Brenda Llewellyn Ihssen on John Moschos and his Meadow

Brenda Llewellyn Ihssen has been doing some very interesting research and writing in the past few years. When I last interviewed her at the very beginning of 2013, it was about her then-new publication, They Who Give from Evil: The Response of the Eastern Church to Moneylending in the Early Christian Era. It is a fascinating and welcome contribution to the field of patristic moral and socio-political theology. Now this year she has come out with a study of an early and important monastic figure: John Moschos' Spiritual Meadow: Authority and Autonomy at the End of the Antique World (Ashgate, 2014), 181pp. I recently had a chance to interview her about this latest publication. Here are her thoughts:

AD: Tell us how you’ve moved from a recent book on money-lending to a book on John Moschos.

BLI: It is hard to believe that they are related, but there is a link! I had always wanted to write on Moschos’ Meadow, and in the Preface of the book I write of how I first encountered the text as a graduate student. For whatever reason, it just kept getting sidetracked as a scholarship project. But one of the tales in the collection always stuck with me, and that is the account of a woman who, when her pagan husband suggests that they loan their money and live off the interest, convinces him to loan fifty coins to the “God of the Christians” because that God will return the money and double it. To make a short story even shorter, the couple ends up profiting at an interest rate of five hundred percent, and this, Moschos writes, persuades the man to immediately become a Christian. It is easy to dismiss this as a fable, but there is so much to learn from this beneficial tale about Byzantine social history: Christians are engaged in lending with interest, a practice forbidden by the Councils; women are financial managers in some households; there is a prevailing belief that those who invest in God will be rewarded, with interest; and, finally, sometimes people are converted when they profit, and this highlights for us the occasional financial advantages of a particular religion and the way in which economic advantage can encourage conversion. So as I was finishing my monograph on moneylending, I decided that it might be a good time to start exploring accounts of “miraculous wealth” in Byzantine Beneficial Tales. The study of those texts led me to discover that I had perhaps more than just an article here, that there were some interesting themes worth exploring in the collection as a whole, even those not addressing money!

AD: Your subtitle speaks of “Authority and Autonomy at the End of the Antique World.” There seems to have been a number of books on authority, power, and social roles in the Christian East of late. What are we learning today about those issues in this time-period?

BLI: Patristic and other scholars of eastern Christianity and antiquity have done a great deal of magnificent work in the last decades of unpacking types of critical expression—one might even suggest subversion—present in the texts of the Christian East. Popularity of theorists like Foucault and Butler has also changed how we read now, and they assist us in understanding how language and ritual contributes to the subjugation of people, or specific groups, genders or castes. I believe that this is particularly important work, too, because I think that what we are finding—or, at least, what I am finding—is a variety of creative approaches to oppressive systems. I am heartened by little expressions, quiet moments of self-sufficiency that are demonstrated in the texts, and most especially when there is next to no comment because that speaks to the importance of the subversive method.

AD: You begin your preface with a winsome story about how you first encountered Moschos’ Spiritual Meadow, and the amusing story of the dead monk. Do we too often miss the humour in the literature of the desert and of the monastery? Are there others writing about the lighter side of monastic pursuits?

Yes, I think that we are so eager to ascribe serious, spiritual meaning to texts within religious history that we fail to see moments of levity. The The Sayings of the Desert Fathers are replete with humorous moments, such as the two monks who attempt but are unable to argue over a brick, or John the Dwarf being shut out of his cell without his cloak. Anyone who has spent time in a monastery knows that there are often subtle—or even not so subtle—glances, phrases or movements that carry with them deep significance, and that significance can be hilarious easily as well as spiritually transcendent. And if, in a monastery, that glance occurs when the observation of something funny is not appropriate, or when noise is not allowed, that can quickly reduce everyone at the table to silent tears of laughter. Such laughter is important, if for no other reason than the slightly naughty feeling one enjoys when one is laughing when one is supposed to be silent or serious. The British anthropologist Mary Douglas writes about precisely this in Implicit Meanings, in which she notes that the essence of a joke is the undermining of something formal by something informal, which affirms that tense and shifting relationship between authority figures and those over whom they claim authority. 

