Eunomius Of Cyzicus Research Articles

Gregory of Nyssa: Contra Eunomium I: An English Translation with Supporting Studies. Edited by Miguel Brugarolas

Between 380 and 383 Gregory of Nyssa wrote three volumes of polemic Contra Eunomium (henceforth CE) against the Trinitarian doctrines of the ‘anomoean’ (radical Arian) Eunomius of Cyzicus. Each of the three volumes of CE has been the subject of one of the international colloquia on Gregory held every four years or so since 1969, whose proceedings are now regularly published by Brill as supplements to Vigiliae Christianae. The current publication follows those on CE II and III, which appeared in 2007 and 2014 respectively (for CE III see JTS, ns 67 [2016], pp. 318–22). CE I was the topic of the colloquium held in Pamplona in 1986, and an earlier version of this volume was published by the University of Navarra in 1988. It has now been reissued by Brill in this revised and updated form, ‘to render that essential part of the original volume . . . more accessible to international readers’ and ‘to offer an up-to-date contribution to the research on [CE]’. It includes 11 selected papers from the previous edition, nine new articles (marked as such in the discussion below), and two original texts revised by the authors. Twelve of the papers are in English, five in German, four in French, and one in Spanish.

There are two roads marked out to us for the discovery of what we seek… Eunomius’ arguments on the generation of the Son based on the concepts of substance and activity

Eunomius of Cyzicus in his writings defends Arian understanding of the ge­neration of the Son of God. He claims that the generation must be perceived as creation of the new essence. Therefore, the Son of God is the first creation and could not be equal with the Father. Among many arguments that he gives to sup­port his thesis, he also evokes the distinction between essence (oÙs…a) and activi­ty (™nšrgeia). Eunomius proposes his own methodology and states that there are two ways leading to proper understanding of generation. First one leads form the recognizing of the essence of God to conclusions on the generation, which is the activity of the Father. Another way of demonstration starts from the activities and allows distinguishing essences according to the products that they have caused. Eunomius underlines that both ways of enquiry lead to an irrefutable conclusion that the Father and the Son cannot have the same essence. Moreover, he claims that there could be no likeness between the two essences of the Father and the Son. The goal of this article is to review Eunomius’ arguments from the view­point of their effectiveness and proposed methodology. The orthodox answer of Basil the Great and Gregory of Nyssa are the context of reviewing Neo- Arian claims.

The Sacramental Reading of Nicene Theology: Athanasius and Gregory of Nyssa on Proverbs 8

ABSTRACT Both Arian and pro-Nicene theologians saw in the Wisdom of Prov 8 a reference to Christ. This agreement, however, did not produce unanimity about the manner of Christological exegesis. Theologians such as Eusebius of Caesarea and Eunomius of Cyzicus tried to determine the "plain" or "literal" meaning of the text. As a result, they saw in the passage references to a shadowy figure, called "Wisdom," whom God had "created," "established," or "begotten" (Prov 8) long before time began—a figure that became incarnate in Jesus Christ. By contrast, the reading strategy of Marcellus of Ancyra, Athanasius of Alexandria, and Gregory of Nyssa was grounded in the sacramental conviction that the genre of the book of Proverbs demands that we recognize a "hidden" meaning, one that becomes clear to us only in and through God's economic self-revelation in Jesus Christ. A strictly literal, nonsacramental reading of Prov 8 was problematic, according to the pro-Nicene theologians, in that it fails to note the sacramental reality (res) of Christ and his church as really present in the Wisdom passages of the book of Proverbs. By refusing to allegorize, the Arian tradition was unable to discern within the book of Proverbs the doctrinal truth of God's full self-disclosure in Jesus Christ.

The Sacramental Reading of Nicene Theology: Athanasius and Gregory of Nyssa on Proverbs 8

ABSTRACT Both Arian and pro-Nicene theologians saw in the Wisdom of Prov 8 a reference to Christ. This agreement, however, did not produce unanimity about the manner of Christological exegesis. Theologians such as Eusebius of Caesarea and Eunomius of Cyzicus tried to determine the "plain" or "literal" meaning of the text. As a result, they saw in the passage references to a shadowy figure, called "Wisdom," whom God had "created," "established," or "begotten" (Prov 8) long before time began—a figure that became incarnate in Jesus Christ. By contrast, the reading strategy of Marcellus of Ancyra, Athanasius of Alexandria, and Gregory of Nyssa was grounded in the sacramental conviction that the genre of the book of Proverbs demands that we recognize a "hidden" meaning, one that becomes clear to us only in and through God's economic self-revelation in Jesus Christ. A strictly literal, nonsacramental reading of Prov 8 was problematic, according to the pro-Nicene theologians, in that it fails to note the sacramental reality (res) of Christ and his church as really present in the Wisdom passages of the book of Proverbs. By refusing to allegorize, the Arian tradition was unable to discern within the book of Proverbs the doctrinal truth of God's full self-disclosure in Jesus Christ.

