Andrew Louth Conference at Durham, UK - 9-12 July 2012

Durham University in conjunction with the Department of Theology and Religion will be hosting the conference ‘A celebration of living theology: Engaging with the work of Andrew Louth’ on 9-12 July 2012 at Durham University. The conference aims to celebrate the work of Andrew Louth in the areas of Patristics, both Western and Eastern, Modern Theology and Theology as Life, as well as explore its reception outside the English-speaking world. The plenary papers will be collected into a Festschrift to be published after the conference.
The confirmed plenary speakers are:
Antoine Arjakovsky: ‘The orthodox theology and the future pan orthodox council’.
John Behr, ‘Studying the Fathers in the Twenty First Century’.
Augustine Casiday, ’Boethius the Theologian’.
Mary Cunningham: ‘The concept of “image” according to an eighth-century Byzantine bishop: St Andrew of Crete’s response to ps-Dionysius the Areopagite’.
Pavel Gavrilyuk: ‘The Evolution of Florovsky’s Reading of Vladimir Solovyov and the Waywardness of Russian Theology’.
Cyril Hovorun: ‘British Patristic School: Its impact on modern Orthodox Theology’.
John Milbank, title tbc.
Kallistos Ware: ‘The Future Path of Orthodox Thought: ‘Culture and Society’ or ‘Mystical Theology’?’.
Jane Baun, title tbc.
Thomas Graumann, title tbc.
Lewis Ayres, title tbc.
and, of course, Andrew Louth.

http://andrewlouthconference2012.wordpress.com/

Morwenna Ludlow - WORKSHOP: 'The Image of God in "Nicene" Theology'

Cappadocian responses I

This paper will respond to the questions posed by Frances Young in her paper “God’s Image: the ‘Elephant in the Room’ in the fourth Century?”, by examining theories of ‘imaging’ as they apply to theology and the arts and, in particular, by focussing on the concept of ‘mimesis’.  This does not appear as an explicit theme in Young’s paper on which this workshop is based; however, mimesis is a prominent theme in her writing on early Christian exegesis, especially in her Biblical Exegesis and the Formation of Christian Culture.  This paper will argue that the Cappadocian fathers (especially the two Gregories) reflect explicitly on the ‘mimetic’ quality of their theological writing: they connect this to artistic mimesis in general (including visual mimesis in pictures and sculpture) and this allows them to make a distinction between mimesis as mere representation or repetition and mimesis which is productive in some other more positive way.  The paper will connect this move to art-historical analyses of ‘viewing’ in Late Antiquity (using the work of Jaś Elsner), arguing that the Cappadocians thought that Christian art did not attempt directly to represent the divine as pagan idols did.  Furthermore, they claimed (against Eunomius) that bad theological writing was ‘idolatrous’ because it tried directly to represent the divine.  The question is, then, whether/how the Cappadocians connected claims about visual and literary idolatry either to the exegesis of Ex 20:4 or to theological claims about Christ being the image of God (Col 1:15) and humans being created in God’s image (Gen 1:27)? 

Timothy LaBarbera - "The Memory of Cyril is Everlasting": A Rhetorical Analysis of the use of Cyril of Alexandria at the Council of Chalcedon.

      In the traditional scholarly interpretation of the council of Chalcedon the primary purpose of the council was to enforce unanimity on the Christological questions raised by the controversy over Eutyches. While it seems natural to assume that a discussion of Christology would dominate the council, a rhetorical analysis of the acts of the council shows that Christology was frequently not the issue being directly discussed. This paper broadens our understanding of the inner workings of the council’s attempts at consensus. In fact, very little technical Christological argumentation occurs at all during the pivotal first session. Discussion was primarily carried out through appeals to sources of authority and references to arguments that had already been made prior to the council. One of the primary sources of authority used by the supporters of Dioscorus was Cyril of Alexandria.