AD: You begin your introduction by admitting how little we know of John Moschos. Give us a quick sketch of what we do know about him with some certainty. 

Well, we do not know where or when he was born and there are scholarly arguments about when he died, but in between we do have a few details of which we can be fairly certain! He was a sixth-century, Chalcedonian Christian, possibly from Damascus. He began his monastic career at the large, well-organized monastery of St. Theodosius. Located about five miles from Bethlehem, this monastery housed hundreds of monks and was known as a site of hospitality for the physically and mentally ill, the elderly and the poor. At some point in his early monastic life he was joined by his companion—and future Patriarch of Jerusalem—Sophronios, who with John practiced two types of ascetic activity: a voluntary, rootless existence in which the monastic figure would be dependent entirely on the hospitality of others, and the collecting and writing of spiritually beneficial tales. For approximately forty years these two wandered through Palestine, Syria, Mount Sinai, Egypt and Rome. The debate about the time and place of John’s death is lively; what is more interesting to me is that after John’s death Sophronios, during a time of great unrest and instability in Palestine, endeavored to return his companion’s body to the monastery where they met; quite a poignant detail, in my opinion.

AD: You speak (pp. 10-11) of some difficulty in classifying Moschos’ writing, which has been seen as a series of “beneficial tales.” How should 21st-century readers approach him, and what should we expect in reading him?

I think that a twenty-first century reader might want to think of Moschos as a sixth-century “John Jacob Niles.” He was an American composer who believed that it was his duty and task to preserve early American music, in addition to writing and recording it. While many people recognize the popular Christmas folk hymn “I Wonder as I Wander,” we might not have had that hymn had Niles not heard strains of that Appalachian tune sung by a rag-tag girl with a beautiful voice. And while many people recognize the important account of St. Mary of Egypt attributed to Sophronios, we might not have had that vita had Moschos’ not heard strains of it and included it in his Meadow. In this way, I think that Moschos collected for spiritual posterity the snippets of beneficial tales of monks who found their way to one monastery or another, just as John Jacob Niles collected for cultural posterity the snippets of the music of British, Irish, Welsh and Scots who—in the nineteenth century—found their way from one country to another.

I make this comparison also because of your question about what to expect; I believe that because Moschos is a collector as much as a composer, and that because he is collecting tales of which only portions existed, that we should expect that much of what we are reading might be lost on us. That is not to say that we cannot derive either pleasure or joy from reading “spiritually beneficial tales,” for the name alone suggests several good things, but the casual reader must know going in that there are layers and elements of social, cultural or political history that are not obvious parts of the tale.

AD: Tell us about the influence of Moschos on monasticism in his own day, and does he remain influential today on monastic life in any way?
 

I am hesitant to suggest that Moschos was influential for monasticism in his day, much less for ours. This is not usually the claim that a scholar wants to make, really, for part of our job is to point out ways in which previously unexamined—or ‘under-examined’—people, ideas, events or artifacts are ‘oh so important.’ Sophronios’ was certainly influential for several reasons, but Moschos was, in many ways, more of a silent partner, even if the Spiritual Meadow is credited to him. As I reflect on the question, I think that the ways in which Moschos ‘matters’ is that aside from the text itself, his activity in the world affirms the variety of ascetic practices of the late sixth and early seventh centuries. Byzantine and patristic scholarship has demonstrated so well the ways in which monastic and ascetic figures interacted with lay persons in the Eastern Empire, a good reminder that not all monks are living behind walls or dying unseen in caves. Moschos also matters because his ascetic practices—walking around and writing—do not fit the traditional model of monastic discipline, and so this is an affirmation of the creativity of eastern monastic practices. Derek Krueger has written some important and insightful articles on this topic, and his work has been helpful for me in understanding the possibilities that exist beyond standard ascetic practices.

AD: Your third and fourth chapters treat medical issues and those of mortality. Are there spiritual or practical insights here that have perhaps been lost but should be recovered?

