Trinitarian Theology of St. Gregory Palamas

Les Éditions du Cerf continues to bring out welcome studies on Orthodoxy and patristics for francophone Orthodoxy, including this recent volume:  Amphiloque Radovic, Le Mystère de la Sainte Trinité selon saint Grégoire de Palamas (2012), 336pp. 

 About this book the publisher tells us: 

Le présent volume est la traduction française de la thèse de doctorat de Mgr Amphiloque Radovic, éditée pour la première fois dans une langue occidentale. Publié en 1973 dans la collection du Centre patriarcal des études patristiques « Vlatadôn » (Thessalonique), considéré en Grèce comme l'un des dix meilleurs livres théologiques du XXe siècle, cet ouvrage est une référence dans le domaine des études des Pères de l'Église. 

Pour Mgr Amphiloque, le thème principal des écrits palamites, à savoir la distinction entre l'essence et les énergies divines, ne peut être compris que dans son contexte triadologique et christologique. La pensée de saint Grégoire Palamas (XIVe siècle) est, à ce titre, fidèle à la vérité biblique et à la Tradition de l'Église. Le métropolite Amphiloque analyse, dans un premier temps, la théorie palamite de la possibilité de la connaissance de la Sainte Trinité et sa manifestation, puis l'enseignement de Palamas sur le Dieu tri-hypostatique, enfin la question des unions et des distinctions dans la Sainte Trinité. Il porte une attention particulière à la critique palamite du « Filioque », qui est inséparable de l'enseignement sur l'unique action (= énergie) de la Sainte Trinité. Cette critique est encore d'actualité et demeure le point de départ de toute discussion théologique entre les Églises orthodoxe et catholique. Selon Mgr Amphiloque, si saint Grégoire Palamas établit une distinction entre l'Être éternel de la Trinité divine et sa manifestation, par économie de son énergie, c'est pour défendre la communion avec Dieu et la réalité de l'expérience mystique, qui est l'essence même de l'Église. 

En ce sens, la question de la distinction de la « théologie » et de l'« économie » dans la Trinité est une question sotériologique et non philosophique. Saint Grégoire Palamas affirme la grandeur et la richesse inexprimables de la Sainte Trinité, mais également la grandeur de l'homme, ancré dans son élévation infinie à travers la communion avec Dieu le Père, le Fils et le Saint-Esprit dans sa gloire éternelle.

Byzantine Political Ideology

Dimiter Angelov of the University of Birmingham has recently authored a book that sheds further light on the politics of the East-Roman Empire: Imperial Ideology and Political Thought in Byzantium, 1204-1330 (Cambridge, 2011), 474pp. 
 

About this book the publisher tells us:

This 2007 study was the first to systematically investigate Byzantine imperial ideology, court rhetoric and political thought after the Latin conquest of Constantinople in 1204 - in the Nicaean state (1204–61) and during the early period of the restored empire of the Palaiologoi. The book explores Byzantine political imagination at a time of crisis when the Empire ceased to be a first-rate power in the Mediterranean. It investigates the correspondence and fissures between official political rhetoric, on the one hand, and the political ideas of lay thinkers and churchmen, on the other. Through the analysis of a wide body of sources, a picture of Byzantine political thought emerges which differs significantly from the traditional one. The period saw refreshing developments in court rhetoric and political thought, some with interesting parallels in the medieval and Renaissance West, which arose in response to the new historical realities.

Patriarch Kiril's Book

Though the patriarch of Moscow does not command the press attention that the patriarch and pope of Rome does, the former is nonetheless a significant figure in global Christianity by virtue of being the head of the second-largest church on the planet. A recent book brings some of his thoughts to us in English: Patriarch Kiril, Freedom and Responsibility: A Search for Harmony (Darton, Longman, and Todd, 2011), 160pp.

About this book the publisher tells us:

At a time of crisis, the leader of the Russian Orthodox Church presents his remarkable personal vision of a ‘multi-polar’ future for the world. Two antagonistic systems are ranged against each other, one liberal, secular and humanistic, the other religious and traditionalist. Patriarch Kirill draws on the bitter experience of the Russian people in the twentieth century to illustrate the dangers of totalitarianism and how grave the break with one’s spiritual roots can be for civilization. Rather than a struggle to the death between competing value systems, he proposes instead the way of co-existence, grounded in mutual respect for moral categories that are common to all. He calls not for liberal values to be abandoned but to be supplemented by other cultural and philosophical systems, and to create a harmony between the two, not just with declarations of mutual friendship and respect but also through the reform of law and global governance. The Patriarch quotes the great Russian writer Dostoyevsky, who declared that "Beauty will save the world".

The Battle of Poltava

Serhii Plokhy, the Mykhailo Hrushevsky Professor of Ukrainian History at Harvard University, has done so much to advance our understanding of East-Slavic history, one integral part of which, of course, is its religious history, which he has treated in such books as Religion and Nation in Modern Ukraine (2003), co-authored with Frank Sysyn; The Cossacks and Religion in Early Modern Ukraine (Oxford, 2002); and Tsars and Cossacks: A Study in Iconography (Harvard, 2002). He is also the author of a fascinating story about the end of World War II and the Yalta conference, to which I drew attention here. 

Now he has come out with a new collection of articles under his editorship: Poltava 1709: The Battle and the Myth (Harvard Papers in Ukrainian Studies) (2012), 480pp.

About this book, the publisher tells us: 

The Battle of Poltava has long been recognized as a crucial event in the geopolitical history of Europe and a decisive point in the Great Northern War between Sweden and the Russian Empire. The Russian victory at Poltava contributed to the decline of Sweden as a Great Power and was a major setback to Ukrainian independence. Hetman Ivan Mazepa, who joined forces with the Swedish king Charles XII against Tsar Peter I, remains a controversial figure even today.

