The Christology of Theodore of Tarsus: The Laterculus Malalianus and the Person and Work of Christ (Studia Traditionis Theologiae: Explorations in Early and Medieval Theology) 9782503533858, 250353385X

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STUDIA TRADITIONIS THEOLOGIAE Explorations in Early and Medieval Theology Theology continually engages with its past: the people, experience, Scriptures, liturgy, learning and customs of Christians. The past is preserved, rejected, modified; but the legacy steadily evolves as Christians are never indifferent to history. Even when engaging the future, theology looks backwards: the next generation’s training includes inheriting a canon of Scripture, doctrine, and controversy; while adapting the past is central in every confrontation with a modernity. This is the dynamic realm of tradition, and this series’ focus. Whether examining people, texts, or periods, its volumes are concerned with how the past evolved in the past, and the interplay of theology, culture, and tradition.

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STUDIA TRADITIONIS THEOLOGIAE Explorations in Early and Medieval Theology 6

Series Editor: Thomas O’Loughlin, Professor of Historical Theology in the University of Nottingham

EDITORIAL BOARD

Director Prof. Thomas O’Loughlin Board Members Dr Andreas Andreopoulos, Dr Augustine Casiday, Dr Mary B. Cunningham, Dr Johannes Hoff, Dr Jonathan Wooding, Dr Juliette Day, Dr Patricia Rumsey, Dr Paul Middleton, Dr Simon Oliver, Prof. Andrew Prescott

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THE CHRISTOLOGY OF THEODORE OF TARSUS The Laterculus Malalianus and the Person and Work of Christ James Siemens

H

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Cover illustration: Tabula Peutingeriana © ÖNB Vienna: Cod. 324, Segm. VIII + IX © 2010, Brepols Publishers n.v., Turnhout, Belgium All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without the prior permission of the publisher. D/2010/0095/162 ISBN 978-2-503-53385-8

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TABLE OF CONTENTS

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS PREFACE LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS

IX XI XV

1. 1.1 1.2 1.3 1.4 1.5

1 4 6 9 13 16

the background of theodore of tarsus Theodore’s Life Edessa Constantinople Rome Canterbury

2. the evidence 2.1 Earliest Evidence 2.2 Pœnitentiale

21 23 25

2.3 2.4 2.5 2.6 2.7

Passio sancti Anastasii Letter to Æthelred Octosyllabic Poems Canterbury Commentaries Laterculus Malalianus

28 32 32 34 40

2.7.1 Editions 2.7.2 Manuscripts 2.7.3 Description of the Text 2.7.4 Sources 2.7.5 Attribution to Theodore 2.7.6 Theology of the Text

41 42 43 44 45 46

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2.8 Conclusion

54

3. theodore’s syriac sources 3.1 People, Places, and Themes

57 57

3.1.1 The Syriac Church 3.1.2 Ephrem 3.1.3 Ephremic Themes: Christ the Physician 3.1.4 Agricultural Imagery 3.1.5 Christ the Good Shepherd 3.1.6 Christ the Priest 3.1.7 Collating the Symbols

3.2 The evidence in Theodore 3.2.1 Ordines Christi 3.2.2 Medical Terminology 3.2.3 Genesis Typology 3.2.4 Jacob’s Stone 3.2.5 Adam’s Age 3.2.6 Summary of the Evidence

60 62 65 66 69 70 73 74

3.3 Syriac features in Latin work after Theodore 3.4 Conclusions

78 78 81 82 85 87 88 92

4. the influence of irenaeus of lyons on theodore 4.1 Background of Irenaeus 4.2 Ideas

96 97 101

4.2.1 Recapitulation 4.2.2 Christ as Victor 4.2.3 The Church: Unity and Tradition

4.3 4.4 4.5 4.6

Transmission The Evidence in Theodore The Source of Theodore’s knowledge of Irenaeus Conclusions

5.

a summary of theodore’s christology in the LATERCULUS MALALIANUS

5.1 5.2 5.3 5.4 5.5 5.6 5.7

Introduction The Picture in Bede’s Historia ecclesiastica gentis Anglorum The Laterculus and Bede: Unity The Laterculus and Bede: The Church and Sacraments Christological elements in the Canterbury Commentaries Christological elements in the Pœnitentiale Theodori Theodore’s Christology: A Summary

vi

102 108 110 114 118 128 135 138 138 140 143 147 152 156 164

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6. 6.1 6.2 6.3 6.4 6.5

the later evidence The Legacy of the Canterbury School The Syriac Legacy Theodore’s influence on Bede Other Anglo-Saxon Evidence Conclusion

167 169 173 176 182 188 191 195

CONCLUSIONS BIBLIOGRAPHY INDEXES

205

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ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

The late antique, or early medieval, period proffers a great deal to captivate the imagination and intellect, especially with regard to the history of the church and the development of its doctrine. Representing, by any measure, a time of remarkable intellectual and social ferment, it was clear to me early on that, when the chance presented itself, I would have to immerse myself in its theological questions more deeply. This was especially so in light of encouragement I had received from a friend and mentor, Fr Gregory Nimijean, during a particularly formative time in Montréal, to take up the study of the Fathers of the Church, and to understand the relevance of the questions they asked. So it was that, when Theodore of Tarsus was first revealed to me in the course of reading Bede’s Historia, he seemed fairly to command investigation. This present work grows out of that initial investigative impulse and the resultant thesis written in fulfilment of the requirements for my Ph.D. between 2001 and 2008. It was Stephen Sharman, rector of St Andrew’s-on-the-Red in Manitoba, Canada, who first made me aware of Theodore’s tangible legacy in the form of separate editions produced by Michael Lapidge and Jane Stevenson, and for that I owe him my sincere thanks. A voracious reader of all things Anglo-Saxon and theological, Stephen’s prodigious production of hand-written, miscellaneous bibliographical references and citations, sent to me by post over the course of my early research, was never more valuable than in the final stages of writing when I thought I was in for a last-minute search through sources, only to find that I was in possession of an important document already. Scholarship could have no better friend.

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The critical encouragement of my supervisor, Professor Tom O’Loughlin was, of course, vital at every stage of my work. From our initial correspondence, when I first proposed my research idea to him, through the numerous supervisory hours from which I would always come away with a renewed sense of purpose and plenty of new intelligence to ponder, to the respect he afforded whatever I had to bring to our conversations, he made the entire research and writing experience a deeply edifying and enjoyable one. It was his pastoral support, insight, and iconoclastic sense of humour, however, that made it an especial privilege to work under his direction. As I was still serving in an ordained capacity in the (Anglican) Diocese of Saskatchewan when I began my research, I cannot fail to recognise the understanding and support shown me by my friends in the Parish of Nipawin, as well as the inspiration and encouragement of my colleagues-in-ministry, especially my bishop the Rt. Rev. Anthony Burton, the Rev. Dr David Smith, the Rev. Lars Nowén, the Rev. Craig O’Brien, and the Rev. David Harris. My friendship with David Harris, especially, was instrumental in igniting my love for theological study as well as keeping me mindful of the object of that study. It is impossible to name everyone who contributed to the advancement of my labours, yet the willingness on the part of various scholars to respond to my queries was invaluable. I am particularly grateful to Sebastian Brock for his comments on Irenaean transmission in Syriac, and to Jane Stevenson for her exceptional generosity in response to my various questions. Finally, the hospitality of the monks of Downside Abbey, their splendid library, and the cadence of their prayers should be mentioned for having propelled me through the final stages of writing. The days spent with them were immeasurably helpful for focusing my attention and, ultimately, channelling my energy into a completed work. In the end, though, it was and remains my family who deserve the greatest credit. Without the abiding love and support of my wife, Kimberly, and the patient sacrifice of all my children (but especially Nicholas, Ambrose, Chloë, and Dominic, who bore the brunt of my absences and extended periods of seclusion), I could neither have first undertaken this project, nor finished it to such a satisfying end. I only hope that, in some small way, its publication, and their inclusion in it, can express the profound esteem in which I hold them and represent something of the love which is their due.

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PREFACE

It is reasonable to suppose that the student of history’s first encounter with Theodore of Tarsus normally comes about as a result of reading book four of Bede’s Historia ecclesiastica gentis Anglorum. Students of theology, on the other hand, hardly have occasion to meet the seventhcentury archbishop and teacher unless their study happens to lead them to the north-westernmost reaches of Europe at the dawn of the middle ages. The christological concerns of conciliar theology can almost be guaranteed to attract attention ahead of the mere administrative concerns of far-flung territories at such a formative time for doctrine. Yet the details provided by Bede concerning Theodore enthral with the possibility that the Greek monk – who, in old age, and after a life lived in some of the most prominent locations in the Christian East, got selected to lead a fragmented church in the distant land of Britain – could represent something altogether more interesting, theologically, than might otherwise be expected from a mere caretaker appointee to the archiepiscopal see of Canterbury. To review Jane Stevenson’s edition of the Laterculus Malalianus is to find the suggestion of Theodore’s theological potential, as it emerges from Bede’s details, wholly substantiated. Stevenson herself makes a preliminary effort at identifying the theology of the Laterculus, but spends more time elucidating the sources and arguing in favour of the work’s Theodoran provenance. To this end, her work is indispensable; however, what the Laterculus has to say about the person and work of Christ far exceeds what she could possibly have touched on within the parameters of her edition and commentary. In fact, the Laterculus Malalianus is virtually abounding in christological references that

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speak of a complex understanding of Christ on the part of the author, at the same time as they reveal something of his cultural and theological formation. And after the intimations of Bede as to Theodore’s theological appeal, it is just this sort of yield that makes the Laterculus so satisfying. I approach the task of drawing out, and expounding on, Theodore’s christological-soteriological understanding as a beneficiary of a great deal of scholarship that has been undertaken on him over the last twenty years. Although begun by the late Bernhard Bischoff, this scholarship was extended by Michael Lapidge, which in turn paved the way for others to contribute something to the developing picture – either by mining the connections between what Bischoff and Lapidge had themselves established about Theodore and the broader theological scene as it existed in Theodore’s time, or by venturing into new territory and pointing out other potential achievements of the archbishop. In this respect, Jane Stevenson accomplished the most by doing both with her work on the Laterculus. Whatever these accomplishments, however, what remains to be explored continues to outweigh that which has been done. There still appears to be little awareness of Theodore of Tarsus outside of such disciplines as Syriac studies. Even within Anglo-Saxon studies – the forum in which he was first treated in recent times – Theodore has found hardly a mention since the mid-nineteen nineties. One can only speculate as to why this may be the case, but it seems reasonable to suspect that, until some contention is made with his thought, Theodore’s appeal as a figure of historical interest alone will remain limited. Fortunately, the very thought that has, as yet, garnered so little interest, is both accessible and intriguing. One has only to consider that Theodore was most likely living in Rome at the time of the Lateran Council of 649, and most likely again to have attended the council, to realize that he is therefore almost certain to have had contact with Maximus the Confessor – a very significant theologian of the time and beyond. This fact alone could be enough to mark Theodore out as a subject worthy of study; but the evidence we now have that he spent time in the Syriac East, and of his education at Constantinople: these facts too should recommend him very highly. Yet they would not if there was no way of engaging them. They would simply become part of a picture of a man that has been compiled over time from a whole assortment of intangible facts. The introduction of a few works attributable to him, such as the biblical commentaries from Canterbury,

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PREFACE

mitigate against this however; although none do so in as thorough a way as the Laterculus Malalianus. It is the fact that the Laterculus represents the only complete prose work attributable to Theodore that makes it so appealing at first. That its content, upon analysis, holds out so much of consequence makes it positively fascinating. It is a text of manifold references, showing a clear bias toward Greek and Syriac sources, even as familiarity with certain Latin sources is also evident. Meanwhile, throughout it courses the soteriological refrain of restoration. The idea is essentially Irenaean, but Theodore casts it in such a way as to suggest the influence of Ephrem the Syrian. Then there are exegetical motifs that, original by comparison with the more common ideas in Greek and Latin exegesis, appear to draw their inspiration from the Syriac tradition. All of these characteristics transform what had, for so long, been seen as a low quality work of exegesis and chronography into something more like a theological goldmine, especially as it concerns establishing what the christological understanding of a figure like Theodore of Tarsus might be. In light of all this, the task of determining how Theodore of Tarsus understood the person and work of Christ, coming as he did to Canterbury having already lived a full life that included exposure to the major traditions of the Christian world at their various sources, seemed a necessary one. The Bischoff and Lapidge edition of the Canterbury glosses provided a biographical picture of Theodore that could hardly fail to provoke questions as to what it was that such a well-travelled and well-educated figure might have had to say about theological matters in his time, yet after its publication, it remained theologically untreated. Meanwhile, Stevenson’s volume containing the Laterculus provided some answers, but without pretending to offer any kind of theological analysis. So the body of work set out in the nineteennineties as belonging to Theodore demanded a theological evaluation. In the following chapters, I attempt to make this evaluation and to present my findings: especially as they derive from the Laterculus Malalianus. I begin doing this by summarizing the life of Theodore. It is important for the reader that he or she be acquainted with all that can be said with certainty about his life, along with all that can be surmised; it serves to provide some rationale for the high expectations we might bring to the reading of his work, and also of the eclectic nature of his learning. Following that, I present a survey of the evidence. Above all,

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the Canterbury biblical commentaries and the Laterculus are discussed, but so too are the Pœnitentiale Theodori and the Passio s. Anastasii, among other lesser works. All of this, however, can only be considered in conjunction with the words of Bede; and so the evidence of the Historia is discussed in detail. The two subsequent chapters really represent the heart of the work. In them, the two biggest influences on Theodore – at least as we can see in the Laterculus – are researched and appraised: first, Ephrem the Syrian, then Irenaeus of Lyons. Here, there must be some overlap, as the ideas of Irenaeus find interpretation in the language of Ephrem, and Theodore weaves themes from both together to make them all his own. After these two chapters, the christology inherent in Theodore’s other work, including his pastoral work as archbishop of Canterbury, is treated for the light it may shed on the Laterculus, before being drawn together and presented as a coherent picture. Finally, assuming Theodore must have impressed at least some of his students, and others who came after him with his ideas, traces of his christological thought are looked for in the work of no less a figure than Bede; but also among less direct possible heirs, including other, later repositories of Anglo-Saxon thought, and in the evidence surrounding the transmission of Ephrem the Syrian’s words in the Latin West. Much of this final chapter is necessarily cursory, in that it seeks to highlight possible avenues for further investigation without extending inappropriately beyond the parameters of my original proposal: to determine the nature of Theodore of Tarsus’ understanding of the person and work of Christ, above all in the Laterculus Malalianus.

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ABBREVIATIONS

A Historical Commentary AB ACO ALMA ASE AT ATR Biblical Commentaries BBKL CCO CCSL CED CGT Colgrave and Mynors CS CSAE CSEL CT CTQ CWS DOP

Bede’s Ecclesiastical History of the English People: A Historical Commentary Analecta Bollandiana Acta Conciliorum Oecumenicorum Archivum Latinitatis Medii Aevi Anglo-Saxon England Archbishop Theodore: Commemorative Studies on His Life and Influence Anglican Theological Review Biblical Commentaries from the Canterbury School of Theodore and Hadrian Biographisch-Bibliographisches Kirchenlexikon Corpus scriptorum Christianorum Orientalium Corpus Christianorum Series Latina Councils and Ecclesiastical Documents relating to Great Britain and Ireland Contemporary Greek Theologians Bede’s Ecclesiastical History Cistercian Studies Cambridge Studies in Anglo-Saxon England Corpus Scriptorum Ecclesiasticorum Latinorum The Christian Tradition: A History of the Development of Doctrine Concordia Theological Quarterly Classics of Western Spirituality Dumbarton Oaks Papers

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ECF EEC GD Hadden and Stubbs HegA HJ HSCP HTR ICL

IP JAAS JECS JRS JTS KCLMS LM MGH NES NPNF ODCC OECS OMT PIMS PG PL PMLA RA RSR RWC SC SE SECT SEHB SettSpol

Early Church Fathers Encyclopedia of the Early Church Gorgias Dissertations Councils and Ecclesiastical Documents relating to Great Britain and Ireland, vol. 3 Bede’s Historia ecclesiastica gentis Anglorum Heythrop Journal Harvard Studies in Classical Philology Harvard Theological Review D. Schaller & E. Könsgen, Initia Carminum Latinorum saeculo undecimo Antiquiorum (Göttingen, 1977) Instrumenta Patristica The Journal of the Assyrian Academic Society Journal of Early Christian Studies Journal of Roman Studies Journal of Theological Studies King’s College London Medieval Studies Laterculus Malalianus Monumenta Germaniae Historica Near Eastern Studies Ante-Nicene, Nicene, Post-Nicene Fathers Oxford Dictionary of the Christian Church Oxford Early Christian Studies Oxford Medieval Texts Pontifical Institute of Medieval Studies, Toronto Patrologia Graeca Patrologia Latina Publications of the Modern Language Association Recherches Augustiniennes Revue des Sciences Religieuses Records of Western Civilization Series Sources Chrétiennes Sciences Ecclésiastiques Sources of Early Christian Thought Studies in the Early History of Britain Settimane di studio del Centro italiano di studi sull’ alto medioevo

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ABBREVIATIONS

SHEPL SJT SLH SP ST SVTQ The School of Archbishop Theodore TRHS TS TTH VTB

Studies in History, Economics and Public Law Scottish Journal of Theology Scriptores Latini Hiberniae Studia Patristica: Historica, biblica, theologica et philosophica Studies and Texts St Vladimir’s Theological Quarterly The Laterculus Malalianus and the School of Archbishop Theodore Transactions of the Royal Historical Society Theological Studies Translated Texts for Historians Van Gorcum’s Theologische Bibliotheek

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1. the background of theodore of tarsus In an entry for the New Dictionary of Theology on ‘christology’, Gerald Bray observes that ‘[t]he period from 451 to 787 is often neglected by modern students, but it was of capital importance in elucidating the Chalcedonian definition.’1 Whatever the nature of and reason for the neglect to which he refers, Bray’s second assertion, concerning the importance of the period, can only really be faulted by reason of its understatement. This is because post-Chalcedonian christology exhibits an importance not only in relation to what it serves to elucidate; what it actively contributes to the enterprise of theology in relation to the person and work of Christ is unsurpassed for its creative consolidation and subtle, yet vital, detail. What is more, the resonances of this contribution come to dominate the thought of every part of the church for a very long time, especially in terms of the relationship between the right understanding of Christ’s person and work and the task of making that understanding manifest. Our subject, Theodore of Tarsus, takes up the christological mantle in this period and in his own person and work makes for an attractive and multifaceted representative of the times. In spite of casting an intriguing silhouette against the background of the seventh century, Theodore of Tarsus has escaped the notice of

1

G.L. Bray, ‘Christology’ in New Dictionary of Theology, IVP, Leicester, p. 138.

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many students of the period. This is notwithstanding the unambiguous admiration for the Greek archbishop on the part of as prolific and important a figure as Bede.2 In fact, we might suppose that, had the history of the church been determined solely by Bede’s Historia ecclesiastica gentis Anglorum, Theodore would never have suffered from the lack of general recognition he did after his death in 690. Yet aside from Bede’s account of Theodore’s time in Britain, little was known about him, and little said, until the late twentieth century.3 One may speculate as to why this was the case: little written work left behind, and no miracles with which to sustain a cult perhaps;4 but this was all to change when, in 1953, Bernhard Bischoff revealed his 1936 discovery of a manuscript containing biblical commentaries

2

Bede’s view of Theodore plays a large part in what we can discern of the latter’s christology, as we shall see below (chapters 5 and 6). That view is probably best summarized by the effusive praise Bede bestows upon Theodore in HegA, 4, 2: Peruenit autem Theodorus ad ecclesiam suam secundo postquam consecratus est anno sub die sexta kalendarum Iuniarum, dominica, et fecit in ea annos xx et unum menses tres dies xxvi. Moxque peragrata insula tota, quaquauersum Anglorum gentes morabantur (nam et libentissime ab omnibus suscipiebatur atque audiebatur), rectum uiuendi ordinem, ritum celebrandi paschae canonicum per omnia comitante et cooperante Hadriano disseminebat; isque primus erat in archiepiscopis, cui omnis Anglorum ecclesia manus dare consentiret . . . Neque umquam prosorus, ex quo Brittaniam petierunt Angli, feliciora fuere tempora . . . ‘Theodore came to his church on Sunday, 27 May, in the second year after his consecration, and there he spent twenty-one years, three months, and twenty-six days. Soon after he arrived, he visited every part of the island where the English peoples lived and was gladly welcomed and listened to by all. He was accompanied everywhere and assisted by Hadrian, as he gave instruction on the ordering of a holy life and the canonical custom of celebrating Easter. He was the first of the archbishops whom the whole English Church consented to obey . . . Never had there been such happy times since the English first came to Britain . . . ’ Colgrave and Mynors, pp. 332/3–34/5. 3 There is sporadic notice of Theodore across various medieval documents, from the Calendar of St Willibrord, compiled within a generation of Theodore’s death, (MS Paris Lat. 10837, available as Facsimile with Transcription, Introduction, and Notes, by H. A. Wilson, d. 1927), to the eleventh-century Leofric Missal. In the article, ‘Wendepunkte in der Geschichte der lateinischen Bibelexegese’, p. 6, (see note 5, below, for detailed mention of this article), Bernhard Bischoff mentions an erroneous latemedieval tradition concerning a Greek library of Theodore in Canterbury, as reported by Montague James in The Ancient Libraries of Canterbury and Dover. These examples, together with the penitential literature with which Theodore’s name was associated, reveal at least that memory of the archbishop existed even if his theological contributions remained unappreciated. 4 Suggestion made by David Farmer, ‘Theodore of Canterbury’ in Oxford Dictionary of Saints, p. 452.

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from Canterbury.5 Prior to that time, the world had been aware only of three primary (or pseudo-primary)6 sources of Theodore’s thought: the penitential literature that bore his name (with varying confidence that the actual content of that literature was his),7 a letter from the archbishop to Æthelred, King of Mercia,8 and a short poem of 5

The original discovery is described by Michael Lapidge in the preface to his and Bernhard Bischoff’s edition of the commentaries (pp. vii–ix). He explains the lull in time between Bischoff’s discovery and its announcement as being due to the onset of the second world war, saying finally that, as a result, ‘ . . .it was not until 1953, in his pioneering article “Wendepunkte in der Geschichte der lateinischen Bibelexegese” that the existence of these Canterbury commentaries was first brought to public notice’ (p. vii). The article in question can be found in both Mittelalterliche Studien. Aufsätze zur Schriftkunde und Literaturgeschichte, 3 vols., Stuttgart, 1966-81, vol. 1, pp. 205‒73, and Sacris Erudiri: Jaarboek voor Godsdienstwetenschappen, 6, Steenbrugge, 1954, pp. 189‒281. It is available in English translation as ‘Turning Points in the History of Latin Exegesis in the Early Middle Ages’ in Biblical Studies: The Medieval Irish Contribution, M. McNamara, ed., pp. 74‒160. 6 Over the course of this work, I refer on occasion to ‘pseudo-primary’ sources alongside primary in acknowledgment of the fact that, in spite of the extensive scholarship that has been undertaken with respect to Theodore’s legacy, some of what can attributed to him today is still the subject of redaction, joint authorship, or informed conjecture. Such is the case most especially with the Pœnitentiale Theodori, some of the octosyllabic poems discussed by Michael Lapidge (in his paper entitled, ‘Theodore and Anglo-Latin octosyllabic verse’, AT, pp. 260‒80), and individual ideas expressed in the Canterbury Commentaries. In the latter instance, this will be because, as Bischoff and Lapidge’s title of their edition suggests, the glosses included therein emerge from the Canterbury school of Theodore and Hadrian, and not Theodore alone. The content of particular statements can assuredly be attributed to Theodore due to their correspondence with what we know of his biographical details, but on the grounds that the useable matter in the commentaries – where our purposes are concerned – is so slight, it has not been thought necessary to distinguish between those thoughts that have certainly stemmed from Theodore, and those that are less certain. As regarding the Pœnitentiale, we appeal to the comments of Hadden and Stubbs in their edition, that, ‘ . . . the discipulus Umbrensium becomes the accredited reporter of Theodore’s determinations,’ and the fact that, across the sources, consensus refers to ‘Theodore’s judgments’, and not those of some anonymous figure. The arguments for attributing a great deal of hitherto unattributed work to Theodore have been made in various sources cited throughout this work. It has been assumed here that, over the course of the ensuing conversation in the years that have followed their publication, these arguments have been evaluated and accepted. Questions regarding the merits of attributing the Laterculus Malalianus to Theodore are discussed at length [later in this chapter], but in light of the evidence in favour, the Laterculus, along with the other writings mentioned above will be treated here as authentic works of the seventh-century archbishop. 7 The history and nature of the penitential literature associated with Theodore is specifically discussed by Thomas Charles-Edwards in the paper, ‘The Penitential of Theodore and the Iudicia Theodori’ (in AT, pp. 14 1‒74), while significant comment is also made in the preface to Hadden and Stubbs’ edition of the Pœnitentiale in CED, vol. 3, pp. 173‒76. As it relates to Theodore’s christology, it is examined below in chapter 5, section 6, ‘Christological elements in the Pœnitentiale Theodori’. 8 Edition contained in Hadden and Stubbs, pp. 171‒72.

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greeting to Bishop Hæddi of Winchester.9 Since then, by contrast, the Canterbury Commentaries have been edited, translated, and made available in a comprehensive volume;10 at least three more poems have been identified as belonging to the same class of poetry – and even, possibly, the same pen – as the verse written by Theodore to Hæddi;11 an analysis has been undertaken of the Passio sancti Anastasii suggesting that it, too, first came to Britain with Theodore, a possible product of his early endeavour at learning Latin;12 and a previously overlooked and anonymous text called Laterculus Malalianus has likewise been edited and translated, attributed to Theodore, and made available in a critical edition.13 So it is on the basis of this abundant, yet hitherto theologically–unexamined work that we undertake our own study of what Theodore of Tarsus might have contributed to the christological developments of his time, especially in Britain.

1.1 Theodore’s Life14 Theodore was born, as his name suggests, in the Greek-speaking city of Tarsus in the year 602.15 We can say little of his childhood with any certainty, other than that at a relatively young age, he must have left for the city of Antioch where the theological studies that would eventually see him recognized for his erudition began. Such a move would 9

Eddius Stephanus, Vita sancti Wilfridi. The letter is contained in Hadden and Stubbs, pp. 171‒2. 10 B. Bischoff and M. Lapidge, eds., Biblical Commentaries from the Canterbury School of Theodore and Hadrian, Cambridge, CUP, 1994. 11 See M. Lapidge, ‘Theodore and Anglo-Latin octosyllabic verse’ in AT, pp. 260‒80. For the actual poems, see pp. 275‒80 in particular. 12 The Passio referred to is that mentioned by Bede at the end of the Historia: ‘ . . . librum uitae et passionis sancti Anastasii male de Greco translatum et peius a quodam inperito emendatum, prout potui, ad sensum correxi . . .,’ 5, 24. A full discussion of the provenance of the text Bede felt the need to correct is put forward by Carmela Vircillo Franklin, ‘Theodore and the Passio s. Anastasii’ in AT, pp. 175‒203, and discussed at greater length in the next chapter, pp. 33‒34. 13 J. Stevenson, The Laterculus Malalianus and the School of Archbishop Theodore, Cambridge, CUP, 1995. This text, which is central to our work, along with Stevenson’s attribution, will be discussed at length in the following chapter. 14 It is of absolute importance to note that, prior to the rigorous textual detective work done on Theodore by Michael Lapidge and Jane Stevenson in particular, what anyone could say about Theodore’s life was extremely limited. While in the Historia Bede provides an invaluable account of Theodore’s acts from the time of his selection for the archiepiscopate to the end of his life, it must be remembered that the Greek

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be of tantamount importance, for although the centre was, by the first half of the seventh century, more than two hundred years removed from the great exponents of the theological and hermeneutical monk had already lived sixty-six years by then. Unfortunately with so little to draw on, prior to the identification of the Canterbury Commentaries as being from Theodore’s school and the attribution of the Laterculus Malalianus to Theodore himself, historians were limited to conjecture as to what the content was of those many years. It is no wonder, then, that such questionable details as Theodore’s supposed time in Athens appears as an assumption across the literature. The origin of this assumption lies in a 748 letter from Pope Zacharias to Boniface in which he says ‘Theodorus greco-latinus ante philosophus et Athenis eruditus Romae ordinatus’ (S. Bonifatii et Lullii Epistolae, ed. Tangl, p. 173, as cited by Michael Lapidge, Biblical Commentaries, p. 49), in spite of the fact that, as Lapidge points out, ‘[i]t is not clear that Zacharias’ statement Athenis eruditus, is any more than an assumption based on the knowledge that Theodore had received training in Greek philosophy’ (Biblical Commentaries, p. 49), and concludes, ‘certainly there is no evidence in the biblical commentaries to suggest a connection with Athens’ (pp. 49‒50). One might add that there was hardly any reason why Theodore should have gone to Athens at the time in any case, seeing as it had no centre of learning of note, in contrast to Constantinople which could boast such a name as Stephen of Alexandria (see the further discussion on this point below, chapter 1, especially n. 28). What the recent work on Theodore has been able to establish amounts to more than the first half of his life, even if it is true that what has been established in these sources suffers from the natural limitations of speculation, however logical the conclusions of that speculation might be. So, for example, when Lapidge draws conclusions about Theodore’s time in Edessa based on comments made in the Canterbury Commentaries (such as the one cited at n. 62 in chapter 3, section 2 of this present work), it may be that the evidence can be interpreted differently than Lapidge interprets it. Likewise the evidence pointing to Theodore’s time in Constantinople. Even as this point is necessarily conceded, however, and the virtual impossibility of saying with certainty that Theodore travelled to any given place other than Rome and Canterbury is admitted, what the cumulative evidence across Bede, the Commentaries and the Laterculus suggests is that an outline of Theodore’s life such as Lapidge recounts is not just reasonable but especially plausible. Future investigation may reveal more concrete detail about Theodore’s life, but what has so far been suggested seems at least reliable enough to begin the process of engaging the archbishop well beyond what could be done prior to the twentieth century. Regardless, though, no argument in this present work relies on the absolute accuracy of Theodore’s biographical particulars. In any case, using textual evidence and period context, first Lapidge, then Stevenson, has been able to determine his most probable early movements. In fact, the information Lapidge provides by way of biography for Theodore at the beginning of Biblical Commentaries (pp. 5‒81), must be the most thorough of any to date. Following that is the paper included in the commemorative volume Archbishop Theodore, entitled, ‘The career of Archbishop Theodore’. What Stevenson provides by way of biographical information is to be drawn from across the painstaking commentary that accompanies her edition of the Laterculus Malalianus. This section of my work is drawn heavily from the well first excavated by them. 15 Theodore’s year of birth can be determined from Bede’s comment in HegA, 5, 8, that Theodore died in 690 at the age of 88.

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tradition with which it is most closely associated, including Diodore of Tarsus, John Chrysostom, and Theodore of Mopsuestia,16 it was still the patriarchal city of Theodore’s native region and can be shown to have retained a school of significance even by the early seventh century.17 In any case, assuming that Antioch was the first step for Theodore on what would be a life-long road of intellectual formation, it will have been important for fostering in him the rigorous approach to the meaning of texts in historical context, a view of Christ that would hold his humanity in high regard, and a particular respect for the fathers that emerged, and who continue to represent, Antioch’s theological tradition.

1.2 Edessa However sensible it might be to say that Theodore first travelled to Antioch for the advent of his theological training, there is, of course, no way of establishing this with certainty. This is because however Antiochene in orientation the work Theodore left behind him is, there is a possibility that he actually learned his trade in a location as sympathetic to the Antiochene tradition as was the city of Antioch itself. And while 16 Reference to the theological tradition of Antioch holds implications both for christology and scriptural exegesis. The entry in ODCC on ‘Antiochene theology’ calls the term itself ‘a modern designation’ (p. 78), but descriptions of it, including detailed work on its essential characteristics and influence, abound in twentieth-century theological literature. Robert V. Sellers, for example, stalwartly maintains the distinctive nature of the approach to Scripture as well as Christ’s person and work represented by the Antiochene school, especially in the run up to the Council of Chalcedon of 451, and in contrast to its Alexandrian counterpart. With greater attention to nuance perhaps, but with no ultimate diminishment of the distinction, scholars such as Aloys Grillmeier and Jaroslav Pelikan assume a similar definition. According to this definition, the Antiochene theological tradition included an especial concern to present the full humanity of Christ and the historical reality of the experiences he underwent. This concern was partly addressed by means of a hermeneutical approach that stressed the literal meaning of biblical passages, and took particular interest in such details as their historical context and the etymological meaning of words. The tradition’s most famous exponents include the three figures listed above, although the techniques they employed were neither absolutely limited to their persons nor their era. What Michael Lapidge mentions in his paper ‘The Career of Archbishop Theodore’ (in AT, p. 6) concerning the work of Evagrius Scholasticus and John Malalas, indicates the existence of a scholarly community at Antioch still working according to the same methods as late as the early seventh century. 17 M. Lapidge, Biblical Commentaries, pp. 24‒5.

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there is no mention of Antioch in the body of work Theodore left behind, nor any overt indication that he had ever been there, there is of Edessa, a city further to the East in Syria, and that plays a substantial part in Theodore’s formation.18 Albeit the idea of Theodore not having begun his studies at Antioch would raise a greater number of problems than supposing he did;19 what interests us most in this case is the consistency of theological and hermeneutical vision between the two centres. In others words, that the more certain sojourn of Theodore in Edessa represents a flowering in a particular direction of a theological worldview that was planted and first nurtured in Antioch, is a most natural step: a step that we see manifested in Theodore’s later years in poetic and theological terms. But it is important, first of all, to establish the Antiochene orientation of the Syriac theological tradition. Robert Murray expressly links the two, particularly with respect to exegesis,20 yet regardless of the overt association, the vocabulary used to describe the Syriac and Antiochene approaches to reading Scripture is often very similar. Most importantly, Syriac exegesis is described by its chroniclers as 18 That Theodore spent time in the Syriac (in contrast to the Greek) part of Syria, is attested to by a number of details both in the Laterculus Malalianus, and in the Canterbury Commentaries. Lapidge and Stevenson log these instances thoroughly in their respective work. On this ground alone it is possible to imagine the extent to which the younger student might have been affected by his time there, but in light of the overwhelming flavour Syriac features lend to the Laterculus in particular, I would assert an even greater causal relationship. 19 That Theodore should have progressed from Tarsus to Antioch before moving on to Edessa, or any other significant centre, simply presents the most reasonable picture. Aside from the importance of Antioch enumerated above, together with the fact that it was geographically so close to Tarsus, it was also a bilingual and bicultural city that would have presented Theodore with many intellectual attractions and plenty of opportunity to become familiar with aspects of Syriac tradition and culture before venturing further into that world. For more on the interchange between Syriac and Greek culture in Antioch, see the comments of Michael Lapidge in ‘The Career of Archbishop Theodore’, pp. 6-8, and especially those in Biblical Commentaries, pp. 27‒8. 20 R. Murray, Symbols of Church and Kingdom, p. 31. After placing Ephrem among the most famous Antiochene writers in terms of age, Murray goes on to say: ‘Ephrem, and especially East Syrian exegetes after him, have been classified as Antiochene in method. Indeed they are similar in insisting on the abiding value of the natural sense of an Old Testament passage and what it meant in its own time and context, and in rejecting artificial allegorical interpretations . . ..’ Important to note is the limitation Murray puts on the comparison, for while he acknowledges the appeal both traditions make to typology in reading the Old and New Testaments, he attributes to Syriac (particularly Ephremic) exegesis a poetic imagination apparently unmatched by that to be found among the Greeks.

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‘typological’,21 not entirely unlike descriptions of Antiochene exegesis that speak of horizontal, as opposed to vertical, figuration.22 Most important to us, however, is the affinity the two regions’ approaches had to each other, and the ease with which someone like Theodore might have been able to move from the first to the second. Indeed, in reading Murray’s description of Syriac exegesis compared to Antiochene, one might conclude that the former in some way completes the latter.23 In light of this, we can assume that Theodore could have enthusiastically embraced his Edessene discoveries without scruple that he might somehow betray his intellectual origins. And according to the evidence, this is exactly what he did. As this work explores in detail in chapter three, Syriac features, including some significant christological imagery, a high regard for Ephrem – the Syriac tradition’s most famous exponent – and some basic, regional reminiscences, all find a place in Theodore’s work. So it seems reasonable to suggest that, in tracing the trajectory of Theodore’s theological education, what he experienced of the Syriac tradition at Edessa was of immense personal importance – taking account of and extending the Antiochene tradition as it did – and would serve as the dominant element in what would ultimately become the tableau of his theological worldview. We can well imagine that the Antiochene plant of Theodore’s youth grew in Syriac soil. In light of this assumption, and before leaving Edessa for Theodore’s next destination, a brief comment on another, seemingly related, influence seems warranted. For this stage of Theodore’s intellectual 21 Discussed in detail by Murray, Symbols, pp. 290‒92; mentioned also by Norman Russell, The Doctrine of Deification, pp. 321‒22, although, with Sebastian Brock (Hymns on Paradise, p. 42), Russell is more expansive with his description of the lengths to which Syriac typology extends. For Brock, Syriac use of typology is not limited to parallels between Old and New Testaments, but includes parallels between ‘ . . . this world and the heavenly, between the New Testament and the Sacraments, between the Sacraments and the eschaton. In every case, they “reveal” what is otherwise “hidden” ’. 22 The vocabulary of ‘vertical’ and ‘horizontal figuration’ is taken from John O’Keefe’s article, very critical of the Antiochene exegetical tradition, called ‘“A Letter that Killeth”: Toward a Reassessment of Antiochene Exegesis, or Diodore, Theodore, and Theodoret on the Psalms’ (pp. 95‒6). His description of the tradition is interesting, in that it simultaneously acknowledges the typological stratum within it, yet does so in a way that entirely negates any possible theological impulsion to it. This is in contrast to Jane Stevenson’s brief assessment of Antiochene exegesis in relation to Theodore of Tarsus, which is both representative of the more common scholarly appraisal of it, and admits to the deeper theological potential of its use of typology, (The School of Archbishop Theodore, p. 66). 23 R. Murray, Symbols, p. 31.

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biography manifests itself in the presence, in his theological outlook as expressed in the Laterculus Malalianus, of one whose work bears a natural affinity with it and whose language is evoked very concretely on the Syriac side. Irenaeus, the second-century apologist and bishop of Lyons, appears to contribute a great deal to the mind of the composer of the Laterculus (as this present work explores in chapter four), and can be said himself to prefigure some of what comes to be associated with the Antiochene theological tradition, all while being absorbed extensively into Syriac writing. Ephrem the Syrian’s language in particular shows signs of having been influenced by the thought of Irenaeus, as evidenced by his use of certain typological motifs, and their associated soteriological idea of restoration.24 That this is the case, and that Theodore recognized it to be so, is at least partly attested to by the fact that on one of the rare occasions that he expressly cites a source, it is Ephrem the Syrian, who in this case is identified as the originator of a version of the ordines Christi – a motif that is fundamentally Irenaean in nature.25 But Theodore’s appeal to Irenaeus is more extensive than the adroit recognition of theological connections to be made between others’ writings. Rather, it goes to the heart of what Irenaeus had to say about the work of Christ, and the implications that Christ’s work would hold for all humanity. The reasons for Theodore’s high regard for Irenaeus may include an instinctive recognition in him of the congenial thought of a compatriot and fellow émigré, or the hint of an earlier theological character that would become an intrinsic dimension of the Antiochene tradition that would so shape him. Whatever the case, whether Theodore knows him by name or through some other source, the influence of Irenaeus on Theodore and the Laterculus Malalianus is great, and at least in some way connected to his earlier career in Antioch followed by Edessa.

1.3 Constantinople The next stage in Theodore’s career, and possibly the most important for raising up the intellectual seeds that had previously been sown in Antioch and Edessa, must have been Constantinople. Prior to the release of Michael Lapidge’s edition of the Canterbury Commentaries, Discussed at length below, chapters 3 and 4. The ordines Christi are likewise discussed below in chapter 3, sections 1.6 and 2.1, as well as chapter 4, section 3. Why the ordines should be see in an Irenaean light is first asserted by Joseph Crehan in his article ‘The Seven Orders of Christ,’ p. 82. 24 25

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no link had been identified between Theodore and the imperial city. Yet as Lapidge states in his discussion of the city in the introduction to the commentaries: ‘Theodore’s presence in the Byzantine capital might perhaps have been inferred from a well-known piece of evidence which reveals Theodore’s familiarity with the environs of Constantinople.’26 He follows this with the assertion: ‘[t]hat Theodore had in fact been in Constantinople at some point in his career is proved by an explanation contained in a manuscript of the Canterbury biblical commentaries now preserved in Würzburg . . .’,27 thereby establishing beyond reasonable doubt that our subject spent time there. This being the case, it could be that Theodore went to Constantinople purely out of a desire to continue in the pursuit of higher education; for surely, as Lapidge points out, he must have been aware of the thriving intellectual life being fostered in the city at the time.28 What seems as likely, though, is that he chose Constantinople as the most fortuitous destination in the wake of the Arab conquest of Syria. When this might have happened is beyond precise reckoning, although Lapidge helpfully gives a terminus ante quem of 637, suggesting that it was 26 Biblical Commentaries, p. 41. The ‘well-known piece of evidence’ is a claim by Bede in his Quaestiones octo (CPL, no. 1364; PL 93, 455‒78) stating that he had ‘ . . . heard certain people maintaining that Theodore of blessed memory, a most learned man and formerly archbishop of the English . . .’ explain some detail of the terrain in the environs of Constantinople. Lapidge provides the full citation. 27 Biblical Commentaries, p. 42. Lapidge provides the crucial evidence from the manuscript: .xii. cofinos de palmatis factos Theodoros se uidisse testator in Constantinopoli ob memoriam obseruatos ab Elina regina portatos. (Wb1 13) ‘Theodore reports that in Constantinople he saw the Twelve Baskets woven from palmbranches and preserved as relics, which had been brought there by the empress Helena.’ 28 Biblical Commentaries, p. 47. Lapidge provides a full description of what was being fostered, and based on these characteristics, calls it a ‘university’. Certainly, this state-sponsored institution, hosting a diversity of disciplines and employing a number of scholars, reflects the same qualities as what we later call a university, and so I follow Lapidge in using this term. Yet, for the sparseness of the textual evidence, some question may remain as to whether or not Theodore really did choose Constantinople in which to continue his studies, as opposed to Athens, which, in light of Pope Zacharias’ words, has a much longer history of association with Theodore. Lapidge’s reasons for asserting Constantinople with such confidence seem warranted, however, on a number of grounds. Above all is the textual evidence of the Canterbury glosses and Bede, cited above at notes 26 and 27. This is positive evidence indeed, and sits in sharp contrast with the fact that there is an absence of any reference to Athens in a Theodoran text and that, while Constantinople was known to have had, at the time, a school of some prominence, scholarly consensus on the state of the academy at Athens is elusive, and perhaps even negatively conclusive. For a recent appraisal of the evidence surrounding the academy at Athens, see Alison Frantz’s 1988 work Late Antiquity: A.D. 267‒700 in The Athenian Agora, vol. 24, especially pp. 84‒5, n. 181, and the conclusion on p. 92.