I was astounded to uncover so many accounts in the Meadow about medical issues, healing, suffering, dying, infertility, and so forth. It should not have surprised me, but it did, how many of the tales dealt with the frailty of our existence and an acute awareness of this. I was writing these two chapters on curing, enduring, death and dying while a friend of mine was dying of cancer. Naturally this had an impact on the way I read and the way I wrote, and that—as much as the texts—has refined my thinking on this theme. My reading of monastic texts, martyr accounts and theoretical approaches to suffering and pain has led me to conclude that an individual in pain forms a relationship with that pain. We cannot just treat pain as something independent of the body and mind of one in pain: we must also treat the relationship with that pain, and, further, we must consider why one forms that relationship to begin with. This manifests itself in monastic texts as “spiritual sickness” or the “ascetic sick role.” This relationship might have at its core a physical reason, or it might be emotional, cultural or spiritual. Either way, illness is used in monastic and ascetic environments for a purpose, and we can assume that this is true of laity as well. We would be wise to think about how illness is used and what it means to people as we seek treatment for their bodies or seek to force treatment upon them. We should also consider if treatment is even what is needed. I suppose if there is a spiritual or practical insight that has been lost but should be recovered, as you ask, it might be to remember that death is also a form of treatment, and illness might also be a cure.

AD: Sum up the book for us and who should read it.

This book is an attempt to uncover some of the social history of late sixth-century life among monastics, desert ascetics, and the laity they encountered and lived among. I make no claims that we can know this period perfectly, but I think that these spiritually beneficial tales can provide us with glimpses of how individuals on the fringes lived and how they might have thought about basic life issues such as Christian discipline, getting, giving or losing money, ill or good health and dying. As for who should read it? I think that it is appropriate for those studying asceticism, Palestinian monasticism, early Byzantine or late Antique social history.

AD: What projects are you at work on now?

It seems that each of these chapters had prompted thinking for me, and each has—in its own way—pushed me towards some future project. The chapter on interaction between laity and ascetics has challenged me to think more about the development of Christian asceticism independent of organized communities; the chapter on death has challenged me to think about how soteriology is understood and defined among monks and the chapter on healthcare has challenged me to think about the use of suffering and pain. As for the chapter on economics? I think I am done thinking about that for some time! My most current work is on the martyr Stephen the Younger. I was invited to think the use of pain imagery in Byzantine martyr vitae at a conference last year with Dr. Vasiliki Limberis and Dr. James Skedros, and this has led me—quite possibly—to my next large project.

Did John Moschos Ever Have to Mow that Spiritual Meadow of His?

Next month Ashgate will publish a book by an author familiar to readers of this blog: Brenda Llewellyn Ihssen, John Moschos' Spiritual Meadow: Authority and Autonomy at the End of the Antique World (Ashgate, 2014), 208pp.

About this book we are told:

John Moschos' Spiritual Meadow is one of the most important sources for late sixth-early seventh century Palestinian, Syrian and Egyptian monasticism. This undisputedly invaluable collection of beneficial tales provides contemporary society with a fuller picture of an imperfect social history of this period: it is a rich source for understanding not only the piety of the monk but also the poor farmer. Brenda Llewellyn Ihssen fills a lacuna in classical monastic secondary literature by highlighting Moschos' unique contribution to the way in which a fertile Christian theology informed the ethics of not only those serving at the altar but also those being served.Introducing appropriate historical and theological background to the tales, Llewellyn Ihssen demonstrates how Moschos' tales addresses issues of the autonomy of individual ascetics and lay persons in relationship with authority figures. Economic practices, health care, death and burials of lay persons and ascetics are examined for the theology and history that they obscure and reveal. Whilst teaching us about the complicated relationships between personal agency and divine intercession, Moschos' tales can also be seen to reveal liminal boundaries we know existed between the secular and the religious.

The Evil of Moneylending

Just released late last year is a book that manages to be both 'ancient and ever new,' that is, to draw on ancient sources still relevant today in our ongoing discussion about fiscal issues and policies in  the world's economies: Brenda Llewellyn Ihssen, They Who Give from Evil: The Response of the Eastern Church to Moneylending in the Early Christian Era (Pickwick, 2012), 207pp. I asked the author, who teaches at Pacific Lutheran University, for an interview and here are her thoughts:

AD: Tell us a bit about your background.

