Steven Hawkes-Teeples on Symeon of Thessaloniki

Previously I drew attention to the publication of St. Symeon Thessalonika, The Liturgical Commentaries. This major work was translated and edited by the Jesuit priest and scholar Steven Hawkes-Teeples, whom I was able to interview. Here are his thoughts: 


AD: Tell us about your background, including other research and scholarly interests.

I was born in 1953 and grew up in San Antonio, Texas. I was baptized into the Catholic Church during my first year at San Antonio College. I completed a BA and an MA in French literature at the University of Texas Austin. I entered the Society of Jesus in 1982 and was ordained a priest in the Byzantine-Ruthenian Church in 1993. Studying under Archimandrite Robert Taft, I completed a doctorate in Eastern Christian liturgy in 1998 with a dissertation on the liturgy in the commentaries of St. Symeon of Thessalonika. From 1997 to 2001, I was director of the Diaconal Formation Program of the Byzantine-Ruthenian Church in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. I also taught at Canisius College in Buffalo, New York and at Regis College in Toronto. Since 2001 I have been teaching liturgy at the Pontifical Oriental Institute in Rome.

AD: Tell us a bit about St. Symeon of Thessalonika's life and work, and speculate if you will why you think he wrote these commentaries.

Symeon was born in Constantinople some time around 1384. He entered a monastery in the capital and was a hieromonk (priest-monk) until he was chosen to be archbishop of Thessalonika. He arrived as the new archbishop in either 1416 or 1417. He had a rather turbulent time as archbishop since the city was under threat of the Ottoman Turks during most of his episcopate. Many wanted to peacefully surrender to the Turks, which meant that most of their social and civic structures would remain intact under Ottoman rule. A military conquest on the other hand brought on three days of pillaging by the conquerors. Symeon sternly demanded that the city must never yield to the Turks. He was also frequently sick. To Symeon’s great disappointment, the Byzantine emperor handed over Thessalonika to Venice in 1423. Symeon died in 1429, just six months before the final fall of the city to the Ottomans, when much of the city was destroyed and virtually the entire surviving population was enslaved.

Symeon lived into his mid-forties, so his many writings suggest someone who wrote easily. Some of his writings, ones that I would judge his later works, frequently have a certain disorganization in them. My guess is that they were dictated to a secretary.

The two commentaries are "Explanation of the Divine Temple" and “On the Sacred Liturgy.” The first is a separate work and better organized. I suspect that it was begun before Symeon became archbishop. In the lengthy title he says that it is sent “to the pious people in Crete, who requested it.” The second commentary, in which he refers to the earlier book, is just one section of an enormous work, The Dialogue in Christ, which deals with all the services of the Orthodox Church. Both works intend to pass on and expand the tradition of mystagogy, the Church’s explanation of the Church’s rites. At the time, Symeon is also very eager to prescribe exactly how certain actions should be done in church.

AD: What led you to work on Symeon and to translate his Liturgical Commentaries?

One of my professors, Fr. Miguel Arranz, suggested that Symeon is an interesting author, worthy of further study. So I started reading his works in the existing edition, published by Jacques-Paul Migne in the 1800s. But as soon as I started reading, I found some very strange things. For instance, the chapter headings don’t fit the text. It’s as if Symeon forgot what he was going to write about after he wrote the titles. For instance, chapter one is “What is the effect of sacred baptism?” The chapter that follows mentions baptism, but is not even one complete sentence. Chapter two is “What is holy chrism?” Chrism is mentioned in the conclusion of that sentence, but the chapter goes on for pages and chrism never comes up again. There were other strange twists and turns that made me aware that there were gigantic problems with the text.

I began looking at some manuscripts and began to find some answers. It turns out that Symeon’s secretary, who wrote down his dictated text, decided to add questions in the margin to make Symeon's works more like Latin theological treatises of the time that had a question-and-answer format. When Symeon was first published, the secretary's marginal questions were inserted into the text as chapter titles.


There were a number of other cases in which the early editors just didn’t understand some of Symeon’s late Byzantine Greek. They corrected Symeon’s Greek in a number of passages, but corrected many of them mistakenly. So I needed to redo many of those “corrections.”

Finally, and most excitingly, I discovered that there is a very important manuscript in Zagora, a small seaside village near the city of Volos. To the best of our knowledge, it is the only manuscript, which has Symeon’s own corrections and additions in his own handwriting, added to a secretarial manuscript. I first got some photocopies, but eventually went to Zagora in 1996 and worked on the manuscript in person. Together with many interesting corrections, all the new material added up to several more pages of the commentaries, particularly the second one. Clearly, someone needed to do a new edition of Symeon’s commentaries on the Divine Liturgy because there was so much new material. I didn’t want to do it at first because I had never studied how this is done. Eventually friends and colleagues pushed me and helped. It took many years, but eventually I managed to put together a new edition of Symeon’s commentaries in Greek.

AD: These commentaries are particularly focused on the hierarchical or pontifical liturgy. Could you briefly describe how the pontifical liturgy in Symeon's day was celebrated?

For the most part, the development of the Byzantine Divine Liturgy stopped in 1526 with the publication of printed versions of the liturgy. For the first time in history we actually had not two or three texts, but hundreds of them with exactly the same words in the same place, and at a price that allowed them to circulate. From then on, the liturgical changes have been fairly minor and easy to trace. As we might expect, Symeon’s liturgy in the early 1400s is similar to the modern liturgy. It is a pontifical, or hierarchal, liturgy, so rather more elaborate that an ordinary priestly liturgy as in present-day usage.

AD: Robert Taft's foreword notes that Symeon is an author of "the first importance" who has nonetheless not often been studied or translated. Why do you think that is?

There are a couple of issues involved here. First, liturgical history is a fairly new discipline. Symeon is overwhelmingly involved in questions of how the services are done. Until the study of how the services developed became a major field of study, Symeon wasn’t seen as very important. Next, Symeon can be a bit “prickly” at times. He had strong prejudices. He disliked Roman Catholics and really hated the Armenians although he doesn’t seem to know much about them. Symeon’s theology became very popular in Russia through the writings of Archbishop Venjamin Rumovsky-Krasnopevkov. His book, The New Tablet, published in 1803, is at times a translation of passage after passage of Symeon from Greek into Russian. In the end, doing serious scholarship on a late Byzantine liturgist is just hard work and there are not that many people who are interested enough to trudge through it.

AD: Taft also notes a relationship between Symeon and Maximus Confessor and Pseudo-Dionysius. Could you elaborate a little bit on those relationships? Who else was influential upon Symeon?