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probably earlier even than that.29 So Theodore’s move from south and east of the Taurus Mountains to the city that would presumably cultivate in him the tools he needed to become the renowned ‘philosopher and archbishop of Great Britain’30 will have taken place when he was a mature, but still young, man. It is clear that Theodore had much to gain by taking up residence in Constantinople when he did. Although there were other schools of whose learning he might have availed himself at the time, Constantinople was experiencing a cultural revival under the patronage of the emperor Heraclius in first half of the seventh century and, just when we might suppose that Theodore would have been contemplating his move, could boast the presence of such a teacher as Stephen of Alexandria.31 Stephen was among the greatest teachers of the age, and is significant to our enquiry for having brought with him to Constantinople expertise in the various disciplines that were taught at Alexandria.32 Each of these disciplines are known to have been taught at Canterbury, and in light of this it can be safely asserted that however Theodore came to find himself in ‘The Career of Archbishop Theodore’, p. 10. Words of Pope Agatho, reflecting his desire that Theodore should have come to Rome to assist in the deliberations with the emperor over the monothelete question that was still raging as late as 680 (recorded in Concilium Vniversale Constantinopolitanum Tertium, Concilii Actiones I-XI, ed. R. Riedinger, ACO, 2nd ser. 2. 1, Berlin, 1990, pp. 132‒3): εἶτα ήλιπίζομεν ἀπὸ Βρεττανίας Θεόδορον τὸν σύνδουλον ἡμῶν καὶ συνεπίσκοπον, τῆς μεγάλης νήσου Βρεττανίας ἀρχιεπίσκοπον καὶ φιλόσοφον, μετὰ ἄλλων ἐκεῖσε κατὰ τὸν τόπον διαγόντων, ἐκεῖθεν τῇ ἡμετέρᾳ ἑνωθῆναι μετριότητι. ‘We were hoping, therefore, that Theodore, our co-servant and co-bishop, the philosopher and archbishop of Great Britain, would join our enterprise, along with certain others who remain there up to the present day,’ (trans. M. Lapidge, Biblical Commentaries, p. 80). The importance of these words will become apparent below, when we look at the activities of Theodore once in Rome. 31 For a full description of the academic and cultural climate of the Greek East in the seventh century, see Guglielmo Cavallo’s article, ‘Theodore of Tarsus and the Greek culture of his time’ in AT, pp. 54‒67. In it, Cavallo indicates that Constantinople, until its brief revival under the emperor, had largely lost its appeal as an academic and culture centre, and that even after the revival, it quickly diminished in stature until the ninth century. Schools like the one in Alexandria would have presented just as attractive a face as Constantinople for the continuity it retained with its cultural past. 32 Stephen, the appointee of Heraclius, as οἰκουμενικὸς διδάσκαλος in Constantinople, is called by Sebastian Brock (in ‘St Theodore of Canterbury, the Canterbury School, and the Christian East’) ‘…one of the most famous scholars of the time’ p. 433. Called ‘griechischer christlicher Philosoph und Gelehrter… der letzte uns bekannte Vertreter der alexandrinischen Schule des Neuplatonismus’ (BBKL), his fields of interest included most notably the sciences of astrology and astronomy (see P. Magdalino, ‘The Byzantine Reception of Classical Astrology’ for a discussion of the distinction between the two), ecclesiastical computus, and medicine. Michael Lapidge dedicates a great deal of space to 29 30

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the city, the outcome made for some propitious results. Whatever the order of acquisition, for example, Theodore’s interest in medicine and his appreciation for Ephrem the Syrian’s medical imagery for Christ and his work, bear some relationship. In other words, whether he was attracted to Ephrem’s medical imagery for Christ and for this reason sought instruction in medicine at Constantinople, or it was the other way around, the one is certainly consistent with the other. In this respect, his continued exposure across the theological traditions only seemed to enhance prior experience, with Canterbury the main beneficiary. Yet while much can be said about the details of Theodore’s time in Constantinople, as these have been covered extensively by Lapidge,33 there is no need to repeat them here. The important thing to establish, for the sake of understanding the background of Theodore and whatever christological perspective he might express in the Laterculus, is that after time growing up in Cilicia, foundational studies in Antioch, and a sojourn in Edessa, Theodore made his way to Constantinople sometime before or around 637, where he became involved in the university there under the (direct or indirect) tutelage of Stephen of Alexandria. In the course of these studies, he became adept in the fields of astronomy and astrology, ecclesiastical computus, philosophy, and medicine, and so acquired for himself the academic background that would eventually come to serve the British church – and to some extent, the whole church north of the Alps – by way of the Canterbury school, so well. But such benefit was not to be had before Theodore went to Rome, and lived for some time at the cultural and doctrinal heart of the church,34 even becoming involved in the christological controversies afloat at the time.35 enumerating Stephen’s various expertises and accomplishments, seeing in them the ground of Theodore’s own manifold proficiencies. See Lapidge, ‘The Career of Archbishop Theodore’, pp. 14–18, and Biblical Commentaries, pp. 41–64. 33 See reference above, n. 29. 34 I do not believe, in light of period evidence, that it is inappropriate to describe the church of Rome in this way. Cyril Mango, for one, in his paper ‘La Culture Grecque et l’Occident au VIIIe Siècle’, describes a Byzantium in decline in favour of an ascendant Rome : ‘Nous avons constaté à la fin du VIIe et au VIIIe siècle un faible rayonnement des lettres grecques en Europe transalpine . . . . L’adoption par le gouvernement impérial d’une doctrine hérétique obligea le parti orthodoxe à faire appel à la plus haute autorité ecclésiastique, c’est-à-dire au Saint Siège,’ pp. 714‒15. Considering the frequency of the struggles for orthodoxy with which the Eastern church, in particular, lived after the council of Chalcedon, it is no wonder that Rome should have become the locus of culture and arbiter of orthodoxy that it did. For more on the decline of Byzantium in this period, see Cavallo’s article, ‘Theodore of Tarsus and the Greek Culture of his Time’ and Andrew Louth’s coverage of it in Maximus the Confessor, pp. 8‒16. 35 The suggestion that Theodore’s presence at the Lateran Council of 649 is a possibility is made by Lapidge (Biblical Commentaries, p. 78) and Stevenson (The School

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1.4 Rome The things that can be said about Theodore’s time in Rome are at once more certain than almost anything prior; yet even then, certainty surrounding what is potentially the most important detail – that is, whether or not Theodore attended the Lateran Council of 649 – remains slightly elusive. Again, it is not possible to say exactly when it was that Theodore left Constantinople, but many of the other details surrounding his life once he had taken up residence in Rome are provided by Bede.36 Lapidge enumerates these before going on to build a much more robust picture of Theodore’s time there.37 Beginning with the fact that Theodore was living in Rome as a monk at the time he was brought to the attention of Pope Vitalian as a potential candidate for the archiepiscopal see of Canterbury, and that, in order to accept the responsibility of going to Canterbury, he needed to grow his hair out of its eastern tonsure and be re-tonsured in the western style, Lapidge goes on to evince the inevitable: Theodore was living in Rome as an eastern monk. This means he could have only been resident in one of four monasteries, and Lapidge goes on to identify the most likely of these as the community of Cilician monks ad aquas Salvias.38 of Archbishop Theodore, p. 39), and somewhat more tentatively by Brock (‘St Theodore of Canterbury, the Canterbury School, and the Christian East’, p. 432). In full recognition of the caution with which such a proposal must be approached, I am inclined to greater confidence in its regard based on the textual and the circumstantial evidence. The relative merits of this are discussed section 4 of this chapter, in the context of Theodore’s time in Rome. 36 Bede, HegA, 4, 1. 37 Biblical Commentaries, pp. 65‒81, and ‘The Career of Archbishop Theodore’, pp. 19‒26. 38 The reasons behind Lapidge’s identification are fascinating in their own right, but also reveal a relationship between hitherto unexamined evidence in Bede, and something of Theodore’s life in Rome. The Cilician monastery ad aquas Salvias was ‘ . . . better known as the monastery of St Anastasius, in honour of Anastasius Magundat who was martyred by the Persians in 628, and who was the community’s patron saint,’ (‘The Career of Archbishop Theodore,’ p. 20). Bede, at the end of the Historia (5, 24) lists some of the works he had produced, and mentions one ‘ . . . librum uitae et passionis sancti Anastasii male de Greco translatum’, a work which Carmela Vircillo Franklin has set forward as having been one of Theodore’s own – an early attempt, perhaps, at learning Latin from his own native Greek. (See C. V. Franklin, ‘Theodore and the Passio s. Anastasii,’ in AT, pp. 175‒203.) The attribution of the text to Theodore shores up our supposition that he must have been resident at the monastery named after the martyr Anastasius, while his being a monk of that house strengthens the thesis that the Latin translation of the Passio is in fact of his hand. The two already-strong likelihoods support each other and create even stronger likelihoods.

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The detail that holds the potential for greatest impact, however, is not one to be found in Bede. Rather, at the end of the acta of the Lateran Council, held in 649 to deal with the monothelete question,39 there is a reference to one Theodorus monachus as being among other Greek monks who participated in the council. It is worth citing Lapidge at length on this: The published acta of the council contain a list of names of the scholars who participated [. . .], and the list includes near its beginning the name of George, abbot of the monastery of Cilicians [. . .], together with those of abbots of other monasteries of oriental monks in Rome. Then follow names of individual scholars who served as advisors, including Maximus monachus, almost certainly identifiable with Maximus the Confessor. Now on the assumption that Theodore, future archbishop of Canterbury, was a member of the community of Cilician monks in Rome, he can hardly have been unaware of the proceedings of the Lateran Council. On the contrary, given his immense learning in Greek patristic sources [. . .] he will have proved a very useful resource in these doctrinal matters. It is interesting to remark, therefore, that the list of signatories appended to the acta of the Lateran Council includes the name of Theodorus monachus, immediately after the abbots and priests, but preceding a list of deacons.40

Strengthening the suggestion that this monk Theodore was actually our subject is the fact that when, more than three decades later Pope Agatho sought to bring the monothelete controversy to a close and so was seeking the support of the whole western church, he said of Archbishop Theodore: ‘We were hoping, therefore, that Theodore, our coservant and co-bishop, the philosopher and archbishop of Great Britain, would join our enterprise, along with certain others who remain there up to the present day.’41 The final point to add in favour of placing Theodore of Tarsus at the Lateran Council of 649 is his familiarity with, and use of, the thought of two of the most important proponents of the orthodox position there: namely Sophronius of 39 Monotheletism began with the emperor Heraclius’ and Patriarch Sergius’ attempt to establish peace between the Chalcedonian party, who defined Christ as having two complete natures – human and divine – and the monophysites, who insisted on Christ having only one nature – the divine. Proposing that Christ had two natures but one will (θέλειν⫽to will), the imperial position only exacerbated the controversy and gave rise to almost six decades of hostility. 40 ‘The Career of Archbishop Theodore,’ p. 22. 41 Cited above, n. 30.

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Jerusalem and Maximus the Confessor.42 Of course, assuming that Theodore was present at the Lateran Council with Maximus the Confessor means that the future archbishop and great teacher of the British church was personally connected to one of the most prominent Greek theologians of the church, not just of the time, but ever. This in turn means that the church that came under Theodore’s care was in some way a beneficiary of the thought shared between its archbishop and one of the most highly regarded theologians across the whole church. That this was so is certainly manifest in the Canterbury Commentaries,43 and may possibly be so in the Laterculus and elsewhere.44 Theodore’s time in Rome, then, is probably most important for what Bede does not report, but which he gives us the background to discern. Of course Rome is where Theodore’s career, as it relates to his time as archbishop of Canterbury, began, and so it is of fundamental significance on that basis alone. But of greater interest from a theological point of view, is the experience his time in Rome must have given him of one of the most substantial conflicts in the history of the church, and that part of said experience would have entailed an association with Maximus the Confessor. It is possible that prior to taking up residence in the monastery of St Anastasius, the most formative influences on Theodore’s theological mind had already taken hold. After all, by the time he did, he would have at least been in his

42 Again, Lapidge fully enumerates the points of contact between Theodore, Sophronius, and Maximus (‘The Career or Archbishop Theodore,’ pp. 23‒4), by pointing out not only the proximate experience they share, but the places in the biblical commentaries where Theodore is clearly drawing on the thought of Maximus, as well as recalling Theodore’s citation of Sophronius and their shared use of a particular Greek verse-form. Sebastian Brock takes this evidence on board in ‘The Canterbury School and the Christian East,’ p. 432. 43 Most interesting is Lapidge’s comment in Biblical Commentaries in relation to EvII 40 (p. 516), regarding an exegetical parallel between Theodore and Maximus. 44 It is not clear that Maximus had anything to do with contributing to Theodore’s main theme in the Laterculus: that of restoration. Jane Stevenson does not identify textual parallels between the Laterculus and anything by Maximus, and I have yet to locate any; but there can be no question that the understanding of Christ and of human nature expressed in Theodore’s work is entirely coherent with that of the Confessor. In Andrew Louth’s synopsis of Maximus’ thinking in both of these categories (Maximus, pp. 57‒9), we are exposed to much of the same language that will be used to describe Theodore’s understanding of Christ and the person later in this work; likewise Norman Russell’s introduction to Maximus in The Doctrine of Deification, p. 262. The approach Theodore takes to penance (as described below in chapter 5, section 6), is equally consistent with the sort of generous view of fallen humanity held by Maximus.

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mid-forties. But even if this was the case, an active mind like his could never have rested in the midst of such ferment as characterized the city when we was there. He would surely have been easily enticed into setting his formidable and well-trained intellect to work on the questions that were facing the church at the time, and bringing to bear all the instruction that he had to that point received. In any case, it is wellknown that that is what he did next, and moreover, that he was still being called upon to do so well into his old age.

1.5 Canterbury The essential empirical data to be had on Theodore’s time as archbishop of Canterbury, from his arrival in Britain on 27 May, 669 to his death on 19 September, 690, can be found in one of three places: Bede’s Historia, Eddius Stephanus’ Vita s. Wilfridi,45 and a letter of Aldhelm to Heahfrith.46 Of these, Bede provides the greater part of Theodore’s story, while Eddius Stephanus provides a record of the conflict that arose between Theodore and Wilfrid in the midst of Theodore’s attempts at ecclesiastical reform, and Aldhelm provides a couple of details, equivalent to no more than a snapshot of the archbishop’s life. However brief the latter evidence, though, what Aldhelm adds by way of his snapshot is of great use: in it, we are given a glimpse of the context in which Theodore was teaching that resonates compellingly with an allusion in the Laterculus.47 But the rest of what we 45

The Life of Bishop Wilfrid by Eddius Stephanus, B. Colgrave, ed. The latter two sources are referenced in M. Lapidge and M. Herren, Aldhelm, pp. 143‒44. A full translation of Aldhelm’s letter is provided in the same work, pp. 160‒64. 47 In Letter V: to Heahfrith (Aldhelm, p. 163), Aldhelm, in florid rhetoric, asks why the Irish should warrant such attention, when there was a school in Britain that could provide the best possible learning: ‘Why, I ask, is Ireland . . . exalted with a sort of ineffable privilege, as if here in the fertile soil of Britain, teachers who are citizens of Greece and Rome cannot be found, who are able to unlock and unravel the murky mysteries of the heavenly library to the scholars who are eager to study them? [. . .] Britain, although situated in almost the outer limit of the western world, possesses, for example, the luculent likeness, as it were, of the flaming sun and moon, that is, Theodore, who discharges the duties of the pontificate and was from the very beginnings of his apprenticeship mature in the flower of the arts of learning . . . . And boldly fighting in the open against the worthless and despised seducer of falseness, with a balanced view of the truth, shall I pronounce judgement: although Theodore who pilots the helm of the high priesthood, be 46

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can say about Theodore’s time in Britain must be inferred from the remaining sources, especially the biblical commentaries, the Pœnitentiale, and the Laterculus Malalianus, together with the evidence of some relatively small liturgical details and the sentiments expressed in a verse composed by him.48 Yet, as vital as these latter sources are for establishing a greater picture of Theodore than we have ever had before, as far as the period of his life spent as archbishop of Canterbury is concerned, nothing surpasses the account of Bede. Due to the ready accessibility of Bede’s account, it is not necessary to catalogue everything we can derive from it here. The principal points are drawn from book four of the Historia, especially chapters hemmed in by a mass of Irish students, like a savage wild boar checked by a snarling pack of hounds, with the filed tooth of the grammarian – nimbly and with no loss of time – he disbands the rebel phalanxes; and just as the warlike bowman in the midst of battle is hemmed in by a dense formation of enemy legions, then, when his bow is tensed by his powerful hands and arms the arrows are drawn from the quiver, that is, from the obscure and acute syllogisms of chronography, the throng, swollen with the arrogance of pride, the shield-wall having been shattered, turn their backs and flee headlong to the dark recesses of their caves, while the victor exalts.’ What makes these lines so important is not only what they say about the quality of education being offered at Canterbury under Theodore’s tuition, but the degree to which the Irish students in the school must have provoked the scholarly archbishop. This may account for this line at the beginning of the Laterculus: Iam ne nos fallant multoloquio suo Scottorum scolaces, ipsa se nobis ueritatis liquidissimis labiorum promat nectareis . . . ‘Now, lest the twisty reasoners/whelps if the Irish deceive us with their verbiage, let truth disclose herself to us with the most liquid nectar of the lips . . . ’ (LM, 1, p. 120/1). Stevenson picks up on the important connection between Aldhelm’s words and especially the use in the latter text of the word scolaces. She says: ‘This may be a piece of wordplay at the expense of the Irish, a punning combination of scholars, the appropriate word, and scolax, ‘twisted’, which devalues their scholarship. Alternatively (or additionally) the wordplay may be on σκύλαξ, pl. σκύλακες , ‘puppy, whelp’, especially when we remember that o and u are frequently confused in this text, calling up the image of yapping (ironically, ‘eloquent’) little dogs. Interestingly, Aldhelm also envisages confrontation between Theodore and the Irish in terms of dogs . . .’ (LM commentary, n. 2, p. 163) 48 The liturgical details are chronicled by Christopher Hohler in a paper entitled, ‘Theodore and the Liturgy’ in AT, pp. 222‒35. According to Hohler, likely Theodoran additions include the addition of a number of saints to the calendar, and a book of Greek prayers for private use; otherwise too much is uncertain. Lapidge, in the paper ‘Theodore and Anglo-Latin octosyllabic verse’ (in AT, pp. 260‒80), provides one poem written by Theodore himself, and identifies three others as likely being of Theodore’s hand. In terms of providing more information on Theodore’s time as archbishop in Britain, the first of the poems is also the most helpful, although all it reveals is the sort of way in which Theodore communicated with a brother bishop: in this case, Hæddi.

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two, five, seventeen and eighteen, including exactly when it was that Theodore arrived, what he set about doing, how his people responded to him, and the synods he was responsible for holding. In this respect, Bede tells us that after Theodore arrived in Britain, he visited every part of the land under his care, and that everywhere he went he was well received.49 His main concern was to instruct the people in what Bede calls the ‘ordering of a holy life,’50 to enforce the canonical observance of Easter, and to instruct in all manner of academic discipline. To this end, he and Hadrian, his companion from Rome, set up the school that would end up attracting both English and Irish students, earning high praise from Bede (and giving rise to this study). In the course of his ecclesiastical administration, Theodore appointed and consecrated bishops, divided up dioceses, and generally brought order to a formerly disorderly church.51 The sanctity of the Mercian bishop Chad features prominently in Bede’s telling, while the conflict between Wilfrid, bishop of the Northumbrians, and Theodore is alluded to only by the bracketed statement in chapter nine of the synod of Hertford regarding the increase in the number of bishops: sed 49 John Wallace-Hadrill, pointing to Nicholas Brooks’ The Early History of the Church of Canterbury (p. 72), says of Theodore’s reception as described by Bede, that, ‘[it] is certainly right to claim that Theodore [and his two immediate successors] exercised greater authority than Canterbury was ever to possess again. But, though evidence is lacking, there can be no doubt in my mind that this was the result of papal instructions. An obvious reason for the general acceptance of Theodore’s authority is that for most of his reign he was working through diocesans of his own appointment’, p. 137. Whatever the reason for his positive reception, however, what matters to Bede and to us is that it is possible to say of Theodore’s church that it was more unified in light of his work than it was before. 50 . . . rectum uiuendi ordinem, HegA 4, 2, Colgrave and Mynors, p. 332/3. This idea of a holy life may be related to Bede’s later comment in 5, 8 (Colgrave and Mynors, p. 474/5) that during Theodore’s time as archbishop, the church under his care, ‘ . . . made more spiritual progress than ever before.’ (Vt enim breuiter dicam, tantum profectus spiritalis tempore praesulatus illius Anglorum ecclesiae, quantum numquam antea potuere, ceperunt.) In any case, Wallace-Hadrill asks of the term ‘spiritual progess’: ‘What has Bede in mind?’ The multifaceted answer, including the benefits of Theodore’s diocesan organization, his educational challenge in the form of the Canterbury school, the proliferation of monasteries under Theodore’s oversight, and the number of miracles and pilgrimages that took place, is to be found in the commentary on HegA 5, 8 in A Historical Commentary, pp. 179‒80. 51 Henry Mayr-Harting, in The Coming of Christianity, provides some invaluable observations on the social and theological issues that underlie the whole question of dioceses and their bishops in Theodore’s Britain, pp. 130‒39. Catherine Cubitt complements this work in considering at length the circumstances surrounding Theodore’s division of dioceses, especially in relation to the legal and political issues involved, in her book, Anglo-Saxon Church Councils: c.650‒c.850, most notably pp. 8‒14.

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de hac re ad praesens siluimus.52 This is in contrast to what we gather from Stephen of Ripon’s record in the Vita s. Wilfridi that the effect this issue had on Wilfrid was to cause a rift between he and Theodore that would only be resolved sometime in the last five years of Theodore’s life.53 Otherwise, it appears that Theodore’s administrative reforms unfolded successfully. Finally, Bede preserves for us the records of the two councils held by Theodore: the first at Hertford; the second at Hatfield,54 concerning questions of church order and the monophysite/monothelete heresies respectively.55 So much for Bede and the other second-hand sources. But everything we can learn from them is confirmed and enhanced by the primary (or pseudo-primary) material, including the biblical commentaries, the Pœnitentiale, and the Laterculus – along with the less extensive evidence of liturgy and verse. It has been well established, for example, that what Bede reports of the success of Theodore’s and Hadrian’s school at Canterbury in terms of breadth and excellence of teaching was not only accurate; the reality went far beyond what he could even tell. Rather, it is as if once in Canterbury, Theodore came into his own, bringing to bear on the church under his care the full 52 HegA, 4, 5. ‘But at the time we came to no decision on the matter,’ Colgrave and Mynors, p. 352/3. It is Mayr-Harting’s rendering of these words that draws out their ominous-sounding implications: ‘About this matter, we have for the present remained silent,’ The Coming of Christianity, p. 131. Their conflict, which is well attested to by Eddius Stephanus, specifically centred on Theodore’s division of Wilfrid’s northern diocese first into three, then into five dioceses. 53 Lapidge covers the details of Theodore’s ecclesiastical administration, and his conflict with Wilfrid in some detail in Biblical Commentaries, pp. 135‒6, citing Stephanus’ record of a letter between Theodore and King Æthelred on the matter at length. 54 For helpful comment on these councils, see Catherine Cubitt, Anglo-Saxon Church Councils, especially pp. 8‒12, and referred to throughout the first part of the work in particular. 55 I mention monophysitism and monotheletism together, for although it was in light of Pope Agatho’s request for Theodore’s support running up to the sixth ecumenical council due to the ongoing problem with monotheletism that Theodore called the council of Hatfield, Bede introduces it in HegA , 4, 17 as being a response to the ‘heresy of Eutyches’. In any case, the theological issues at stake in both heresies are largely the same. In Bede’s Ecclesiastical History of the English People: A Historical Commentary, Wallace-Hadrill comments on this ‘hole’ in Bede’s learning, saying: ‘The form of heresy debated was in fact Monothelitism, of which Bede makes very little mention, and none at all of Maximus the Confessor, the great Greek theologian under whose influence Pope Martin I had summoned the Lateran synod of 649.’ Citing Gerald Bonner (‘Bede and Medieval Civilization’ in ASE, 2, pp. 71‒90), he concludes: ‘Bede was a stranger to “the sophisticated world of Greek patristic theology”,’ p. 157.

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weight of accumulated learning and experience he had from sixty-five years of life in different parts of the eastern and Mediterranean worlds. From Bede we learn that Theodore was an educated Greek monk from Tarsus in Cilicia. From the biblical commentaries and the Laterculus, we learn that he was not only from Tarsus, but that he must have had a good foundational education, probably at Antioch. Further references tell us that he must have also spent time further east – probably in Syriac-speaking Edessa. Bede reveals that medicine was one of Theodore’s primary interests, and that he taught ‘metre, astronomy, and ecclesiastical computation’.56 The commentaries suggest that he spent time studying precisely these subjects at Constantinople, and the Laterculus draws on all of them. Bede alludes to Theodore’s effectiveness as the chief pastor of the British church; in its nature and in its very words, the Pœnitentiale embodies the same qualities. Between each of the sources and all the other evidence, we can now imagine Theodore’s life and character very vividly indeed.57

HegA, 4, 2. How exactly each of these latter sources embody the accuracy of Bede’s claims and – for the most part – expand on them, is discussed both above, in terms of the evidence for Theodore’s various formative expeditions, and in the chapters below, in terms of the theology that can be derived from them. 56 57

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2. the evidence The work that has taken place on Theodore since the late Bernhard Bischoff ’s 1936 discovery in Milan’s Biblioteca Ambrosiana of the biblical commentaries from Canterbury1 has enabled a great deal of progress in the field of ‘Theodore studies’. Indeed, that the work on Theodore’s life and written legacy even warrants a name like ‘Theodore studies’, or could be called a ‘field’, is something that can only be conceived of as a result of this initial find. The volume of material now attributable to him, however – that is, material that has either been linked to Theodore since that discovery or else recognized as being a degree closer to him than previously thought2 – the preliminary studies that have been undertaken on aspects of his life and labours,3 and the subsequent developments in fields of scholarship that now see Theodore as a factor to be reckoned

For this reference, see chapter 1 above, n. 5. The Passio s. Anastasii and the Laterculus Malalianus are texts that have benefited from rapprochement with Theodore in light of the analysis undertaken on them. The Pœnitentiale Theodori, meanwhile, which has always been associated with the archbishop, can perhaps be more confidently read in light of the knowledge we now have of him. Finally, the Canterbury Commentaries represent an altogether new collection of teachings that had hitherto existed unknown and so unevaluated. 3 These studies are contained in the volume Archbishop Theodore: Commemorative Studies on his Life and Influence, edited by Michael Lapidge, and containing papers prepared in response to the thirteen hundredth anniversary of Theodore’s death. 1 2

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with,4 all contribute to making this an entirely reasonable notion. The various primary sources demonstrate their worth by casting light on other evidence, while that evidence in turn bolsters the value and reliability of the primary sources. The quantity of the secondary literature, meanwhile, has continued to increase, adding quality material for consideration in the study of Theodore. Much of that secondary literature has proven especially valuable in this present study, as we seek to deal with the theology of the person and work of Christ as drawn from the Laterculus Malalianus – a text that, until relatively recently, seemed destined for lasting obscurity, apparently confused as to what its own purpose was, and composed in ineloquent Latin besides.5 In this respect, Michael Lapidge’s work on the Theodoran evidence was simply to gather together in one place all that was known of the archbishop’s legacy; his interest was obviously not in determining Theodore’s christological understanding as manifest in one particular work. Yet he has done an immeasurable amount of work in establishing the content of Theodore’s canon, including the degree to which each piece of work could be understood to have derived from Theodore’s hand.6 For all that has been done already, however, due to the lack of attention paid at the time to the very source we are here considering (by reason of its not yet having been uncovered), an evaluation of the sources corresponding to our particular purpose is now in order.

4 If the number of papers in the journal of Syriac studies, Hugoye, mentioning Theodore as a means of Ephrem the Syrian’s transmission in Anglo-Saxon England is anything to go by, then we can count it as one example of a field whose considerations have been augmented in light of an increased awareness of Theodore. The premise of George Dempsey, in his article ‘Aldhelm of Malmesbury and the Paris Psalter: A Note on the Survival of Antiochene Exegesis,’ indicates that the whole question of Antiochene exegesis represents another field in which new questions are being asked as a result of the more extensive information now available surrounding Theodore’s work in Britain and the results of that work. 5 These details about the Laterculus Malalianus are discussed in full below. 6 M. Lapidge, ‘The School of Theodore and Hadrian’ in Anglo-Latin Literature 600‒899, pp. 141‒68. Originally published in ASE, 15, 1986, pp. 45‒72. Lapidge’s article constitutes what is essentially the most thorough accounting of Theodore’s evidence to date, and our discussion here relies heavily upon it. It was, however, produced before Jane Stevenson had made her examination of the Laterculus Malalianus, and for that reason, remains incomplete.

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2.1 Earliest Evidence The first encounter to be had with Theodore comes via the commonly known and equally accessible Historia ecclesiastica gentis Anglorum of Bede.7 As we have already seen in the first chapter of this work, the Historia provides the student with much of the initial information from which to establish certain key facts about Theodore’s life, even if some of it has to be unearthed from the midst of Bede’s own prose. What is of greatest importance in light of our purpose here, however, is Bede’s report of Theodore’s scholarly activity, being as it is our first indication that there will be something more to investigate of Theodore’s legacy than the pastoral achievements that might be expected of any competent bishop. Of Theodore and Hadrian together Bede says: Et quia litteris sacris simul et saecularibus, ut diximus, abundanter ambo erant instructi, congregate discipulorum caterua scientiae salutaris cotidie flumina inrigandis eorum cordibus emanabant, ita ut etiam metricae artis, astronimiae et arithmeticae ecclesiasticae disciplinam inter sacrorum apicum uolumina suis auditoribus contraderent. Indicio est quod usque hodie supersunt de eorum discipulis, qui Latinam Graecamque linguam aeque ut propriam in qua nati sunt norunt.8

And with these words, he initiates the whole quest for both the sources and the yield of Theodore’s remarkable achievement. But Bede’s is not the only testimony to the impact Theodore made on his pastoral charge bordering on being a contemporary witness. There is also the Vita sancti Wilfridi by Eddius Stephanus,9 which includes significant information regarding the relationship between

7 The Historia ecclesiastica gentis Anglorum was composed in 731. It was preceded as a work by the Vita s. Wilfridi of Eddius Stephanus (discussed below) by at least eleven years, but both in terms of quantity of material, and in terms of the scope of the work, the Historia must be given priority. 8 HegA, 4, 2, Colgrave and Mynors, pp. 334/5‒36/7: ‘And because both of them were extremely learned in sacred and secular literature, they attracted a crowd of students into whose minds they daily poured the streams of wholesome learning. They gave their hearers instruction not only in the books of holy Scripture but also in the art of metre, astronomy, and ecclesiastical computation. As evidence of this, some of their students still survive who know Latin and Greek just as well as their native tongue.’ 9 Composed sometime after Wilfrid’s death in 709, and finished before 720.

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Theodore and the Northumbrian bishop Wilfrid, most especially in the form of a letter written by Theodore himself to King Æthelred of Mercia about his and Wilfrid’s reconciliation.10 Although coverage of Theodore’s acts in the Vita is essentially limited to what transpired between him and Wilfrid,11 and therefore, chronologically, to a very brief moment in the archbishop’s long life, what it provides of greater knowledge of Theodore’s character and, to some extent, the effects his pastoral approach had on those among whom he was working, may be quantitatively small, but it is not negligible. Finally, however, by way of insight into the aspect of Theodore’s work that concerns us most here, there is the valuable letter of Aldhelm to Heahfrith, in which Aldhelm proffers his opinion on the school of Theodore and Hadrian, and the Irish students that went there to study.12 From it, one can envisage the interaction between instructor and students that must have characterized the Canterbury school. Together then, these three sources – Bede’s Historia, the Vita s. Wilfridi by Eddius Stephanus, and a letter written by Aldhelm – make for a picture of Theodore’s work in Britain that is at once multi-faceted, yet also limited. It is detailed in as much as it can be, but serves best as a starting point for more involved analysis. After these examples of early witnesses to Theodore’s career come the primary sources, the existence of which was largely despaired of by academics until the nineteen nineties.13 Precisely what, at one time, Vita s. Wilfridi, 43. An edition of the letter appears in Hadden and Stubbs, p. 171‒2. The issue of Theodore’s and Wilfrid’s reconciliation occupies the whole of chapter 43 of the Vita, being preceded as it is by Stephanus’ account of the meeting between Wilfrid and the archbishop in the presence of the bishop of London, and the humility of Theodore shown there over his original deposition of Wilfrid. The letter, as well as the interview recorded by Stephanus, is dated to 686: only four years before Theodore’s death. 11 There is also a mention of Theodore in relation to Chad in chapter 15 of Vita, but other than revealing more detail of the circumstances surrounding Chad’s deposition than that provided by Bede in HegA, 4, 2., the episode as Stephanus records it offers nothing by way of further insight into the mind of the archbishop. 12 Aldhelm’s words from this letter are quoted at length above, chapter 1, n. 47. 13 In spite of Bernhard Bischoff ’s revelation in 1954 of the existence of the Canterbury Commentaries, in 1988 the likes of John Wallace-Hadrill felt able to say, ‘But we know nothing of Theodore’s books or library,’ A Historical Commentary, p. 138. This is not an unreasonable comment, nor is the note of which it is a part an unreasonable description of the state of the scholarship at the time. There is, however, little by way of the optimism in Wallace-Hadrill’s words that we might have expected in light of the work that was being done on Theodore in the wake of the pioneering work of Bischoff at the time that the Historical Commentary was being written. 10

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the sources had been seen as being made up of can be found in the compendium of period resources that is the third volume of Hadden’s and Stubbs’ Councils and Ecclesiastical Documents relating to Great Britain and Ireland. Here, the editors did the valuable work of drawing together in one place all the known primary texts that derived from Theodore’s period and were somehow connected to the record surrounding him. As things stand today, however, that work has been radically superseded, if in no one, single place. On the other hand, the volume edited by Michael Lapidge entitled Archbishop Theodore: Commemorative Studies on His Life and Influence, contains a series of papers that, one by one, introduce the reader to all the main themes and sources associated with Theodore that are known today, and that warrant exploration by anyone seeking to do further work on his life and thought. In fact, considering it proffers not only commentary on the different issues at stake with respect to Theodore, but also a detailed discussion of every source even newly connected with him, it currently stands as a necessary first stop for anyone wishing to make advanced investigation into the subject.14 It is by drawing on this work that we are able to outline the arguments behind the primary sources.

2.2 Pœnitentiale The first and probably most prominent document to look at, based on its long-established association with Theodore, is the Pœnitentiale. In Archbishop Theodore, the discussion of penitential literature associated with the archbishop is set out by Thomas Charles-Edwards, in a paper that covers matters ranging from the nature of the texts attributed to him, to the sources of those texts, to the proliferation of Theodore’s name in the continental penitential tradition that arose after him.15 It is an important paper, first of all, for making sense of the difference between the two main records of Theodore’s teaching on disciplinary matters: namely the iudicia Theodori found in the A-Recension of the

14 The contents of the volume include separate discussions on the Pœnitentiale, the Passio s. Anastasii, the Laterculus Malalianus, four poems in octosyllabic verse, the Canterbury Commentaries, as well as all of the issues to be derived from the newly discernible biographical details that have come to light as a result of these texts. 15 T. Charles-Edwards, ‘The Penitential of Theodore and the Iudicia Theodori,’ in AT, pp. 141‒74.

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Collectio Canonum Hibernensis, and compiled before 725, and the more substantial, but later, work of the discipulus Umbrensium.16 Further, the paper painstakingly seeks to establish Theodore’s motives in giving his approval to what was apparently the exclusively insular practice of private confession, by tracing all the possible influences over the Iudicia and the text of the discipulus. It concludes that, in light of the actual interaction of the Theodoran texts with each other, with earlier Irish texts, and with the teaching of Basil of Caesarea, it was not so much a matter of Theodore appropriating Irish custom as it was him adapting the teaching of one of his own authorities (Basil) to the pastoral conditions in which he found himself.17 In any case, the Pœnitentiale as we receive it, and as we refer to it here, is in fact the text of the Northumbrian disciple, an edition of which is found in Haddan and Stubbs with commentary (and a translation of which is found in John McNeill’s Medieval Handbooks of Penance),18 on the basis that it proffers the most content, and that its second book incorporates most of the iudicia anyway.19 The document itself is in four parts, including two central books bounded by a prologue and epilogue. The prologue is written by the editor, the self-described discipulus Umbrensium, by way of explaining his rationale, his method, and to some extent, his sources. Following that is the first book: a penitential typical of the genre, comprised of This is outlined in short order within the paper, pp. 141‒3. T. Charles-Edwards, ‘The Penitential of Theodore and the Iudicia Theodori,’ p. 170. 18 For his translation, McNeill uses the Latin edition found in Finsterwalder’s Die Canones Theodori Cantuariensis und ihrer Überlieferungsformen. 19 Thomas Charles-Edwards, in ‘The Penitential of Theodore,’ p. 151, says of the iudicia: ‘ . . . nearly all of the material contained in the text is also in the Disciple’s work and the wording is very similar. There evidently is, therefore, a textual link between the Iudicia and the Disciple’s work . . . .’ This assertion is repeated later in the paper, in an important summary of the development of the Disciple’s edition. After providing a concordance for statements in common between the Iudicia (which, following Finsterwalder, he designates as ‘D’) and the work of the Disciple (which, again following Finsterwalder, he designates as ‘U’), Charles-Edwards says: ‘What these concordances show is that the decisive difference between D and U is that the former mixes penitential and canonical material in a single sequence of rules, while the latter uses a principle of organization derived from Cassian via Cummian and so separates penitential from canonical material. There is a further implication of the concordances, namely that the Iudicia give pride of place to canonical rules (which then appear in bk II of the Disciple’s work), whereas the Disciple made bk I his penitential and, to judge from the Prologue, saw it, rather than bk II, as his principle concern. Bk II was mostly already in D whereas most of bk I was lacking D,’ pp. 156‒7. 16

17

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a directory of possible sins with specific associated penances. The second book, by contrast, is a lengthy list of rules governing the life of the church. It is among these rules that the most obvious theological statements are asserted by the original author. And finally there is the epilogue, wherein the disciple reiterates his motives and his sources, while expressing his hope that what he offers may be found reliable and useful. It is a lengthy text, and a fascinating one for what it represents of the penitential teaching of Cassian, the Cappadocians,20 and, more broadly, the Irish tradition of at least the seventh century. The pressing question, however, as to the extent to which the Pœnitentiale can be taken as Theodore’s teaching, could mitigate its unequivocal use as an original source. It is clear that the Pœnitentiale had a major influence beyond its original insular context,21 and that in spite of the fact that Theodore’s was not the first penitential to be circulated around the islands, his name was being cited as a penitential authority within a short time after his death, and maybe before.22 So it must be that the archbishop had something to say on the subject of penitential discipline that 20 In light of Charles-Edwards’ identification, we have mentioned Basil already as an influence over the content of the Pœnitentiale, but as Thomas O’Loughlin with Helen Conrad-O’Briain maintain, and as we discuss below (chapter 5, section 6), Gregory Nazianzen should also feature as a general influence for his notion of the ‘baptism of tears.’ 21 The witnesses to this are extensive. Haddan and Stubbs identify the Liber Pontificalis along with French and Irish penitentials from the second half of the eighth century, as well as Rabanus Maurus, Regino of Prüm, and others as testifying to Theodore’s having drawn up his own penitential, p. 173. Charles-Edwards’ tracing of the iudicia reveals an even earlier date by which Theodore’s authority on penitential matters was being drawn upon than the later eighth century. Finally, Haddan and Stubbs provide a forceful witness to the esteem in which Theodore was held due to his penitential teaching: ‘Archbishop Egbert of York, whose pontificate extended from A.D. 734 to A.D. 766, and whose memory must have covered at least twenty years before the former date, twice in his genuine penitential quotes Theodore by name; in the [preface] reckoning Theodore with Paphnutius, Jerome, Augustine, and Gregory as the chief authorities on the subject,’ p. 174. 22 Charles-Edwards (‘The Penitential of Theodore,’ p. 162) speculates that the mass of Irish students described by Aldhelm in his letter to Heahfrith (cited above, chapter 1, n. 47) is the same as those referred to by the Disciple in his prologue: Multi quoque non solum uiri, sed etiam feminae de his ab eo inextinguibili feruore accensi sitim hanc ad sedandam ardenti cum desiderio frequentari hujus nostri nimirum saeculi singularis scientiae hominem festinabant . . . (Haddan & Stubbs, p. 176‒7). ‘Further, not only many men but also women, enkindled by him through these [decisions] with inextinguishable fervor, burning with desire to quench this thirst, made haste in crowds to visit a man undoubtedly of extraordinary knowledge for our age,’ (trans., J. T. McNeill, Medieval Handbooks of Penance, p. 183).

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members of the church – both in Britain and elsewhere – wanted to hear. In light of this, it would not be unreasonable to assume that Theodore left some written record of his teaching; and this is what the modern commentators appear to allow. From Haddan and Stubbs to McNeill to Mayr-Harting to Charles-Edwards, all acknowledge the fact that, however forthright the discipulus Umbrensium might have been about his own editing work and the mediatory role played by Eoda with the libellus scottorum,23 the essential content of the text can be effectively linked with Theodore.24 Consequently, for this present work, books one and two of the Pœnitentiale Theodori – that is, the actual penitential section and the list of pronouncements – are seen as constituting an important part of Theodore’s corpus.

2.3 Passio sancti Anastasii25 So the Pœnitentiale represents the most prominent of the works early on associated with Theodore; in spite of this, it has never, to my knowledge, been examined as a source for determining Theodore’s 23

Pœnitentiale Theodori, from the preface. Henry Mayr-Harting says of the Pœnitentiale: ‘For all its problems of text and transmission . . . there is no doubt that it represents for the most part genuine traditions of Theodore’s teaching,’ The Coming of Christianity, p. 259. John McNeill’s acknowledgement of the Theodoran origin of the Pœnitentiale is rooted in the fact that Theodore was indeed seen as a major source for penitential teaching in his time and after; so he describes it as ‘emanating from Theodore of Tarsus,’ Medieval Handbooks, p. 179. We have drawn extensively upon Charles-Edwards’ thoughts on the Pœnitentiale, but it is worth considering his specific comment about the text of the Pœnitentiale (referred to as ‘U’): ‘What we have, then, in U, is a text edited no later than the middle of the eighth century by someone who had good access to information about Theodore, his pupils and their reaction to his teaching, and in particular had a text written by one or more of those pupils and circulating among them . . . . We may not have the very words written by Theodore, but what we do have is a quite exceptional wealth of information on the impact of his iudicia, both canonical and penitential, over several years upon a wide group of pupils,’ ‘The Penitential of Theodore,’ p. 158. But the last word in this instance goes to Haddan and Stubbs, whose support for close identification of the Pœnitentiale with Theodore is stated thus: ‘ . . . there is nothing to make it improbable that it was drawn up with the sanction of Theodore himself, or under his eye: rather it may be said that the verses found at the end of the treatise, in which Theodore commends himself to the prayers of bishop Hæddi, make it certain that this was the case,’ p. 173. Some paragraphs later, they say, ‘[I]t cannot be considered a mistake that this work should be regarded as Theodore’s,’ p. 174. 25 BHL 410b 24

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theological outlook. Whatever the reasons for this though, the fact that it is the case demonstrates how pervasive the assumption was that the evidence surrounding Theodore was somehow unreliable, unworthy, or simply unknowable – at least until the labours of the late twentieth-century went some way toward overturning it. Yet even as these labours serve to shed new light on relatively well-worn material, they also draw to our attention the possibilities inherent in other, less significant texts. The Passio sancti Anastasii is one such. The Passio is not a text that will receive significant treatment here, above all because it was only ever a translation of an original Greek text, the provenance of which is said to be the hand of a monastic brother of Anastasius, set to the task of writing his life between March and December, 630,26 even if such texts have the potential to shed light on the hagiographical methods of their authors to the reader.27 It is, however, a text that recent scholarship has shown to be of interest, and one which must undoubtedly be accounted for within the body of evidence surrounding Theodore of Tarsus. The story of the Passio is recounted by Carmela Vircillo Franklin in her paper entitled, ‘Theodore and the Passio s. Anastasii,’28 following on work she had already published on the Passio with Paul Meyvaert in 1982.29 Originally the Greek acta of Anastasius, a Persian convert who was martyred in 628 – and a figure whose circumstances intersect with Theodore’s at many points30 – the text takes on particular interest for being mentioned by Bede at the end of the Historia as one of the things he worked on amidst his extensive scholarly activity. Among numerous works Bede lists, he includes ‘ . . . librum uitae et passionis sancti Anastasii male de Greco translatum et peius a quodam inperito emendatum, prout potui, ad sensum correxi . . . ,’31 words which, in light ‘Theodore and the Passio s. Anastasii’, p. 176‒7. As Michael Lapidge suggests BHL 408 does Bede’s, in his paper ‘Anglo-Latin Literature’ in Anglo-Latin Literature: 600‒899, p. 18. 28 In Archbishop Theodore, pp. 175‒203. 29 ‘Has Bede’s Version of the Passio S. Anastasii Come Down to Us in BHL 408?’ AB, 373‒400. 30 Recounted by Carmela Vircillo Franklin in ‘Theodore and the Passio S. Anastasii,’ especially pp. 175‒81. 31 HegA, 5, 24, Colgrave and Mynors, pp. 568/9‒570/1. ‘ . . . a book on the life and passion of St. Anastasius which was badly translated from the Greek by some ignorant person, which I have corrected as best I could, to clarify the meaning.’ It is significant to note that the comment provided by Colgrave and Mynors in their edition, accompanying this statement of Bede’s, states that ‘This book seems to have been lost. It is 26 27

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of what is now known of Theodore’s career, and the points of contact between the future archbishop and the acta, immediately appear to point in his direction. The work that led to the concrete attribution of the Latin Passio to Theodore, however, could not be based on assumptions; the labours undertaken to the end of going beyond assumptions are principally those of Franklin. The first step in tracing the Passio was taken when, in 1982, Franklin and Meyvaert published the results of their investigation into BHL 408, showing that it was indeed a manuscript of the re-translation undertaken and described by Bede. The evidence for this rested on editorial style and transmission, and was quickly accepted into scholarly discourse as a sound contention.32 There were three relevant manuscripts of the Passio around at the time: BHL 408 which had been published in the Acta sanctorum; BHL 410 which belonged to a collection known as the Magnum legendarium Austriacum; and BHL 410b, identified in 1909 in Turin.33 What Franklin provides in ‘Theodore and the Passio,’ is that ‘[a] comparison of these three texts with the original Greek passio . . . revealed [. . .] that the Turin text (BHL 410b) is the only surviving witness to an original Latin translation of the Greek acta, and that BHL, nos. 408 and 410 are later, independent reworkings of this first Latin version.’34 So together, Franklin and Meyvaert showed that Bede’s version of the Passio was transmitted as BHL 408, which in turn was a re-writing of the original Latin translation from the Greek Acta, represented by BHL 410b. It was then for Franklin to establish how BHL 410b made it from its home among the Greeks of seventh-century Rome to Bede’s monastery at Jarrow in the first part of the eighth century. Possibilities for this transmission included Benedict Biscop, in light of his numerous journeys between England and Rome, as well as his not certain which Anastasius is was, but it may well have been the friend of St Gregory who translated the Regula Pastoralis into Greek, who became the Patriarch of Antioch in 599 and was killed in an insurrection of the Jews in 610,’ p. 570. This stands in marked contrast to the commentary accompanying the English edition (based on Colgrave and Mynors) by Judith McClure and Roger Collins, which clearly benefits from the more recent scholarship of Franklin and Meyvaert: ‘[T]his work, long thought lost, has been identified; see C. V. Franklin and P. Meyvaert in Analecta Bollandia, 100 (1982), 373‒400,’ in The Ecclesiastical History of the English People, J. McClure and R. Collins, eds., p. 419. 32 See, for example, Wallace-Hadrill’s statement of only a few years later that, ‘[t]he text of the Vita Anastasii which Bede improved has recently been discovered . . . ,’ A Historical Commentary, p. 242. 33 C. V. Franklin, ‘Theodore and the Passio,’ p. 182. 34 C. V. Franklin, ‘Theodore and the Passio,’ p. 182.