BLI: Well let me begin by saying “thank you” to you for this opportunity to answer some questions about myself and my work. I was born and raised in western Washington State, on the Puget Sound. I completed my Bachelor’s Degree in English and Education, and taught English in the public school system in Oregon state for a few years. Though I enjoyed my job and knew that I was called to the vocation of teaching, still I desired to study the early history and theology of the Christian church. I took a leave from teaching and returned to school; I completed my Master’s degree in theology at Pacific Lutheran Theological Seminary in Berkeley, California, and then my PhD at the University of St. Michael’s College in Toronto. After I graduated I returned to teaching, but not to the junior high classroom. I returned to the Pacific Northwest, where I teach as a Visiting Assistant Professor of Religion at Pacific Lutheran University.

AD: What led you to write this book in particular?

BLI: This began as a dissertation. I was directed towards this topic by my Doctor-Father, T. Allan Smith at the Faculty of Theology (St. Michael’s). Many dissertations emerge from places of deep passion for students; this was not my situation. That said, I found myself quite wooed by the topic of usury and by those about whom I was writing; quite quickly, their concerns became mine. I cannot help but think that this had something to do with the fact that I did not grow up with wealth and as a graduate student I was deeply in debt.

After I completed the dissertation I assumed that I would put this away and move on, but people were interested, and so I kept working on it. From the dissertation I produced an article for the Journal of Early Christian Studies, a chapter for the book Reading Patristic Texts on Social Ethics: Issues and Challenges for Twenty-First-Century Christian Social Thought (Catholic University of America Press, 2011) and another chapter for a forthcoming compendium on the social justice theologies of the patristic authors. While these projects seemed to close the chapter on this topic for me, enough people encouraged me to revisit the dissertation and revise it for publication as a monograph. I found myself rewriting large sections in light of what I have learned since 2004, and so I am ultimately glad that I revised the work for those who are interested in the social justice theologies of early Christian authors.

AD: Your title already "telegraphs" a rather stark view of many early Christian leaders about money-lending. In what did the evil consist? 

BLI: The evil for patristics lies in the deception of the one who lends, and this is an attitude that has quite ancient roots. The one who lends operates under the pretext of helping someone in need; while it appears as if the lender is offering assistance, in fact they are setting up a condition of debt from which it is often unlikely that the impoverished individual will successfully emerge. I compare this in my book to a usurer throwing an anvil rather than a rope to a person who is drowning. That said, the one who borrows is not off the hook, and individuals are cautioned—especially in the works of Basil and Gregory—to refrain from borrowing money for an extravagant lifestyle. In such cases, they are not innocent.

AD: You open with a chapter on Basil and Gregory of Nyssa and most of your focus is on them. What led you to them in particular? 

Well they are exceptional because they are the only two Greek patristic theologians to write sermons dedicated solely to this topic. Other writings on usury were simply tangential portions embedded in writings that had other intentions. In the Latin west there is Ambrose, but his sermon on this topic draws directly from Basil. So I was interested first in the scarcity of the topic, then on the fact that these two brothers—from affluent families, no less—are both writing on usury, and they are the only ones devoting concentrated attention to it. Then I was intrigued by secondary scholarship that seemed to dismiss Gregory’s contribution though my interpretation was that Gregory had something unique to offer. My desire to go forward with this project was supported by the patristic scholar Paul Fedwick, who felt that it was a good time to reassess the value of these sermons, most especially that of Gregory.

Basil the Great

AD: Are there other patristic sources, in addition to Basil and Gregory, who are important for or influential upon the questions of moneylending?  