In 2009, the Harvard Ukrainian Research Institute gathered scholars from around the globe and from many fields of study—history, military affairs, philology, linguistics, literature, art history, music—to mark the 300th anniversary of the battle. This book is a collection of their papers on such topics as the international, Russian, and Ukrainian contexts of the battle; Mazepa in European culture; the language and literature of the period; art and architecture; history and memory; and fact, fiction, and the literary imagination. Mazepa himself is the focus of many of the articles—a hero to Ukrainians but a treacherous figure to Russians. This book provides a fresh look at this watershed event and sheds new light on the legacies of the battle’s major players.

Gregory of Nyssa on the Beatitudes

One of the most important and influential, if at times baffling or ambigous, Fathers of the Church remains St. Gregory of Nyssa, on whom, as I noted before, publications continue to pour forth today. This month sees a new treatment of his eight homilies on the Beatitudes:

Michael Glerup, Gregory of Nyssa: Sermons on the Beatitudes (Classics in Spiritual Formation) (InterVarsity Press, 2012), 160pp.

This does not sound exactly like a translation per se, but a version that seems suited for use in a parish study or a book club or something similar. The publisher tells us:

As part of the Classics in Spiritual Formation, the sermons of Gregory of Nyssa offer a contemporary rendering of ancient spiritual wisdom for today's readers. Begin with the introduction, which provides the context and background, and then dive into the text, translated and paraphrased Michael Glerup from the original languages. You'll also find helpful callouts that show how the work relates to your personal spiritual formation and clarify unfamiliar ideas. Don't miss this unique opportunity to interact with the work of some of Christianity's great spiritual formation teachers and experience true spiritual transformation.

Origen the Writer

Interest in Origen, as I have noted frequently, remains very high today. He was one of the most influential figures of early Christianity and remains so today. A massive new collection, published at the very end of last year in the Bibliotheca Ephemeridum Theologicarum Lovaniensium series, looks at Origen as scribe: H. Pietras and S. Kaczmarek, eds., Origeniana Decima: Origen as Writer (Peeters, 2011), xviii+1039pp. 

About this book the publisher tells us:

This volume contains the proceedings of the tenth meeting of the international “Origeniana” conference which is convened every four years. The overall theme of the “Origeniana Decima” is “Origen as writer”. The volume is divided into eight parts which are preceded by two introductory papers that introduce the reader into some of the secrets of Origen’s writing techniques. The first part consists of two essays that deal with two intellectual traditions that had a major influence on Origen, Neo-Platonism and the rabbinic exegetical tradition. Part Two deals with the scope and complexity of Origen’s oeuvre and Part Three with aspects of hermeneutics. Part Four focuses on the Apologies, with special interest in the Contra Celsum, and Part Five on the commentaries and the homilies. The sixth part includes articles on various aspects of Origen’s language. Part Seven deals with the philosophical sources as these are used in exegetical and other works. Part Eight, on the disciples and followers of Origen, is the longest one with nineteen essays. Overall, this is once more an excellent specimen of the famous Origeniana conferences which for now almost forty years bring together specialists from all over the world. This volume, like previous ones in the series, will contribute significantly to our knowledge of Origen’s achievements and of his influence.

The publisher also helpfully provides a PDF of the table of contents here.  

Miracles from Byzantium

Just released this month is a new collection that will interest Byzantinists especially: Alice-Mary Talbot and Scott Fitzgerald Johnson, trans., Miracle Tales from Byzantium (Dumbarton Oaks Medieval Library) (Harvard University Press, 2012), 480pp.

About this book the publisher tells us:

Miracles occupied a unique place in medieval and Byzantine life and thought. This volume makes available three collections of miracle tales never before translated into English. Together, the collections offer an exceptional variety of miracles from the Byzantine era.

First are the fifth-century Miracles of Saint Thekla. Legendary female companion of the Apostle Paul, Thekla counted among the most revered martyrs of the early church. Her Miracles depict activities, at once extraordinary and ordinary, in a rural healing shrine at a time when Christianity was still supplanting traditional religion. A half millennium later comes another anonymous text, the tenth-century Miracles of the Spring of the Virgin Mary. This collection describes how the marvelous waters at this shrine outside Constantinople healed emperors, courtiers, and churchmen.

Complementing the first two collections are the Miracles of Saint Gregory Palamas, fourteenth-century archbishop of Thessalonike. Written by the most gifted hagiographer of his era (Philotheos Kokkinos), this account tells of miraculous healings that Palamas performed, both while alive and once dead. It allows readers to witness the development of a saint’s cult in late Byzantium. Saints and their miracles were essential components of faith in medieval and Byzantine culture. These collections deepen our understanding of attitudes toward miracles. Simultaneously, they display a remarkable range of registers in which Greek could be written during the still little-known Byzantine period.

ASEC: Call for Papers

I have previously drawn attention to the conferences of the Association for the Study of Eastern Christian History and Culture (ASEC) and the publication of some of its proceedings. The last two conferences at Ohio State were fantastic affairs--warmly collegial in the exchanges, helpfully critical in advancing research and scholarship, and deeply fascinating sessions interspersed with good food and conversation among some lovely people.

The next conference will be held in March 2013 at Georgetown in Washington, DC., and the organizers have recently released a call for papers. I strongly encourage all who are interested at least to attend, if not to consider presenting a paper:

The Association for the Study of Eastern Christian History and Culture (ASEC, Inc.). ASEC announces its fifth biennial conference to take place at Georgetown University, in Washington, DC on March 8-9, 2013. We are pleased to invite papers for a multi-disciplinary conference devoted to the cultures that have been influenced by forms of Christianity originating from the Eastern/Byzantine tradition.

The theme for this year is “Antecedents and Subsequents of Iosif Volotsky: Exploring Eastern Christian Concerns” and is conceptualized to embrace topics from any period, and all regions related to Eastern Christian groups.

