Christe Eleison! The Invocation of Christ in Eastern Monastic Psalmody c.350-450. By JAMES F. WELLINGTON.

Abstract

T his book sets out to locate the evolution of the Jesus Prayer within the wider context of monastic liturgical life, particularly the recitation of the Psalms. The author approaches this task by examining the christological nature of the exegesis of the Psalms in Evagrios’ Scholia on the Psalms and other early monastic sources and commentaries. As a work of scholarship the aim of contextualizing the Jesus Prayer is only partly achieved. Most importantly, the author has not fully assimilated the content of Diadochos of Photike’s 100 Gnostic Chapters . It is in this fifth-century composition that we first find reference to the prayer ‘Lord Jesus’. Wellington is alive to the importance of Diadochos in the development of the Jesus Prayer, but there his interest ends. He seems unaware that the 100 Gnostic Chapters is also rich both in its Christology and in its references to and exegesis of the Psalms. Thus he only looks at those chapters of Diadochos that specifically mention the prayer ‘Lord Jesus’, leaving unexplored chapters that deal with the relationship between contemplative prayer and psalmody (e.g. 68 and 73). There is also no discussion of Diadochos’ many exegeses of individual verses of the Psalms. Almost all of these treat the Psalms as an allegorical account of contemplative prayer. Indeed in chapter 94 Diadochos relates the contemplative state directly to Ps. 4:7 (LXX): ‘The light of your face, O Lord, was printed on us.’