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This concluding chapter presents a synthesis of the analysis made in this volume. This study examined the following sources: the Vita Petri Iberi (extant in Syriac, translated into German), the Plerophoriae (extant in Syriac, translated into French), and the De obitu Theodosii (extant in Syriac, translated into Latin), all of which can reasonably be ascribed to John Rufus, the anti-Chalcedonian biographer and likely successor of Peter the Iberian. Based on these texts as well as on supplementary literary, historical, and archaeological sources, this book brought into focus the figure of Peter the Iberian, who until recently had been thoroughly neglected. It is shown that the concerns of Peter and his followers, as presented through Rufus’ lens, were not to engage in a thorough discussion of theology based on hermeneutical or philosophical categories to apologize for and to defend themselves and to prove all else was heresy. Rather, their aim was to live out their belief in their own life, no matter what forms of hardships that would require.

This chapter shows that Abba Isaiah and Philoxenus of Mabbugh were influential contributors to anti-Chalcedonian theological and ascetico-spiritual perspectives in Palestine. They provided an immediate context for the theology and spirituality of Peter the Iberian, John Rufus, and their anti-Chalcedonian ascetic followers in the Gaza area. The importance of the Cross in the spiritual theology of these two teachers and leaders is discussed.

In this age of theological pluralism, even within Christianity, is there good reason to affirm the incarnation of Christ as expressed in the Creed of Chalcedon? To affirm as much is to commit oneself to what is called a maximal christology, as opposed to the many minimal christologies available today. It is argued that the New Testament picture of Jesus is unified and consistent. The purpose of the incarnation is to show what God is like, to make it possible for human beings to know God, and to defeat God’s enemies. To accomplish as much, Jesus had to be truly human and truly divine. Four indications that Christ was divine are considered: his willingness to forgive sins, his reference to God as Abba, his willingness to speak “with authority”, and his implicit claims to be divine.

How can the contemporary feminist theologians continue to remain engaged with the Christian tradition, whose creeds and sacred texts pose seemingly insuperable obstacles for a diversity of feminist thinkers? This chapter argues that a postliberal rule theory approach to doctrine allows us to see how womanist theologies that are ostensibly disconnected from the Nicene-Chalcedonian creedal tradition (and possibly even at odds with each other) are regulatively instantiating a stream of that tradition in diverse ways. Employing feminist, deconstructive, postcolonial, and queer hermeneutical tools, the chapter offers a reading of John 4 that subverts the dominant tradition's masculinist, heteronormative, christocentric, or imperialist interpretations of this story as an account of the successful conversion of a Samaritan woman with dubious morals, misguided messianic notions, and illicit desires. This reading stands as an example of how the feminist scholar might resist “disciplinary” biblical texts, even while (perhaps surprisingly) finding herself still desiring to continue to read such texts at all.

Leo's decision to write letters offering theological teaching was a new departure for the papacy. The Tome was his most ambitious theological project; arguments against his authorship are weak. It is uncharacteristic of the main emphases of his theological development in previous years, where he had sought to coordinate rather than distinguish the two natures of Christ. It can best be understood as a response to what he thought to be the opposite errors of Eutyches and Nestorius. He revised his understanding of Nestorius when he was accused of Nestorianism in the aftermath of Chalcedon, and produced a more characteristic and satisfactory Christological statement in the Letter to the Palestininan monks.

This introductory chapter begins with a discussion of Alexandrian Christology from the 2nd to the 5th centuries. It then discusses the strong influence of Cyril of Alexandria, the Council of Chalcedon, and the reception of Alexandrian Greek Christology.

Having discussed Ambrose’s view of resurrection in Chapter 5, the book turns to the Christological and pneumatological foundation of Ambrose’s understanding of the Christian’s participation in the transformation of resurrection and the new humanity of the resurrection through an analysis of his use of the Pauline contrast between the inner man born in baptism and the outer man that is wasting away (Col. 3:9–10). In Christ Jesus, Ambrose sees the restoration and perfection of the harmonic relation of soul and body that is the prototype for the new humanity of the resurrection. In the Spirit, Ambrose locates the divine power that divinizes the soul and so allows the Christian’s life to be conformed to the model of the new Adam.

This chapter examines what Newman had to say between the years of 1834 and 1840 about the doctrine of Christ's person and works. Covering the period from the publication of Arians to Newman's first insights into the development of doctrine, the chapter focuses on the three summer vacations which he spent researching the Christology of different Greek patristic authors and the result on Newman's sermons. In the summer of 1839, examining various Fathers before and after the Council of Chalcedon, he began to see doctrine no longer as something static but in development. Newman became aware of the need for an idea whereby pre-Nicenes like Origen and Dionysius of Alexandria could ‘develop’ into the fuller doctrinal positions of Athanasius and Cyril. But even Athanasius and Cyril needed some later interpreters to clarify their positions, particularly the trio of Leontius, Maximus, and John of Damascus.