Basil of Caesarea versus Eunomius of Cyzicus on the Nature of Time: A Patristic Reception of the Critique of Plato

This paper investigates rival views about the nature of time that were articulated in the fourth-century controversies over the Trinity. In his Contra Eunomium Basil of Caesarea refuted the definition of time put forward by his opponent, Eunomius of Cyzicus, and presented his own views on its nature. This study seeks to contextualize the views of both contestants polemically, theologically, and philosophically. It is argued that Eunomius’s definition of time has a Platonic pedigree. In addition, it is demonstrated that, in both his critique of Eunomius’s definition and the positive presentation of his own views on time, Basil draws upon his familiarity with the philosophical critique of Plato’s views, as found in Aristotle, the Peripatetics, the Stoics, and the Middle Platonists (and perhaps even Galen). Basil’s own views on time have been most immediately influenced by Middle Platonist, Peripatetic, and Stoic concerns.

Angels in Late Ancient Christianity by Ellen Muehlberger (review)

Reviewed by: Angels in Late Ancient Christianity by Ellen Muehlberger Heidi Marx-Wolf Angels in Late Ancient Christianity Ellen Muehlberger Oxford and New York: Oxford University Press, 2013. Pp. xi + 279. ISBN 978–0-19–993193–4 It likely comes as little surprise that angels were important to late ancient Christians. What is surprising is how little scholarly attention has been given to the question. Hence, until the publication of Ellen Muehlberger’s excellent book on the subject, it has been difficult to assess just how important angels were in the fourth through sixth centuries ce and in what respects they mattered to early Christians. Unlike previous scholars who took their cues from the elaborate angelology [End Page 364] of Pseudo-Dionysus and attempted to reproduce such discourses for earlier time periods in Christian history, Muehlberger succeeds at contextualizing the hierarchical discourses of an impressively wide variety of early Christian intellectuals, re-embedding them in “specific local social contexts” (212), in “fields of practice emergent in the culture that took form after the legitimization of Christianity” (212). The two social contexts she explores are what she calls “cultivation,” that is, approaches to questions about higher spiritual beings that are embedded in academic and ascetic lineages aimed at self-transformation and the cultivation of nous, and “contestation,” approaches that seek to wield power in order to “assemble a congregation” using “rhetorical persuasion” (212). Although readers may be inclined to see these two contexts in light of the stereotypical juxtaposition of “ascetic” versus “bishop,” one of the great virtues of Muehlberger’s study is the way it resists this overly simple dichotomy and clearly demonstrates important instances of cross-pollination and dialogic exchange between writers in monastic and urban ecclesiastical settings. A few key and interrelated points emerge as a result of Muehlberger’s approach. The most significant of these is that although angels were central to the ways in which late ancient Christians imagined their communities, religious traditions, and identities, there was little agreement about what angels were, what they could and could not do in the cosmos, where they fit in, and how they related to humans both ontologically and soteriologically. The author succeeds in efficiently and clearly giving the reader a taste of this diversity without endeavoring to be encyclopedic, at the same time signaling why it matters for our overall understanding of late ancient Christianity. Muehlberger demonstrates just how great the differences were among late ancient intellectuals on the topic of angels in chapter 1, “Late Ancient Theories of Angels: Evagrius of Pontus and Augustine of Hippo Compared.” In this chapter, she juxtaposes Evagrius’s emphasis on the mutability of angels, namely that they can become other spiritual species (a view he clearly derives from Origen), with Augustine who holds the view that angels, after the fall, were fixed in their identity as citizens of the City of God, in essence losing their free will as a “reward” for their initial faithfulness to God. She further highlights the ways in which these authors’ thinking about angels was fully integrated into their respective “programs of salvation.” For Evagrius, the mobility of angels implied a similar mobility for Christian souls involved in practices of cultivation. In the case of Augustine, angels were importantly different from humans, whose wills had been perverted as a result of the fall. Hence, angels were not so much models for humans on the path to salvation as reminders of just how wrong things had gone. Chapter 2, “Locating Christ in Scripture: Angels in the Development of Theological Reading,” highlights the diverse ways in which Christians thought about angels in the context of their efforts to “establish reliable knowledge of Christ’s identity” from reading Hebrew Scripture. At issue was whether or not one could interpret angelic beings and other spirits in these texts as Christ. Muehlberger discusses the differences between writers such as Justin Martyr, Athanasius, Eunomius of Cyzicus, Basil of Caesarea, Gregory of Nyssa, and Augustine. While [End Page 365] Greek writers entertained the possibility that spirits in Hebrew Scripture did indeed represent direct divine interaction and intervention, Augustine argued that any such moment was enacted through the agency of lesser spirits...