Syemon is a part of the whole tradition of Christian mystagogy, explaining the Church’s liturgical services. It has it roots in the Old Testament explanations of the Jewish rituals. In Christian literature, we find mystagogical discussions in many of the fathers, including St. John Chrysostom. Theodore of Mopsuestia really developed a very rich symbolic mystagogy, as did the Pseudo-Dionysius a bit later. By Symeon’s time, there was a whole tradition of Greek Byzantine commentaries from Maximus Confessor to Nicholas Cabasilas. Symeon worked out of and built on this tradition of commentaries. But, above all, Symeon’s favorite theologian without any doubt is certainly the Pseudo-Dionysius. He sometimes mentions other figures, but the anonymous author claiming to be Dionysius the Aeropagite is the only one Symeon cites repeatedly.

AD: Taft further argues that some often overlook or look down upon the genre of mystagogy and liturgical commentary. Why would that be? What role does a liturgical commentary play? How would you characterize it as a text--more as "history" or more as "theology" or something else?

From the eighth century on, Byzantine mystagogy tended to become “contemplative” and not very participatory. As something to see and contemplate, rather than be involved in, liturgy tended to take on very rich symbolic interpretations. Some of this symbolism is not connected with the deeper theological meaning of the liturgy. This is a genuine problem that shouldn’t be overlooked.

On the other hand, we also have to say that Christian mystagogy is an act of Christian faith. Some people who want to do a ritual history or ritual analysis of Christian liturgy without a faith perspective may be uncomfortable with mystagogy.

In most ways, every generation has to do its own mystagogy. How we understand and how we participate in the liturgy is always changing. We should build on our past, but we can’t live in it.

Symeon’s commentaries are a sort of snapshot of the liturgy and the mentality surrounding it at one particular moment in the history of Byzantine Christians. Symeon gives a lot of information about how the liturgy was done in his day, what he and others thought it meant, and how he thought it ought to be done right; occasionally he also tells us about practices he disapproves of. Symeon really doesn’t fit into any of our modern categories. He was a writer of his own time, using other structures. For instance, Symeon doesn’t organize his thought in paragraphs. He sees it as a continuous flow. One of his most common expressions in Greek means roughly, “and on that basis it follows that…”

AD: Translators, it seems to me, are often the unsung heroes of scholarship. Take us behind the scenes, as it were, into the world of theological translation, particularly of old manuscripts. What is that process like? What are the difficulties you face, and how do you overcome them?

In preparing an edition like this, the translation is the final part, after all the hard work is done. The real work is figuring out what text itself means in Greek. What was Symeon really trying to say? Greek manuscripts don’t have modern punctuation, so one has to decide how many clauses to string together before adding a period. Maybe these two sections are so connected that we will separate them with a semi-colon.

This manuscript especially presented big problems with Symeon’s writing. His secretary wrote in a very clear black script with what was probably a metal pen. Symeon’s additions and corrections are in a reddish-brown ink and likely done with some sort of reed. Symeon’s writing is sometimes squeezed in between the lines and at other times in the margins. When the Zagora manuscript was bound, they trimmed the pages and cut off some of Symeon’s notes. The real struggle was to recover every last bit that I could of what Symeon wrote.

In the introduction of the book I discuss some of the work involved in producing the book. I wouldn’t want to say that the translation was easy. There certainly were moments when I sweated over it. Still, getting the Greek right was the much harder task.

For a serious scholar, translations are like encyclopedias: they are a good place to start. Once you get seriously into a topic, you can’t rely on a translation. You have to go to the original. Having a translation saves you a lot of time in reading through a lot of material quickly. It can help you find the sections that you need to look at carefully. Once you get there, then you need to read the original. There are all sorts of translations, but in the end, a translation is only someone else’s idea of what he thinks it means. Shakespeare has been translated into most of the written languages of the world, but a Shakespearean scholar reads Shakespeare in English, just as a real Dostoevskij scholar reads The Brothers Karamazov in Russian.

AD: What other works by Symeon are extant but still untranslated into, say, English?

To my knowledge, the only other thing by Symeon out in English is a weak translation of Symeon’s commentary on the liturgy of the hours. So everything is out there to be done.

However, as with the commentaries on the Divine Liturgy, the first thing we need to do in most cases is first produce a good Greek text of what Symeon was actually saying. Only once we have a good text does it make much sense to do a translation.

AD: Taft notes that Symeon's influence continues to live on--an example of Byzance après Byzance. Where is that influence most notable in the centuries since his death?

Much of the way the Divine Liturgy is still explained today in the Byzantine Catholic and Orthodox Churches is still very much dependent on Symeon’s mystagogy. In talking with friends in Russia, it is obvious that for many Orthodox in present-day Russia the real authority on the meaning of the Divine Liturgy is Archbishop Venjamin’s The New Tablet and that is simply Symeon recycled. Nikolai Gogol’s Meditations on the Divine Liturgy is dependent on Symeon directly and indirectly through Archbishop Venjamin. In point of fact, no one has really come up with another system, focused more on our participation in the liturgy. So without anything new, we continue to use the older system.

AD: If a graduate student today were looking for unexplored or untranslated authors and areas in Eastern liturgiology to work on, which would you recommend?


Serious liturgical research is an awful lot of very hard work. One has to learn the needed languages of the original texts, and one also has to be able to read contemporary scholarship at least in English, French, and German although recent studies in Russian and Italian are very important. So, first and foremost, one has to choose something that interests you at the beginning. It will get dull later on, but if you start with something that is boring to you at the beginning, you’ll never finish it.

There is so much to be done in Eastern liturgical studies that one can’t possibly name it all. Fr. Taft is working on finishing up his book on the anaphora and that will be his fifth book on the Byzantine Divine Liturgy from the Cherubic Hymn to the end. I am inclined to think that those will be the definitive books on that topic for some time. So I don’t recommend to anyone to work on that part of the Divine Liturgy because I doubt that you will easily find anything new and worthwhile to say. Other than that and a few other areas that have been done very thoroughly, it’s pretty much a wide open field. The other sacraments? Sure. Liturgy of the hours? Certainly. There is a ton of stuff to be done on the earlier parts of the Divine Liturgy.

If one is adventurous and hardworking, one could investigate other non-Byzantine liturgies that have been studied much less. The connection between the three Syriac liturgical traditions (Assyro-Chaldean, Syro-Antiochene, and Maronite) is a fascinating point to sort out. Especially the Ethiopic liturgical tradition has only just begun to be studied. If one has the patience, the brains and the interest, the sky is the limit.

AD: Having completed The Liturgical Commentaries: St. Symeon of Thessalonika, what are you at work on now?

I am currently working on two editing projects. First, I am preparing for publication the papers from the third congress of the Society of Oriental Liturgies held in Volos, Greece in 2010. I am also trying to finish up editing, indexing, organizing and often re-translating an English version of Juan Mateos’ book on the first half of the Byzantine Divine Liturgy.

When I finish those tasks, I hope to do more work on the Prothesis, the preparatory rites of the Divine Liturgy. With that I would also like to produce improved and updated versions of some of Symeon’s other writings.

