Vox Patrum

Bibliography of "The Testament of Abraham"

Andrzej Suski — Sat, 15 Jun 2024 00:00:00 +0200

2023 Polish Bibliography of the Christian Antiquity. With Additions from 2022

Adam Pawlak — Sat, 15 Jun 2024 00:00:00 +0200

Every year Vox Patrum publishes a bibliography of Christian antiquity, presenting the publications of Polish authors from the previous year. The bibliography is divided into 13 thematic categories and the names of the ancient authors to whom the publications refer.

Dissertations in Christian Antiquity Completed in Polish Academic Centres in 2022-2023 (with additions from previous years)

Marcin Wysocki — Sat, 15 Jun 2024 00:00:00 +0200

Dissertations in Christian Antiquity completed in Polish academic centres in 2022-2023 (with additions from previous years).

Galatians 6:17 and its Reception History: Assessing the Echoes

Steven Muir — Sat, 15 Jun 2024 00:00:00 +0200

This preface engages with the concept of echo as a creative way of generating ideas on how to assess issues in the reception history of a scripture text -- here, Galatians 6:17.

Stigmata and the Pressure of Interpretation

Warren Campbell — Sat, 15 Jun 2024 00:00:00 +0200

Some conclusions of the series of the articles on the stigmata.

Two-Way Trauma in Paul's Letter to the Galatians

Steven Muir — Sat, 15 Jun 2024 00:00:00 +0200

This essay considers the blunt and controversial statement of Paul at the conclusion of Galatians (Gal 6:17). Paul says, “from now on, let no one trouble me, for I bear on my body the marks (stigma, brand or tattoo) of Christ.” Scholars agree that Paul is speaking metaphorically about the scars he received in ministry. By calling his scars “tattoos,” Paul makes an odd sort of honour claim, since tattoos typically were inflicted on low-status slaves in the Roman empire as a mark of ownership and punishment. This essay looks at a common thread of trauma and violence in the letter to the Galatians. Paul works through the traumas he received in two ways. First, he presents a variety of traumatic episodes in the Galatian community – at times, lashing out at his opponents. Second, he deliberately inverts honor and status categories. By boldly claiming to be Christ’s slave Paul asserts his status and finds meaning and vindication in his suffering. This essay takes a more wholistic view of the letter to the Galatians that has previously been done.

Marius Victorinus on the Stigmata of the Apostle Paul (Gal 6:17)

Wendy Elgersma Helleman — Sat, 15 Jun 2024 00:00:00 +0200

This discussion of the fourth-century commentary of Marius Victorinus on Paul’s epistle to the Galatians serves as a critical witness to late ancient understanding of Paul’s self-identification with the stigmata of Christ (of Gal 6:17), as the marks of his humiliating death on the cross. Echoing Paul on “being crucified with Christ”, Victorinus exhorted Christians to follow that example in suffering for their faith, warning them that suffering is inevitable. The present textual study uses linguistic, grammatical, rhetorical, and socio-historical analysis, particularly on the key terms, stigmata and mysterium. It concludes that Victorinus associated these terms to give meaning to trauma and suffering for Christians. The term mysterium in Victorinus’ work is closely associated with central aspects of Christ’s life and work, especially his crucifixion and death. While rejecting the “history of religions” school of thought on Christian liturgy borrowing from mystery religions, this study concludes that Victorinus’ use of the term mysterium reflects a move in fourth century Christianity to adapt language of the mysteries for the sacraments; more particularly, baptism is understood as a symbolic reenactment of Christ’s crucifixion, death and resurrection. Such an approach enhances the meaning of suffering in terms of service to Christ, for in baptism Christians share not only in Christ’s death, as suffering “with Christ”, but also in his resurrection, as victory over sin, suffering and death.

Rendering Trauma Beneficial… for Whom? Gregory of Nyssa’s Homily 12 on the Song of Songs

Maria Dasios — Sat, 15 Jun 2024 00:00:00 +0200

Gregory’s Homily 12 on the Song of Songs offers one opportunity to trace the legacies of the compelling claim, in Galatians 6:17, that Paul bears “the marks of Christ” on his body. Gregory appeals to this verse to aid his exegesis of Song 5:7 (a violent passage he calls “repellant in its plain sense”) and develop his claims that “the wound”, after all, is “an admirable thing”. My paper probes social and ethical dimensions of this exegetical and cultural conceptual lineage. It surveys wounds and marks in Homily 12; suggests how other works by Gregory support “striking and wounding” as enacting spiritual healing (ἴασιν); considers contexts for violence in the name of guardianship and instruction in late antiquity; and closes by considering violence enacted in the name of Christianization and “civilization” in Canada’s residential schools. This study embeds Gregory’s treatment of Gal 6:17 in a larger attempt to raise critical questions about the persistence of benevolent understandings of trauma and violence across diverse Christian exegetical contexts and the harms such understandings may perpetuate.

The Therapeutic Gospel for the Traumatic World. Stigmata Domini Iesu Christi in Corpore as the Crown of Victory

Jimmy Chan — Sat, 15 Jun 2024 00:00:00 +0200

Drawing on Augustine’s Epistolae ad Galatas Expositionis Liber Unus, I would like to explore two insights into the therapeutic understanding of persona trauma. First, for Augustine, Paul’s past turbulentas contentiones are not in and of themselves stigmata domini Iesu Christi. What, then, is the meaning and significance for Augustine of Paul’s statement “For I bear the marks of the Lord Jesus Christ in my body” (Gal 6:17)? Secondly, Augustine recognizes that Paul has been fighting his “alios conflictus et certamina”. What is his struggle and how does it relate to the stigmata of the Lord Jesus Christ in the body? In traumatic experiences, our hearts may be troubled by the guilt of the traumatic experiences (for example, by asking questions like: “Did I do something wrong to cause this?”). Paul is able to recognize and reject anyone (or anything) that might tempt him to return to the accusation of the law, hence the declaration: “De cetero, inquit, laborem nemo
mihi praestet”. I argue that by interpreting the metaphorical sense of ad coronam uictoriae proficiebant, Augustine pronounces Christ’s victory on the Cross over sin and death by explaining Paul’s proclamation of his hermeneutic of Christ’s stigmata. Through this soteriological lens, Augustine brings his interpretation of Galatians to its climax by proclaiming “Gratia domini nostri Iesu Christi cum spiritu uestro, fratres, Amen” (Gal 6:18).