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recognized penchant for book acquisitions while there.35 But on circumstantial grounds alone, before even the manuscript evidence is accounted for, Theodore emerges as the most likely bearer of the text from Rome to England. Over the course of her paper, and especially in her outline of the life of Anastasius, Franklin highlights the points of contact between the martyr and the archbishop. She says: They both lived through the momentous events that shook the Middle East in the early seventh century. The Cilician monks who inhabited the monastery ‘ad Aquas Salvias’ may have been the ones to bring the relic, the icon, and the acta of the Persian martyr to Rome. And Theodore, a Cilician from Tarsus, was most likely a monk of this community before his departure for Canterbury in 668 . . . My argument that the Passio s. Anastasii was almost certainly brought to England by Theodore, and Michel’s contention that Theodore was living at the monastery ‘ad Aquas Salvias’ when he was appointed by Pope Vitalian to the archbishopric of Canterbury strengthen each other.36

The argument to which Franklin alludes here is based on the fact that the Latin Passio of BHL 410b is linked in its transmission to another text which Aldhelm, who was himself at Canterbury in Theodore’s time, uses concurrently in composing his own De uirginitate. This, Franklin says, establishes the highest likelihood that the text first came to England and was at Canterbury in Theodore’s time. Enhancing this likelihood is the fact that the text reveals itself to have begun life as a Latin gloss on the original Greek, which is something that connects it more strongly with Theodore than, say, with someone like Benedict Biscop. Finally, and of immense interest for this present work, is Franklin’s verdict that ‘[t]he language . . . and particularly the approach to Latin exhibited in the translation are strongly reminiscent of those found in the Canterbury biblical commentaries discussed by Michael Lapidge as well as in Theodore’s Laterculus Malalianus as discussed by Jane Stevenson, making it possible to advance the hypothesis that this early translation of the Greek acta was the work of Theodore himself.’37 Principally Bede, Historia abbatum, 1. ‘Theodore and the Passio,’ p. 182‒3. 37 This citation, along with the information immediately preceding it, is taken from Franklin’s summary of her own argument in ‘Theodore and the Passio,’ pp. 183‒4. In 2004, Franklin published a critical edition of all three texts (BHL nos. 408, 410, and 410b) entitled, The Latin dossier of Anastasius the Persian: hagiographic translations and transformations (PIMS, Toronto). 35 36

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2.4 Letter to Æthelred After the Pœnitentiale and the Passio s. Anastasii, the letter of reconciliation written by Theodore to King Æthelred of Mercia regarding his conflict with Wilfrid, and preserved by Eddius Stephanus in the Vita s. Wilfridi,38 warrants only a brief comment. It is a short letter, and contains little of a specifically theological nature. It was written by the then-elderly archbishop whose interest was in obedience to the wishes of Rome, and in reconciling with others before he passed from life.39 In this respect, the letter does reveal something of Theodore’s pastoral approach, as well as his own sense of spiritual responsibility; but other than after a most circuitous fashion, it offers nothing to enlighten one in pursuit of Theodore’s views of the person and work of Christ. It is a text that should be noted, however, most especially for its first-person perspective in that it unambiguously manifests Theodore’s own words, and because it reveals something of the character of the man whose thought so interests us. Nevertheless, having noted it, the letter of Theodore to King Æthelred (for our purposes) has little more to offer.

2.5 Octosyllabic Poems The octosyllabic poems identified and discussed by Michael Lapidge in the paper, ‘Theodore and Anglo-Latin octosyllabic verse’ present a very different story to the letter discussed immediately above. As with the letter, the space dedicated to the examination of these poems will be minimal, but not by reason of theological meagreness. On the contrary, if Lapidge is correct in his belief that all four of the poems are of Theodore’s hand, then together they represent a veritable treasury of terminology to supplement that encountered in the texts more closely associated with his pedagogical work. The poems are different in tone, however, and would require a great deal more effort to understand in 38 Vita s. Wilfridi, chapter 43. The text of Stephanus is available in Hadden and Stubbs, pp. 171‒2, and available in a translation by Bertram Colgrave as The Life of Bishop Wilfrid by Eddius Stephanus. 39 According to Rome’s findings in the matter, Wilfrid was to be re-instated, and amends to be made for the inappropriateness of his removal. Stephanus chronicles this in chapters 29‒34, concluding with the specific recounting of Theodore’s reconciliation in chapter 43.

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the context of a theological examination of the Laterculus Malalianus than their potential yield would warrant. Whereas all the other texts of relevance to this study serve an essentially theological, pastoral, or pedagogical purpose, the octosyllabic verses ascribed by Lapidge to Theodore are essentially pious and personal. The first of these poems, and the most obviously attributable to Theodore, is that which he addresses to his contemporary, Hæddi, bishop of Winchester. By virtue of its brevity, it is worth supplying here in full: Te nunc, sancta speculator, Verbi Dei digne dator, Hæddi, pie praesul, precor, Pontificum ditum decor, Pro me tuo peregrino Preces funde Theodoro.40

Lapidge informs us that the poem is listed ICL, no. 16100, and ‘preserved uniquely in Cambridge, Corpus Christi College 320 (St Augustine’s, Canterbury, s. xex), p. 71, where it is associated with the Iudicia of Theodore’41; explaining its clear provenance not due to the petition in the last line, but to its transmission with the iudicia and the poet’s selfdescription as a peregrinus.42 Once established as categorically Theodoran, though, it is Lapidge’s analysis of the poem’s metre and form43 that direct him to suggest three other poems sharing precisely the same features, and hitherto preserved anonymously in the Book of Printed, with translation, in M. Lapidge, ‘Theodore and octosyllabic verse’, p. 275: You, now, holy bishop, / Worthy giver of the Word of God, / Hæddi, holy prelate, I beseech you, / The glory of powerful pontiffs: / For me, your foreign visitor, / Pour out prayers for Theodore. 41 M. Lapidge, ‘Theodore and octosyllabic verse,’ p. 275. 42 Interesting to note is the recognition of David Howlett that Theodore, with Aldhelm, was ‘[a]mong Anglo-Latin poets the first to compose octosyllabic verse,’ in ‘Aldhelmi Carmen Rhythmicum,’ p. 130. This is consistent with Lapidge’s belief that Theodore was a pioneer of Anglo-Latin verse, and particularly the form encountered in the four poems under discussion. 43 The path of Lapidge’s analysis leads him to conclude that the sources for this type of poem were not Latin at all, but Greek. First pointing out (p. 261) that Latin iambic dimeter hymns could not have served as the model for Theodore’s verse, Lapidge goes on to illustrate how the form is in fact a Latin imitation ‘of a Greek verseform known as the “anaclastic” ionic dimeter’ (p. 265), used by the likes of Gregory of Nazianzus and Sophronius of Jerusalem. 40

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Cerne,44 as likewise sharing a common author. And as with so much of the evidence surrounding Theodore, recent as it is, this makes the octosyllabic poems here discussed, another one of the mutually sustaining pieces: casting light on the sources that inspired Theodore, and in turn being supported by the details to be gleaned from such texts as the Canterbury Commentaries, the Pœnitentiale, and the Laterculus Malalianus.

2.6 Canterbury Commentaries The next, and probably most momentous text to be considered in our examination of the evidence surrounding Theodore, is that of the Canterbury Commentaries.45 The story of the commentaries began when, in 1936 inside Milan’s Biblioteca Ambrosiana, Bernhard Bischoff came across some unprinted biblical commentaries in Latin (M.79 sup.) containing references to Theodore and Hadrian, and including glosses in Greek and Old English.46 Due to the outbreak of war, he was unable to present his findings for some time, but in Sacris Erudiri in 1954 published them as part of a major article entitled ‘Wendepunkte in der Geschichte der lateinischen Bibelexegese.’47 As the manuscript 44

A ninth century manuscript, arguably Northumbrian, now held at Cambridge, University Library, Ll. 1. 10. An analysis of the manuscript is available by Michelle Brown, entitled The Book of Cerne: Prayer, Patronage and Power in Ninth-Century England, London, 1996. 45 It is vital to note that the Canterbury Commentaries do not represent the only compendium of glosses from Theodore (and Hadrian) and the school at Canterbury. As Lapidge says, ‘[t]hey are the most extensive, but not the only, record of their classroom teaching,’ Biblical Commentaries, p. 173. Whereas the content of the Canterbury Commentaries is limited to commentary on the Pentateuch and the Gospels, many other books of the Bible, along with patristic and other works, are represented in a group of glossaries called the ‘Leiden-Family’ glossaries. This group of glossaries takes its name from the most extensive of the collection, the Leiden Glossary, described in detail by Lapidge as part of his general discussion of the subject (Biblical Commentaries, pp. 173‒9), in which he tells us that there are numerous verbal links between these glosses and the Canterbury Commentaries, including direct attributions to Theodore and Hadrian. It is apparent that any comprehensive survey of Theodore’s work will need to take account of these in the future. For now, however, Theodore’s thought as reflected in these glosses will be represented by the Canterbury Commentaries alone. 46 The story of Bischoff ’s discovery is recounted by Michael Lapidge in the preface to Biblical Commentaries, pp. vii-ix. 47 The full bibliographical reference for both the original article and its English translation is provided above, chapter 1, n. 5. I will work with the translation here, ‘Turning Points in the History of Latin Exegesis in the Early Irish Church: A.D. 650‒800,’ and all page references are made to it.

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remained unpublished, in that article Bischoff described the nature of it in detail.48 But beyond this – and perhaps most important for our present study – he also ventures to present his preliminary observations:49 observations that would be confirmed through his collaboration with Michael Lapidge and eventually presented in full in the volume, Biblical Commentaries from the Canterbury School of Theodore and Hadrian. Bischoff ’s observations are comprised of three main statements. First off is the fact that the commentaries he uncovered are dominated by an unmitigated Antiochene exegetical approach. Secondly, the commentaries contain an exclusive appeal to Greek authorities in citation. (In this regard, Bischoff counts five citations of John Chrysostom, three of Epiphanius, and one each of Clement of Alexandria, Ephrem the Syrian, Gregory of Nazianzus, Sophronius, and Theophilus of Alexandria.)50 Thirdly, there is a great deal to be learned about oriental life from the many references throughout the commentaries. So, for example, Bischoff mentions Theodore’s description of a herding technique used by oriental shepherds; a small rock-dwelling creature from Sinai; and large melons from Edessa.51 As for the content of the manuscript having derived ultimately from Theodore and the school at Canterbury, two main reasons are given: it corresponds to everything that could then be presumed about Theodore, and he is directly cited by whomever the student was that wrote his words down.52 Finally, Bischoff indicates where one might look for traces of Theodore’s influence in light of these observations, including manifestations of his exegetical bias in Bede’s biblical commentaries and, although he does not venture to say in what respect or where, in Aldhelm.53 From this point it was that Michael Lapidge took up the mantle and presented us with the greatly expanded, and exhaustively ‘Turning Points,’ pp. 75‒6. ‘Turning Points’, pp. 74‒8. 50 ‘Turning Points,’ p. 77. 51 ‘Turning Points,’ p. 76. 52 ‘Turning Points, p. 76. 53 Of Bede, Bischoff remarks that he ‘ . . . had a predilection for allegorical interpretation, but it was not the sole dominant factor in his extensive exegetical work,’ p. 74. Aldhelm is mentioned only in a general sense along with Bede. Still with regard to the Northumbrian historian, Bischoff says, ‘ . . . he also had a personal tradition from the school of Theodore and Hadrian, whose heralds Aldhelm and Bede himself were,’ p. 75. 48 49

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chronicled, form of Bischoff ’s observations arising from the Canterbury Commentaries. It is a result of Lapidge’s elaborations, for example, that we now have available the most complete biography of Theodore known to date.54 More than that, though, Lapidge has managed to examine and evaluate the evidence for Bischoff ’s contention regarding the Antiochene exegetical tradition represented by the commentaries; he has teased out the implications of those many Greek authorities cited in the commentaries; and he has dealt with the oriental details provided by Theodore in the commentaries by illustrating what they might have meant to an itinerant monkcum-archbishop. The commentaries themselves are divided into three sections: two dealing with the books of the Pentateuch, and one with the Gospels.55 The first, entitled ‘Commentarius primus in Pentateuchum,’ Lapidge abbreviates in English to PentI.56 It is the longest of the sections by far, and begins with an account of the Greeks’ negative attitude to Jerome and, like the other sections, includes a mix of paragraph-length explanations and pithy remarks on the meaning of single words, more than two hundred glosses on Genesis, just over one hundred on Exodus, and fewer than a hundred on each of Leviticus, Numbers and Deuteronomy. The second, called ‘Commentarius augumentatus in Genesim, Exodum et Evangelia,’ but abbreviated as Gn-Ex-EvIa for Lapidge’s English translation,57 includes sixteen glosses on Genesis, five on Exodus, and fourteen on the Gospels. Finally, the third, called ‘Commentarius in Evangelia secundus’ and abbreviated as EvII,58 contains sixty-two glosses on Matthew, twenty-five on Mark, thirty-one on Luke, and thirty on John. Each section of the commentaries includes historical information, topographical insights, exegetical deductions, and grammatical or linguistic elucidations: all features that might be expected in a document dedicated to an Antiochene exegesis. Yet for all they proffer, there is hardly an explicit theological statement to be found. One can only surmise that, in the absence of controversy, specific theological discussion took place in a different 54 Drawn on extensively in the first chapter of this present work, and found in Biblical Commentaries, pp. 5‒81. 55 The text of the commentaries can be found in Latin with an English parallel translation in Biblical Commentaries, pp. 298‒423. 56 Biblical Commentaries, pp. 298‒385. 57 Biblical Commentaries, pp. 286‒395. 58 Biblical Commentaries, pp. 396‒423.

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sort of forum than the classroom dedicated to the exposition of meaning in Scripture. There are a number of other scholarly concerns,59 however, of interest especially as they lend a great deal of insight to the understanding of what motivated Theodore, as well as the sorts of subjects he retained from his time of study at, for example, Constantinople. The first of these is medicine: a topic to be found running through all the most significant evidence in relation to Theodore.60 We first mentioned it here when discussing Theodore’s formation at Constantinople,61 but as Jane Stevenson points out, that the archbishop was well informed about medicine is one of very few pieces of personal information that Bede actually gives us about him.62 And the record in Bede is unequivocal. In recounting a miracle story about Bishop John of Hexham, Bede tells how he is faced by a young nun who has been bled as part of an effort to eradicate an illness, and how John responds: Interrogans autem ille, quando flebotomata esset puella, et ut cognouit, quia in luna quarta, dixit: ‘Multum insipienter et indocte fecistis in luna quarta flebotomando. Memini enim beatae memoriae Theodorum archiepiscopum dicere, quia periculosa sit satis illius temporis flebotomia, quando et lumen lunae et reuma oceani in cremento est.63

This remarkable passage indicates a great deal as to what was taught in the Canterbury school, but also what was of importance to Theodore, personally. Of course, it is also entirely consistent with the picture we gain of him from the commentaries. One can well imagine John’s advice as reported by Bede having come from the same teacher who proclaimed that 59 There are dealt with by Lapidge in the section ‘Scholarly Concerns’, including subsections on medicine, philosophy, rhetoric, metrology, and chronology, Biblical Commentaries, pp. 249‒66. 60 Medical knowledge is one of the threads that binds almost all the evidence surrounding Theodore together, in that Bede mentions it in the Historia, it features in the Canterbury Commentaries, it is an issue in the Pœnitentiale, and it features prominently in the Laterculus. 61 See above, chapter 1, section 3. 62 J. Stevenson, The School of Archbishop Theodore, p. 47. 63 HegA, 5, 3. ‘Then he asked when the girl had been bled and, on hearing that it was on the fourth day of the moon, he exclaimed, “You have acted foolishly and ignorantly to bleed her on the fourth day of the moon; I remember how Archbishop Theodore of blessed memory used to say that it was very dangerous to bleed a patient when the moon was waxing and the ocean tide flowing . . . ”,’ Colgrave and Mynors, p. 461.

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Lunaticus est cuius minuente luna minuatur uel mutatur cerebrum et, intrante daemone per narem, dementem facit. Aliter lunatici dicuntur qui incipiente luna uel in medio siue in fine cadunt et prosternuntur.64

But the degree to which medical knowledge permeates the text can not be understated, attesting to the background and ongoing concern of Theodore. To this end, Lapidge says of the medical explanations in the commentaries that ‘[they] cannot be found in a single medical source; they are rather the result of a training in Byzantine medicine.’65 That Theodore’s training was even more diverse than terse acknowledgement of his Antiochene exegetical perspective would allow – even permitting an appended interest like medicine – is further attested to in the commentaries by the other scholarly concerns identified by Lapidge. The next of these, giving credence to Pope Agatho’s reference to Theodore as ‘philosopher’66 is the subject of philosophy itself. Lapidge provides numerous examples of where such philosophical training is apparent in the commentaries,67 but one example in particular stands out: Theodore’s use of the term ἀπλανής (transliterated as ‘aplanem’ in the Latin) for firmamentum when talking about the firmament in Genesis. In PentI 17, he says of the first line of Genesis (‘In principio fecit Deus caelum’), ‘.i. firmamentum caelum quem philosophi dicunt aplanem, in quo sunt omnes stellae fixae quasi claui, nisi .vii. planetae,’68 using the same word ἀπλανής on two additional occasions.69 So instead of using (στερέωμα) the preferred term of the Septuagint translators, Theodore opts to use the term of Plato and Aristotle, ‘. . . who referred to the abode of the stars as ἀπλανής or ‘fixed’, in distinction to the movement enjoyed by the planets.’70

64 From the Canterbury Commentaries, EvII, 43: ‘Lunatic [Mt. XVII.14] is someone whose brain diminishes or changes as the moon wanes and, with a demon entering through his nostrils, makes him demented. Otherwise lunatics are said to be those who, with the moon waxing, full or waning, fall down and prostrate themselves,’ Biblical Commentaries, p. 404/5. 65 Biblical Commentaries, p. 250. 66 See above, chapter 1, n. 30. 67 Biblical Commentaries, pp. 255‒9. 68 PentI 17: ‘In the beginning God created heaven [I. 1]: that is, the firmament, the part of the sky which the philosophers call aplanes (ἀπλανής), in which all the stars are fixed like nails, all except for the seven planets,’ Biblical Commentaries, p. 304/5. 69 PentI 26 and 27. 70 This citation, including all the information regarding Theodore’s use of ἀπλανής, is from Biblical Commentaries, p. 255.

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Together with Theodore’s deference for ‘the philosophers’ that appears elsewhere in the Canterbury Commentaries,71 then, what we can determine of his time in Constantinople, and the reputation he had obviously acquired even in papal circles, the stronger and clearer the picture of Theodore that emerges all the time. The last concern we shall note here is that of chronology. Lapidge lists this not so much as a discernible area of strength in the commentaries, but frankly, as a subject of which the commentator is aware and can deal with. This is a somewhat less enthusiastic appraisal of Theodore’s facility with chronology than one might expect, when considered in light of Bede’s statement that ecclesiastical computation was one of the subjects taught at the Canterbury school,72 but stands as the only way to summarize the evidence as presented in the commentaries. One of the more significant places where a question of chronology arises is at PentI 248,73 which reads: Mense nouarum frugum: .i. ut accedit uel a Martio usque ad Pentecosten, siue ab Aprili, hoc est .xiiii. Pascalis accederat, inde usque quinquagesimum Pentecosten dicebatur mensis nouarum frugum. Et inde similiter incipient omnia uere reuiuescere; nouaque dicuntur pro inceptione anni a Iudaeis.74

In teaching thus, Theodore must have been drawing on his Constantinopolitan training, but when compared to the other subjects on the curriculum, chronology comes across as less compelling. This is especially the case when one considers Lapidge’s remark that, ‘ . . . the Commentator’s own counting deserts him at PentI 81 when he attempts to reckon the equivalent of the ‘tenth month’ of Gen. VIII.5: on his reckoning the ‘tenth month’ is said to fall in February, whereas it should properly fall in December/January.’75 See PentI 16. HegA, 4, 2. 73 The others include PentI 75, 81, 274, 377, 391, 394, 401, 412, and EvII 130, most of which signify brief attempts at establishing the exact month being referred to by means of reconciling Julian with Hebrew datings. 74 PentI 248 (treating Exodus 13:4): ‘In the month of new corn [XIII.4]: that is, it fell either from March to Pentecost; or else the period from April – that is if Easter had fallen on the fourteenth moon – thence to the Quinquagesima of Pentecost is said to be the month of ‘new corn’. And then likewise all things truly begin to grow again; they are said to be ‘new’ because of the beginning of the year according to the Jews,’ Biblical Commentaries, p. 346/7. 75 Biblical Commentaries, p. 265. 71 72

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But the light that has been cast over so important a source as the Canterbury Commentaries enables the scholar to approach other texts with much greater confidence. The certainty that the commentaries emerged from the Canterbury school, and their nature as a repository of sundry references, transforms them from a series of glosses on books of the Bible into a measure of almost every other text conceivably attributable to Theodore. For if another text were to diverge too radically from the substance of the commentaries, then any case for ascribing its authorship to Theodore would almost certainly suffer. That the texts so far discussed fit comfortably with a Theodoran ascription will be due to the fact that they have manifested such characteristics as a typically Antiochene approach to Scriptural interpretation, an appeal to predominantly Greek sources though composed in a Latin milieu, and an awareness of eclectic Eastern cultural details, including anything from topography to animals to food. Such a list is certainly not exhaustive, but together with the other standards for determining authorship, including the right palaeographical and transmission criteria, it means that their inclusion in anything like a canon would be deserved. In light of all this, it can be said that the discovery and gradual introduction of the Canterbury Commentaries to the world in the twentieth century, and their publication as a volume including all the analysis that such publication entailed, represents the single most important advancement for the scholar interested in Theodore of Tarsus, along with what must be considerable implications for other fields of study.

2.7 Laterculus Malalianus The last of our texts for consideration is the one on which this present study is based. The individual elements of the Laterculus Malalianus correspond with all the criteria established in light of the Canterbury Commentaries by which a text might be tested for ascription to Theodore, and more besides. It is a text unlike any of the others we have so far examined in that it alone serves no explicit pedagogical or pastoral purpose. It is not a list, and was not written down by someone else. Like the letter to King Æthelred and the first of the octosyllabic poems, it is written by Theodore’s own hand and so gives form to his thought; unlike them, it is not addressed to anyone and is not related to his pastoral ministry. Like the other

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poems ascribed to Theodore by Michael Lapidge, the Laterculus is about Christ and reveals something about Theodore’s conception of Christ; unlike them, the Laterculus does not arise from personal, pious sentiment. The Laterculus Malalianus is a rather more standard piece of theological prose. From the beginning, it sets out what it is going to do and does it, presenting the figure of Christ from different angles, and introducing any number of theological themes in the meantime. Its name implies it is a chronicle; it is, in fact, an historical exegesis on the life of Christ:76 for which reason, along with its poor Latin,77 it may have spent a lot longer languishing in two compendia of early Latin sources than it might otherwise have done.

2.7.1 Editions The Laterculus Malalianus is a text that had been contained exclusively in the Patrologia Latina78 and Monumenta Germaniae Historica;79 that in the Patrologia being the earlier of the two editions, although the latter should perhaps be counted as the more trustworthy.80 Then in 1995, a critical edition was published,81 saving the text from relative obscurity and setting it before the academic community as the only original, complete text from the hand of Theodore of Tarsus to have survived. This work was undertaken by Jane Stevenson, the result of whose seemingly monumental efforts at identifying sources and drawing connections must be considered close in importance to that of the publication of the Canterbury Commentaries. She

76 A description originally coined by Jane Stevenson, The School of Archbishop Theodore, p. 3. 77 Angelo Mai said of the Laterculus: ‘ . . . nihilominus ejus Latinitas ualde squalet,’ PL 94, 1161 in chronicon sequens Maii monitum. Stevenson adds: ‘In a context of chronicle texts, it has seemed to earlier commentators to be poor stuff, naïve and illinformed,’ The School of Archbishop Theodore, p. 114. 78 PL 94, 1161‒74. 79 Chronica Minora III, ed. T. Mommsen, pp. 424‒37. 80 This is due to the tendency of Angelo Mai (the editor of the PL version) to emend the text in order to bring it into better conformity with classical Latinity, as compared with the practice of Mommsen who simply reproduced the spelling as he found it in the manuscript. Stevenson discusses this in The School of Archbishop Theodore, p. 119. 81 J. Stevenson, ed., as part of the volume, The Laterculus Malalianus and the School of Archbishop Theodore, pp. 120‒161.

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recounts that, while working on Altus Prosator,82 she came across a reference somewhere referring to a curious Latin chronicle text called the Laterculus Malalianus. As a result of the context of the reference, and the description of the language of the Laterculus as ‘peculiar,’ Stevenson’s interest was piqued and she sought out the text in Mommsen. In the meantime, Lapidge had delivered a paper on the Canterbury glosses; with that in mind, the nature of the Laterculus, with its dig against the Irish – so reminiscent of Aldhelm – in its preamble, together with the fact that half of it was an interlinear translation from Greek, brought Theodore to her mind. Then, having shown it to Lapidge in order to test her suspicion, and having been met with encouraging sounds, Stevenson explored the possibility that it was in fact a text from Theodore’s hand. Ultimately, references in the text, its style, its express and more subtle appeals to Ephrem the Syrian, and the fact that it corresponded to the Canterbury Commentaries in all these ways, determined her argument. She finally presented the Laterculus as a product of the seventh century Canterbury school, and most likely the hand of Theodore of Tarsus himself, along with the aforesaid edition.83

2.7.2 The Manuscripts Of the Laterculus there are two manuscripts: Vatican, Pal. Lat. 277 and Leiden, Voss. Misc. 11, although it is the Vatican manuscript that is of greatest import. The palaeographical details of both manuscripts are provided in Stevenson’s edition so need not be repeated here,84 although a few issues are worth mentioning. The Vatican manuscript is in two parts, the first of which contains the Laterculus. Our text is itself to be found among two Isidorean texts, two Irish, one Roman, and one unidentified,85 and it is important to note what Stevenson says about the contents of the manuscript supporting ‘ . . . the thesis that the collection was first put together in an Insular milieu, conceivably in the circle of an English missionary on the Continent.’86 The

82 A seventh century poem sometimes associated with Columba. The nature of Stevenson’s work can be read in J. Stevenson, ‘Altus Prosator,’ in Celtica, 23, 1999, pp. 326‒28. 83 Thanks are due to Jane Stevenson for sharing this with me in correspondence. 84 The School of Archbishop Theodore, pp. 94‒113. 85 The School of Archbishop Theodore, p. 98. 86 The School of Archbishop Theodore, p. 99.

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Leiden manuscript, on the other hand, reveals nothing especially important to our consideration of the evidence, given that it is a copy of the Vatican text containing a few very minor, superficial corrections, and that the texts with which it is bound are so random as to reveal very little.87 Ultimately, Stevenson determines that the principle manuscript of the Laterculus is early eighth century and inscribed by an Italian scribe, having been transmitted to Italy from an original, Insular source on the Continent.

2.7.3 Description of the Text The Laterculus itself is a twenty five chapter work, based on an original chronicle text by the sixth century Greek John Malalas. Malalas’ original, called Χρονογραφία, was divided into eighteen books, covering the time from creation to the time of the emperors of the second half of the sixth century, and much of this is taken up into the later Laterculus. The Laterculus, however, is very much an independent work with an entirely different purpose; almost as if its use of the Malaline original was entirely incidental. It could not have been, of course, for as Stevenson points out, ‘[o]ne salient aspect of the text is its practicality as a teaching document: parts of Malalas’s Chronographia have been reshaped into a concise text which offers a simple and effective guide to the kind and quantity of world history which an un-Romanized people would need in order to set the central mystery of Christ’s life on earth in context.’88 Yet, however the work of Malalas was used in the Laterculus, there can be no question that in terms of both quantity of material added, and the nature of that material, the Laterculus Malalianus is essentially original. The Laterculus itself takes its name from the fact that by the early middle ages, the word which originally meant ‘brick’ or ‘tile’ was sometimes used to mean ‘list,’ in a sense comparable to fasti.89 Exegetically and rhetorically, it exhibits the influence of many Greek, some Syriac, and only a couple of Latin writers to its time, while theologically, it appears to draw together ideas from sources as far apart as Gaul and Mesopotamia. The text accords very well with the Canterbury

The School of Archbishop Theodore, pp. 111‒13. The School of Archbishop Theodore, p. 114. 89 The School of Archbishop Theodore, p. 1. 87 88

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Commentaries,90 and sits comfortably alongside all the evidence so far examined. This is especially the case with the Passio sancti Anastasii, with which it shares the same translation technique and approach to language.91 By virtue of the name given it by Mommsen, then, it could not possibly convey a very positive image to the cursory reader. As a chronicle it is not very good. As a work of Latin prose, it is worse. As a work of exegesis in the Antiochene tradition, and a work of theology representing a cosmopolitan host of influences, however, the Laterculus is deeply intriguing.

2.7.4 Sources In terms of sources for the Laterculus, Stevenson has been able to put a finger on a great number that can be identified textually: whether or not they have been cited by name, their words have been used verbatim but not acknowledged, or there is only the hint of a parallel between words in the Laterculus and their original work.92 Some of these, of course, are obvious, beginning with John Malalas’ Χρονογραφία, as well as the Old and New Testaments. Two sources are then named, including Epiphanius of Cyprus who is given credit for an apocryphal story about the flight of the holy family into Egypt,93 and Ephrem the Syrian, who is identified as the source for a version of the ordines Christi.94 Interestingly, as it turns out, Ephrem could not have been Theodore’s source for the ordines Christi, yet his influence over the text looms large even if his name appears in relation to something that he, in all likelihood, did not contribute.95 But without any further named references, it was up to

90 How well the Laterculus accords with the commentaries will be explored below. For Lapidge’s reaction to the Laterculus, see his comments in Biblical Commentaries, pp. 180‒82. 91 Asserted by Carmela Vircillo Franklin in ‘Theodore and the Passio S. Anastasii,’ pp. 201‒03, and confirmed by Michael Lapidge, Biblical Commentaries, p. 184. 92 Most of whom she identifies is contained in the section on sources, The School of Archbishop Theodore, pp. 56‒73. Some of the sources she only names in that section are elaborated on elsewhere in the work, however, so it is almost necessary to scour the work in order to compile a complete list with any detail. 93 LM, 7. 94 LM, 19. The ordines Christi and the significance of this acknowledgement is commented on between chapter 3, sections 1.6 and 2.1, and chapter 4, section 3 of this present work. 95 For more on Ephrem and his influence over Theodore and the Laterculus, see chapter 3, below.

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Stevenson to identify Theodore of Mopsuestia, the additional use of Epiphanius, casual appeal to Theodoretus, Cyril of Alexandria, Theophilus, and Hippolytus, and the two Latins, Proba and Caelius Sedulius.96 Finally, after naming the Greeks and adding two more Syrians’ names to Ephrem’s (that is, Narsai and Jacob of Sarug), Stevenson adds that ‘John Chrysostom and Irenaeus . . . may also have been read by this writer,’ adding by way of a footnote that, ‘[t]he works of the great Syrian doctors were rapidly translated into Greek, and similarly, much Greek literature, theological and otherwise was translated into Syriac,’97 implying that the task of saying for sure in what languages some of Theodore’s sources were read could prove very difficult, if not impossible. But what Stevenson says actually holds implications where the influence of Irenaeus on Theodore is concerned, that she herself was apparently not aware of.98 There might be a distinction to be drawn between textual influences and theological influences, and while the influence of Irenaeus may not be obvious from a textual point of view, his theological influence is overwhelming. Moreover, it is also closely related to that of Ephrem: a point we will explore more fully in chapter five, below. In the meantime, what we are most concerned with here are the sources that inform Theodore’s mind on matters concerning the person and work of Christ. And however much he may have known such figures as Proba or any of the others, it is Irenaeus, possibly mediated through Ephrem, that stands above everyone else.

These are all itemized in The School of Archbishop Theodore, p. 57. The School of Archbishop Theodore, p. 57, including note 3. 98 In our examination below, for example, of the influence of both Ephrem and Irenaeus over Theodore and the Laterculus Malalianus, it is clear that Ephrem’s poetry is abounding in motifs of Irenaean origin. This is why I think it can not be mere coincidence that sees Theodore misidentify the distinctly Irenaean ordines Christi with Ephrem. Whatever his reasons for doing so – and they may well have been simply textual – it certainly suits his theological scheme in the Laterculus. But a problem arises in determining the precise nature of Irenaeus’ influence, which is partly due to the uncertainty of the relationship between Ephrem’s writing and Irenaeus. Ephrem is reputed to have had no Greek language, and to have had little patience with the philosophical nature of Greek writing (although this may be exaggerated). At the same time, it appears unlikely that Irenaeus was available in Syriac until after Ephrem’s time. This means that, at least for now, the real extent of Irenaeus’ influence over Theodore must remain a question. It is indeed significant; it may just be more. 96 97

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2.7.5 Attribution to Theodore It may seem incredible to some that so significant a text as the Laterculus should come to light and be assigned an author at so late a date. For unlike the Passio s. Anastasii, the Laterculus never earned a mention from Bede; it was to be found in no notable manuscript; and there was no one looking to locate it as anyone’s lost work. Although it is difficult to say why, it may be that these factors have contributed to the comparative silence that has greeted the text since Stevenson completed her work on it and it was published in the mid-nineteen nineties. Either there remains uncertainty in scholars’ minds over the attribution, or more than a millennium of relative inattention to Theodore has engendered a habit of not thinking about him, even when a new text comes to light that can be shown to have originated with him.99 Whatever the 99 Between 2001 and 2008, not a single work on Theodore composed since the mid-1990s has come to my attention. Even a 1996 dictionary entry on Theodore by Klaus-Peter Todt (‘Theodor von Canterbury,’ in BBKL, 23.09.06), as extensive as it is, fails to mention any of the work undertaken by Stevenson or, more surprisingly, Lapidge in the early part of that decade. At least it draws on Bischoff ’s ‘Wendepunkt in der Geschichte der lateinischen Exegese im Frühmittelalter,’ but the renaissance one might have hoped that such a pivotal paper as Bischoff ’s would have heralded is little in evidence in the literature, either in Todt’s entry or elsewhere. One exception that, while not about Theodore as a primary subject, deals with him extensively in light of the recent scholarship, is a paper by Michael Herren entitled, ‘Scholarly Contacts between the Irish and the Southern English in the Seventh Century.’ The paper is important in many respects, but in this context its significance rests in its acceptance of Stevenson’s attribution of the Laterculus to Theodore, by including it as a part of the evidence for Herren’s investigation into the links between the communities of the title. ‘Closely connected to Lapidge’s oeuvre is Jane Stevenson’s edition of the Laterculus Malalianus, a text which, as we shall see, sets out the teaching of Theodore’s school on questions of chronography and biblical exegesis and makes it possible to pinpoint the nature of disputes with Irish scholars,’ Herren says (pp. 25‒6). The notice that was taken of Stevenson’s work tended to be lumped together – not inappropriately, I think – with either Bischoff ’s and Lapidge’s Biblical Commentaries, or Lapidge’s Archbishop Theodore: Commemorative Studies on his Life and Influence, and consists of a handful of generally positive reviews and a couple of negative ones. While it is not necessary to list them all, whether positive or negative, it might be useful to mention one in particular, lest our acceptance of the Laterculus as a genuine work of Theodore be seen as uncritical. In the December 1996 edition of Notes and Queries (vol. 43, no. 4, p. 457‒50), Michael Winterbottom rather acerbically dissects so much of Stevenson’s work in The School of Archbishop Theodore that it is difficult to keep up with his criticisms. After unequivocally praising the Bischoff-Lapidge effort in Biblical Commentaries (whose mix of textual certitudes, facts established circumstantially, and informed conjecture seems hardly different from Stevenson’s), Winterbottom first takes on the picture

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case, it seems appropriate that Stevenson’s argument for attributing the Laterculus to Theodore should be revisited, if only to corroborate her findings before moving onto the central arguments of this work. It should be noted at the outset that the Laterculus Malalianus is a fascinating text in its own right. Whether it had come to light as an anonymous text, attributable only to a nameless Greek monk labour-

Stevenson builds of Theodore’s work as archbishop, then her translation; ironically concluding nothing directly as to the validity of her argument. As for the translation, while it is true that there are points at which it may be helpful to translate the Latin differently for the purpose of investigating the text for its ideas, whatever weaknesses are present make little difference. Stevenson is seeking to establish authorship; not a Latin masterpiece. The criticism ad linguam may be valid, but it does nothing to establish whether or not The School of Archbishop Theodore is a sound contribution to the scholarship surrounding Theodore. But most perplexing are Winterbottom’s comments on the life of Theodore as discernible from the text. Stevenson asserts nothing about Theodore that Lapidge and Franklin do not assert in their respective works, but when she suggests that Theodore read Virgil in his late sixties, it garners the response: ‘ . . . this is Stevenson’s own view, apparently put forward without irony.’ One last remark may suffice to illustrate the real nature of this review. In the second paragraph, Winterbottom says of the evidence in the Laterculus: ‘It is all somewhat perplexing. The man can barely write Latin; it hardly appears . . . that he was very good at Greek; and it seems from pages 146‒8 that he had difficulty in counting beyond six.’ This last comment is a reference to the form of the ordines Christi found in chapter 19, where it said that the church consecrates six grades of office, then proceeds to list seven grades. But Stevenson, too, notes this discrepancy, and R. Reynolds, in The Ordinals of Christ from their Origins to the Twelfth Century (p. 47), offers a perfectly reasonable explanation. Indeed, the Laterculus was not alone in committing such an ‘error’ in any case. In fact, confusion between the number of grades and the grades themselves might be considered further testimony to the Insular origin of the Laterculus. Joseph Crehan provides, in his article ‘The Seven Orders of Christ,’ that ‘[a] Lambeth MS, which was published by Dom Germain Morin in 1897, gives what is obviously a British version of the seven orders . . . . One might almost suspect that the scribe was an Irishman; for while he calls his list a tradition about the seven orders of Christ, he gives only six,’ pp. 84‒5. Recalling the fact that it is difficult to locate very many works composed in light of the flurry of activity relating to Theodore in the mid-nineteen nineties, we are left with only a handful of reviews. The majority of these are positive, while some of them go so far as to express excitement over the implications of having new texts to work with, including the Laterculus, from the school of Theodore at Canterbury. In spite of the enthusiasm shown by many scholars in the field, however, it has been necessary to consider the criticisms before moving too far forward in working with the text, lest our work be undermined by a weakness in the preliminary argument. The strongest criticisms, however, as represented by Winterbottom’s review, can in no way be seen to undermine either Jane Stevenson’s argument that Theodore is the author of the Laterculus, nor the value of the text in its own right. In fact, it may be said that for all the acidity of the comments, they have both missed the central point of Stevenson’s work, and failed to account for some of the detailed discussion that underpins it.

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ing in seventh century Rome, or as it did – based on a suspicion that it was the product of the hand of one of the most important figures in early medieval Britain – is irrelevant to its nature as a document noteworthy for the array of disparate sources it draws upon, and for the learning it exhibits. It is what Stevenson says it is: a work very much steeped in the traditions of Antioch and the Syriac-speaking East, reflecting the mind of a man who is at once educated and experienced, yet intellectually curious enough to put his hand to something that is not first-nature. Whatever the case, though, it must be clearly stated that the more time spent working with the Laterculus, especially in conjunction with the Canterbury Commentaries, the more plausible Stevenson’s argument for a Theodoran attribution becomes. Her argument, like those of Lapidge for the Canterbury Commentaries and Franklin’s for the Passio s. Anastasii might at first seem circular; but the arguments in favour of each work genuinely strengthen arguments in favour of the others. After ten years of simmering, the whole latterly-identified œuvre can be said to have taken on a most satisfactory flavour.

2.7.6 The Theology of the Text As an extended treatment of the life of Christ, one would expect the theology of the Laterculus to be immediately apparent. Because of its exegetical nature however, the author often becomes sidetracked by detail that obscures his theological point. There are times, in fact, when what he is saying about Christ seems more to be couched in platitudes punctuating long tracts on embryology or number theory than to be represented by any sort of coherent, continuous thought. Such is the case, for example, with chapters twelve through fourteen. Chapter twelve is the point at which Theodore abandons Malalas in favour of his own, entirely original, material. In doing so, his words make for a promising start. ‘Omnia gesta sunt in hominem plenum cum Deo,’100 he asserts, as if seeking to establish his orthodox credentials or pre-empting any possibility of christological misunderstanding. Then, only a few lines down, he seems to digress with a prolonged comment on the gestational period of Christ. But compressed between his opening statement

100

‘All things were done in full humanity with God,’ LM, 12, p. 136/7.

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and this apparent digression is a remarkable declaration as to how things were done ‘in full humanity with God’: ‘nam quod Christus per angelum uirgini nuntiatur ad euacuandum consilium serpentis ad Euam in paradyso . . . ’101 The phrase could almost go unnoticed for the subsequent discussion of gestation, but actually represents the direction of the remainder of the chapter, and the text as a whole. The rest of the sentence extends the parallel he is drawing – that is, of the Virgin Mary as both the new Eve and the virgin soil from which Christ, the new Adam, springs – concluding with a summary of its meaning: that Christ is rerum reparator. It is only when read in light of this reality that the gestational question makes sense. For Christ is being portrayed in embryonic form (kenosis – the first condition of restoration), and the numbers related to that form are being used (in relation to the re-building of the Jerusalem temple by Zerubbabel in the Book of Ezra102) to advance the argument that Christ’s purpose is restorative. The significance of this imagery can hardly be overstated. In light of the fact that it is repeated numerous times throughout the Laterculus, or at least that section of the Laterculus which is wholly Theodore’s, it can fairly be said to represent the dominant christological-soteriological outlook of the work. Moreover, its source can ultimately be identified with Irenaeus,103 whether mediated or unmediated through Ephrem the Syrian or some other figure. Interestingly, the approach the Laterculus takes to the restoration imagery is somewhat underdeveloped compared to the form that same imagery would take in other sources even prior to the seventh century;104 so, for example, a word for restoration is used on at least seven occasions through the course of the work (either restaurare, reparare, or renovare), but not once is the more complex (and more Pauline) word recapitulatio used, even when it is clear that that is what Theodore means.105 101

‘[F]or Christ was announced to [the] virgin by an angel, in order to nullify the counsel of the serpent Eve in paradise,’ LM, 12, p. 136/7. 102 Ezra 1. 103 See below, chapter 4, section 5 and particularly the discussion around n. 108. 104 Jean Daniélou in Sacramentum Futuri, p. 31, points out that the same Irenaean language is applied by Cyril of Jerusalem in a slightly more developed form (see for example PG 33, 796 A-B; 800A), while Athanasius’ appropriation of the language of recapitulation represents the theological fruition of such language. Tertullian, too, picks up the Adam-virgin earth/Christ-virgin Mary parallel from Irenaeus in De carne Christi, 17, and elaborates on it.