ASEC’s mission is to encourage scholarship in all areas of Eastern Christian culture from any time period or region. Therefore, while Iosif Volotsky (d. 1515) represents a branch of the Russian tradition, ASEC nevertheless encourages papers and panels on topics outside that experience. The topic is broadly conceived to address the interests and concerns of Iosif, a monastic reformer, whose life and work influenced the religious culture of Muscovy as well as modern scholarship of his period. Iosif’s interests encompassed the multi-faceted issues of religious and spiritual life and ranged from monastic reform to patristics, liturgics, education, administration, spirituality, heresy, and secular Christian life, among others.

The conference will include two days of panels plus a keynote address. Panel proposals of three to four presenters plus chair/discussant are preferred but individual papers are also encouraged. Please send panel and paper proposals with abstracts of 100-200 words for each paper, and a brief one- to two-page curriculum vitae for each participant to Valeria Nollan (NOLLAN@rhodes.edu).

Proposals must be received by August 15, 2012.

Registration is $50 ($25 for graduate students) and participants must be members of ASEC by the time of the conference. Fees are waived for students and faculty of Georgetown University with current university identification.

To become a member of ASEC, please contact the ASEC treasurer, Lucien Frary, Rider University, 2083 Lawrence Road, Lawrenceville NJ 08648 (lfrary@rider.edu).

The conference is co-sponsored by: ASEC, Inc.; Georgetown University’s Medieval Studies Program, Department of History, Department of Theology, and the Center for Eurasian, Russian and East European Studies; The Ohio State University’s Resource Center for Medieval Slavic Studies, and the Hilandar Research Library; Eastern Kentucky University’s Department of History.

For more information contact Jennifer Spock jennifer.spock@eku.edu

Islam Encountering Byzantium

As I have noted before, we are still struggling to learn about the first encounters between Eastern Christians and Islam in the first millennium especially. A new exhibit at the Met in New York, which I plan on seeing this summer, helps aid our understanding. Accompanying that exhibit is a new book, which Peter Brown, perhaps the most distinguished antique historian of our time, discusses here at length in the New York Review of Books. That book is Helen C. Evans, ed., Byzantium and Islam: Age of Transition (Metropolitan Museum of Art, 2012), 332pp. (Distributed by Yale University Press.)

About this book the publisher tells us:

This groundbreaking volume explores the epochal transformations and unexpected continuities in the Byzantine Empire from the seventh to the ninth century. As the period opened, the Empire's southern provinces—the vibrant, diverse areas of North Africa and the eastern Mediterranean—were at the crossroads of trade routes reaching from Spain to China. These regions experienced historic upheavals when their Christian and Jewish communities encountered the emerging Islamic world, and by the ninth century, an unprecedented cross-fertilization of cultures had taken place.

This extraordinary age is brought vividly to life by leading international scholars, their writings accompanied by sumptuous illustrations of the period's most notable arts and artifacts. Resplendent images of authority, religion, and trade—embodied in precious metals, brilliant textiles, fine ivories, elaborate mosaics, manuscripts, and icons, many of them never before published—highlight the dynamic dialogue between the rich array of Byzantine styles and the evolving Islamic aesthetic. With its masterful exploration of two centuries that would shape the emerging medieval world, Byzantium and Islamprovides a revelatory interpretation of a period with profound ramifications for the modern era.

New Works on the Syriac Tradition.

Gorgias Press, whose lists on Eastern Christianity and much else besides are among the most impressive in the world, is coming out with a new series of translations of the Syriac Bible. Details here.

They also published in February the hefty (612pp.) Gorgias Encyclopedic Dictionary of the Syriac Heritage under the expert pens of Sebastian Brock, Aaron Butts, George Kiraz, and Lucas van Rompay. 

About this encyclopedia and those who worked on it, the publisher tells us:

The Gorgias Encyclopedic Dictionary of the Syriac Heritage (GEDSH) is the first major encyclopedia-type reference work devoted exclusively to Syriac Christianity, both as a field of scholarly inquiry and as the inheritance of Syriac Christians today. In more than 600 entries it covers the Syriac heritage from its beginnings in the first centuries of the Common Era up to the present day. Special attention is given to authors, literary works, scholars, and locations that are associated with the Classical Syriac tradition. Within this tradition, the diversity of Syriac Christianity is highlighted as well as Syriac Christianity s broader literary and historical contexts, with major entries devoted to Greek and Arabic authors and more general themes, such as Syriac Christianity s contacts with Judaism and Islam, and with Armenian, Coptic, Ethiopian, and Georgian Christianities. In addition to the literary tradition, inscriptions and objects of art are given due consideration. The entries are accompanied by 131 illustrations, twenty of which are in color. The volume closes with maps, lists of patriarchs of the main Syriac Churches of the Middle East, and elaborate indices.

GEDSH is a collaborative project that involves seventy-six scholars from across the globe. Three of the four editors are associated with major universities in Europe and the United States: Oxford University, Yale University, and Duke University. The fourth editor is the founding director of Beth Mardutho: The Syriac Institute. GEDSH was carried out under the auspices of Beth Mardutho.

Radical Platonism in Byzantium

The role of Platonism in shaping Christianity, from antiquity to the present, continues to be debated by Christians of all traditions today. A new book continues the examination: Niketas Siniossoglou, Radical Platonism in Byzantium: Illumination and Utopia in Gemistos Plethon (Cambridge Classical Studies) (CUP, 2011), 470pp.

About this book the publisher tells us:

Byzantium has recently attracted much attention, but principally among cultural, social and economic historians. This book shifts the focus to intellectual history, exploring the thoughts of visionary reformer Gemistos Plethon (c.1355-1452). It argues that Plethon brought to their fulfilment latent tendencies among Byzantine humanists towards a distinctive anti-Christian and pagan outlook. His magnum opus, the pagan Nomoi, was meant to provide an alternative to and escape-route from the polarity of the Orthodoxy of Gregory Palamas and Thomism. It was also a groundbreaking reaction to the bankruptcy of a pre-existing humanist agenda and to aborted attempts at the secularisation of the State, whose cause Plethon had himself championed in his two utopian Memoranda. Inspired by Plato, Plethon's secular utopianism and paganism emerge as the two sides of a single coin. On another level, the book challenges anti-essentialist scholarship that views paganism and Christianity as social and cultural constructions.

