Early Christian Philosophy (Tertullian to Bede)

Following the first volume entitled Analogical Identities: The Creation of the Christian Self of a trilogy dedicated to Christian anthropology in a modern re-assessment the present second volume deals with the specific content of this concept of “Analogical Identity” as a new hermeneutic retrieval of Christian anthropology in its relation with its historical roots and in the light of modern Philosophical and Psychological thought to which we thus introduce some new conceptual tools. At the same time a theological criticism of modern Philosophy and Psychology is initiated and some new anthropological concepts of theological provenance are proposed.

The Institutiones humanarum litterarum - that is the second book of Cassiodorus’ masterpiece devoted to secular learning - have come down to us in three different textual forms: the ‘authentic’ recension Ω corresponding to Cassiodorus’ final wishes and two subsequent recensions designated as Φ and Δ. In these two recensions later interpolations were added on the basis of an earlier authorial draft providing modern readers with valuable information both about Cassiodorus’ progressive revisions and about the early fortune of his work.

This volume provides a full commentary to the first critical edition of the interpolated recensions Φ and Δ (CC SL 99A). In doing so it conveys a full picture of the complex history of the Institutiones saeculares from their first appearance in the monastery of Vivarium to the Carolingian Renaissance at which time they knew their greatest success and circulation.

La storia della filosofia tardo-antica medievale e umanistica ha visto ricorrere con frequenza e continuità una peculiare struttura terminologico-concettuale di origine neoplatonica definita dai termini essenza (οὐσία - substantia o essentia) - potenza (δύναμις - virtus) - atto (ἐνέργεια - operatio). Essa trova le sue prime attestazioni in Galeno e Giamblico e sviluppi in Proclo Damascio e Simplicio sebbene il suo modello ontologico emergesse già in Plotino. Talvolta assimilata allo schema aristotelico atto - potenza questa triade comporta in realtà una radicale rielaborazione dell’ontologia aristotelica - dalla cui base terminologica e concettuale prende peraltro le mosse - attraverso la reintroduzione dell’elemento esemplaristico platonico configurandosi così come struttura causalistico-processionale. Essa venne ripresa dal pensiero cristiano patristico e attraverso lo snodo fondamentale dello pseudo-Dionigi conoscerà una inesauribile fortuna nel Medioevo greco e latino dove verrà utilizzata per spiegare questioni di angelologia di psicologia e di dottrina trinitaria. A Bisanzio la triade converge verso la teologia delle energie divine venendo impiegata da autori quali Massimo il Confessore Giovanni Damasceno e Gregorio Palamas. Nel Medioevo latino essa viene utilizzata da autori come Eriugena Ugo di San Vittore Isacco della Stella Egidio Romano Enrico di Gand Bonaventura Alberto Magno Tommaso d’Aquino e Dante diffondendosi fino alle soglie dell’Età moderna (Ficino Bruno). Attraverso le fonti neoplatoniche la triade conosce fortuna anche nella filosofia araba (Al-Fārābī Ibn Sīnā). Questo volume mira a offrire una quanto più possibile esaustiva identificazione e discussione delle occorrenze e delle trasformazioni concettuali (nonché talvolta delle metamorfosi lessicali) che la triade ha conosciuto nei contesti storico-filosofici qui presi in esame.

In the age of Augustine within the classical structures of society nothing was more valued than friends and friendship. Augustine was an innovative thinker and friendship represents a good example of his flair for reconfiguring its framework into an ecclesial setting. He wrote: ‘what greater consolation do we have in this human society riddled with errors and anxieties than the unfeigned faith and mutual love of true and good friends?’. Yet as a Christian Bishop how would he reconceive this well established and treasured institution? Friendship was certainly something that became recast within the light of his conversion and immersion into the life of the Church. In Augustine’s exchange with the Donatists we glimpse his most fully developed vision of friendship. Through his preaching on John’s gospel which comes to us as his In Iohannis Euangelium Tractatus Augustine reveals this vision of what friendship is. Given that John’s gospel gives such weight to the incarnation and to friendship we can witness through his hermeneutical strategy of figuration his notion that friendship with God comes in belonging to the totus Christus ‘the whole Christ’. For Augustine the universal nature of the Church as Christ’s body and bride enjoys a continued connection to the head (Christ) and through the Church its members live within the embrace of the Spirit. With this foundation of friendship Augustine cried out to those separated by schism: belong-be bound-be friends with God in Christ.

