Still, even Hippolytus was forced to admit that Sabellius was an honest and open-minded man, and one with whom he could argue so frankly that he had great hopes of converting him. But Callistus interfered. Not that he himself was quite a modalist; his own Christology, while having strong modalistic leanings, was saved from downright modalism by dexterous qualifications. But he regarded Hippolytus’s doctrine—which he probably could not really understand—as the worse of the two evils. So Sabellius, finding the two great Roman leaders at loggerheads, reverted to his former position. To Hippolytus this was the last straw and he publicly denounced Callistus[47] as a heretic. Callistus retorted by hurling at Hippolytus the final insult: “Ditheist!” The result was a schism.
It took place, apparently, in the last years of Zephyrinus,[48] who died in 217. Hippolytus and his disciples fled from the—to them—polluted and heretical communion of the regular bishop and proclaimed that they and they alone were the true church of Rome. They were not numerous but their standing appears to have been high; at any rate they were able to find bishops willing to consecrate their leader to the episcopate. But their withdrawal left the “regular” church completely under Callistus’s control, and at Zephyrinus’s death he was elected to succeed him. This election, of course, Hippolytus treated as wholly null, asserting contemptuously that what Callistus had done was to become the leader of a “school of Callistans”, not of a “church of Christians”.
Callistus disposed of the Christological controversy by excommunicating both Sabellius and Hippolytus, and then turned his attention to the most thorny practical question that perplexed contemporary Christians, the problem of mortal sin after baptism. From the beginning of the post-apostolic age[49] the church almost universally held that such sin could not receive absolution, so that the sinners were permanently excommunicate and without hope of restoration.[50] The only “orthodox” voice in opposition to this rigorism was raised by the Shepherd of Hermas, and even its author dared oppose the universal teaching of his age only because he had received a special revelation from God; nor did he venture to promise more than the remission of one post-baptismal sin for anyone. In many quarters, indeed, even this mild relaxation of the rule was passionately resisted, and the most vigorous religious movement of the second century—Montanism—took as its watchword, “No second remission!”
By the beginning of the third century a final settlement of the question had become a necessity. The Christians had been successful beyond their dreams in attracting converts, but probably the majority possessed only general good moral qualities and lacked the heroic virtues. What was to be done with them? Should the church dismiss them as unworthy and so reduce its numbers drastically? Or should it do what it could for those whose intentions were good, without expecting too much of them? To Hippolytus the church’s constant teaching since the apostles’ time removed the problem from debate: Christians must be saints in the fullest sense of the word. So his flock was constantly purged by excommunications. Callistus, on the contrary, took the bold step of brushing aside tradition altogether and of appealing directly to the New Testament: “Let the tares grow with the wheat until the harvest”,[51] and, “Who art thou that judgest another man’s servant?"[52] Sinners were, of course, put to penance, but if they proved their good faith they could be absolved, no matter what their offence nor how often it had been committed. This decision of Callistus was nothing short of revolutionary, and it was destined to change the ideal of church membership for all time. Naturally it shocked Hippolytus beyond measure—and his horror was intensified when those whom he himself had excommunicated were received into communion by Callistus.
The latter, in fact, went so far in the abolition of the stricter rules that his own successors at Rome withdrew or seriously modified some of his concessions. He pronounced that second and even third marriages constituted no impediment to ordination, and allowed clerics to marry after they had been ordained. And he declined to recognize for Christian marriage the impediment of disparity of status in the Roman civil law; as a result the church permitted marriages that the parties could disown to the state—with some curious consequences.
All of this so incensed Hippolytus and his party that Callistus’s death in 222 did not end the schism; it continued under his successors Urbanus (222-230)—of whom nothing is certainly known—and Pontianus (230-235). But in 235 Maximinus became emperor and he undertook a persecution that singled out the Christian leaders. So in Rome both Pontianus and Hippolytus were arrested and sent to Sardinia, where they shortly afterward succumbed to the hardships of convict life. This healed the breach in the church, and the reunited factions completed the reconciliation by pronouncing both bishops to be saints and martyrs.
This action has been taken by some scholars—arguing from the premises of a later day—as evidence that Hippolytus made a retractation before his death. But Hippolytus was not the man to retract anything. And the Roman church of the next generation would never have allowed the erection of his statue if they had held him to be saved only by a deathbed repentance; still less would they have permitted the public and honourable inscription of the titles of works in which he glories in his conduct.[53] The church really acknowledged that both sides had made mistakes, and that Hippolytus’s errors—whatever they may have been—were due to an excess of zeal for righteousness and were not to be weighed against his consecrated learning and his burning devotion.
THE APOSTOLIC TRADITION
For a list and description of Hippolytus’s works reference must be made to the treatises on patrology; he was a prolific writer on exegetical, doctrinal and practical themes, who published at least fifty books and probably many more. But after he had been consecrated bishop of his separatist congregation, his first task was to provide treatises to perpetuate the principles for which he was contending so bitterly. One of these was Of Gifts, to which he alludes in [1. 1]; it has not been preserved, although traces appear to be incorporated in Constitutions VIII, i-ii. And it was followed immediately by the Apostolic Tradition.
Its introduction fixes its date and purpose. A “lapse or error” had “recently occurred” ([1. 4]), and Hippolytus undertakes to guard against its effects by setting forth the true doctrine “which has continued up to now”. And he recurs to the same theme at the close: “the many heresies have increased because their leaders would not learn the purpose of the apostles”, but “over all who hear the apostolic tradition and keep it, no heretics or any other man will prevail” ([38. 2]-3). The date accordingly must be close to 217 and the purpose is to cleave to the old ways, rejecting every innovation; the tradition which Hippolytus received from the presbyters before him ([36. 12]) must be maintained inviolate.