A leading historical theologian surveys the early Church’s thinking about Christ
Brian E. Daley, SJ, is a renowned and prolific historical theologian. His research has been published in a wide range of academic journals and edited collections; this volume brings several of his numerous studies of patristic Christology together for the first time.
The sixteen essays in this collection explore the Christology of the early Church with attention to narrative overviews, the Cappadocians, Augustine, and Chalcedon with its legacies; consideration is also given to Christology within the contexts of early philosophical and apocalyptic traditions. This unique collection is an important resource for theological libraries and scholars interested in the early Church’s thinking about Christ.
Table of Contents
Acknowledgments
Introduction by Andrew Hofer, OP
Part 1: Christological Surveys of the Early Church
1. Christ and Christologies
2. Seeing God in Flesh: The Range and Implications of Patristic Christology
3. “One Thing and Another”: The Persons in God and the Person of Christ in Patristic Theology
4. The Word and His Flesh: Human Weakness and the Identity of Jesus in Patristic Christology
5. Antioch and Alexandria: Christology as Reflection on God’s Presence in History
Part 2: Cappadocian Christology and the Apollinarian Challenge
6. Divine Transcendence and Human Transformation: Gregory of Nyssa’s Anti-Apollinarian Christology
7. “Heavenly Man” and “Eternal Christ”: Apollinarius and Gregory of Nyssa on the Personal Identity of the Savior
Part 3: Augustine’s Christology
8. Word, Soul, and Flesh: Origen and Augustine on the Person of Christ
9. The Giant’s Twin Substances: Ambrose and the Christology of Augustine’s Contra sermonem Arianorum
10. A Humble Mediator: The Distinctive Elements in St. Augustine’s Christology
Part 4: Christology after Chalcedon
11. Unpacking the Chalcedonian Formula: From Studied Ambiguity to Saving Mystery
12. Apollo as a Chalcedonian: A New Fragment of a Controversial Work from Early Sixth-Century Constantinople
13. Leontius of Byzantium and the Reception of the Chalcedonian Definition
14. Nature and the “Mode of Union”: Late Patristic Models for the Personal Unity of Christ
Part 5: Christ in Philosophical and Apocalyptic Traditions
15. Logos as Reason and Logos Incarnate: Philosophy, Theology, and the Voices of Tradition
16. “Faithful and True”: Early Christian Apocalyptic and the Person of Christ
Index of Authors
Index of Subjects
Brian E. Daley, SJ, is Catherine F. Huisking Professor of Theology Emeritus at the University of Notre Dame. In recognition of his significant scholarship, he has been awarded the Johannes Quasten Medal and the Ratzinger Prize for Theology. Daley’s books include The Hope of the Early Church, God Visible, and Biblical Interpretation and Doctrine in Early Christianity.
