The Contested Legacy of Athanasius

Introduction

Athanasius of Alexandria has divided modern opinion just as surely as he divided those of his contemporaries.^[1]

—David Gwynn

From the start, conflict and contention have encompassed the figure of Athanasius. The epithet commonly employed in praise of Athanasius, contra mundum (against the world), aptly reflects the struggle that has beset him from his day until ours. Upon his elevation as Alexandria’s archbishop in 328 CE he became embroiled in disputes on several fronts. He was driven from his see five times, spending upward of seventeen years in exile. Throughout the forty-six years of his episcopal ministry, whether through personal contact or the written word, Athanasius combined a fierce defense of his conduct with a sharp refutation of those he termed “Arians,” all the while explicating the Trinitarian-incarnational account of the Christian faith that he championed. As the time of his death drew near (in 373), resident in his own city of Alexandria, he found relative peace, having been reconciled with many of his former opponents and able to see the impending triumph of the Nicene faith on the horizon.

A microcosm of the contested legacy of Athanasius appears in early fifth-century church histories. The dominant interpretation, wholly favorable to Athanasius, appears in Socrates, Sozomen, and Theodoret.^[2] These church historians, writing between 439 and 450, recount the history of Athanasius’s struggles in great detail and judge him entirely innocent of all charges against him. In the words of Theodoret, Athanasius was “the champion of the truth.” “Athanasius very rapidly acquired legendary status as the one who defended Nicene orthodoxy pretty well single-handed through the years of Arian ascendency.”^[3] The minority view, highly critical of Athanasius’s conduct and teaching, is espoused by Philostorgius (d. ca. 439), a strong supporter of the teaching of Aetius and Eunomius.^[4] These divergent readings of Athanasius’s teaching and character will be replicated and further developed in the modern period. Notwithstanding this early contention over Athanasius’s legacy, the Eastern and Western Christian traditions have received Athanasius enthusiastically as the champion of Christian orthodoxy and the supreme exemplar—the icon—of the struggle for the faith against all odds. Any account of Athanasius’s reception must take into account this iconic—and sometimes hotly contested—role he played in a hugely pivotal era for the church.

The task of tracing the reception of Athanasius faces two notable challenges with respect to his written works. First, it is unclear how widely his written works were disseminated and actively used. Certain of his writings, for example his Life of Antony, had an enormous influence in both the East and the West, and several of his treatises and letters are cited frequently by later writers. But it appears that Athanasius was revered more than he was read. Consequently, there is no commentarial tradition on his major texts that we can track.

Second, some writings attributed to him, and by which he was best known, turn out not to have come from his pen. There is a broad pseudo-Athanasian corpus that often proved more popular than his actual writings. The most influential example is the Athanasian Creed, probably composed in late fifth-century Gaul. It functioned in the Western  church  both  as  a  standard  of  orthodoxy  and  as  the  prime representative statement of Athanasius’s teaching. Athanasius’s genuine writings are certainly not unimportant for his reception in the Christian tradition, but it is preeminently his perseverance in great trial and the faith he contended for, enshrined in the Nicene and Athanasian Creeds, that stand out as the principal emblems of his achievement.

The account of Athanasius’s reception that follows makes no claim to thoroughness. The goal, rather, is to be representative. We will begin by examining his reception in the East, especially in the period immediately following his death, and then turn to investigate how he was received in the West, with a special focus on the role of the Athanasian Creed. We will then examine two illuminating and intriguing contra and pro Athanasius tendencies marked by the figures of Isaac Newton and John Henry Newman respectively. Finally, we will bring the account up to the present day by considering and evaluating the various contemporary—and contrasting—readings of Athanasius’s teaching and character.

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