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And recapitulatio is what Theodore means through the whole course of the Laterculus. Chapter twelve gives over to thirteen106 where he belabours the gestational parallel with the rebuilding of the temple, and then, by means of the same analogy, draws in that other favourite theme of his, the sex aetates mundi,107 which he then links back to restoration. It could all be very confusing, except that chapter fourteen makes everything clear. Chapter fourteen is, in many respects, the densest section of the text.108 It begins with the exegesis of the nativity story as found in Luke’s gospel: something that, even by Theodore’s time had barely been done.109 Then, drawing on imagery very much reminiscent of Ephrem,110 Theodore comments on the kenotic experience of the Logos. Why? In order to establish the starting point of the work of restoration, different dimensions of which are revealed through the rest of the chapter. The first of these is the hint of medical imagery that concludes the first paragraph. We 105 One reason for this may be something Norman Russell says about the earlier Antiochene fathers concerning the concept of deification – that is, the theological end result of recapitulation: ‘The great Antiochene fathers never use the term ‘deification’ at all. That is not to say they repudiated the Irenaean themes of divine sonship by grace and recapitulation in Christ . . . . But we are gods only in a titular sense. Theodore of Mopsuestia spells this out very clearly. Although the baptized may be called gods, it is only at the resurrection that we will appropriate the divine attributes of immortality and immutability that completes the first spiritual birth of baptism,’ The Doctrine of Deification in the Greek Patristic Tradition, p. 237. It is as if Theodore, in the Laterculus is exhibiting a tradition that is actually three centuries older than his own time. Even his soteriological conclusion in chapter 22 corresponds to Russell’s paradigm. After describing every act of Christ on earth, including the ministry of the church – cast as a simple extension of Christ’s earthly ministry – Theodore concludes: . . . in augmento filiorum Dei peracta sunt, LM, 22, p. 152. 106 LM, 13, p. 138/9. 107 The six ages of the world – that is, the idea that ‘a thousand years is as a day in the sight of God’ – is of great interest to many of the church fathers who emerged from what Jean Daniélou might call the Jewish-Christian theological tradition. (See J. Daniélou, The Theology of Jewish Christianity: The Development of Christian Doctrine before the Council of Nicaea.) It holds important implications for the reckoning of time, as the seventh age (i.e. the Sabbath) was, according to some, the final thousand years of the world before the eschaton. A millenarian concern is something reflected in the Laterculus. 108 For a more detailed analysis of the chapter, see J. Siemens, ‘Christ’s Restoration of Humankind in the Laterculus Malalianus, 14.’ 109 Commenting on Bede’s exegesis of Luke’s nativity narrative, Joseph Kelly mentions Ambrose as a prominent source, but says that ‘ . . . Bede had a virtually free hand in dealing with this section of Luke’s gospel,’ ‘Bede’s exegesis of Luke’s nativity narrative,’ pp. 60‒1. 110 For extensive discussion of this, see below, chapter 3, section 3.

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know from Theodore’s time in Constantinople that he studied medicine, and we have seen that medical questions arise for him even where other commentators might not consider them.111 But Theodore uses medical language on a poetic level as well, always with a view to describing the work of Christ; and that is the case here. After drawing an analogy between the manger in the Bethlehem stable and Christ’s mission of feeding the whole world, Theodore declares: Pannis uero aduoluitur nostras miseries quatiendo, in quibus adibens nobis enplastra nostris uulneribus exibuit medecinam.112 What is significant about this line is how, especially when considered alongside the further medical imagery of chapter nineteen,113 it is evocative of Ephrem the Syrian, for whom soteriological medical imagery is of great importance.114 Of course, this is not to say that Ephrem is somehow exclusive in using medical imagery for Christ in his writing; only that in light of what we can now say about Theodore’s history in relation to Edessa, and the fact that Ephrem is one of only two authorities that he cites by name in the Laterculus, it is probable that Ephrem’s inspiration is what saw him set his technical medical interest in poetic-theological terms.115 But most important of all is how such language speaks of restoration, and it is clear that, in the broader context of chapter fourteen, the Christus medicus figure is central. There is a mingling of imagery in chapter fourteen that does not appear in the remainder of the Laterculus, but that creates a setting in 111 So, for example, the detailed gestational analysis brought to bear on the numerical problem of how long it took to rebuild the temple in chapters twelve and thirteen of the LM; also, the numerous examples in the Canterbury Commentaries, enumerated by Lapidge, pp. 249‒50. 112 ‘He is wrapped in cloths for shaking our miseries, in which, approaching, he showed forth to us medication and plasters for our wounds, LM, 14, p. 140/1. This same text is dealt with at length below, chapter 3, section 2.3. 113 Quod autem infirmitates adque egrotationes nostras sicut reor praedixerat Esias libenter portauerit, et sic per omnia currens quemadmodum gigans per uiam . . . LM, 19, p. 146/7. ‘As I think, Isaiah predicted that he freely carried something of our infirmities and sickness, and running through all things “like a giant on the road” . . . ’ 114 Introduced below, chapter 3, section 1.2, and discussed in detail through the rest of the chapter. 115 Because of the specific aim of this present work, emphasis is placed on the influence of Ephrem on Theodore as the foremost representative of the Syriac theological tradition, and the figure whose soteriological imagery is most consistent with that found in the Laterculus. The further typological motifs identified by Jane Stevenson in The School of Archbishop Theodore (p. 45), however, are of immense importance to note in any further analysis of the Laterculus, for the direction in which they may point in terms of sources, overall character of the work, and specific theological meaning.

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which the rest of the text comfortably sits. This mingling includes the way Theodore works through the remaining details of the nativity, drawing parallels between the shepherds and Christ the good shepherd, with a view to emphasizing their eucharistic ministry; the use of agricultural metaphors like triticum (wheat) for the food offered by God; and the founding of Bethlehem by Jacob as the place where Jews and Gentiles would be made one people.116 All of these images are put forward as a means of which the end is humanity’s restoration; something that may not be immediately apparent unless they are seen in relation to the whole text. For what unfolds in the remaining chapters is something that, at first, seems to be a miscellaneous collection of exegetical statements and motifs, together with secondary christological and soteriological assertions, none of which naturally fit together. It is only when one recognizes the repeated appearance of one of the three words Theodore uses for restoration, like a subtle refrain throughout the text, that it is all drawn together. And then, once the point has been made and summarized, and humanity’s destiny has been laid out before the reader as it is at the end of chapter twenty two, Theodore is free to return to his concern with the ages of the world. For Theodore, restoration means the enjoyment of the Sabbath, as the consummation of the divine operation – the ongoing work of creation and re-creation – the ultimate work of God: Et tunc uere sabbatizabunt iusti cum Domino et diem primam fit octauam in resurrectionem sanctorum.117 That Theodore chose Malalas’ Chronographia as the text he would use to frame his own thoughts on the meaning of Christ’s person and work, then, takes on new significance. For to Theodore, it is precisely the nature of the Incarnation that it should take place in time, and that the restoration affected in the human race should bear some relationship to the ages of that race. That this is the case may partly be seen in Theodore’s use of Theophilus of Antioch in the text. In her enumeration of sources for the Laterculus, Stevenson identifies one Theophilus

116 This particular motif appears to be of great importance, insofar as it says a lot both about Theodore’s familiarity with some aspect of middle eastern life (the real meaning of the word corner-stone), as well as the fact that Ephrem brings the same interpretation to bear on this passage in his Exposition of the Gospel (chap. 6). Irenaeus, too, speaks of the circumcised and the uncircumcised in an identical way in Adv. haer., 3, 3. See Stevenson’s comment on this in The School of Archbishop Theodore, p. 202. 117 ‘And then the just will truly experience the Sabbath with God, and the first day will become the octave of the Resurrection of the saints,’ LM, 24, p. 156/7.

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as he is cited by the original Malaline chronicle in book ten,118 but says of him: ‘The Clement and Theophilus may be Clement, bishop of Alexandria and Theophilus, bishop of Antioch, but no historical work has survived from either writer to set beside his exegetical œuvre.’ She then quotes Hydatius on Theophilus of Alexandria, by way of showing that he, too, composed a chronological table concerned with the date of Easter, and therefore could have been the source to whom John Malalas was referring.119 But whomever it was that Malalas was acknowledging, it seems most likely that Theodore’s Theophilus, whether he knew it or not, was Theophilus of Antioch. The reason for this is related to something Jean Daniélou says about Theophilus’ interest in time, history, and particularly the seventh millennium: The earliest important evidence comes in Theophilus of Antioch. He was one of the first Christian writers to take an interest in the theology of history, and was to influence Irenaeus in the direction. In his recapitulation of the chronology of world history, he fixed the birth of Christ in the year 5500. He makes no direct allusion either to the seven millennia nor to millenarianism; but this figure shows quite definitely that in his view, Christ was born in the middle of the sixth millennium, and this implies that the year 6000 will begin the messianic reign which is to fill the seventh millennium, and that the year 7000 will be the end of the world and the founding of the heavenly city.120

Considering that, since the time of Theophilus (late second century), according to his own estimation, the time of the sixth millennium had ended, Theodore’s statement that [i]gitur expletum est sextum millarium aetatis huius mundi, aetiam quamius contradicant qui hoc percipere nolunt, et septima agit saeculus hic diem sollemnitatis suae frequentiam . . . ,121 takes on an especial poignancy. In this respect, there is a concern with time in the Laterculus that, although by no means entirely original, is profound in nature, and connected in some way to the author’s concern with Christ’s actions. It is a concern that can be traced through a Jewish-Christian tradition, and the way it manifests itself in the Laterculus appears to be filtered This citation is taken over by Theodore’s Laterculus in chapter 1, p. 120/1. The School of Archbishop Theodore, p. 56. 120 J. Daniélou, The Theology of Jewish Christianity, p. 401. 121 LM, 24, p. 154/5. ‘Therefore the six thousands of the age of this world have been fulfilled, even though people may deny it who do not wish to perceive it, and the seventh age brings this day of his solemnity nearer . . . .’ 118 119

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through Irenaeus.122 Suddenly, then, the seemingly random comment in chapter fourteen of the Laterculus, as to the establishment of the location of Bethlehem by Jacob – that is, the site of the Incarnation – as the ‘house of God and the gate of heaven’ where people can come from all different directions, Jew and Gentile, and be united, takes on threefold significance: first, as a Syriac paradisal image of the seventh millennium; second, as a reflection again of subtle, but very real, Irenaean influence; and third, as a connecting motif in which the restoration of humankind, and the fulfilment of God’s cosmic work in creation, meet.

2.8 Conclusion Now, after an extensive introduction to the Laterculus Malalianus, as the source on which this present study is based, a reminder of the evidence to date is in order, as is a brief comment on the state of the scholarship around Theodore. Prior to 1936, virtually nothing was known of Theodore of Tarsus other than what could be determined from the information available in Bede’s Historia, a letter Theodore wrote to King Æthelred about Wilfrid, preserved by Eddius Stephanus,123 and an accolade from Aldhelm in a letter to Heahfrith about Theodore and the school at Canterbury.124 Additionally, Theodore’s name had become associated with a strong penitential tradition even within his lifetime, which was reflected later in the number of iudicia that claimed his authorship and penitentials that drew on his authority. Here, these have been distilled down to the Pœnitentiale Theodori, as edited by Haddan and Stubbs.125 After 1936, when Bernhard Bischoff first unearthed the biblical glosses in Milan’s Biblioteca Ambrosiana, and more particularly 1954, when he 122 According to Daniélou, as well as taking his cue from Theophilus of Antioch, Irenaeus ‘ . . . made a synthesis of the Asiatic tradition of the paradisal millennium and of the Gnostic tradition of the seventh millennium as a time of rest,’ (The Theology of Jewish Christianity, p. 399), referring us to Adv. haer., 5, 28, 3. 123 Available in Haddan and Stubbs, p. 171, and in translation as part of B. Colgrave, The Life of Bishop Wilfrid by Eddius Stephanus. 124 Available as an edition in Aldhelm, Opera Omnia, R. Ehwald, ed., in MGH: Auctores Antiquissimi, 15, and translated by M. Lapidge and M. Herren in Aldhelm: The Prose Works. 125 Haddan and Stubbs, pp. 173‒204, and McNeill’s translation, Medieval Handbooks of Penance, pp. 182‒215.

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announced his discovery, the limits of our knowledge about Theodore would alter radically. This announcement instantly meant that scholars would have to amend what they thought they knew about Theodore’s life. So, for example, the idea that he had studied in Athens, derived as it was from a mistaken supposition of Pope Zacharias in a 748 letter to Boniface,126 would need to be revised as nothing in the commentaries indicated this was so. A picture of Theodore that typifies perceptions of him ‘pre-Wendepunkte’ might be David Farmer’s entry on him in the Oxford Dictionary of Saints.127 By contrast, Klaus-Peter Todt’s entry in the Biographisch-Bibliographisches Kirchenlexikon is interesting for having been written in 1996,128 and so showing knowledge of Bischoff ’s work but none of the scholarship immediately preceding Todt’s own, as spearheaded by Michael Lapidge and including Jane Stevenson. It shows what might have been the state of scholarship had nothing happened in the nineteen nineties by way of furthering Bischoff ’s efforts. Then, in the nineteen nineties, there was a flurry of work in the wake of a symposium which met by way of commemorating the thirteen-hundredth anniversary of the death of Theodore, at which numerous scholars came together to deliver papers covering some or other aspect of the archbishop’s life.129 These papers were published in 1995, but not before Bischoff ’s and Lapidge’s critical edition of the Canterbury Commentaries had been published,130 including the first biography of Theodore based on all the known information about him that could be determined from the commentaries, along with the other works that had come to light in the years immediately preceding the symposium. Soon thereafter, Stevenson’s work on the Laterculus Malalianus also came out in critical edition,131 and the field of Theodore studies had a trinity of volumes, including two that contained entirely new (or newly reclaimed) texts, from which to begin further work. Since that time, however, little has been done. Carmela Vircillo Franklin has recently published her findings on the Passio s. Anastasii in a new volume entitled, The Latin dossier of Anastasius the Persian: Hagiographic Transla-

See above, chapter 1, n. 14. Cited above, chapter 1, n. 4. 128 See this chapter, n. 99. 129 This is recorded in the preface to Archbishop Theodore, p. vii. 130 First published in 1994. 131 Published in 1995. 126 127

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tions and Transformations,132 and Theodore’s name has appeared in various papers published in Hugoye, a journal of Syriac studies, often as one of the figures responsible for the transmission of Ephrem’s work in the Latin West.133 Further, this author has published two papers in recent times, both dealing explicitly with the christological terms of the Laterculus,134 but I am aware of nothing beyond this. In spite of the importance of the new texts that have emerged in the last two decades then, and the remarkable complexity and depth of the Laterculus, there is little to report on the scholarship at the present time. There is a body of evidence strong enough from which to launch much more extensive enquiries into the nature of Theodore’s thought generally; but for now we will be content with examining the Laterculus Malalianus for what it has to say about the person and work of Christ.

PIMS, 2004. See, for example, J. Stevenson, ‘Ephraim the Syrian in Anglo-Saxon England’; D. Ganz, ‘Knowledge of Ephraim’s Writings in the Merovingian and Carolingian Age’; and A. Palmer, ‘The Influence of Ephraim the Syrian’. 134 J. Siemens, ‘The Christology of Theodore of Tarsus in the Laterculus Malalianus’ and ‘The Restoration of Humankind in the Laterculus Malalianus, 14’. 132 133

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3.1 Places, people, and themes It can be said that, with the 1994 publication of Bernhard Bischoff’s and Michael Lapidge’s edition of the biblical commentaries from the Canterbury school, century-old speculation over the possible influence of Ephrem the Syrian on the English church was vindicated, and the door opened wide for others to assert more confidently the Syriac connections present in Bede and other early mediaeval Insular Latin literature.2 This is certainly the case with the Laterculus Malalianus. In her edition of the text, Jane Stevenson exposes the necessity of appraising the Syriac tradition in the process of understanding Theodore’s christology. In doing so, she evinces numerous indications that the archbishop’s mind was

1

For the purposes of this work, I will follow Robert Murray’s convention of employing the adjective ‘Syriac’ not just for the language, but for the people and churches who used it regardless of location, as opposed to ‘Syrian’, which denotes both Syriac speakers and Greeks who lived and wrote in Syria. See R. Murray, Symbols of Church and Kingdom: A Study in Early Syriac Tradition, p. 3. 2 For a history of this issue, see W. Peterson, ‘Ephrem Syrus and the Venerable Bede: Do East and West Meet?’, pp. 443‒452. Petersen introduces his subject with reference to J. Rendell Harris, who, as early as 1895, raised the possibility of there having been some contact between Ephrem and Bede via an unknown source.

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dedicated to imagery derived directly from his experience of Edessa – the cradle of Syriac Christianity – with particular regard for Ephrem the Syrian.3 I suggest that, as the imagery Theodore takes from Ephrem – to be redeployed in the Laterculus – is evaluated theologically, what emerges is a construct in which Ephrem’s subtle christology is drawn out, and the relationship it bears to the soteriology of Irenaeus of Lyons4 established and developed. To appreciate the Syriac influence on Theodore and the Laterculus, then, may be to appreciate Ephremic colour added to Irenaean lines. But because it exercises such a significant influence on Theodore’s thought, we must become more familiar with at least some aspects of the Syriac tradition, and come to understand what it meant to the sometime archbishop of Canterbury. Even while popular conceptions of the historic church tend to identify two parties – the Latin West and the Greek East – at work in the years when theological and spiritual traditions are being coagulated across the Christian world,5 the increasing quantity and quality of material available on the nature of the Church in Syria through the same period should serve to expand this insufficient rendering of church history.6 A happy result of revived interest in Theodore is that it actually forces a redress of the situation, in that in his own person, 3 Michael Lapidge investigates Theodore’s Syriac background as part of his introduction to the archbishop in Biblical Commentaries, pp. 27‒37. It is here that the case around Theodore’s acquaintance with the Syriac tradition is laid out, as it arises both from the text of the commentaries itself, and the circumstances surrounding Theodore’s life. 4 Theological links between Ephrem and Irenaeus have been pointed out by other scholars before, but as far as I can tell, these have not been examined in any detail. Of particular interest to us here is Joseph Crehan’s suggestion in his article, ‘The Seven Orders of Christ,’ pp. 81‒93, that Irenaeus’ idea of the five ages of humankind recapitulated in Christ, is paralleled in the work of ‘the unknown Egyptian monk who would have [Christ] sanctify, by sharing them, the five orders of the Church’ (p. 82), and whose work in turn is taken up by a Latin commentator who ascribes it to Ephrem. This Latin commentator has since been shown to be Theodore. See the discussion on ordines Christi, below, sections 1.6 and 2.1, and again in chapter 4, section 3. 5 S. Brock, ‘The Syriac Background’ in AT, p. 30. 6 Sidney Griffith says in a Hugoye article dealing specifically with Ephrem, entitled ‘A Spiritual Father for the Whole Church: The Universal Appeal of St Ephraem the Syrian’, that ‘[t]he modern publication of the Syriac works of Ephraem has been accompanied by a crescendo in the number of studies devoted to them, and to his life and thought more generally. The effect of all this attention has been gradually to bring Ephraem’s Syriac works into the mainstream of modern patristic scholarship, although one can even now consult the index of too many studies of early Christian thought in areas on which he wrote extensively and still not find a mention of his name’ p. 2. Robert Murray comments on the ‘ . . . exponential growth of Syriac studies in recent years,’ in the preface to Symbols of Church and Kingdom, ix.

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Theodore represents the three major church traditions, bearing the lesser known of the three to the West in tandem with his native Greek. To begin with, it has been suggested that the obvious, empirical influence of the Syriac tradition on Theodore may be limited to a superficial acquaintance with the language, a possible sojourn to Edessa, and the use of a selection of both the authentic and pseudoEphremic canon.7 If this is the case, and Theodore’s engagement with Syriac sources is confined to these areas, then it really is no wonder; by Theodore’s time, Syriac Christianity had experienced a series of schisms that had not only rent the cloth of unity, but limited any appeal to catholic Syriac sources to the period before the Nestorian schism that followed the Council of Ephesus in 431.8 And as we see elsewhere, it is one of Theodore’s main concerns that he should remain well within the bounds of orthodoxy.9 In light of this, it is 7 All such biographical details about Theodore are assumed from Lapidge, Biblical Commentaries, pp. 27‒37. Theodore’s appeals to Ephrem or Syriac life are made in both the Canterbury Commentaries and the Laterculus, and are discussed by Lapidge and Stevenson respectively. As for his knowledge of the Syriac language, Theodore himself gives the Syriac etymology for certain words in the course of the Canterbury Commentaries (EvII 58, 70, and 72). 8 Sebastian Brock, in his article entitled ‘The Syriac Background’, p. 30, identifies three distinct communities of Syriac Christians in existence in Theodore’s time: the Syrian Orthodox, who rejected the council of Chalcedon (AD 451); the Church of the East, who rejected the Council of Ephesus (AD 431); and the Syriac-speaking Chalcedonian communities, who themselves would split into two groups (the dyothelete Melkites and monothelete Maronites) following the Second Council of Constantinople (AD 680). It is important to note that the picture Brock presents in this paper of seventh-century Christianity in eastern Syria – that is, the Syriac tradition of Theodore of Tarsus’ time – is one of a literary culture, Syriac in language, philhellenic in nature, flourishing even in the face of first Persian, then Arab, attack (p. 32). This being the case, we can only speculate as to why Theodore did not draw on contemporary Syriac culture, although it would be reasonable to assume that, wanting to remain orthodox, his interest in Syriac texts was limited to those whose orthodoxy was undisputed. Further, what we assume was Theodore’s limited facility with the Syriac language would have diminished his ability to discern between what was sound and unsound without appeal to tradition. 9 See, for example, the words at the beginning of chapter 12 of the Laterculus: Omnia gesta sunt in hominem plenum cum Deo. ‘All things were done in full humanity with God.’ LM, 12, p. 136/7. These words may have been written as an assertion of orthodoxy in response to the monothelete controversy that was so fresh in the second half of the seventh century, especially from one who had emerged from an immediate context of controversy. A remark made in the Canterbury Commentaries supports this: Quia aliquando etiam per humanitatem fecit. ‘Because sometimes Jesus did these things through his humanity,’ Biblical Commentaries, 408/9. Bede’s statement in HegA 4, 1, that Hadrian was asked to accompany Theodore to Canterbury partly out of concern for the Greek’s orthodoxy, if accurate, would have given Theodore reason to want to prove the soundness of his own thought on christological matters.

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probably accurate to say that the Syriac church we are speaking about in relation to Theodore of Tarsus is limited to the community of Christians who lived and wrote in the Euphrates Valley before the middle of the fifth century.

3.1.1 The Syriac Church Geographically, the Syriac church was centred in Edessa, but ranged the length of the Euphrates Valley, and so included numerous communities representing the Jewish diaspora, which may be one of its chiefest characteristics.10 In any case, it certainly reflects a different intellectual temperament and rhetorical style than the Greek tradition to which it was physically closest. Robert Murray says of the early Syriac writers: ‘[T]heir purposes were not necessarily the same as ours, and we will fail in our purpose if we impose a pattern alien to their thought. The Western mind looks for a ’logical’ order. But the ideas and thought-processes of Semitic writers (at least before the later Syriac writers) are not to be rendered in categories that go back to the Greek philosophical method. Our authors are typically Semitic in the way they order their matter.’11

Murray goes on to attempt ‘. . . to locate the fourth-century Syriac Fathers in relation to earlier Christian, Gnostic, and Jewish literature and even to earlier Mesopotamian traditions.’12 Francis Burkitt’s picture of the early Syriac Church is consistent with this one, if speculative in its detail.13 He includes in his description the idea that a Jewish colony may have settled at Edessa, having in their possession a translation of the Hebrew Scriptures. At an unknown date, a Christian missionary by the name of Addai came to this colony and converted most of the population, as well as some of the surrounding non-Jews. But this new Christian community had no New Testament. It relied solely on the Law, the Prophets, and oral transmission of the apostolic teaching about Jesus. Rather, it took a 10

The ways in which the Jewish diaspora influenced the Syriac church is discussed by Murray in Symbols, pp. 17‒19. 11 R. Murray, Symbols, 2 (emphasis mine). That the Semitic character of Syriac tradition is remarked upon in every major work on the subject, recommends it as an factor of significance when considering how the tradition differed from the neighbouring Greek. 12 Symbols, p. 3. 13 Burkitt admits as much. See Early Eastern Christianity, pp. 39‒41, 78.

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generation for a New Testament to appear, and when it did, it took the form of a Syriac translation of Tatian’s harmony of the gospels, called the Diatessaron. Without having to compete against other versions, the Diatessaron became established in the minds of Syriac Christians as the pre-eminent gospel source for both instruction and devotion. Then, around the year 200, a reforming bishop named Palut introduced a proper version of the New Testament as part of an attempt to bring his church into line with the greater catholic church. It seems, however, that while the New Testament he imported was used in an official capacity, the Diatessaron continued to be used for devotional purposes until the fifth century.14 What this picture reveals to us is that the Syriac tradition from which Theodore’s influences emerge is slightly eccentric in nature when compared to the orthodox tradition within the Greek East and the Latin West, and that even its foundational texts differ in content and nature from those used by the rest of the church. Interestingly, however, as the Syriac church divided up in the years following 431 along Antiochene and Alexandrian christological lines, all parties continued to make appeal to the same versions of Scripture and express reverence for the same spiritual fathers, such as Aphrahat and Ephrem.15 Yet as intriguing a picture as we are presented with in Syria before the mid-fifth century, two figures in particular stand out and demand that we should become better acquainted. In his magisterial work on early Syriac Christianity, Robert Murray says of Aphrahat and Ephrem: ‘. . . our two main authors [. . .] can speak for themselves without a detailed historical backdrop, and also teach us much about their culture. . . .’16 As Murray’s work unfolds, it is clear that of the themes in early Syriac tradition he deals with, all are most thoroughly 14 This paragraph is a summary of Burkitt’s account of early Syriac ecclesiastical history as presented in Early Eastern Christianity, pp. 75‒78. 15 In terms of Scripture texts, the Peshitta Old Testament – that is, the version of the Old Testament used by Syriac Christians before the second-half of the fifth century – does not cease to be used after the death of Rabbula (bishop of Edessa from 411 to 435), but rather, as Burkitt tells us, has ‘remained in continuous possession. [It] is quoted by Syriac writers of every class, and used liturgically by every Syriac-speaking sect,’ Early Eastern Christianity, p. 52. Likewise, Murray says of the work of Aphrahat and Ephrem discussed within his book that ‘ . . . it never was a subject of controversy; it is shared by all Syriac Christians as much in the eighth century as in the fourth,’ Symbols, p. 37. 16 Symbols, p. 9.

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represented in one of the two fathers individually, or both of them together. As for Aphrahat, we know little about his life except that Murray dates him to somewhere between 270 and 345.17 Aphrahat’s writings, the Demonstrations, permit a certain personal intimacy with him,18 being, at least in part, a series of homilies written in response to a friend’s enquiries.19 He is spoken of warmly by modern scholars,20 and what he proffers in terms of images for Christ is reflective of his own pastoral interests.21 Ultimately though, one is forced to concede to Aphrahat’s approximate contemporary, Ephrem, the higher place of thematic comprehensiveness and catholic profile.22 It is actually impossible to talk about Theodore’s knowledge of Syriac Christianity without referring at length to Ephrem, said to be ‘[a]mong the early Syriac writers, [. . .] doubtless the greatest,’23 and called in one place, ‘the intellectual Euphrates of the Church.’24

3.1.2 Ephrem The name of Ephrem looms large over the study of Syriac literature in the fourth century, while recognition of him as a spiritual authority

Symbols, p. 29. Symbols, p. 29. 19 A. Shemunkasho, Healing in the Theology of Saint Ephrem, p. 45. 20 Namely Robert Murray in Symbols, p. 29, and Francis C. Burkitt in Early Eastern Christianity, p. 121. 21 For example, Syriac references to penance and both Christ’s and the apostles’ prerogative to forgive sins. Murray says: ‘Aphrahat has no doubt about the reality of the spiritual authority which Christ has given to his Church, but he seems most impressed by the horror of seeing a man set in Christ’s place and abusing that authority. Dem. XIV contains pages of sorrowful anger at unmerciful and corrupt use of the power of ‘binding’. There are ecclesiastics who abuse their spiritual authority arbitrarily and irresponsibly . . .’ Symbols, p. 186. 22 No serious account of Syriac tradition would be possible without extensive coverage of the way it is embodied by Ephrem. Even when authors such as Francis Burkitt express their distaste for the fourth-century poet, they can hardly escape his mention in discussion of any major Syriac theme. Certainly in Murray’s Symbols, Ephrem either dominates the survey of almost every theme in the book or, at most, shares the attention with Aphrahat. The proliferation of Ephrem’s authentic writings, however, and even those spuriously attributed to him, attests to his being the prevailing Syriac figure on the whole Christian church, East and West. 23 A. Shemunkasho, Healing in the Theology of Saint Ephrem, p. 2. 24 Andrew Palmer opens his paper, ‘The Influence of Ephraim the Syrian’ with these words, to which he appends the information that they come from an anonymous speech in praise of Ephrem, discussed by David Taylor and Sebastian Brock in Hugoye, and found at col. 824A of vol. 46 of PG. 17 18

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extends well beyond.25 Both a reason for this high regard, and a result of it, is that the writings he genuinely left behind are profuse in number, while those spuriously attributed to him make his canon appear even more extensive. His writings are comprised mainly of hymns and homilies in verse, along with prose commentaries on the Scriptures, including commentaries on Genesis, Exodus, and the Diatessaron Gospel. Murray says that ‘[h]is dates (c. 306‒73) make him the father of Syriac exegesis.’26 Yet for all his obvious importance, Ephrem is not without his detractors. Perhaps it is a condition of such a profile as his, but Ephrem’s poetic legacy has elicited hostile reactions from some quarters.27 In any case, the importance of Ephrem the Syrian, the fourth century deacon and most prolific Syriac writer of the period, can hardly be overstated. Along with Aphrahat, he represents the most important aspects of his tradition, and serves as the conduit by which

25 For a discussion on the importance of Ephrem to the whole Church through history, see Hugoye, vol. 1, no. 2, and vol. 2, no. 1, editions dedicated to Ephrem’s influence. A summary of the topic can be found in Andrew Palmer’s paper, ‘The Influence of Ephraim the Syrian,’ in the second of these volumes. 26 R. Murray, Symbols, p. 31. 27 Burkitt says of Ephrem, for example: ‘What has given S. Ephraim his magnificent reputation is hard to say. According to his biographer he is to be accredited with the honour of having invented the Controversial Hymn, a rather melancholy addition to public worship. His interest to modern scholars arises from the fact that a Syriac writer of the fourth century, whose works are voluminous and well preserved, cannot help affording us many curious glimpses into the life and thought of the Church to which he belongs. But it is a weary task, gleaning the grains of wheat from the chaff. Ephraim is extremely prolix, he repeats himself again and again, and for all the immense mass of material there seems very little to take hold of. His style is as allusive and unnatural as if the thought was really deep and subtle, and yet when the thought is unravelled, it is generally commonplace,’ Early Eastern Christianity, pp. 95‒6. Murray acknowledges this criticism, but says that neither Burkitt nor his fellow critic, J. B. Segal, show ‘. . . any feel either for [Ephrem’s] word-music or for his almost infinitely rich and imaginative symbolism, both biblical and original.’ He continues: ‘Personally I do not hesitate to evaluate Ephrem not only as the true ancestor of Romanos and therefore of the Byzantine Kontakion, but “as the greatest poet of the patristic age and, perhaps, the only theologian-poet to rank beside Dante” ’ Symbols, p. 32. In this author’s opinion, Murray’s generous claim for Ephrem’s importance is more apt than the criticism cited above. To dismiss Ephrem’s thought as ‘commonplace’ is to do a great disservice to the study of christology by effectively dismissing the soteriological implications of Ephrem’s favourite themes. Ironically, Burkitt is able to identify these implications, but seems unable to recognize their significance, when he says: ‘According to S. Ephraim, the object of the Incarnation, the taking of the Manhood into God, was that Christians might incorporate the Divine into their Manhood’ Early Eastern Christianity, p. 103.

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the rest of the church catholic would come to know something of that tradition. And so it is to Ephrem’s themes in particular, as the most obvious Syriac source for Theodore of Tarsus, that we will turn. As might be expected from one whose works are so voluminous, the actual themes and concerns covered by Ephrem are manifold. In this context, however, we are concerned with only a few of them: particularly those that correspond to the Laterculus.28 First and foremost is the image that Ephrem invokes very often for Christ, and which has implications for his apostles as well: that of Christus medicus, or Christ the physician. This is an image common to the whole Syriac tradition, and is particularly discernible in Aphrahat; but it is described by Murray as ‘. . .Ephrem’s favourite title of all for Christ,’29 and is certainly most closely associated with him. It is also an image that figures significantly in the Laterculus, as well as in other works belonging to Theodore,30 and its soteriological implications are immense. Following that, there is the agricultural theme with its images of the labourer (or farmer), grain and wheat, the grape, the vine, and its product, wine. Again, this theme has a history in Syriac culture, but is taken up most distinctly by Ephrem. In some respects, it is related to the medicus imagery, and like the medicus imagery, much can be 28 In addition to the themes under consideration, there are textual characteristics belonging to Ephrem’s work that warrant further examination for the relationship they might bear to the Laterculus. One such characteristic is identified by Andrew Palmer in ‘The Influence of Ephraim the Syrian’, when discussing the first section of the Homily of Our Lord. The way in which Ephrem is noted to have rounded off this section of the homily, by returning at the end to language he has used at the very beginning, is remarked upon by Palmer as being significant. It is a device also employed by Theodore of Tarsus in the Laterculus, and which is mentioned in J. Siemens, ‘Christ’s Restoration of Humankind in the Laterculus Malalianus, 14’, pp. 18‒28. Clearly, concluding a passage using the same language with which it was begun may be considered a common rhetorical technique, but its similar use by Ephrem and Theodore may also signal a close affinity between them on another level. 29 R. Murray, Symbols, p. 200. Aho Shemunkasho sheds new light on the subject of Christus medicus, in his substantial work, Healing in the Theology of Saint Ephrem. 30 The author of the Laterculus is clearly interested in medicine. The exegesis of chapter 13, for example, employs a mix of number theory and medicine to establish Christ as restorer of the temple. More important for our current subject, though, is the allusion in chapter 14 to Christ the physician, who ‘shows forth medication and plasters for our wounds’, p. 141, and that which opens chapter 19, where it says that ‘ . . . Isaiah predicted that he freely carried something of our infirmities and sickness’, p. 147. Stevenson also reminds us of references to Christus medicus in a letter from Theodore to Æthelred (Haddan and Stubbs, p. 171), as well as in the preface to the Pœnitentiale, (Haddan and Stubbs, pp. 173‒4). She discusses Theodore’s medical interests further in chapter 4 of The School of Archbishop Theodore, pp 47‒55.

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understood about Christ and the apostles in light of it. Finally, however, there is the pastoral image of Christ as the shepherd, through which we not only learn about Christ, but his mission as extended through the apostles. All of these images we find sitting comfortably side by side in the words of Ephrem himself: Blessed be the Shepherd who became a Lamb for our reconcilement! Blessed the Branch who became a Cup for our redemption! Blessed also be the Cluster, Fount of medicine of life! Blessed also be the Tiller, who became Wheat, that he might be sown; and a Sheaf, that he might be cut!31

Meanwhile, it may be that the relationship between Ephrem’s various images hinges on his understanding of Christ’s priesthood, and if so, then Theodore’s attribution of a version of the ordines Christi to Ephrem in the Laterculus is at least thematically justifiable, even if no actual Ephremic source has been located for it.32 Together, then, these themes either figure very prominently in the work of Ephrem, or, with respect to the ordines Christi, derive somehow from him. Importantly for our study, they are also the themes that find a place in the work of Theodore, and so they will be examined in greater detail.

3.1.3 Ephremic Themes: Christ the Physician Aho Shemunkasho has produced a recent, substantial study on the theology of healing in the work of Ephrem.33 His premise is that the language of healing and sickness, with Christ as physician, is central to Ephrem, and that to understand this idea is to understand the nature of salvation according to the Syriac father. He gives this summary: The cause of spiritual sickness is sin that is the result of the misuse of man’s free will and the influence of man’s enemy, i.e. Satan, the Evil One. Ephrem understands Adam and Eve’s expulsion from Paradise as a ‘Fall’ into a state of sickness. God provides heavenly medicine for

Ephrem, Hymns on the Nativity, 2, 15, NPNF, ser. 2, vol. 13, p. 228. See below for a thorough discussion of the ordines Christi, including what they are and what they mean as a motif. Stevenson says of the version of the ordines in the Laterculus, that Theodore’s reasons for noting its similarity to that of a late patristic eastern ordinal, are ‘. . . corroborated by the most recent studies of the ordinals as a genre’ in the commentary on the LM, note 177, p. 214. 33 First referred to at note 19, above. 31 32

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humanity, first through His chosen people, the patriarchs and the prophets, and then through His Son Who is the Physician par excellence and the Medicine of Life that is also present in the Church’s sacraments for the faithful.34

If this description of Ephrem’s understanding of salvation is accurate, what makes it so remarkable is how creative he has been in developing it. Christ as medicus is an image employed by numerous commentators before and after Ephrem, and yet none of his predecessors or contemporaries appear to apply it in precisely the same way and with the same complexity.35 In Ephrem’s medical depiction of salvation, there is no explicit participation of the individual in their own woundedness; rather he portrays humankind as the general sufferer from an illness that has come about by various means, and whose cure is Christ the physician in himself and in the sacraments of the church. Shemunkasho describes Ephrem’s physician this way: ‘Since the function of this Physician, par excellence, is not just the healing of the individual, but of the whole of mankind, Ephrem presents Hi00m as the Physician of “all”, of “us”, of “humanity”, and of all “sinners” and wounded.’36

3.1.4 Agricultural Imagery Related to the medicus image is Ephrem’s agricultural language which speaks of Christ as farmer (or labourer), and so includes mention of the produce of the land, such as wheat, bread, the grape, and the vine. Sometimes the relationship between this multi-faceted agricultural imagery and the more singular medical imagery is explicit, and sometimes it can be discerned only by tracing the implied connections 34

A. Shemunkasho, Healing, from the preface, xv-xvi. Comparing, for example, Augustine’s use of spiritual healing as a metaphor for Christ’s work to Ephrem’s, there is a difference both in terms of who the patient is, and of what it is they need to be healed. Augustine explicitly defines his use of the metaphor when he says, ‘. . . whenever God [. . .] spiritually heals the sick or raises the dead, that is, justifies the ungodly, and whenever he has brought him to perfect health, in other words, to the fullness of life and righteousness . . . God, therefore, heals us not only that he may blot out the sin which we have committed, but, furthermore, that he may enable us even to avoid sinning’ (italics mine), On Nature and Grace, 29, NPNF ser. 1, vol. 5, p. 130. In other words, for Augustine, the patient is every individual sinner, and what they need to be healed of is each individual sin, while that which it leads to is justification. There is a strong moral element in Augustine’s healing imagery. This contrasts significantly with Ephrem, for whom the patient is humankind as a race, and for whom the malady is humankind’s fallen state. P.C.J. Eijkenboom explores Augustine’s use of Christus medicus in Het Christus-Medicusmotief in de preken van Sint Augustinus, Assen, 1960. 36 A. Shemunkasho, Healing, p. 135. 35

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between Ephrem’s understanding of the apostolic ministry as an extension of Christ’s own, and the healing nature of the eucharistic elements, derived as they are from the fruits of the earth, and administered by the apostles. Shemunkasho identifies the connection with regard to Ephrem’s use of the term ‘medicines’ or ‘pigments’. He says, ‘In Virg 37.3, Ephrem speaks of three medicines through which the Lord “bound up our sickness”: “wheat, the olive and grapes”.’37 While Ephrem’s meaning is normally clear when he uses one of his metaphors in a particular phrase, when the agricultural theme is spread widely across various passages, and expressed in different language, it may be possible to miss his christological purpose. It is helpful, then, to plot the ways in which Ephrem’s agricultural metaphors are used. In hymn six of Ephrem’s Hymns on Paradise, stanzas seven and eight provide an example of agricultural language mixed with that of healing: God planted the fair garden, He built the pure Church; Upon the Tree of Knowledge He established the injunction. He gave joy, but they took no delight, He gave admonition, but they were unafraid. In the Church, he implanted The Word Which causes rejoicing with its promises, Which causes fear with its warnings: He who despises the Word, perishes, He who takes warning lives. The assembly of saints Bears resemblance to Paradise: In it each day is plucked The fruit of Him who gives life to all; In it, my brethren, is trodden The cluster of grapes, to be the Medicine of Life. The serpent is crippled and bound By the curse, While Eve’s mouth is sealed With a silence that is beneficial but it also serves once again as a harp to sing the praises of her Creator.38 A. Shemunkasho, Healing, p. 146. Ephrem, Hymns on Paradise, Hymn 6, stanzas 7 & 8, translated by S. Brock in Ephrem the Syrian, Hymns on Paradise, p. 111. 37 38

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In these lines, God is the planter of the garden, and the church represents his people in the garden who fail to take heed of him. In the church, God implants Christ, the Word, which means that now, the Word is both the means by which the garden is created, and a part of the garden itself. Because of the Word’s presence, the church can be compared to paradise, and the Word who abides there a source of food (the fruit which is plucked). This fruit, called ‘grapes’, is trodden to become the ‘Medicine of Life’, which would be the eucharistic blood of Christ. At this point, however, no mention is made of Christ the farmer, or labourer, in the garden, nor is anything said of his apostles. But this image, too, is very much a part of the agricultural theme as expressed by Ephrem. In the Carmina Nisibena, for example, he says: My Farmer, plough my lands, And again and a third time, Lord! Just as by a three-fold action Thou has baptized and brought to life The soil of our souls, The church of our spirits! So did the Apostles, twice and a third time, They sowed and reaped; And from that same crop [the increase] Has continued to come down. It has grown rich and filled the earth With the treasures of teaching.39

Together, these representative words make it clear that, in Ephrem’s writings, God the Word is both the gardener and the garden. He is both a labourer in the garden and fruit of the garden. His purpose is the restoration of those whom he has set in the garden, and as such he makes himself the medicine of life under the guise of the fruit of the garden, which is both the trodden grape (wine), or the bread of life. Tanios Bou Mansour reflects this in his own discussion of the agricultural imagery in Ephrem40 (in this case, the metaphor of wheat): Ephrem, Carmina Nisibena, 29, 35‒36, translated by R. Murray, in Symbols, p. 196. These lines in particular are referred to: ‘O Fairest Ear of corn / which grew among the hateful tares / and gave the Bread of Life / without labour to the hungry / It undid the curse / with which Adam was bound / who had eaten with sweat / the bread of pain and thorns / Blessed is he who eats / of that Bread of blessing / and makes the curse pass from him,’ from ‘A Hymn of St Ephrem to Christ’, 14, R. Murray, trans., in Eastern Churches Review, vol. 1, no. 1, 1979, p. 43. 39

40

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. . . Ce renvoi peut même remonter plus loin, jusqu’à Adam, si l’on envisage l’effet qu’ont eu les épis dans la terre de l’ivraie; ceux-ci ont délié Adam de la malediction, suivant laquelle il devait manger son pain à la sueur de son front, et ils ont donné sans effort un pain de vie aux affamés (Virg 31, 14). On comprendrait par là que le pain nouveau est un pain qui vient se substituer au pain adamique devant être obtenu par l’effort, et qui rassasie gratuitement la faim de l’humanité.41

Finally, God the Word manifests this ministry to the whole garden by means of his apostles. Ephrem thus conveys, in agricultural imagery, a unified understanding of Christ and the Church that reflects an advanced soteriology and deep sacramentalism.

