Christian Heresies of the
Second Century:


    Marcionites:
    Against God the Father: Marcion in 110 taught the existence of two gods, the evil one of the Old Testament and the good one taught by Jesus; Jesus is not the Messiah, he denied the Incarnation of Christ and did not really die on the cross.
    According to Marcion, the God of the Hebrew Bible was inconstant, jealous, wrathful, and legalistic. Jesus revealed to the world a hitherto unknown god, who was different from the God of the Hebrew Bible. Jesus's god was free from passion and wrath, wholly benevolent. Jesus was not the Messiah promised by Judaism; that Messiah was to be a conqueror and a political leader. Rather, Jesus was sent by a god greater than the Creator.
    He is a Gnostic, please look at Gnosticism in the First Century
    Marcionites are the followers of Marcion, the son of the Bishop of Sinope in Pontus, born about 110. For some fault not definitely known to history he was excommunicated by his father. At this time it appears that he was suffragan bishop to his father, to whom he appealed for re-admission into the Church. Reconciliation being refused him, he traveled to Rome where he united with Cerdo and began propagating heretical doctrines. Tertullian relates in 207 that Marcion professed penitence and accepted as condition for his readmission into the Church that he should bring back to the fold those whom he had led astray. But he died before he could carry out his good intentions. Marcion

    Ebionites:
    Denied the divinity of Christ, Jesus is human, the son of God, but not God considered St. Paul a heretic, and practiced free-love.

    Montanism:
    Montanus, a priest of Cybele who became a Christian, in 156 had revelation of the Spirit and his teachings were above those of the Church, he spoke in ecstatic visions and urged their followers to fast and pray, so that they might share the personal revelations. (beware Pentecostals, Charismatics...)
    He belief that the Trinity consisted of only a single person. He proclaimed that everybody in the Church must be perfect and the Christians who fell from grace could not be redeemed.
    The most widely known defender of Montanists was undoubtedly Tertullian, a champion of orthodox belief, who believed that the new prophecy was genuinely motivated and began to fall out of step.
    Montanism  is also known as the Phrygians because it was founded by Montanus in Phrygia (a small province in Turkey). The movement was a response to what Montanus saw as the relaxation in Christian zeal by the church itself. All his followers, not merely the priests, were discouraged from marriage. Second marriages were absolutely forbidden. Martyrdom was invited, any followers who declined a chance of martyrdom was condemned. Also harsh regimes of fasting were followed.
    The sect also was convinced that the end of the world was imminent and that Christ was to return in the immediate future.
    One can't help but still feel today, on reading such broad details about this sect, that there was a strong air of fanaticism about this group.
    The movement continued until the sixth century when emperor Justinian vehemently suppressed it. Loyal to their creed, as well as fanatical, the montanists of Constantinople rather committed suicide than surrender. They gathered in their churches and then set light to them, perishing in the flames.
    Montanus was converted about the year 150 and soon after began to fall into fits of ecstacy and to utter "prophecies". Maximilla and Priscilla deserted their husbands and became "prophetesses". Expelled from the Church, Montanus set up for himself, organizing a body of preachers to be supported by the voluntary contributions of his followers. Eusebius says that he died miserably by hanging himself.   Heresies 

    Monarchians, 190, denied the Mystery of the Trinity, God is one person, God the Father and God the Son were one and the same person.
    Monarchianism (mono - "one"; arche - "rule") was an error concerning the nature of God that developed in the second century A.D.  It arose as an attempt to maintain Monotheism and refute tritheism.  Unfortunately, it also contradicts the orthodox doctrine of the Trinity.  Monarchianism teaches that there is one God as one person:  the Father.  The Trinity is that there is one God in three persons:  Father, Son, and the Holy Spirit.  The Trinity is monotheistic, not polytheistic as some of its critics like to assert.  Monarchians were divided into two main groups, the dynamic monarchians and the modal monarchians.   
     Dynamic Monarchianism teaches that God is the Father and that Jesus is only a man, denied the personal subsistence of the Logos and taught that the Holy Spirit was a force or presence of God the Father.  Present day groups in this category are the Jehovah's Witnesses, Christadelphians, and Unitarians.  Additionally, some ancient dynamic monarchianists were also known as Adoptionists who taught that Jesus was tested by God and after passing this test and upon His baptism, He was granted supernatural powers by God and adopted as the Son.  Ancient teachers of dynamic monarchianism were Theodotians, a Tanner in Byzantium around 190 A.D., and Paul of Samosata a bishop of Antioch in Syria around 260 AD. 
     Modal monarchianism teaches that the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit are just modes of the single person who is God.  In other words, the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit are not simultaneous and separate persons, but consecutive modes of one person.  Praxeas, a priest from Asia Minor, taught this in Rome around 200 AD.  Modern groups in this general category are the Oneness Pentecostal groups known as the United Pentecostal and United Apostolic Churches.  However, the present day modalists maintain that God's name is Jesus.  They also require baptism "in Jesus' name" not "in the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit" for salvation. Monarchianism
    The word "Monarchian" was first used by Tertulian as a nickname for a group of heretics known as Patripassionists in the West and Sabellians in the East, but was seldom used by theancients. In modern times it has been extended to include an earlier group of heretic known as Theodotians. Thus there are two branches of what are now known as Monarchians, the Theodotians and the group comprised of the Patripassionists and the Sabellians. These two branches are also sometimes classified as Dynamistic and Modalist Monarchians respectibely, and at other times are united under the single name of Antitrinitarians. Their founder was Praxeas, a native of Phrygia and an early anti-Montanist. He is known to us only through Tertullian’s book "Adversus Praxeam", where he is described as being inflated with pride as a Confessor of the Faith because he had spent a short time in prison. He was probably the first of the Monarchians to visit Rome, where he was well received by the Pope about 190-198, with whom he used his influence against the Montanists.
    http://www.carm.org/heresy/monarchianism.htm   http://www.catholicapologetics.net/apolo_48.htm
       - Adoptionism, in the eight century, claims that Christ was born a human only, and was not divine until his baptism, at which point he was adopted as the Son by God the Father.

