Sabellius
190 CE–220 CE · Rome
Sabellius (early 3rd century) was a theologian, probably from the Libyan Pentapolis and active in Rome, who taught Modalism (Sabellianism): that Father, Son, and Holy Spirit are not three distinct persons but three modes or aspects of one indivisible God. The view, known as modalistic monarchianism, was rejected by Pope Callixtus I, who excommunicated Sabellius around 220.
Contested teaching
Pope Callixtus I excommunicated Sabellius around 220 for teaching that Father, Son, and Spirit are modes of one person rather than three distinct persons.
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RomeרומאItaly
What they did here
Active in Rome under Popes Zephyrinus and Callixtus I, Sabellius taught that Father, Son, and Spirit were one God in three modes; Callixtus I excommunicated him around 220.
Rome in this era
Governed by the Roman emperors from the Antonines through the Tetrarchy, Rome housed a bishop's see of growing prestige, was the scene of periodic persecutions, and saw theologians such as Justin Martyr debate and die for the faith in the second century.
About Rome
Rome, on the Tiber in central Italy, grew from an Iron Age settlement into the capital of the Roman Republic and then of an empire that by the 1st century CE ruled the whole Mediterranean. Its Jewish community, attested from the 2nd century BCE, is among the oldest in Europe. Christian tradition holds that the apostles Peter and Paul died there, and the city became the seat of the popes. After the Western Empire ended in 476 it passed to Gothic kings, to Byzantium and then to papal rule as capital of the Papal States, until it became the capital of unified Italy in 1871. Vatican City, independent since 1929, lies within it.
In Rome at the same time
Julius Africanus, Hippolytus, Novatian, Callixtus I, Bishop of Rome, Zephyrinus, Bishop of Rome, Minucius Felix
Across the traditions, in Rome at the same time
In the same place & time
Sages whose lives overlapped with Sabellius’s in the same cities, drawn from their recorded journeys.
Across the traditions
In the same tradition
Julius Africanus, Hippolytus, Novatian, Callixtus I, Bishop of Rome, Zephyrinus, Bishop of Rome, Minucius Felix
The world in their lifetime
Thinkers and teachers of other traditions whose lives overlapped with Sabellius’s — a glimpse of the wider world they lived in. Drawn purely from recorded birth and death years.
Works
No works attributed in the corpus yet.