The Ottomans

As we are rapidly coming on the centenary of the outbreak of World War I, we are seeing new books examining the legacy of that event which more than any other shaped the last century and continues to shape the world we live in today. A recent collection, edited by Jørgen S. Nielsen, looks at the collapse of one of the empires in which large numbers of Eastern Christians--Armenians, Greeks, Assyrians, and others--found themselves: Religion, Ethnicity and Contested Nationhood in the Former Ottoman Space (Brill, 2011), 294pp.

About this book the publisher tells us:

There has been a growing interest in recent years in reviewing the continued impact of the Ottoman empire even long after its demise at the end of the First World War. The wars in former Yugoslavia, following hot on the civil war in Lebanon, were reminders that the settlements of 1918-22 were not final. While many of the successor states to the Ottoman empire, in east and west, had been built on forms of nationalist ideology and rhetoric opposed to the empire, a newer trend among historians has been to look at these histories as Ottoman provincial history. The present volume is an attempt to bring some of those histories from across the former Ottoman space together. They cover from parts of former Yugoslavia, Bulgaria and Greece to Lebanon, including Turkey itself, providing rich material for comparing regions which normally are not compared.

Strange Bedfellows?

Interest in Origen of Alexandria, as I have noted repeatedly, remains high. His influence is to be found in rather unlikely places such as the work of the post-revolutionary French political thinker Joseph de Maistre. I am in the midst of reading Marc Froidefont's fascinating recent book Théologie de Joseph de Maistre (Paris: Éditions Classiques Garnier, 2010).

Froidefont lays out in elaborate detail just how indebted Maistre was to Origen, including some of the latter's rather dodgier bits of eschatology. This will surely be disconcerting to certain "traditionalist" Catholics who assume, usually without having read him, that someone as reportedly revanchist as Maistre, stout defender Du Pape, must be impeccably orthodox and totally reliable. Maistre was heavily influenced by not only Origen but also illuminism and Masonry and other things that would surely give people pause today. Origen's influence especially, Froidefont says, has left a "soupçon d'hétérodoxie...sur l'oeuvre de Maistre."

Oh, No, You're Not Wearing THAT to Church

Who among us--parents or children--has not argued over the "appropriateness" of wearing some get-up or other to church? Who among us, Pharisee-like, has not looked askance at something worn by our neighbor in the nearby pew and prayed "I thank thee Lord that thou didst not create me a slob like this poor fattie?" It seems to have been forever thus if a new book about Tertullian is any indication. 

Tertullian in the Latin tradition, like Origen in the Greek, is somewhat sui generis. Nevertheless, his influence was and is still considerable. A new book looks at what he thought and wrote about an issue that seems eternally to rile Christians: what to wear--to church and in general. Carly Daniel-Hughes, The Salvation of the Flesh in Tertullian of Carthage: Dressing for the Resurrection (Palgrave Macmillan, 2011), 192pp. 

About this book the publisher tells us:

Why did the influential Christian thinker, Tertullian of Carthage (160-220 C.E.), while addressing the critical issue of salvation of the flesh, write about clothing? Why did he care what Christians wore? Carly Daniel-Hughes answers that in early Christian communities clothing tied to identity and theology. Placing Tertullian’s writings in the Roman culture of dress, she shows that in them men’s dress is used to envision Christian masculinity as non-Roman and anti-imperial. His concerns about women’s dress, however, reveal internal Christian debates about the nature of the flesh and the possibility of its transformation in to a resurrected, glorious body.

The Russian Time of Troubles

Northern Illinois University Press, as I have noted before, continues to publish fascinating books in their welcome and acclaimed series on Eastern Orthodoxy. The latest offering is Isaiah Gruber, Orthodox Russia in Crisis: Church and Nation in the Time of Troubles (NILP, 2012), 300pp.

About this book the publisher tells us:

A pivotal period in Russian history, the Time of Troubles in the early seventeenth century has taken on new resonance in the country’s post-Soviet search for new national narratives. The historical role of the Orthodox Church has emerged as a key theme in contemporary remembrances of this time—but what precisely was that role?
The first comprehensive study of the Church during the Troubles, Orthodox Russia in Crisis reconstructs this tumultuous time, offering new interpretations of familiar episodes while delving deep into the archives to uncover a much fuller picture of the era. Analyzing these sources, Isaiah Gruber argues that the business activity of monasteries played a significant role in the origins and course of the Troubles and that frequent changes in power forced Church ideologues to innovate politically, for example inventing new justifications for power to be granted to the people and to royal women. These new ideas, Gruber contends, ultimately helped bring about a new age in Russian spiritual life and a crystallization of the national mentality.

In the coming weeks I hope to interview the author. And I look forward to seeing this book reviewed in Logos: A Journal of Eastern Christian Studies, the oldest academic revue of its kind in North America, to which you will want to subscribe here.  

Tim Kelleher on the Niceno-Constantinopolitan Creed

I have previously drawn attention to a recently released documentary on DVD about the Nicene Creed: The Creed: What Christians Profess, and Why It Ought to Matter.

As I noted in my review, this is an excellent resource ideally suited for, say, parish study groups or introductory survey courses on Christian doctrine, doctrinal history, or the ecumenical councils. Such study of the creed--and of the ecumenical councils--is all the more necessary today in an age of general ignorance about both Christian history and fundamental Christian doctrine. 

I asked the producer, Tim Kelleher, for an interview about this production and his other works. Here are his thoughts:


AD: Tell us about your background:

TK: Before I do, I’d like to thank you. As I’m a big fan of Logos, it means a lot to have this chance to talk with you about our film.

