Tag: Adversus fraudes Apollinistarum

Leontius of Byzantium, Against the frauds of the Apollinarists – now online in English

Posted on by Roger Pearse

The 6th century Chalcedonian theologian, Leontius of Byzantium, is most likely the author of a compilation of texts by the 4th century heretic, Apollinarius of Laodicea, entitled “Against the frauds of the Apollinarists”.  What was happening was that Monophysite polemicists were using these texts for anti-Chalcedon arguments.  The texts themselves were circulating under the names of respectable authors such as Pope Julius I or Gregory Nazianzen.  Leontius tracked down the original comments by Apollinarius and his disciples, and compiled a set of them, so that their ideas could be recognised.

Bryson Sewell has kindly translated it into English for us, from the text printed by Angelo Mai and reprinted in the Patrologia Graeca.

I have uploaded the translation to the Additional Fathers site here.  In addition I have uploaded a PDF of the translation (plus the word .doc file) to Archive.org here.

This translation is public domain.  Do whatever you like with it, personal, educational or commercial.

If you would like to help me commission further translations, why not use the donate button on the right, or purchase a copy of my CD from here.

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From my diary

Posted on by Roger Pearse

I’ve asked a colleague to translate for us Leontius of Byzantium, Adversus fraudes Apollinistarum (Against the forgeries of the Apollinarists) (CPG 6817, PG 86, col. 1948-1976).  This is fourteen and a half columns of Migne, and may well be interesting.  The circulation of banned works under other names was an inevitable consequence of the intolerance in the 5th century, and it will be very interesting to see what Leontius uses by way of criteria for identifying these things.

I’m preparing for my trip to Rome.  I’ve made a list of Mithraic monuments that I hope to photograph.  It looks as if I may be able to go to Ostia Antica as well!

On a less pleasant note, I’ve had to add additional security code to the Mithras site.  The incessant attempts to hack my site show up in the log, and are sobering to see.

Rather foolishly – for I don’t enjoy reviewing books – I have agreed to review Tony Burke’s, Ancient gospel or modern forgery, the volume of papers from the “Secret Mark” conference.  Wipf and Stock have started to send me stuff. 

It will be interesting to see if any substantive reply has emerged to Stephen C. Carlson’s crushing demolition of the book.  Carlson suggested that the book was a scholarly hoax rather than a forgery; a distinction of real importance, but not always noted by either his supporters or opponents.

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