La doctrine anthropologique qui se dégage dans les Questions à Thalassios de Maxime le Confesseur donne une place de choix à la perception sensible qui est considérée comme la première étape indispensable à toute connaissance humaine. Le juste exercice de la sensation est un des enjeux fondamentaux de la vie pratique c’est-à-dire de la morale puisque le développement des passions mauvaises dans la vie humaine découle d’une ignorance et d’une erreur de jugement précisément en ce qui concerne l’appréhension du monde sensible. Le juste exercice de la sensation est aussi la condition de possibilité de la contemplation naturelle car il permet à l’homme de voir à travers les figures du monde visible l’intention et le plan du Créateur. C’est grâce à cette contemplation du créé que l’être humain accomplit sa mission d’unification du monde sensible et du monde intelligible et accède à la connaissance de Dieu et à l’union avec Dieu en vue de laquelle il a été créé.

Is it possible for nihilism and an ontology of personhood as will to power to be incubated in the womb of Christian Mysticism? Is it possible that the modern ontology of power which constitutes the core of the Greek-Western metaphysics has a theological grounding? Has Nietszche reversed Plato or more likely Augustine and Origen re-fashioning in a secular framework the very essence of their ontology? Do we have any alternative Patristic anthropological sources of the Greek-Western Self beyond what has been traditionally called "Spirituality" or "Mysticism"? Patristic theology seems to ultimately provide us with a different understanding of selfhood beyond any Ancient or modern Platonic or not Transcendentalism. This book strives to decipher retrieve and re-embody the underlying mature Patristic concept of selfhood beyond the dichotomies of mind and body essence and existence transcendence and immanence inner and outer conscious and unconscious person and nature freedom and necessity: the Analogical Identityof this Self needs to be explored.

This book presents a thorough re-examination of Apuleius’ Platonic philosophy encompassing both his philosophical and literary works. Its primary concern lies in demonstrating how there is no significant gap between the Platonic philosophy of the Opuscula (De deo Socratis De Platone et eius dogmate De mundo) and the literary tastes of his rhetorical and most important output such as the Apologia the Florida and foremost the Metamorphoses. Apuleius’ Middle-Platonism did not limit itself to technical works but also influenced his literary interests.

Up to now Apuleius’ Platonism has been very poorly investigated. It had attracted the attention of only a few - although prominent - scholars (Festugière Dodds Theiler) before being taken briefly into consideration in the monographs by John Dillon (The Middleplatonists London 1977) and Stephen Gersh (Middle Platonism and Neoplatonism. The Latin Tradition Notre Dame 1986). Because of his multifaceted interests and brilliant style which is reflected in his conferences judicial orations and in the novel Apuleius was mainly treated as a sophist. In the wake of a recent revival of interest in Greek Middle Platonism and in its predecessors (such as Philo of Alexandria or Plutarch) the rhetor of Madauros is worthy of a new examination. This book aims at considering Apuleius as a Philosophus Platonicus who at the same time is a Latin Sophist showing how the two aspects are closely intertwined.

Examining only one aspect would be easy but would not do justice to Apuleius’ personality. In particular it is necessary to insert him into a philosophical line which runs from the first to the third century AD thus outlining the specifics of Latin Platonism. On the other hand it is necessary to take into account the concerns of the Second Sophistic in philosophy though in a somewhat trivialized and less systematic way.

The title of the book (Apuleius and the Metamorphoses of Platonism) indeed underlines how Apuleius’ chameleonic Platonism ‘transforms’ itself both in his philosophical and his literary works. While challenging the current scholarly trend that overrates the philosophical presence in the Metamorphoses this book suggests new outlooks as well as providing a new perspective on many hypotheses previously considered as a given. In order to do this it investigates the literary religious and philosophical Graeco-Roman / African milieu in which Apuleius lived from a literary religious and philosophical point of view while considering his influence on authors from Late Antiquity.

