May 11 • History
⚠️ 2 EXTREMELY Good Books
A common objection to Nicene orthodoxy (or to any doctrinal commitment within the Nicene trajectory) is that these commitments were *invented* at Nicaea with no pre-Nicene precedent.
This is completely false.
It’s a myth that is largely running rampant on the internet. We need to know how to respond decisively so we’re not blindsided when the accusation comes.
Here are two books you have to get your hands on, and a quick look at how they help you dismantle this argument and show just how embarrassingly bad it is.
R.P.C. Hanson’s The Search for the Christian Doctrine of God (1988) is widely regarded as the definitive scholarly treatment of the fourth-century trinitarian controversy.
A few reasons it matters:
It dismantled the old narrative of a clean “orthodox vs. Arian” fight. Hanson showed there was no unified Arian party. Instead, it was a spectrum of theologians groping toward a vocabulary for how the Son relates to the Father.
It argued that “orthodoxy” itself was being constructed during the controversy, not defended from a fixed deposit. The Nicene settlement of 381 was a hard-won outcome instead of a foregone conclusion.
It rehabilitated figures long dismissed as heretics (Eusebius of Caesarea, the Homoiousians) by taking their arguments seriously on their own terms, and complicated the heroic portraits of Athanasius and the Cappadocians.
It remains the standard reference. Nearly every subsequent book on Nicaea, Athanasius, or fourth-century theology engages Hanson, even when disagreeing with him (e.g., Lewis Ayres, Khaled Anatolios).
John Behr’s The Nicene Faith (2004, two parts) is the second volume of his Formation of Christian Theology series and covers much the same ground as Hanson, but with a very different sensibility.
Why it matters:
Behr reads the controversy theologically rather than primarily as institutional history. He’s interested in what the Fathers were actually trying to say about God.
For Behr, the fight was a struggle over how to read Scripture christologically, especially the apostolic preaching of the crucified Christ.
He recasts Athanasius and the Cappadocians as creative theologians working out a coherent vision, rather than political operators or system-builders.
He writes as an Orthodox theologian, which gives the book a constructive edge. It’s a work of ressourcement as much as scholarship, treating Nicaea as living theology.
Read together, the two books are a great pairing:
Hanson is the rigorous (sometimes a skeptical historian who shows you the mess) while Behr is the theologian who shows you what the Fathers thought they were doing inside that mess.
Happy reading 🤙🏽🔥
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⚠️ 2 EXTREMELY Good Books
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