The Cappadocian Milieu 14:00 - 16:00 Tuesday, 20th August, 2019 East School Presentation type Short Communications Ilaria
518 Basil and Amelius
Arnaud PERROT Ecole normale supérieure, Paris, France
Abstract
Basil’s Homily on the word: ‘In the beginning was the Word (John 1:1)’ alludes to the admiration of the pagans for the prologue of the Gospel of John and to how the pagans are supposed to have made use of this text in their own writings. Behind these words, one can easily recognize an allusion to the Neoplatonist Amelius, Plotinus’ senior disciple. Basil’s Neoplatonism has been the subject of much debate, especially as far as his direct knowledge of Plotinus is concerned. In this paper, I will show that Basil has certainly not read Amelius, but, exactly like the other Christian writers who referred to Amelius’ testimony, is dependent here on Eusebius’ Evangelical Preparation and the way the Palestinian bishop had more or less coined Amelius’ testimony on the value of John’s Prologue. 896 Sympatheia and the Body of Christ in Basil of Caesarea
Thomas Tatterfield Boston College, Chestnut Hill, USA
Abstract
It is no secret that Basil of Caesarea utilizes the Stoic philosophical concept of sympatheia in his cosmology. This article's point of departure is an article on the subject by N. Joseph Torchia in which various Plotinian parallels are discussed. Once sympatheia is understood in its broader usage, Basil's unique treatment of it is revealed. This paper argues that Basil's use of sympatheia is integrated in to his treatment of the unity of the Church. More specifically, he places it at the heart of his explanation of the Pauline image of the Church as the Body of Christ and describes the Holy Spirit as the cause of its sympatheia. In the process, Basil employs sympatheia in his Biblical exegesis, chiefly 1Corinthians 12:26. 796 “Language is the author of all these emotions:” Greek Novels and Christian affect in Gregory of Nyssa
Michael Motia University of Massachusetts Boston, Providence, USA
Abstract
Gregory of Nyssa framed Christian perfection as an intensification (epitasis) and expansion (epektasis) of desire for God. While much work has been done on the philosophical and medical sources for Gregory’s theory, this paper examines Achilles Tatius’s Platonic novel Leucippe et Clitophon and its discussion of language, eros, and affect. Byzantine tradition would even claim that Tatius become a Christian bishop after writing the novel.
Tim Whitmarsh recently argued that Greek Novels emphasize “dirty love,” or a union that transcends traditional Greek identity. The novels, that is, meditate on desire, specifically meditate on the way desire can break and reform bonds of community. This mixing desire and remaking of traditional social bonds are also central to Gregory’s project.
More specifically, Tatitus’s discussion of the way “language” authors affective sates, I argue, is central to Gregory’s project of shaping the proper forms of desire. “Bloodless are affect's lacerations, though deep their penetration,” Tatitus writes. Gregory’s sermons on the Song of Songs picked up this line of thinking and transformed it into a series of ascetic practices aimed at Christian perfection. By invoking, theorizing, and transforming tropes found in Leucippe et Clitophon, Gregory provided his audience a vivid image of Christian perfection theorized as a “purified” erotic relationship. He produced what Sarah Ahmed has called a new "affective economy."
853 “Epistolary Agōn and Exhibitions of Manhood in Fourth-Century Cappadocia”
Nathan Howard University of Tennessee at Martin, Martin, USA
Abstract
In a perspective inherited from second sophistic predecessors, fourth-century pepaideumenoi (individuals trained in paideia) believed that aretē (manly virtue) had to be earned and it had to be proven repeatedly. This paper shows how epistolary discourse provided literati a venue for circulating such social signals. In letters addressed to select addressees, the Cappadocian Fathers appealed to two timeless truths: first, that leading men (agathoi) emanated from settings of contest. And second, that classical Greece provided episodes of agōnes (‘contests’ or ‘struggles’) that illustrated ideal virility. A cross-section of letters by Basil, Nazianzen, and Nyssen (the Cappadocian Fathers) illustrates that these clergymen used epistolary composition to identify with ideals of manhood from classical Greece such as courage and resolve. With an emphasis on the Greek past as the crucible of masculinity, I argue, the Cappadocians staged letter exchange as a discourse analogous to the feats of warfare, athleticism, and oratory. Through such parallels, the Cappadocians re- inscribed the heritage of agōnes as their own, subsequently integrating the ideals of elite manhood into the collective consciousness of the church and identifying the pro-Nicene episcopacy with classical notions of aretē.