Synodical Letter

1A synodal letter of Amphilochius, bishop of Iconium. Even before your letters arrived from your love, report had reached us of the purity of your faith, how it is being stretched toward dangers and is steadfast amid sufferings for Christ, and how firm in you is love for God and hope for the future. And now that we have encountered the letters of your reverence, we have truly seen the character of an apostolic church and the zeal of good shepherds, an unwearying diligence befitting true Christians. For you did not reckon the length of the road, nor did you bring your inquiries separately, but you made your request together through your letters. This has made us very hopeful that, having written with one accord, you will also receive our answers with one accord; and we received the harmony in your letters as a kind of prelude to a more perfect unity of mind.

It was our prayer to welcome to the synod the most admirable bishop Basil, who is named with all reverence, and to have him as a sharer—or rather as the leader—in our dealings with you. But since an overwhelming bodily illness prevented him from coming, it is a mark of your perfect love that you did not overlook even the letters of our smallness. Yet we have not left your holy church without a share in his voice either. Since we have a treatise of his composed specifically on this very subject, through that writing we have him speaking together with us. What, then, is the answer to your inquiry?

2We recognize the holy synod of the fathers at Nicaea as truly catholic and apostolic, and we guard the faith set forth by the fathers at that time, praying that it may remain unmoved and unshaken forever. It became necessary then for the fathers to explain more fully the glory of the Only Begotten, because they were eager to cut off the recently sprouting heresy of Arius, cutting away its first seeds beforehand, before the thorn became fully hardened. But since the question concerning the Spirit was then still silenced, they added nothing more extensive about it. Yet for those who read intelligently, the teaching about the Spirit in that creed is sufficient. Just as they decreed belief in the Father and the Son, so also they decreed belief in the Spirit, neither introducing any other nature into the divine and blessed Trinity nor cutting off any member of the Trinity from the statement of faith. But since Satan, attempting afresh to shake the churches, has cast into some people doubt about the Spirit, it is necessary to run back to the source of the faith from which the fathers at Nicaea drew when they made their statement of faith. What, then, is the perfection of our faith?

3The Lord's tradition is what he commanded his holy disciples after his resurrection from the dead, when he ordered them: "Go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit" (Matthew 28:19). Clearly we received the command not only to baptize in this way, but also to make disciples in this way. Through this command the sickness of Sabellius is shut out, because the three persons have been delivered to us clearly, and the mouths of the Anomoeans, the Arians, and the opponents of the Spirit are stopped, because the persons and hypostases are shown to be three, while the nature and the Godhead are confessed as one. It is necessary, then, for us to baptize as we were taught, to believe as we were baptized, and to glorify as we believed. For however much we examine with our minds and turn our thoughts in every direction, we can devise nothing between the creator and the creation. So if we separate the Spirit from the Godhead, it is necessary to number him with the creatures. And if we dare to call him a creature, how can he be joined in baptism? We denounce polytheism just as we denounce atheism. We proclaim neither three first principles nor three gods nor three different natures, but we know the Father as the first principle of all things, we reject none of the three persons, and we bring forward the majesty of the divine Scriptures and the testimonies concerning each one.

4But since discussing these matters in fine detail would exceed the measure of a letter, and since we have trusted that your love will be satisfied with the main point of our exposition and will add the rest from your own resources—for, as the saying goes, give a wise man an opportunity and he will be wiser—we consider what we have written to be sufficient. To this it is enough to add a brief exhortation.

We urge you to remain sons of peace, so that you may fulfill the apostolic command, being of one soul, thinking the one thing, and sharing in the sufferings endured for Christ. Do not give the evil one a chance to separate what has been well joined together, and do not make yourselves easier prey for the wolves by division, thereby confirming their prayers. For we have learned how many struggles you have undergone for the sake of orthodoxy.

Since you have overcome the threats and the pressures from your adversaries, give no opportunity to division, lest hatred creeping in little by little, if it finds a place, may set great cliffs under you. But in your doxologies you must glorify the Spirit together with the Father and the Son, and know this: those who, through blasphemy against the Spirit, incur the unforgivable sin vainly reject communion with the Arians. For they will be condemned with them.

We pray that you, having kept the body of the church uncut and without quarreling, may pass the remaining time in this present age peacefully, and may stand gloriously before the judgment seat of Christ on the day of judgment.