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John Chrysostom and the Transformation of the City. by Aideen M

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John Chrysostom and the Transformation of the City. by Aideen M 98 JOURNAL OF ECCLESIASTICAL HISTORY membership, as defined by Athanasius, shifted over time and according to his polemical purposes, enabling him to present all his opponents from the 330s to the late 350s as representatives of a single heretical party. Gwynn then analyses whether the actions of those whom Athanasius calls ‘the Eusebians’ provide any evidence for a unified political agenda of a single ecclesiastical party against Athanasius and his ‘orthodox’ supporters. Given the fragmentary non-Athanasian evidence for many of these activities, the results here are largely inconclusive. In the last, and longest, chapter, Gwynn determines whether ‘the Eusebians’ subscribed to ‘Arian’ theology. He first defines what he calls ‘Athanasian Arianism,’ that is, how Athanasius himself presented the theological views of Arius and his supporters. Gwynn then compares this theological construct to the known views of specific ‘Eusebians’, Arius, Asterius, Eusebius of Nicomedia, as well as to the Second Creed of the Dedication Council of Antioch in 341, maintaining that neither these ‘Eusebians’ nor the creed reflects an ‘Athanasian Arian’ theology. Gwynn then concludes that the ‘Eusebians’ did not exist as a distinct ecclesiastical party except in the polemic of Athanasius and that the monolithic ‘Arianism’ imputed to them by Athanasius does not do justice to their distinctive theologies. This is not to deny that the so-called ‘Eusebians’ shared political and theological concerns; it is to realise that Athanasius’ polemic distorts the reality. Gwynn’s monograph notes but does not address why Athanasius’s polemical construct found widespread acceptance. EMORY UNIVERSITY MARK DELCOGLIANO John Chrysostom and the transformation of the city. By Aideen M. Hartney. Pp. ix+222. London: Duckworth, 2004. £45. 0 7156 3193 4 JEH (59) 2008; doi:10.1017/S0022046907002989 Hartney’s study brings into focus the preaching of one of the most prolific and highly acclaimed preachers of the ancient Church, John Chrysostom. The central aim of the book is to show how his sermonising reveals a concerted effort to create a Christian discourse intent on transforming the entire fabric of traditional city life and the public sphere, not simply in a confrontational manner, though, but in ‘overlaying’ existing structures with a Christian perspective. Special attention is given to ‘gendered’ behaviour where John’s preaching presents role models for both sexes, but notably for women. This interest ties in with related topics including social order and wealth. The gender perspective, and the attention to the con- struction of a Christian discourse, chime with recent trends in scholarship and put a contemporary emphasis on themes which have traditionally been examined in the perspective of ‘Christian ethics’. However, claims that the relevant areas have been under-researched are overstated and ‘traditional’ studies might in part fill some of the purported gaps. It is unfortunate in the context that the bibliography consists almost entirely (with a few exceptions in French) of English-language studies. The focus on rhetoric directs the attention to the relationship between preacher and audience and prompts a wider, principal question. If Chrysostom had a coherent programme of instruction, which he followed in Antioch as much as in Constantinople, what do audience responses tell us about the social fabric of both cities and John’s (in)ability and (un)willingness to accommodate difference? Even Downloaded from https://www.cambridge.org/core. 02 Oct 2021 at 17:34:49, subject to the Cambridge Core terms of use. REVIEWS 99 if such responses can only sporadically be reconstructed and the dating and placing of individual sermons or even series of sermons on related texts is extremely difficult (as Hartney rightly points out), the question remains. Unless the absence in Antioch of the hostility and criticism we hear from Constantinople is just a blind spot in our sources, something important must be different. And surely it matters to the ambitious social programme outlined by Hartney whether – and why – John’s sermonising succeeded or failed to create a positive rapport with his audience, their needs, worries and self-perception. John’s temperament is only in part to blame; for a fuller answer, more research into the social worlds of Constantinople and Antioch is needed; here, there may still be much to uncover in Chrysostom’s sermons and Hartney’s study marks an important step in that direction. FACULTY OF DIVINITY, THOMAS GRAUMANN CAMBRIDGE The homilies of St John Chrysostom. Provenance. Reshaping the foundations. By Wendy Mayer. (Orientalia Christiana Analecta, 273.) Pp. 570 incl. 16 tables. Rome: Pontificium Institutum Orientalium Studiorum, 2005. E32 ( paper). 88 7210 347 9; 1590 7449 JEH (59) 2008; doi:10.1017/S0022046907003168 Ancient sermons hold the greatest potential for modern scholars if they can be placed in a particular context of delivery; at the very least a particular city and preferably a particular church. If they know this context, scholars can link the content of particular sermons with a specific audience and a specific social situation as well as with the particular issues that were pertinent to local Christians. For this reason, Wendy Mayer’s book is essential reading for anyone undertaking a serious study of the preaching of John Chrysostom. It reveals some acute problems with the ways in which scholars have previously assigned provenance to Chrysostom’s preaching and lays the foundations for a new methodology for deciding which sermons were delivered where. Anyone who makes any kind of argument that relies heavily on linking Chrysostom’s preaching to a particular context in the future will now have a clear set of guidelines to follow when deciding which sermons to use and will no longer have to make do with the contradictory scholarship on the subject that has developed over the last four centuries. Chapter i of Mayer’s work outlines the views of previous scholars on the provenance of Chrysostom’s preaching from Savile in the seventeenth century until the present day. Here it becomes clear that previous scholars have favoured a chronological or biographical approach that first decided when in his career Chrysostom preached particular sermons and then automatically assigned them to a provenance at Antioch or Constantinople on that basis. This is particularly prob- lematic because it has often relied on the assumption that sermons that have come down to us as a cohesive series in the manuscript tradition were originally delivered as a series. In fact some series contain individual sermons that were delivered in different cities, so undermining the idea that references to chronology in one sermon in a series can necessarily apply to the series as a whole. Chapters ii and iii ( part II)of the book categorise and assess the criteria on which previous judgements about provenance have been made. In so doing, Mayer puts aside purely chronological Downloaded from https://www.cambridge.org/core. 02 Oct 2021 at 17:34:49, subject to the Cambridge Core terms of use..
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