      This study uses rhetorical analysis to analyze the appeals to Cyril of Alexandria as a source of authority. Certain groups and individuals showed definite predilections toward particular sources of authority. For example, in the first session, current or one-time partisans of Dioscorus made approximately 95% of the appeals to the authority of Cyril of Alexandria. Despite switching sides, the bishops tended to take their favorite sources of authority with them. Rhetorical analysis can also be used to highlight shifts in the strategy used by the bishops at the council. Dioscorus, the most frequent voice during the first session, an Alexandrian and the successor of Cyril, makes surprisingly spare use of Cyril of Alexandria as a source of authority, accounting for less than 10% of Dioscorus’ total number of appeals to sources of authority. Dioscorus more frequently utilized appeals to imperial authority and proper procedure. Appeals to precedent, not including Cyril of Alexandria, were also common during the first session of the council. Current or one-time partisans of Dioscorus used Cyril more accounting for approximately 28% of their appeals to authority. In fact, appeals to Cyril make up approximately 12.5% of the total number of appeals made during the first session of the council.

Victoria Leonard - Nefarious Acts and Sacrilegious Sacrifices: Live Burial in the Historia adversus paganos

This paper is concerned with the spectacle of live burial in the Historia adversus paganos, a seven-book History written by Paulus Orosius in the early fifth century AD. The text provides one of the earliest etymological definitions of the term ‘pagan’, an example that was influential for later post-classical understandings of the word. This paper will examine the construction of paganism within the Historia, considering the representation of pagan religious practice in Christian apologetic. This will give specific attention to the leitmotiv of live burial and its function within the text. In Plutarch’s Life of Numa the description of the live burial of a Vestal Virgin prompts the reflection that ‘No other spectacle is more appalling, nor does any other day bring more gloom to the city than this.’ (10.3) The Historia sees live burial as a punishment most frequently enforced upon the Vestal Virgins for the sins of ‘defilement’ and ‘pollution’. The connection between the custom of live burial and the city of Rome is recurrent. But it is also more widely connected in myth and history with ‘unnatural crimes’ such as parricide and incest, and most notably, the practice of pagan sacrifice and theatrical performances. This paper seeks to demonstrate the pejorative yet subtle rhetoric of deprecation enacted against the pagan in the polemical discourse of the Historia and how this contributes to the representation of paganism in the text. 

Catherine LEFORT - À propos d’une source inédite des Soliloques d’Augustin : la notion cicéronienne de « vraisemblance ».

La logique de la difficile argumentation du livre II des Soliloques s’éclaire si l’on sait y discerner la présence de la philosophie cicéronienne, une source qui n’a pas été suffisamment été mise en lumière pour ce dialogue philosophique. Augustin y adopte en effet le concept néoacadémicien de « vraisemblance » (uerisimile/similitudo) pour structurer une grande partie de ses développements. On se propose donc de voir en quel sens le nouveau converti reprend à son compte cette notion, comment il la pense dans un cadre ontologique renouvelé par sa découverte récente du néoplatonisme et de quelle manière ses analyses de jeunesse joueront un rôle important dans l’élaboration de sa doctrine ultérieure. 

The logic of the difficult argument of the second book of the Soliloquies gets clearer if one knows to read through it the presence of Ciceronian philosophy. Such a source has not been brought to light enough yet when it comes to this philosophical dialogue. Indeed, Augustine chooses the neo-academician concept of “verisimilitude” (verisimile/similitudo), in order to structure an important part of his propositions. Thus, our aim is to see how the newly convert uses that notion for his own purpose, how he conceives it in a new ontological frame, renewed par his fresh discovery of neo-platonism and how his early-year analyses will have an important role in the elaboration of his ulterior doctrine.

James Lee - The Church as Mystery in the Theology of St Augustine

Augustine’s use of “mystery” (mysterium, sacramentum) precisely with regard to the Church provides an entry point into his complex ecclesiology, which resists reduction to a particular concept and defies easy systematization. For Augustine, the Church is a “mystery” that is both “visible” and “invisible,” “inner” and “outer.” These distinctions serve not so much as marks of absolute delineation within the Church, but instead are taken up into a broader theology of transformation whereby, as Augustine proclaims, “Babylon becomes Jerusalem.” Contemplation of the Church as “mystery” arises from contemplation of Scripture, for as Augustine asserts in en Ps 79.1, the “total mystery” (totum mysterium) of Scripture is “Christ and the Church” (Christum et ecclesiam). This study examines Augustine’s exegesis of Scriptural figures such as Noah’s Ark, Jacob and Esau, and the two cities (Babylon and Jerusalem) in significant ecclesiological works, including De baptismo, De fide rerum invisibilium, Enarrationes in Psalmos, In Johannis evengelium tractatus, and De civitate dei, in order to explore how the Church is a “mystery” in the theology of St Augustine.

