A Bishop’s Assistant Takes A Stand For Truth And Spends His Whole Life Defending It Amid The Political Turmoil And Intrigue Of Ancient Rome.
Now That Should Be A Movie.
Hello and thank you for visiting That Should Be A Movie. Today’s story I would like to pitch as a movie is the Life of Saint Athanasius. A SparksNotes version of his life can be found in Contending for Our All: Defending Truth and Treasuring Christ in the Lives of Athanasius, John Owen, and J. Gresham Machen by John Piper, from Crossway Books.
Athanasius lived from AD 298 to May 2, 373 in Egypt. He would spend nearly his entire adult life defending the doctrines of the divinity and incarnation of Christ and the Trinity against the heresy of Arianism. The story starts when Athanasius is just a deacon and an assistant to Bishop Alexander of Alexandria. Alexander was combating the teachings of another deacon named Arius. Arius taught his followers that Jesus was a different creature from God, created by Him at some point in time. Being of a different substance of God would also make Jesus subordinate to God the Father instead of equal to Him as God the Son. Arius’ teachings were spread with the poetical verses of his work Thalia as well as by his followers who marched through the streets of Alexandria chanting “There was a time when the son was not.”
The debate between Alexander and Arius would lead to the First Council of Nicaea, an ecumenical council, being called by Roman Emperor Constantine I in the city of Nicaea in AD 325. A debate ensued, including a fistfight that resulted in Bishop Nicholas of Bari, Myra, and Manhattan, the inspiration for Santa Claus, being rightfully rebuked for punching Arius in the nose. The Council ruled that Jesus was of the same nature as and begotten, not made, by God, therefore equal with him. Arius was disposed from office and his teachings were defined as heresy. Athanasius wrote the deposition. It was from this council that we got the part of the Nicaean Creed about the nature of Jesus always existing.
We believe in one God, the Father almighty, maker of heaven and earth, of all things visible and invisible. And in one Lord Jesus Christ, the only Son of God, begotten from the Father before all ages, God from God, Light from Light, true God from true God, begotten, not made; of the same essence as the Father. Through him all things were made For us and for our salvation he came down from heaven; he became incarnate by the Holy Spirit and the Virgin Mary. and was made human. He was crucified for us under Pontius Pilate; he suffered and was buried. The third day he rose again, according to the Scriptures. He ascended to heaven and is seated at the right hand of the Father. He will come again with glory to judge the living and the dead. His kingdom will never end.
Three years later, in 328, Alexander died, passing the bishop and mantel of orthodoxy onto Athanasius. He would dedicate his life to eradicating Arianism from Egypt and using his empire-wide influence to fight heresy. This influence would lead to trouble when Emperor Constantine began allowing Arius and his followers to return from exile and to places of power. Even though Arius died in 336, a death some believed to be miraculous, his teachings would continue to hold a strong sway among the powerful leaders of Constantinian Rome. This led to Athanasius’ first exile when bishops tired of his zeal falsely accused him before the emperor. It would be the first of five exiles Athanasius would have to endure, either due to his stance on the divinity of Christ or because he rejected the pagan gods of Rome. He would spend seventeen years of his forty-five years as bishop of Alexandria in exile.
His first exile began in 336 after conflict began with Meletius of Lycopolis, a bishop who had failed to abide by the Council of Nicaea. Meletius falsely accused him of abusing Arians and Meletians and even murdering a bishop. Athanasius answered and was exonerated of these charges at the First Synod of Tyre. However, when both sides met with Constantine I, Athanasius was found guilty of cutting off grain supplies to Constantinople and exiled to modern day Germany. His exile would end the next year when Constantine died and the empire was divided between his three sons, Constantius, Constans and Constantine II. It was Constantine II who restored Athanasius to his church office.
The second exile would be the longest, beginning in 339 and lasting until 346. The leader of the Arians, Eusebius, convinced Constantius to remove Athanasius from office. Constantius took church leadership into his own hands and replaced him with Gregory of Cappadocia as Patriarch of Alexandria. Constans and Constantine II supported Athanasius and called the Council of Sardica in 343 to hear his case. The council vindicated Athanasius but it would take three more years of political wrangling, including Constans threating Constantius with war, before Athanasius could return to his flock in Alexandria.
The third exile happened after Constans was assassinated in 350 and his brother Constantius, an Arian, was able to solidify his power over the empire. He used this power to attack Athanasius and his followers, often violently. According to Gregory of Nazianzus, “women were murdered, the church wrecked and polluted with the very worst orgies of heathenism, houses and even tombs were ransacked throughout the city and suburbs on pretense of ‘seeking for Athanasius.’” He went into exile in 356. During his exile Constantius called four hundred bishops together at Seleucia in 359 to settle the conflict between the Arians and the followers of the Nicaean creed. A vague compromise was settled upon, stating that Jesus was like the Father. Athanasius refused to accept this compromise. He would not return to Alexandria until 362 when Constantius died and his successor, the pagan Julian, reversed all of proceeding emperor’s banishments. Athanasius did not rest on his laurels, instead calling for a synod at Alexandria in which he solidified the doctrine of Christ’s divinity, leading to a growing acceptance of it in Christendom. Historian Archibald Robertson says this action was “the crown of the career of Athanasius.”