Anselm (1033-1109) described the Monologion his first major theological work as a model meditation on the divine essence; and he enjoined his potential critics to read Augustine’s De trinitate diligently and then judge the Monologion by it. In following Anselm’s admonition I have paid particular attention to Anselm’s claims about the persuasiveness of his arguments and probed the cogency of some of the many arguments that make up the Monologion. The result is something like a critical companion to the Monologion. It is not meant to replace an actual reading of the Monologion which is an experience worth having since no interpretation or paraphrase can capture the feeling of wading through Anselm’s analytic arguments. And I have resisted the common tendency of reading the Monologion merely as a prelude to its more evocative sequel the Proslogion. Because Anselm’s arguments attend to fundamental themes in philosophical theology this book also provides comment on the state of early medieval philosophical theology and Anselm’s unique contribution to it. The book has implications not only for our understanding of Anselm’s thought and its relation to ancient and early medieval Christian tradition but also for the ways in which theologians and philosophers since Anselm have appropriated his ideas. Since a good deal of that appropriation often overlooks the Monologion this study should help towards a re-orientation to Anselm and his relevance to contemporary debates about theological method in general and analytic theology in particular.

Dr. F. B. A. Asiedu is a visiting scholar at Emory University (Atlanta GA). His research and teaching cover a wide area including ancient and medieval Christianity intellectual history philosophical hermeneutics and social and political thought.

La théodicée de Plotin et la théodicée chrétienne d’Origène et Grégoire de Nysse ont plusieurs éléments en commun: l’identification du mal et du non-être l’idée d’un ordre rationnel de la réalité provenant du principe divin l’élaboration d’une notion unitaire de mal. Cependant ces similarités cachent des logiques très différentes. Pour Plotin la solution au problème du mal réside dans la demonstration de sa nécessité en tant que produit non accidentel de la procession. Pour Origène et Grégoire de Nysse par contre c’est dans l’élaboration d’une idée radicale de liberté et dans l’instabilité ontologique de la créature qu’il faut chercher la solution. Ce livre analyse ces deux théodicées la théodicée de la nécessité et celle de la liberté les confrontant à une série de “mésaventures” afin de mettre en lumière aussi bien les difficultés surmontées par ces auteurs dans leur élaboration de la notion de mal que celles qui restent encore ouvertes.

Ce livre est une tentative de donner sens à toutes les scènes de lecture qui jalonnent le récit des Confessions et qui forment comme l’inévitable parallèle à la ligne de vie du récit autobiographique. Pourquoi ce premier grand récit autobiographique accorde-t-il une telle importance à la lecture ? Quel est l’impact spécifique du livre sur l’âme du lecteur ? Comment la lecture entre-t-elle dans la construction ou dans la reconstruction de l’identité du sujet qui narre son histoire ? En quelle mesure la profondeur de cet impact ne bouleverse-t-il pas profondément les pratiques de soi et les exercices spirituels puisqu’il constitue un renversement évident de la condamnation platonicienne de la lecture dans le Phèdre?En s’appuyant sur la très abondante littérature secondaire de type historique cette étude s’essaye à développer une vision cohérente et structurale des concepts fondateurs de l’anthropologie augustinienne et plus largement de l’anthropologie chrétienne. Elle s'appuie sur l'analyse de thèses récurrentes dans les Confessions et qui s’appellent mutuellement : 1) l’idée de la transmission du péché et de la culpabilité inaugurale de tout homme depuis Adam 2) le rôle de la volonté dans la faute originelle 3) les conséquences de cette faute pour l’homme dans la création d’un univers de labeur 4) l’assimilation de ce labeur à un travail de la volonté sur elle-même 5) le rôle de la lecture dans ce travail du vouloir et enfin 6) la place du plaisir de lire dans cet univers de labeur contraint et de travail sur soi pour se défaire d’une culpabilité originelle.Cette étude vise à « raréfier » certaines notions comme celle de travail intellectuel de plaisir littéraire de travail sur soi etc. c’est-à-dire à en déconstruire l’évidence pour nous par une généalogie qui en montre les conditions d’apparition et qui permet ainsi de souligner leur étrangeté à l’univers de pensée des Grecs.