Writing an Arian Christian

zornhau said:

Hello - I hope you'll pardon the intrusion.

I'm writing a story set in the Early Dark Ages and trying to authentically portray the religious faiths of the characters. I've run into a problem with the Arian "heresy".

Most of the Goths were Arian Christians, but the only information I can find about the belief system is theological. Obviously, what I'm after - as a writer - is what it's like to be an Arian.

For example, I know that Roman pagans cared about ritual purity, Germanic pagan warriors about falling in battle and keeping oaths, early Christians about... well... lots of stuff. But, what about Arians?

Thanks very much in advance.

Z

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Since it may be that technically, before the council of 381 made these things more clear, almost all Christians were Arians (without giving it much thought) the best model of an Arian mind woul be any Christian before say 300 AD.

This would give you St. Paul's authentic letters as a starting point and another interesting Arian-neutral set of texts would be early church fathers such as Justin:

Justin very clearly distinguishes the Son, or Logos, as being an Angel and an Apostle of God, but not the one true God himself, the Maker of all things, as Justin calls him. Justin confers the title of Creator only to the Father in all of his writings. There is no indication of the trinitarian doctrine, or of Christ being the "one true God", as Justin gives this title only to the Father.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Justin_Martyr

Some Chronology:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nicene_Creed#Comparison_between_Creed_of_325_and_Creed_of_381

zornhau said:

That's a useful tip - but I'm still perplexed. I get that an Arian would say something like "God created Christ created the world and the Holy Spirit". However, I can't project that into e.g. a kill/not kill decision.

Early Catholic: If I prevail, it is God's Will (and I can always endow a church)
Germanic Pagan: I am strong and he is weak (and we'll drink beer together in Valhalla anyway)
Arian: ?

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Well, you have Clovis as a model of a slightly Catholic Barbarian. In fact he started as an Arian and then did a lot better as a Catholic. Wikipedia analyses his motives which were partly geopolitical and partly a matter of getting along with his wife.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clovis_I

zornhau said:

That's a useful tip - but I'm still perplexed. I get that an Arian would say something like "God created Christ created the world and the Holy Spirit". However, I can't project that into e.g. a kill/not kill decision.

Early Catholic: If I prevail, it is God's Will (and I can always endow a church)
Germanic Pagan: I am strong and he is weak (and we'll drink beer together in Valhalla anyway)
Arian: ?

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With Clovis as a model, maybe Arians were more flexible in their decisions as in: "I am weak, but if I get Catholic support I can beat my fellow beer-drinking barbarians, win kingdom and keep my wife happy."

zornhau said:

Hmmm. He certainly cheerfuly offed a lot of his relatives. Is it, "If Christ isn't human, then humans aren't perfectable, so why bother being good anyway?"

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I think you have Arianism turned around. In Arianism, Christ is not the same being as the creator god. He is presumably as human as the Catholic Christ, he's just not as totally a major a cosmic being as his Father is totally a major cosmic being.

The Council of Nicea tried to make this clear:

But those who say: 'There was a time when he was not;' and 'He was not before he was made;' and 'He was made out of nothing,' or 'He is of another substance' or 'essence,' or 'The Son of God is created,' or 'changeable,' or 'alterable'—they are condemned by the holy catholic and apostolic Church.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nicene_Creed#Comparison_between_Creed_of_325_and_Creed_of_381

zornhau said:

OK, yes. Thanks. However this still doesn't take me nearer to the resulting mentality!

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I think a literate Arian would be more or less the same as an Orthodox Christian before 300 AD.

I think an Arian barbarian would be more or less the same as your average barbarian.

One thing you might consider is that the Celtic church was not certfied as entirely orthodox catholic until the Synod of Whitby in 664, so you could possibly use early welsh poetry as a sample of what the mental world of a non-Orthodox Dark Age European would be like such as:


Cad Goddau The Battle of the Trees, from Preidu Annwn, is one of the transformation/prophecy poems of the legendary Taliesin.

My fingers are long and white,
far from a shepherd was I reared;
I rolled on the ground
before I became a proficient.
I traversed, I went round them,
I slept on a thousand islands.
I took a hundred forts.
Wise druids, prophesy to Arthur
what will be, what is,
what was once perceived:
the story of the flood
Christ's crucifixion
with Judgement Day at hand.

From:

http://www.britannia.com/history/docs/stanzas.html

I think you are asking akin to the difference in mentality of a Mormon and a Southern Baptist. They are largely the same. So there really isn't much difference between an Orthodox Christian and an Arian Christian. For much of the life of Arianism, it worked within the Church and being one did not exclude you from the other. So the difference in mindset between the two would be so small as to be unnoticable unless the topic specifically came to Christ's Divinity.

Mark W. said:

I think you are asking akin to the difference in mentality of a Mormon and a Southern Baptist. They are largely the same. So there really isn't much difference between an Orthodox Christian and an Arian Christian. For much of the life of Arianism, it worked within the Church and being one did not exclude you from the other. So the difference in mindset between the two would be so small as to be unnoticable unless the topic specifically came to Christ's Divinity.

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I agree. And even then for the average Arian or Orthodox the differences would not be easy to define. Except, I suppose that the Arian would not be familiar with the various orthodox creeds as used in liturgical contexts.