"The Bible's teaching about Christ", by Viktor Rydberg (1862) (Part 16)
By the ecclesiastical author Dionysius Alexandrinus (died 264) we own a letter to Bishop Paulus of Samosata, in which he combats his opinion, that Jesus was only human. In the polemic writing against such a doctrine it would have been appropriate to, along with other Bible passages, quote the verse about the unity of the father, the word and the holy spirit. But Dionysius does not invoke him.
The father of orthodoxy and the actual originator of the ecclesiastical doctrine of the Trinity was the famous bishop of Alexandria, Athanasius (died 373). It is his name, associated with the Council of Nicaea, which announces the outbreak of the savage war between the so-called orthodox and the Arians, who later denied that Christ was God in the absolute sense, and declared him to be a created being. Among Athanasius' surviving writings are four speeches against the Arians and a treatise on the incarnation of the Word; but neither in them nor in other treatises, which are by him, the alleged heavenly witnesses are mentioned.
Basil the Great (died 371) was one of the strongest opponents of the Arians. He devoted a large part of his authorship activity to combat them, but nowhere in his writings do you find, among Bible passages which he invoked against them, the disputed words in 1 Joh. 5:7-8, although this more than anything else could serve as defense against Arianism.
Basilius' childhood friend, Gregorius Nazianzus, who during his ceaseless fierce struggle against the Arians acquired by the orthodox the honorific name "Theologus", quoted from John's first letter the words: »there are three witnesses, the spirit, the water and the blood» but observes an understandable silence regarding the three witnesses in heaven.
Didymus (died 395) has left two writings, one »On the Trinity», the other »Exposition of John's first letter" (just that letter, of which here is question). In neither can be traced the slightest hint of the spurious verse.
The same is the case with the by Epiphanius (died 403) written History of heretics, which is all the more strange, since she wants to be an orthodox refutation of all until then arisen "heresies", and for this purpose invokes a large number of passages from the New Testament.
Finally, we announce two particularly clear and decisive testimonies from the literature of the Greek church. The one is left by the acts of the third ecumenical meeting; the second by Cyrillus' polemic writing »Condemnations against Nestorius». The third ecumenical meeting, held at Ephesus in 431, was the scene for a fierce battle about the nature of the union of the divine and human nature in the person of Christ. On one side stood Nestorius with his more rational opinion; on the other hand Cyrillus, who imagined the union as a substantial unity. Among Bible passages, which in the acts of the meeting and in Cyrillus's polemic writing were invoked against Nestorius, were the fifth chapter of John's first letter. The acts quote it from the 5th through the 8th verse; the polemic writing from the 4th through the 10th. In both sources the 7th and 8th verses have the short unadulterated wording: »For there are three witnesses, the spirit, the water and the blood, and the three are one». - If the victors at the Ephesian meeting had in 1 Joh. 5: 7-8 read something about the unity of the father, the word and the holy spirit, why then should they, from the verses which they quoted otherwise, have excluded the very words that were most useful to them to plead against Nestorius?
