fir s t

The Dumb Ox and

the Orthodox
by Andrew Louth

Orthodox Readings o f Aquinas

BY M A R C U S P L E S T E D
O X F O R D , 2 7 2 PAGES, $ 9 9

he Greeks never had any

interest in Latin culture:
This was true in the classical period and was inherited by the Church
Fathers (the interest of the Greeks in
St. Gregory the Great is the exception that proves the rule). It began to
change at the end of the thirteenth
century, when, in the wake of the
Byzantines outright rejection of the
reunion negotiated at the Second
Council of Lyon in 1274, the Emperor Michael VIII Palaiologos commissioned a translation of Augustines
De Trinitate, to inform the Greeks
about Latin theology. The translator
also translated Boethius De Consolatione Philosophiae, as well as some
Ovid, which suggests genuine interest
among the Greeks in Latin culture.
The process initiated by the emperor continued and grew apace.
The most striking example of this
is the Byzantine interest in Thomas
Aquinas, several of whose works were
translated into Greek, beginning with
his Summa contra Gentiles, translated
in 1354, and continuing with much of
the Summa Theologiae, several quaestiones, some of his opuscula, and
commentaries on Aristotle all this
backed up by works expounding and
commenting on Aquinas, as well as attacking him, a process that continued
to the end of the Byzantine Empire
in 1453. This is the core of Marcus
Plesteds magnificent book, the fruit
of vast erudition and research in territory as yet very imperfectly mapped.

th in g s

May 2013

Plested begins the story rather differently, however; he wants to place

Aquinas in the context of w hat he
calls Byzantine scholasticism. By
this he means a tradition of learned
analysis of theological issues, using
logic and argument, that he traces
back to the eighth-century father
John Damascenes Fount o f Knowledge, written by the former civil servant to the M uslim caliphate who
had become a monk near Jerusalem,
where he devoted his life to prayer
and study. This trad itio n Plested
traces fu rth e r in great Byzantine
scholars such as Photios, the great
ninth-century patriarch of Constantinople, and the courtly M ichael
Psellos, Consul of the Philosophers
in the eleventh century.
This was a very learned tradition of scholarship, but it was nothing like the scholasticism of the high
Middle Ages, which is much more
than a keenness to present theology
systematically combined with the use
of syllogistic reasoning. Medieval
scholasticism was a product of the
g ro w th of the university, w hich
spawned intense competition among
the teachers, the schoolmen, for students: competition pursued through
the quaestio, at which a schoolman
invited challenges to his opinions (the
questions), to which he responded
with virtuosic displays of learning
and argument.
There is no parallel in the Byzantine East, where there was hardly
one university, and no institutional
competition. Nevertheless, Plested is
right to underline Aquinas debt to
Greek theology, found especially in
his Christology, and his indebtedness
to John Damascene and the writings
ascribed to Dionysius the Areopagite. This interest in Greek theology
is more marked in him than in any
of the other scholastics. Plested also
draws attention to the championing
of the use of reason in theological

Andrew Louth, an Orthodox priest, is professor emeritus o f Patristic and

Byzantine studies at the University o f Durham.

matters by Gregory Palamas. It is, indeed, one of most admirable features

of this book that it is sensitive to what
East and West have in common.

Eastern and Western traditions. The

interest in Aquinas in the Byzantine
East in the last century of the Byzantine Empire was not paralleled in
the West, where T hom as star was
already declining in the face of attacks by Duns Scotus and William
of Ockham, the rise of nominalism
in philosophy, and the dissolution of
his rational metaphysics by the two
powers doctrine in theology. It was
only with Pope Leo X IIIs bull Aeterni Patris (1879) that Thomas role
as the Catholic theologian, the doctor
communis, became assured.
One wonders why there was this
Byzantine interest. Plested does not
speculate; he draws attention to the
fact and gives a fine account of the
engagement of Byzantine thinkers
with Aquinas. This account upsets
the com m only received w isdom .
Enthusiasm for T hom as was felt
throughout the intellectual world of
late Byzantium, fractured as it was by
the so-called Hesychast controversy
over the claims by Athonite monks
to have genuine experience of the
uncreated light of the Godhead in
prayer, not least through the use of
the Jesus Prayer.
As Plested points out, the Hesychast controversy was already
settled before the advent of Thomas
on the Byzantine scene. Despite the
recent tendency in Orthodox circles
to oppose Aquinas and Gregory
Palamas, Hesychasms main theological defender, there is little sense of
this in the fourteenth century. Prominent supporters of Palamas, such as
Nicholas Cabasilas and Theophanes
of Nicaea, made enthusiastic use of
elements of Aquinas theology.
O rth o d o x interest in A quinas
did not end w ith the collapse of