Ste. Croix continued his challenge to traditional views about the history of the early Church through an exhaustive study of the Council of Chalcedon, which Emperor Marcian summoned in 451 in an attempt to resolve disputes about how the divine and human elements combined in the single person of Christ. His investigation revealed that proceedings were kept under close imperial control, which was implemented through the presiding officer, the general Anatolius. Far from being a neutral referee, Anatolius emerges as a significant correspondent of Bishop Theodoret, one of the key individuals at Chalcedon where he was reinstated in spite of doubts about his doctrinal views. Church Councils are revealed to have been particularly unruly events, with the attending bishops repeatedly shouting down their opponents, the detailed records being subject to manipulation, and violence or intimidation never far away.

In the light of the book's treatment of grace and christology, this chapter argues that the central issue in patristic christology was not whether Christ was one person or two or whether one spoke of one nature or two, but whether God the Son was personally present on earth through the incarnation. The chapter asserts that the key phrase expressing this issue was the ‘double birth’ of the Logos. Those who insisted that God the Son must be and was personally present insisted that the Logos was born twice (of the Father eternally and of Mary in time). This chapter looks briefly at John Chrysostom, John of Antioch, Celestine, Leo, and the Chalcedonian Definition and concludes that belief in the double birth of the Logos was the faith of the entire Church in the fifth century, with only a small handful of dissenters.

Many previous interpreters have sought to locate the origins of the Dormition traditions within ancient “Jewish‐Christianity.” Although they are quite correct in identifying a number of heterodox features present in some of the narratives, Jewish‐Christianity is a highly problematic construct that does not offer the best explanation for these features. Contact with some sort of gnostic Christianity can better explain these elements. Most importantly, these traces of contact with early Christian heterodoxy very strongly suggest that the narratives in question most likely were composed by the third century at the latest. This early date, along with several other features, makes very unlikely the frequently suggested hypothesis that the origin of the Dormition traditions is somehow linked with resistance to the council of Chalcedon.

This Chapter—on Calvin's Christology—continues some of the themes of Ch. 2. Calvin's Christology is essentially Chalcedonian. He emphasizes the Son's undiminished deity in the Incarnation. The relation between the Son of God and the Incarnation is considered, and what Calvin means by the communicatio idiomatum is discussed. The ways in which dogma is meant to regulate our understanding of Scripture rather than to explain mysteries is further explored.

The Christological debate between 449 and 451 was marked by continuing divisions in the east and became embroiled with the question of the authority of Rome. The anti‐Nestorian position won the sympathy of the eastern emperor Theodosius II and then of Pulcheria, the dominant figure in the reunited empire in 450–51. The second Council of Ephesus in 449 was marked by the intervention and assertion of Roman supremacy by Pope Leo I. In the divided eastern churches, the controversy was crucial in defining the legitimacy of the ordination of bishops, especially Nestorian or Monophysite bishops in Alexandria. The canons produced by the Council of Chalcedon in 451 and the question of their legitimacy contributed to the alienation between east and west and to divisions among the Greek churches for more than a century afterwards.

Provides the necessary historical and theological background for understanding the monothelite controversy of the 7th century and the Christology of St Maximus the Confessor. It presents the Christological positions of Apollinarianism, Nestorianism, Cyril, and the Council of Chalcedon. It also presents the views of the Council’s critics, and of the Council’s defenders, including John the Grammarian and, in particular, Leontius of Byzantium and Leontius of Jerusalem. It argues that Apollinarism, Nestorianism, and monophysitism put forward unsatisfactory suggestions regarding the doctrine of the person of Christ. By contrast, the Council of Chalcedon (ad 451) put forward a very balanced view of Christ’s unity of person and distinction of natures. The Leontioi, in countering objections to Chalcedon, explained the Chalcedonian distinction between person/hypostasis and nature/essence in detail and in doing so paved the way for Maximus’ Christology. This chapter challenges the view that post-Chalcedonian Christology was strongly asymmetrical and thus undermined the Christological balance achieved by Chalcedon and thus led to the emergence of monothelitism.

Orthodox christology upholds divine impassibility while paradoxically affirming that in the events of the incarnation ‘one of the trinity suffered for us.’ Maximus integrates Chalcedonian christology with the more ‘pastoral’ and dynamic christology of Cyril of Alexandria, defending on both rational and salvific grounds the integrity of Christ’s humanity against reductionistic alternatives.