Patristic Reading

Though, frustratingly, I have never been able to find it again after I thought I first read it in his writings, the late Pope John Paul II seems to have remarked at one point that "every age of authentic renewal in the Church has come about through a renewed study of the Fathers." It is precisely such questions as these--memory, hermeneutics, and context--that are among others explored in a new collection: Morwenna Ludlow and Scot Douglass, eds., Reading the Church Fathers (T&T Clark, 2011), 224pp.

About this book the publisher tells us:

Reading the corpus of texts written by the Fathers of the Church has always been a core area in Christian theology. However, scholars and academics are by no means united in the question how these important but difficult authors should be read and interpreted. Many of them are divided by implicit (but often unquestioned) assumptions about the best way to approach the texts or by underlying hermeneutical questions about the norms, limits and opportunities of reading Ancient Christian writers.

This book will raise profound hermeneutical questions surrounding the reading of the Fathers with greater clarity than it has been done before. The contributors to this volume are theologians and historians who have used contemporary post-modern approaches to illuminate the Ancien corpus of texts. The chapters discuss issues such as:

• What makes a 'good' reading of a church Father?

• What constitutes a 'responsible' reading?

• Is the reading of the Fathers limited to a specialist audience?

• What can modern thinkers contribute to our reading of the Fathers?

The publisher also provides the table of contents:

1.Foreword: Scot Douglass, Morwenna Ludlow

Part I: Postmodern Readings of the Fathers
2. Jean-Luc Marion’s Reading of Dionysius the Areopagite. Hermeneutics and Reception History (Johannes Zachhuber)
3.Time and the Responsibilities of Reading: Revisiting Derrida and Dionysius (David Newheiser)
4. Seeing God in Bodies: Wolfson, Rosenzweig, Augustine (Virginia Burrus)
Part II: Reading Postmodern Thinkers in Parallel with Reading the Fathers
5. Emmanuel Levinas and Gregory of Nyssa on Reading, Desire and Subjectivity (Tamsin Jones)
6. The Combinatory Detour: The prefix Sun- in Gregory of Nyssa’s Production of Theological Knowledge (Scot Douglass)
Part III: Reading the Fathers Reading Themselves
7. Text and Context: the Importance of Scholarly Reading. Gregory of Nyssa, Contra Eunomium (Matthieu Cassin)
8. Anatomy--Investigating the Body of Texts in Origen and Gregory of Nyssa (Morwenna Ludlow)
9. Afterword: Conversations about Reading
Bibliography

Alexandria

Alexandria, of course, has long been recognized as one of the world's great cities, famed for its vast bibliographic holdings, its schools of learning, its orators, heretics, bishops, theologians, and much else besides. It is also a city that has been at the forefront of intra-Christian and Muslim-Christian conflicts. A recent book narrates that history for us: Bojana Mojsov, Alexandria Lost: from the Advent of Christianity to the Arab Conquest (London: Duckworth, 2010), 224pp.

About this book the publisher tells us:

In the fourth century AD Christian zealots destroyed the Great Library of Alexandria and killed Hypatia, the last director of the Platonic Academy. Over the next two centuries they systematically erased the entire ‘pagan’ heritage of that great city, previously renowned as a centre of learning. Later, war between the Byzantine and Egyptian Churches only added to Alexandria’s decline. The inquisition unleashed by the Byzantine Patriarch Cyrus against the Egyptian Copts drove them into the arms of the invading Arabs, whose tolerance ensured both the survival of the Coptic Church of Egypt and the ready conversion of many Egyptians to Islam. But when, after conquering Alexandria by force, the Arabs demolished the surrounding walls, an entire civilisation perished.

This book tells the extraordinary story of the destruction of classical Alexandria, exposing disturbing facts long erased from our collective historical memory. In charting the origins of the loss of dialogue between Europe and the Middle East, Bojana Mojsov reflects on the power and dangers of ignorance driven by faith.

Inventing Byzantine Iconoclasm

Leslie Brubaker, whose collaboration with John Haldon on another book earlier this year on Byzantine iconoclasm I discussed here, has another book out this month: Inventing Byzantine Iconoclasm (London: Duckworth, 2011), 160pp.

About this book the publisher tells us:

Byzantine ‘iconoclasm’ is famous and has influenced iconoclast movements from the English Reformation and French Revolution to Taliban, but it has also been woefully misunderstood: this book shows how and why the debate about images was more complicated, and more interesting, than it has been presented in the past. It explores how icons came to be so important, who opposed them, and how the debate about images played itself out over the years between c. 680 and 850. Many widely accepted assumptions about ‘iconoclasm’ – that it was an imperial initiative that resulted in widespread destruction of images, that the major promoters of icon veneration were monks, and that the era was one of cultural stagnation – are shown to be incorrect. Instead, the years of the image debates saw technological advances and intellectual shifts that, coupled with a growing economy, concluded with the emergence of medieval Byzantium as a strong and stable empire.

I look forward to seeing this expertly reviewed in the new year.

Theosis

Based on the locus classicus of II Peter 1:4, and the almost equally famous saying of the great Athanasius of Alexandria ("God became man so that man might become God"), the topic of theosis or deification/divinization has attracted an enormous amount of attention if the number of publications in English in just the last five years is anything to go by. Over the years we have reviewed in Logos: A Journal of Eastern Christian Studies almost all of the following:

In 2006 we had Stephen Finlan and Vladimir Kharlamov, Theosis: Deification in Christian Theology.

Also that year we had Norman Russell, The Doctrine of Deification in the Greek Patristic Tradition.

In 2007 we had two more books: Nancy J. Hudson, Becoming God: the Doctrine of Theosis in Nicholas of Cusa. Daniel Keating published a study of theosis that explicitly sought to situate it within modern Roman Catholic theology and demonstrate its acceptability to that tradition: Deification and Grace.

In 2008, we had a welcome ecumenical collection of scholars, from Roman Catholic, Protestant, and Orthodox traditions discussing theosis in Michael Christensen and Jeffrey Wittung, Partakers of the Divine Nature: the History and Development of Deification in the Christian Traditions.

Also in that year, Kharlamov returned with another book: The Beauty of the Unity and the Harmony of the Whole: the Concept of Theosis in the Theology of Pseudo-Dionysius.

And then Stephen Thomas published Deification in the Eastern Orthodox Tradition: a Biblical Perspective.

In 2009, Russell returned with a second book: Fellow Workers with God: Orthodox Thinkers on Theosis.

In 2010, we had Paul M. Collins, Partaking in Divine Nature: Deification and Communion.

This year, Kharlamov returned again with the second volume to his 2006 volume: Theosis: Deification in Christian Theology.

