letter, sent by Athanasius to the churches of Egypt in 367, contains a list of the books to be read as Scripture, and that list names the twenty-seven books of the New Testament exactly as they stand today. It is the earliest surviving list that matches the New Testament canon precisely, at a time when writers still disputed books including Hebrews, James, 2 Peter, 2 and 3 John, Jude and Revelation.

When is the feast day of St. Athanasius?

His memorial in the Roman calendar is 2 May, the day of his death in 373. The Byzantine churches keep 18 January as a joint feast with Cyril of Alexandria and also observe 2 May, and the Coptic Orthodox Church venerates him as Saint Athanasius the Apostolic, the twentieth Pope of Alexandria. He is honoured in common by the Catholic, Eastern Orthodox, Oriental Orthodox and most Protestant traditions.