It is worth pointing out that patristic theologians of both the Eastern and Western realms of the Empire were in agreement on the subject of usurious lending; though legal, usury was understood as contrary to divine law, and therefore any interest at all was condemned. This does not mean that the patristics did not recognize that lending did take place; it just meant that they did not agree that it should. In the Eastern Empire, Clement of Alexandria relies on biblical precedent in the Hebrew Scriptures for his statements in the Stromata against usurious practices, and Cyril of Jerusalem lists usury in his On the Ten Points of Doctrine within a list of sins that includes tavern-hunting, necromancy and witchcraft! Gregory of Nazianzus also condemned the practice in his poignant Oration 16. John Chrysostom is probably the most important and condemning of the practice; apart from our brothers Basil and Gregory, he has the most to say about moneylending and wealth in general. Many of Chrysostom’s homilies argue that the only investment worth making is in heaven; therefore one should give to the poor as Christ and earn interest for themselves in heaven, not on earth. Of the Latin fathers, perhaps the most important is Ambrose’ De Tobia; though his text lifts whole sections from Basil’s sermon, nevertheless his contribution is both important and provocative. It is worth noting also that the patristic theologians East and West inherited their attitudes from philosophers such as Philo of Alexandria, Plutarch, Aristotle and Plato. In this way, the Christian authors stand in a tradition of great thinkers on this topic.

AD:  Some Christians today would say that these early strictures about interest, usury, and related notions are no longer applicable because the economies of our time--at least in most of Europe, North America, and Australasia--are so vastly different. What are your thoughts on that?  

Yes, I hear this often. But while our economic systems and structures for handling finance have radically changed, people have not. We continue to have problems associated with greed and abundance, and we continue to fail to solve the problem of scarcity. A great example of this is that in late November—just after the holiday in the United States devoted to domestic arts—I read in the news that between thirty to fifty percent of food is wasted globally due to problems with storage, rigid adherence to expiry dates on packages and a need for fruits and vegetables to match an aesthetic criterion that is unreasonable. It takes no technology to fix this problem; it takes only a willingness to be morally responsible to the needs of the people and the planet. One might choose to purchase and eat food that is not perfect, or to not buy foods in bulk if they may go to waste. Or, if something might go to waste one could quickly share it with someone who might need it. These are three simple solutions, and this same type of thinking is found in the writings of Basil and Gregory. For example Basil (drawing on the works of Plutarch and from Proverbs), encourages those in need to avoid borrowing if they can, and to look first to their own resources first before enslaving themselves to money-lenders. He writes “Do you have metal plates, clothing, beasts of burden, utensils of every kind? Sell them; permit all things to go except your liberty.” This is as good a suggestion today as it was then, so while the systems are different, I think that the solutions are still appropriate. I do think that these early strictures about interest and usury are as applicable today as they were in the fourth century.

AD: The end of your first chapter references the subprime lending and mortgage crisis that sent much of the world into economic tumult in the last five years. Were they alive today, what advice would the Cappadocian brothers give to these problems?

I think that Basil would not have soothing words to say to those who tried to live beyond their means and borrowed too much, but I also think that he would take banks to task for holding out the promise of low interest to people who are not able to understand fully what financial deal they are making. I think that we can turn to John Chrysostom for the most extreme response to the evil of the type of lending that has been so disastrous for our country, for he equates a moneylender in his Homily Five on Matthew with a murderer: “under the cloak of kindness he digs the pitfall deeper, by the act of help burdening a man’s poverty, and in the act of stretching out the hand thrusting him down, and when receiving him as in harbor, involving him in shipwreck, as on a rock, or shoal, or reef.” Elsewhere Basil agrees with this sentiment, that one who has it in their good to do power but instead does evil is equated with a murderer, and Gregory refers to a usurer as a “murderous physician” who kills rather than heals. This is not an image of their own making, for the Hebrew Scriptures equate financial sins with murder, and Psalm 15—the Psalm on which Basil and Gregory focus their sermons—notes that the usurer will not be counted among those who will dwell on the Lord’s “holy hill.” Even Cato the Elder when asked “What do you think of lending at usury?” replied, “What do you think of killing a man?” So, what do I think of those who lent to those who did not have the capacity to pay their mortgages? Well, what do you think of killing someone?

AD: You note (p.109) that no Father was as adamant as John Chrysostom in his denunciations of affluence and usury. What are the problems he sees? Is his thinking broadly representative of the other sources you look at? 

