MONASTIC SPIRITUALITY IN THE TEACHING OF SAINT BASIL THE GREAT

The spiritual training of the exceptional beacon of the Cappadocian Fathers, Saint Basil the Great, influenced the subsequent ecclesial life, but especially the monastic one, by the divinely inspired rules, which became essential for all the subsequent monastic settlements, the fruits of the monastic spirituality according to his teaching being substantiated in the principles governing the life of the monastic community by love, obedience, teaching, knowledge, asceticism, without despising the hermitic (skete) life, trying to combine the most useful principles of both of these forms of monastic asceticism.

Moral Virtue as a Requisite for Illumination in the Platonic Tradition

This paper traces the development of the idea that we must cultivate moral virtue in order to attain some degree of illumination regarding the nature of reality. I use the term “illumination” to cover a range of meanings intended by the philosophers I discuss, such as the “acquisition of wisdom” (Phaedo, 65a), the “sight” of divine beauty (Symposium, 210d–212b), or a mystical experience involving God or divine reality. Although this theme appears in many texts from the Platonic tradition, I focus on three major stages of its development. First, I show how Plato provides the basic framework of the idea that moral virtue is necessary for illumination, especially in his Phaedo and Symposium. Then, I explain how Plotinus synthesizes and substantially develops Plato’s discussions of this idea. Finally, I discuss the Cappadocian Fathers’ (Basil of Caesarea, Gregory of Nyssa, and Gregory Nazianzen) Christianization of this Platonic theme. In other words, Plotinus develops the basic framework of this argument first set forth by Plato, and the Cappadocians then adapt and modify Plotinus’ views to fit their Christian commitments.

Spigolature pseudodidimiane

The present study, after a quick codicological investigation of the two surviving manuscripts of the De trinitate by pseudo-Didymus, in which it is concluded that one is a copy of the other, focuses on the lexical analysis of the first book of the mutilated trinitarian treatise. By showing divergences from the authentic works of Didymus, alongside parallels with the writings of the Cappadocian Fathers, Cyril of Alexandria, Theodoret, of other late patristic authors, as well as with those of the Neoplatonic philosophers, in particular Proclus, the author concludes that the chronological position of De trinitate should not be before the end of the 5th century, and suggests a possible origin from an environment of Antiochene influence.

Love in Dionysius the Areopagite and St Maximus the Confessor

Love (erōs, agapē) is a fundamental category in the sixth-century Dionysius the Areopagite and the seventh-century Maximus the Confessor, the latter being confessedly dependant on the former, and both formative for the later Byzantine tradition. Both are indebted to earlier thinkers, both pagan thinkers such as Plato, Plotinus, and Proclus, and Christian thinkers such as Origen and the Cappadocian Fathers. Dionysius’s teaching on love presents a fundamentally metaphysical account, with cosmic entailments. He assimilates the two Greek words for love, erōs and agapē, seeing them both as manifestations of beauty and responses to beauty, and using them more or less interchangeably for the ecstatic love of God for the cosmos and the love that underlies the creatures’ return to union, to the One. Maximus shares Dionysius’s sense of love as metaphysical and cosmic, but his teaching is much more practical, and presents love as something that can be attained by the Christian or monk, though it requires genuine ascetic struggle. He makes more of a distinction between erōs and agapē than Dionysius, seeing erōs as perfecting the soul’s desire, while agapē perfects the soul’s thumos, psychic energy. Maximus’s understanding of the interrelated psychological makeup of the soul, influenced by Evagrius, though with its own characteristic emphases, also underlies his sense of what is meant by the restoration of the cosmos.

The Cappadocians and their Christian Philosophy

This chapter offers an in-depth analysis of the philosophy underlying the teaching of the so-called Cappadocian fathers. After an introductory overview of their historical and intellectual background in the trinitarian controversy of the fourth century, the chapter initially turns to Basil of Caesarea. He introduced a distinctive terminological and conceptual framework to articulate his proposal for a solution to the trinitarian controversy. Philosophically, it is geared towards grammar and logic; it is therefore called the ‘abstract’ dimension of the Cappadocian theory. All three Cappadocians accept this abstract theory. Subsequently, the chapter turns to Gregory of Nyssa who in his cosmological and trinitarian writings develops a corresponding theory geared towards physics and ontology. It will be referred to as the ‘concrete’ dimension of Cappadocian philosophy. These two are conceived as complementary but their difference introduces a conceptual tension into the Cappadocian theory.

Introduction

This chapter provides an overall introduction to the book. It outlines its methodological approach, explains the selection of authors, and sets out the case that will be argued. Central for the approach is the concept of Patristic philosophy meant to stem the traditional dualism of Christian thought and philosophy. Christian writers themselves are thus seen as philosophers. While Christian philosophy in this sense began in the second century, it obtains a distinctive shape at the end of the fourth century through the work of the Cappadocian fathers. The book recounts the history of this uniquely influential, classical theory. It is subsequently received but also modified and transformed. The history must represent the diversity of this development and cannot be restricted to Chalcedonian authors only. The tensions between the needs of the Christological controversy and the inherited Cappadocian theory lead to philosophical innovations that prepare much later developments.