And now we have just seen released Nicholas Bamford, Deified Person: A Study of Deification in Relation to Person and Christian Becoming (University Press of America, 2011), 176pp.

About this book, the publisher tells us:

Deified Person: A Study of Deification in Relation to Person and Christian Becoming focuses on a theological exploration of “person” through the notion of deification and is placed within a Christian Orthodox–Byzantine context. The book offers new interpretations of person in relation to Christian becoming while at the same time exploring some of the difficult avenues of Christian theological developments. Nicholas Bamford encourages theological inquiry, and the book will appeal to those who wish to challenge ideas and push the boundaries forward.

Gilles Emery and Matthew Levering on the Trinity

Earlier I drew attention to a fantastic new book on the Trinity: Gilles Emery and Matthew Levering, eds., The Oxford Handbook of the Trinity (Oxford UP, 2011), 704pp.

I asked both editors for an interview to discuss this book and some of the issues raised by and treated in it. Here are their thoughts:

AD: Tell us about your backgrounds, and also how you came to know and work with each other.

We are both Catholic theologians, and both of us are interested in Trinitarian theology. Gilles has been working on Trinitarian theology for twenty years, from the time of his S.Th.D (on “The Creative Trinity”). Gilles’s publications are mostly focused on St. Thomas Aquinas, and on Trinitarian theology (have a look here). We got to know each other when in 1999 Matthew translated Gilles's article on divine essence and divine persons. Since that time, we've worked together on two acclaimed collections of Gilles's essays, and most recently Matthew translated Gilles's The Trinity: an Introduction to Catholic Doctrine on the Triune God (Catholic University of America Press, 2011). We also met at several conferences in the US. We both have a strong interest in the theology of Aquinas. Matthew has published books in a variety of areas including, among others, soteriology, the theology of God, the Eucharist, the priesthood, natural law, and predestination (have a look here).

AD: What about your own backgrounds led you to work on a collection about the Trinity?

This particular project got started through a suggestion made by our friend Francesca Murphy, now at the University of Notre Dame. Francesca had translated a book of Gilles's for Oxford, The Trinitarian Theology of St. Thomas Aquinas and Matthew had known Francesca since 2003. She suggested to us that we might be interested in co-editing The Oxford Handbook of the Trinity. Tom Perridge, the superb Oxford commissioning editor, had asked her for names, and she'd mentioned ours to him. We got together at the Dominican House of Studies in Washington DC on 15-17 September 2007 to sketch a plan for the volume. At that time, our friend Fr. Thomas Joseph White was instrumental in helping us think about the outline for the volume as well as possible contributors. Bruce Marshall, Reinhard Hütter, Fr. Emmanuel Perrier, and others helped as well.

AD: There seems to have been quite a recent upsurge in interest in Trinitarian theology if the large number of very recent books is anything to go by. Why do you think that is? How does yours stand out?

One source of the renewed emphasis on Trinitarian theology is the retrieval of the Fathers, which has roots in the Oxford Movement, the Tübingen School, and in the Orthodox and Catholic patristic ressourcement of the early twentieth century, including the Thomistic renewal. In retrieving the theology of the Fathers, theologians had to pay attention to the rich doctrinal debates of the patristic period and especially of the fourth and fifth centuries. Athanasius, the Cappadocians, Augustine and other Fathers naturally inspire great interest in the doctrine of the Trinity. Another impetus was clearly the reaction against classical liberal Protestant and Enlightenment theology. Friedrich Schleiermacher's rejection of the doctrine as insignificant led to a surge of interest in defending the doctrine and in showing its relevance (think of Karl Barth). Lastly, as our Handbook shows, Trinitarian theology is a perennial Christian theme and so there has always been, in every era, a large number of works on Trinitarian doctrine. The Handbook shows that, rather than a “rediscovery” of Trinitarian faith in the twentieth century, there has been a real continuity of Christian thinking on the Trinity, notably in the Middle Ages, and during modern times as well. Our Handbook's greatest strength is clearly the comprehensiveness of its historical scholarship. In this regard, it stands out significantly from other books on the Trinity. Our contributors made possible a survey of the history of the doctrine that is uniquely comprehensive. The other areas of the Handbook -- for example its biblical and dogmatic sections -- are also superb.

AD: I can affirm that this is not just promotional propaganda, either: among many reasons I adopted this text for my classes, the overriding reason was precisely the comprehensiveness, which is very significant and truly outstanding vis-à-vis other comparable texts.

So did you have a particular audience in mind for this Handbook? What did you and Oxford have in mind by treating this as a "Handbook"?

The title "Handbook" is simply Oxford's way of signaling that the volume aims to be a comprehensive resource for scholars and students who seek an introduction to the basic areas of study that one might undertake regarding the Trinity. One thinks of Cambridge's highly successful series of Companions. Whereas a Cambridge Companion might have 16 essays, the Oxford Handbooks tend to have over 40. Blackwell and Cambridge both are publishing Handbook-like volumes lately. The audience for our Handbook of the Trinity is primarily Christian students and scholars (Catholic, Orthodox, and Protestant). We hope that the Handbook will be useful for classes, and once the paperback is published, which shouldn't be too long, it will become much more accessible for individual purchasers.

AD: Were there any surprises either in your writing parts for, or overall editing of, this book?

Other than the Introduction and Conclusion, we didn't do any writing for the Handbook, but instead we focused on discussing precisely the content of each essay with the contributors, and on editing. It was a joy to read the essays as they came in, because they were so informative and one was always learning something. Gilles in particular proved to be a master editor: he outdid even the Oxford copy-editors! We were also blessed to find excellent, timely replacements for a few scheduled contributors who were unable to write their essays due to unforeseen events. We were extraordinarily blessed in this Handbook by the talent of our contributors.

AD: Historically, of course, questions of Trinitarian theology have been thought to divide Christians, especially the vexed issue of the filioque. But over the last fifteen years, enormous strides have been made, and many Orthodox (e.g., John Zizioulas, Kallistos Ware) no longer see it as Church-dividing (a position given detailed exposition in the 2003 statement on the filioque by the North American Orthodox-Catholic Dialogue). What are your thoughts on the filioque and the ecumenical issues that attend it?

Gilles has written carefully and extensively on the procession of the Holy Spirit from the Father and Son, and on the Filioque (the Catholic doctrine must not be reduced to the insertion of the word “Filioque” into the Niceno-Constantinopolitan Creed). We are pleased indeed to see that the issue is no longer thought of as Church-dividing, at least by many scholars, and we would certainly agree with that assessment.

AD: Anglophone Roman Catholics have just begun to experience a new translation of the Roman Missal, including a new translation of the Nicene-Constantinopolitan Creed. Do you think the translators missed an opportunity to translate the creed anew into English from the Greek original rather than the interpolated Latin version?

