Ascetic Pneumatology from John Cassian to Gregory the Great

Ascetic Pneumatology from John Cassian to Gregory the Great PDF Author: Thomas L. Humphries
Publisher:
ISBN: 9780191765537
Category : Holy Spirit
Languages : en
Pages : 256

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Book Description
This is a study of how Christians understood the Holy Spirit in the 5th and 6th centuries. Humphries argues that we can see various schools of thought within Christianity in this period but that many of them are occupied with similar questions about how to understand human life and how to understand divine life.

Ascetic Pneumatology from John Cassian to Gregory the Great

Ascetic Pneumatology from John Cassian to Gregory the Great PDF Author: Thomas L. Humphries Jr.
Publisher: OUP Oxford
ISBN: 019150808X
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 256

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Book Description
Ascetic Pneumatology from John Cassian to Gregory the Great presents three interconnected arguments. The first argument concerns scholarly readings of antiquity: there are developments in 5th and 6th century Latin pneumatology which we have overlooked. Theologians like John Cassian and Gregory the Great were engaged in a significant discussion of how the Holy Spirit works within Christian ascetics to reform their inner lives. Other theologians, like Leo the Great, participate to a lesser extent in a similar project. They applied pneumatology to theological anthropology. Thomas L. Humphries, Jr. labels that development "ascetic pneumatology," and beings to track some of the late antique schools of thought about the Holy Spirit. The second argument concerns the reception of Augustine in the two centuries immediately after his death: different people read Augustine differently. Augustine's theology was known and understood to varying degrees in various regions. Humphries demonstrates significant engagements with Augustine's theology as it was relevant to Pelagianism (evidenced in Prosper of Aquitaine), as it was relevant to Gallic Arians (evidenced with the Lérinian theologians), and as it was relevant to African Arians and certain questions posed of Nestorianism (evidenced with Fulgentius of Ruspe). Instead of attempting to rank various theologians as better and worse "Augustinians," Humphries argues that there were different kinds of "Augustinianisms" even in the years immediately after Augustine. The third argument concerns Gregory the Great and his sources. Once we see that ascetic pneumatology was a strain of thought in this era and see that there are different kinds of Augustinianisms, we can see that Gregory depends on both Augustine and Cassian. In the closing chapters, Humphries argues that Gregory uses Cassian's ascetic pneumatology, and this allows Gregory's synthesis of Cassian and Augustine to stand in greater relief than it has before. The study begins with Cassian, ends with Gregory, and is attentive to Augustine throughout.

Ascetic Pneumatology from John Cassian to Gregory the Great

Ascetic Pneumatology from John Cassian to Gregory the Great PDF Author: Thomas L. Humphries
Publisher:
ISBN: 9780191765537
Category : Holy Spirit
Languages : en
Pages : 256

Get Book Here

Book Description
This is a study of how Christians understood the Holy Spirit in the 5th and 6th centuries. Humphries argues that we can see various schools of thought within Christianity in this period but that many of them are occupied with similar questions about how to understand human life and how to understand divine life.

Ascetic Pneumatology from John Cassian to Gregory the Great

Ascetic Pneumatology from John Cassian to Gregory the Great PDF Author: Thomas L. Humphries
Publisher:
ISBN: 0199685037
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 256

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Book Description
A study of how Christians understood the Holy Spirit in the 5th and 6th centuries. Humphries argues that we can see various schools of thought within Christianity in this period, but that many of them are occupied with similar questions about how to understand human life and how to understand divine life.

Gregory of Nazianzus' Soteriological Pneumatology

Gregory of Nazianzus' Soteriological Pneumatology PDF Author: Oliver B. Langworthy
Publisher: Mohr Siebeck
ISBN: 3161589513
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 201

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Book Description
Oliver B. Langworthy examines the interaction of soteriology and pneumatology in Gregory of Nazianzus' thought. He shows that this interaction, Gregory's soteriological pneumatology, is a coherent, significant, but under-examined area of Gregory's thought. His study engages in a chronological treatment of a wide range of Gregory's prose and poetic works. This allows for the particular character of Gregory's soteriological pneumatology to emerge, notably his emphasis on the experience of the Spirit. The result is a more complete and nuanced picture of Gregory's theological investment in a divine and "truly holy" Spirit that is operative in the salvation of the believer.

Grace for Grace

Grace for Grace PDF Author: Alexander Y. Hwang
Publisher: CUA Press
ISBN: 0813226015
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 336

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Book Description
The contributors to Grace for Grace focus on the debates on grace and free will inspired by Augustine's later teachings on grace and the various reactions to it. Based on fresh study of a wealth of primary sources, this international team of scholars explores the intra-Church debates over grace and free will after Augustine and Pelagius. In both popular and scholarly literature, the conflict has been traditionally referred to as the "Semi-Pelagian Controversy". For several decades, however, scholars have been distancing themselves from that simplistic and inaccurate portrayal. This book intends to solidify a disparate movement of scholarly thought and provide a secure basis for renewed study of the persons, texts, and events of a critical period in the reception of Augustine in the Early Middle Ages. (book jacket).

The New Cambridge Companion to Christian Doctrine

The New Cambridge Companion to Christian Doctrine PDF Author: Michael Allen
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
ISBN: 1108840442
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 401

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Book Description
This Companion guides the reader through the main topics and the most significant methods for practicing Christian theology. The essays in this first part engage the ten most notable loci in Christian doctrine. The ten essays in the second part address the most significant movements that have broad impact upon the practice of Christian doctrine.