So, here we go. I was born in the Bronx, NY and went on to live in all five boroughs of NYC – which I believe ties the record! Thanks, in large part, to the heroism of certain Sisters of Charity of Halifax, I graduated from Villanova, where Bernard Prusak and Jack Caputo were teaching at the time. Since then, I’ve been fortunate to work consistently as a stage, film and TV actor, writer and director while continuing to study. In 1995 I “turned to the East,” was eventually received into the Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church, and am about to complete a graduate degree in theology at The Catholic University America.

AD: What led you to work on The Creed?

When you think about it you realize that maybe more than anything else, what Christians have most tangibly in common is the Creed. And what does the Creed say?  Well, in a way, it can be distilled to those words of St. Athanasius: God became human, so that humans might become God. This is an astonishing vision of the dignity with which humanity – and by implication, all creation, indeed, reality itself – is endowed. All bluster aside, the worst that can really be said about it is that it’s too good to be true. And to that we ought to respond with the Psalmist: Taste and see.

At the beginning of the film there are two quotes, one of which is from 1 Peter: Always be prepared to give an account of the reasons for your hope. Well, this is exactly what we’re being asked to do today, by a culture in which a motivated minority is determined, not just to marginalize religious faith – and Christianity in particular – but to shove it off the cliff. What is unacceptable to me is that the far greater number of people--agnostic and religious--are bullied into virtual silence because of a lack of background in history, philosophy and theology that would enable them to see the gross deficiencies of the “threat” and respond to it with confidence and charity. But, honestly, it is tough--painful and awkward in this culture--to be a believer, or anyone in between, without such resources. You don’t have to be Karl Rahner or Pavel Florensky, but it’s not enough to parrot pious formula either, no matter how orthodox. People on both sides of the question require and deserve something real, personal, and alive.

The Creed has a unique capacity to foster that – most importantly, by helping to deepen an individual’s relationship to God in and through Christ. It is the impossible beauty of this experience that can, in time, be expressed in the form of the “reasons” spoken of in that Letter of Peter. 

AD: You draw on a remarkably "balanced" sample of theologians from Protestant, Catholic, and Orthodox backgrounds. Was that by design?

TK: Thank you for saying so. It was important to us to aim for that kind of balance. Even though the scope of the project got trimmed quicker than a mullet on the first day of boot camp, I am deeply grateful for the people who agreed to participate. The late Charles Colson watched it and was very positive. He did ask, ”Where are the evangelicals?” Well, I can tell you, it wasn’t for lack of trying – or for lack of response. It came down to a matter of logistics and tight schedules. But I’ve heard from a number of evangelicals who’ve been very complimentary. And we did get a nice review from Timothy George, dean of Beeson Divinity.

AD: When it comes to the creed, Eastern and Western versions are identical except for one little word that has created huge problems: the "filioque." You do not really address that in your film. Why not?

The Fathers of Nicaea with the Symbol

TK: It’s true. I deliberately chose not to address the “filioque.” Given the time constraint (approx. 30 minutes), I felt I couldn’t justify “stepping out” of a narrative meant to focus on the Creed’s unifying charism. Certainly, the filoque is an important and fascinating topic, well worth exploring. Thankfully, it is also an issue that needs no longer pose an obstacle to the existentially urgent request issued so poignantly in Ut Unum Sint.


AD: Do we take the Creed for granted today? I'm thinking here of the common practice in Orthodox, Catholic, and some Protestant traditions to recite the Creed every Sunday. Do you think that weekly recitation helps with understanding and appreciation of the creed or does it instead tend to encourage a rote-memorization approach that glazes the riches of what the Creed actually says?

TK: I know that for a long time I took it for granted. Certainly, working on this project opened up aspects of the Creed I really hadn't appreciated before.  In the film, one of our participants puts it very well, calling it "an under-examined, under-utilized, and under-appreciated instrument," and voices the hope that parishes and all manner of Christian communities will come together to study the Creed. As he says, "It has produced saints of incredible power." I can’t argue with that.


AD: Is the Niceno-Constantinopolitan Creed too long and complicated? Should we just use shorter, simpler creeds like the so-called Apostles' Creed some in the West use? Or should Christians follow Islamic practice in their "shahaddah" that sums up the faith in one sentence ("there is no God but Allah and Mohammad is his last prophet"). Why not have a Christian equivalent "I believe in the Triune God of Father, Son, and Holy Spirit." Wouldn't that be enough? 

TK: I suppose we could say something along the lines you’ve suggested – or St. Athanasius’s rendering of theosis – if that was all we had. But it’s not. The Trinity, made manifest through the experience of Jesus, is what differentiates Christianity from the other monotheistic traditions. Wolfhart Pannenberg once said that the Incarnation makes monotheism concrete. The Nicene Creed is the fullest creedal expression of that. Therefore, it would be pointless not to utilize it and mine its depths as we do.


AD: How would you explain the role, authority, and rationale of the Creed to a non-Christian? Why have such a statement of beliefs? 


TK: You’ve just touched on one of the reasons the Creed is so surprisingly compelling – and why it has such potential as an instrument for evangelization. It presents the opportunity to begin by identifying the historical context that made the Creed a necessity in the first place – namely, the Arian claim that denied the divinity of Christ. This is a great jumping-off point because this controversy has never completely gone away. In varying degrees, it continues to operate in, as well as outside, the Church.


AD: Today we've seen the "argument" from some Christians (e.g., Anglicans) that things not explicitly covered in the Creed can be changed. Thus Anglicans have said that same-sex marriages are not in the creed so Christians should have no problem approving them. Do we need an updated version of the Creed addressing in more detail such moral questions? 

TK: Now that’s a question Mike Wallace could be proud of!  I would say that the Tradition can accommodate – in fact, facilitate – the development of doctrine. However, within the Christian communion, we do see what looks like the eagerness for a different kind of accommodation, one keen to take its cue from secular models. This desire to accommodate, or synthesize, often seems lacking in an awareness of, or interest in, the fact that many of the models referenced are themselves deeply indebted to the Judeo-Christian tradition. This is a confused situation that is bound to multiply confusion.

