Macedonianism

After the Council of Nicaea in 325, during the reign of Emperor Constantius, a man named Macedonius came to power as the Bishop of Constantinople (unlawfully). Macedonius was a Semi-Arian, but a very specific type of Semi-Arian. He took the ideas of Arius to their fullest logical extent. These new ideas became known by the name of their founder, the followers called “Macedonians.” And no, we are not talking about people from that country here.

They had a second name that came from the teachings. Their most common alternate name was the “Pneumatomachi,” which is Greek for “enemies of the Spirit.” What teaching did this come from? Well, they were already Semi-Arians, which means that they rejected the Son’s claim to divinity. They were enemies of the Spirit because they also rejected the Holy Spirit as divine.

How did they get to that point? Unfortunately, they got there with a little bit of bad philosophy. In the Nicene Creed, it was officially and formally declared that the Son was the only-begotten of the father. Macedonius brought this to a rather unusual conclusion. He declared that there were only two options. Either the Spirit was ALSO begotten of the Father or Son or the Holy Spirit is UNbegotten.

Both of these options were contrary to the Council of Nicaea. Why? Because the Father is the only unbegotten. If the Holy Spirit is unbegotten, there’s a minor problem with the Trinity. If the Spirit was begotton, it makes Him either the Son’s brother or the Father’s nephew. Well, Nicaea already declared that the Son was the only-begotten of the Father.

Basically, they decided that both of those options were a bit ridiculous and rejected that the Holy Spirit was divine at all. However, they had also recognized something else. They did realize that the use of “homoousios,” that fancy Greek word from Nicaea, left only two options.  You could either accept that option and be Orthodox, or fully reject everything and become a full Arian. To Macedonius, there was no middle ground.

The Macedonian camp was formally denounced by the Council of Constantinople. The Creed was changed to reflect these attacks by the Macedonian camp. They added a whole section about the Holy Spirit. The issue of relationships in the Trinity was addressed there. What has officially been defined shows that the Macedonians were completely wrong about how the Holy Spirit works.

So we have the Father. The Father begets the Son. The Son is the only begotten of the Father, from all eternity. Both are completely eternal and completely God. The Father loves the Son with his whole being, completely infinitely. The Son loves his Father back equally. The Father and the Son have such an infinite love between them that this love actually takes the form of a third person in the Trinity. This is the Holy Spirit, who proceeds from both the Father and the Son.  That part of the definition was a slight source of controversy in the history of the Church… But we’ll get to that later.

So these three persons all share the same nature. A dog (or any other animal/plant) is zero persons in one nature (animal/plant). A human is one person in one nature. God is three persons in one nature. Confusing? Good. This is a Mystery of the Church. It’s not supposed to make sense. Actually, it’s probably a good thing that it doesn’t make sense. I’ll explore that idea in the future, though.