3.1.5 Christ the Good Shepherd The third of Ephrem’s images that we are concerned about is that of Christ as the good shepherd, with its associated figures. This is an image that coheres quite naturally with the medical and agricultural metaphors Ephrem uses, except that it extends Christ’s ministry through the apostles more explicitly than do the others. As we have seen, among the examples of Ephrem’s use of the agricultural theme, there are clear occasions when the work that Christ the farmer has set about is shared with the apostles. In addition to the lines cited above from Carmina Nisibena is Ephrem’s explicit statement from Against the Heresies: ‘The twelve Apostles were the farmers of the whole world . . .’;42 yet for all the clarity of such a statement, Christ the good shepherd appears in Ephrem as having more obvious qualities to share with his disciples than does Christ the farmer or Christ the produce of the land. Murray says of Ephrem simply that he ‘. . . applies the figure of Shepherd to Christ, the Apostles and bishops in a traditional way.’ That he does can be seen in the third of the Hymns on the Nativity, for example, when he says of Christ, ‘. . . the Shepherd of all became a Lamb in the flocks,’43 and again in the figures of Moses and Adam, who both prefigure Christ’s role as shepherd, in the Homily on our Lord 44 and the Commentary on Genesis45 respectively. At last, how such language is extended to the apostles (and their successors, the bishops), is plainly seen in the Nisibene T. Bou Mansour, La Pensée Symbolique de saint Ephrem le Syrien, p. 390. Ephrem, HcHaer. 23, 1, in R. Murray, Symbols, p. 197. 43 On the Nativity, Hymn 3, NPNF, ser. 2, vol. 13, p. 232. 44 Homily on our Lord, 18, NPNF, ser. 2, vol. 13, p. 312. 45 Commentary on Genesis, 9, S. Brock, trans., Hymns on Paradise, p. 203. 41 42

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Hymns, as it relates to Abraham, bishop of Nisibis. Ephrem says: ‘I will speak of the shepherd, under him who has become head of the flock; who was disciple of the Three, and has become our fourth master. . .’46

3.1.6 Christ the priest Even as Ephrem revered the scriptures as a whole,47 his choice of scriptural titles for Christ was quite selective, and the appellation for Christ found in the epistle to the Hebrews – that of high priest – is not one that explicitly appears very often in his work.48 But in stanza thirteen of hymn thirteen of the Hymns on Paradise, Ephrem writes: Samson is a type of the death of Christ the High Priest: Samson’s death returns prisoners to their towns, whereas the High Priest’s death has returned us to our heritage. Let us repeat to each other the good news in joy, that the gate is once again open, and happy is he who enters in quickly. Blessed is He who has not made us outlaws never to return.49

For the lack of attention paid to this formal title, however, it can not be said that Ephrem has no interest in the priestly aspect of Christ’s work. Rather, it appears that when all the images are added together, and especially when they are considered alongside Ephrem’s interest in

Ephrem, Nisibene Hymns, 17, 1, NPNF, ser. 2, vol. 13, p. 186. In hymn 6 of the Hymns on Paradise, Ephrem calls Scripture ‘ . . . the book of creation, the treasure house of the Ark, the crown of the Law,’ and he says, ‘This is a book which, above its companions, has in its narrative made the Creator perceptible and transmitted His actions . . . . Scripture brought me to the gate of Paradise,’ stanzas 1‒2. S. Brock, trans., Hymns on Paradise, pp. 108‒9. 48 Perhaps due to its Jewish origins, the Syriac tradition is peculiar in its desire to link the priesthood of Christ to that of Aaron, via John the Baptist. While the idea appears across the tradition, once again it is Ephrem who gives it its most explicit expression. In fact, Murray declares this to be the only really important feature of the Syriac tradition’s – and particularly Ephrem’s – use of the priestly title for Christ, and he cites Ephrem’s HcHaer. 22, 19 to illustrate this (Symbols, pp. 178‒9). 49 Ephrem, Hymns on Paradise, 13, 13, in S. Brock, Hymns on Paradise, pp. 173‒4. 46 47

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the apostolic ministry and succession,50 the idea of Christ’s priesthood is paramount to him. If the precise language of high priesthood is not used for Christ as frequently as other language, it is not for lack of attention to the idea. Priesthood permeates all that Ephrem writes. If the sources for Christ’s priesthood are confusing in the Syriac tradition,51 the function of that priesthood is less so. Its ontological reality is treated by Ephrem in, for example, the Homily on our Lord,52 but its soteriological reality is manifest in every symbol for Christ employed by the poet. For Ephrem, it is not enough that Christ heals. The healing he brings is healing that reconciles humanity with God and sees the race returned to its proper place in paradise. It is not enough that Christ should represent an idea in the form of a shepherd, or a vine, or a sheaf of wheat. Rather, ‘[a]ccording to S. Ephraim, the object of the Incarnation, the taking of the Manhood into God, was that Christians might incorporate the Divine into their Manhood.’53 The function of Christ’s priesthood, then, according to Ephrem, is to extend to humanity all things necessary for its renewal as a divine creature. This includes all the things that Christ is in himself, as well as every physical element he proffers by his ministry, or that of the apostles. For along with all

50 Throughout Ephrem’s work, the relationship between Christ’s titles, other metaphors used for Christ, and the work of Christ’s apostles is made very clear. Murray discusses this, as well as the issue of apostolic succession, at length in chapter five of Symbols, pp. 159‒204. 51 See above, this chapter, n. 48; also Ephrem, Homily on Our Lord, 53‒56, NPNF, ser. 2, vol. 13, pp. 329‒30. In addition to the appeals to John the Baptist and the link with the Aaronic priesthood, Ephrem also asserts the more traditional – and scripturally warranted – link with the priesthood of Melchizedech as, for example, he does in hymn 7 of Hymns on the Nativity (NPNF, ser. 2, vol. 13, pp. 240‒241). 52 Ephrem, Homily on Our Lord, 53‒56, NPNF, ser. 2, vol. 13, pp. 329‒30. 53 F. C. Burkitt, Early Eastern Christianity, p. 103. Burkitt is generally unsympathetic to Ephrem’s poetry and likewise says of his theology, in spite of the positive analysis cited above, that ‘[i]t is really very difficult to extract from S. Ephraim any clear exposition of his views’ (Early Eastern Christianity, p. 104). This is in stark contrast to the fact that the christology Burkitt is able to discern in Ephrem – namely, a theology of divinization, or theosis – represents a remarkable development for Syriac theology. As Sebastian Brock suggests: ‘It has sometimes been said that the concept of the divinization, or theosis, of humanity is something that crept into Christianity, and especially Eastern Christianity, under Hellenic influence. It is clear, however, that St Ephrem, whom Theodoret described as “unacquainted with the language of the Greeks” (Ecclesiastical History, 4, 29), and whose thought patterns are essentially Semitic and Biblical in character, is nonetheless and important witness to this teaching’, (St Ephrem the Syrian: Hymns on Paradise, p. 73).

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the images Ephrem uses to describe Christ and his priestly acts, the sacraments are never far from his mind.54 In light of this, it is no wonder that Theodore of Tarsus, in the Laterculus, employs a version of the ordines Christi and associates it with Ephrem.55 Whatever the textual grounds for doing so, beside the overt suggestion of his respect for the authority of the Syriac father, is that fact that the version of the ordines outlined by Theodore reflects the same understanding of Christ’s restorative operation in the apostolic ministry as that reflected in Ephrem’s agricultural imagery and elsewhere. Even if Theodore does not suggest that this precise version of the ordines actually came from Ephrem’s hand,56 he must see the 54 Burkitt provides a striking example of what he calls Ephrem’s ‘fanciful points’, wherein the Syrian draws a remarkable parallel between the Eucharistic bread and Christ’s healing of the blind man with physical spittle, in Early Eastern Christianity, pp. 104‒5. 55 In chapter 19 of the Laterculus, Theodore says: Quod autem infirmitates adque egrotationes nostras sicut reor praedixerat Esaias libenter portauerit, et sic per omnia currens quemadmodem gigans per uiam, oportit inspicere quomodo in se consecrando ecclesia grados eius per singulos commendauerit, id est, per sex grada officii mancipandum, et altario sanciendum; id est: ostiarius, fossarius, lector, subdiaconus, diaconus, presbyter, et episcopus. Hos sex grados impleuit Christus in carne. Nam hostiarius fuit, quando ostium archae aperuit, et iterum clausit. Fossarius fuit, quando Lazarum de monumento quarto iam fetidum euocauit. Lector fuit, quando librum Esaiae prophetae in medio synagogae in aures pleui aperuit, legit, et cum replicuissit, ministro tradidit. Subdiaconus fuit, quando aqua in pelue misit, et humiliter sua sponte pedes discipolorum lauit. Diaconus fuit, quando calicem benedixit, et apostolis suis ad bibendum porrexit. Presbyter fuit, quando panem benedixit, et eis similiter tradidit. Episcopus fuit, quando in templo populos, sicut potestatem habens, eos regnum Dei docebat. Et haec quidem etiam sanctus Ephrem commemorat similiter. ‘As I think, Isaiah predicted that he freely carried something of our infirmities and sickness, and running through all things ‘like a giant on the road’, we ought thus to examine how the Church consecrates its grades in itself that it entrusts to individuals that is, through the six [seven] grades of office to serve and sanctify the altar, which are doorkeeper, gravedigger, reader, subdeacon, deacon, priest, and bishop. Christ fulfilled these six [seven] grades in the flesh. He was a doorkeeper when he opened the door of the ark and closed it again. He was a gravedigger when he called forth Lazarus already stinking from his tomb on the fourth day. He was a reader when he opened the book of Isaiah in the midst of the synagogue to the ears of the people, read and then re-rolled it, and returned it to the priest. He was a subdeacon when he put water in the basin and humbly, of his own will, washed the feet of his disciples. He was a deacon when he blessed the cup and gave it to his apostles to drink. He was a presbyter when he blessed bread and similarly gave it to them. He was a bishop when he taught the people in the temple, as he had the power [to do], about the kingdom of God. And this also is similarly recorded by the holy Ephrem,’ LM, 19, pp. 146/7‒148/9. 56 R. Reynolds, in The Ordinals of Christ from their Origins to the Twelfth Century, pp. 15 & 43‒48, discusses this version of the ordines at length. He identifies the latefourth or early-fifth century Expositio fidei of Epiphanius of Salamis as a likely source, but says also that ‘. . . the Malalian Ordinal suggests several of the patristic sources of the fourth and fifth centuries in both East and West which have been mentioned

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theological correlation between the ordines, the work of Ephrem’s that he has access to, and an agenda of his own that included portraying Christ as a restorer. The ordines Christi are a recurring motif in the writings of the early Church, universally comprised of a list of orders in the Church, which, though the lower orders may vary, begin with a lowest order, such as gravedigger, and extend through to bishop. Each order’s function is described and compared to some moment in the earthly ministry of Christ. The ordines have a long history, and in recent decades have enjoyed a treatment more appropriate to their status as a window into both late-patristic and early medieval ecclesiology and christology.57 They are interesting for what they reveal of the orders present in different regional churches, as well as the authority afforded to those orders, but most important to our inquiry is their express relationship with the recapitulative soteriology of Irenaeus.58 This brings us back, once again, to the language of restoration, and the single idea that seems to run most consistently through Ephrem’s poetry.

3.1.7 Collating the symbols While it may be inaccurate to describe Ephrem as a systematic theologian, it should not be assumed that he had no conscious theological purpose in mind when employing the imagery he does in his work. For example, it must be the case with Ephrem’s use of Christus medicus that he intended to convey a specific soteriological idea: a fact that seems to inform scholarly opinion on the nature of his implied christology.59 Although to date there is no single source that explores in an already’, p. 44. Of the Ephremic ascription with which this particular version concludes, Reynolds says, ‘. . . [it] may hint of an acquaintance with a Syrian-Egyptian tradition,’ The Ordinals of Christ, p. 44. 57 See Reynolds, Ordinals, p. vii; also, J. Crehan, ‘The Seven Orders of Christ’ in TS, 19, pp. 81‒93, and A. Wilmart, ‘Les ordres du Christ’ in RSR, 3, pp. 305‒27. 58 J. Crehan treats this at length in ‘The Seven Orders of Christ’, p. 82. 59 Referring to the image of the second Adam in Ephrem, for example, Robert Murray says: ‘To turn to the Second Adam, a favourite Pauline figure for Christ as head of the restored human race, we find this theme often in Ephrem, but little in others, not even Aphrahat,’ (Symbols, p. 83). Francis Burkitt, meanwhile, describes the Syrian’s soteriological vision this way: ‘According to S. Ephraim, the object of the Incarnation, the taking of the Manhood into God, was that Christians might incorporate the Divine into their Manhood. We may notice that in Ephraim’s view the doctrine of Christ’s Nature and the doctrine of the Sacraments are inextricably intertwined,’ (Early Eastern Christianity, pp. 103‒4). Ute Possekel, in a review of Shemunkasho’s Healing in the Theology of Saint Ephrem for Hugoye, (vol. 6, no. 1), says: ‘A second important result of

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explicit way the relationship between Christus medicus and the Irenaean concept of restoration,60 this particular soteriological metaphor and the earlier description of Christ’s work inhere quite naturally; wherein appears to lie Ephrem’s conscious theology. Again, this is further expressed in the imagery drawn from agriculture that Ephrem uses for Christ: the medicine of life is in fact the bread of life, which in turn is derived from the wheat that grew in the garden of humanity. By this wheat-become-bread-become-medicine, humanity is healed and restored. Finally, this is meted out by Christ the shepherd and his apostles, whom he called to serve as shepherds with, and for, him. In light of all we have extracted from Ephrem’s writing, of great interest to us is how Theodore of Tarsus appears to recognize the fullness of what the Syrian is saying: in his admiration for, and use of, Ephremic metaphor, in his frequent deployment of language that faithfully reflects Ephrem’s theological purpose, and even, with respect to the ordines Christi, in his use of a motif spuriously attributed to Ephrem, perhaps precisely because it so naturally extends what else Theodore knows of the Syriac father. In any case, what we encounter of the Syriac tradition in Theodore is entirely consistent with everything else we learn about that tradition from the numerous sources available to us now, both primary and secondary.

3.2 The evidence in Theodore As suggested at the beginning of this chapter, Bernhard Bischoff and Michael Lapidge’s edition of the biblical commentaries from Canterbury is a key primary source that must have facilitated the confident identification of such a work as the Laterculus Malalianus with Theodore of Tarsus, by reinforcing the first indications that familiarity with Syriac tradition might be a feature of Theodore’s work. For this reason, if the evidence for Syriac influence on Theodore and the Laterculus is to be appraised, turning first to the evidence in the Canterbury Commentaries will be instructive. Shemunkasho’s book is that Ephrem’s healing theology – although the references occur scattered throughout the Syrian’s works – constitutes indeed a systematic whole. Healing imagery permeates Ephrem’s writings, and this reflects the importance of this theme within Ephrem’s history of salvation.’ 60 While it seems that the Syriac version of Irenaeus appeared at a date later than that when Ephrem was writing, and at the same time that Ephrem knew no Greek, it

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A great debt, in fact, is owed to Michael Lapidge for making the investigation into the evidence for a Syriac influence on Theodore, as manifest in the Canterbury Commentaries, a straightforward task.61 One is left in no doubt as to Theodore’s exposure to the tradition of Syriac Christianity, even if what it means to the archbishop, theologically, requires interpretation. Concerning the commentaries, the most obvious suggestion as to an awareness of things Syriac may lie in an observation Theodore makes which is recorded by his students, and includes a direct reference to Edessa. It reads: cucumeres et pepones unum sunt, sed tamen cucumeres dicuntur pepones cum magni fiunt; ac saepe in uno pepone fiunt .xxx. librae. In Edissia ciuitate fiunt ut uix potest duo portare unus camelus.62 Additionally, we find that, ‘[a]t three points in the commentaries, biblical expressions are explained in terms of Syriac etymology (EvII, 58, 70, and 72).’63 Then, not unlike the Laterculus – where we find Ephrem (not without reason, but) mistakenly mentioned by name in relation to the ordines Christi – the Syriac father is also mistakenly mentioned by name in the Commentaries, in relation to a quote from a Greek composition based on his work. Theodore’s students record him as saying: Margarita Grece, latine gemma. Effrem dicit quod in Mari Rubro concae a profundo natantes super aquas quae, facto tonitruo et fulgore intranteque ictu fulgoris, ita se concludentes concipiant et efficient margaritam. Ita et Maria could prove a fruitful venture to investigate the transmission of Irenaeus, or his ideas, and their conscious application, to Ephrem. At the same time that Ephrem was composing his great poems and denouncing the use of Greek philosophical ideas, it is clear that he had his own theological purpose in mind. (See S. Griffith, ‘A Spiritual Father for the Whole Church’, pp. 6‒7 for more on this.) In fact, Ephrem’s is a purpose that is not at all inconsistent with that of his Alexandrian (and more consciously philosophical) counterpart, Athanasius – a figure who made great use of Irenaean soteriology. In one place, Irenaeus was being used to good effect in the development of a profound understanding of the work of Christ. In another, Irenaean ideas are present in an author who, due to the barrier of language, should have no access to them, and who, additionally, would denounce the very Greek philosophical tradition in which these ideas are steeped. Ute Possekel’s work, Evidence of Greek Philosophical Concepts in the Writings of Ephrem the Syrian, is worth consulting for an alternative perspective on what has traditionally been accepted as Ephrem’s odium Graecorum. 61 See M. Lapidge, Biblical Commentaries, pp. 233‒40, as well as his paper entitled, ‘The Career of Archbishop Theodore’ in AT, pp. 1‒29. 62 PentI, 413 [Numbers 11:5] ‘Cucumbers and melons are the same thing, but cucumbers are called pepones when they grow large, and often one pepon will weigh thirty pounds. In the city of Edessa they grow so large that a camel can scarcely carry two of them,’ M. Lapidge, trans., in Biblical Commentaries, p. 374/5. 63 M. Lapidge, ‘The Career of Archbishop Theodore’ in AT, p. 8.

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concepit sermonem Dei.64 Finally, Lapidge remarks on other instances of a Syriac presence in the commentaries, in the form of exegetical parallels with Ephrem’s Commentary on Genesis and the sixth-century exegetical compilation Book of the Cave of Treasures,65 which together commend to the reader the likelihood not just of a Syriac influence on Theodore, but a substantial first-hand acquaintance on his part with the language and at least some other works from the Syriac literary canon. So this is what emerges from an examination of the Canterbury Commentaries; but in light of those commentaries, we are now free to interpret other features of the works of Theodore as having been influenced by, or quoted directly from, Syriac sources. Jane Stevenson’s edition of the Laterculus Malalianus is notable for doing just this.66 Because Ephrem is a named source in the Laterculus,67 his influence on the text is evident. Yet in light of the acceptance Ephrem’s writings found throughout the Christian world in the period from which the only known manuscripts of the Laterculus emerge,68 it is not necessarily 64 EvII, 29 [Matthew 13:46] ‘“Pearl” (Μαργαρίτης) in Greek, in Latin “a gem”. Ephraim says that in the Red Sea there are shellfish which swim from the bottom to the surface of the water, which, when there is thunder and lightning, are struck and entered by the lightning-bolt. Then they close themselves up, conceive, and produce a pearl. Thus did Mary conceive the Word of God,’ M. Lapidge, trans., in Biblical Commentaries, p. 402/3. According to Lapidge in Biblical Commentaries, p. 514, the origin of this comment seems to be a fifth-century Greek Sermo aduersus haereticos based on one of Ephrem’s hymns On Faith. Jane Stevenson has more to say about this, along with Ephrem’s use of the pearl, in her article for Hugoye, entitled ‘Ephraim the Syrian in Anglo-Saxon England’, pp. 3‒4. 65 This is also discussed in detail by Stevenson in ‘Ephraim the Syrian in AngloSaxon England’, p. 5. 66 ‘Ephraim the Syrian in Anglo-Saxon England’, pp. 8‒14. See also the notes in Stevenson’s edition of the Laterculus, and the chapter entitled Sources of the Laterculus, pp. 67‒70. Of further significance is that fact that, as Lapidge remarks, in light of Stevenson’s work on the Laterculus, ‘. . . Carmela Vircillo Franklin, who has done pioneering work on the Latin hagiography of St Anastasius, undertook to reconsider the transmission of the Greek and Latin passiones of St Anastasius with the career of Theodore in mind. Her reconsiderations . . . led to the wholly new hypothesis that Theodore was himself the author of the earliest Latin translation of the Greek Passio s. Anastasii, from the introduction of M. Lapidge, ed., Archbishop Theodore, p. ix. 67 When Theodore writes, ‘Et haec quidem etiam sanctus Ephrem commemorat similiter.’ For the full quotation, with bibliographical information, see note 55, above. 68 Stevenson provides a description of both manuscripts containing the Laterculus: Vatican City, Pal. Lat. 277, and Leiden, Voss. misc. 11. This is discussed in greater detail above, chapter 2, section 7.1, but Stevenson gives a date around the beginning of the eighth century to Pal. lat. 277, and around 800, or soon thereafter, to Voss. misc. 11. Some reviewers have taken issue with certain aspects of Stevenson’s palaeographical

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obvious that any greater influence on the text should be assumed apart from Theodore’s one reference to him at the end of the section containing the ordines Christi. Stevenson, however, asserts that ‘[a]part from [the] generic resemblance between the Laterculus and the Antiochene school, there are also a number of specific points where the thought of the Laterculus can be shown to derive from the theological tradition of the schools of Antioch, Edessa and Nisibis. The conspicuous typological stratum in the Laterculus, can frequently be paralleled in the Christian Semitic tradition of Ephrem, Narsai and other Syrian exegetes.’69

She goes on to identify the image of Christ as physician, and mentions two points of contact between Theodore in the Laterculus and Ephrem in terms of exegetical comparisons: between the virgin earth of creation and the Virgin Mary,70 and Jacob’s dream with the significance of the two walls.71 Additionally, while Ephrem is a champion among Greeks and Syrians for maintaining Adam’s full mental competence at the time of the fall,72 the same position is taken up in the Laterculus in conclusions (discussed at length above, chapter 2, n. 99); as it concerns our inquiry regarding Ephremic influence on the Laterculus, however, even were the manuscripts to be assigned a later date, the possibility of locating more Ephremic references would only be strengthened. See paragraph 28 of Sidney Griffith’s paper, ‘A Spiritual Father for the Whole Church,’ p. 10, for the history in Latin of one Ephremic source, the Sermo Asceticus, as early as the seventh century. 69 J. Stevenson, The School of Archbishop Theodore, p. 69. 70 LM, 12. 71 LM, 14. 72 There is some contradictory evidence on this point. Citing Ginzberg (Legends I, p. 59), Stevenson says in her commentary on the Laterculus that ‘Syriac writers . . . were influenced by the Jewish midrashic tradition which made Adam fullgrown, either twenty or forty. Even so, Narsai appeared to endorse the idea of Adam as mentally undeveloped (Homélie sur la création, ch. 61, in Homélie de Narsaï sur la création, ed. Gignoux, p. 316). ‘Ephrem, however, was unaffected by this Greek tradition and concerned himself with original kingly authority of Adam and its relationship to his free will (Commentarius in Genesim, ed. and trans. R.-M. Tonneau, p. 24),’ n. 153, p. 207. In Symbols, meanwhile, Robert Murray cites Ephrem’s Hymns on Paradise (2, 1) by way of illustrating precisely the opposite point: that Ephrem shares the idea of Adam’s and Eve’s infancy in the Garden of Eden with such authors as Irenaeus (p. 305). He enthusiastically declares that ‘[t]here is something refreshing about such a reading, which, when reinforced by the knowledge that one of the greatest theologians among the Fathers (Irenaeus) and one of the greatest Christian poets (Ephrem) also read Genesis in a similar way, gives us a reminder worth pondering, that the Augustinian reading of Genesis in the light of St Paul has no monopoly in Christian theology’ (p. 306).

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chapter seventeen.73 We will now examine some of these apparently Syriac references in detail, beginning with the most obvious: the attribution to Ephrem of Theodore’s version of the ordines Christi.

3.2.1 Ordines Christi As the ordines Christi attribution in the Laterculus is in fact an erroneous one, its real significance lies not in having come originally from Ephrem’s pen; in terms of evidence for Ephrem’s influence on Theodore, it lies in the fact that Theodore should have sought to invoke Ephrem’s authority at all. There is, of course, the theological significance of the ordines, and the fact that it is entirely consistent with Ephrem’s own theological outlook,74 but for empirical evidence of the presence of Syriac sources in the Laterculus, it is the mere mention of Ephrem’s name, and the fact that he is one of only two Patristic authorities directly cited,75 that we refer to it here. This, together with the evidence in the Canterbury Commentaries, encourages us to investigate the question of Syriac – and particularly Ephremic – influence on the Laterculus, even further.

3.2.2 Medical Terminology With this in mind, Theodore’s use of the medical metaphor in chapter fourteen, when he declares, Pannis uero aduoluitur nostras miserias quatiendo, in quibis adibens nobis enplastra nostris uulneribus exibuit medecinam,76 takes on particular relevance. As we have already seen, medical imagery for Christ is extremely important for Ephrem. It is present in other Syriac literature, but nowhere is it more utilized than By way of explanation, it could be that one of the two scholars has missed half of the evidence, although this is unlikely. What is rather more likely is that something else Murray expresses must have greater application than he himself was suggesting when he wrote it: ‘. . . it need not surprise us to find incompatible alternatives in the same author, since on many subjects Scripture itself provides us with precisely that. This is not, however, a theologian’s misfortune; it is an essential characteristic of symbolic and imaginative thought,’ Symbols, p. 305‒6. 73 J. Stevenson, The School of Archbishop Theodore, p. 70. 74 Refer to the discussion of priesthood in Ephrem, above. 75 In the twenty-five chapters that constitute the full text of the Laterculus, Epiphanius, bishop of Cyprus is appealed to once, in chapter seven (p. 130/1), Ephrem once in chapter nineteen (p. 148/9), and a general appeal made to ‘patristic authority’ once in chapter eight (p. 130/1). 76 ‘He is wrapped in cloths for shaking our miseries, in which, approaching, he showed forth to us medication and plasters for our wounds,’ LM, 14, p. 140/1.

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in the writings of the most renowned Syriac father. The extent to which the imagery appears across Ephrem’s canon makes it one of that canon’s most remarkable features. So we know the importance of medical imagery for Ephrem, but we should also be reminded of the staggering range of language he uses to communicate it.77 Importantly, the medical vocabulary used in the Laterculus resembles that present in Ephrem very closely, as does the spirit in which it is employed. The three terms of greatest importance in the medical allusion of chapter fourteen of the Laterculus are ‘medication’ (medicinam), ‘plasters’ (emplastra), and ‘[for] our wounds’ (nostris uulneribus), and while it is obviously not possible to make exact etymological comparisons between these Latin terms and Ephrem’s Syriac originals,78 an approximate etymological comparison, as well as a sense comparison, can be made. Before investigating what these terms hold in common with the vocabulary of Ephrem’s work, however, it might be helpful to see how they correspond with others’ use of the same, or similar, terms. Work has been done in determining where and how medical terminology has been used in the early Christian tradition,79 and figures like Augustine and Ambrose feature prominently in this respect. Yet if our example above of Augustine’s use of medical terminology80 is indicative of his conception of how such language was to be used, then we can assume that no matter what precise words he chose, their theological purpose would be the same. Certainly when Ambrose, Augustine’s great mentor, employed medical terminology, he did so in a way that was entirely consistent with Augustine’s use. Ambrose draws on medical imagery in remarks he makes on the parable of the good Samaritan in his commentary on Luke: Adam sic letale uulnus accepit, in quo omne genus occidisset humanum, nisi Samaritanus ille descendens uulnera 77 A. Shemunkasho, Healing, pp. 85‒175. Over the course of these pages, which constitute the third chapter of the book, Shemunkasho divides Ephrem’s language into two categories: language for sickness, and for healing. His treatment of the terminology is exhaustive, and reveals to us how comprehensive Ephrem’s view of Christ’s ‘medical’ mission actually was. 78 Unfortunately, it does not fall within my competence to provide direct reference to the Syriac. The full Syriac vocabulary for healing is provided by Shemunkasho (pp. 85‒175), and his translations can be compared to the various Greek and Latin words found across the sources. 78 See G. Fichtner, ‘Christus als Arzt: Ursprünge und Wirkungen eines Motivs’, Frühmittelalterliche Studien 16, p. 1‒18, for an attempt at locating the places where medical terminology is used in early Christian sources. 80 See this chapter, n. 35.

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eius acerba curasset . . . Multa medicamenta medicus habet iste, quibis sanare consueuit.81 The word medicamenta (nom. sg. medicamentum), while not exactly the same as medicinam (nom. sg. medicina), is, however, little different either in form or in meaning from Theodore’s chosen word. Yet Ambrose’s theological purpose is quite different; it is, rather, very much the same as Augustine’s. An earlier remark by Ambrose in the same work reveals this purpose more precisely: Exui Levin, postquam Christum indui . . . solumte sequor, domine, Jesu, qui sanas uulnera mea . . . Aufer igitur, domine Jesu, potenti machaera tua meorum putredines peccatorum . . . Audite me, terreni homines . . . Et ego Levis talibus eram passionibus sauciatus. Inueni medicum, qui in caelo habitat et in terris spargit medicamenta. Hic solus potest sanare uulnera mea, qui sua nescit . . .82

Just as Augustine’s Christus medicus came to ‘blot out the sin we have committed’, the wounds in need of Christ’s medication in Ambrose are the wounds of an individual, derived from that individual’s susceptibility to sin, or the ‘passions’. By contrast, when such terms as ‘medication’ and ‘wounds’ appear in Ephrem, they consistently apply to humanitas as opposed to homo. In other words, instead of addressing the individual sins of individual human beings, they almost always address a general condition of woundedness in humankind, which is caused by sin, and which therefore requires medications from the physician.83 These medications may take different forms, and may include such things 81 Ambrose, Exp. Eu. Luc, 7. 73‒75 (from CC 14.238‒9): Adam was set upon by robbers, by demons and ‘thus suffered a mortal wound from which the entire human race would have perished had not that compassionate Samaritan come down and healed his deep wounds . . . This physician has many medicaments with which he is accustomed to heal,’ trans. G. M. Lukken in Original Sin in the Roman Liturgy, p. 301. The subtitle of this book is: Research into the theology of original sin in the Roman Sacramentaria and the early Baptismal liturgy, and it contains a helpful account of the use of medical imagery by the early western Fathers, referring the reader both to P.C.J. Eijkenboom (see reference above, n. 35), as well as R. Arbesmann, whose work includes ‘Christ the Medicus humilis in St Augustine’ in Augustinus Magister, pp. 623‒9, and ‘The concept of Christus medicus in St Augustine’, pp. 1‒28. 82 Ambrose, Exp. Eu. Luc, 5. 27 (from CC 14.145): ‘I have put off Levi and clothed myself with Christ . . . Only you do I follow Lord Jesus, who heal my wounds . . . Remove then with your powerful knife the rotten areas of my sins . . . Hear me, earthly people . . . I was wounded by passions. But I have found the physician who dwells in heaven and distributes his medicines on earth. Only he can heal my wounds who himself knows no wounds . . .’ trans. G. M. Lukken in Original Sin in the Roman Liturgy, p. 301. 83 Again, see Shemunkasho, pp. 85‒175, for a full account of Ephrem’s vocabulary.

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as plasters, but they all lead to humankind’s restoration to health, which is a divine state. The same can be said of Theodore’s meaning in the Laterculus.84

3.2.3 Genesis Typology The setting forth of Mary in the Laterculus as the new Eve, and her comparison with ‘virgin and unpolluted earth’,85 is another prominent idea in Ephrem, and comprises a subject well chronicled by Stevenson.86 Along with its related image of Christ as the new Adam, it is a typology employed in both the Syriac and Greek traditions, while Irenaeus appears to be its originator. For Irenaeus, the typology is intrinsically linked with his concern to portray Christ as the restorer of all things,87 and can be seen as a major point of contact between the second-century bishop of Lyons and the fourth-century Syrian poet,88 in all aspects of its application. A possible genesis for the Eve-Mary/virgin soil-virgin mother comparison, together with the Adam-Christ comparison, may have been Irenaeus’ desire to assert the authentic humanity of Christ against the Gnostics, which was positively vital in laying the foundation for God’s recapitulative work in the Incarnation, beginning with his kenosis in the manger. Jaroslav Pelikan notes these connections in the context of a discussion on the place of Mary in salvation: In the conflicts with Gnosticism Mary had served as proof for the reality of the humanity of Jesus: he had been truly born of a human mother and therefore was a man. But as Christian piety and reflection sought to probe the deeper meaning of salvation, the parallel between 84 For an account of Theodore’s theology of restoration as manifest in his use of medical imagery, see J. Siemens, ‘Christ’s Restoration of Humankind in the Laterculus Malalianus, 14’, pp. 21‒22. 85 . . . nam quod Christus per angelum uirgini nuntiatur ad euacuandum consilium serpentis as Euam in paradyso; quod autem de uirgine natus est propter protoplaustrum Adam, quem de uirgine terra et inpolluta ad suam fecit imaginem. . . . ‘. . . for Christ was announced to [the] virgin by an angel, in order to nullify the counsel of the serpent to Eve in paradise; he was born of a virgin, on account of Adam the first man, whom he had made in his own image of virgin and unpolluted earth . . .’, LM, 12, p. 136/7. 86 See her discussion in The School of Archbishop Theodore, p. 193. 87 What this means is fully explored in the chapter on Irenaean ideas as a source for Theodore’s christology, below. 88 See P. Bijesh, ‘A Comparative Study of the Concept of the Fall in St Irenaeus and St Ephrem’, comparing the sections on Adam-Christ typology in St Irenaeus (pp. 50‒52) and in St Ephrem (pp. 99‒101).

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Christ and Adam found its counterpart in the picture of Mary as the Second Eve, who by her obedience had undone the damage wrought by the disobedience of the mother of mankind.89

Except that, of course, the use Irenaeus makes of the parallel becomes even more than the beginning of recapitulation: that Mary should be the new Eve and Christ the new Adam becomes the very epitome of it. It could be that the presence in the Laterculus of this typology is due to Theodore having had access to some other individual father in whose work it also features, but considering the actual sources for the text identified by Stevenson, this is not likely.90 Caelius Sedulius, for example, is identified among Latin writers as a ‘most significant’91 source, and at least one passage in his Carmen Paschale even manifests familiarity with the Eve/Mary parallel,92 but insofar as it appears, it does so in an exclusive, isolated way – and so quite differently from the way it does in Irenaeus and Ephrem. Clearly, Sedulius deploys the motif with the same theological intent; but as one line set amidst a more significant work, it can neither be said to reflect the same emphasis, nor could the poet cover the same detailed ground. Rather, compared with what we read in Sedulius, Brock describes Ephrem’s use of the typology this way: Ephrem perceives a detailed pattern of complementarity between the processes of fall and restoration: all the individual details of the fall are reversed, so that we are presented with a series of contrasted types, Adam/Christ and Eve/Mary as protagonists.93

According to this description, there is a surprising degree of systematic deliberation in the poet’s use of the typology, which is not very different from Irenaeus’ own words. Irenaeus says: J. Pelikan, The Emergence of the Catholic Tradition, p. 241. See chapter five of The School of Archbishop Theodore, particularly pp. 56‒7 and pp. 65‒73. 91 The School of Archbishop Theodore, p. 70. 92 Caelius Sedulius, Carmen Paschale, Book 2, 30. Sic Euae de stripe sacra ueniente Maria / Virginis antiquae facinus noua uirgo piaret / Vt quoniam natura prior uitiata iacebat Sub dicione necis, / Christo nascente renasci Possit homo et ueteris maculam deponere carnis, J. Huemer, ed., Sedulii opera omnia, accedunt excerpta ex Remigii Expositione in Sedulii Paschale Carmen (CSEL 10; Wien, 1885). ‘Thus from the root of Eve comes Holy Mary / The New Virgin redressing the sin of the old virgin / As since by birth, the elder, having been corrupted, lay dead under the rule of death / By Christ springing forth, man might be able to be born again, and to give up the stain of the old body.’ Stevenson points to Sedulius’ Cantemus Socii, lines 7‒8 as another example. 93 S. Brock, The Luminous Eye, p. 32, as cited by P. Bijesh, A Comparative Study, p. 99. 89 90

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For as by one man’s disobedience sin entered, and death obtained [a place] through sin; so also by the obedience of one man, righteousness having been introduced, shall cause life to fructify in those persons who in times past, were dead. And as protoplast himself, Adam, had his substance from untilled, and as yet, virgin soil . . . . So did He who is the Word, recapitulating Adam in Himself, rightly receive a birth, enabling Him to gather up Adam . . . from Mary, who was as yet a virgin.94

So in light of the proximity of Theodore’s use of this image to Irenaeus’ and Ephrem’s, it is most likely from one of them that he harvested it. And considering the manner in which he has appealed to Ephrem elsewhere in the Laterculus, the strongest likelihood is that it came from the Syrian.

3.2.4 Jacob’s Stone The section in chapter fourteen of the Laterculus95 that comments on the events surrounding Jacob’s journey from Beersheba to Haran,96 must be one of the most interesting features to arise from the enumeration of Syriac sources in the text. The reasons for this begin with a detail identified by Stevenson, suggesting first-hand knowledge on the part of the exegete with a particular aspect of middle eastern life. At one point in her commentary on the Laterculus,97 she cites an explanation of Duncan Derrett for the ‘corner-stone’ which plays a central role in Theodore’s exegesis of Jacob’s dream. Derrett says: ‘The final stone, which serves to complete the corner of the house, binding two walls together and which serves also as an ornament, a shelter on the roof and a part of the parapet which every Jewish house must have, is called Irenaeus, Adv. haer., 3, 21, 10, in NPNF, ser. 1, vol. 1, p. 454. The passage in question reads: Dum suporatus (PL provides soporatus), scalam ibi ad caelum usque conspiceret, et angelos Dei ascendentes et descendentes uidisset, et Deum in summo incubuisset aspiceret. Dixit : ‘hic est’, et lapidem quem ad caput sibi Iacob posuerat in similitudinem illius lapidis angularis, ‘uere domus Dei est et porta caeli,’ unde appellatur Bethel; cui iuncti duo parietes e diuerso uenientes condidit, in semetipso copuluit, scilicet populorum conexio Iudeorum adque gentilium pacem in utrosque perficiens ‘While [Jacob] was asleep, he saw a ladder reaching up to heaven, and perceived angels of God ascending and descending it, and saw God sitting at the top. He said, ‘This is truly the house of God and the gate of heaven,’ from which it is called Bethel [House of God]. The stone which Jacob had put under his head is a similitude of the Corner-Stone, from which he made two walls meeting, coming from different directions, and he joined them together, as it were the linking of the Jewish people with the gentiles, creating peace between them both, p. 140/1. 96 Genesis 28:10‒22 97 The School of Archbishop Theodore, n. 128, p. 201. 94 95

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the “head of the corner”. A house would have no less than four.’98 Stevenson goes on to say about the observations in chapter fourteen, that ‘[t]his exegesis of Jacob’s dream demonstrates that the author of the Laterculus was familiar with the real meaning of lapis angularis in its original context of middle eastern architecture . . .’.99 Like the reference to cucumbers and melons in the Canterbury Commentaries,100 these words imply that their author emerged from a place where such knowledge would have been common, setting the assertion of a Syriac background to the Laterculus on even surer footing. But the passage is interesting for another reason as well. The Laterculus seems to draw on Ephrem’s (and Aphrahat’s) exegesis of the stone, in that the meaning inferred from it in the Latin work is identical with that of the two Syriac fathers. In the case of the Laterculus, the stone, which is Christ, is the means of unity and peace between Jew and Gentile. For Ephrem, the stone is also Christ, and his purpose is to bring together the circumcised and the uncircumcised.101 For Aphrahat, meanwhile, the anointed stone is about the ‘calling of the Nations’ (i.e. the Gentiles, or the uncircumcised).102 All three of these sources are concerned with portraying the stone as a holy thing, anointed either by a literal pouring out of oil (Aphrahat) or by its use as a pillow by a holy figure (Theodore), but either way, set aside as an image of the incarnate Logos, in order to represent the calling of all

98 J. D. M. Derrett, ‘The Stone The Builders Rejected’, in Studia Evangelica 4 [= TU 102] (1968) p. 181, as cited by J. Stevenson, The School of Archbishop Theodore, n. 128, p. 201. 99 J. Stevenson, The School of Archbishop Theodore, p. 202. 100 See above, n. 62. 101 ‘And David was not the corner, for one wall of the buildings was made in him, only circumcision. Now since Christ preached circumcision and uncircumcision, two walls were made from him and he became the head/chief ’ Ephrem, Exposition of the Gospel, chapter 6, G. A. Egan, trans., Louvain, 1968, as cited by Stevenson, The School of Archbishop of Theodore, p. 202. 102 ‘And Jacob called that place Bethel; and Jacob set up there a pillar of stone for a testimony, and poured oil on its head . . . Thus in Jacob’s prayer the mystery of the calling of the Nations is prefigured’ Aphrahat, Dem. 4, 145, 15‒25, R. Murray, trans., Symbols, p. 45. Murray explains elsewhere, ‘. . . that both authors see in Jacob’s anointing of his stone at Bethel a type of Christ ‘anointing’ believers who come from the Gentiles’, R. Murray, Symbols , p. 208. An interesting question to ask of this interpretation of the story of Jacob and the stone is to what degree the primary concern it reflects arises out of the distinct context of the Middle East where Jews and Christians would have lived side by side, and so to what degree it yields to other interpretations as one moves further away from the particular milieu.

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people into his church.103 It is an interpretation that few early exegetes seem to share.104

3.2.5 Adam’s Age At last there is the issue, also identified by Stevenson,105 of Adam’s full mental competence, and the fact that Theodore holds the same position again on the issue as his teachers from the Syriac tradition. Chapter seventeen of the Laterculus is indeed dedicated to the topic of Adam’s mental and physical capabilities at the time of his creation and

103 This concern represents another interesting intersection between Theodore, Ephrem, and Irenaeus. In her commentary on the passage, Stevenson points out language used by Irenaeus in Adversus haereses (book 3), that reflects an almost identical portrayal of Christ as the corner-stone who has brought together the circumcised and the uncircumcised (The School of Archbishop Theodore, p. 202). This is discussed at greater length in the chapter on Irenaeus of Lyons and the Laterculus Malalianus, below. 104 Of the few church fathers who comment on the corner-stone, whether it be in the context of the Jacob story in Genesis, or part of Jesus’ words in Matthew 21:42 or Mark 12:10, the closest to propose a meaning resembling that found in the Syrians and Theodore is John Chrysostom (Homily 68, On Matthew 21: 33‒44, 2) who says of God’s intention to extend his kingdom to the Gentiles: ‘[Jesus] both added a prophecy, and reproves them in a way to put them to shame, saying, ‘Did ye never read, the stone which the builders rejected, the same is become the head of the corner? this is the Lord’s doing, and it is marvellous in our eyes;’ by all things showing, that they should be cast out for unbelief, and the Gentiles brought in’, NPNF, ser. 1 , vol. 10, p. 416. However much it might compare on some level to the language of Aphrahat, Ephrem, and Theodore, in terms of Christ the corner-stone being a means to the entry of the Gentiles into the picture of salvation, the language of these lines is less conciliatory than what we have encountered so far, and fails to accommodate the Jews in the new picture. The stone seems to be more about the reversal of order (the lowly being exalted; the Gentiles taking the place of the Jews) than the conjoining of two different elements (the Jews and the Gentiles together). One reason for this difference may be that Chrysostom was unaware of the architectural significance of the corner-stone, not having first-hand knowledge of it himself, while another may be that the Jews were not his immediate neighbours as they might have been for those more intimately connected with the Semitic world. Whatever the case, Chrysostom appears to be one of the only exegetes whose interpretation of the stone bears any resemblance to the one shared by the Syrians and Theodore. Many seem not to have commented on any of the passages we are concerned with, while others who did have very different purposes. Compare, for example, Jerome’s very different comments on Genesis 28:11‒13 (Letter 123: To Ageruchia, 15), and Augustine’s reference to the same symbol in Sermon 39: On Matthew 21:19, 5, and Sermon 72: On John 1:48, 2. 105 The School of Archbishop Theodore, p. 70.

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subsequent fall, asserting that the first man must have been in complete possession of his faculties in order to have fallen from grace as he did. This is a position the author shares with the entire Syriac tradition, a fact that Stevenson chronicles in detail.106 The nature of its appearance in the Laterculus, however, suggests it was an issue of particular importance to Theodore. Unlike other chapters within the text, chapter seventeen presents no series of images or diverse observations to excite the mind. The chapter is single-minded in its assertion that the first human beings can only have been fully competent when they succumbed to the temptation in the garden, presumably to emphasize their culpability in light of the punishment they would receive. But there is more to it as well. Theodore has taken up a theme on which the Syriac tradition has coincidental consensus, and the exclusive space he gives to its exposition suggests a more significant interest in the matter. Above all, the language with which he mingles it in his conclusion, casts it in a different light. In the final paragraph of chapter seventeen, we encounter the language of restoration in relation to the age and capabilities of Adam. Theodore says of us, Adam’s offspring: Renouatur autem per gratia creatoris qui solum paruolis coronauit, dum natus est uerum aetiam diabulum pescauit cum passus est, donando nobis quod ipse gessit in carne, ut resurrectionis similiter Christi, omnis anima .xxx. surgat annorum aetate, in hac ipsa quam gessit uiuens in corpore carnem, ut recipiat unusquisque iuxta quod egit in corpore siue bonum siue malum.107

What is remarkable about these lines is how they place into context the idea that Adam and Eve were of an age and ability to choose between good or evil in the Garden of Eden, and transform it from being a mere explanation of how it is they came to be punished, to how it was also used by Christ as a means of Adam and Eve’s (and so humanity’s) transformation. In other words, by concluding chapter 106 See her thorough inventory of Syriac approaches to this question, The School of Archbishop Theodore, pp. 207‒8. 107 ‘Renewed, however, through the creator’s grace, who did not only crown babies when he was born, but truly also crushed the devil when he suffered; what he did in the flesh was a gift for us, so that at the Resurrection, all souls will rise like Christ at thirty years old, the age he reached when he was living in the body, so that each one will receive flesh according to what he had in this body, whether good or bad’ LM, 17, p. 144/5.