    Tritheism: There are three Gods, the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit, against the Trinity. Present day Mormonism is tritheistic
    Tritheism is the teaching that the Godhead is really three separate beings forming three separate gods.  This erring view is often misplaced by the cults for the doctrine of the Trinity which states that there is but one God in three persons:  Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.  The doctrine of the trinity is, by definition, monothestic.  That is, it is a doctrine that affirms that there is only one God in all the universe.  
     Tritheism has taken different forms throughout the centuries. In the early church the Christians were accused of being tritheists by those who either refused to understand or could not understand the doctrine of the Trinity. In the late 11th century a Catholic monk of Compiègne in France, Roscelin considered the three Divine Persons as three independent beings and that it could be said they were three gods. He maintained that God the Father and God the Holy Ghost would have become incarnate with God the Son unless there were three gods. 
     Present day Mormonism is tritheistic -- but with a twist. Mormonism teaches that there are many God's in the universe but they serve and worship only one of them.  The godhead for earth is to them really three separate gods: the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost.  The Father used to be a man on another world who brought one of his wives with him to this world - they both have bodies of flesh and bones.  The son is a second god who was literally begotten between god the father and his goddess wife.  The holy ghost is a third god.  Therefore, in reality, Mormonism is polytheistic with a tritheistic emphasis.
     Of course, tritheism clearly contradicts the teaching of the Bible regarding monotheism.

    Modalism:   
    Modalism is probably the most common theological error concerning the nature of God.  It is a denial of the Trinity which states that God is a single person who, throughout biblical history, has revealed Himself in three consecutive modes, or forms.  Thus, God is a single person who first manifested himself in the mode of the Father in Old Testament times.  At the incarnation, the mode was the Son.  After Jesus' ascension, the mode is the Holy Spirit.  These modes are consecutive and never simultaneous.  In other words, the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit never all exist at the same time, only one after another.  Modalism denies the distinctiveness of the three persons in the Trinity even though it retains the divinity of Christ.
     Present day groups that hold to this error are the United Pentecostal and United Apostolic Churches.  They deny the Trinity, teach that the name of God is Jesus, and require baptism for salvation.  These modalist churches often accuse Trinitarians of teaching three gods.  This is not what the Trinity is.  The correct teaching of the Trinity is one God in three eternal coexistent persons:  The Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. http://www.carm.org/heresy/modalism.htm
 

    - Basidilians: So-called after Basilides, a native of Alexandria who flourished under the Emperors Hadrian and Antonius Pius from about 120 to 140. Of his life we know nothing except that he had a son Isidore who followed in his footsteps. One of the maxim of Basilides was: "Know others, but let no one know you".
    The Basilidians held fabulous views on the Deity; rejected Revelation and claimed the God of the Jews to be only an angel; held that angels created the world; denied the humanity and miracles of Jesus; denied the resurrection of the body , and believed that Simon of Cyrene was crucified in place of Christ who returned to His Father unharmed.

    - Carpocratians: Followers of Carpoerates, an Alexandrian philosopher, who flourished during the reign of the Emperor Hadrian (117-138). They are also called "gnostics", that is learned or enlightened.
    The Carpocratians held that everyone has two souls; believed in the transmigration of souls; maintained that the world was created by angels; denied the divinity of Christ, and advocated the practice of immorality as a means of union with God.

Art Galleries of Religions and Christianity
World Religions and 101 Cults

The Jerome Bible Commentary, book by book
1,093 prophecies and types of the Old Testament fulfilled in Jesus and His Church

Other Web Sites of Dr. Dominguez
(over 300 in English and Spanish)

Public domain text. May be distributed freely. No rights reserved.

Home   E- Mail to: J. Dominguez, M.D.