EVER-MOVING REPOSE the Notion of Time in Maximus the Confessor’S Philosophy Through the Perspective of a Relational Ontology
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Sotiris Mitralexis Institut für Philosophie EVER-MOVING REPOSE The Notion of Time in Maximus the Confessor’s Philosophy Through the Perspective of a Relational Ontology Dissertation zur Erlangung des akademischen Grades „Doktor der Philosophie“ (Dr. phil.) am Fachbereich Philosophie und Geisteswissenschaften der Freien Universität Berlin vorgelegt von Sotirios Mitralexis-Georgakakos aus Athen Berlin, 2014 1. Gutachter: Prof. Dr. Wilhelm Schmidt-Biggemann (Institut für Philosophie, Freie Universität Berlin) 2. Gutachter: Dr. Rowan Williams (Master of Magdalene College, University of Cambridge) Tag der Disputation: 24. September 2014 Exemplare für die Erfüllung der Veröffentlichungspflicht gemäß der Promo- tionsordnung zum Dr. phil. des Fachbereichs Philosophie und Geisteswissen- schaften der Freien Universität Berlin. Gedruckt mit Unterstützung des Deutschen Akademischen Austauschdienstes (DAAD). 4 Table of Contents Abstract ............................................................................................................................ 9 Zusammenfassung ......................................................................................................... 11 Acknowledgements ........................................................................................................ 13 Abbreviations ................................................................................................................. 15 PART I: INTRODUCTION – MAXIMUS’ LIFE AND STATUS QUAESTIONIS 17 I.1. Aim, Scope and Method ......................................................................................... 19 I.2. Maximus the Confessor’s Life and Work ............................................................. 24 I.2.1. Maximus’ Life ................................................................................................... 24 I.2.2. The Syriac Life .................................................................................................. 29 I.2.3. Maximus’ Works ............................................................................................... 31 I.3. State of Research ..................................................................................................... 37 I.3.1. Overviews of the Secondary Literature ............................................................. 37 I.3.2. Main Developments in Maximian Scholarship .................................................. 39 I.3.3. ‘Byzantine’ Philosophy...................................................................................... 44 PART II: AN ECCLESIAL WELTANSCHAUUNG – AND A RELATIONAL AND CRITICAL ONTOLOGY ................................................................................... 46 II.1. Early Christian/‘Byzantine’ Philosophy and Maximus the Confessor ............. 47 II.1.1. Philosophy and Theology ................................................................................. 47 II.1.2. Ontotheology as Incompatible with Ecclesial Testimony ................................ 50 II.1.3. Maximus’ Apophaticism: “God does not exist” ............................................... 52 II.1.4. The Testimony of the Hebrews, the Language of the Greeks ........................... 55 II.1.5. Ecclesial Testimony and Heresy....................................................................... 58 II.1.6. Person, Substance and Hypostasis in the Trinity and in Christ ........................ 61 II.1.7. Concerning the Body/Soul Distinction in Maximus the Confessor’s Thought. 67 II.1.8. An ‘Immortal’ Soul? Hell and the Possibility of Inexistence ........................... 73 II.1.9. Createdness and the Uncreated ......................................................................... 76 II.1.10. The Mode of the Uncreated ............................................................................ 78 II.1.11. Ontological Ecclesiology ................................................................................ 82 II.2. Hermeneutic Tools in Approaching Maximus: Christos Yannaras’ Ontology 86 II.2.1. A Note on Methodology ................................................................................... 86 5 II.2.2. Christos Yannaras and John Zizioulas as Maximian Commentators ................ 88 II.2.3. An Introduction to Christos Yannaras’ Philosophy .......................................... 89 II.2.4. Apophaticism as the Epistemological Stance of the Greek Tradition .............. 91 II.2.5. ἔρως and πρόσωπον: Person and Eros .............................................................. 94 II.2.6. Studying Yannaras’ Philosophical Terminology through his Critical (and Relational) Ontology ................................................................................................... 