Andrew Louth - Symbolism and the Angels

Dionysios the Areopagite develops an elaborate doctrine of like and unlike symbolism mostly in connexion with his teaching on the celestial beings (‘angels’, though for Dionysios ‘angel’ is the title of the lowest rank of the celestial beings).  This paper will explore the background of his theory of symbolism in Neoplatonism, especially in Proklos, and outline its development in St Maximos the Confessor.

Joshua Lollar - The Contemplation of Nature in Maximus the Confessor's Ambigua to John

This paper gives an analysis of the theme of “natural contemplation” or “natural philosophy” in Maximus the Confessor’s Ambigua to John. It begins with a brief overview of the contents of the Ambigua, showing the centrality of the notion of knowledge of the created world in Maximus’ vision of the transgression of Adam, the economy of salvation, and the relation of the different aspects of philosophy: ethics/praxis, natural contemplation, and theology. It then focuses specifically on three themes from the Origenist controversy of previous generations—the fall of intellects from a primordial henad, the supposed intellectualism (at the expense of concerted ascetical practice) of the Origenist monks, and the notion of the world as the place of judgment of fallen intellects—showing how Maximus addresses these issues especially in the opening chapters of the Ambigua, chapters 6-8 and 10, and the last chapter, 71. I show how Ambigua 6-8 interpret Gregory Nazianzen’s statements from his oration On the Love of the Poor regarding the human condition in a way that establishes the fundamental condition of human passibility and thus sets the stage for his description of the nature of philosophy in Ambiguum 10. Here I demonstrate how Maximus argues for the inseparability of praxis and contemplation, arguing, in fact, that reason and contemplation (logos and theôria) “contain” praxis within themselves. Finally, I show how Maximus appropriates Origen’s notion of the world as judgment and training ground to his own understanding of the world as the image of divine reality. Here the contemplation of nature is regarded by Maximus as a “game” the Word plays with us in order to lead us on to knowledge of the divine. The paper thus contributes to our understanding of what Maximus takes to be the nature of true philosophy and presents a nuanced reading of Maximus’ relationship to Origenism.

Hugo Lundhaug - Origenism in Fifth-Century Upper Egypt: Shenoute of Atripe and the Nag Hammadi Codices

The presence of "Origenists" in and around the monasteries of Upper Egypt in the second quarter of the Fifth Century is vividly attested by a letter sent by the archbishop Dioscorus of Alexandria to the great archimandrite Shenoute of Atripe sometime in the 440-ies, as well as by several of the writings of Shenoute himself. Most prominent among the latter is the substantial anti-heretical writing known as I Am Amazed, a text which also transmits archbishop Theophilus of Alexandria's anti-Origenist festal letter of 401 in Coptic translation. Both Dioscorus' letter and Shenoute's writings connect their charges against the followers of Origen with the use of heretical books. Arguing that the Nag Hammadi Codices represent likely candidates for the kind of illicit books utilised by Shenoute's opponents, this short communication looks into how certain topics of contention, such as the pre-existence and fall of souls and the resurrection of the flesh, are treated in some of the Nag Hammadi texts and in the writings of Shenoute, aiming to shed some light on the nature of the differences between the illustrious archimandrite and his "Origenist" opponents, as well as the possible identity of the latter.

Nina Lubomierski - Legitimacy through procedure - a different view of the ancient Church Councils

It is impossible to overestimate the importance of the ancient Church Councils as the essential institutions to decide upon the Christian doctrine and to establish the legal system of the Church. Since the middle of the 2^nd century neighboring parishes or their bishops assembled to decide on issues of doctrine or discipline. These local councils underwent an enormous transformation when Emperor Constantine began to invite bishops from all over the Roman Empire. The following so-called ecumenical councils were meant to bring unity to the Church and an end to disputes concerning the Christian faith. This aim was not reached as can be shown e.g. by the Council of Chalcedon that lead in a major schism. Thus the question of authority or legitimacy of the Church Councils arises. This question has commonly been answered by referring to scripture and tradition, the authority of the Pope or the power of the Emperor. 