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seventeen with this statement, Theodore takes an idea he shares with his Syriac mentors, and reconciles it very explicitly with an idea he shares with Irenaeus of Lyons: that of humanity’s restoration in the image and likeness of God by means of Christ’s recapitulation of all ages and conditions of humanity in himself. In this respect, the principal theme of chapter seventeen – that the origin of the fallen human state is in Adam and Eve’s conscious decision to disobey (a theme that actually contradicts Irenaeus’ own position vis à vis Adam and Eve’s original competence108) – is mitigated in its opposition to Irenaeus by this final compromise. In employing Ephrem and what he knew of the Syriac tradition, Theodore appears to have done so in a way that is at the same time respectful, but also most favourable to another of his influences: Irenaeus of Lyons.

3.2.6 Summary of the evidence The conclusions we draw include the fact that in appraising the Syriac influence on Theodore as it appears in the Laterculus Malalianus, one is actually obliged to begin elsewhere. In terms of our study, the biblical commentaries from Canterbury are vital as a sort of key by which much else can be unlocked. Their indisputable provenance and the references to Ephrem and Edessa within them give the attribution of the Laterculus to Theodore, as well as the discernment of its characteristics and sources, an even more reliable quality. They have also enabled the identification of similar qualities in other works of Theodore, meaning that one is able to see just how widespread the archbishop’s use of Syriac sources was, and to identify the characteristics that bind his various works together. Regardless of the existence of the Canterbury Commentaries, however, it is clear that the Laterculus Malalianus is infused with language, imagery, and references drawn from the author’s experience of Syriac tradition and culture, and we can see that this author – Theodore of Tarsus – has recognized the richness of his chosen sources and been able to rework them into another theological model with respect to the person and work of Christ.

108 J. N. D. Kelly introduces the significance of Adam’s infancy in the midst of a discussion on what Irenaeus meant by humankind having been created in ‘the image and likeness’ of God, in Early Christian Doctrines, p. 171. It is explored at greater length by Matthew Steenberg in ‘Children in Paradise: Adam and Eve as “Infants” in Irenaeus of Lyons’, JECS, vol. 12, no. 1, pp. 1‒22.

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3.3 Syriac Features in Latin Work after Theodore An important factor to consider in terms of the Syriac influence over Theodore of Tarsus and the Laterculus Malalianus, is whether or not that influence extended beyond the teacher to his students, and others who might have benefited from his work, either directly or indirectly. Were Ephrem, and the tradition he represents by his spiritual and theological language, to be discernible in writers who appeared in Britain after Theodore, it would cast retrospective light on the presence of Syriac sources, and reveal something of how those sources were transmitted. Fortunately, we have suggestions going back more than one hundred years signalling the possibility of such extended influence.109 Of greatest interest to us, for being the most immediate in terms of proximity in time and place to Theodore, are the possible signs of an Ephremic presence in the writings of Bede.110 J. Rendel Harris enumerates these in his 1895 work, Fragments of the Commentary of Ephrem Syrus on the Diaterssaron, and William Petersen re-presents them in his article, ‘Ephrem Syrus and the Venerable Bede: Do East and West Meet?’111, so there is no need to list them again here. It should be noted, however, that among these signs, there are no exact parallels with anything in either the Laterculus or the Canterbury Commentaries. Yet this does not tell us that there is no connection. Rather, an hypothesis assumed by Harris – that there existed some sort of gloss to which Bede had access, and from which he drew the ideas he shares with Ephrem – seems to have been vindicated by the work of Bischoff and Lapidge on the Canterbury Commentaries. Petersen says of the Canterbury Commentaries that they ‘consist largely of glosses, whose genre is virtually identical with what we have found in common between Bede and Ephrem.’112 More importantly, though, he continues: While the Canterbury commentaries are not the source of the common readings between Ephrem and Bede (for they lack the readings we have discovered), they conclusively demonstrate that (1) Syriac exegetical tropes – sometimes identified as such – were in circulation in Britain in See this chapter, n. 2. In Fragments of the Commentary of Ephrem Syrus upon the Diatessaron, p. 98, J. Rendell Harris identified, for example, ‘. . . some curious coincidences between the Ephrem Commentary [on the Diatessaron] and the Commentaries of the Venerable Bede, which suggest that the extreme East and West are in contact at some unknown Patristic point.’ 111 Both texts are cited above: Harris, in note 110 and Petersen, in note 2. 112 W. Petersen, ‘Ephrem Syrus’, p. 451. 109 110

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the seventh century; that (2) the genre of these tropes is identical with the genre of the parallels found between Ephrem and Bede; that (3) Ephrem was known and cited by name in Latin commentaries produced in the seventh century; and that (4) a document like the one we hypothesized (in genre, scope, and sources) was the source for some of Bede’s parallels with Ephrem is not a hypothesis, for such a document exists.113

And while Petersen is mostly concerned with the connection between the Canterbury Commentaries and the Ephremic indicators in Bede, his third point especially – that Ephrem was known and cited by name in Latin commentaries produced in the seventh century – would certainly include the Laterculus Malalianus. It is reasonable to assert, then, that the presence of the Syriac tradition’s most prolific representative is discernible in Bede. It is equally reasonable to say that Bede’s Ephremic source is held in common with the Canterbury commentator (being Theodore), and that Bede probably incorporated some of the material that the Canterbury commentator himself produced. So whatever the exact texts referred to by the Northumbrian historian, it will most likely have been by the hand of Theodore of Tarsus that he received it. Yet for all we might conclude, in light of this, that the Laterculus as a specific source for Bede was merely possible and not probable, there is at least one detail that suggests otherwise. In chapter fourteen of the Laterculus, Theodore gives comment on Luke’s infancy narrative, and by the seventh century, he is one of only a small number to do so. Ephrem, meanwhile, is another.114 In the W. Petersen, ‘Ephrem Syrus’, pp. 451‒2. I have been able to locate only minimal references to Luke’s infancy narrative among the major church fathers, and what I have found looks nothing like the more significant commentary found in the Laterculus. On one point that Theodore raises, a comment in Leo the Great’s Letter 28 coincides. In the context of a discussion of Christ’s true manhood and divinity, Leo writes: ‘The infancy of a babe is shown in the humbleness of its cradle: the greatness of the Most High is proclaimed by the angels’ voices’ (NPNF, ser. 2, vol. 12, p. 41). This is similar in meaning to the Laterculus only insofar as Theodore also uses the manger as an illustration of the kenosis of the Logos. Ephrem, by contrast, both comments on the scene, and uses vocabulary that is employed in the Laterculus almost word for word. Paul Russell draws our attention to some examples of Ephrem’s interpretations in his paper, ‘The Image of the Infant Jesus in Ephrem the Syrian’ in Hugoye. Joseph Kelly says of this issue, that ‘. . . the birth of Christ continued to be unimportant in orthodox circles in the second and third centuries, as a reading of the major Fathers of that time reveals . . . . The Christological controversies of the fifth century, especially in the Eastern Church, made the birth of Christ more important theologically, relating it to the question of his full human nature, and Christmas soon became more important liturgically, joining Easter in having a time of preparation, Advent, by the sixth century, if not earlier. But Western interest in the birth of Christ was still not great,’ in ‘Bede’s Exegesis of Luke’s Nativity Narrative’, Mediaevalia, vol. 15, pp. 59‒70. 113 114

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course of his commentary, Theodore appears to draw on Ephrem as he elucidates the meaning of Christ’s manger, and connects it to the nourishment of God’s people in the Eucharist. His words – Presepium totus mundus adseritur, in quo suis iumentis rationabilibus pabulum subministrat Dominus magestatis , together with Quod uero amirauiles pastores uel uigiles inuenitur, siue quod in cunabulis adoratur, typum gerebatur optimorum pastorum, quos Christus paterfamilias constituens super famulos et famulas, ut iuste trittici mensuram distribuant sollicite diligenterque mandauit115 – very much reflect Ephrem’s description of Christ as nourishment in the extended agricultural metaphors discussed earlier.116 Importantly, one of the only other authors to comment on Luke’s infancy narrative to the twelfth century is Bede, and his words are not only startlingly similar to Theodore’s, but the only to give a kenotic interpretation specifically to the swaddling clothes as the archbishop does.117 This being the case, an examination of the characteristics of Bede’s commentary becomes imperative. Bede’s commentary on the infancy narrative in Luke118 begins with an evaluation of how it is that the Logos chose his earthly parents, together with the Father and the Holy Spirit. It then makes a statement on Bethlehem as the city of David, following which there is something about why Christ was subject to the census (which Bede sums up as ‘servitude for liberation’). Then, significantly, Bede reflects some more on Bethlehem, relating Christ to that city by saying that 115 ‘The whole world is declared the manger, in which the Lord of majesty administers sustenance to his rational draught-animals’, and ‘He is found by admirable shepherds and watchmen, like those by whom he was adored in the cradle, and they exist as a type of the good shepherds, whom Christ the paterfamilias commanded sedulously and diligently, setting them over his manservants and maidservants, so that they might justly distribute the measure of wheat’ LM, 14, p. 141/2. 116 See this chapter, section 1.4. 117 Bede writes: ‘The infancy of the Saviour was impressed upon us, both by frequent heraldings of angels and testimonies of evangelists, that we might be the more deeply penetrated in our hearts by what has been done for us. And we may observe that the signs given us of the newborn Saviour were, that he would be found not clothed in Tyrian purple, but wrapped in poor swaddling clothes, not lying in gilded couches, but in a manger,’ as recorded by Thomas Aquinas in Catena Aurea: Commentary on the Four Gospels, collected from the works of the Fathers (vol. 3, pt. 1., J. H. Parker, Oxford, 1843). The observation regarding Bede’s kenotic interpretation of the swaddling clothes is originally made by the nineteenth-century translator and editor of the Catena Aurea. 118 Luke 2: 11‒14. The whole of Bede’s commentary on Luke is found in: Beda Venerabilis, Opera exegetica: In Lucae euangelium exposito, D. Hurst, ed., CCSL, Brepols, 1960, reprinted 2001.

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Christ is the house of David. It is after a defence of Mary’s virginity, however, that the commentary moves into exegetical territory most representative of the Laterculus. At this point, Bede raises the issue of the lowliness of Christ in the manger and says that Christ lying there represents the bread of angels feeding the animals. Finally, by a shift in focus from the Holy Family to the other participants in the nativity drama, he ends up with a look at the significance of the shepherds. The pattern, then, along with the general content, and even some specific comments, is all suggestive of a connection with the Laterculus, and hence with Ephrem’s influence – especially in terms of the agricultural metaphors used for Christ, and the identification of Christ in the manger with bread.119 Only a thorough analysis of Bede’s commentary on the Lucan nativity will determine whether, and to what extent, Theodore and the Laterculus influenced it. Kelly has laid the groundwork for this task by commending the commentary to our attention in the first place, even if his paper dealing with Bede’s patristic sources for the commentary on Luke fails to recognize any Syriac connection, and shows no awareness of the Canterbury Commentaries, let alone the Laterculus Malalianus.120 But the conclusion that christological themes in chapter fourteen of the Laterculus are present in Bede’s commentary on Luke’s infancy narrative, and so, by extension, themes inherited from the Syriac tradition – and Ephrem in particular121 – seems unavoidable. What this means is that Britain’s great historian and exegete of the early Middle Ages has most likely been informed by a tradition well beyond what even he himself perceived. Likewise, via a man whose scholarship he reported on and praised, Bede gained an insight into the person and work of Christ that few of his contemporaries would have realized. The Syriac tradition, particularly in the person of Ephrem, exerted its influence over Theodore of Tarsus, and through Theodore of Tarsus, Bede. Because the characteristics we observe in

119 See J. F. Kelly, ‘Bede’s Exegesis of Luke’s Infancy Narrative’, pp. 59‒70, for a thorough examination of these issues. See also J. Siemens, ‘Christ’s Restoration of Humankind in the Laterculus Malalianus, 14’, where the connection between Bede, the Laterculus, and Ephrem is first explored by this author. 120 See J. F. Kelly, ‘Bede’s use of the Fathers to Interpret the Infancy Narratives’, in SP 34, pp. 388‒94. 121 In addition to the themes discussed throughout this chapter, see the specific discussion of the infant Jesus in Ephrem’s writing by Paul S. Russell: ‘The Image of the Infant Jesus in Ephrem the Syrian’, in Hugoye, 5, 1.

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Bede’s commentary on Luke’s infancy narrative so closely reflect the Laterculus, and because the aspects of the Laterculus they reflect are derived from Ephrem, they end up serving to reinforce our perception of the Syriac tradition in Theodore’s work.

3.4 Conclusions Due to the evidence supplied by Bernhard Bischoff and Michael Lapidge in their edition of the commentaries from Canterbury, and to a greater extent to the work accomplished by Jane Stevenson in her edition of the Laterculus Malalianus, it is possible to discern the substantial influence of Ephrem the Syrian and other contributors from the Syriac tradition, over Theodore of Tarsus in the Laterculus. This is significant for a number of reasons. First of all, it reinforces Stevenson’s argument that authorship of the Laterculus can properly be ascribed to Theodore. Secondly, it makes further work on the subject possible, by casting light on other areas where Ephremic motifs may be discerned. Thirdly, it gives us some insight into how it is that regard for Ephrem the Syrian would come to extend to the Latin West into the middle ages and even down to the present. Most important for our purpose, though, is what it does for the understanding of Theodore’s christology: it is clear that his mind on christological matters is so informed by the Syriac tradition. With respect to the first suggestion, the study of Syriac influences in the Laterculus proffers an unexpected insight. One of Stevenson’s purposes in her edition is to establish the authorship of the formerly anonymous Laterculus, which she contends to be Theodore. Considering what we now know with certainty about Theodore’s life, as elucidated by Michael Lapidge, and extended by the work of the various scholars who came together to commemorate the anniversary of the death of Theodore,122 it is entirely consistent with Stevenson’s hypothesis that a Syriac influence should be present. While a few critics of Stevenson’s work have suggested that her paleographical evidence is suspect,123 not one of the critics encountered has questioned the

122

As recorded in M. Lapidge, ed., Archbishop Theodore: Commemorative Studies on His Life and Influence. 123 For details, see above, n. 68.

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resolute correspondence between the contents of the Laterculus and the facts of Theodore’s life, including his certain sojourn in Edessa and the influences he would have come across while there. Rather, such criticisms are considerably diminished by the fact that any alternative hypothesis would have a harder time contending with these features than the one suggested by Stevenson in the first place. It is a case, according to an old axiom, that ‘. . . when all other contingencies fail, whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth.’ The full extent to which the Syriac tradition, and Ephrem in particular, is discernible in the Laterculus, makes Stevenson’s attribution of the text to Theodore far from improbable. For even as other, perhaps less obscure, influences prevail on the text, the spirit of Ephrem runs inexorably through it. At one point, Theodore appeals to the Syriac father by name, but at numerous points incorporates his imagery without citation, or perhaps even a conscious awareness that he is doing so. His exegesis is often shared with Ephrem, and even his disinclination to get involved in theological polemic to any great extent may be a reflection of Ephrem’s own professed suspicion of the philosophical approach to questions of theology. Such esteem for a tradition, as embodied by a monolithic figure like Ephrem, and mixed as it is with so many cross-cultural influences in one text, must surely have come from someone whom we know to have been (at least partly) formed in the Syriac milieu, and whose itinerant life would unquestionably bring him into contact with a diverse range of sources. Theodore of Tarsus measures up perfectly. In his article ‘The Influence of Ephraim the Syrian’, Andrew Palmer says of Ephrem’s transmission in the Latin West that, ‘The Latin Ephraim had a certain influence on German literature in the eighth and ninth centuries; and later, it seems, on Hildegard of Bingen. And something of the original Ephraim was preserved in the Latin: for example, Ephraim’s predilection for the name of ‘Physician’ in referring to Christ.’124 Sidney Griffith, meanwhile, in ‘A Spiritual Father for the Whole Church’, cites various examples of Ephrem’s work drawn on by individual Latin scholars and monastic communities throughout the Middle Ages.125 But the article ‘Knowledge of Ephraim’s Writings in the Merovingian and Carolingian Age’ is most helpful in identifying precise channels of 124 125

In Hugoye, 2, 1, p. 3. Hugoye, 1, 2, July 1998.

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Ephremic transmission into medieval Latin tradition.126 Oblique reference is even made to Theodore as a source for Ephrem’s dissemination in German circles: ‘The popularity of Ephraim in Bavaria may reflect a sense that the sermons were particularly fitting in an area of more recent Christianization, or suggest the legacy of the Anglo-Saxon missionaries and so supplement the evidence for knowledge of Ephraim in Anglo-Saxon England presented by Jane Stevenson . . . .’127 Together, these papers present a picture of Ephrem and, by extension, aspects of Syriac tradition, as having so pervaded the theological canon of western Europe, that Pope Benedict XV in 1920 is able to proclaim Ephrem a doctor of the universal church, reflecting in the twentieth century the acclamation he had already earned in ‘. . . east and west in medieval times.’128 More specific work needs to be done in this field if we are to know the exact extent to which Theodore of Tarsus was a part of this process, but the evidence to date suggests a significant contribution. After a lengthy examination of the Syriac sources drawn upon by Theodore in the Laterculus, the most important conclusions we can draw must be those concerning Theodore’s understanding of the person and work of Christ. Of these, the most obvious is manifest in the Ephremic language Theodore uses for the incarnate Logos. As seen in chapter fourteen of the Laterculus particularly, this involves a mix of metaphors drawn from Ephrem’s well – including that of Christ as food, shepherd, and physician – which, if at first they seem arbitrary, in fact serve to communicate an image of Christ that is at once restorative and fundamentally eucharistic. Yet for all that the language of the Laterculus reflects Syriac inspiration, it is the suggestion of recapitulation – the Irenaean theological brain-child – that Theodore draws out of the language that makes it so significant. It is possible that Ephrem meant to direct his language in such a way as to lead to the idea of recapitulation. Certainly, as we have discovered above, ideas of Irenaeus are evident in his poetry. Only a full study of Irenaean transmission in the Syriac church will establish if his writing was known there by Ephrem’s time, or if the apparent knowledge was actually just indirect acquaintance. In any case, the Laterculus is replete with Irenaean language and ideas, and the relationship Hugoye, 2, 1, January, 1999. D. Ganz, ‘Knowledge of Ephraim’s writings’, Hugoye 2, 1, p. 3. 128 S. Griffith, ‘A Spiritual Father for the Whole Church’, p. 1. 126 127

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between these and the language of Ephrem is brilliantly drawn out by Theodore. For the Theodore who is so enamoured of Syriac tradition and of Ephrem in particular, it ultimately seems that even as he draws on these exotic sources in the composition of the Laterculus, his agenda is something more cosmically significant. In the hands of Theodore, Ephrem is not merely the purveyor of original and picturesque metaphors for Christ; his avowedly non-philosophical language is the means to a most philosophically consequential saviour and restorer of humankind.

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4. the influence of irenaeus of lyons on theodore A survey of the Laterculus Malalianus reveals that the words ‘restoration’ and ‘renewal’ are, together, used no fewer than seven times in the course of the section of text belonging to Theodore alone. Even if one were to miss all other potential indicators of Irenaean influence on the text, the fact that this vocabulary is as prominent as it is, makes it hard to ignore Irenaeus of Lyons as a contributor to the author’s mind on christological (and more especially, soteriological) matters. For the idea of restoration, such as it appears in the Laterculus, corresponds to the quintessential idea of Irenaeus: that the work of Christ was to recapitulate all things in himself, and thereby to re-establish humankind in the vocation of representing God in image and likeness. And once one determines the prominence of restoration as a theological theme in the Laterculus, it can serve as something of a key in approaching the rest of the text: unlocking images, and revealing that what lies behind them is a picture of the Incarnation that might have been drawn, in many respects, from the pages of the second-century bishop of Lyons’ work against the Gnostics. In the end, it appears that the Laterculus Malalianus is replete with language, the purpose of which is to depict Christ as recapitulator: one who liberates humankind from bondage, by taking on himself all aspects of what it is to be human, and sanctifying humanity once again for its original, intended purpose.

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4.1 Background of Irenaeus Irenaeus of Lyons was originally from Asia Minor, born, by his own account, in what was probably Smyrna, on the Aegean coast. The details he provides of his own childhood1 enable us to estimate his year of birth at sometime around 140, making him a close successor of the apostles. For this reason, together with his having been a first-hand witness to the teaching of Polycarp – himself a disciple of St John2 – Irenaeus represents a major link between apostolic and early patristic teaching. Importantly, that connection with Polycarp was something Irenaeus consciously drew on for the sense of continuity it gave him; in terms of his own apostolic work it was a source of strength.3 Due to an account he provides of Polycarp’s time in Rome in approximately 155, it is suggested that Irenaeus spent some time there himself, but regardless, we can locate him in the city of Lyons by 177.4 By reason of this trans-European migration, Irenaeus has also been described as a link between East and West.5 At the same time, Robert Grant tells us that such ‘[m]igration from Asia to Gaul was common in the second century,’ citing William Frend, who records the names of numerous Greek migrants to the region.6 However common the move, though, Irenaeus must not have assimilated entirely without difficulty and to the extent that he lost his Greek consciousness. In this regard, 1 Many of the details of Irenaeus’ life are recorded over the course of his own works, and collected by Eusebius in the Historia ecclesiastica, predominantly in book 5. Robert Grant recounts them in his book, Irenaeus of Lyons, pp. 1‒10. 2 Et Polycarpus autem, non solum ab apostolis edoctus et conuersatus cum multis eis qui Dominum nostrum uiderunt, sed etiam ab apostolis in Asia in ea quae est Smyrnis Ecclesia constitutus episcopus, quem et nos uidemus in prima nostra aetate, multum enim perseuerauit et ualde senex gloriosissime et nobilissime martyrium faciens exiuit de hac uita, haec docuit simper quae ab apostolis didicerat, quae et Ecclesiae tradidit, et sola sunt uera. ‘Mais on peut nommer également Polycarpe. Non seulement il fut disciple des apôtres et vécut avec beaucoup de gens qui avaient vu le Seigneur, mais c’est encore par des apôtres qu’il fut établi, pour l’Asie, comme évêque dans l’Église de Smyrne. Nous-même l’avons vu dans notre prime jeunesse – car il vécut longtemps et c’est dans une vieillesse avancée que, après avoir rendu un glorieux et très éclatant témoignage, il sortit de cette vie. Or, il enseigna toujours la doctrine qui est aussi celle que l’Église transmet et qui est la seule vraie,’ Adv. haer., 3, 3, 4; vol. 2; SC, 211, pp. 39‒40. 3 A. Orbe, ‘Irenaeus’ in EEC, p. 413. 4 As remarked upon in note 1, this, and other biographical details, can be found in a number of sources, but are here compiled from the work of both Antonio Orbe (‘Irenaeus’) and Robert Grant (Irenaeus of Lyons). 5 See the entry on Irenaeus in ODCC, p. 847. 6 R. Grant, Irenaeus of Lyons, p. 4.

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Grant says that ‘Greek culture seems to have flourished at Lyons,’ but further reports that ‘sometimes Irenaeus regretted his absence from the deeper culture of Christian Asia.’7 If he was a link of any importance, then, Irenaeus will not have been so due to his being the only easterner in western Europe. It must be, rather, that he took on prominence as a Christian theologian, expounding the faith before a pagan audience, as well as the more dangerous philosophical opposition of the Gnostics. In this regard, the connection Irenaeus is said to have represented between East and West is dealt with somewhat more effusively by Grant, who says that Irenaeus ‘. . . gathered up and combined the traditions of predecessors from Asia Minor, Syria, and Rome’, and that ‘[i]n his own person he united the major traditions of Christendom from Asia Minor, Syria, Rome, and Gaul . . .’8 Further, Grant says that Irenaeus ‘. . . built up a body of Christian theology that resembled a Gothic cathedral, strongly supported by columns of biblical faith and tradition, illuminated by vast expanses of exegetical and logical argument, and upheld by flying buttresses of rhetorical and philosophical considerations from the outside.’9 Yet in order to understand Irenaeus and his context, it is not to grand metaphors that the reader must turn, however complimentary of his genius; it is to the theological milieu in which he would take up the mantle of Christian ministry. Above all, it was heresy that served as the impetus to Irenaeus’ magnum opus, entitled Adversus haereses10, and more precisely the multifaceted heresy of Gnosticism.11 In response to the threat of R. Grant, Irenaeus of Lyons, p. 4. R. Grant, Irenaeus of Lyons, p. 1. 9 R. Grant, Irenaeus of Lyons, p. 1. 10 Adversus haereses was written originally in Greek and entitled, ῎Ελεγχος καὶ ἀνατροπἠ τῆς ψευδωνύμου γνώσεως. The Greek text was lost, but the work itself preserved in ‘…rather literal Latin translation; an Armenian translation of books 4 and 5; numerous fragments in Syriac and various fragments in Greek traceable through citations in later authors and in the catenae (Irenaeus was a much read author)’, A. Orbe, ‘Irenaeus’ in EEC, p. 413. A critical reconstruction of the Greek text was undertaken by A. Rousseau and L. Doutreleau, and is so available in Greek and Latin parallel in SC, 263/4 (I); 293/4 (II); 210/11 (III); 100 (IV); 152/3 (V), with French translation. 11 ‘Mais c’est sans doute la connaissance de la situation ecclésiastique qui éclaire le mieux la pensée de l’évêque de Lyon. Il suffit de rappeler ici quelques-uns des traits essentiels qui caractérisent la situation de l’Église à cette époque : formation du canon, élaboration de la doctrine de la tradition, existence d’un épiscopat hiérarchisé se référant à la succession apostolique, naissance et développement des hérésies et principalement de la gnose. C’est sur cet arrière-plan que va se profiler la silhouette intellectuelle d’Irénée. Dans ce contexte ecclésiastique, ce qu’il faut surtout retenir pour bien saisir la pensée irénéenne, c’est la présence de l’hérésie. Irénée entre en scène au moment où l’hérésie gnostique, 7 8

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Gnosticism – and particularly Valentinian Gnosticism12 – Irenaeus commandingly exercised his mind on theological matters, and thereby developed an ecclesiological and christological system that would become fundamental for the Church thereafter. In this respect, we can say of Irenaeus and his theological formulations what Aloys Grillmeier does in his introduction to a broader discussion on second-century thought on the nature of Christ: The incentive for this [christological work] came less from within than from without, not least from the Church’s encounter with the pagan world and its philosophy. The need to construct a théologie savante emerged from this encounter with pagan philosophy. Both the concepts and the language with which Christian doctrine was presented had to be developed further. [. . .] Thus the second century introduced the great task of the patristic period, that of achieving a better grasp of the data of revelation with the help of pagan philosophy. This proved to be a both a powerful driving force to theological progress and a favourite starting point for heresies. It had important consequences for christology: the dynamic presentation of the mission of Christ in the economy of salvation was impregnated more and more with a static-ontological awareness of the reality of Christ as God and man.13

This begs the question of Irenaeus, however, as to what his specific contribution to christology entailed, how it differed from others’, and how it developed in response to the challenge of Gnosticism. The christological concept most characteristic of Irenaeus14 takes as its starting point St Paul’s description of God’s purpose, expressed in Ephesians, that ‘[God] has made known to us in all wisdom and insight the mystery of his will, according to his purpose which he set forth in Christ as a plan for the fullness of time, to unite all things in him, things in heaven and things on earth.’15 The verb

plus exactement, les tendances gnostiques sont en pleine floraison et menacent de dissoudre le christianisme dans un vaste syncrétisme,’ A. Benoît, Saint Irénée: Introduction à l’Étude de sa Théologie, p. 48. 12 J. T. Nielsen, Adam and Christ in the Theology of Irenaeus of Lyons, p. 3. 13 A. Grillmeier, Christ in Christian Tradition, vol. 1, pp. 36‒7. 14 J. N. D. Kelly, Early Christian Doctrines, p. 172. 15 Eph. 1: 9‒10: γνωρίσας ἡμῖν τὸ μυστήριον τοῦ θελήματος αὐτοῦ, κατὰ τὴν εὐδοκίαν αὐτοῦ ἣν προέθετο ἐν αὐτῷ εἰς οἰκονομίαν τοῦ πληρώματος τῶν καιρῶν, ἀνακεφαλαιώσασθαι τὰ πάντα ἐν τῷ Χριστῷ, τὰ ἐπὶ τοῖς οὐρανοῖς καὶ τὰ ἐπὶ τῆς γῆς ἐν αὐτῷ.

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‘ἀνακεφαλαιώσασθαι’, translated here as ‘to unite’, becomes for Irenaeus ‘recapitulation’. John Kelly explains that Irenaeus ‘…understands the Pauline text as implying that the Redeemer gathers together, includes or comprises the whole of reality in Himself, the human race being included.’16 How Christ does this, according to Irenaeus’ doctrine of recapitulation, is described at length by Kelly: In close conjunction with this he exploits to the full the parallelism between Adam and Christ which was so dear to St Paul. Christ is indeed, in his eyes, the ‘second Adam’ (ὁ δεύτερος Ἀδάμ), and ‘recapitulated’ or reproduced the first even in the manner of His birth, being generated from the Blessed Virgin as he was from virgin earth. […] When He became incarnate, Christ ‘recapitulated in Himself the long sequence of mankind’, and passed through all the stages of human life, sanctifying each in turn. As a result (and this is Irenaeus’s main point), just as Adam was the originator of a race disobedient and doomed to death, so Christ can be regarded as inaugurating a new, redeemed humanity.17

And while certain of the apostolic fathers may have contributed something to the development of Irenaeus’ view that there existed a parallel between the virgin earth from which Adam took his humanity and the Virgin Mary from whom the God-Man took his, for Irenaeus it becomes an exegetical notion central to his christology.18 The catalyst to this theological ferment that lead to the composition of Adversus haereses was, of course, the Gnosticism that threatened orthodox faith in Lyons and elsewhere. John Lawson presents a picture of Adversus haereses as more of a pastoral ramble than a systematic theological treatise, but that is in no way to minimize its composition in response to the threat posed by Gnosticism; it is, rather, precisely because of this threat that Irenaeus, the shepherd of his flock, should come to write in the manner he does.19 That this is the J. N. D. Kelly, Early Christian Doctrines, p. 172. J. N. D. Kelly, Early Christian Doctrines, pp. 172‒3. 18 Jan Nielsen discusses Irenaeus’ sources for the Adam-Christ parallel in Adam and Christ in the Theology of Irenaeus of Lyons, pp. 86‒92. He identifies Justin Martyr, Theophilus of Antioch, the Easter Homily of Melito of Sardis, and the apocryphal correspondence between the Corinthians and the Apostle Paul as possible influences, but says that none of them ultimately provided Irenaeus with the image of a first Adam–second Adam such as he expounds in his own work. In this, Irenaeus is quite original. 19 J. Lawson, Biblical Theology of Saint Irenaeus, p. 6. 16 17

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case Lawson further implies by turning his attention to other scholars’ description of the context for Adversus haereses, recording, for example, Ludwig Duncker’s observations on Irenaeus’ attacks on Gnosticism, in detail.20 Of great importance for placing the work of Irenaeus in context, however, is Jan Nielsen’s Adam and Christ in the Theology of Irenaeus of Lyons, as it presents a detailed analysis of Irenaeus’ responses to his opponents’ various propositions.21 Nielsen’s summary of specific points of controversy includes the Valentinians’ distinction ‘. . . between an “unknown and unknowable” Father at the summit of the Pleroma and the Creator God, who originated from an Aeon fallen from the Pleroma, and Irenaeus’ assertion that “there is one Creator God, the very highest, who is the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob and the Father of Jesus Christ.”’22 It also includes the Gnostics’ distinction ‘. . . between a “terrestrial” and “celestial” Jesus, a Christ come from the Pleroma,’ and Irenaeus’ declaration that there is only one Jesus Christ ‘. . . who came from God and came upon the earth in the flesh.’23

4.2 Ideas William Frend’s description of Adversus haereses as ‘. . . containing a good many of the seeds of western Catholicism’24 manifests the fact that in Irenaeus’ seminal work are a number of concepts that would be taken up by the church from his time on. Of these, it must be that the idea of recapitulation is the most remarkable for being both the most original, and for having the greatest consequences for theology and exegesis. But along with recapitulation is also a concern on Irenaeus’ part to portray Christ as victor, to expound the nature of unity in the Church – especially in terms of unity with Rome – and to assert the absolute impor20 J. Lawson, Biblical Theology of Saint Irenaeus, p. 6‒12. The work in question is L. Duncker, Des heiligen Irenäus Christologie in Zusammenhange mit dessen theologischen und anthropologischen Grundlehren, Göttingen, 1843. Lawson then cites the work of Paul Beuzart, Essai sur la Théologie d’Irenée, Paris, 1908. What Lawson presents of the respective authors is their account of Irenaeus’ theology as formed in direct response to specific ideas current among the Gnostics. 21 Chapters 2 and 3 (pp. 24‒55) of Nielsen’s work are dedicated to this task. 22 J. T. Nielsen, Adam and Christ, p. 54. 23 J. T. Nielsen, Adam and Christ, p. 54. 24 W. H. C. Frend, The Early Church, p. 66.

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tance of tradition as a basis for reading Scripture as well as being a litmus test for orthodoxy. And again, each of these ideas has many tributaries, even if their treatment here will be limited to those that are judged of greatest significance for our immediate purpose.25 So in light of this, and because we have already established (via Kelly) that the concept of ἀνακεφαλαίωσις or recapitulation, is at the heart of Irenaeus’ thought26, we need first to understand the full nature of this idea, and all the implications it holds for such fields as biblical exegesis, anthropology, and christology – the latter especially in terms of soteriology.

4.2.1 Recapitulation Recapitulation, as expressed by Irenaeus, is a doctrine firmly rooted in St Paul’s words to the Ephesians; although this is more apparent, perhaps, when both the New Testament and Irenaeus are read in Greek or Latin than in English.27 The different interpretations placed on St Paul by English translators can be of use, however, as together they serve to draw out the multidimensional meaning for ἀνακεφαλαίωσις developed by Irenaeus. Seen in his interpretation of the work of Christ, this meaning includes the ideas of humankind’s ‘summing up’; being re-constituted; being renewed in its ability to accurately reflect God’s image and likeness. In this latter 25 The manifold ideas of Irenaeus have been explored in depth by numerous scholars within the last hundred and fifty years, and spawned many important volumes and papers. The bibliographies found in both the EEC and ODCC under their respective articles on Irenaeus, while by no means exhaustive, are extensive, and should serve as a starting point for any investigation into the theology of the early father. 26 See the discussion above, section 4. 1, beginning around note 14. 27 In Greek, Irenaeus uses ἀνακεφαλαίωσις as his noun for Paul’s verb ἀνακεφαλαίωσασθαι. In Latin, the word that appears in Ephesians is recapitulare – a literal translation of the Greek – which in Irenaeus becomes recapitulationis. The Revised Standard and the Authorized Version respectively translate ἀνακεφαλαίωσασθαι as ‘to unite’ or ‘to gather together’. In similar fashion, Luther’s German Bible provides ‘zusammengefaßt’, while La Bible de Genève uses ‘recueillist ensemble’. In terms of early vernacular translations of the Bible, Douai-Rheims employs a literal English rendering of the Vulgate’s instaurare, with ‘to re-establish’. We are informed by Lawson (Biblical Theology, p. 140) that ‘G. Molwitz opens his very useful dissertation De ΑΝΑΚΕΦΑΛΑΙΩΣΕΩΣ in Irenaei Theologia Potestate (Dresden, 1874) with a careful discussion of the derivation of this term.’ In the pages following this statement, Lawson offers his own, helpful analysis of the word, however mentioning that ‘[m]any writers upon Irenaeus have essayed a definition of the meaning of the word ‘recapitulation’ as used by him, and with a perplexing variety of results’, p. 141 For another analysis of the word ἀνακεφαλαίωσασθαι and its derivatives, see J-M. Dufort, S.J., ‘La recapitulation paulinienne dans l’exégèse des Pères’ in Sciences ecclésiastiques, 12, no. 1, 1960, pp. 21‒38.

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sense, recapitulation could equally be read as ‘restoration’.28 Additionally, Jaroslav Pelikan says that ‘Irenaeus’s doctrine of recapitulation can be read as the most profound theological vindication in the second and third centuries of the universal Christian ideal of the imitation of Christ.’29 André Benoît, meanwhile, offers this summary definition of recapitulation: ‘l’incarnation du Fils qui reprend toutes choses et les mène à leur achèvement.’30 Definitions on their own, however, are insufficient for establishing implications and depth of meaning, especially for an idea as complex as recapitulation. For this, only an analysis of Adversus haereses, together with a substantial consideration of all the principles discovered there would really be appropriate. Fortunately for our purpose, the work of Irenaeus has been the subject of a number of rigorous studies over the course of the last century, of which we shall avail ourselves. First, however, the words of Irenaeus: Et antiquam plasmationem in se recapitulates est, quia quemadmodum per inobaudientiam unius hominis introitum peccatum habuit et per peccatum mors obtinuit, sic et per obaudientiam unius hominis iustitia introducta uitam fructificat his qui olim mortui errant hominibus. Et quemadmodum protoplatus ille Adam de rudi terra et de adhuc uirgine – nondum enim pluerat Deus et homo non erat operatus terram – habuit substantiam et plasmatus est manu Dei, id est Verbo Dei – omnia enim per ipsum facta sunt, et sumpsit Dominus limun a terra et plasmauit hominem – ita recapitulans in se Adam ipse Verbum exsistens, ex Maria quae adhuc erat Virgo,

28 Henry Bettenson says of recapitulation: ‘In Irenaeus, the word has several meanings or shades of meaning: (i) the idea of consummation: Christ as the true man, fulfilling the divine purpose, with the closely related idea of “restoration” of what man had been at the Fall; this seems to be most frequently in his mind when he uses the phrase, as in V.XXI.1. (ii) Sometimes, however, he employs it in a sense somewhat like that in Romans, as in III.XXIII.3 – the Lucan genealogy shows our Lord “recapitulating” the whole human race – and III.XXIII.1 – Christ’s work as a “recapitulation” of God’s plan of salvation – where a compendious action is described. (iii) In V.XIX.1 by his obedience “on the tree” the Lord “recapitulates” (cancels) the disobedience “connected with a tree” . . .’, in The Early Christian Fathers, n. 2, p. 81. Lawson summarizes the theological interpretations of recapitulation of a number of different scholars, including Harnack, Wendt, Bonwetsch, Seeberg, Vernet, Loofs, and Beuzart, Biblical Theology, p. 141‒3. 29 J. Pelikan, The Emergence of the Catholic Tradition, p. 144. Importantly, Pelikan goes on to discuss the meaning of ‘imitation’ in relation to early philosophical ideas, distinguishing it in Irenaeus’ context from possible notions of a purely moralistic conformity to the example of Christ. 30 A. Benoît, Saint Irenée, p. 227.

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recte accipiebat generationem Adae recapitulationis. Si igitur primus Adam habuit patrem hominem et ex semine uiri natus est, merito dicerant et secundem Adam ex Ioseph esse generatum. Si autem ille de terra quidem sumptus est et Verbo Dei plasmatus est, oportebat idipsum Verbum, recapitulationem Adae in semetipsum faciens, eiusdem generationis habere similitudinem. Quare igitur non iterum sumpsit limum Deus, sed ex Maria operatus est plasmationem fieri? Vt no alia plasmatio fieret neque alia esset plasmatio quae saluaretur, sed eadem ipsa recapitularetur, seruata similitudine.31

Key to this section of text is the assertion, right in the middle of the paragraph, that, ‘. . . ita recapitulans in se Adam ipse Verbum exsistens, ex Maria quae adhuc erat Virgo, recte accipiebat generationem Adae recapitulationis.’ From this sentence can be derived many of the ideas that the greater idea of recapitulation gives rise to, as well as what contributes to it in the first place. Recapitulation is simultaneously a christological doctrine and an anthropological doctrine, saying as much about the nature of humankind as it does about Christ.32 Irenaeus thinks of God’s work as a whole, including the acts of creation, salvation, and completion, calling it οἰκονομία.33 For this reason, we encounter Adam and Eve at the outset; Irenaeus declares the purpose of their existence to be the reflection of God’s image and likeness. What constitutes God’s image and 31 Adv. haer., 3, 21,10: ‘. . . And he recapitulated in himself the work originally fashioned, because, just as through the disobedience of one man sin came in, and through sin death prevailed, so also through the obedience of one man justice was brought in and produced the fruit of life for the men formerly dead. And as the firstfashioned Adam received his substance from earth uncultivated and still virgin – ‘for God had not yet rained and man had not yet worked the earth’ (Gen. 2: 5) – and was fashioned by the hand of God, that is, by the Word of God, for ‘everything was made through him’ (John 1:3) and ‘the Lord took dust from the earth and fashioned man’ (Gen 2: 7), thus the Word, recapitulating Adam in himself, from Mary still virgin rightly received the generation that is the recapitulation of Adam. If then the first Adam had had a man for father and been born of the seed of a man, the heretics could rightly say that the second Adam was generated by Joseph. But if the first Adam was taken from the earth and fashioned by the Word of God, it was necessary that the Word himself, working in himself the recapitulation of Adam, possessed a like origin. One might object, why did God not take dust anew and why did he make what he fashioned proceed from Mary? So that there would not be another fashioning nor another work fashioned to be saved but that the same thing might be recapitulated, with the likeness preserved,’ trans. R. Grant, Irenaeus, p. 139. 32 The anthropological implications of Irenaeus’ doctrine are considered in detail by Thomas Weinandy in an article entitled, ‘St Irenaeus and the Imago Dei: The Importance of Being Human’ in Logos, pp. 15‒34. 33 J. T. Nielsen, Adam and Christ, p. 56‒7.