I would agree that he is broadly representative of the sources, not only in his theology but also in his method. Like the other Fathers whom I highlight in the text, Chrysostom includes usury in homilies devoted to other subjects, but the financial concerns are brought into the discussion as part of something larger. As well, with respect to the problems that he sees regarding unjust financial transactions, Chrysostom is largely concerned with the direction of people’s investments. In other words, they are investing in transitory, material things rather than in that which is divine, or Heaven. Of course this seems odd to many who do not come from an Orthodox or Catholic background with a tradition of the Fathers; how can one invest in Heaven? To understand what this means for the Fathers, one has to understand something of their anthropology and theology. If God is accessible through God’s uncreated energies, then investing in Heaven is possible in the “here and now” because when one aids someone in need, then one is responding to God. This is a concept that all of the Greek Fathers seem to share, but it does seem that for Chrysostom it is a theme to which he returns many times. Gregory of Nyssa also promotes this same way of thinking about giving as “investing in heaven,” going so far as to call God a debtor to us! But of course what he means by that is that God, who gives from God’s abundance, is the model for giving.

 AD: How do you, and the Fathers, understand the problem of moneylending in directly theological terms? That is, usury is condemned (presumably) not just because of socioeconomic problems it creates for people, but also because such practices do not reflect who God is. What images of God, what descriptions of His nature, emerge from the Christian tradition's treatment of usury? 

BLI: All of the Fathers on whom I write are approaching their topic through the lens of asceticism and monasticism. In other words, they are individuals who have intentionally divested themselves of unnecessary wealth and they live among a community that supports that ideal. Of course, we have to recognize that they lived during an age when ecclesiastical leaders were expected to be connected to monastic communities and being an “ascetic” had become rather part of the job description of the professional religious. Further, they had communities that supported them spiritually, emotionally and materially, so to divest oneself of wealth while still be provided for is hardly the same thing as divesting oneself of wealth and not knowing a single soul in the city. As well, these were all individuals who were classically educated, and so their image of God is very much shaped by that education. Their theology has an impact on their understanding of economic practices as each moment, each financial interaction, becomes for them—and for us as well—an opportunity to meet God in the poor. However, this also means that something of God’s nature (the divine energies) cannot be approached or known as long as human nature is dressed in the garments of sin and stained by avarice. Gregory of Nyssa, in his Sermon 5, Forgive us our Debts, writes that an evil response by the wealthy to the poor distorts the inherent goodness of creation. This is ultimately, for Gregory, tied up in his Christology, for a proper understanding of shared human nature on the part of the giver will move both the giver and the receiver towards an original state of purity. In this way, acts of benevolence and goodness clarify the divine image that both parties are capable of demonstrating. “For as you practice goodness,” he writes, “you are clothed in Christ and as you become like Christ you become like God.”

AD: Sum up for us what you hope to accomplish with this book, and then tell us what you are working on now.  


First, I hoped that this book might provide a helpful history of the development of lending in the Greek, Roman and Hebrew cultures. Many times books on economic history are pretty formidable, and so I attempted to write a history that would be accessible to those with more than a passing interest but yet not necessarily students of ancient economies or legal systems. Second, I felt strongly that Gregory of Nyssa did not receive due treatment in secondary materials that analyzed his work; it felt too often that his sermon was treated as a mere copy of Basil’s, when in fact it was Ambrose who lifted who passages out of Basil’s sermon! I think that many times Gregory’s writings on similar topics of Basil’s were his way of saying “I have something to contribute as well,” and that is an attitude that we should model. I think it would have been challenging to have been the sibling of Basil, and even though Gregory has in no way suffered with respect to academic treatment of his theology, still, with respect to this one sermon I felt that it warranted—and that he deserved—a closer look.

What I am working on now is something quite different. I am completing for Ashgate a manuscript on the writing of John Moschos, a late sixth, early seventh century monk who composed a document known as the Pratum Spirituale, or The Spiritual Meadow. Along with his companion Sophronios, Moschos traveled around Palestine and Sinai and collected what we call “beneficial tales,” very brief stories most often focused on monastic life. Moschos is an enigmatic figure, and my manuscript seeks to uncover through close analysis of select tales in his text what we might be able to learn of the social history of the early Byzantine monks and lay people at a turning point in the history of the Eastern Empire. Now this seems like a project that is unrelated, but it is actually the topic of finances that led me back to Moschos’ Pratum. Years ago I realized that many of the tales dealt with—in some way—problems of scarcity, greed and financial suffering. So when it was time to embark on a new scholarship project I found my way into the text through, once again, the theme of social justice.