Angels in Late Ancient Christianity by Ellen Muehlberger (review)

Reviewed by: Angels in Late Ancient Christianity by Ellen Muehlberger Heidi Marx-Wolf Angels in Late Ancient Christianity Ellen Muehlberger Oxford and New York: Oxford University Press, 2013. Pp. xi + 279. ISBN 978–0-19–993193–4. It likely comes as little surprise that angels were important to late ancient Christians. What is surprising is how little scholarly attention has been given to the question. Hence, until the publication of Ellen Muehlberger’s excellent book on the subject, it has been difficult to assess just how important angels were in the fourth through sixth centuries ce and in what respects they mattered to early Christians. Unlike previous scholars who took their cues from the elaborate angelology of Pseudo-Dionysus and attempted to reproduce such discourses for earlier time periods in Christian history, Muehlberger succeeds at contextualizing the hierarchical discourses of an impressively wide variety of early Christian intellectuals, re-embedding them in “specific local social contexts” (212), in “fields of practice emergent in the culture that took form after the legitimization of Christianity” (212). The two social contexts she explores are what she calls “cultivation,” [End Page 189] that is, approaches to questions about higher spiritual beings that are embedded in academic and ascetic lineages aimed at self-transformation and the cultivation of nous, and “contestation,” approaches that seek to wield power in order to “assemble a congregation” using “rhetorical persuasion” (212). Although readers may be inclined to see these two contexts in light of the stereotypical juxtaposition of “ascetic” versus “bishop,” one of the great virtues of Muehlberger’s study is the way it resists this overly simple dichotomy and clearly demonstrates important instances of cross-pollination and dialogic exchange between writers in monastic and urban ecclesiastical settings. A few key and interrelated points emerge as a result of Muehlberger’s approach. The most significant of these is that, although angels were central to the ways in which late ancient Christians imagined their communities, religious traditions, and identities, there was little agreement about what angels were, what they could and could not do in the cosmos, where they fit in, and how they related to humans both ontologically and soteriologically. The author succeeds in efficiently and clearly giving the reader a taste of this diversity without endeavoring to be encyclopedic, at the same time signaling why it matters for our overall understanding of late ancient Christianity. Muehlberger demonstrates just how great the differences were among late ancient intellectuals on the topic of angels in chapter 1, “Late Ancient Theories of Angels: Evagrius of Pontus and Augustine of Hippo Compared.” In this chapter, she juxtaposes Evagrius’s emphasis on the mutability of angels, namely that they can become other spiritual species (a view he clearly derives from Origen) with Augustine who holds the view that angels, after the fall, were fixed in their identity as citizens of the City of God, in essence losing their free will as a “reward” for their initial faithfulness to God. She further highlights the ways in which these authors’ thinking about angels was fully integrated into their respective “programs of salvation.” For Evagrius, the mobility of angels implied a similar mobility for Christian souls involved in practices of cultivation. In the case of Augustine, angels were importantly different from humans, whose wills had been perverted as a result of the fall. Hence, angels were not so much models for humans on the path to salvation as reminders of just how wrong things had gone. Chapter 2, “Locating Christ in Scripture: Angels in the Development of Theological Reading,” highlights the diverse ways in which Christians thought about angels in the context of their efforts to “establish reliable knowledge of Christ’s identity” from reading Hebrew Scripture. At issue was whether or not one could interpret angelic beings and other spirits in these texts as Christ. Muehlberger discusses the differences between writers such as Justin Martyr, Athanasius, Eunomius of Cyzicus, Basil of Caesarea, Gregory of Nyssa, and Augustine. While Greek writers entertained the possibility that spirits in Hebrew Scripture did indeed represent direct divine interaction and intervention, Augustine argued that any such moment was enacted through the agency of lesser spirits, i.e., angels...