A different approach can be deduced from Niklas Luhmann, a German sociologist. In his book „Legitimation by procedure“(1969) he describes the importance of procedure for the acceptance of decisions. Luhmann’s theory can give a new insight into the legitimacy of different Councils. Therefore my short communication will draw attention to the procedures of the ancient Church Councils and their impact on the acceptance or rejection of the Councils’ resolutions.

Basil Lourié - The Eleutherius Recension of the Twelve Firdays: A Syriac Anti-Jewish Apocalyptic Work Preserved Only in Slavonic

The “Twelve Fridays” texts are known in all Chalcedonian Christian traditions; they enumerate the 12 Fridays which must be especially venerated by strict fasting and prayers. Only in Slavonic, however, there is so-called Eleutherius recension which contains a relatively long legend introducing the text on the 12 Fridays. The latter contains, in this recension only, some explicit references to the Arab invasion and a prophecy about its duration similar to that in Pseudo-Methodius. I argue that the original language is Syriac (although it is unclear whether the Slavonic translation is made from Greek or from Syriac directly), the date is nearly the same as that of Pseudo-Methodius (the late seventh cent.), and the story of Eleutherius and his dispute with the Jew Tarasius is composed in the vein of the sixth-century Syriac hagiography related to the conversion of the Arabs in the Arabian Peninsula, especially in Nagran.

An English translation of the story of Eleutherius from Slavonic is provided.

Anna Lampadaridi - John Chrysostom and the Life of Porphyry of Gaza (BHG 1570)

The Life of Porphyry of Gaza (BHG³ 1570)  is a hagiographical text of the protobyzantine period, a major source for the Christianization of Late Antique Gaza, whose author purports to be Mark the Deacon, Porphyry’s disciple. Written after the saint’s death in 420, the plagiarism of Theodoret of Cyrrhus’s Philotheos History obliges us to date the current form of the Vita not earlier than 444. Porphyry plays a major role in the Christianization of the city of Gaza, which was still a pagan fortress in 395, when he was appointed bishop. In the frame of his struggle against pagan cults, he organizes two missions to Constantinople, aiming in gaining the imperial support for the destruction of Gaza’s temples. These two voyages, especially the second one, occupy a substantial part in Mark’s narrative. John Chrysostom, who was at that time the archbishop of Constantinople, is present at both visits to the capital and contributes to the accomplishment of Porphyry’s goal. During the first embassy to Constantinople, Chrysostom is powerful enough to support Porphyry’s aim, whereas during the second one, due to his quarrel with Eudoxia, he in no longer in position to help. In this paper, we will deal with the role that John Chrysostom plays in Mark’s narrative, as well as with every detail that the Vita provides concerning his conflict with the empress. This study will allow us to form some hypotheses concerning the milieu from which the Vita derives and the author’s position regarding this famous quarrel.

Sandra Leuenberger-Wenger - The Case of Theodoret at the Council of Chalcedon

The aim of the lecture is to show how the treatment of Theodoret of Cyrrhus at the council of Chalcedon is significant for the Church’s treatment of dissident members or dissident positions in the fifth century. 

At the synod of 449 Theodoret has been deposed for alleged Nestorianism. To the Alexandrian party Theodoret was a provocation for his constant support of Nestorius instead of the condemnation of Nestorius 431. At Chalcedon the position of Theodoret was still unclear and there is an interesting discussion whether he should be treated as a full member or as an accused. As the most prominent and skilled exponent of the Antiochene theology and known for his loyalty to Nestorius, Theodoret was in the eye of many of the present bishops a danger for the peace and orthodoxy of the church. It’s due to the intervention of the imperial officials that he was given the chance of rehabilitation. The council nonetheless made its demands for the full acceptance of Theodoret clear: the anathema to Nestorius. This, Theodoret had refused in the years before. But the council was not willing to accept him without the full submission to this demand and Theodoret finally had to give in. 

For the council this was a substantial victory because it has managed to enforce its rule in forcing Theodoret to accept and agree in public to the condemnation of Nestorius. The humiliating treatment of Theodoret was an admonition to all bishops to withdraw from independent positions which would endanger the homogeneity of the official doctrine.

