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Page 493

 

493 RELIGIOUS ENCYCLOPEDIA

263, Kiel, 1847; R. Wallace, Antitrinitarian Biography. 3 vols., London, 1850; W. Cunningham, Historical Theology, vol. ii., Edinburgh, 1862; E. L. T. Henke, Vorieaunpen aber neuere Kirchenpeschichte, i. 453 eqq·, Halls, 1874; J. Ferenca, Kleiner Unitarserspiepel, Vienna, 1879; J. H. Allen, in American Church History Series, x. 4996, New York, 1894; H. Dalton, Laaciana. Berlin, 1898; W. J. van Doruwen, in ThT, 1898, parts 1 3; J. F. Hurst, Hist. of Rationalism, revised ed., New York, 1901; O. Koniecki, lieachichte der Reformation in Polen, pp. 198-220, Breslau, 1901; G. Krause, Reformation and Gegenreformation im

. . Polen, Posen, 1901; A. C. McGiffert, Protestant Thought before Kant, pp. 107-118, New York, 1911; the works on the history of doctrine, e.g., Harnack, Dogma, v.-vii., especially vii. 119-167.

SOCINUS, LAELIUS (LELIO SOZZINI): Antitrinitarian, and uncle of Faustus Socinus (q.v.); b. at Siena in 1525; d. at Zurich May 16, 1562. One of the Italian free inquirers, he left Italy about 1544 to escape the Inquisition, and, going to Switzerland, found a home in Zurich. His candid intelligence and pleasant manner were the cause of much homage from the leading German and Swiss Reformers. Later on, though he did not expressly deny the doctrine of the Trinity, suspicion arose against him, and he needed the assistance of Bullinger to appease Calvin, and to turn aide the doubt as to his belief. Thereafter he abstained from controversy, and kept his opinions more to himself. At the time of his visit to Italy in 1560, on the occasion of his father's death, his correspondence brought upon his house the ill repute of heresy, so that the family estate was confiscated to the Inquisition, and he returned to Zurich to spend there the last two years of his life in poverty, and yet in peace and prestige due to the friendship of Sigismund II. of Poland. He published De hwreticis, an lint persequendi . . doctorum virorum . . . sententim (Magdeburg [Basel], 1554); and De sacramentis dissertth do (Freistadt, Holland, 1654).

BiBLtoasAPHy: J. C. F. Hoefer, Nouvelle biographie pbrale, a.v., 46 vols., Paris, 1855-66; J. H. Allen, in American Church History Series, x. 49-56, New York, 1894; and the literature under SOCIN08, FAUsTUs.

SOCRATES, sec'ra-tiz: Greek church historian; b. at Constantinople c. 380.

I. Life: Even in ancient times nothing seems to have been known of the life of Socrates except what was gathered from notices in his " Church History." His birth and education are related in V., xxiv. 9; his teachers were the grammarian Helladius and Ammonius, who came to Constantinople from Alexandria, where they had been heathen priests (V., xvi. 9). A revolt, accompanied by an attack upon the heathen temples, had forced them to flee. This revolt is dated about 390 (cf. she annotations of Reading and Hussey to V., xvi. 1). That Socrates later profited by the teaching of the sophist Troilus, is not proven; no certainty exists as to his precise vocation, although it may be inferred from his work that he was a layman. On the title-page of his history, he is designated as a scholasticus (lawyer). In later years Socrates traveled and visited among other places Paphlagonia and Cyprus (cf. Hist. ccd., I., xii. 8, II., xxxviii. 30).

IL His " Church History ": Socrates' work on church history was first edited in Greek by R. Stephen, on the basis of Codex Regius 1443 (Paris, 1544); a translation into Latin by Johannes

Christophorson (1612) is important for its various readings. The fundamental edition, however, was

produced by Valesius (Paris, 1668), Period, who used Codex Regius, a Codex Vati-

Purpose, canus, and a Codex Florentinus, and Scope. also employed the indirect tradition

of Theodorus Lector (Codex Leonis Alladi). The history covers the years 305-439, and was finished about 439, in any case during the lifetime of Emperor Theodosius, i.e., before 450 (cf. VIL, xxii. 1; fuller details in Jeep, Quelenuntersuchungen au den grieehwchen Kirchenhwtorikern in New dahrbucher fur Phillologie and Padagogik, xiv. 137 sqq). The purpose of the history is to give a continuation of the work of Eusebius (I., i.). It relates in simple language and without panegyric what the Church has experienced from the days of Constantine to the writer's time. Ecclesiastical dissensions occupy the foreground; for when the Church is at peace there is nothing for the church historian to relate (VII., xlviii. 7). The fact that, besides treating of the Church, the work also deals with Arianism and with political events is defended in the preface to book V. Socrates seems to have owed the impulse to write his work to a certain Theodorus, who is alluded to in the proemium to bk. II. as " a holy man of God " and seems therefore to have been a monk or one of the higher clergy.

The history in its present form is not a first edition. This is shown in the opening of the second book, where Socrates relates that he has thoroughly

revised books I.-II. He has done this Sources. because in these books he had orig-

inally followed Rufinus, and in books III.-VII. he had drawn partly from Rufinus and partly from other sources. Then, from the works of Athanasius and the letters of prominent men of his time, he learned that Rufinus was not trustworthy, and was therefore induced to revise his work, and add the numerous documents scattered through the first two books. That the revision was not confined to these two books, but extended to the following ones, is shown by the erasure of the repetition at the end of the sixth book in the second Florentine manuscript. This passage proves also that the first edition was not oxlly prepared but published. An attempt to state the sources used by Socrates was first made in a thorough manner by Jeep. It was shown that Socrates usually makes express mention of the source of his information. Geppert (see bibliography) offers a systematic analysis of these sources as follows; (1) Rufinus is often transcribed (I., xii., xv., II., i.; etc.), often quoted without acknowledgment from the Greek trandation by Gelasius of Cwsarea; (2) Eusebius, De tits Condantini, cited in I., i., viii., xvi.; etc.; (3) Athanasius, De synodis, cited II., xxxvii.; and above all the Apologia contra Arianos (cf. the preface to book II.); (4) the collections of the acts of the councils by the Macedonian Sabinus, cited I., via., II., xv.; etc.; (5) Eutropius, who is nowhere cited, although the comparison of Socrates II., xv. with Eutropius K., ix. shows the use of this author; (6) the Fasti, to whom Socrates is indebted for his political and semi-political data. Formally,