The Controversy between al-Kindī and Yaḥyā b. ʿAdī on the Trinity, Part Two: Gregory of Nyssa’s and Ibn ʿAdī’s Refutations of Eunomius’ and al-Kindī’s ‘Error’

This article is the second part of an investigation into the controversy between the Arab-Muslim philosopher Abū Yūsuf Yaʿqūb b. Isḥāq al-Kindī (died after 256/870, ca. 873) and the Christian-Jacobite logician and theologian Yaḥyā b. ʿAdī (d. 363/974). It argues that we can draw a line from Basil of Caesarea’s and Gregory of Nyssa’s refutation of Eunomius of Cyzicus to Yaḥyā b. ʿAdī’s refutation of al-Kindī. According to Gregory’s and Ibn ʿAdī’s reasoning Eunomius’ and al-Kindī’s refutation of the consubstantiality of God-Father and God-Son is grounded in a series of misunderstandings starting from the fundamental error of a false interpretation of the relationship between substance and hypostases. The term ‘hypostases’ in Gregory’s and Ibn ʿAdī’s interpretation does not indicate ‘individual substances’ but rather different subsistences of a nature or essence realised by the properties peculiar to that nature. The nature in turn is knowable by its intelligible properties, and the fact of the subsistence of properties is signified by an appellation or by the predication of a circumscription (πeριγραφή) or characterisation and attribute (ṣifa) respectively.

THE THEOLOGICAL CONTROVERSY BETWEEN EUNOMIUS AND BASIL THE GREAT: A PHILOSOPHICAL APPROACH

ABSTRACT In this paper we examine an aspect of the conflict between Eunomius of Cyzicus and Basil the Great, as it referred to supreme dogmatic matters, such as the relationships between the Persons of the Holy Trinity. This theological rupture appears in a period, during which Christian doctrines are composed at advanced levels of maturity, also with the development among other things of impressive leaps toward which had been attempted by Origen, who was basically also the founder of Christian Hermeneutics. We refer to the basic concept of the conflict, namely the epinoia, and we set it off through the ontological-epistemological knowledge-contrast of realism-idealism. Our research programme is based in part on the historical element, par excellence on the systematic. As to the specific object of analysis, our report will be limited to an outline text of Basil of Caesarea and our aim will be to draw it out in its full development, from one expression to the next. This is the sixth chapter of the first book from the treatise Against Eunomius.

The Controversy between al-Kindī and Yayā b. Adī on the Trinity, (part one): A Revival of the Controversy between Eunomius and the Cappadocian Fathers

AbstractThis article deals with the reasoning of the neo-Arian Eunomius of Cyzicus and the Arabic philosopher al-Kindī against the consubstantiality (τ µοοσιον) of God the Father and God the Son and of three divine hypostases respectively. I wish to make evident that al-Kindī attacks the doctrine of Eunomius’ main adversaries Basil of Caesarea and Gregory of Nyssa as well as the doctrine of John Philoponus by taking up Aetius’ and Eunomius’ argument of the logical impossibility that the Ingenerate becomes generate. The philosophical and logico-semantic issue of dispute in the controversy is undistributed commonness versus distributed commonness (κοινωνα/cf. umūm), in other words intension versus extension. An investigation of Yayā b. Adī’s counter-refutation is forthcoming in one of the next volumes of Oriens.

The Holy Spirit as Agent, not Activity: Origen’s Argument with Modalism and its Afterlife in Didymus, Eunomius, and Gregory of Nazianzus

AbstractIn the latter half of the fourth century, Didymus the Blind, Eunomius of Cyzicus, and Gregory of Nazianzus all responded to the position that the Holy Spirit is merely an activity of God, and not a substantial reality. Heretofore, those who held this position have remained unidentified in modern scholarship. In this article, it is argued that the fourth-century arguments derive directly from an authentic fragment (number 37) of Origen’s Commentary on John, in which Origen argues against some form of modalism, perhaps Sabellianism. Origen’s use of John 3:8 together with 1 Corinthians 12:11 became decisive for later theologians in ascribing agency to the Spirit. Despite their obvious differences, Didymus, Eunomius, and Gregory follow Origen in viewing it as imperative to speak of the Spirit as a substantial reality in order to preserve the scriptural portrayal of the Spirit as active. Accordingly, this article provides testimony to the diverse legacy of Origen in the fourth century, as well as to the function of ‘substance’ language in fourth-century doctrinal disputes.

