Forthcoming SVS Publications

Saint Vladimir's Seminary Press just sent me their latest catalogue, and in it we find a number of new books, each of which looks fascinating. So far none of them are on-line yet--at least not at Amazon or the website of the press. As they are released, look for further information on here and discussion and reviews of them as well.

December 2011:

We have two new books forthcoming, both in the Popular Patristics series, to which I have drawn attention on several occasions in the past. These new volumes both feature works primarily of Athanasius the Great of Alexandria:

• St. Athanasius, On the Incarnation (a new translation by John Behr) in two formats: English only (112pp.), or English and Greek on facing pages (174pp.).

• Athanasius and Didymus the Blind, Works on the Spirit, trans. Mark DelCogliano, Andrew Radde-Gallwitz, and Lewis Ayres (240pp.).

January 2012:

• Gabriel Bunge, Despondency: the Spiritual Teaching of Evagrius of Pontus, trans. Anthony P. Gythiel (156pp.). Evagrius, as I noted before, continues to fascinate many people, not least for the frisson of heterodoxy that may or may not attend some of his views. Bunge has written on him before and also authored several other well-received studies, including Earthen Vessels: The Practice of Personal Prayer According to the Patristic Tradition and a lovely book on that most famous of icons: The Rublev Trinity: The Icon of the Trinity by the Monk-painter Andrei Rublev.

• John McGuckin, The Ascent of Christian Law: Patristic and Byzantine Formulations of a New Civilization (340pp.). McGuckin is a very prolific fellow, as I have noted repeatedly. Most recently he has published an excellent introductory volume, The Orthodox Church: An Introduction to its History, Doctrine, and Spiritual Culture and overseen The Encyclopedia of Eastern Orthodox Christianity, on which I have commented many times.

• Vladimir Lossky, Seven Days on the Roads of France, trans. Michael Donley (114pp.). This book documents Lossky's experience and reflections in Nazi-occupied France. It sounds fascinating, and it puts me in mind of another recent biography of an Orthodox theologian who lived through the same experience, Elisabeth Behr-Sigel. Lossky, of course, is probably best known for his The Mystical Theology of the Eastern Church as well as his In the Image and Likeness of God and the large volume, co-authored with Leonid Ouspensky, The Meaning of Icons.

February 2012:

Constantine Nasr, Anthony Bashir--Metropolitan and Missionary (224pp.). Bashir was instrumental in establishing the Antiochian Orthodox Christian Archdiocese of North America. This book, volume three in the SVS series "Orthodox Profiles," tells his story.

Boris Bobrinskoy, The Mystery of the Church: a Course in Orthodox Dogmatic Theology, trans. Michael Breck (380pp.). Bobrinskoy, author of several works, including The Mystery of the Trinity: Trinitarian Experience and Vision in the Biblical and Patristic Tradition, here turns to the question of ecclesiology. I greatly look forward to reading this, having had a few things to say on ecclesiological matters myself in Orthodoxy and the Roman Papacy.