Assuming that you mean the addition of the Filioque, that is an interesting question. Perhaps what is needed is a footnote to the Filioque passage in the Latin version! Indeed, the larger question may well consist in the relationship of the Church today to the first seven Councils. It may be more an ecclesiological question than a Trinitarian one. As Gilles wrote, just eliminating the Filioque from the Catholic version of the creed cannot be the proper means to achieve ecumenical unity. Rather, if agreement could be reached and the mutual respect of each doctrinal tradition ensured (this should be the first step, a prerequisite), then opportunity could also present itself to drop the mention of the Filioque in the Latin version of the Constantinopolitan Creed.

AD: There seemed to be a moment in Trinitarian theology in the last three decades of the twentieth century where some theologians were trying to figure out the "social implications" of the Trinity--e.g., various liberation theology projects. Is that movement over?

Perhaps one could say that this movement has been given the opportunity to begin anew, but this time on a better footing. Rather than seeking the social relevance of Trinitarian doctrine by beginning with what society seems to need, it may be better to begin with what Trinitarian doctrine implies and then try to live in accordance with the exigencies of Trinitarian faith. In the Oxford Handbook of the Trinity Fritz Bauerschmidt has a splendid essay along these lines.

AD: Théodore de Régnon's infamous treatment of the Trinity (Études de théologie positive sur la Sainte Trinité [Paris: Victor Retaux, 1892/1898]) has often led people to assume that the "Latin" Triadology (especially Augustinian) is always focused on the unity of divine substance while the "Greeks" (especially the Cappadocians) are concerned about the plurality of Persons. Has 21st-century Trinitarian theology finally moved past these stereotypes?

Yes, we think it has, largely as a result of the work of patristic scholars such as André de Halleux, Lewis Ayres, and Michel Barnes. However, even if the Greek versus Latin polarity is no longer so strong, the basic impulse to set in opposition unity/substance and Trinity/Persons will be hard to overcome. Such opposition is obviously a wrong and misleading approach to the problem, both historically and from a systematic standpoint. Even today, authors frequently can be found who consider monotheism to be violent, on the grounds that monotheism seeks unity rather than permitting a diversity of gods and of religious paths; and some theologians are tempted to consider faith in the Trinity as a “looser” form of monotheism, a claim that cannot be accepted. Similarly, one fears that the need to articulate the particular strengths of Eastern and Western Christianity will lead theologians to continue to resort to negative stereotypes. Interestingly, these stereotypes frequently appear in the writings of Catholics who use them to criticize the Catholic Church. The superficiality of the stereotypes is thereby underscored.

Beware the Idols

The appalling news that a French political-satirical magazine has been bombed because it featured Mohammad on its cover reminds us again of the puerile reaction that erupted in the 2006 Danish cartoon absurdity. It has not always been thus, and is not consistently thus today, but incidents like these two make it clear that Islam--even more than Judaism and Christianity--remains deeply disturbed by the prospect or even the perception of "idolatry." As a result, Islam remains much more deeply committed to iconoclasm (often quite literally) than its two monotheistic predecessors.

Along comes a new book to examine this phenomenon, bearing the apt title Idol Anxiety. Edited by Josh Ellenbogen and Aaron Tugendhaft, this new publication comes from Stamford University Press (2011, 256pp.), which tells us that:

This interdisciplinary collection of essays addresses idolatry, a contested issue that has given rise to both religious accusations and heated scholarly disputes. Idol Anxiety brings together insightful new statements from scholars in religious studies, art history, philosophy, and musicology to show that idolatry is a concept that can be helpful in articulating the ways in which human beings interact with and conceive of the things around them. It includes both case studies that provide examples of how the concept of idolatry can be used to study material objects and more theoretical interventions. Among the book's highlights are a foundational treatment of the second commandment by Jan Assmann; an essay by W.J.T. Mitchell on Nicolas Poussin that will be a model for future discussions of art objects; a groundbreaking consideration of the Islamic ban on images by Mika Natif; and a lucid description by Jean-Luc Marion of his cutting-edge phenomenology of the visible.

Eye Candy for Bibliophiles

And now for something completely different. Go here for a fantastic collection of photos of books and their display. (Thanks to Fr. Michael Winn for passing this on.)

The Byzantine World

All things Byzantine continue to fascinate people today. A recent Routledge collection brings together a variety of scholarly studies for those who cannot get enough of the life of the East-Roman Empire and its inhabitants: Paul Stephenson, ed., The Byzantine World (Routledge 2010), 640pp.

About this book the publisher tells us:

The Byzantine World presents the latest insights of the leading scholars in the fields of Byzantine studies, history, art and architectural history, literature, and theology. Those who know little of Byzantine history, culture and civilization between AD 700 and 1453 will find overviews and distillations, while those who know much already will be afforded countless new vistas. Each chapter offers an innovative approach to a well-known topic or a diversion from a well-trodden path.

Readers will be introduced to Byzantine women and children, men and eunuchs, emperors, patriarchs, aristocrats and slaves. They will explore churches and fortifications, monasteries and palaces, from Constantinople to Cyprus and Syria in the east, and to Apulia and Venice in the west. Secular and sacred art, profane and spiritual literature will be revealed to the reader, who will be encouraged to read, see, smell and touch. The worlds of Byzantine ceremonial and sanctity, liturgy and letters, Orthodoxy and heresy will be explored, by both leading and innovative international scholars.

Ultimately, readers will find insights into the emergence of modern Byzantine studies and of popular Byzantine history that are informative, novel and unexpected, and that provide a thorough understanding of both.

Contents

Part 1: The Byzantines and their World 1. Michael Angold, The Byzantine Political Process at Crisis Point 2. Paul Stephenson, The Rise of the Middle Byzantine Aristocracy and the Decline of the Imperial State 3. Cécile Morrisson, Money, Coins and the Economy 4. John Haldon, The Army and Military Logistics 5. Anthony Kaldellis, The Study of Women and Children: Methodological Challenges and New Directions 6. Leonora Neville, Strong Women and their Husbands in Byzantine Historiography 7. Shaun Tougher, Cherchez l’homme! Byzantine Men: A Eunuch Perspective 8. Günter Prinzing, Slaves and Slavery 9. Christopher Livanos, Monotheists, Dualists and Pagans 10. Tia Kolbaba, The Virtues and Faults of the Latin Christians

Part 2: The Written World 11. Catherine Holmes, Political Literacy 12. Denis Sullivan, Byzantine Military Manuals: Prescriptions, Practice, and Pedagogy 13 J.M. Featherstone, De Cerimoniis and the Great Palace 14. Emmanuel Bourbouhakis, Rhetoric and Performance 15. Stratis Papaioannou, Letter-writing 16. Christopher Livanos, Trends and Developments in the Byzantine Poetic Tradition 17. Anthony Kaldellis, The Corps of Byzantine Historiography: An Interpretative Essay 18. Youval Rotman, Christians, Jews, and Muslims in Byzantine Italy: Medieval Conflicts in Local Perspective 19. Alice-Mary Talbot, The Miracles of Gregory Palamas by Philotheos Kokkinos 20. Joseph Munitiz, Writing for the Heart: the Spiritual Literature of Byzantium