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likeness is not definitively presented by Irenaeus, but the possibility of humankind representing them is lost in the beginning in the fall.34 But ‘[t]he ground lost in the fall was regained, and a new order of spiritual progress initiated.’35 This was possible because Jesus Christ went over the same ground as Adam, but in the reverse direction. He placed himself in the same circumstances as Adam, and was confronted with the same choices. At every point where Adam weakly yielded, slipping down to destruction, Christ heroically resisted, and at the cost of His agony retrieved the disaster. The benefits of this victory can pass to mankind, because Christ was acting as the Champion of humanity . . . . The Incarnation was subsequently the great climax of history of the human race.36

The culmination of the spiritual progress referred to above is humanity’s restored ability to represent God’s image and likeness: after the fashion suggested by Pelikan,37 and expounded further by John Meyendorff and others as the complete transformation of the human being leading to total union with God.38

34 Robert Grant points out the possible discrepancy in Irenaeus’ use of God’s image and likeness: ‘In Irenaeus’ scheme, the disobedience of Adam was especially important. He was made in the image and likeness of God and lost both when he fell (3.18.1) or, according to another passage, retained the image but lost the likeness (5.6.1). Christ, the creative Word, restored one or both to human beings by the gift of the Spirit and made them immortal’, Irenaeus, p. 52. 35 J. Lawson, Biblical Theology, p. 145. 36 J. Lawson, Biblical Theology, p. 144‒5. Italics mine. 37 See above, this chapter, n. 29. 38 J. Meyendorff, Christ in Eastern Christian Thought. Irenaeus appears throughout Meyendorff ’s work as a source for many christological ideas that would pass into eastern thought. See especially pp. 74‒5, and Meyendorff ’s discussion of Leontius of Jerusalem, for the contribution of Irenaeus. The implication of divinization in Leontius’ christology (when he wrote: ‘The Word in latter times, having himself clothed with flesh his hypostasis and his nature, which existed before his human nature, and which, before the worlds, were without flesh, hypostatized human nature into his own hypostasis’, Adv. Nest. 5. 28, cited by Meyendorff, p. 74), is shared with Irenaeus, as the origins of Leontius’ thought can be traced back to him. Later, in Meyendorff ’s discussion of Dionysius the Areopagite’s ecclesiology, he draws again on Irenaeus, saying that ‘Dionysius intended to express in his doctrine of the hierarchy the simple idea that all beings were created in view of their union with God’, and that this was ‘. . . a central idea of patristic anthropology since St Irenaeus’ (p. 107). ‘Union’ in Meyendorff is always taken to mean humankind’s deification. Agreeing with Meyendorff is Demetrios Constantelos, who says in his article, ‘Irenaeos of Lyons and His Central Views on Human Nature’, ‘The moral and

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So the anthropological dimension of recapitulation is that humankind was made in the image of God, with the eternal vocation to uphold God’s image. But human beings lost the means of living out this vocation due to Adam’s and Eve’s disobedience, and so found themselves separated from God. Just as Adam was responsible for the loss of vocation, another human being was now needed to re-cast humanity in God’s image; wherein lies the christological dimension of recapitulation. This dimension must be fundamentally soteriological in nature, insofar as it concerns what Christ does in order to bridge the separation between God and creation. God the Word takes on flesh, and so becomes the necessary human being. In doing so, he perfectly lives through every human age and experience, making possible the restoration of God’s image in the creature. Finally, with this accomplished – with every human experience except disobedience undertaken by God the Word – recapitulation becomes the means of humanity’s becoming like God: its result being humanity’s deification.39 Another important aspect of Irenaeus that concerns us here is the way in which he read Scripture, how the idea of recapitulation might spiritual growth of human nature is subject to progress and evolution. God reveals himself progressively in history, and man, endowed with all the potential, endowed with God’s presence in his being, moves forward progressively toward his ultimate and eternal life in God. God’s progressive disclosure culminated in the person of Christ, and man’s high point of spiritual evolution culminates in theosis. What mankind lost through the disobedience of Adam, it regains through the obedience of the New Adam. And the new-Adam is a theanthropos, a being that makes man’s union with God possible’ pp. 362‒3. 39 The theology of deification is explored in detail by Panayiotis Nellas in the book, Deification in Christ: The Nature of the Human Person. Included in an appendix of texts intrinsic to the concept is a passage from Irenaeus’ Adversus haereses. He is one of only four patristic authors specifically included in the appendix, and constitutes the earliest by more than a century. The others include: Gregory Nazianzus, Gregory of Nyssa, and Maximus Confessor. More polemical, perhaps, though no less informative on the subject of deification is Georgios Mantzaridis’ The Deification of Man. This work is more an analysis of the subject as taught by Gregory Palamas, though Irenaeus is cited among other fathers. Remarkably, Athanasius is cited by Mantzaridis as a source for the development of the theology of deification more than Irenaeus, even when Irenaeus has been the source for Athanasius’ ideas. Indeed, the summary statement that ‘God became what we are in order that we might become what he is,’ is found first in Irenaeus (Adv. haer. 5, pref.) and later in Athanasius (De Incarnatione, 54). The use and interpretation of Athanasius is important for our study, as he is often seen by scholars as a later expositor of Irenaeus. Athanasian soteriology, especially, can serve to illumine our study of Irenaeus, and what he meant by ‘recapitulation’. See K. Anatolias, ‘The Influence of Irenaeus on Athanasius’ in SP 36, pp. 463‒476, for a thorough examination of the question.

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have been derived from his particular hermeneutic, and how it might have informed it. His approach to the scriptures was one of deep reverence, whereby they became for him, when read in concert with apostolic tradition, the ultimate arbiter of doctrine. Irenaeus was not an exegete in the way we use the word today: reading through the Bible in a systematic way, employing a given method of interpretation to different texts.40 Rather, subordinating himself to tradition, he used the texts to establish what was true about their principal subject: Christ, of whom all Scripture spoke.41 On such a basis, his approach to the relevant texts of St Paul (for example, Romans 5:14 and 1 Corinthians 15: 45‒49), would have informed the way he read Genesis, and vice versa, and his approach to the rest of the scriptures would have followed suit. Lawson describes Irenaeus’ approach to the biblical texts as ‘allegorical’42, but it would surely be more accurate to describe it as ‘typological’. The use of typology is a feature of what would come to be known as the Antiochene school of exegesis, and as it would for the Antiochenes, for Irenaeus it means that in various figures and events of the Old Testament, he sees a typos of Christ.43 In this regard, everything described by Thomas O’Loughlin as ‘Christocentric exegesis’ might equally apply to Irenaeus’ method of reading the scriptures.44 In any case, the relationship Irenaeus’ scriptural exegesis bears to recapitulation is most clearly seen in that typological comparison employed so fruitfully by him: that of Adam to Christ. Yet even if the Adam-Christ typology is the most appreciable effect of Irenaeus’ manner of reading the scriptures, it can not be the only one; for if Christ is the new Adam, reconstituting in himself the 40

On this point, see T. O’Loughlin, ‘Christ and the Scriptures: the chasm between modern and pre-modern exegesis’, pp. 475‒85. 41 This typically patristic, ‘christocentric’ exegesis is described in T. O’Loughlin, ‘Christ and the Scriptures,’ p. 478. For a comment on Irenaeus’ approach to Scripture in particular, and the relationship this approach had to tradition, see J. Lawson, Biblical Theology, pp. 23‒4. 42 J. Lawson, Biblical Theology, p. 23. 43 In a discussion of typology as it applies to the Laterculus, Jane Stevenson also associates it with the Antiochene school of exegesis, and opposes it to allegory, citing David Wallace-Hadrill in evidence: ‘This [typological exegesis] was not allegorising. It was the practice of theoria, insight, which enabled the Christian to see what could not be seen by people living in the old dispensation. Typology based on historical fact is permitted [in the Antiochene school], allegory is not . . . typological linking of one event with another must presuppose the historical reality of both events’, (D. S. Wallace-Hadrill, Christian Antioch: A Study of Early Christian Thought in the East, pp. 35‒6), in The School of Archbishop Theodore, p. 43‒7. 44 See above, n. 41.

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nature of humanity, making him the recapitulator of all, he must equally reconstitute the priesthood of Aaron, Moses’ role as paterfamilias, and Jacob’s Israel. Virtually every Old Testament figure becomes a typos of Christ; but not a typos only. Each comes to represent a thing that Christ will restore by taking it on for himself. Irenaeus’ is a typological reading of the scriptures, but because of recapitulation, it is a typological reading that implies a complete overhaul of each typos.

4.2.2 Christ as Victor In recapitulating every aspect of what it is to be human, and so in reestablishing human beings in the vocation proper to them, Christ does what humanity could never have done for itself. The disobedience, or sin, that caused human beings to lose their place in the cosmic order is done away with by one who knew no disobedience or sin. In effect, this means that human beings, in Christ, were finally able to overcome, or conquer, the thing that separated them from God, making Christ the champion, victor, or liberator, of humanity. It is almost impossible to separate Irenaeus’ images for Christ from his portrayal of him as the recapitulator, or restorer, of all things. That this is the case, however, does not undermine the worth of his secondary images on their own. This intrinsic relationship between the Irenaean concepts of recapitulator and victor is discernible when he says: Oportebat enim eum qui inciperet occidere peccatum et mortis reum redimere hominem id ipsum fieri quod erat ille, id est hominem qui a peccato quidem in seruitium tractus fuerat, a morte uero tenebatur, ut peccatum ab homine interficeretur et homo exiret a morte.45

In this instance, the championship of Christ is entirely bound up with his having condescended to humanity by becoming man, as it was impossible that death could have been legitimately conquered by a being other than the type that had ushered it in. The uniform of defeat – flesh – is taken on by Christ and worn instead so as to become a uniform of victory. John Lawson draws out this connection clearly, in his discussion of Christ the champion, beginning with a quotation from book five of 45 Adv. haer. 3, 18, 7: ‘For it behoved him who was to destroy sin, and redeem man under the power of death, that he should himself be made that very same thing which he was, that is, man; who had been drawn by sin into bondage, but was held by death, so that sin should be destroyed by man, and man should go forth from death,’ W.H. Rambaut, trans., NPNF, ser. 1, vol. 1, p. 448.

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Adversus haereses: ‘He has therefore, in His work of recapitulation, summed up all things, both waging war against our enemy, and crushing him who at the beginning had led us away captive in Adam . . . in order that, as our species went down to death through a vanquished man, so we may ascend to life again through a victorious one.’46 In commenting on Irenaeus’ words, he continues by saying about Christ: ‘At every point where Adam weakly yielded, slipping down to destruction, Christ heroically resisted, and at the cost of his agony retrieved the disaster. Thus was wrought out a decisive victory over the adversary. The benefits of this victory can pass to all mankind, because Christ was acting as the Champion of humanity.’47 This language of combat is interpreted by Lawson as vital to Irenaeus’ doctrine of the atonement, in which case he is not alone.48 The language of combat and Christ’s victory in Irenaeus expands what his modern readers might see as a positive soteriological vision limited to humanity’s recapitulation and ultimate deification,49 into a vision that takes unquestionable account of the need for sin to be done away with. Lawson attaches a great deal of importance to this development as he finds it in Gustav Aulén’s Christus Victor. He draws on the Swedish author’s work to set Irenaeus’ view of the atonement in relief against the backAdv. haer., 5, 21,1, in J. Lawson, Biblical Theology, p. 144. J. Lawson, Biblical Theology, p. 145. 48 Lawson spends a significant part of his discussion of Christus victor drawing on the work of Gustav Aulén, (Den kristna försoningstanken, Stockholm, 1930, and translated by A. G. Hebert as Christus Victor, London, 1931), for whom the idea of Christ defeating the scourge faced by humanity is central. Lawson further points to Irenaeus’ contemporary, Clement of Alexandria, as another patristic source for this depiction of Christ as combatant and victor, citing his Exhortation 10, by way of example: ‘Fashioning himself in flesh, he enacted the drama of human salvation: for he was a true champion and a fellow-champion with the creature.’ 49 Typical of such a view would be André Benoît’s statement regarding the theme of progression in the Adversus haereses: ‘Théologiquement, cette idée de l’évolution progressive de l’homme ne laisse que fort peu de place à la notion de péché. Adam n’avait pas été créé parfait. Il avait à se developer et à progresser, avant d’atteindre l’état de maturité spirituelle où Dieu voulait le conduire. La chute, si elle introduit quelque désordre dans ce plan, ne le modifie pas dans son ensemble, tout au plus retarde-t-elle sa réalisation. Dans cette perspective, la rémission des péchés n’est qu’une étape préparatoire, au cours de cette grande progression qui mène l’homme à la perfection et la divinisation,’ Saint Irénée, p. 230. This assertion of Benoît, made in the context of his chapter on the themes of the Adversus haereses, and which includes a discussion of the three themes of unity, economy, and progression, contrasts sharply with Lawson’s view, that the idea of Christus victor comprises a central dimension to Irenaeus’ thought, and that this idea in turn represents what Aulén calls the ‘classic view of the Atonement’, Biblical Theology, p. 146. Lawson is not alone in his agreement with Aulén in this respect. Gustaf Wingren, in Man and the Incarnation: A Study in the Biblical Theology of St Irenaeus (R. Mackenzie, 46 47

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ground of what both he and Aulén call the ‘Latin view’ of the atonement, describing Irenaeus’ as the view of the atonement most consistent with that of the New Testament.50 Perhaps more important for our purpose here, however, is how Lawson relates Irenaeus’ use of the Christus victor motif to his theology of recapitulation. Lawson almost suggests that the two terms are so closely related as to be interchangeable: ‘In detailing the career of the heavenly champion of man most of the important things that S. Irenaeus has to say about the saving work of Christ fall into place. The more one looks into the detail, the more convincing becomes the whole scheme. This circumstance substantiates the claim that it is this conception which is essentially represented by the word “recapitulation.’”51 It is certainly possible to conclude that portraying Christ as the victor, or champion, of humankind springs very naturally from a portrayal of him as the one who descends out of heaven in order to put right that which had originally gone awry; especially if what has gone awry means that the subject finds itself held captive as a result. In this way, the Christus victor motif transforms Irenaeus’ understanding of recapitulation from a solely positive idea entailing deification, to one that deals unambiguously with the sin that affects the whole human condition.

4.2.3 The Church: Unity and Tradition It was essential for Irenaeus that his readers understand the oneness of God, his actions, his Son, and his church. For this reason, expressions of the necessity of unity emerge time and time again through the course of Adversus haereses, almost without regard for what aspect of God’s economy Irenaeus was referring to. André Benoiˆt draws this point out in detail: Le thème que la lecture de l’ouvrage Contre les hérésies accentue avec le plus de force est celui de l’unité. Cette notion, Irénée la traduit par l’emploi répété de l’adjectif unus. Et pour insister sur cette unité, et lui donner plus de poids, trans., Edinburgh, 1959), says: ‘It has been a frequent allegation in works on Irenaeus that for him the Crucifixion has no essential significance for man’s salvation. The basis for such an assertion is a doctrine of the Atonement which came to be formulated at a later period, and which gave a significance to the death of Jesus that was completely independent of His Resurrection, and indeed which might even be said to have rejected the Resurrection, for the doctrine of the Atonement has in fact gradually lost its Resurrection content. In Irenaeus, the Crucifixion and the Resurrection are integrally related and bound up with Christ’s victory over the Devil, just as the humanity of Jesus is bound up with his victory’, pp. 121‒2 (italics mine). 50 See Lawson, Biblical Theology, pp. 146‒7. 51 J. Lawson, Biblical Theology, pp. 147‒8.

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il se sert des expressions redoublées: eis kai autos, unus et idem, unus et ipse. L’adjectif solus convient également, ainsi que des expressions négatives comme neque aliud sed . . . Cette affirmation de l’unité s’applique surtout à Dieu. Il n’y a qu’un seul Dieu (1), elle se rencontre fréquemment à propos du Christ: il n’y a qu’un seul Christ (2). L’expression unus Spiritus ou ses équivalents, sont, par contre, relativement rares (3). Puis le thème se ramifie: il n’y a qu’une seule foi (4), il n’y a qu’un seul salut (5), il n’y a qu’une seule tradition (6), il n’y a qu’une seule prédication de l’Église (7), il n’y a qu’un Évangile (8), il n’y a qu’un seul genre humain (9), un seul corps du Christ (10).52

In saying this, he demonstrates how sweeping Irenaeus’ concern for unity was. In the face of Gnostic multiplicity, Irenaeus needed to show precisely that God and his actions were entirely at one, and that in God there could be no division.53 The idea of unity appears to have been informed by, and to have informed, Irenaeus’ thoughts about recapitulation. There is an intrinsic relationship, for instance, between the oneness Christ shares with God the Father and the oneness he shares with humankind in his incarnation. Outside of such exclusive singularity, there could have been no restoration of humanity to its rightful place, no recapitulation of humanity’s different expressions and experiences. According to Jeffrey Bingham’s54 interpretation of Irenaeus, however, neither could there be any legitimate love for God on the part of human beings if there was no understanding of his unity. In other words, only the right understanding of God could beget a right approach to him.55 Beginning with Irenaeus’ use of a quote from Justin Martyr’s Against Marcion (‘I would

A. Benoît, Saint Irénée, pp. 203‒4. Jan Tjeerd Nielsen adduces the same concern for oneness on Irenaeus’ part in response to the Gnostics. In summing up that concern, Nielsen says, ‘There is one creator God, the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, above whom there is no other God, neither a beginning, nor a Pleroma. This God is the Father of Jesus Christ. Man is his ‘making’ (πλάσμα) (cf. Adv.haer. 1, 22, 1). ‘It is from the solid ground of the ‘rule of truth’ that Irenaeus proceeds to ‘unmask’ and ‘refute’ the Gnostic systems. The whole Adversus haereses is dominated by the main theme of there being one sole God, the Creator, who is also the father of the one and only Jesus Christ,’ Adam and Christ, p. 47. 54 In an article entitled, ‘Knowledge and Love in Irenaeus of Lyons’ in SP 36, pp. 184‒99. 55 ‘Ce thème de l’unité trouve une autre ramification peut-être moins apparente, mais réelle cependent : l’œuvre du Christ consiste à rétablir l’unité ou la communion de l’homme avec Dieu,’ A. Benoît, Saint Irénée, pp. 217. 52 53

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not have believed the Lord himself if he had announced a God other than the Creator’56), Bingham goes on to say: What is astounding about these words is that, for Justin, faith in the revealing Saviour is subordinated to the theological doctrine of God’s unity. Irenaeus concurs by citing them with approval. Just prior to the words of Justin, he had differentiated faith in the Son’s revelation from love for the Father, which is love for the one Father and Creator. The idea of the Saviour’s advent in history must never be taken to suggest that the Father has not always provided for humanity through the continual presence of his Word . . . . Love for the Father, then, involves loving him as the one who creates, exercises providence, and sends the Son. But one is not to believe the Son at the expense of love for theological unity which has the corollary of the Word’s continual providing ministry. That unity and a love for it is the test of a true Christology.57

Unity, or oneness, is the key to understanding anything about God as well as what he does in his Son, or in the Church. Yet while Irenaeus deals at length with the importance of unity in considering all aspects of the divine economy across Adversus haereses, and while André Benoiˆt deals with unity in relation to each of those aspects in turn, of greatest interest to this brief study is how it affects Irenaeus’ concept of the church and the church’s ministry.58 Robert Grant identifies two chapters in Adversus haereses where the importance of the Church’s unity to Irenaeus is particularly discernible: ‘The church, dispersed throughout the world to the ends of the earth, received from the apostles and their disciples the faith in one God the Cited in Adv. haer. 4, 6, 2. ‘Knowledge and Love’, pp. 187‒88. 58 If oneness, or unity, can be understood to relate to the universal nature of the church’s mission (and indeed, as Irenaeus liberally suggests, we can), then we might also find something of a universalist tendency in his idea. In Man and the Incarnation, Wingren says, ‘We shall fail to understand the Irenaean concept of the Church if we do not keep [the] universal perspective in mind. The Church is not a group, but a manifestation of Christ’s progressive dominion. Its redemptive function continues, and it is meaningless to start dealing with rejected groups of men . . . . What is done in the Church counteracts the Fall. Countless numbers outside the Church have not yet heard the message of Christ’s victory, but they are encompassed in hope by the Church . . . . Irenaeus’ view of the Church is marked by an exceptional breadth and openness. Christ’s dominion embraces the whole of humanity, and his Church represents in the present time this dominion in the process of expansion. It will eventually extend to all humanity . . .’ pp. 141‒2. 56 57

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Father Almighty, “who made heaven and earth and sea and all that is in them” (1, 10, 1) . . . . The church, having received this preaching and this faith . . . though dispersed in the whole world, diligently guards them as living in one house, believes them as having one soul and one heart . . . ’ (1, 10, 2).59 There are certain conditions to be met by the church if it is to have any share in that name, however, as Irenaeus’ concern for church unity comes bound up with the idea of tradition as a determining factor in establishing the legitimacy of a faith community, most especially in terms of that community’s relationship with the church of Rome,60 but also in terms of how it read Scripture.61 As cited by R. Grant, Irenaeus of Lyons, pp. 70‒1. This point is articulated most clearly in book three of Adv. haer. with such phrases as, Traditionem itaque apostolorum in toto mundo manifestatem in omni Ecclesia adest perspicere omnibus qui uera uelint uidere. ‘Thus the tradition of the apostles, manifest in the whole world, is present in every church to be perceived by all who wish to see the truth’ (3, 1), R. Grant, trans., Irenaeus of Lyons, p. 124, and, Sed quoniam ualde longum est in hoc tali uolumine omnium Ecclesiarum enumerare successions, maximae et antiquissimae et omnibus cognitae, a gloriosissimis duobus apostolis Petro et Paulo Romae fundate et constitutae Ecclesiae, eam quam habet ab apostolis traditionem et adnuntiatem hominibus fidem per successions episcoporum peruenientem usque ad nos indicantes, confundimus omnes eos qui quoquo modo uel per sibiplacentiam uel uanam gloriam uel per caecitatem et sententiam malam, praeterquam oportet colligunt: ad hanc enim Ecclesiam propter potentiorem principalitatem necesse est omnem conuenire Ecclesiam, hoc est eos qui sunt undique fideles, in qua semper ab his qui sunt undique conseruata est ea quae est ab apostolis traditio. ‘Since, however, it would be very tedious, in such a volume as this, to reckon up the successions of all the churches, we do put to confusion all those who, in whatever manner, whether by an evil self-pleasing, by vainglory, or by blindness and perverse opinion, assemble in unauthorized meetings; [we do this, I say,] by indicating that tradition derived from the apostles, of the very great, the very ancient, and universally known church founded and organized at Rome by the two most glorious apostles, Peter and Paul; as also [by pointing out] the faith preached to men, which comes down to our time by means of the successors of the bishops. For it is a matter of necessity that every church should agree with this church, on account of its pre-eminent authority, that is, the faithful everywhere, inasmuch as the apostolical tradition has been preserved continuously by those [faithful men] who exist everywhere’ (3, 2), W. H. Rambant, trans., NPNF, ser. 1, vol. 1, pp. 415‒16. 61 In terms of Scripture, Irenaeus suggests that it must be interpreted according to the regula fidei. This rule is understood to include the ideas of ‘ . . . One God the Creator, Jesus Christ and his coming, the Holy Spirit, the Church, and the future judgement. Irenaeus asserts that the whole meaning of the gospel is summed up in this Rule. Barbarians who cannot yet read or hear the Scriptures are saved by it. In the face of heretical interpretations, it tests the true meaning of Scripture,’ S. Hall, Doctrine and Practice in the Early Church, pp. 61‒2. For Irenaeus, it was Scripture, read in concert with apostolic tradition, that had to be the criterion by which doctrine was elucidated. Scripture was ultimately an intrinsic part of the edifice that represented God’s oneness. 59 60

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4.3 Transmission The ideas of Irenaeus are well-attested to across Christian tradition. Irenaean undercurrents can be discerned in Christian East and West, in exegesis, individual exegetical inferences, and in complex theological developments. Yet for all his influence, no specific study of the dissemination of his work has taken place, either in terms of manuscript transmission, or in terms of a methodical tracing of his ideas from Lyons through the rest of the Mediterranean world.62 Such ideas as the ‘exchange formula’ for the Incarnation (that the Son of God became what we are in order that we might become what he is); motifs such as the ordines Christi, reflecting as they do the certain echo of recapitulation, as Christ passes through each stage and experience of human life; the infancy of Adam and Eve in the garden; the variations on the old Adam/new Adam typology: all of these pass into, by one route or another, the language of patristic, and later, theology. From a certain perspective, it may be that one of the most important manifestations of Irenaean transmission is to be found in Athanasius, the fourth-century Alexandrian. This importance would be due to a number of factors. First of all, Athanasius is a pivotal 62 The general manuscript tradition of Irenaeus’ work is commonly known. Antonio Orbe outlines it briefly this way: ‘I[renaeus]’s surviving works are two: a) Adversus Haereses, preserved entire only in a rather literal Latin translation; an Armenian translation of books IV and V; numerous fragments in Syriac and various fragments in Greek traceable through citations in later authors and in the catenae’, ‘Irenaeus’ in EEC, p. 413. Orbe goes on to say that Irenaeus was a much read author. He was certainly regarded as an important figure, as attested to by, for example, Eusebius. Details are also given of various Irenaean fragments in CPG, vol. 1, nos. 1306‒21, M. Geerard & F. Glorie, eds., Turnhout, Brepols, 1983, pp. 110‒18. But what interests us here most especially, is how and when Irenaeus was transmitted in Syriac. As Orbe mentions, there are Syriac fragments of Adv. haer., but opinion is divided on how early Irenaeus was translated. Robert Murray suggests in Symbols that ‘[i]t is possible that Irenaeus might have been translated into Syriac by the fourth century’ (p. 306), while Sebastian Brock has stated (in personal correspondence, for which I am indebted) that the fragments we know are all later than that. At the same time, Murray says (at least with respect to the shared motif of Adam’s and Eve’s primordial infancy) that there need not have been any borrowing from Irenaeus, while Ute Possekel challenges the supposed absence of direct Greek influence over Ephrem in his paper, ‘Evidence of Greek philosophical concepts in the writings of Ephrem the Syrian’. There can be little doubt that Irenaeus exercised some influence over the great Syriac father Ephrem, as evidenced by various themes represented in Ephrem’s poetry (see chapter 3 above, ‘Theodore’s Syriac Sources’), but knowing how such influence reached him could prove a valuable scholarly asset, as the answer to the question could bear very heavily on what we identify as Ephremic or Irenaean influence in the Laterculus Malalianus.

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figure in the development of christological and trinitarian doctrine, arguing as he does in favour of Christ’s full sharing in the substance of the Godhead against the Arian subordination of the Logos. Secondly, it is Athanasius’ deployment of the exchange formula, borrowed as it is from Irenaeus, that becomes the foundation for the Greek theological elaboration of deification (θέωσις).63 Finally, and more generally, there is a sharing between the two fathers of what Khaled Anatolios describes as the ‘…emphatic insistence on… the “immediacy of relation between God and the world,”’ concerning which he further declares: ‘[t]he language of the mutual presence between God and world, the presenting of the world to the Father by Christ, the terminology of joining, blending and uniting, all bespeak that emphasis.’64 In addition to the evidence we have for Irenaeus’ influence on the work of Athanasius, there are less obvious ways in which the transmission of his theology can be discerned in Christian thought after him. One example of this would be the inherent theology of the ordines Christi.65 Although the first appearance of this motif only dates to the fifth century, in his paper ‘The Seven Orders of Christ’, Joseph Crehan establishes its implicit continuity with the recapitulative theology of Irenaeus: ‘Irenaeus had laid it down that Christ took upon himself all the five ages of man. He was an infant among infants, a child among children, a boy, a youth, and even a senior . . . ; he thus sanctified the five ages of man . . . . [I]t is sufficient to see that there is a continuity of idea between Irenaeus, who would have Christ sanctify the five ages of man, and the unknown Egyptian monk who would have him sanctify, by sharing them, the five orders of the Church.’66 Proliferation of

63 For a thorough treatment of this doctrine, see N. Russell, The Doctrine of Deification in the Greek Patristic Tradition. In Russell’s work, the history of theosis is set out, including Irenaeus’ contribution, along with its transmission through the work of various Fathers, including Ephrem the Syrian. 64 K. Anatolios, ‘The Influence of Irenaeus on Athanasius’ in SP 36, pp. 464‒5. This article is of greater importance regarding the extent of Irenaeus’ influence on Athanasius, as well as the broader Greek theological tradition, than the use I have made of it here allows. In it, the author evaluates precise phrases and ideas that the Alexandrian will have taken from Irenaeus, although Anatolios also indicates the possible mediating role of Origen and Eusebius. Of such a concept as God’s accessibility in the Incarnation, for example, he says, ‘[o]nce again, this Irenaean legacy passes through Origen and Eusebius on its way to Athanasius,’ p. 469. 65 See discussion above, chapter 3, section 1.6. 66 J. Crehan, ‘The Seven Orders of Christ’, p. 82.

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this theologically Irenaean idea was such that it would become a part of theological discourse until at least the sixteenth century.67 Yet evidence for the transmission of Irenaeus’ writings and ideas is neither limited to his specific contribution to the development of the doctrine of deification, nor to the broad reception of his idea of recapitulation in such motifs as the ordines Christi. Besides the full, and rather literal, Latin translation of Adversus haereses, and the Greek fragments ‘. . . traceable through citations in later authors’,68 for example, as discussed above,69 there also exist some relatively early manuscript fragments in Syriac, along with an Armenian translation of books four and five. This, along with the fact that scholarship shows Irenaeus to have been, very early on, ‘. . . a much read author’,70 suggests that the transmission of his thought will have been very wide indeed. It is for this reason that we turn with interest to another specific sign of his influence: the presence in Ephrem the Syrian of two exegetical ideas concerning the figures of Adam and Eve,71 which derive unmistakably from Irenaeus. The first of these is Adam’s and Eve’s infant status in the Garden of Eden, and the second is the Eve-Mary/Adam-Christ typology.72 As to their status in the garden, it is of immense importance to Irenaeus that Adam and Eve should be understood to have been infants (or children), for such a notion is directly related to their ability to appropriate the full image and likeness of God when it was proffered.73

See R. Reynolds, The Ordinals, p. 2‒3. A. Orbe, ‘Irenaeus’ in EEC, p. 413. 69 See this chapter, above, n. 62. 70 A. Orbe, ‘Irenaeus’ in EEC, p. 413. 71 Of course these ideas are not limited in their dissemination to Ephrem, as we have seen in chapter 3, above. 72 Both of these instances of Irenaean influence on Ephrem are discussed in chapter 3, section 2.5 and section 2.3 respectively. While we have seen that the view of Adam and Eve as infants at the time of the fall is one that Ephrem treats differently at different times, its presence in his work at all suggests that he may have found it in an external source, and struggles to find its most judicious application. It is equally possible that Ephrem’s treatment of the question reflects the same desire as that of Irenaeus to apportion Adam and Eve the appropriate amount of responsibility for their actions according to the degree to which they reflected both God’s image and likeness. In this respect, Irenaeus’ lack of definition may be reflected by Ephrem’s lack of clarity. 73 As, for example, in Adv.haer. 4, 62, 1: οὕτως καὶ ὁ Θεὸς αὐτὸς μὲν οἶός τε ἦν παρασχεῖν ἀπ᾿ ἀρχῆς τῷ ἀνθρώπῳ τὸ τέλειον, ὁ δὲ ἄνθρωπος ἀδύνατος λαβεῖν αὐτό, νήπιος γὰρ ἦν. ‘. . . [S]o God was indeed able to himself to bestow on man perfection from the beginning, but man was incapable of receiving it, for he was a 67 68

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An important distinction to make in the treatment of Adam’s and Eve’s infancy, however, is between their stage of growth and their mental state. As Matthew Steenberg notes, ‘Adam and Eve were infants, not infantile; children, not childlike . . . To call an adult νήπιος (child) amounts to calling him a fool or imbecile. Irenaeus, however, seems not at all to intend a diminutive meaning.’74 Instead, Irenaeus’ interest is in distinguishing in humanity between what it could possess of God’s reflection and what it could not. ‘In his original state, Irenaeus teaches, man was created “in the image and likeness of God.” Although his usage is far from being consistent, he seems occasionally to have distinguished between the “image” and “likeness.”’75 In the inconsistency, we can imagine that Irenaeus was trying to illustrate how it was that humanity was dependent on the Incarnation, without simultaneously absolving the creatures from their culpability in furthering the separation.76 Yet whatever Irenaeus’ intent, it may be this apparent inconsistency that comes to inform Ephrem the Syrian’s use of the same concept, however he employs it. As to the EveMary/Adam-Christ typology, because we have discussed its implications above,77 it is not necessary to revisit its precise meaning now. Equally, attention is directed back to chapter three for a reminder as to how it was employed by Ephrem in the Syriac tradition.78 What we are concerned with here is the fact that this theme makes an appearance in Ephrem’s writing at all, for it is in its appearance in the Syrian’s work that the sheer breadth of Irenaeus’ influence is further revealed.

child’ (W. W. Harvey, ed. Sancti Irenaei episcope Lugdenensis libros quinque aduersus haereses, vol. 2., Cambridge, 1862, pp. 292–3, as cited by Jane Stevenson in Laterculus Malalianus, p. 207, n. 153). No consideration of the subject of Adam and Eve as ‘infants’ in the garden is complete without taking into account the paper by Matthew Steenberg entitled, ‘Children in Paradise: Adam and Eve as “Infants” in Irenaeus of Lyons’ in JECS, 12, 1, pp. 1–22. 74 M. C. Steenberg, ‘Children in Paradise’, pp. 4 & 5. 75 J. N. D. Kelly, Early Christian Doctrines, p. 171. 76 ‘ . . . [B]eing a creature, Adam was necessarily far removed from the divine perfection and incorruptibility; an infinite distance divided him from God. In Paradise, therefore, he was morally, spiritually, and intellectually still a child; and Irenaeus makes the point that, while God infused into the first man ‘the breath of life’, He did not bestow upon him the Spirit of adoption which He gives to Christians . . . . Unfortunately, because of his very weakness and inexperience, the process was interrupted almost at the start; he fell an easy prey to Satan’s wiles and disobeyed God,’ J. N. D. Kelly, Early Christian Doctrines, p. 171. 77 This chapter, section 2.1. 78 In chapter 3, section 2.3.

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In any case, what is essential to understand about the transmission of Irenaeus’ writing and his ideas, is just how wide and deep it was. We have seen his influence over such towering figures in christological development as Athanasius, and so, as the initial composer of the exchange formula, over the whole of the Greek theological tradition in terms of deification. We have seen how his doctrine of recapitulation would manifest itself in such concepts as ordines Christi, meaning that consciously or unconsciously, it would be taken up by numerous commentators in the East and West until the Reformation. Likewise in the exegetical tradition of the second Adam and second Eve would this doctrine find a vehicle to carry it through theological history: Syriac, Greek, and Latin. In light of this, as one moves further away from Irenaeus and his influence becomes more diffused across the theological spectrum, identifying his contributions to anyone’s thought with any precision becomes a difficult task. Yet the language of the Laterculus is such that Irenaeus is impossible to ignore; on which grounds we turn to an examination of the influence of Irenaeus on Theodore of Tarsus.

4.4 The Evidence in Theodore This chapter opened with a cursory account of Irenaean terminology in the Laterculus Malalianus, along with the suggestion that in addition to this specific vocabulary were intimations that conscious use was made by the author of other ideas that can be plainly located in the work of the second-century Greek bishop. It is now our task to examine these references in more detail, and to elaborate on the place they appear to hold in the thought of Theodore of Tarsus overall. Many of the points of contact between the biblical commentaries from Canterbury and the Laterculus have been chronicled by Jane Stevenson in her work on the latter text.79 Yet in the points of contact so identified, there is nothing to indicate a shared interest in Irenaean christological ideas. There is much in common exegetically, and in terms of shared patristic references, but it is difficult to say with any confidence what sort of theological assumptions regarding the person and work of Christ can be drawn form the Canterbury Commentaries. This is largely because of the commentaries’ punctuated nature, and the fact they treat 79

Both in her edition of the Laterculus Malalianus, as well as in her paper, ‘Theodore and the Laterculus Malalianus’ in AT, pp. 204‒21.

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only those things that the Canterbury student has noted and time has preserved.80 Although there is no obvious theological content in the commentaries that overlaps with that of the Laterculus, however, neither is there any that contradicts it; in light of which, the few occasions that appear consistent with Irenaean thought are worth mentioning. In the first instance, at PentI, 32, there is a brief comment on Genesis 2: 7, in which we find a restoration in the Apostles of a gift that was originally given to Adam, but which he lost in the fall: Spirauit in faciem eius: erat gratia spiritus sancti prophetalis quam in peccato perdidit. Et sic apostolis bis datur spiritus, sic et in Adam factus est, .i. primum anima et inspiration, postea .i. spiritualis gratia sicut in apostolis sufflauit dicens, ‘Accipite spiritum sanctum.’81

Although this gloss does not draw out the typological significance of Christ’s breath to any great extent, what is significant is the subject of comparison: something lost on Adam but re-established by Christ. In all likelihood this is merely a result of the typological exegesis common to both the Canterbury Commentaries and the Laterculus; at the same time, the fact that some aspect of Adam is set in relation to some aspect of Christ at least bears the trace of an Irenaean conclusion. There are, in any case, three other glosses of a similar nature in the commentaries, all of roughly the same import.82 All that can really be concluded from such a cursory comparison between the Canterbury Commentaries and the Laterculus is that there is no contradictory evidence concerning the influence of Irenaean ideas between the two texts. If we look to the commentaries for specific support in evaluating the Laterculus, however, we will not find it. It remains, then, to examine the Laterculus on its own terms, beginning with its language. 80 For a discussion of the Canterbury Commentaries, see chapter 2, especially section 6. 81 Genesis 2: 7. ‘32 And breathed into his face. It was the prophetic gift of the Holy Spirit which Adam lost through sin. And thus the spirit is given twice to the Apostles, as it was created in Adam; that is, in the first instance, soul and breath, but subsequently, the spiritual grace, as when he breathed into the Apostles, saying, “Receive ye the Holy Ghost,” ’ in Biblical Commentaries, p. 308/09. 82 They include PentI, 36; PentI, 58; and PentI, 247. In each, some connection is identified between an Old Testament event and an event in the life of Christ. Again, one would expect this as a result of Theodore’s exegetical method. In each of these cases, however, there is at least the suggestion of a recapitulative result.

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To read the Laterculus Malalianus, especially those chapters that belong to the hand of Theodore alone, is to encounter a veritable repository of Irenaean references. In fact, assuming a definition for ἀνακεφαλαίωσις that emphasises the idea of restoration, or renewal,83 it could be argued that one purpose of the work as a whole is to set forth an image of Christ as the restorer of humankind, together with the ancillary image of Christ as victor, or liberator, both of which ultimately derive from Irenaeus. As strong as the evidence for this is, however, it should be understood that at no point does Theodore use the specific word ‘ἀνακεφαλαίωσις’ anywhere in the text. Rather, it is as if the author very deliberately chooses to avoid the term in favour of the secondary (and somewhat elliptical) vocabulary of reparator and restaurator, both of which draw out the idea of restoration more directly. Even if the vocabulary is not explicitly Irenaean, however, the context and overwhelming thematic focus of the text is strongly suggestive of knowledge on Theodore’s part of something more than a mere sense of Irenaean thought. At the same time, neither is there any textual evidence that the Greek monk and archbishop knew anything like the Adversus haereses directly. A thorough examination of the Laterculus with Irenaeus in mind will hopefully serve to expose what it was that inspired Theodore as he composed the work. A review of the first twelve chapters of the Laterculus reveals nothing that might be identified specifically with Irenaeus, either in terms of broad theme or vocabulary. Theodore adds some interesting emphasis to the Malaline text concerning the six ages of the world and,84 later, the flight of the holy family into Egypt,85 but it is only in chapter twelve – the first of the exclusively Theodoran material – that one first encounters ideas that can be linked to the erstwhile bishop of Lyons. It is this chapter that sets the tone for almost everything else said over the course of the Laterculus; it may, in fact, represent something of the author’s manifesto for the whole of the work. The chapter begins with an unequivocal christological statement about the place of Christ in relation to the Godhead – a concern

For a discussion of the different aspects of this term, see above, section 2.1. LM, chapters 3 & 4. 85 LM, chapter 7. 83 84

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Theodore raises on only a couple of occasions in the Laterculus86 – and moves immediately to the well-documented Irenaean parallel between Eve and Mary. In the course of one prolonged sentence, he takes in the full scope of this parallel, drawing out the implications for Adam, and concludes with an explicit acknowledgement of the recapitulative theology behind it. . . .nam quod Christus per angelum uirgini nuntiatur ad euacuandum consilium serpentis ad Euam in paradyso; quod autem de uirgine natus est propter protoplaustum Adam, quem de uirgine terra et inpolluta ad suam fecit imaginem, qui cum suadente diabulo mortis incorrisset exitium, a solo Domino Christo rerum reparator et conditor eius corporis et animae per immortalitatis Christi restauraretur domicilium . . . .87

The emphasis on restoration does not stop there, however. Theodore segues into an argument that takes in at least three different themes, two of which are of especial interest to him, but which he weaves together into an elaborate illustration of Christ’s recapitulative work.88 86

It is suggested in J. Siemens, ‘A Survey of the Christology of Theodore of Tarsus in the Laterculus Malalianus’, that Theodore’s motivation in peppering his text with such declarations may be due, in part, to the heated theological milieu from which he emerged. As we established in chapter 1, there are many reasons to suppose that maintaining an explicitly orthodox christological line would have been a concern of Theodore’s, the greatest of which would have been the danger of monotheletism. 87 ‘. . . for Christ was announced to [the] Virgin by an angel, in order to nullify the counsel of the serpent to Eve in paradise; he was born of [the] Virgin, on account of Adam, the first man, whom he had made in his own image of virgin and unpolluted earth [but] who, when at the persuasion of the devil he underwent the destruction of death, was restored to his heavenly home by the Lord Christ alone, through the immortality of Christ . . . ,’ LM, 12, p. 136/7. 88 Theodore draws on his interest in medicine, as well as number-theory, in order to demonstrate the relationship between the number of years it took Zerubbabel to rebuild the Jerusalem Temple and Christ as the Temple’s true restorer. His purpose becomes apparent when he says, ‘Sed Iudaei ignorantes capitulum rationis protulerunt testimonium ueritatis, et ita Domino respondents aiunt:“.xl. et .vi. annos aedificatum est templum hoc, et tu in tribus diebus suscitabis illud?” Ille autem, inquid euangelista, dicebat de templo corporis sui, cuius dispensationem adpraehendere nequiuerunt Iudaei.’ ‘But the Jews, not understanding the [head] of reason, uttered a testimony of truth, and responded thus to the Lord: “This temple was built in forty-six years, and you will raise it in three days?” But he was saying this, the evangelist tells us, of the temple of his body, the dispensation of which the Jews were not able to understand,’ LM, 12, p. 136/7. Stevenson remarks on Theodore’s blending of themes through this section of chapter 12 in her commentary on the text, n. 104, p. 194.

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Finally, it is important to note that, in this introductory chapter to the author’s own thought, in addition to the explicit use of Irenaeus’ recapitulative parallels between Adam and Eve and Christ and Mary, is his use of specifically restorative vocabulary. This includes reparator as a title for Christ (as in rerum reparator); restauraretur in reference to Adam’s being restored to his [presumably heavenly] home; and restauratorem for Zerubbabel as a figure of Christ.89 Chapter thirteen essentially continues the work begun in the preceding chapter, in terms both of Theodore’s thematic synthesizing and his use of different words for restoration.90 What distinguishes this section of text, however, is the introduction of another image very much reminiscent of Irenaeus: that of Christ the victor, or liberator – terms employed almost interchangeably through the course of the Laterculus by Theodore. In the immediate setting, Theodore uses the verb liberare and the noun uictor, in reference to Christ in the final lines of the chapter, although he leaves them theologically relatively undeveloped. One gets the impression that, set in the spiritual context of restoration as the metaphors are, the author is willing to let them be defined by it.91 Although the words form part of substantive sentences in their own right, they clearly hearken back to that overarching theme established in chapter twelve, and which chapter thirteen merely extends. Although discernible in chapter fourteen, the influence of Irenaeus is less obvious. In this section of text, there is no explicit vocabulary of restoration, and no mention of Christ having come as a champion to liberate humanity from bondage to the devil. Instead, chapter fourteen marks the first moment in the Laterculus in which the author makes creative use of his influences, weaving together an exegetical tapestry that incorporates Irenaean threads at the very heart of the picture.92

89 Mai emends reparator to reparatore in PL. Likewise, restauratorem is emended to restauratore. 90 Reparator is used as a direct metaphor for Christ once, while the verb restaurare is used twice. 91 The sentences concerned are: . . . corpus Christi . . . illius salutaris aedificium restauraret. Et passus post tertium diem numquam iam moriturus erigeret et sic omnem hominem a subiectione diabuli liberaret. ‘ . . . the Body of Christ . . . restored his healthy building. And having suffered, rose again after the third day never more to die, and thus liberated all mankind from the subjection of the devil’; and, . . . Vnde et ipse saluator temptatus a diabulo uelut homo, uictor exstitit. ‘From whence this same Saviour, having been tempted by the devil as if he was a man, was a victor,’ LM, 13, p. 138/9. 92 Chapter 14 of the Laterculus is explored in detail in J. Siemens, ‘Christ’s Restoration of Humankind in the Laterculus Malalianus, 14’.

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Beginning with an examination of the infancy of Jesus, Theodore does what few others had done before him, and proffers an understanding of the meaning of such details as the manger and swaddling cloths in line, not only with Ephrem the Syrian, but with one of Irenaeus’ primary concerns. Because Irenaeus needed to show Christ as having passed through every stage of human development in order for the recapitulation of humankind to have been complete, it is apt that Theodore should have borrowed a motif from Ephrem and used it to anchor his own treatment of humanity’s restoration. Of course, even as he does this, he defaults to his primary task of expounding exegetically on Christ’s life, introducing a range of eclectic references. The result may seem somewhat disorderly, but is actually rather rich in detail, and consistent in its portrayal of Christ as the cornerstone of all grace.93 The next hint of the spirit of Irenaeus appears in chapter sixteen, when Theodore turns to the theme of circumcision. When, in chapter fourteen, he employs the image of the corner-stone in much the same way as Irenaeus had done in book three of Adversus haereses, Theodore almost inadvertently draws the reader’s attention to the image of circumcision as a result. For this reason, it seems more than coincidental that he should open chapter sixteen with the words, ‘Quod autem circumcisionem Christus in carne pertulerit, propter illud quod apostulus ait . . . ,’ especially since it concludes with the assertion that Christ, ‘. . . a seruitutis iugum nos liberauit.’94 As we have already established, the Christus uictor (or liberator) image is one that serves a crucial role in Irenaeus’ soteriological conception, so the line drawn in the Laterculus from Christ’s

93 The term ‘corner-stone’ (lapidis angularis) is central to chapter 14. As discussed in the first section of our previous chapter on Syriac sources for the Laterculus, and as Stevenson points out in her commentary on the text (n. 130, p. 202), it is a reference Theodore develops in a way that could only have arisen from first-hand acquaintance with middle eastern architecture. Most importantly, however, it is presented in such a way as to reflect both acquaintance with Ephrem and with an Irenaean interpretation concerning the meeting in Christ of both Jew and Gentile. In the same note, Stevenson elaborates on lapis angularis: ‘Christ appears, as in the Laterculus, to be the cornerstone, with two walls shooting off at angles from him. Irenaeus used the same theme (Adv. haer. III.v.3., ed., Harvey II, 20): Hic in nouissimis temporibus apparens, lapis summus angularis, in unam legit, et uniuit eos qui longe, ut eos qui prope, hoc est, circumcisionem et praeputium (“He, appearing in the last days, the chief corner-stone, gathered into one and united those who are far off and those who are near, i.e., the circumcision and the uncircumcision”).’ She concludes by drawing the reader’s attention to the fact that Theodore raises the issue of circumcision again in a later chapter. 94 ‘Christ suffered circumcision in the body, according to what the apostle said . . . and [so] liberated us from the yoke of slavery’, LM, 16, p. 142/3.