Michel Willy Libambu - Augustinian Interpretation of Genesis 1-2. Exegetical Writing and Theological Rewriting

This paper is a brief analysis of the place, the resonance and the influence of the Holy Scriptures in the hermeneutical arrangement of Saint Augustine.

The question we are concerned with in this paper is to know to which extent we can speak of the influence of the book of Genesis in the Augustine's Hermeneutics.

To do this, the different steps of the theological articulation of the biblical narration are taken into account: lexio, questiones, responsiones (in the light of the Creed).

David Lambert - Present and Future Judgement in Salvian

Salvian of Marseille is generally associated with the idea, put forward at length in his De gubernatione Dei (c. 440), that God intervenes in human history to punish the sins of Christians in the present world by disasters such as defeat and conquest by barbarians. However, in his other surviving full length work, Ad ecclesiam, written a few years earlier, this idea is completely absent, even though the work otherwise deals with many of the same issues. In Ad ecclesiam, rather than the punishment of whole communities in this world, Salvian uses the threat of post-mortem punishment of the individual. Ad ecclesiam contains some of the most sustained, rhetorically highly-developed, descriptions of Hell in western patristic literature, yet this element, in turn, is almost entirely absent from De gubernatione Dei. 

This paper examines the nature of this radical change in Salvian’s ideas about the judgement of sin. It investigates the theological and rhetorical reasoning which may have motivated such a development, and it attempts to trace the development which the change implies in Salvian’s ideas about the nature of Christian community.

Nikolai Lipatov - Preaching as the audience heard it: unedited transcripts of Patristic homilies.

Texts of most Patristic homilies preserved in manuscripts represent edited versions produced by their authors for publication. The amount of reworking could be substantial. Although it has resulted in a more polished appearance it also has hidden from us the live interaction between the preacher and his audience as well as the spontaneous turns which the preacher’s thought could take. Even when the author chose to include in the final version of the text the audience’s response to his words at the time of their delivery (as St. Basil has done in the eighth homily of the Hexaemeron) the process of selection and editing which affected the text available to us imposes serious qualifications on any conclusions we can reach about the actual interaction between the speaker and the listeners.

Examples of unedited transcripts are very valuable since they allow us a glimpse at how particular preachers were communicating with their audiences. They also provide the material for comparison between the reworked and untouched texts which may allow us to establish at least approximately the amount of changes introduced in the process of editing.

The two unedited texts considered in the communication are the homily “In memory of the martyrs” (CPG 2941) preserved under the name of St. Basil in a single manuscript, and the fourth homily from the group of six homilies “On king Uzziah” by St. John Chrysostom (CPG 4417).

The first text is clearly an untouched transcript since the text reflects the growing tension between the preacher and the bishop disapproving of his symbolical interpretation. The preacher, having barely completed the introductory part of his sermon, breaks it off with a stinging remark about his superior.

The second unedited text is particularly remarkable because alongside it the group “On king Uzziah” contains its thoroughly reworked but recognisable descendant. The unedited version (the fourth homily ) and the edited text (the fifth homily) ended up in Greek manuscripts side by side as a result of a long process of formation of the cycle. Its initial stages are revealed by the Syriac and Armenian translation of the homilies.

Susan Loftus - Episcopal consecration - the contemporary religious practice of late antique Gaul in the 6th and 7th century: Ideal and reality.

Consecration of bishops in Gaul in the sixth and seventh century were often depicted as an automatic conclusion to the appointment through ordination and election. This paper will examine and compare the evidence of consecration in church council canons and the contemporary narrative sources for the terminology and practice of episcopal consecration in Gaul.  

     With the brevity of the paper in mind the aim is to formulate some conclusions of the similarities or differences in consecration practice and language in the evidence from a variety of genres. Ordination and election and consecration of bishops were ineluctably connected to the establishment of the late antique church hierarchy and so most significant in the construction of a bishop’s legitimacy and authority. But it is also important to separate the three procedures and concentrate on one aspect at a time to try to gain a more informative picture of the practice of the period.  The terminology and the procedures of the all three topics need to be examined separately to be able to eliminate confusion with language usage and practice. 