Part 3: Heaven and Earth: Byzantine Art and Architecture 21. Bissera Pentcheva, What is a Byzantine icon? Constantinople versus Sinai 22. Vasileios Marinis, Defining Liturgical Space 23. Warren T. Woodfin, Celestial Hierarchies and Earthly Hierarchies in the Art of the Byzantine Church 24. Henry Maguire, Unofficial Art and the Resistance to Orthodoxy 25. Robert Ousterhout, Constantinople and the Construction of Medieval urban Identity 26. Nikolas Bakirtzis, The Practice, Perception and Experience of Byzantine Fortification 27. Jonathan Shepard, Imperial Outliers: Building and Decorative Works in the Borderlands and Beyond 28. Tassos Papacostas, The Medieval Progeny of the Holy Apostles: Trails of Architectural Imitation across the Mediterranean 29. Thomas Dale, Sacred Space from Constantinople to Venice

Part 4: The World of Byzantine Studies 30. D. Roderich Reinsch, The History of Editing Byzantine Historiographical Texts 31. Despina Christodoulou, Byzantium in Nineteenth-century Greek Historiography 32. Paul Stephenson, Pioneers of Popular Byzantine history: Freeman, Gregorovius, Schlumberger 33. Srđan Pirivatrić, A Case Study in the Emergence of Byzantine Studies: Serbia in the Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries 34. Johann P. Arnason, Byzantium and Historical Sociology 35. Paul Stephenson, Byzantium's European Future

On Dumitru Staniloae's Ecclesiology

I drew brief attention earlier to a new book by Radu Bordeianu, Dumitru Staniloae: An Ecumenical Ecclesiology (T&T Clark, 2011). It is, as I said before, one of the most rewarding new books in ecclesiology in the last ten years at least. Too much of what passes for ecclesiology today forgets that it is a theological discipline, and thus God should be central. More often than not, God is given a perfunctory mention in a book's preface, and then the author spends the rest of the book running away from Him, often offering us instead what I call ecclesiastical sociology. Not so with Bordeianu's splendid book, which shows us just how deeply Trinitarian Dumitru Staniloae's ecclesiology is. (Several of Bordeianu's articles on these themes are available on his website here.)

In mentioning this book to others, I was reminded by one person of a suspicion of Staniloae that I myself once shared: that he had never sufficiently accounted in general for anti-Catholic views in Romanian Orthodox circles or, in particular, for the brutal suppression of what was once the second-largest Eastern Catholic Church in the world, the Romanian Greco-Catholic Church. That suppression, aided and abetted by some in the Romanian Orthodox Church--some details of which were discussed in a 2005 article by Michael Mates published in Logos: A Journal of Eastern Christian Studies--was something that Staniloae was himself said to be supportive of, or at least did not object to or repent of. I am very glad indeed to now learn otherwise, first in Ronald Roberson's important chapter "Dumitru Staniloae on Christian Unity" in Dumitru Staniloae: Tradition and Modernity in Theology, ed. Lucian Turcescu (Centre for Romanian Studies, 2002), 104-25; and second in Radu Bordeianu's book, especially the introduction and first chapter. It is, indeed, Bordeianu's book that has removed all doubt in my mind about Staniloae and his perceptions of, and relations with, Catholics and other Christians. Thanks to this masterful study, Staniloae now emerges as one of the freshest and most important voices in the on-going dialogue and search for Catholic-Orthodox unity (and much else besides). He is anything but a fulminating Athonite denouncing ecumenism as the "pan-heresy" and stamping his feet while trumpeting Oρθοδοξία ή θάνατος.

On this particular charge of the suppression of the Romanian Catholic Church, Bordeianu comes out at the end of his introduction and flatly admits that "these Byzantine Catholic churches were dissolved forcefully by the political regime, and coerced into becoming Orthodox or simply going underground. Staniloae saw this instance as a restoration of justice--undoubtedly a blemish on his magnificent work"(8).

More widely still, and much more encouragingly, Bordeianu starts his introduction by insisting that "Staniloae was far from being anti-ecumenical, despite the occasional highly polemical tone that he adopted." Indeed, B shows that S often used Western concepts and language as part of his method of "'open sobornicity,' which is defined as the acceptance of valid theological insights in Western theologies without altering the essence of Orthodox teaching. His work provides a model for creative engagement with the West" (5; my emphasis). From here Bordeianu goes on to say that he is "deeply concerned about the growing anti-ecumenical attitude in...Orthodoxy in particular," the representatives of which are "never able to produce evidence of ecumenical documents in which Orthodox representatives...have corrupted the essence of the faith" (6). But it is not enough, Bordeianu insists, for Orthodox merely to defend their faith from all apparent "corruptions" based on dialogues with other Christians: instead, Orthodox need to ask themselves "are we there to learn from other Christians? Few among us would admit it. Even fewer would apply it. And yet, Staniloae's concept of open sobornicity commends it. Orthodox Christians can and must learn from the other instances of God's manifestation outside the Orthodox space," all the while holding in tension the belief that Orthodoxy represents the fullness of truth but not at the exclusion of truth manifested, however partially or inadequately, outside her boundaries.

Bordeianu spends all of chapter one unpacking the concept of open sobornicity, arguing that "Orthodoxy needs to be enriched (even corrected) by other historical instances of God's revelation"(29). This open sobornicity also sees the West and East joining together as friends so that each can help the other develop its tradition. In particular, Bordeianu argues that the East might be aided by the West in two areas: its understanding of sacraments (including their very number, and their differentiation from "sacramentals"); and a fuller understanding of apophaticism in contemporary Trinitarian theology. In his discussion of sacraments and East-West relations, Bordeianu makes two incautious and inaccurate generalizations when he says that "any baptized Christian can be received in the Orthodox Church through Chrismation without needing a second baptism" and "the Orthodox Church recognizes some of the ordinations of other denominations"(39). In fact, there is no consistent practice for the reception into Orthodoxy of other Christians--as John Erickson showed a number of years ago in an article in St. Vladimir's Theological Quarterly. I know of several cases in which other Christians, including Roman Catholics, have been re-baptized, re-chrismated, and even, in the case of one Roman Catholic priest received into the Russian Church only this year, re-ordained! Many, but not all, Orthodox churches would not commit such sacrilege, but some do--including some Copts whom I know. There is, in fact, no consistency on these questions even within the same Orthodox Church, as recent and contrary examples in the Russian Church alone illustrate. (None of this is surprising, it should be noted: as the late Archpriest Robert Anderson always said to me, "in the East, everything is local custom.")

