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Andrew Louth - Syriac Christian Church

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DIFFICULTY 5<br />

NOTES 213<br />

1 There is an analysis of this Difficulty by E.Bellini, in Heinzer and<br />

Schönborn (1982), 37–49.<br />

2 Denys the Areopagite, Ep. 4:1072A.<br />

3 ‘Mode’ has been used throughout this Amb. to translate tropos. ‘Mode of<br />

existence’ (tropos tês hyparxeôs) is used by the Cappadocians as<br />

equivalent to hypostasis (see chapter 4 of the Introduction, above).<br />

Throughout this Amb. Maximus makes a consistent distinction between<br />

logos which characterizes nature, and tropos (mode) which characterizes<br />

the person. It is part of the ‘Cappadocian’ or ‘Chalcedonian’ logic that<br />

Maximus strives to use in a systematic way.<br />

4 I have been unable to locate this precise form of words in Denys the<br />

Areopagite.<br />

5 From this point on Maximus comments on Denys’ Ep. 4, phrase by<br />

phrase: the quotations are from this epistle, unless otherwise identified.<br />

6 This word, proslêpsis (literally: something added), is regularly used in<br />

the Fathers to refer to the human nature assumed by the Word in the<br />

Incarnation.<br />

7 Members of a dualist-gnostic sect founded by Mani (c. 216–276), that<br />

was particularly influential in the fourth and fifth centuries. They<br />

were universally (and probably correctly) regarded by the Fathers of the<br />

<strong>Church</strong> as <strong>Christian</strong> heretics. It was alleged they regarded Christ as a<br />

mere phantom. They are thus frequently associated with Monophysites<br />

by the Orthodox: a tradition strikingly represented by Pope Leo (see<br />

Grillmeier [1987], 172–94). Much play was naturally made of the<br />

similarity of his name with the Greek for madness (mania).<br />

8 Apollinaris was a fourth-century heretic, who denied that Christ had a<br />

human soul, its place being taken by the Word of God. It was also<br />

generally believed by the Orthodox (wrongly, in fact) that he maintained<br />

that Christ brought his flesh down with him from heaven, as mentioned<br />

here (see Grillmeier [1975], 330–333).<br />

9 A quotation from the previous letter of Denys: Ep. 3:1069B.<br />

10 Allusion to Gregory Nazianzen, Sermon 39.13—‘The natures are<br />

instituted afresh, and God becomes man’—discussed by Maximus in<br />

Amb. 41, above.<br />

11 Here Maximus is interpreting the account in the Gospels of Jesus’<br />

walking on the water (Matt. 14:25ff. and parallels). His interpretation is<br />

very like that of the ‘Monophysite’ Severus of Antioch, Ep. 1 to Sergius:<br />

‘For how will anyone divide walking upon the water? For to run upon<br />

the sea is foreign to the human nature, but it is not proper to the divine<br />

nature to use bodily feet. Therefore that action is of the Incarnate Word,<br />

to whom belongs at the same time divine character and humanity<br />

indivisibly’ (trans. in Torrance [1988], 154).<br />

12 According to Denys, all negation (apophasis) in respect of God is made<br />

transcendently (kath’ hyperochên): see, e.g., Divine Names 7.2:869A.

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