63

REVIEWS

the Byzantine Empire. D uring the

period of Turkish rule, some of the
Byzantine engagement with Thomas
was secondhand (much knowledge
of T hom as in the West was also
secon dh an d ), but Plested poin ts
us to thinkers, virtually unkn o w n
nowadays, such as Koursoulas and
D am odos, who display a genuine
knowledge and appreciation for the
Angelic Doctor.
The author surveys Russian engagement with Thom as before the
nineteenth century and then moves on
to the modern period, beginning with
that century. There are some books
that have escaped his keen attention
(by Olga Meerson and Myroslaw I.
Tataryn, for instance), but the modern period, properly speaking, attracts his withering examination.
The astonishing receptivity to
Aquinas among O rthodox thinkers
seemed to falter in the last century.
Aquinas became a cipher for the alleged failures of the West: a narrow,
juridical rationalism, an overweening
confidence in human understanding
of God. Plested closes his book by
making a plea for the Orthodox to recover the confidence in their own tradition that enabled them to respond
with understanding and enthusiasm
to Aquinas, and to engage with his
theological achievement.
He is less clear on what this might
m ean. Partly this is simply th a t
such an engagement would involve

another book, which he may well be

contemplating. I hope he is; it will be
eagerly awaited.
t the beginning of the book,
Plested shows himself well
abreast of developments in
the study of Aquinas over the last
century or so. The Aquinas that the
Russian migr theologian Bulgakov,
for example, encountered in Paris in
the later twenties the traditional
Thomism of Garrigou-Lagrange and
the Neo-Thomism of M aritain and
Gilson is not the Aquinas found
in m odern studies of the saint; the
theologian, the commentator on the
Scriptures, is not overlooked now, as
he largely was in the past.
Plested does not explore w hat
engagement w ith the Aquinas of
modern research would entail, nor
does he relate this rediscovery of the
breadth of Aquinas to the Aquinas
encountered in his history of Orthodox reading of him. In fact, it seems
that the Byzantine reading of Aquinas
was limited to quite narrow concerns:
those regarding the so u ght-after
union with the West; after the Reformation, other, similarly narrow concerns emerged grace and free will,
the doctrine of the sacraments.
But the tran sla to rs themselves
must have engaged with more extensive issues. How? It is difficult for
m odern scholars to ascertain. For
one reason, the Byzantine Thomas is

Scores of important resources.

One convenient location.
A growing inventory of books, monographs, DVDs, back issues, reprints, and
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64

largely unknown: There are hardly

any editions, and Plested himself has
drawn on forays among manuscripts.
However, there is now a research
project, Th o m a s de A q u in o Byzantinus, that will eventually see the
publication of critical editions of the
Byzantine translations of Aquinas
and many of the Byzantine discussions of him.

able. Until then, it is very difficult to

move beyond what this book has so
clearly and elegantly outlined. What
did, or does, Thomas look like in
Greek dress? Already, in a conference
held last year in connection with the
Thomas de Aquino Byzantinus project, some hints of an answrer emerged.
It was suggested, for example, that
the analytical Thomas of the Latins
became, in the Greek of Kydones
translation, a rhetorical Thomas.
The question of translating from
one cultural m atrix to another is
complex. It is true, as Plested urges,
that Aquinas had an exceptional 111terest in Greek theology and philosophy, but he read all this in Latin, not
Greek, and it could be argued that
both John Damascene and the Areopagite read rather differently in Latin
translation (however accurate) than
in the original Greek: They were read
in a Latin cultural matrix profoundly
influenced by Augustine.
That is only a symbol of a much
larger problem. Plested does not do
much towards addressing it, but he
ably brings us to the threshold. If he
manages to dislodge the stereotypes
with which Western theology, not
least St. Thomas, has been (with a few
exceptions) approached by Orthodox
theologians in the twentieth century,
his achievement will be great.
Perhaps all that is needed, to begin with, is for Orthodox theologians
actually to work their way through
some of the quaestiones of the Summa Theologiae. They will discover

f irs t

much that is congenial, even if it is

expressed in an unfamiliar idiom and
with concerns that are unexpected.
For example, Thomas devotes much
time to the virtues, as does the Orthodox ascetic tradition; nonetheless,
it sounds rather different (different
lists, different arrangements).
It would be interesting to explore
w hat such difference am ounts to.
This book clears the way for such an
engagement, and as such it deserves
an enthusiastic welcome. Q

th in g s

May 2013

does not, I think, give them as much

credit as they deserve in this book,
an English translation of a Hebrew
biography published in 2007. He argues that Begin, while a principled,
truthful, and moral politician, was
governed almost totally by emotion
and intuition , shortchan gin g his
analytical abilities.

In his later service as prime minister, Begin is best known for ceding the
Sinai Peninsula to Egypt in exchange
for a peace treaty, a widely praised
accomplishment, though its wisdom
(which not a few far-sighted people
questioned at the time) seems less
evident now with the rise of the Mus11m Brotherhood in Egypt. I think he

Should We

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he early decades of Israeli

politics were dom inated by
Labor Zionists, mainly secular Ashkenazis (Jews from central
and eastern Europe) whose goal was
to create a New Jew based upon a
pioneering socialist ethos and rooted
in the Bible and the love of the homeland. M enachem Begin (1913-92),
a military and political leader who
became prime minister of Israel, was
in many ways the Labor Zionists
polar opposite.
As the leader of the small Revisionist underground Etzel, he led a
revolt against British forces in the
1940s. An excellent strategist, he
played a vital role in driving out the
British, though you would not guess
this from Avi ShiloiVs biography. The
author seems to adhere to a centerleft Zionism, though he does try to
be fair to Begin and recognizes many
of his strengths.
While not ignoring Begins strategic skills, Shilon, an Israeli journalist,

Forever?

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Meilaender's style is vintage, disciplined, and forceful.
D a v id H. S mi t h
An eloquent and wise theological witness. Meilaender calls
us to leave behind the futile search for meaning merely in an
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65

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