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Survey of Recent Work on St. Maximus the Confessor

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  04 August 2017

Dom Polycarp Sherwood
Dom Polycarp Sherwood*
Affiliation:
St. Meinrad Archabbey, St. Meinrad, Indiana
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Extract

The appearance of Hans Urs von Balthasar's corpus of Maximian studies in a new and reworked edition, after the lapse of more than twenty years, deserves more than usual attention. I must confess that I am a little embarrassed in undertaking the task. For, having myself written on Maximus after he had published his work, I had it constantly before me and more than once have criticized some of his positions, without fully grasping all that he wished to convey or the breadth of the background against which he was operating, even though, as he himself suggests (KL 14), we are in basic agreement in our understanding of Maximus and of the Maximian synthesis. Nonetheless, our approaches to Maximus do differ. A clear understanding of that difference will facilitate, I think, a surer appreciation of von Balthasar's own work and will also lead to a better grasp of the significance of Maximus and of the problems that confront the student of the Confessor. May their number increase!

Type
Miscellany
Information
Traditio , Volume 20 , 1964 , pp. 428 - 437
Copyright
Copyright © Fordham University Press 

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References

1 Kosmische Liturgie: Das Weltbild Maximus des Bekenners, 2 völlig veränderte Auflage, Johannes-Verlag (Einsiedeln 1961). Hereafter referred to as KL. The first edition will be noted by KL1, the French by KLf. Besides the reworked KL, the present volume contains a German version of the Mystagogy and of the Four Centuries on Charity (without the Logos asceticos), each with a brief introduction and a bare minimum of notes. His work, Die Gnostischen Centurien (Herder 1941), is reprinted with a new introduction but without the chronological material. The study of the Scholia on Denis (Scholastik 16 [1940] 16-38) is reproduced, the faulty citations being corrected. The volume is closed with three indices: Namen, Griechische Begriffe, Sachen. Google Scholar

2 Présence et Pensée: Essai sur la philosophie religieuse de Grégoire de Nysse (Paris 1942).Google Scholar

3 Op. cit. vii f.Google Scholar

4 Op. cit. IX and X. There is an interestng similarity between the views of von Balthasar here expressed and those of Georges Florovsky: Il faut posséder la théologie des Pères par l'intérieur. L'intuition serait là plus importante que l'érudition, elle seule ravive les écrits et en fait un témoignage (italics of the author). ‘Rejoindre les Pères,’ en tout état de cause, signifie progresser et non reculer. Il s'agit de la fidélité à l'esprit et non à la lettre des Pères; de s'enflammer au contact de leur inspiration ignée, et non de constituer un herbier. Unde ardet, inde lucet! Suivre les Pères, on ne le peut qu'en créant (my italics), non pas en imitant (from the concluding chapter of The Ways of Russian Theology , translated from the Russian in Dieu Vivant 13 [1949] 47 and 48).Google Scholar

5 The study on Origen appears not to have been written as part of the trilogy. It had not been written by 1942 (cf. Présence, cited in n. 2, xi). There is, however, the substantial article: ‘Le Mystérion d'Origène’ Recherches de science religieuse 26 (1936) 513–562, 27(1937) 38-64; also, the anthology of Origen: Geist und Feuer (1938, 21951). (Reprinted as Parole et mystère chez Origène [Paris 1957]).Google Scholar

6 Certainly, the Byzantine elaboration of Christian tradition manifests more easily and clearly that tradition's affinities with Hindu thought. This, I think, is obvious to the Byzantinist who would read The Quintessence of Hinduism (Bombay 1951) by Hubert Mascarenhas, principal of St. Sebastian Goan High School, Bombay, and lecturer in ancient Indian Culture at the University of Bombay. The author, acquainted only with the Latin tradition of Catholic theology, is far less convincing than he might have been had the comparison been instituted between Byzantine theology and Hindu thought.Google Scholar