Evangelical Dictionary of Theology

Evangelical Dictionary of Theology PDF Author: Daniel J. Treier
Publisher: Baker Academic
ISBN: 1493410776
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 1993

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Book Description
This bestselling reference tool has been a trusted resource for more than 25 years with over 165,000 copies sold. Now thoroughly updated and substantially revised to meet the needs of today's students and classrooms, it offers cutting-edge overviews of key theological topics. Readable and reliable, this work features new articles on topics of contemporary relevance to world Christianity and freshened articles on enduring theological subjects, providing comprehensive A-Z coverage for today's theology students. The author base reflects the increasing diversity of evangelical scholars. Advisory editors include D. Jeffrey Bingham, Cheryl Bridges Johns, John G. Stackhouse Jr., Tite Tiénou, and Kevin J. Vanhoozer.

Gregory of Nyssa's Tabernacle Imagery in Its Jewish and Christian Contexts

Gregory of Nyssa's Tabernacle Imagery in Its Jewish and Christian Contexts PDF Author: Ann Conway-Jones
Publisher: OUP Oxford
ISBN: 0191024600
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 321

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Book Description
Integrating patristics and early Jewish mysticism, this book examines Gregory of Nyssa's tabernacle imagery, as found in Life of Moses 2. 170-201. Previous scholarship has often focused on Gregory's interpretation of the darkness on Mount Sinai as divine incomprehensibility. However, true to Exodus, Gregory continues with Moses's vision of the tabernacle 'not made with hands' received within that darkness. This innovative methodology of heuristic comparison doesn't strive to prove influence, but to use heavenly ascent texts as a foil, in order to shed new light on Gregory's imagery. Ann Conway-Jones presents a well-rounded, nuanced understanding of Gregory's exegesis, in which mysticism, theology, and politics are intertwined. Heavenly ascent texts use descriptions of religious experience to claim authoritative knowledge. For Gregory, the high point of Moses's ascent into the darkness of Mount Sinai is the mystery of Christian doctrine. The heavenly tabernacle is a type of the heavenly Christ. This mystery is beyond intellectual comprehension, it can only be grasped by faith; and only the select few, destined for positions of responsibility, should even attempt to do so.

The Role of Death in the Ladder of Divine Ascent and the Greek Ascetic Tradition

The Role of Death in the Ladder of Divine Ascent and the Greek Ascetic Tradition PDF Author: Jonathan L. Zecher
Publisher:
ISBN: 0198724942
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 273

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Book Description
The Ladder of Divine Ascent, the work of an otherwise shadowy figure, John Climacus (meaning of the Ladder), abbot of St. Catherine's, Sinai (ca. 579-649 CE), is one of the most popular and enduring classics of Greek ascetic spiritual direction. Hailed as the great synthesis of early ascetic writings, the Ladder presents a spirituality self-consciously rooted in the literary and theological tradition of the Desert Fathers and the Great Old Men of Gaza. Despite its incredible popularity among monastic and lay readers, the Ladder is virtually unknown in scholarship. In this work, Jonathan L. Zecher offers a sustained study of the Ladder's spiritual vision, which is contextualized within an equally sustained genealogical survey of Climacus' own tradition. The Ladder is built up through the 'memory of death', a term referring to admonitions of early authors to remember one's inevitable but unknowable death and to contemplate the divine judgment which would follow to cultivate particular ascetic, Christian, lifestyles in their readers. In the literature that formed Climacus, every aspect of the 'memory of death' varied considerably, but Climacus draws these together in the Ladder so that death and the judgment which follows defines a symbolic framework within which monks reflect on their past and approach the future. Climacus also took up metaphorical practices of dying to oneself and others to craft an idea of spiritual progress in the imitation of Christ taking into account failure and frailty. At the heart of this study is the abiding question of how tradition forms, and in the Ladder is an outstanding example of how unflinching fidelity to tradition results in a creative, synthetic achievement.

Debates over the Resurrection of the Dead

Debates over the Resurrection of the Dead PDF Author: Outi Lehtipuu
Publisher: OUP Oxford
ISBN: 0191037788
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 255

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Book Description
In Debates over the Resurrection of the Dead, Outi Lehtipuu highlights the striking observation that in many early texts the way that belief in resurrection is formulated is used as a sign of inclusion and exclusion, not only in relation to non-Christians but vis-à-vis other Christians. Those who teach otherwise have deviated from the truth, are not true Christians, and do the works of the devil. Using insights from the sociological study of deviance, Dr Lehtipuu demonstrates that labelling was used as a tool for marking boundaries between those who belonged and those who did not. This was extremely important in the fluid conditions where the small Christian minority groups found themselves. In a situation where there were no universally accepted structures that defined what constituted the true Christian belief, several competing interpretations and their representatives struggled for recognition of their views based on what they believed to be the apostolic tradition. The most hotly-debated aspect of resurrection was whether it would entail the body of flesh and blood or not. When resurrection would take place was closely related to this. Controversies died since the scriptural legacy was ambiguous enough to allow different hermeneutical solutions. The battle over resurrection was closely related to the question of how scriptures were to be understood as well as to what constituted the human self that would survive death. To demonstrate this a wide variety of texts are studied, from theological treatises (including relevant Nag Hammadi texts) to apocryphal acts and martyrologies. Acknowledging the complexity and diversity of the early Christian movement, this volume views early Christian discourse as part of the broader ancient discursive world where similar debates were going on among both Jews and the majority population.