Sabellianism

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For the ancient Italic peoples, see Sabellians.

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In Christianity, Sabellianism (also known as modalism, modalistic monarchianism, or modal monarchism) is the nontrinitarian belief that the Heavenly Father, Resurrected Son and Holy Spirit are different modes or aspects of one God (for us only), rather than three distinct persons (in Himself).

1 Meaning and origins
2 Opposition
3 Later teachings
4 References
5 External links

[edit] Meaning and origins

God was said to have three "faces" or "masks" (Grk. prosopa). The question is: "is God's threeness a matter of our falsely seeing it to be so (Sabellianism/modalism), or a matter of God's own essence revealed as three-in-one (orthodox trinitarianism)?" Modalists note that the only number ascribed to God in the Holy Bible is One and that there is no inherent threeness ascribed to God explicitly in scripture. The number three is never mentioned in relation to God in scripture, which of course is the number that is central to the word Trinity. The only possible exception to this is the Comma Johanneum, a disputed text passage in First John known primarily from the King James Version and some versions of the Textus Receptus but not included in modern critical texts. It has been attributed to Sabellius,^{[citation needed]} who taught a form of this doctrine in Rome in the third century.

Hippolytus of Rome knew Sabellius personally and mentioned him in the Philosophumena. He knew Sabellius disliked Trinitarian theology, yet he called Modal Monarchism the heresy of Noetos, not that of Sabellius. Sabellianism was embraced by Christians in Cyrenaica, to whom Demetrius, Patriarch of Alexandria, wrote letters arguing against this belief.

[edit] Opposition

The chief opponent of Sabellianism was Tertullian, who labelled the movement "Patripassianism", from the Latin words pater for "father", and passus from the verb "to suffer" because it implied that the Father suffered on the Cross. It was coined by Tertullian in his work Adversus Praxeas, Chapter I, "By this Praxeas did a twofold service for the devil at Rome: he drove away prophecy, and he brought in heresy; he put to flight the Paraclete, and he crucified the Father."

It is important to note that our only sources extant for our understanding of Sabellianism are from their detractors. Scholars today are not in agreement as to what exactly Sabellius or Praxeus taught. It is easy to suppose Tertullian and Hippolytus misrepresented the opinions of their opponents.^[1]

Tertullian seems to suggest that the majority of believers at that time favoured the Sabellian view of the oneness of God.^[2] Epiphanius (Haeres 62) about 375 AD notes that the adherents of Sabellius were still to be found in great numbers, both in Mesopotamia and at Rome.^[3] The second general council at Constantinople in 533 AD declared the baptism of Sabellius to be invalid, which indicates that Sabellianism was still extant.^[3]

Historic Sabellianism taught that God the Father was the only person of the Godhead, a belief known as Monarchianism. One author has described Sabellius' teaching thus: The true question, therefore, turns on this, viz., what is it which constitutes what we name ‘person’ in the Godhead? Is it original, substantial, essential to divinity itself? Or does it belong to and arise from the exhibitions and developments which the divine Being has made of himself to his creatures? The former Sabellius denied; the latter he fully admitted. ^[3]

Sabellianism has been rejected by the majority of Christian churches in favour of Trinitarianism, which was eventually defined as three distinct, co-equal, co-eternal persons.^[4]

[edit] Later teachings

Both Michael Servetus and Emanuel Swedenborg have been interpreted as a proponents of Modalism, however, neither describes God as appearing in three modes. Both describe God as the One Divine Person, Jesus Christ, who has a Divine Soul of Love, Divine Mind of Truth, and Divine Body of Activity. Jesus, through a process of uniting his human form to the Divine, became entirely One with His Divine Soul from the Father to the point of having no distinction of personality.^[5][1]

Oneness Pentecostalism teaches that the Father (a spirit) is united with Jesus (a man) as the Son of God. However, Oneness Pentecostalism differs significantly by rejecting sequential modalism and by the full acceptance of the begotten humanity of the Son, not eternally begotten, who was the man Jesus and was born, crucified, and risen, and not the deity. This directly opposes Patripassianism and the pre-existence of the Son, which Sabellianism does not. Oneness Pentecostalism can be compared to Sabellianism as both are Nontrinitarian, but they do not correctly identify each other.