Britt Dahlman: The signs of humility: Cassian’s use of an Evagrian text and the question of authorship and language

In recent research the authorship of John Cassian (or Cassian the Roman as he is called in the East) has been questioned. Cassian’s Institutiones IV.39 is known for having influenced the monastic rules; it was included and reworked in the chapter on humility in theRegula magistri and soon thereafter in the Regula Benedicti. This text is also found in a florilegium of excerpts in Greek attributed to Evagrius. Cassian’s text in both the Latin and Greek versions seems to be rewritten and expanded compared to the florilegium text. However, Cassian’s Greek version has more resemblance than the Latin with the text of the florilegium, raising questions of dependence and, I will argue, supporting thehypothesis that Cassian originally wrote the Institutiones in Greek.