Book Reviews

Books reviewed:Renate Egger‐Wenzel, Ben Sira's GodPaul J. Achtemeier, Joel B. Green and Marianne Meye Thompson, Introducing the New Testament, Its Literature and TheologyI. Boxall, Revelation: Vision and Insight. An Introduction to the ApocalypseS. Moyise, Studies in the Book of RevelationG. R. Osborne, Revelation: The Baker Exegetical Commentary on the New TestamentN. T. Wright, The Resurrection of the Son of GodGillian Clark and T. Rajak, Philosophy and Power in the Graeco‐Roman World: Essays in Honour of Miriam GriffinRichard Paul Vaggione, Eunomius of Cyzicus and the Nicene RevolutionStephen T. Davies, Daniel Kendall S. J. and Gerald O'Collins, The Incarnation. An Interdisciplinary Symposium on the Incarnation of the Son of GodRichard Cross, The Metaphysics of the IncarnationHugh Connolly, SinAnthony W. Bartlett, Cross Purposes: The Violent Grammar of Christian AtonementStanley Hauerwas, With the Grain of the Universe: The Church's Witness and Natural TheologySarah Coakley, Powers and Submissions: Spirituality, Philosophy and GenderChristopher Cocksworth and Rosalind Brown, Being a Priest Today: Exploring priestly identityRandall Balmer, Encyclopedia of EvangelicalismKate Armstrong, Crisis and RepetitionAnthony A. Barrett, Livia: First Lady of Imperial RomeGerhard Podskalsky, Von Photios zu Bessarion: Der Vorrang humanistisch geprägter Theologie in Byzanz und deren bleibende BedeutungNicola Coldstream, Medieval ArchitectureW. J. Armstrong, J. A. W. Hellmann and W. Short, Francis of Assisi: Early Documents, IIIEllen E. Kittell and Thomas F. Madden, Medieval and Renaissance VeniceTheodor Dieter, Der junge Luther und Aristoteles: Eine historisch‐systematische Untersuchung zum Verhältnis von Theologie und PhilosophieAndrew Brown, Church and Society in England, 1000–1500Renate Blumenfeld‐Kosinski, Duncan Robertson, and Nancy Warren, The Vernacular Spirit: Essays on Medieval Religious LiteratureBarry Collett, Female Monastic Life in Early Tudor England, with an Edition of Richard Fox's Translation of the Benedictine Rule for Women, 1517Marc R. Forster, The Catholic Revival in the Age of the Baroque. Religious Identity in Southwest Germany, 1550–1750W. R. Ward, Christianity under the Ancien Régime 1648–1789Nigel Aston, Religion and Revolution in France 1780–1804Catharine Edwards, Roman Presences: Receptions of Rome in European Culture, 1789–1945Bruce L. Kinzer, England's Disgrace? J. S. Mill and the Irish QuestionJohn Corrigan, Business of the Heart: Religion and Emotion in the Nineteenth CenturyPeter M. Chisnall, John Henry Cardinal Newman: A Man of Courage, Conflict and ConvictionVincent Ferrer Blehl, Pilgrim Journey: John Henry Newman 1801–1845Kester Aspden, Fortress Church. The English Roman Catholic Bishops and Politics 1903–63David Alvarez, Spies In The Vatican: Espionage and Intrigue From Napoleon to the HolocaustPeter McDonough and Eugene C. Bianchi, Passionate Uncertainty: Inside the American JesuitsRuby Blondell, The Play of Character in Plato's Dialogues

Eunomius of Cyzicus and the Nicene Revolution (review)

Building on his earlier edition of the extant works of Eunomius, Richard Vaggione has now provided us with a detailed study of the notorious "Arian" thinker in the context of political, theological, and geographical factors that shaped his life and thought. Eunomius of Cyzicus and the Nicene Revolution is more than a biography of a fourth-century "heretic." It challenges common notions of much that we associate with the religious history of this period: trinitarian theology, the Arian controversy, the Council and Creed of Nicaea, and the very nature of "heresy."

Review: Eunomius of Cyzicus and the Nicene Revolution

Review: Eunomius of Cyzicus and the Nicene Revolution

Eunomius of Cyzicus and the Nicene Revolution (review)

Eunomius of Cyzicus and the Nicene Revolution (review)

Eunomius of Cyzicus and Gregory of Nyssa: Two Traditions of Transcendent Causality

Eunomius of Cyzicus and Gregory of Nyssa: Two Traditions of Transcendent Causality