Andrew Louth - Syriac Christian Church

3
MAXIMUS’ SPIRITUAL THEOLOGY
We have already seen that, so far as his writings go, Maximus seems
to have begun by addressing himself to matters of spiritual or ascetical
theology. Before his arrival in Africa, round about 630, few of his
writings raise questions of dogmatic or philosophical theology, though
if it is indeed the case, as has been conjectured, that on his way from
Asia Minor to Africa he engaged in disputation with Severan
Monophysites in Crete, it would seem that he already had a
reputation as a defender of Orthodoxy. I have already argued that it is
probably not fortuitous that his concerns were initially ascetic. It is, it
seems to me, of a piece with the way in which his theological writings
are essentially occasional, the response to requests for elucidation on
the part of his friends. He early acquired a reputation as a spiritual
father (though it seems that he never became an abbot, still less a
priest), and it was out of that relationship that he began to write both
letters and short treatises many of which follow closely the forms of
monastic catechesis.
A THEOLOGICAL ASCESIS
But from the beginning his ascetical theology is firmly set against a
theological background: ascetical theology is about how we come to
know God, it is not about some kind of spiritual technique; to come to
know God is a matter of experience, not speculation; for a Christian to
come to know God is to respond to a God who has made himself
known. This is where Maximus begins. Early on in his short treatise
on the Lord’s Prayer (written before 630) we read:
The Logos bestows adoption on us when He grants us that
birth and deification which, transcending nature, comes by grace
from above through the Spirit. The guarding and preservation of
this in God depends on the resolve of those thus born: on their
sincere acceptance of the grace bestowed on them and, through