Staniloae did not always think in these terms of openness to other Christian traditions: early in his life, he sometimes resorted to "caricatures, unfair generalizations" and ambiguous or dubious sources when describing the West and Western theology. But later on he came to praise the ecumenical movement, encourage Orthodox to adopt an irenical posture towards other Christians, and argue that there are no "essential differences" dividing Orthodox and Catholics.

Part of the change in Staniloae came about after his 1946 "trial" and unjust imprisonment in the Gulag for five years. These years of abuse, isolation, hunger and extreme suffering marked him ever after, though he rarely talked about them. For details, one must read his daughter Lidia's essay "Remembering My Father" in the Turcescu volume noted above: Tradition and Modernity.

After this "methodological" first chapter, Bordeianu then begins to take us progressively deeper into the Trinitarian theology at the heart of Staniloae's project, starting with chapter 2, which functions as a general overview--to be unpacked in the next three chapters--of his Triadology.

Chapter 2, "Filled with the Trinity: the Relationship Between the Trinity and the Church" is a lucid overview of four "models" by which most theologians have recently attempted to conceive of the relationship between the Triune God and His Church. Many of those theologians either take that relationship for granted and never bother to elucidate it, or else do so by means that are not always adequate to the task. Bordeianu thus takes us, in increasing order of coherence and usefulness, through the models of reflection, icon, sacrament, and theosis. The first three models are not rejected, but found wanting to greater or lesser degree; each offers something to the task, but inadequately so.

In this chapter, Bordeianu discusses Staniloae's views on the filioque, arguing that Staniloae's treatment of this issue does not reflect the latter's best thinking and noting that much of this debate has been dealt with in the 2003 agreed statement of the North American Orthodox-Catholic dialogue. (See also the splendid book of Edward Siecienski, whom I interview here.)

Bordeianu's book goes from strength to strength as we enter chapter 3, "Adoptive Children of the Father: the Relationship Between the Father and the Church." This chapter is unique in a great deal of contemporary ecclesiology, which tends to ricochet between Christology and pneumatology, but to seldom, if ever, ask "Where is the Father in ecclesiology?" This chapter is unique, as Bordeianu says, because "Staniloae's contribution toward a fully trinitarian ecclesiology is even more significant when considering the paucity of similar contributions among contemporary Orthodox theologians" (82)--to say nothing of other theologians.

The next chapter, on Christ and the Church, sees Staniloae applying "the dogma of Chalcedon...to the Church, adding a Maximian perspective, in reference to Christ's two wills and their symphonic manifestation....He argued that Christ and the Church are united without confusion and without change" (91). The importance of seeing Chalcedon in an ecclesiological perspective is one I always emphasize, and in fact was just this week discussing it again with some of my students. Too often people, in thinking of the Church, are either crypto-Arians (focusing exclusively on the human dimension) or crypto-Monophysites (focusing exclusively on the divine dimension). It always bears repeating that the Church is both divine (and thus holy and spotless) and human (and thus composed of sinful beings). Towards the end of this chapter, Bordeianu focuses on the liturgy, including the epiclesis, a topic given, I think, greater elucidation in Michael Zheltov's recent and very important essay in Issues in Eucharistic Praying in East and West: Essays in Liturgical and Theological Analysis, which I discuss here.

Chapter 5, on the Holy Spirit in ecclesiology, begins with the age-old struggle between "charismatic" and "institutional" authority in the Church. Staniloae is adamant in not separating the two, just as he insists that one cannot separate Christology and pneumatology in ecclesiology. In the end, Staniloae insists that each of the Persons must be understood in "their reciprocal interiority" (118). Staniloae's Trinitarian ecclesiology is perhaps given greatest articulation in this passage:

On account of these interior relations with the others [perichoresis] no divine Person is ever, either in the Church as a whole or in the individual believer, without the other divine Persons or without the particular characteristics of the others. "The Church is filled with the Trinity," said Origen, and the faithful too....Christ and the Spirit work together to make us sons of the Father (118, quoting Staniloae's Theology and the Church).

In the third and final section of the book, Bordeianu treats the question of "Priesthood Toward Creation" and "The Priesthood of the Church: Communion between Clergy and the People." I will pass over these chapters in the interests of length, but also because they do not seem entirely well connected to either the foregoing six chapters, nor to the eighth and final chapter. (In addition, I think the treatment of infallibility at the end of chapter 7 is too brief and needs greater development, as I called for here and also attempted, too briefly I freely admit, in my own book Orthodoxy and the Roman Papacy: Ut Unum Sint and the Prospects of East-West Unity.

Let me turn, in conclusion, to the last chapter, "Locality and Universality: Eucharistic Ecclesiology," which positions Staniloae between Nicholas Afanasiev and John Zizioulas, arguing that those two "positions...need to be complemented or at times even corrected by Staniloae's ecclesiology" (189). Part of what both Zizioulas and Staniloae rejected in Afanasiev was his recognition that, while doctrinal harmony is the ideal, it has never been the sine qua non for eucharistic sharing between Christians. (As Bordeianu notes, almost all other contemporary Orthodox theologians also reject this, but Paul Evdokimov's recently translated Orthodoxy is the one exception.)

Bordeianu concludes his chapter and his splendid book by presenting "four elements" necessary for unity: "doctrinal unity, episcopal communion, love, and eucharistic communion" (209).

Doctrinal Unity: Here Bordeianu recognizes, as Zizioulas and the others have also, that the only serious issue is that of papal primacy (which, again, if I may be forgiven the repeated self-references, I treat in my Orthodoxy and the Roman Papacy: Ut Unum Sint and the Prospects of East-West Unity).

Episcopal Communion: Here Bordeianu admits that "Ideally from an Orthodox perspective" such communion would consist of the pope and all the bishops of the world exercising authority together in a synod (which I have also suggested) "without overlapping jurisdictions" (211). This, he says, is less important than the first point, citing the current jurisdictional mess in North American Orthodoxy which does not inhibit eucharistic sharing among bishops: "eucharistic communion is possible even before solving all the juridical issues" (212).

Love: Bordeianu says that he does not support eucharistic sharing between Catholics and Orthodox currently, in large part because of a lack of love between both. Once greater bonds of love are built between both--especially outside of North America, where relations are, he says, on the whole quite amicable--then we will be in a better position to move toward...

Eucharistic Communion: But before we get to that happy day, Bordeianu proposes something I have not seen advocated by others before, "namely, communion in all the other sacraments except the Eucharist."

In sum, Radu Bordeianu's Dumitru Staniloae: An Ecumenical Ecclesiology is an incredibly rich, challenging work that has cogently and convincingly introduced us in a deeper and more satisfying way than anyone has hitherto done to the ecclesiological thought of Romania's preeminent theologian, who offers great wisdom for all Christians in our ongoing search for that unity which the Lord wills for His Church. Nobody who cares about Christian unity, or about ecclesiology, can afford to ignore this book.

