Definitions for "Arianism"
Keywords:  arius, heresy, heretical, jesus, nicaea
The doctrines of the Arians.
View defended by Arius, a fourth-century priest in Alexandria, that Jesus was not the same as God, but was the greatest of all creatures; Arianism was the version of Christianity held by important Germanic kingdoms, including the Visigoths and the Lombards, between the fifth and seventh centuries. (Lynch, Joseph H. The Medieval Church: A Brief History, 359)
The teaching of Arius, who was condemned by the Council of Nicaea in AD 325. He maintained that Jesus Christ was a created being, that He was not eternal, that though He might be called "God" as a courtesy title, He did not share in the essence or being of the Father and thus was not truly God. (Similar to the belief of Jehovah's Witnesses.)