Meditations of the Heart: The Psalms in Early Christian Thought and Practice. Essays in Honour of Andrew Louth. Edited by ANDREAS ANDREOPOULOS, AUGUSTINE CASIDAY, and CAROL HARRISON

Abstract

Andrew Louth is one of the most perceptive Christian minds of our time. His spiritual journey from Anglicanism into Orthodoxy, and more recently into the Orthodox priesthood, has represented a long quest for intellectual and spiritual authenticity. The issue for him has always been how to be both a scholar and a disciple; how to live Evagrius’ maxim that the theologian is the one who truly prays, the one who prays is a theologian. This has not been a journey that has taken place in solitude. The sixteen essayists in this volume are Orthodox, Anglican, and Roman Catholic and represent a world of study, friendship, prayer, and collegiality. It is always difficult to pick out particular gems from such a rich collection, especially when the authors have interpreted their brief in very diverse ways. The essays which stick closest to the title are perhaps the most satisfactory, demonstrating the seminal role of the Psalms in the development both of Christology and the language of prayer. Rowan Williams offers a densely argued and rewarding exploration of the interpretation of Psalm 45, showing that different and sometimes conflicting perspectives contributed to a Trinitarian language which was both dogmatic and prayerful—of all the essays this one most closely mirrors Andrew Louth’s theological agenda. In the same spirit is a fine essay by John A. McGuckin on Origen’s bold appropriation of the Psalms as the place in the Old Testament in which the Logos could be heard to speak most directly. The Psalms were as close to the heart of revelation for Origen as John’s Gospel or the Pauline epistles. Norman Russell takes as his text Ps. 81:6, ‘I said, you are gods, sons of the most high’, and shows the part it played in the theology of Gregory Palamas and his opponents: the issue here is how human beings participate in the divine nature; and whether this is to be understood as a reality in this life or as a reward in the next.