7 Völker, W. Has already published two preparatory studies: (On the Image and Knowedge of God) in: Universitas — Dienst an Wahrheit und Leben, Festschrift für Bischof Dr. Albert Stohr, im Auftrag der Kath.-theol. Facultät der Johannes-Gutenberg-Universität Mainz, hrg. Lenhart, von L. (Mainz 1960) 243–254; and: ‘Der Einfluss des Pseudo-Dionysius Areopagita auf Maximus Confessor.’ in: Studien zum Neuen Testament und Patristik (TU 77 [Berlin 1961] 331-350.Google Scholar

8 See the reviews of KLf by Botte, B., Revue de Théologie ancienne et médiévale 15 (1948) 376, and by Wenger, A., Revue des études byzantines 7 (1949) 233f.Google Scholar

9 Dalmais, I. H. has newly assessed, at the Oxford Patristic Congress of 1963, the relationship between Maximus and Evagrius, in the light of the new Syriac version published by Guillaumont, A. (PO 28.1 [1958]); cf. also Guillaumont's, article, Le texte véritable des Gnostica d'Evagre, Revue de l'histoire des religions 142 (1952) 156–205, and now his full study, Paris 1962. Hausherr Orientalia Christiana Periodica [= OCP] 25 [1959] 44-52) is cautious about accepting this newly discovered version as the genuine Evagrius.Google Scholar

10 Hausherr, , Ignorance Infinie , OCP 2 (1936) 351–362; see the critique of this position in my Earlier Ambigua (Rome 1955) 124 n 1.Google Scholar

11 As the publication of the two works was simultaneous, I was able to introduce into the notes of the Ascetic Life references to my study on the Ambigua. Google Scholar

12 Von Balthasar in beginning his work on the confessor, obeyed a similar need for detailed study. The results are his studies on the Gnostic Centuries and the Scholia to Denis.Google Scholar

13 See Schultze, Bernardo S. J.: ‘Teologia e teologia orientale,’ in Problemi e Orientamenti di Teologia Dommatica (Milan 1957) 1. 547–573; in English in The Unity of the Churches of God (Baltimore 1963).Google Scholar

14 This latter aspect comes more into view in von Balthasar's, Die Gottesfrage des heutigen Menschen (entitled in English: Science, Religion and Christianity (Westminster [Md.] and London 1958).Google Scholar

15 Maximos der Bekenner: All-eins in Christus, Auswahl, Übertragung, von Endre von Ivanka, Einleitung. Johannes-Verlag Einsiedeln [1961]. See Introduction 6 and 7. The excerpts are all from the earlier Ambigua and the Ad Thalassium. I have not seen the same author's article, ‘Der philosophische Ertrag der Auseinandersetzung Maximos des Bekenners mit dem Origenismus,’ Jahrbuch der österreichischen byzantinischen Gesellschaft 7 (1958) 23-49.Google Scholar

16 On all this I have made a further study: ‘Maximus and Origenism’ Berichte zum XI Byzantinischen Kongress (München 1958). This was apparently unknown to von Balthasar when he was revising KL. On the skopos, see KL 270, 271, 275.Google Scholar

17 I would insist again on my note in my Earlier Ambigua (Rome 1955) 16755 Von Balthasar has taken no notice of it (KL 113). Yet I accept his strictures on my treatment of the Trinity (KL 94, 95, 632).Google Scholar

18 In these remarks I depend in part on the thesis of Maurus Wallace (see Appended Note).Google Scholar

19 KL 260. This section, as von Balthasar now presents it, owes much to the Christological investigations found in the work: Das Konzil von Chalkedon, edd. Grillmeier, and Bacht, .Google Scholar

20 Saint Augustine on Personality (New York, Macmillan 1960).Google Scholar

21 Vie Spirituelle 107 (1962) 318.Google Scholar

22 The dissertation of Maurus Wallace (see Appended Note) devotes a chapter to Creation and Participation in Maximus. Further, there is the dissertation, soon to be published, of Dom David Balas, S. O. Cist.: Metousia Theou, The Participation of the Divine Perfections in the Theology of Saint Gregory of Nyssa, at the Pontifical Institute of Sant'Anselmo, Rome.Google Scholar