As Luke Timothy Johnson points out in the film, the Creed is descriptive not prescriptive. It is not, for example, the US Constitution, open to prescriptive amendment. It seems to me that when broaching matters of doctrine and discipline, the various churches ought take every conceivable pain to distinguish clearly between development and innovation – or worse – novelty. Here, the paradigm of self-emptying, sacrificial love to which the Creed points is the only standard for evaluating what can authentically be called, Christian. To cross that border is to enter the minefield of self-reference.

AD: When I lecture on the ecumenical councils, especially Nicaea I and Constantinople I that gave us the eponymous creed, I often encounter bewilderment from people that the process of producing the creed was contentious and that people fought one another over it. But the fact they fought each other, I say, is just a sign of how seriously people of the fourth century took doctrinal debates. Are we too complacent about doctrine today--more worried about updating our wall on Facebook than understanding Christian dogma? 

TK: In those days, theological debate could be a full-contact affair. And it's not a pretty picture. For Christians, "religious violence" should be a contradiction in terms. Yet, while the means used were at times regrettable, the need for clarity was real. Today "doctrine" is a dirty word in many precincts. That's silly of course--and unfortunate. The more important things are, the greater the need to be specific when speaking of them. This specificity doesn't thereby limit discussion. Rather, it limits the confusion that clouds discussion. John Behr does a terrific job explaining this in the film when he elaborates on the Creed as the "canon" of truth. (Not an easy thing to get across in a tweet).

AD: In my review of The Creed, I lamented only one thing and that was the fact that it was only a half-hour. Did you hope to go into more detail and at greater length? Is a sequel in the works?  

TK: I would love to expand the film--really open up and explore each aspect of the Creed. There's just so much to consider--and virtually every dimension of theology is brought into play. I think it could work well as an ongoing series. As of now, though, I haven't been asked to clean the camera or test the mics. Until then, one thing I think could be done is to develop a study guide for the film.

AD: What other projects are you working on? 

TK: I have two TV pilot scripts that have just gone to market and I’m working on a new feature film script. There are a couple of documentary ideas--also with theological themes--that I'm developing too. Most importantly, I'm hoping to resume formation.

AD: Sum up for us what you were hoping to accomplish with The Creed. 

TK: In talking about the Creed, I describe it as “a treasure hidden in plain sight.” My hope is that more and more people will discover it – and avail themselves of that treasure.

Do Icons Speak to Your Kindle?

As I have had many occasions to note on here, books about icons continue to be among the most popular today in all of Eastern Christian studies. They pour forth from presses large and small, religious and academic. And now we have a "book" about icons available for downloading on Amazon's Kindle: Anthony Coniaris, Icons Speak: Their Message (Light and Life Publishing, 2012), 325pp.

About this book the publisher briefly informs us:

Introducing the Twelve Great Feast Days of Orthodox Christianity through the written and the visual Gospel (the Bible and Icon) emphasizing their meaning for us today.

The First Crusade and the Quest for Apocalypse

As I have noted several times before, interest in the Crusades remains high; so does gross misunderstanding or tendentious misrepresentation of them. A new book from Jay Rubenstein, who teaches medieval history at the University of Tennessee, has just been released, this time focusing in a particular way on the first Crusade: Armies of Heaven: The First Crusade and the Quest for Apocalypse (New York: Basic Books, 2011), 424pp.

About this book, the publisher provides this titillating blurb:

At Moson, the river Danube ran red with blood. At Antioch, the Crusaders— their saddles freshly decorated with sawed-off heads—indiscriminately clogged the streets with the bodies of eastern Christians and Turks. At Ma’arra, they cooked children on spits and ate them. By the time the Crusaders reached Jerusalem, their quest—and their violence— had become distinctly otherworldly: blood literally ran shin-deep through the streets as the Crusaders overran the sacred city.

Beginning in 1095 and culminating four bloody years later, the First Crusade represented a new kind of warfare: holy, unrestrained, and apocalyptic. In Armies of Heaven, medieval historian Jay Rubenstein tells the story of this cataclysmic event through the eyes of those who witnessed it, emphasizing the fundamental role that apocalyptic thought played in motivating the Crusaders. A thrilling work of military and religious history, Armies of Heaven will revolutionize our understanding of the Crusades.

We are having this expertly reviewed in Logos: A Journal of Eastern Christian Studies in 2012.

Yves Congar Newly Translated

If you read my Orthodoxy and the Roman Papacy: Ut Unum Sint and the Prospects of East-West Unity you will note in there my indebtedness to, inter alia, Yves Congar, especially his great work True and False Reform in the Church,
whose French original, published in Paris in 1950, I drew on. Congar noted rightly that any true reform always consists of a return to first principles and proceeds ex traditione: “la grande loi d’un réformisme catholique sera donc de commencer par un retour aux principes du catholicisme. Il faudra d’abord interroger la tradition, se replonger en elle.” Only in 2011 was this book finally translated into English, making this pivotal figure and his rich thinking available to anglophone audiences.

Congar, in his own day, was perhaps best known for his After Nine Hundred Years: The Background of the Schism Between the Eastern and Western Churches. He was easily one of the most informed and most sympathetic Roman Catholic scholars of the Christian East, and one of the important proponents of the ressourcement movement that did so much for Catholics and Orthodox alike in recovering forgotten parts of our common patristic heritage.

The last two years have seen a considerable number of his works emerge at long last. In 2010 we had Yves Congar: Essential Writings as well as At the Heart of Christian Worship: Liturgical Essays of Yves Congar. Just before Christmas 2011, we had Fifty Years of Catholic Theology: Conversations with Yves Congar. 