     While the normative evidence discloses the ecclesiastical ideal, it also depicts problems with a number of consecrations carried out by metropolitans and their bishops. For example when certain topics are repeated or reworded it may reveal contemporary concerns with a topic. The topic of consecration at church councils in the acta of the Concilia Galliae was of less interest compared to the topics of ordination or election. Was this because there was less interest or concern for the practice?  Narrative accounts of the period refer to consecration of bishops in disparate accounts that reveal the attendant friction in the authority over consecration. The paper traces the role of consecration as one of three standard practices essential for entry into the episcopal hierarchy in late antique Gaul. 

Lillian Larsen - The Sayings of the Desert Fathers and the Monostichs of Menander

This paper situates monastic collections of sayings and sentences within a broader gnomic frame. It argues the particular merits of reading compilations of ancient/late-ancient monostichs as fundamentally linked to emergent collections of the Apophthegmata Patrum. In exploring these ideas, the technical parameters that govern the structure and content of gnomic elaboration will serve as tools for analysis.  Likewise, literary models will be placed in conversation with extant material and manuscript evidence. Highlighting the integral role accorded gnomic content in broader school traditions, the networks of gnomic trajectories that link the collections of particular monastic teachers and their students will provide a preliminary locus for further inquiry. 

Catherine Lefort - About a previously unidentified source of Augustine’s Soliloquies : the Ciceronian notion of verisimilitude

La logique de la difficile argumentation du livre II des Soliloques s’éclaire si l’on sait y discerner la présence de la philosophie cicéronienne, une source qui n’a pas été suffisamment été mise en lumière pour ce dialogue philosophique. Augustin y adopte en effet le concept néoacadémicien de « vraisemblance » (uerisimile/similitudo) pour structurer une grande partie de ses développements. On se propose donc de voir en quel sens le nouveau converti reprend à son compte cette notion, comment il la pense dans un cadre ontologique renouvelé par sa découverte récente du néoplatonisme et de quelle manière ses analyses de jeunesse joueront un rôle important dans l’élaboration de sa doctrine ultérieure. 

The logic of the difficult argument of the second book of the Soliloquies gets clearer if one knows to read through it the presence of Ciceronian philosophy. Such a source has not been brought to light enough yet when it comes to this philosophical dialogue. Indeed, Augustine chooses the neo-academician concept of “verisimilitude” (verisimile/similitudo), in order to structure an important part of his propositions. Thus, our aim is to see how the newly convert uses that notion for his own purpose, how he conceives it in a new ontological frame, renewed par his fresh discovery of neo-platonism and how his early-year analyses will have an important role in the elaboration of his ulterior doctrine.

Andrew Lenox-Conyngham - In praise of St Jerome and against the Anglican cult of 'niceness'

Jerome was a highly controversial character in his lifetime and it is well known that he used his acerbic tongue against such contemporaries as Ambrose and Augustine.  His reputation, however, has steadily – and (this communication would argue) deservedly – increased with the passing of the centuries.  Erasmus was among the most prominent of his admirers.  There is greater interest in him today than probably at any time in the past.  The 2006 International Colloquy on Jerome held at Cardiff University, consisting of eighteen papers, is just one sign of the current recognition of the importance of this intellectual and, I would argue, spiritual giant.  Traditionally he is one of the four Latin Fathers of the Church, together with Ambrose, Augustine and Gregory.  However this increasingly international – and, indeed, ecumenical – recognition of his importance has paradoxically been accompanied by a liturgical downgrading of him in the Church of England.  This is clearly shown by the fact that his Feast Day on 30 September is no longer on the same level as such saints as his contemporaries, Ambrose and Augustine, but has been lowered to the third, and lowest, level.  This seemingly trivial matter is a clear representation of the general, and distorted, view of him in the Church of England today.  It is difficult to think of any reason for this other than the fact that Jerome does not satisfy the Anglican criterion of ‘niceness’, i.e. that because he was not, perhaps, a very pleasant character he is regarded as not deserving the honour which has always – even in the Church of England itself until recently – traditionally and rightly been due to him.  Niceness and sanctity, however, have nothing to do with each other and it will be argued that Jerome’s present lowly place in the Church of England calendar of saints gives a false and distorted impression of his true spiritual and intellectual greatness.