The Evil of Money-Lending

As the interminable opéra bouffe drags on in Washington over the "debt ceiling" and "fiscal cliff," a new book lands on my desk from the publisher quite unexpectedly: Brenda Llewellyn Ihssen, They Who Give from Evil: The Response of the Eastern Church to Moneylending in the Early Christian Era (Pickwick Publications, 2012), xiii+207pp.

The author, who has written reviews for Logos: A Journal of Eastern Christian Studies recently, is a visiting professor at the Pacific Lutheran University. About her book the publisher tells us: 

The purpose of They Who Give from Evil is to consider the financial and salvific implications of usury on the community and the individual soul as it is addressed within the sermons of a selection of early Christian Greek authors, in the historical context of the fourth century Roman Empire. Although focusing on two Greek texts, St. Basil's Homily on Psalm Fourteen and Against Those Who Practice Usury by St. Gregory of Nyssa, Ihssen is able to shed fascinating insight on Roman life and illustrate the rich social justice theologies of the patristic world.

I look forward to seeing this book discussed further in the new year, and also to interviewing the author.

Logos: A Journal of Eastern Christian Studies

The spring issue (vol. 53, nos. 1-2) of Logos: A Journal of Eastern Christian Studies is beginning to take shape quite nicely. I will have more details as articles move through the review process and are accepted. Here for now are just some of the books we are having reviewed:

Daniel Galadza reviews Stefano Parenti, A Oriente e Occidente di Costantinopoli. Temi e problemi liturgici di ieri e di oggi (2010), a collection of articles by Parenti, a professor of liturgy at the Pontificio Ateneo Sant'Anselmo in Rome and co-editor of the oldest Byzantine euchologion, Barberini gr. 336. Galadza notes that this collection helps to "answer fundamental problems troubling liturgical scholars for the last century."

Galadza also reviews a new book on the Liturgy of St. James first noted here.

Robert Klymasz, the Zurawecky Research Fellow at the Centre for Ukrainian Canadian Studies at the University of Manitoba, reviews Myrna Kostash, Prodigal Daughter: A Journey to Byzantium, calling it a book whose journey leaves the reader "humbled, enlightened, and refreshed." 

Michael Plekon reviews Antoine Arjakovsky, En attendant le Concile de l'Eglise Orthodoxe. (For my own thoughts on this book, see the lengthy review here.) Plekon notes that this book "witnesses that he [Arjakovsky] is...a wonderful theologian of the Christian life in the 21st century."

Bradley Daugherty reviews Allen Brent, Cyprian and Roman Carthage, saying of it that it will "become a standard work and necessary reading for those seeking to understand the bishop of Carthage and his milieu."


Brenda Llewellyn Ihssen reviews John Renard, Islam and Christianity: Theological Themes in Comparative Perspective, calling it an "articulate and eloquent rendering of the major features of the theological language of Islam and Christianity."

North America's greatest Dante scholar, Anthony Esolen, reviews E.D. Karampetsos, Dante and Byzantium.

Michael Lower of the University of Minnesota reviews Thomas Asbridge, The Crusades: The Authoritative History of the War for the Holy Land. Asbridge's scholarship has attracted a great deal of attention recently, especially in Britain. Lower says that anyone interested in the Crusades "can learn a great deal from this book," which he further calls "a wonderful achievement."


Peter Galadza reviews Thomas Pott, Byzantine Liturgical Reform: A Study of Liturgical Change in the Byzantine Tradition. In a long, critical review, Galadza notes that the book is not without several problems, but that it raises crucial issues in a groundbreaking way and it "will become a classic work on Eastern Christian liturgical reform."


Myroslaw Tataryn reviews Chris Hann and Hermann Goltz, eds., Eastern Christians in Anthropological Perspective, saying of this collection that it is "very readable, well organized, and highly recommended for its refreshing and thorough perspectives on contemporary Eastern Christianity."