Ποῖ φύγωμεν, Ὅμηρε, καὶ στῶμεν; The Role of Greek Archaic Epic in the Work "Paedagogus" by Clement of Alexandria

Monika Szczot — Sat, 15 Jun 2024 00:00:00 +0200

The main problem of the article is an attempt to describe the role of Greek archaic epic in the works of Clement of Alexandria. The problem part of the article includes interpretations of selected and representative borrowings from Homer's poems in the work Paedagogus. The Homeric epic and Homer's role as a teacher of ancient Hellad provide an important context for consideration. The philological analyses reveal the complex Christian-pagan structure of Clement's work and emphasise the important role of Homer in the construction of the aesthetics of the famous handbook of moral theology. The article also shows that Clement's literary output still offers new interpretative possibilities in aspects of the structure of his works and their aesthetics, genology and communicative function. The polyphony of quotations, allusions and borrowings adds credibility to the Clement’s claims and theses, presenting them in a complex discourse that serves aesthetic, erudite, moral and evangelistic purposes.

St. Jerome’s Struggle against Christological Heresies in the Light of his Teaching on Christ Contained in His Letters

Michał Łukaszczyk — Sat, 15 Jun 2024 00:00:00 +0200

This article describes the Christological heresies found in the Epistles of St Jerome. These are Arianism, Apolinarianism, the heresies preached by the Ebionites and Nazarenes, the heresies professing Docetism and Pelagianism. In the heresies described, the Author of the Vulgate demonstrates not only doctrinal errors, but also defends the orthodoxy of the Christian faith in his writings. The article furthermore points out the important issues in Christology highlighted by the Monk of Bethlehem. It is mainly concerned with the confusion of concepts in Greek and Latin concerning the terms οὐσία and ὑπόστασις, the attempt to restore their proper meaning, the formation of the correct meaning and understanding of the term persona, the pointing out of the dangers of Pelagianism and the linking of it to earlier heresies in order to draw attention to its pernicious effects.

Biblical Reading according to John Cassian’s Collatio Patrum XIV: From a Mere Erudition Towards a True Experience

Bogna Kosmulska — Sat, 15 Jun 2024 00:00:00 +0200

The paper presents how John Cassian, particularly in his Collatio Patrum XIV, deals both with the a-intelectual (not to say with the anti-intellectual) and the erudite elements of the monastic tradition. In the introduction, the general conditions of literacy in the early monasticism have been depicted (with the special reference to the example of St. Anthony as indicated in the Prologue to St. Augustine’s De doctrina christiana and to abba Theodor in Cassian’s De institutis coenobiorum). In the main part of the article, Collatio XIV, that is the conversation with abba Nesteros on spiritual knowledge, has been analysed. In addition to classical divisions of knowledge and Biblical senses, the following topics have been discussed: (1) the transmission medium of Cassian’s books themselves (written, yet containing some criticism of writing and, above all, of a mere erudition); (2) universality of the written culture; (3) the meaning of the notion of meditation, also anight one (not necessarily covering only the night office, but also time dedicated for rest); (4) the dynamics of the spiritual development of the listener/reader of the Holy Scriptures, including the difficulty characteristic of a young and educated reader – addressed in the paper’s title – how to pass from a mere erudition to a true experience. The main conclusion of the paper is that Cassian represents a balanced attitude towards the Christian intellectualism (gnosis). Although he does not abandon any of the intellectual achievements of his original environment, whose problems are reflected in Collatio XIV, he is able to formulate a universal proposal also for uneducated Christians who can be participants not only in Christian praxis, but also in theoria.

Philoxenus of Mabbug, On Gestures and Prayer When One Recieves Communion in the Hand

Tomasz Szymczak — Sat, 15 Jun 2024 00:00:00 +0200

Translation into Polish of Philoxenus of Mabbu's work On Gestures and Prayer When One Recieves Communion in the Hand.

Aelred of Rievaulx, A Certain Wonderful Miracle

Ryszard Stefan Groń, Marsha L. Dutton; Robert Sochań — Sat, 15 Jun 2024 00:00:00 +0200

The aim of the article is to present a translation from ecclesiastical Latin into Polish together with a commentary on the work of the 12th-century English abbot from the Cistercian abbey in Rievaulx, Aelred, entitled A Certain Wonderful Miracle. The article is divided into three parts: a short note on the life and work of Aelred (1110-1167), his literary legacy, including its translations into Polish (1); presentation of the work itself, taking into account its environment, history, meaning and purpose (2). The first part is written by the editor of this project, Ryszard Groń; the second part was written by prof. Marsha L. Dutton, from the Ohio University in the USA, invited to cooperate. The translation from Latin was undertaken by Robert Sochań, the translation of the article by prof. Dutton from English was made by Ryszard Groń. The third part is the Polish text of the presented work by Aelred (3).

Sempiternus rex Christus. Encyclical letter of Pope Pius XII on the fifteenth centenary of the Council of Chalcedon

Janusz Królikowski — Sat, 15 Jun 2024 00:00:00 +0200