And later this month, we will have at long last an English translation of his fascinating and delightful journals which he kept during Vatican II: My Journal of the Council (Liturgical Press: May, 2012), 1100pp. This is an important and personal record of much that went on between 1962 and 1965 at that pivotal ecclesial event not merely for the Catholic Church but perforce for all Christians. As I noted before, I am an unrepentant reader of diaries and so, having read parts of this in French in the library in Ottawa many years ago, I look forward to reading the whole thing later this year--especially in conjunction with the forthcoming council diaries of another important figure, Maxim Hermaniuk.  

About Congar's diaries, the publisher tells us:

“At the beginning of the meeting Cardinal Ottaviani said that, to speed the work up, the experts should not speak unless questioned. Beside me Rahner chafed at the bit, and said, ‘What are we doing here?’”

Yves Congar, OP, was one of the most important and influential theologians of the twentieth century. Much of this influence came as a result of his role as theological advisor to the bishops who participated at the Second Vatican Council (1962-1965). After working under a cloud of ecclesiastical censure and suspicion in the decade prior to its start, Congar was, from beginning to end, an influential day-to-day participant in the council’s work. He also managed to keep detailed personal notes throughout the time.

At long last, the council diaries of Yves Congar are available in English! This material is a treasure trove of information and insight for anyone interested in the history of that council and its remarkable and historic teaching. It provides a window into the council’s workings and the development of what would become a series of historic documents and declarations. It also offers Congar’s own down-to-earth and personal perspective on many of the other remarkable figures who played a role in the council.

Conciliarism in the Church

I have discussed before the very serious and unmet challenges posed, at least in and to Western ecclesiology, by the broad phenomenon of conciliarism. I have also had some detailed things to say about the role of councils and synods in my Orthodoxy and the Roman Papacy: Ut Unum Sint and the Prospects of East-West Unity. Now a new book continues the discussion. 

Paul Valliere, author of the acclaimed study Modern Russian Theology: Bukharev, Soloviev, Bulgakov: Orthodox Theology in a New Key (Eerdmans, 2001), has recently published what looks to be a fascinating book on a topic very much in need of careful consideration and in-depth study: Conciliarism: A History of Decision-Making in the Church (Cambridge UP, 2012), 302pp.

About this book, the publisher tells us:

Conciliarism is one of the oldest and most essential means of decision-making in the history of the Christian Church. Indeed, as a leading Orthodox theologian Alexander Schmemann states, "Before we understand the place and the function of the council in the Church, we must, therefore, see the Church herself as a council." Paul Valliere tells the story of councils and conciliar decision-making in the Christian Church from earliest times to the present. Drawing extensively upon the scholarship on conciliarism which has appeared in the last half-century, Valliere brings a broad ecumenical perspective to the study and shows how the conciliar tradition of the Christian past can serve as a resource for resolving conflicts in the Church today. The book presents a conciliarism which involves historical legacy, but which leads us forward, not backward, and which keeps the Church's collective eyes on the prize--the eschatological kingdom of God.

I greatly look forward to reading this, discussing it on here, and interviewing the author.  

Coptic Iconography

As I have noted before, books on Byzantine iconography continue to pour forth from all manner of presses, but works on Coptic iconography lag very considerably behind. A forthcoming work may help to remedy, at least a little, this lacuna: Nadia Tomoum, Coptic Art Revealed (American University of Cairo Press, 2012), 240pp.

About this book the publisher tells us:

This superbly illustrated volume sheds light on the splendid artifacts produced during the Coptic era and celebrates the Copts' remarkable contribution to Egypt's rich cultural heritage, presenting rediscovered treasures from the Coptic Museum's storerooms, precious items from its permanent display, and pieces from other museum collections in Egypt. The featured artifacts include colorful icons painted by renowned artists, beautiful textiles, illuminated manuscripts, pages from the famous Nag Hammadi library, stone and wooden friezes with intricate designs, and fascinating objects that were at one time in daily use.

I look forward to seeing this expertly reviewed, later this year or early in 2013, in Logos: A Journal of Eastern Christian Studies. 

Political Theology

William T. Cavanaugh et al, eds., An Eerdmans Reader in Contemporary Political Theology (Eerdmans, 2011), 836pp.

About this book the publisher tells us:

An Eerdmans Reader in Contemporary Political Theology gathers some of the most significant and influential writings in political theology from the twentieth and twenty-first centuries. Given that the locus of Christianity is undeniably shifting to the global South, this volume uniquely integrates key voices from Africa, Asia, and Latin America with central texts from Europe and North America on such major subjects as church and state, gender and race, and Christendom and postcolonialism.Carefully selected, thematically arranged, and expertly introduced, these forty-nine essential readings constitute an ideal primary-source introduction to contemporary political theology — a profoundly relevant resource for globally engaged citizens, students, and scholars.

Among the many authors of interest included, Alexander Schmemann stands out but many other well known theologians are included. 

Greek Scriptures and Greek Fathers

Hendrickson Publishers continues to publish numerous reference books of interest to readers of the Septuagint and the Greek Fathers. Among those they have recently sent me include Rodney A. Whitacre, A Patristic Greek Reader.

More recently I have received Gary Alan Chamberlain, The Greek of the Septuagint: A Supplemental Lexicon (2011), 304pp. About this book the publisher tells us:

For New Testament students and scholars who want to fully exegete the Septuagint, this lexicon will be a welcome addition to their libraries. Used in conjunction with the New Testament (NT) lexicon they already possess, The Greek of the Septuagint: A Supplemental Lexicon will bridge the gap with additional information that's needed to translate the Septuagint. While those who have learned the Greek of the New Testament possess the grammatical skills necessary to read Septuagint Greek, the vocabulary found in the Septuagint differs sufficiently from both that found in the NT and that found in Classical Greek, so that a specialized lexicon is not just of great help, but essential.

Finally, Maurice Robinson and Mark House have edited a revised and updated edition of their Analytical Lexicon of New Testament Greek (2012), 506pp.

