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Ephrem the Syrian · 350–363 · Poem
Ephrem the Syrian's Hymns Against Heresies emerged from the theological battlegrounds of fourth-century Mesopotamia, where Christian communities faced sustained challenges from Arian, Marcionite, and Manichaean teachings. Writing between 350 and 363 in…
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Ephrem the Syrian · 350–370 · Poem
The Madrāšē d-Haymənutā (Hymns on Faith) represent Ephrem the Syrian's poetic response to the Arian controversy that threatened to divide fourth-century Christianity. Writing from Nisibis and later Edessa between 350 and 370,…
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Ephrem the Syrian · 350–363 · Poem
The Carmina Nisibena (Songs of Nisibis) is a collection of seventy-seven hymns composed by Ephrem the Syrian between 350 and 363 CE in response to the repeated Persian sieges of his native…
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Athanasius of Alexandria · 350 · Treatise
For readers who want to know why Nicaea used the word "of one essence" with the Father; the best short entry into the controversy.
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Athanasius of Alexandria · 356 · Letter
For historians and students of the creeds of the 350s; a pastoral warning letter.
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Hilary of Poitiers · 356–367 · Commentary
Hilary of Poitiers composed this commentary on Matthew's Gospel during his exile in Phrygia between 356 and 360, imposed by Emperor Constantius II for his opposition to Arianism. Writing from enforced isolation…
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Hilary of Poitiers · 356–359 · Treatise
Hilary of Poitiers composed this monumental treatise on the Trinity during his exile in Phrygia between 356 and 359, imposed by the Arian emperor Constantius II for his defense of Nicene orthodoxy.…
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Athanasius of Alexandria · 356–361 · Treatise
For students of the Trinity and of Nicaea who want the full case against Arius from Scripture; long and demanding, not a first book.
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Athanasius of Alexandria · 357 · Treatise
For historians of the Arian years: a dossier of letters and council records in his own defence; not devotional reading.
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Athanasius of Alexandria · 357 · Treatise
For readers following his conflict with the emperor; a polished defence speech rather than theology.
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Athanasius of Alexandria · 357 · Treatise
For readers interested in Athanasius himself and in when a pastor may flee persecution; short and personal.
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Athanasius of Alexandria · 357–358 · Treatise
For historians of the Arian crisis and of church and empire; a vivid, partisan narrative, not theology.
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Basil the Great · 357–378 · Letter
For anyone curious about the man rather than the doctrine: a bishop's working correspondence - friends, officials, grieving parents, quarrelling monks, the Pope who would not answer. Read a dozen, not all 366; Letters 2, 14, 22, 70 and 223 first.
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Philocalia The Philocalia of Origen
Basil the Great, Gregory of Nazianzus, Origen of Alexandria · 358–360 · Other
For readers who want the best of Origen chosen by two of his greatest admirers: on Scripture, on free will, and against Celsus.
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Short Rules Regulae brevius tractatae
Basil the Great · 358–364 · Treatise
For readers interested in how a monastery actually ran: 313 short questions from monks and Basil's answers - on anger, on sleep, on what to do with a brother who will not work. For the monastic historian and the curious; not devotional reading.
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Basil the Great · 358–364 · Treatise
For readers who want to see how Basil built an ethic out of nothing but the New Testament: eighty rules, each a heading and the verses that ground it. A reference text to dip into; the two short prefaces are worth reading whole.
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Cyril of Jerusalem · 359 · Letter
Cyril of Jerusalem's Letter to Emperor Constantius emerged from a critical moment in fourth-century Christianity when imperial politics and theological orthodoxy collided with devastating force. Written in 359 during Cyril's second exile…
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Letters to Serapion Letters to Serapion concerning the Holy Spirit
Athanasius of Alexandria · 359–361 · Letter
For students of the doctrine of the Holy Spirit: the first sustained argument that the Spirit is fully God; not a first book of Athanasius.
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Athanasius of Alexandria · 359 · Treatise
For historians of the fourth-century councils and creeds, and for the conciliatory turn toward the "Semi-Arians"; documentary and dense.
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Ephrem the Syrian · 360–370 · Poem
The Hymns on the Nativity comprise a collection of twenty-eight hymns composed by Ephrem the Syrian during the 360s, written in Syriac for liturgical use during the Christmas season. These works emerged…
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Athanasius of Alexandria · 360 · Other
For anyone drawn to prayer, solitude or the desert tradition, and the first saint's life most readers should meet; not a work of doctrine.
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Basil the Great · 360–370 · Treatise
For readers who want a fourth-century bishop's own account of what baptism asks of the baptised: discipleship before doctrine, almost every paragraph built from Scripture. Not for anyone looking for the history of the rite.
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Gregory of Nazianzus · 362 · Sermon
For clergy, ordinands and anyone weighing a call to ministry: the sermon on what a priest is that Chrysostom and Gregory the Great both drew on.
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Orations Orations of Gregory of Nazianzus
Gregory of Nazianzus · 362–390 · Sermon
For readers who want Gregory the preacher and orator, taken by occasion — a funeral, a feast, a farewell — rather than read end to end; the free English covers twenty-four of the forty-five.
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