LOGOS: A Journal of Eastern Christian Studies

Which of your friends and family would not rejoice to find, under the Christmas tree this month, a subscription to Logos: A Journal of Eastern Christian Studies? Consider the many outstanding features of this revue:

• The oldest journal of its kind in North America
  
• This journal alone features more recent book reviews than many other comparable journals combined.
  
• This journal alone manages to be published consistently on schedule
• This journal features the widest array of scholars--historians, theologians, anthropologists, psychologists, canonists, religious studies scholars, sociologists, philosophers, and others--from the widest array of backgrounds: we welcome all who are interested in Eastern Christianity, and one does not need to belong to a particular church or denominational "society" in order to contribute.
• This journal publishes leading scholars from Oxford, Harvard, Princeton, Notre Dame, Chicago, and many other universities in North America and Europe.
  

Consider the riches of the fall issue, which it is not too late to order here for your family and friends:

Scholarly Articles:

• "Pavel Florensky: His Life and Work" (by Richard W. Armstrong)
• "Symbols and Symbolism in the Liturgy Revisited: A Ricoeurian Critique of Schmemann's Symbology" (by Brian Butcher)
• "The Canonical Rules of the Orthodox Church: Theory and Practice" (by Sr. Vassa Larin)
• "Parenting in the Spirit: Helping Children Stay on the King's Highway" (by Theresa Zolner)

Book Reviews:

• Diarmaid MacCulloch's Christianity: The First Three Thousand Years is reviewed by Michael Plekon

• Ray Brandon and Wendy Lower, eds., The Shoah in Ukraine: History, Testimony, Memorialization is reviewed by Myroslav Shkandrij

• Maxwell Johnson's edited collection, Issues in Eucharistic Praying in East and West, which I briefly discussed here, is reviewed by Nicholas Denysenko

• Nelly van Doorn-Harder reviews Rachel Scott, The Challenge of Political Islam: Non-Muslims and the Egyptian State

• Peter Leithart's Defending Constantine: The Twilight of an Empire and the Dawn of Christendom is reviewed by Daniel Larison

• Stanley Harakas reviews the collection At the Roots of Christian Bioethics: Critical Essays on the Thought of H. Tristram Engelhardt, Jr

• John Hunwicke reviews James Siemens, The Christology of Theodore of Tarsus: The Laterculus Malalianus and the Person and Work of Christ (Studia Traditionis Theologiae

• Robert Slesinski, himself a Florensky scholar and expert on the Slavophiles, reviews three new books:
• G.M. Hamburg and R. A. Poole, eds., A History of Russian Philosophy 1830-1930: Faith, Reason, and the Defense of Human Dignity
• Laura Engelstein, Slavophile Empire: Imperial Russia's Illiberal Path
• S.L. Frank, The Meaning of Life

• Sarah Phillips reviews Jarrett Zizon, "HIV is God's Blessing:" Rehabilitating Morality in Neoliberal Russia

• Stephen Need reviews Anthony O'Mahony, ed., Christianity and Jerusalem

• David Bertaina reviews Philip Wood, `We have no king but Christ': Christian Political Thought in Greater Syria on the Eve of the Arab Conquest (c.400-585) (Oxford Studies in Byzantium)

• Robert Slesinski reviews Basilio Petrà, L'Etica Ortodossa: Storia, fonti, identità.

• Oxford's Hugh Wybrew reviews Bryn Geffert, Eastern Orthodox and Anglicans: Diplomacy, Theology, and the Politics of Interwar Ecumenism

• Harvard's Nicolas Prevelakis reviews Victor Roudometov and Vasilios N. Makrides, eds.,Orthodox Christianity in 21st Century Greece

• Heather Bailey reviews Lee Trepanier, Political Symbols in Russian History: Church, State, and the Quest for Order and Justice

Given this abundance of scholarly riches, what prevents you from subscribing today?

Efficacious Sacraments

Liturgical Press has unexpectedly sent me a new book that is primarily focused on Western sacramental theology, but one which does, in places, take a comparative approach and so briefly acknowledges Eastern practices and figures including Robert Taft, Anton Baumstark, Origen, and John Chrysostom: Kimberly Hope Belcher, Efficacious Engagement: Sacramental Participation in the Trinitarian Mystery (Collegeville, MN, 2011), xi+199pp.

About this book, the publisher tells us:

The long-standing tradition of baptizing infants suggests that the sacraments plunge our bodies into salvation, so the revelation of God's love in the sacraments addresses the whole person, not the mind alone. In this work, the contemporary Roman Catholic rite of baptism for infants becomes a case study, manifesting the connections between the human body, the ecclesial body, and the Body of Christ. The sacramental life, for children as for adults, is an ongoing journey deeper into the life of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. By examining the Church's practice of infant baptism, Kimberly Hope Belcher asks how human beings participate in God s life through the sacraments. Christian sacraments are embodied, cultural rituals performed by and for human beings. At the same time, the sacraments are God's gifts of grace, by which human beings enter into God's own life. In this study, contemporary ritual studies, sacramental theology, and trinitarian theology are used to explore how participation in the sacraments can be an efficacious engagement in God's life of love.

The Armenian Catholicos

Those who read my Orthodoxy and the Roman Papacy: Ut Unum Sint and the Prospects of East-West Unity will know the great esteem in which I hold the Armenian Apostolic Church, whose structures, which I analyze in great detail, are completely singular.

Now one of their two catholicoi, His Holiness Catholicos Aram of Cilicia, has recently published a book entitled Taking the Church to the People. The press release from his publisher tells us the following about this book:

The book consists of three parts. In the first part, Catholicos Aram I describes the nature of the church, its mission and its institutional expressions, including the parish, the dioceses and the wider Armenian community in Armenia and the Diaspora. While describing the organization of each, His Holiness suggests ways in which they should be renewed. In the second part our Pontiff identifies the core issues that the Armenian Church is currently facing. He starts with the Bible as the foundation of Christian faith and its interpretation; he then discusses the family, the school and Christian education. At the end of this section, His Holiness Aram I explains the meaning of the term "people of God" and explains why Armenian women, youth and children, who have been marginalized in the Church and all community organizations, should participate in building their communities.

In the final part of the book, His Holiness includes certain pastoral letters and messages that he has previously addressed to youth in order to prompt a meaningful dialogue with them. The book is a basic reader for all Armenians who want to learn about the Armenian Church and its faith, mission and organization. It is an invitation to the people in Armenia and the Diaspora to equip themselves with the legacy of the past and build Armenian communities responsive to the challenges of globalization. Finally, it is a guide to being the Church as the people of God both in Armenia and Diaspora.