About this book the publisher tells us:

The Analytical Lexicon of New Testament Greek is an invaluable resource for the study of the Greek New Testament. Based on a completely updated and corrected computer database, this new edition provides a detailed grammatical analysis (parsing) of each Greek word in the New Testament- information essential for correct translation and interpretation. A host of additional features make the Analytical Lexicon an essential addition to the library of any biblical student or scholar

Irenaeus of Lyons and the Theology of the Holy Spirit

I have before drawn attention to the importance of Irenaeus of Lyons, and the upsurge of scholarly interest in him lately. Now a new book, in the prestigious Oxford Early Christian Studies series, was just sent to me. It looks at his pneumatology: Anthony Briggman, Irenaeus of Lyons and the Theology of the Holy Spirit (2012), xv+247pp. 

About this book the publisher tells us:

Irenaeus' theology of the Holy Spirit is often highly regarded amongst theologians today, but that regard is not universal, nor has an adequate volume of literature supported it. This study provides a detailed examination of certain principal, often distinctive, aspects of Irenaeus' pneumatology. In contrast to those who have suggested Irenaeus held a weak conception of the person and work of the Holy Spirit, Anthony Briggman demonstrates that Irenaeus combined Second Temple Jewish traditions of the spirit with New Testament theology to produce the most complex Jewish-Christian pneumatology of the early church. In so doing, Irenaeus moved beyond his contemporaries by being the first author, following the New Testament writings, to construct a theological account in which binitarian logic did not diminish either the identity or activity of the Holy Spirit. That is to say, he was the first to support his Trinitarian convictions by means of Trinitarian logic.

Briggman advances the narrative that locates early Christian pneumatologies in the context of Jewish traditions regarding the spirit. In particular, he argues that the appropriation and repudiation of Second Temple Jewish forms of thought explain three moments in the development of Christian theology. First, the existence of a rudimentary pneumatology correlating to the earliest stage of Trinitarian theology in which a Trinitarian confession is accompanied by binitarian orientation/logic, such as in the thought of Justin Martyr. Second, the development of a sophisticated pneumatology correlating to a mature second century Trinitarian theology in which a Trinitarian confession is accompanied by Trinitarian logic. This second moment is visible in Irenaeus' thought, which eschewed Jewish traditions that often hindered theological accounts of his near contemporaries, such as Justin, while adopting and adapting Jewish traditions that enabled him to strengthen and clarify his own understanding of the Holy Spirit. Third, the return to a rudimentary account of the Spirit at the turn of the third century when theologians such as Tertullian, Origen, and Novatian repudiated Jewish traditions integral to Irenaeus' account of the Holy Spirit.

Interpreting the Bible in Late Antiquity

As I noted before, conflicts over interpretation of Scripture are very commonplace at any point in Christian history.  A new book takes us back to some very early debates over how to understand Scripture, and the regional differences in those understandings: Interpreting the Bible and Aristotle in Late Antiquity: the Alexandria Commentary Tradition between Rome and Baghdad, eds., Josef Lössl and John W. Watt (Ashgate, 2011, 360pp).

About this book, the publisher tells us the following, supplying also the contents:

This book brings together sixteen studies by internationally renowned scholars on the origins and early development of the Latin and Syriac biblical and philosophical commentary traditions. It casts light on the work of the founder of philosophical biblical commentary, Origen of Alexandria, and traces the developments of fourth- and fifth-century Latin commentary techniques in writers such as Marius Victorinus, Jerome and Boethius. The focus then moves east, to the beginnings of Syriac philosophical commentary and its relationship to theology in the works of Sergius of Reshaina, Probus and Paul the Persian, and the influence of this continuing tradition in the East up to the Arabic writings of al-Farabi. There are also chapters on the practice of teaching Aristotelian and Platonic philosophy in fifth-century Alexandria, on contemporaneous developments among Byzantine thinkers, and on the connections in Latin and Syriac traditions between translation (from Greek) and commentary.

With its enormous breadth and the groundbreaking originality of its contributions, this volume is an indispensable resource not only for specialists, but also for all students and scholars interested in late-antique intellectual history, especially the practice of teaching and studying philosophy, the philosophical exegesis of the Bible, and the role of commentary in the post-Hellenistic world as far as the classical renaissance in Islam.

Contents: Introduction, Josef Lössl and John Watt.Part 1 Alexandria to Rome: Origen: exegesis and philosophy in early Christian Alexandria, Alfons Fürst; Prologue topics and translation problems in Latin commentaries on Paul, Sophie Lunn-Rockliffe; Ambrosiaster's method of interpretation in the Questions on the Old and New Testament, Marie-Pierre Bussières; Philosophical exegesis in Marius Victorinus' Commentaries on Paul, Stephen Cooper; Jerome's Pauline commentaries between East and West: tradition and innovation in the Commentary on Galatians, Andrew Cain; The Bible and Aristotle in the controversy between Augustine and Julian of Aeclanum, Josef Lössl; Boethius as a translator and Aristotelian commentator, Sten Ebbesen.

Part 2 Alexandria to Baghdad: Translating the personal aspect of late Platonism in the commentary tradition, Edward Watts; Aristotelianism and the disintegration of the late Antique theological discourse, Dirk Krausmüller; Sergius of Reshaina as translator: the case of the De Mundo, Adam McCollum; Sergius of Reshaina and pseudo-Dionysius: a dialectical fidelity, Emiliano Fiori; The commentator Probus: problems of date and identity, Sebastian Brock; Du commentaire à la reconstruction: Paul le Perse interprète d'Aristote (sur une lecture du Peri Hermeneias, à propos des modes et des adverbes selon Paul, Ammonius et Boèce), Henri Hugonnard-Roche; The genesis and development of a logical lexicon in the Syriac tradition, Daniel King; From Sergius to Matta: Aristotle and pseudo-Dionysius in Syriac tradition, John Watt; Al-Farabi's arguments for the eternity of the world and the contingency of natural phenomena, Philippe Vallat; Bibliography; Indexes.