A
homoiousian (from the from ,
hómoios, "similar" and ,
ousía, "essence, being") was a member of 4th-century AD theological party which held that
God the Son was of a similar, but not identical, substance or essence to
God the Father. Proponents of this view included
Eustathius of Sebaste and
George of Laodicea. Homoiousianism arose in the early period of the
Christian religion out of a wing of
Arianism. It was an attempt to reconcile the seemingly irreconcilable views of the
pro-Nicene homoousians, who believed that
God the Father and
Jesus his son were
identical (,
homós) in substance, with the "neo-Arian" position that God the Father is "incomparable" and therefore the
Son of God can not be described in any sense as "equal in substance or attributes" but only "like" (,
hómoios) the Father in some subordinate sense of the term.