99 II.2.7. Preconditions for a Critical and Relational Ontology: λόγος, Relation, Consciousness ........................................................................................................... 100 II.2.8. Ontological Categories: Substance, Particulars, Activities............................. 102 II.2.9. The Activities (ἐνέργειαι) as a Primary Ontological Category ....................... 103 II.2.10. Otherness (ἑτερότητα) and Artistic Expression ............................................ 105 II.2.11. Axiomatic Dichotomies and Problematic Ontologies .................................. 107 II.2.12. Different Accesses to Reality: a Personal Causal Principle and the Fullness of Participation .............................................................................................................. 108 II.2.13. Employing Yannaras’ Thought as a Hermeneutic Tool ............................... 111 ΙΙ.3. Μaximus’ ‘Logical’ Ontology: the λόγοι of Beings ........................................... 113 ΙΙ.3.1. Τhe Semantic Frame of the Philosophical Notion of λόγος ........................... 113 ΙΙ.3.2. ‘Logical’ Existence and the God as Λόγος ..................................................... 114 ΙΙ.3.3. ‘λόγος of Nature’, Nature-as-such and ‘According to Nature’ ....................... 117 ΙΙ.3.4. The Many, the One and the Contemplation of the λόγοι ................................ 118 ΙΙ.3.5. An Ontology of Dialogical Reciprocity .......................................................... 121 PART III: MAXIMUS THE CONFESSOR’S UNDERSTANDING OF MOTION AND TEMPORALITY ............................................................................................... 123 ΙΙΙ.1. Motion and Time in Aristotle’s Physics as a Precursor to Maximus’ Definition of Time .......................................................................................................................... 125 III.1.1. Aristotle’s Theory of Motion (κίνησις) ......................................................... 125 III.1.2. The prime unmoved mover (πρῶτον κινοῦν ἀκίνητον) ................................. 128 III.1.3. The Aristotelian theory of time ..................................................................... 130 III.1.4. Time and Corruption ..................................................................................... 134 III.1.5. The Aeon in Plato’s Timaeus: Time as a “Moving Image of Eternity” ........ 136 III.2. Maximus’ Philosophy of Motion ....................................................................... 139 III.2.1. Origination – Motion – Fixity ....................................................................... 139 III.2.2. Motion κατὰ φύσιν, Returning Motion, Motion παρὰ φύσιν ........................ 142 III.2.3. The Motion of the Uncreated ........................................................................ 145 III.2.4. Ever-moving Repose, Stationary Movement ................................................ 148 III.2.5. Creative Motion ............................................................................................ 149 III.2.6. Fixity and Repose: στάσις ............................................................................. 150 III.2.7. Motion in Maximus and Aristotle ................................................................. 152 III.3. Introducing Maximus’ Conception of Time .................................................... 154 6 III.3.1. Time for Maximus the Confessor and Aristotle ............................................ 154 III.3.2. Space-Time Continuum ................................................................................ 155 III.3.3. ‘Whereness’ and ‘Whenness’ ........................................................................ 155 III.3.4. The Definition of αἰών, the Aeon .................................................................. 158 III.3.5. Beyond Time: The ‘Temporality’ of στάσις ἀεικίνητος ............................... 159 III.4. The Fundamentals of Temporality, Spatiality and Motion: Sections 35-40 from the Tenth ‘Difficulty’ ......................................................................................... 162 III.4.1. Section 35: Creation’s εὐκοσμία as Disclosing its Originator ...................... 163 III.4.2. Section 36: Creation’s Temporal Beginning ................................................. 165 III.4.3. Section 37: The Motion of Substance, Quantity and Quality ........................ 169 III.4.4. Section 38: Maximus’ Space-Time Continuum ............................................ 172 III.4.5. Section 39: Createdness Excludes the Possibility of Spatiotemporal Infinity .................................................................................................................................. 178 III.4.6. Section 40: Further Elucidations