It was good that Athanasius sued this time well for just eight months later he was in exile again. This time it was the pagan Emperor Julian, who was generally opposed to all Christianity, that ordered him to leave Alexandria. This exile would last from 362 to 364, ending when Julian died of wounds received in the Battle of Samarra during a campaign in Persia. Some believed he was assassinated by a Christian within his own rank of soldiers. The new emperor Joven was a Christian who began restoring Christianity to a place of prominence in Rome, including reinstating Athanasius to his bishopship.
Unfortunately, Joven’s restoration of Christianity as the official state religion would last just two years, ending with his death in 364. He was succeeded by Emperor Valens, who favored Arianism. Athanasius, sensing what was about to occur, withdrew to the outskirts of Alexandria. Within a year he was able to return to the city since Valens did not want to incur a popular uprising and appeased the people by allowing their beloved bishop to remain.
Athanasius would spend his final years in peace undoing the damage incurred by years of violence and exile. Able to preach, write and distribute his works undisturbed, he proclaimed the doctrine of the Incarnation established at Nicaea. In 368 he would see Pope Damasus oversee a church council that declared that only those who held to the Nicaean Creed could be bishops.
Athanasius is one of the most important figures in early church history and should be made known to modern Christians through a biopic. Often called The Father of Orthodoxy, without his firm stand many Christians would not know the joy of hearing that God Himself, manifested in God the Son, took on human flesh and laid down His life for them, making the perfect and satisfactory sacrifice, very God forsaken of very God, to atone for their sins. Of Athanasius’s influence, John Henry Newman says he was the “principal instrument, after the Apostles, by which the sacred truths of Christianity have been conveyed and secured to the world.” Cornelius Clifford called Athanasius “the greatest champion of Catholic belief on the subject of the Incarnation that the Church has ever [known].” All compliments he deserves considering his willingness to lay down his career, comfort and even his life for the truth. Surely such a man should be honored and remembered with a movie.
A theme of a movie about Athanasius would be his relationship with the people of Alexandria. They loved Athanasius. When Constantius’ military commander Syrianus went to arrest him while he was preaching, Athanasius insisted on remaining in his spot until all of his flock had escaped the church. It was members of his flock who finally physically carried Athanasius out of the church and to safety. During his exiles as he wondered over the Western and Eastern Roman empires he always managed to write his congregation an especial Easter letter. His popularity with them became apparent when during his third exile, the archbishop George of Laodicea began to violently persecute anyone who sided with Athanasius against Arianism. As Athanasius received report after export of his followers being martyred one must wonder if Athanasius ever thought to himself how many youths had to die for his stance on truth. Perhaps he did since he wrote the emotional History of the Arians in which he proclaimed Constantius to be a precursor of the Antichrist. Back in Alexandria George of Laodcica’s persecution of both Christians and pagans led to his death at the hands of a lynch mob on December 24th, 361. A few months later in 362 Athanasius was welcomed back into Alexandria.
One group of supporting characters in a movie would be the desert monks. They often helped Athanasius during his exiles. He had visited these ascetic practitioners of celibacy, simplicity and solitude during his youth and their example had set him on fire for God. There is a story that during his fourth exile that one of these monks prophesied that the exile would soon be over due to Emperor Julian being killed in battle. Soon after that Athanasius was allowed to return home. One monk in particular that captured Athanasius’ attention and affection was Antony. Antony actually went to Alexandria one time to dispel rumors that the monks were Arian. Athanasius was so impressed by Antony’s commitment to the truth that he wrote a book about him, Life of Antony. This biography would later help lead to the conversion of Saint Augustine, but that’s another story that should be a movie for another time.
In some ways an Athanasius biopic would fall in the category of cloak and dagger or Sword-and-sandal. It is intertwined with many historical characters and events. The intrigue surrounding Constantin, his sons Constantius, Constans and Constantine II and even his sister Constantia would offer audiences a glimpse of a world often overlooked in history. The life of other emperors such as Valens and Julian being intertwined with the development of Christian theology would be fascinating. The dangers of persecution, including an attack by Diogenes’ upon Alexandria in 355, would help viewers realize that doctrine is not a cold academic chore, but a vibrant truth that is life defining, worth defending and even dying for. I could see Kevin Reynolds, Andrew Hyatt, Timur Bekmambetov, Roland Joffé, Emilio Estevez, George D. Escobar, Ray Bengston or Dean Wright behind the director’s wheel. If done right, the audience would be cheering and echoing Athanasius’s contra mundum: The world against Athanasius, Athanasius against the world!
An exciting story of a little known but very important figure in Christian history is why The Life of Saint Athanasius of Alexandria Should Be A Movie.
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