Primary source · Koine Greek

The Refutation of All Heresies

Hippolytus of Rome · c. AD 222–235

What this text is

Hippolytus’ ten books deriving every heresy from Greek philosophy and the mysteries — with the inside story, hostile but firsthand, of the Roman church under Zephyrinus and Callistus.

Profile of Justinus the Gnostic →

Interlinear passages

Word-for-word glosses of the original; the complete public-domain translation is linked below.

Book X — the labyrinth
τὸνtheλαβύρινθονlabyrinthτῶνof theαἱρέσεωνheresiesδιαρρήξαντεςhaving broken throughἐπὶuntoτὴνtheτῆςof theἀληθείαςtruthἐπίδειξινdemonstrationὁρμήσωμεν.let us press on

Public-domain translations

J. H. MacMahon (ANF, 1886)

Having broken through the labyrinth of heresies, we hasten on to the demonstration of the truth itself… The pupils of these men, when they perceived the doctrines publicly divulged, called us worm-eaten heretics — but the truth is not thereby harmed.

Manuscript witnesses

Paris, suppl. gr. 464 (from Mount Athos)

14th c.

The Athos codex brought to Paris in 1842, first printed as Origen's 'Philosophumena' before the attribution settled on Hippolytus.

PRINCIPAL WITNESS (BOOKS IV–X)

Book I tradition (as 'Origen')

medieval

The first book circulated separately under the wrong name for centuries.

PARTIAL TRADITION

Provenance

Rome, c. AD 222–235; Book I long known, IV–X recovered from Athos in 1842

Editions & scholarship

Critical editions and standard translations behind the text above.

Figures named in this text (24)

Complete public-domain text ↗