Philosophy and the Gospel
Philosophy and the Gospel
This chapter explores three related claims made by Torrance, and shows the way in which they are related to his fundamental assumptions about the relation between early Christianity and Hellenistic philosophy and the way in which Gregory of Nazianzus differs from the other two Cappadocians. The first claim is that Gregory of Nazianzus sees the three divine persons as ‘substantive relations’, whereas the other two Cappadocians see them as ‘modes of being’ (tropoi huparxeōs). Second is that for Basil and Gregory of Nyssa ousia is an ‘abstract’ and ‘impersonal’ concept. Thirdly, Torrance describes as ‘rather dualist’ the distinction which Basil and Gregory of Nyssa tend to draw between the transcendent unknowable ‘Being of God’ and ‘the uncreated energies of his self-revelation’. The chapter examines some other factors which influence Torrance's reading of Gregory of Nyssa, notably his reading of Cappadocian analogies and his response to debates in contemporary theology about the doctrine of the Trinity.
Keywords: Torrance, Trinity, early Christianity, Hellenistic philosophy, Gregory of Nazianzus, Cappadocians
Oxford Scholarship Online requires a subscription or purchase to access the full text of books within the service. Public users can however freely search the site and view the abstracts and keywords for each book and chapter.
Please, subscribe or login to access full text content.
If you think you should have access to this title, please contact your librarian.
To troubleshoot, please check our FAQs , and if you can't find the answer there, please contact us .
