For centuries scholars have considered Gregory Thaumaturgus as the
pupil of Origen, the author of the Oratio panegyrica and the prodigious
bishop of Neocaesarea to whom Gregory of Nyssa dedicated the De Vita
Gregorii Thaumaturgi. This identification was further confirmed by
Eusebius's Historia Ecclesiastica, which includes these biographical
pieces of information and provides us with the first external testimony
on Gregory. In 1977 Pierre Nautin raised serious doubts regarding this
portrayal. His main argument was that Eusebius had arbitrarily merged
together three different persons and that both the ascription of the
Oratio and the later testimonies on Gregory should be deemed as
erroneous because they all took over Eusebius's mistake. Notwithstanding
the contrary reply of Henri Crouzel (1979), Gregory's traditional
figure has been considered an open question by several scholars (e.g.
Clausi - Milazzo 2002).
However, little attention has been paid to the information furnished by Gregory of Nyssa, Jerome and Socrates of Constantinople. In this paper I will argue that Gregory Thaumaturgus's traditional figure should still be considered trustworthy. My main hypothesis is that none of these authors actually depended on Eusebius's Historia. Jerome and Socrates rely on two lost works of Pamphilus, which preceded the Historia Ecclesiastica-his catalogue of the library of Caesarea, which was included by Eusebius in the third book of the Vita Pamphili, and one of the lost books of the Apologia pro Origene. It was ostensibly Pamphilus to have supplied Eusebius with the earliest traditional account of the figure of Gregory Thaumaturgus.
However, little attention has been paid to the information furnished by Gregory of Nyssa, Jerome and Socrates of Constantinople. In this paper I will argue that Gregory Thaumaturgus's traditional figure should still be considered trustworthy. My main hypothesis is that none of these authors actually depended on Eusebius's Historia. Jerome and Socrates rely on two lost works of Pamphilus, which preceded the Historia Ecclesiastica-his catalogue of the library of Caesarea, which was included by Eusebius in the third book of the Vita Pamphili, and one of the lost books of the Apologia pro Origene. It was ostensibly Pamphilus to have supplied Eusebius with the earliest traditional account of the figure of Gregory Thaumaturgus.
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