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circumcision to the defeat of death and the liberation of humankind seems a logical one. It is as if Theodore has identified and made explicit a connection that was previously present in Irenaeus by implication. From wholehearted use of Irenaeus’ essential soteriological ideas to what appears to be a significant disagreement with an anthropological one, chapter seventeen of the Laterculus is most interesting for its systematic contention with Irenaeus’ suggestion that Adam was an infant in the Garden of Eden. As we determined above,95 the idea of Adam’s infancy takes a prominent place in Irenaeus’ conception of humankind, but what is apparent at the same time is that it is possible to draw numerous conclusions from this emphasis. This is not to say that Irenaeus was somehow inconsistent in his thought on the question; it is more that his view of the true nature of humanity’s culpability at the fall could not really be expressed in a single image. As Steenberg affirms,96 the whole question of what is meant by ‘God’s image and likeness’, as much as Irenaeus discusses it, is never entirely clarified over the course of his work. In any case, if there is room for interpretation in the matter, Theodore makes use of it. What makes Theodore’s position so striking is the boldness of his assertions. It is as if, over the course of this chapter, he was consumed with the preposterousness of the idea that Adam’s and Eve’s wills were somehow impaired, and so their guilt in choosing to disobey lessened. This seems to lead him to conclude that the victory of Christ, and so the whole project of recapitulation, is diminished if one allows that Adam and Eve may not have been of full maturity. In this way, it could be said that chapter seventeen sets forth a resolute argument against one Irenaean notion for the sake of another: that of upholding and strengthening his greater picture of Christ’s victory and humankind’s restoration. From the opening words, Nam et primum hominem Deus aetatem perfectum nec non et intellectum adque rationem praeditum . . . [de terra finxit], to the transitional . . . quia scienti bonum facere et non facienti peccatum est illi [imputatum],97 Theodore is adamant that Adam must be considered a fully rational being.98 In section 3. Cited above, this chapter, n. 73. 97 ‘For God made the first man the perfect age, endowed as well with intellect and reason . . . because with the understanding to do good and not doing it, sin is imputed to him,’ LM, 17, pp. 142, 144. 98 Stevenson provides extensive commentary (n. 153, pp. 207‒8) on the ‘perfect age of man’, even citing some words of Irenaeus (along with Theophilus of Antioch) that 95 96

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For all the seeming contradiction, however, locating the underlying agreement between the arguments is not impossible. If we begin with the premise that the primary purpose of both Irenaeus and Theodore is to portray Christ as the victorious restorer of humankind, and that the reason for his being so was the human race’s inability to escape the bondage it had brought upon itself, making the fulfilment of its original purpose impossible, then it could be that what at first seems contradictory is actually an attempt on Theodore’s part to correct a weakness he perceives in the original line of reasoning. That there was a weakness in the earlier, Irenaean argument is manifest in the ambiguity with which it is appropriated (or used) by someone like Ephrem, whose own exegesis of Adam’s and Eve’s age in paradise is less than consistent.99 Certainly, the final paragraph of the chapter sets Theodore’s main desire in context, as it explicitly incorporates both Christ’s work of renewal – especially as regarding all ages of humankind – and the attendant victory. Chapter eighteen of the Laterculus yields three references to Christ as the champion of humanity, but by far the most interesting element in the chapter is that of an expression, highlighted by Stevenson, concerning the nature of the Logos. After a couple of sentences dedicated to placing Christ in proper relation to the other persons of the Trinity, Theodore says, Quod autem ab spiritu expulsus in deserto, id est calefactus homo, quem sumpserat propter ueteram Adam, quem intra delicias paradysi diabulus uicerat . . . .100 In her commentary on the text, Jane Stevenson suggests that ‘calefactus homo, quem sumpserat . . .’ may reflect a hint of Theodore of Mopsuestia’s homo assumptus – verbum assumens distinction,101 which would certainly be consistent with Theodore of Tarsus’ Antiochene exegetical and theological bias. To imply somehow that the Logos ‘put on’ human form is indicative of the ‘anthropological maximalism’ John Meyendorff describes in his

clearly contradict what is being said in the Laterculus; but her interest is more in the historical debate around what constitutes that perfect age than on the theological implications of Adam’s state in paradise, the variable treatment it receives by Irenaeus, Ephrem, and Theodore, and how it might inform the idea of recapitulation. 99 See the discussion of this question above, chapter 3, n. 72. 100 ‘When he was cast out [by] the Spirit into the desert, that is, the man made warm, whom he took on account of old Adam, whom the devil had conquered among the delights of paradise . . .’, LM, 18, p. 146/7. 101 J. Stevenson, The School of Archbishop Theodore., n. 164, pp. 210‒11.

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discussion on Antiochene christology.102 It would also place this chapter of the Laterculus squarely alongside of the wider Antiochene tradition, and correspond very naturally with the soteriological essence of Irenaeus’ thought. Chapter nineteen brings us to one of the most significant images used by Theodore in his endeavour to elucidate the theological meaning of Christ’s life. It is in this chapter that we encounter the ordines Christi, which, as we have seen already, while not derived directly from Irenaeus, parallel his exploration of the ages of humankind exactly. In this respect, chapter nineteen does not simply present its contents as if they bore no relation to the rest of the text. Rather, the ordines, connected as they are to Christ’s having lived through the various ages of humankind, merely follow from that very discussion, begun as it was back in chapter seventeen. Theodore had drawn that chapter to a close with words that could have been taken from Irenaeus himself: Renouatur autem per gratia creatoris qui solum paruolos coronauit, dum natus est uerum aetiam diabulum pescauit cum passus est . . .,103 more than alluding thereby to the theme occupying his mind. The nature of the ordines has already been touched on,104 but it is really in light of such images that it is possible to identify the restorative language that Theodore uses throughout the Laterculus with the more concretely Irenaean vocabulary of recapitulation. While it is true that Irenaeus did not use the passage of Christ through certain activities in his life to represent his passing through each grade of office in the Church, the relationship between such a scheme and that of Christ passing through all the ages of humanity for the sake of the restoration of the whole of the human person is incontrovertible. The fact that Theodore ascribes his use of this motif to ‘the holy Ephrem’ merely

102 J. Meyendorff, Christ in Eastern Christian Thought, p. 17. Robert Sellers in The Council of Chalcedon, includes in his description of Antiochene christology a summary that very nearly takes account of Theodore’s wording in the Laterculus: ‘And what these teachers [particularly Theodore of Mopsuestia] mean by the ‘Economy of our Lord Jesus Christ’ is that in him, the divine Logos, the Second Person of the Trinity, has assumed ‘the form of a servant’, and united it to himself, and that, as a result of this union, the divine image is now restored to man, and heaven and earth are once more brought together. This ‘form of a servant’, they hold, was especially created through the agency of the Holy Spirit and the Virgin Mary, that it might be the instrument of the Logos in establishing the renewed order of obedience to God’s will . . .’ pp. 167‒8. 103 ‘Renewed, however, through the creator’s grace, who did not only crown babies when he was born, but truly also crushed the devil when he suffered . . .’ LM, 17, p. 144/5. 104 In chapter 3, sections 1.6 and 2.1, and in this chapter, section 3.

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forces us to ask if his encounter with Irenaeus was direct or via another source, a question we deal with below. In terms of Christ passing through human experience so that he might re-order it, chapter twenty of the Laterculus is merely a list of such occurrences. In this chapter, it could appear as if Theodore had become taken with the thought of Christ taking on all human experience in order to legitimate it – that is, in order to set it in its rightful place – and so inundated his text with numerous examples. In this case, Christ is taken prisoner to set prisoners free; he is struck with open hands in order to give humanity true freedom; he is battered with slaps on the head in order to become humanity’s true head; he is spit upon in order to clean shame from human faces; he is beaten with whips in order to ‘remove the plagues of death and the whips of the devil; he stood before the tribunal of Pilate in order to take from humanity the fear of the judges of this world. And so Theodore continues to the end of the part of the Laterculus that makes up his original contribution, not merely weaving together an assortment of typological appraisals, but tendering theological interpretations on Christ’s person and work, many of which draw very explicitly on the terminology of victory and liberation.105 Before concluding our analysis of Irenaeus’ influence over Theodore’s work in the Laterculus Malalianus, a comment on a particular characteristic of the closing chapters of the text seems warranted. From chapter eighteen on, there appears to be a change in tone. Prior to this, Theodore’s writing is directly evocative of his influences. It is as if he is trying to bring to bear on the events of Christ’s life many of the sources he has encountered over the course of his study. This is suggested by the presence in the opening sections of his medical interest, together with number theory, and including such exegetical exercises as he employs on the infant Christ in the manger, shared, as it is, with Ephrem the Syrian. After an almost transitional chapter seventeen, however, the richer scholarly references (aside from the ordines in chapter nineteen) seem to disappear. It is not like Theodore gives up on his broader authorities altogether; in her commentary, Stevenson gives ample evidence for their presence in the work. He does, however, seem to default to a more straightforward use of Antiochene exegetical method in his approach to the events of Christ’s life. As this relates to Irenaeus, it is not so much reflective of his style; but in the relentless 105

At least six more references to Christ’s victory and the liberation it proffers God’s people can be found from the end of chapter 20 to the end of chapter 22.

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typological comments that characterise the closing chapters of the Laterculus, a paradigm of exchange emerges that manifests, in microcosmic form, the exchange formula of Irenaeus’ soteriology. In the end, the Laterculus Malalianus is infused with an Irenaean worldview that, whether the apologist and one-time bishop of Lyons is called upon by name or not – and to be sure, he is not – has an almost exclusive appeal to Theodore’s mind on christological matters.

4.5 The Source of Theodore’s Knowledge of Irenaeus It remains to be seen just how it was that Irenaeus should have come to exercise such a hold on Theodore’s theological imagination when at no point in the Laterculus, or in any other Theodoran text, is appeal made to him by name. Furthermore, for all the idea of recapitulation dominates the Laterculus, the fact that the actual word recapitulatio (and its derivatives) is never used, and is instead communicated using almost every other interpretive replacement such as restaurare, reparare, renouare, demands an answer as to why this should be the case. In response to both issues, it appears that there could be a few different hypotheses, though none that provides a definitive answer. A first hypothesis we can dismiss out of hand is that Theodore developed his ideas independently of Irenaeus. There are simply too many images and themes strongly reminiscent of the earlier figure’s work for this to have been the case. All the evidence tells us that Theodore was a consummate scholar, whose concern for sound sources and respect for those he most admired was significant.106 That he could have structured a work like the Laterculus around an idea as complex as recapitulation without having taken his queue from elsewhere in the canon of orthodox theology is incongruous, and therefore, most unlikely. For this reason, we can reasonably pay more attention to the next suggestion: that at some point in Theodore’s career, he read Irenaeus, and while impressed by him, did not have access to Adversus haereses when he was working in Canterbury. It is realistic to think that Theodore had read Adversus haereses at some point over the course of his studies and been impressed by what he found there. Following that, we might reason that, due to the 106 As evidenced by his evocation of such names as Ephrem and Epiphanius as authorities he was drawing on.

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absence of direct quotations, he simply had no text to refer to when composing his own. Yet like the previous suggestion, this one is not without its problems. For instance, it does not account for why Irenaeus’ name is not mentioned in the text of the Laterculus. After all, he was clearly enjoying no small influence at the time that Theodore would have been composing his own work, and even without a copy of Adversus haereses in front of him, Theodore could still have named him as he does other sources.107 Then again, due in part to the way Irenaeus found his way into others’ theological systems, while we might expect him to be recognised, celebrated, and so credited, the opposite may also have been the case: that his ideas were so well used, his name was hardly considered. Certainly, Adversus haereses had been transmitted widely enough to have been encountered on its own terms, but with no conscious citations, a specific study would be required in order to determine more exactly how it was that Irenaeus’ central concepts were communicated to his later beneficiaries.108 This is the case for Theodore and the Laterculus Malalianus no less than for any other work. When the ideas of Irenaeus have been used by so many to the seventh century, and even as they are drawn on and

107 That Irenaeus was enjoying some influence at the time, is attested to by the fact that on at least two occasions in his work, The Mystical Theology of the Eastern Church (on pages 164‒5 & 177), Vladimir Lossky builds up to a point made by Maximus the Confessor by identifying its precedent in Irenaeus. The implication is, of course, that Maximus, a contemporary of Theodore – and one of the most prolific theologians to be concerned, like Theodore, with the monothelete question – thought in ways that reflect a direct reliance on Irenaeus. But then Maximus is clearly to be found in the theological stream that does the most to develop and proliferate the concept of theosis (deification), at the root of which is Irenaeus’ summary exchange formula. So one is bound to see Irenaeus in Maximus. 108 That this is so has been touched upon at various points over the course of this chapter and the last (particularly this chapter, section 3). Such a theme as the muchdiscussed virgin earth-Virgin Mary, first Eve-second Eve/first Adam-second Adam reflects this, as it becomes absorbed into the work of such diverse authors as Ephrem the Syrian and Caelius Sedulius. More significantly, though, the implications of Irenaeus’ ‘exchange formula’ and his doctrine of recapitulation are taken up and developed by no less important a figure as the fourth-century Athanasius in his De Incarnatione. The extent to which Irenaeus affects the whole of the (at least Greek) christological enterprise is dealt with effectively by Norman Russell in The Doctrine of Deification in the Greek Patristic Tradition, especially pages 105‒14, 169, 191, and 202‒05. John Meyendorff also treats the issue of Irenaeus’ seminal relationship to later theologians of the Greek East in Christ in Eastern Christian Thought, especially p. 74‒5, where no less than Leontius of Jerusalem, Gregory of Nyssa, and Cyril of Alexandria are mentioned as expositors of a theology directly inherent of Irenaeus’ original work.

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further developed by a major contemporary of Theodore, it is impossible to say with any certainty one way or the other whether or not Theodore had actually gone to the well himself at some point and drunk of its waters, or simply received the benefits indirectly, without taking notice of the source. In the midst of such uncertainty, the question of the language in which Theodore might have first encountered Irenaeus could be an instructive one to ask. Theodore was nurtured in a Greek theological environment, in close proximity to, and ultimately in conjunction with, certain Syriac influences. We know that Irenaeus wrote in Greek, although the only evidence of Greek transmission we have is limited to various fragments ‘. . . traceable through citations in later authors and in the catenae.’109 We are further told that ‘Irenaeus was a much read author;’110 yet in what language, and in what specific context is nowhere made clear. On the other hand, Theodore may have read him in Syriac, as there exist in Syriac ‘numerous fragments’ of Irenaeus’ work;111 except that we can not be sure he would have had the facility to engage with such texts to the necessary depth in that language.112 The other alternative, that Theodore read Irenaeus in Latin, is possible, though as with Syriac, unlikely. First of all, Theodore’s Latin, like we imagine his Syriac, was less than perfect. This is attested to by the quality of the Latin in the Laterculus,113 as well as by Bede’s description of the Latin translation of an originally Greek text, the Passio sancti Anastasii,114 a work very likely of Theodore’s hand. Furthermore, the A. Orbe, ‘Irenaeus’ in EEC, p. 413. A. Orbe, ‘Irenaeus’ in EEC, p. 413. 111 A. Orbe, ‘Irenaeus’ in EEC, p. 413. 112 M. Lapidge gives us the impression that Theodore’s facility with Syriac was less than fluent, which means that the possibility of him having read Irenaeus primarily in Syriac is low. As Lapidge says: ‘. . . Theodore was familiar in some way with the Syriac language and with aspects of Syriac biblical exegesis. It need not imply that Theodore could read (or had studied) Syriac patristic literature . . .’ Biblical Commentaries, p. 36. 113 In her work preceding her edition of the text, Stevenson says this of Theodore’s relationship with the Latin language: ‘. . . it is the unpolished and generally crude Latinity of the Laterculus which suggest that it was written by Theodore rather than his pupils. It is the work of a man who is immensely learned and has a considerable gift for communication, but who is indifferent to the rules,’ p. 86. This agrees with Angelo Mai’s comment concerning the work: ‘. . . nihilominus ejus Latinitas ualde squalet,’ PL 94, 1161. 114 That the translation of the Passio sancti Anastasii referred to by Bede is of Theodore’s hand is mentioned by Lapidge in his and Bischoff ’s edition of the Canterbury Commentaries (pp. 182‒4), but argued convincingly by Carmela Vircillo Franklin in her paper, ‘Theodore and the Passio s. Anastasii’ in AT, pp. 175‒203. Bede’s original remarks appear in HegA, 5, 24: ‘librum uitae et passionis sancti Anastasii male de Greco 109 110

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Latin vocabulary Theodore uses to convey his central concerns in the Laterculus does not very much overlap with that used by Irenaeus. Rather, the fact that he has appropriated much of Irenaeus’ meaning without direct citation and the use of precise vocabulary suggests that his encounter with the prior material was via a different source, at least linguistically. At any rate, the next possibility for Theodore’s encounter with Irenaeus follows logically from the previous: that is, by what indirect means he might have encountered him. Theodore was a native of the same part of the world as Irenaeus, albeit around four and a half centuries later. He was, as we have seen, educated in a region that at some point gave rise to one of the most prominent schools of thought on matters both hermeneutical and christological. Although Irenaeus pre-dates any specifically Antiochene position regarding Scripture and the Incarnation, there are certainly conditions common to the individual and the later school that make sense of the features shared by the two.115 And whether Theodore would regard Antioch, Edessa, or Constantinople as his theological alma mater would have no bearing on the nature of the foremost stimulus to his intellectual development.116 The Antiochene tradition of scriptural exegesis and the Antiochene christological school characterised all three places, meaning that Theodore’s and Irenaeus’ common origins in Asia Minor will have entailed at least something of a shared intellectual heritage. So we begin, albeit tentatively, by asserting a broadly common background. Then, in light of what

translatum et peius a quodam inperito emendatum, prout potui, ad sensum correxi,’ (‘. . . a book on the life and passion of St. Anastasius which was badly translated from the Greek by some ignorant person, which I have corrected as best I could’), Colgrave and Mynors, pp. 568/9‒570/1, and discussed above, chapter 2, section 3. 115 They were, for example, both shaped, at least in part, by Judaic influences. In this regard, Lawson describes Irenaeus’ biblical cast of mind as ‘Hebraic’ (Biblical Theology, p. 6), while Karlfried Froehlich says that ‘Jewish influences’ were important to the Antiochene hermeneutical tradition as a whole (‘Interpretation, History of: Early Christian Interpretation’ in The Oxford Companion to the Bible, B. Metzger and M. Coogan, eds., p. 312). In the context of a discussion about early Jewish-Christian christological thought, Aloys Grillmeier says that a characteristic exegetical interest of Jewish-Christians was in Genesis (Christian Tradition, vol. 1, p. 40). This was true of Irenaeus as well, as Grillmeier points out later (p. 100). 116 All were Antiochene in hermeneutical (and ultimately, christological) tradition. As for the work of the Edessenes, we have cited Stevenson on this point in the previous chapter (n. 69, p. 103), while Antioch’s main exponents, including Diodore of Tarsus and Theodore of Mopsuestia, were precisely those from whom John Chrysostom in Constantinople either learned, or with whom he studied.

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we have determined concerning the limits of Theodore’s linguistic abilities – at least in his formative years – we suppose that his encounter with Irenaeus’ ideas would have been through the medium of his mother tongue, Greek. But, considering that Theodore does not draw out the recapitulative dimension of Christ’s work in any way similar to someone like his renowned Alexandrian predecessor Athanasius,117 even if his encounter with Irenaeus was via Greek sources, we can be reasonably sure that these sources were not in the same theological tradition as those whose influences were primarily Alexandrian.118 This leads us to think that Theodore must have drawn

117 In his most famous work, De Incarnatione (54), the fourth-century Alexandrian Athanasius, would develop the Irenaean concept of recapitulation, transforming his ‘exchange formula’ into a developed theology of theosis. Norman Russell says of this: ‘Athanasius’ first use of Θεοποιέω in a Christian theological context is in his famous enunciation of the ‘exchange formula’ in De Incarnatione 54: “he became human that we might become divine” (αὐτὸς γὰρ ἐνηνθρώπησεν, ἵνα ἡμεῖς θεοποιηθῶμεν). The dependence of this on Irenaeus was pointed out more than a century ago (Sträter 1894: 40). It is a restatement in more technical language of Irenaeus’ “he became what we are in order to make us what he is himself ” (factus est quod sumus nos, uti nos perficeret esse quod et ipse) (Adv. haer. 5, Praef.). Like Irenaeus, Athanasius sees salvation in terms of a reorientation of fallen humanity towards the divine . . . . The fruits of the deification of representative humanity assumed by the Word are knowledge of God and freedom from corruption’ (The Doctrine of Deification, p. 169). 118 There is a clear divide between the christological thought that was taking place in the Antiochene world as compared to that of roughly the same period in an Alexandrian context. Norman Russell does a thorough job of tracing the development of deification in Alexandria, from Clement in the second century through Origen and Didymus the Blind, illustrating how their concerns were primarily speculative, if rooted in exegesis of Biblical texts, borrowing Platonic metaphors, before being taken on by Athanasius and further developed (N. Russell, The Doctrine of Deification, pp. 121‒63). That neither the Laterculus nor the Canterbury Commentaries reveal an interest in the kind of speculative and mystical thought associated with this part of the Greek world may be due in part to what John Meyendorff describes as a weakness of Antiochene theology: ‘Cyril’s victory at Ephesus (431) did not merely have the negative effect of eliminating from Orthodox theology the “Nestorian” temptation. Its importance consisted not only of the assertion of a historical truth, that of Christ’s unity, but also of the proclamation of a positive and theologically creative concept: that of a Christic humanity wholly human. Wholly “appropriated” by the Word, and constituting the principle of the deification to which all those who are “in Christ” are destined . . . . In the flesh (κατὰ σάρκα) did the Son of God suffer, die, and rise again; with this flesh is the whole of redeemed mankind called to have communion with the Holy Spirit. The concept of “participation” in God and of the deification of man could not be attained in a strictly Antiochene context,’ Christ in Eastern Christian Thought, p. 21 (italics mine).

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on a Greek source for Irenaeus that was composed in an Antiochene theological milieu, but was not comprised of the full, attributed text of the Adversus haereses itself. In light of Orbe’s comment concerning Irenaeus’ wide transmission in various catenae,119 it could be that therein lay Theodore’s source. It is probable that this constitutes part of our solution. Yet, consistent with this is one specific option that both meets our criteria closely and that we know Theodore was connected with: Ephrem the Syrian. That Theodore spent time in a Syriac-speaking environment, availing himself of the riches of Syriac tradition, and that Ephrem’s work had a particular influence on him has been well-covered in these pages. So too has the fact that Irenaean influence can be discerned with little effort in Ephrem’s writings.120 That this may have been the means of Theodore’s encounter with Irenaeus, however, has not been explored to any extent. Although the Syriac Christian world may not be the most obvious match with our conditions for establishing Theodore’s likely Irenaean source, what we know of Ephrem’s work, and what we encounter in the work of Theodore that draws on Ephrem, exhibits precisely the sorts of features that indicate the apologist’s influence. We first encountered the Irenaean thread in Ephrem’s work in the previous chapter; two motifs in particular manifest this. Of these, the first Adam-second Adam/first Eve-second Eve typology, including the parallel between the new Adam having been formed of the Virgin Mary and the old Adam having been formed of virgin earth is the most important.121 Probably no image shared between Ephrem and Irenaeus embodies the idea of recapitulation more than this one, so for Theodore to have taken it on so unequivocally is theologically significant. But Ephrem communicates more of Irenaeus than this single theme. The whole question of the age of Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden is treated by both Irenaeus and Ephrem: quite forcefully by the former, and somewhat ambiguously by the latter. That it is an issue in the works of both, however, is indisputable. Equally important, though, is the fact that both motifs find a prominent place in Theodore’s Laterculus, suggesting that whatever the order in which he encountered them, there is a correlation between Theodore’s appreciation of Ephrem and his own use of Irenaean theological concepts. See above, this chapter, n. 108. See chapter 3, section 2.3. 121 chapter 3, section 2.3. 119 120

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So the Laterculus has been shown to exhibit some obvious signs that it was composed by an author who had spent time in the Syriac East and was drawing on Syriac ideas, with especial regard for Ephrem. At significant points, Ephrem seems to draw on Irenaeus directly, using types that are first proposed by Irenaeus, and by working through ideas that are first developed by him. Therefore, as the author of the Laterculus, Theodore is indebted to Irenaeus for his central theological concern – that is, the idea of restoration – at the same time as he employs language that has been assumed from Ephrem. At one point, when he cites Ephrem directly (if incorrectly), it is with regard to an image (ordines Christi) that is considered to be correlative with the importance afforded by Irenaeus to Christ’s living through every human age.122 That the connection Theodore draws between what he finds (or believes he finds) in Ephrem and Irenaeus was not accidental is confirmed by his exegesis of Christ’s infancy in chapter fourteen of the Laterculus, and the fact that he specifically includes in his Irenaeusinspired exposition some typically Ephremic imagery.123 In light of all these things, we may not be able to conclude that Theodore encountered Irenaeus’ ideas, including certain images that originated with Irenaeus’ pen, in Ephrem alone; we can say, however, that the Irenaean images he draws on over the course of his fundamentally Irenaean treatise are shared by another of his biggest influences, Ephrem the Syrian. What we may further determine is that, as the author of the Laterculus, he clearly had in mind one of these two figures when he was drawing on the other, and that the theological lessons to be learnt from Irenaeus can be demonstrated using illustrations employed by Ephrem. However inconclusive our work might be concerning the sources for Theodore’s encounter with Irenaeus or his ideas then, we can nevertheless claim a strong sense that Ephrem played a part in his engagement with the second-century apologist. In light of this, it is most reasonable to believe that in the search for Theodore’s Irenaean inspiration, he found it not in Adversus haereses directly, but in the various catenae through which Irenaeus was transmitted, as well as in the writings of Ephrem the Syrian. The fundamentally Antiochene orientation of the Laterculus – both in terms of exegesis and christology – suggests that it was unlikely he took his cue Discussed in this chapter, above, section 3. See J. Siemens, ‘Christ’s Restoration of Humankind in the Laterculus Malalianus, 14’. 122 123

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from such Greek exponents of Irenaeus as Athanasius. He may well have been encouraged in his use of Irenaeus through his association with Maximus the Confessor in Rome, but Theodore, as he speaks in the Laterculus, appears confidently attached to his Antiochene-style use of the Irenaean inheritance.

4.6 Conclusions The principal work of Irenaeus of Lyons, Adversus haereses, originally intended to refute the broad heresy of Gnosticism, was to hold immense sway over theological developments from its own time onwards. Its scope was such that subjects as diverse as apostolic authority, Petrine primacy, catholic tradition, and soteriology were covered succinctly and clearly, even as the work itself spans five volumes. In spite of his immense contribution to the foundations of catholic theology, however, and in spite of the fact that his idea of recapitulation, with its summary exchange formula, would become a virtual fountainhead in the development of the theology of deification,124 Irenaeus hardly features ab nomine in later texts. This is the situation we face with the Laterculus Malalianus. However Theodore of Tarsus, as the author of the Laterculus, became aware of Irenaeus’ ideas though, what must be understood is how much those ideas would contribute to the development of theology generally: especially in the Greek East, and more especially in terms of christology. A direct line can be drawn from Irenaeus’ thought on recapitulation, as summarised in the words of the exchange formula, to Athanasius’ use of precisely those words, to Maximus the Confessor’s synthesis in the seventh century, and beyond.125 In any

124 Russell specifically names Clement of Alexandria, Hippolytus of Rome and Athanasius as being directly indebted to Irenaeus for some of their terminology, The Doctrine of Deification, pp. 110 & 169. 125 We have already discussed the connection between Irenaeus and Athanasius. Russell further says about Maximus the Confessor that, ‘Deification is a major theme in Maximus. It informs the whole of his theological anthropology as a doctrine correlative to that of the Incarnation of the Word. The Irenaean and Alexandrian principle that God became man in order that man might become god received in his hands the greatest elaboration and most profound articulation. The kenosis of the Word is followed by the theosis of the believer . . .’ The Doctrine of Deification, p. 262.

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case, it does appear that, according to the way Irenaeus was taken up by his theological successors, his work in Adversus haereses would become the seed of a philosophically complex and attractive picture of Christ, with implications for the rest of theology as well. Meanwhile, in part by using the vocabulary of restoration, in part by drawing on motifs originally established and developed by Irenaeus, and in part by employing themes that, while not Irenaean in origin, are entirely consistent with his main theological point, Theodore of Tarsus has set recapitulation firmly at the heart of the Laterculus. The difficulty is that Theodore has done so in such a way as to obscure his original sources, if not his inspiration. Sense would suggest that he encountered Irenaeus in Greek, but there is no evidence indicating that he knew Irenaeus’ work directly. Furthermore, the most common Greek sources for the transmission of Irenaeus’ ideas that we know of were principally part of the Alexandrian theological school, the tone of which could not be more different from that of the Laterculus. Yet regardless of what we may not be able to say about the origins of Theodore’s interest in Irenaeus, we can trust that he was encouraged in this interest by what he found in the work of one figure he explicitly acknowledged as an influence: Ephrem the Syrian. As we have established, at the very least, in Ephrem Theodore would have found allusions to all of the principle motifs he himself employs, including humanity’s need for restoration, the contrast between first Adam/first Eve and second Adam/second Eve, and the age of Adam and Eve when they were ejected from the Garden of Eden. In addition to this is the interesting misattribution Theodore makes of a fundamentally Irenaean idea to Ephrem in terms of the ordines Christi. Steeped in the concept of Christ’s recapitulation of humanity, in this case by way of the church’s institutions – the fact that Theodore has drawn it from a source he believes to be Ephremic is a strong indication that he must be conscious of a relationship between Irenaean theology and Ephrem. There can be no doubt, then, that for Theodore of Tarsus, the ideas of Irenaeus were of immense importance. The text of the Laterculus is infused with the language of restoration, in addition to all of the themes, images, and motifs that have been derived from the work of the early bishop of Lyons. It seems very likely that Theodore drew his inspiration, and probably even a great deal of his acquaintance with specific Irenaean texts, from the writings of Ephrem the Syrian, although it may be that there were other sources for his knowledge

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than Ephrem, including Caelius Sedulius, various Greek and Latin catenae, and even Irenaeus himself. Whatever the case, the influence of Irenaeus on theology to Theodore’s time and beyond was immense, and however much Theodore’s use of him might differ from that made of him in other parts of the theological world, the thrust is the same. In the Laterculus, the soteriological picture set out is one of the Logos taking on flesh for the sake of restoring humankind to its rightful place, by means of his kenotic birth in the manger and, by extension, his having lived through all human experience, and so providing a new image from which all humankind could take its pattern. In this respect, the ideas of Irenaeus are not used by Theodore with the same effect as they are by other, particularly Greek, theologians; it is clear, however, that Theodore has appropriated the ideas in such a way as to place him in close relation to the school of thought that is seen by many to be representative of the Greek perspective on the work of Christ. In Theodore’s Laterculus is to be found the language of restoration and so the beginnings of deification, mediated through his experience of Syriac tradition and a wealth of other sources besides.

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5.1 Introduction Jane Stevenson’s work surrounding the Laterculus Malalianus, including her setting it in context and her identification of its sources, which together make possible its attribution to the hand of Theodore of Tarsus, is both scrupulous and estimable. Her efforts in ascertaining the origins of the manifold references in the text have been praised by fellow scholars,1 and many of her conclusions have since been absorbed into related fields of study.2 Yet it is not Stevenson’s purpose to provide us with an exhaustive account of Theodore’s theology, even if the Laterculus – the focus of her work – is a ‘ . . . Nicholas Brooks, in a review for The English Historical Review, (Nov. 1997, vol. 112, n. 449, p. 1227), Paul Szarmach in The Journal of Religion, (July 1997, vol. 77, n. 3), p. 461), and Patrick Wormald in Notes and Queries (June 1997, vol. 44, n. 2, p. 242), represent a cadre of scholars who acknowledge the considerable erudition evidenced in Jane Stevenson’s introduction to, and commentary on, her edition of the Laterculus Malaianus. 2 Indeed, Carmela Vircillo Franklin’s work on Passio sancti Anastasii is reported by Michael Lapidge to have been partly prompted by Stevenson’s work on the Laterculus (AT, ix), while the influence of her conclusions can also be found in the field of Syriac studies, where the connection she establishes between Theodore of Tarsus and Ephrem the Syrian has been referred to as a possible factor in the transmission of Ephrem’s writings in the Latin West in the early middle ages (see for example, D. Ganz, ‘Knowledge of Ephraim’s Writings in the Merovingian and Carolingian Age’, p. 3). 1

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historical exegesis of the life of Christ.’3 The scope of her commentary on the text and her description of its contents are rather to argue in favour of Theodore’s authorship and, at the same time, to present the reader with a picture of an early mediæval writer whose sources and credentials are truly ecumenical. For this reason, what she does proffer by way of theological analysis can be excused for being somewhat cursory.4 In any case, even while she may not have comprehensively mined the language of the Laterculus for theological significance, in pointing the reader to so many of its varied sources, she sets the stage for further analysis and greater understanding of its meaning. The pursuit of Theodore’s christology certainly benefits from this work. We have already seen in what direction Stevenson’s efforts first lead. What she outlines of Ephrem the Syrian’s presence (along with other sources from the Syriac tradition) in the Laterculus calls upon the reader to deal first of all with the implications this presence holds for Theodore’s christology.5 But some of Ephrem’s language is also shared in detail with Irenaeus of Lyons, and so we look to the earlier apologist to enhance our apprehension of the christological content of the text.6 What is more, we find that much of the vocabulary of the Laterculus, as it relates specifically to the work of Christ, is of Irenaean derivation on its own terms, and that Theodore’s Ephremic borrowings are always consistent with the Irenaean christological purpose expressed by this unambiguous vocabulary.7 Having explored these two avenues, then – a task undertaken over the course of chapters three and four of this J. Stevenson, The School of Archbishop Theodore, p. 3. In the twelve pages she dedicates to describing the theology of the Laterculus, Stevenson draws the reader’s attention to many points of interest. The aspects of the text she remarks on as being theological, however, are limited only to the most obvious, especially the statement of Theodore in chapter 24 that, ‘. . . quidquid enim operator pater, unum est cum filio et spiritu sancto,’ (p. 154). This declaration, set in its proper context in the chapter, is admittedly reminiscent of Augustine – something highlighted by Stevenson – but in light of the otherwise overwhelming theological thrust of the text, to emphasise it disproportionately is to miss out on some far more incisive, if less obvious, themes. See pp. 31‒43 for Stevenson’s theological evaluation of the Laterculus. 5 See above, chapter 3. 6 Dealt with in chapter 4, above. 7 See note 6. The logical consistency between Theodore’s use of Ephrem’s Christus medicus and the Irenaean image of Christus reparator, and its importance in developing a picture of Theodore’s soteriological understanding is dealt with in J. Siemens, ‘A survey of the christology of Theodore of Tarsus in the Laterculus Malalianus’, pp. 220‒21. 3 4

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work – we have a picture of Christ who is the restorer of humankind,8 who has achieved this restoration by means of having recapitulated all the ages and conditions of humankind in himself,9 who, in doing so, has effected healing among human beings,10 fed them,11 liberated them from their bondage,12 and so enabled them to become, once again, the creatures they were meant to be.13 But Syriac and Irenaean influence on their own or combined, do not give the whole picture of Theodore’s christology as manifest in the Laterculus Malalianus, especially when we take account of his pastoral activities when he was archbishop of Canterbury, along with other evidence from his life. It is this that we shall now attempt to examine and collate into a single picture.

5.2 The Picture in Bede’s Historia ecclesiastica gentis Anglorum Although much more has been determined about Theodore’s life in the last century than Bede was able to say in the Historia ecclesiastica gentis Anglorum,14 the recent empirical histories do not reveal the same 8 Adam . . . a solo Domino Christo rerum reparator et conditor eius corporis et animae, per immortalitatis Christi, restauraretur domicilium. ‘Adam . . . was restored to his heavenly home by the Lord Christ alone, through the immortality of Christ, restorer of things and creator of his body and soul,’ LM, 12, p. 136/7. 9 Renouatur autem per gratia creatoris qui solum paruolos coronauit, dum natus est uerum aetiam diabulum pescauit cum passus est . . . ‘Renewed, however, through the creator’s grace, who did not only crown babies when he was born, but truly also crushed the devil when he suffered . . .,’ LM, 17, p. 144/5. 10 . . . in quibus adibens nobis enplastra nostris uulneribus exibuit medecinam. ‘. . . according to which, approaching, he showed forth to us medication and plasters for our wounds,’ LM, 14, p. 140/1. 11 Presepium totus mundus adseritur, in quo suis iumentis rationabilibus pabulum subministrat Dominus magestatis. ‘The whole world is declared the manger, in which the Lord of majesty administers sustenance to his rational draught-animals,’ LM, 14, p. 140/1. 12 . . . nobis ueram libertatem donauit. ‘. . . he gave true freedom to us,’ LM, 20, p. 148/9. 13 Quidquid igitur in natiuitate, quid in aetate, quidquid in praedicatione, quidquid in passione, quidquid in resurrectione Christi, quidquid in ascensione Domini, quidquid in diuinis Spiritus omnium linguarum elucutione, in sacramento uel ministerio sanctae catholicae ecclesiae gesta sunt, adque in augmento filiorum Dei peracta sunt. ‘Whatsoever in his birth, whatsoever in his adult age, whatsoever in his preaching, whatsoever in his Passion, whatsoever in the Resurrection of Christ, whatsoever in the ascension of the Lord, whatsoever in the holy speech through the Spirit in all languages, and in the Sacraments and ministry of the holy Catholic church is done and performed for the increase of the sons of God,’ LM, 22, p. 152/3. 14 See the whole family of works dealing with Theodore, enumerated above, chapter 1.

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theological agenda as does the Historia.15 Whether Bede imposed an agenda on his subjects, his subjects guided him, or there was something of an interchange between them, the end product is a valuable resource for understanding what was theologically important to at least one towering figure within a generation of Theodore’s death. For this reason, as we seek to further explore Theodore’s understanding of the person and work of Christ, we begin with Bede’s best known work. Bede’s account of Theodore and his auspicious dawning on the British ecclesiastical scene, which begins in the first chapter of book four of the Historia, is entirely consistent with what Henry Mayr-Harting designates as one of the historian’s main purposes in composing the work.16 The order and unity – the oneness – of the church, especially in relation to Rome, is of paramount concern to Bede, and his reverence for Theodore is conveyed in terms that emphasize most pointedly the Greek’s role as herald of precisely those things that only Rome could embody and provide. Bede’s anecdotes provide plenty of evidence of this, beginning even with the seemingly peripheral issue of Theodore’s tonsure.17 Such an act may have been a necessary condition of heading to Canterbury, but in Bede’s words is the suggestion that what would prove of utmost importance in Theodore’s ministry was conformity to the practices of the Catholic Church as represented by Rome. The rest of the story of Theodore in the Historia is recounted in the same way. According to Bede, Theodore’s time as archbishop would prove the happiest in English history;18 but Bede’s emphasis throughout reveals

15

That Bede wrote with a specific theological agenda is hardly disputed, although whether it is a positive or negative feature of the Historia may be the subject of disagreement. Eric John, for example, in Re-assessing Anglo-Saxon England, regards Bede with what might best be described as a sense of irritation. However, consensus seems to favour Henry Mayr-Harting’s account in The Coming of Christianity to Anglo-Saxon England, in which he writes: ‘What were the general aims of Bede’s book? First of all Bede wanted to write about the way in which the order and unity of the English Church had been achieved . . . To Bede, however, order meant chiefly Roman order. He admired the Irish missionaries, but he lived in a monastery which had derived its services form the archchanter of St Peter’s and much of its library from Rome, or at least from Italy. He recognised that the power of binding and loosing had been given to all the apostles, but he believed that to Peter had been given a special power . . .,’ pp. 42‒3. 16 See above, n. 15. 17 HegA, 4, 1. Bede reports that, after his appointment to Canterbury by the pope, Theodore stayed in Rome a further four months in order to grow out his hair and then receive the western-style tonsure: habuerat enim tonsuram more orientalium sancti apostoli Pauli. 18 HegA, 4, 2.

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that this was due to Theodore’s pastoral ministry, and above all his faithful teaching of church doctrine,19 both of which were geared toward establishing a sense of order and unity in the church under his care. Everything Theodore did, he did de catholica ratione, and Bede appeals to more than anecdote and legend to prove it. In the Historia is preserved the text of the Council of Hertford of 672, and that of Hæthfeld of 679,20 the canons of which represent a concern for ecclesiastical and doctrinal unity that, as indicated by Bede, so characterised Theodore’s ministry: the first in terms of issues that were of importance for the English Church in particular – that is, the dating of Easter and the ministry and comportment of bishops; the second in terms of issues that affected the whole Church – that is, the treatment of heresy, and especially monotheletism.21 Theodore’s own words bear this out: Cumque in unum conuenientes iuxta ordinem quique suum resedissemus, ‘Rogo,’ inquam, ‘dilectissimi fratres, propter timorem et amorem Redemptoris nostri, ut in commune omnes pro nostra fide tractemus, ut, quaeque decreta ac definite sunt a sanctis ac probabilibus patribus, incorrupte ab omnibus nobis seruentur.’ Haec et alia quamplura, quae ad caritatem pertinebant unitatemque ecclesiae conseruandam, prosecutus sum.22

Of course, the fact that the text of the chapters selected for discussion at the Council of Hertford was simply taken from canons enacted by the ecumenical councils of two centuries earlier23 is in itself significant HegA, 4, 2. In the case of both of these councils, Catherine Cubitt argues in favour of different dates than those provided by Bede. Her reasons have to do with Bede’s method of date calculation, which in the case of the councils being considered, puts them one year later than other evidence suggests they occurred. See C. Cubitt, Anglo-Saxon Church Councils, pp. 249 & 252‒7. 21 The full text of these can be found in HegA, 4, 5 & 4, 17 respectively. 22 ‘When we had all met together and sat down each in his own place, I said: ‘Beloved brethren, I beseech you, for the fear and love of our Redeemer, that we should all deliberate in common for the benefit of the faith; so that whatever has been decreed and defined by the holy fathers of proved worth may be preserved incorrupt by us all.’ This and much more I added on the need to preserve charity and unity in the Church,’ HegA, 4, 5, Colgrave and Mynors, p. 350/1. 23 R. Collins and J. McClure, eds., The Ecclesiastical History of the English People, n. 181, p. 401. Martin Brett, in an article entitled ‘Theodore and the Latin canon law’ (in AT, pp. 120‒40), explains that the text of the canons raised by Theodore for discussion at the council of Hertford can be traced to no known law book, although a variety of possible sources present themselves, all of which are discussed in detail by Brett. 19 20

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for what it says of the authority Theodore ascribed to the universal church. It seems that for him, a regional church could only count itself as part of the universal church if it consciously consented to the universal, yet singular, authority of that church. This is entirely consistent with what we find in the Laterculus Malalianus. It is true that, while we learned in the previous chapter24 how important the theme of unity was to Irenaeus, whom Theodore drew on extensively in composing the Laterculus, it only appeared in the latter work rather obliquely; it is in going back to the text having been reminded by Bede of Theodore’s work as archbishop that the whole idea becomes clearer.

5.3 The Laterculus and Bede: Unity Returning to the Laterculus, we find five instances in particular that attest to the idea of oneness as a concern of Theodore’s. These are examples of differing weight and uneven affinity with the idea as expressed in the Historia, but nonetheless exposed, in part, due to the testimony of that work. In the first instance, the phrase is evocative of Irenaeus, especially as his concern for unity is described by André Benoît and cited in the previous chapter:25 Omnia gesta sunt in hominem plenum cum deo.26 I have suggested elsewhere that these words were very likely employed in response to the theological environment from which Theodore emerged – that is, an environment in which the monothelete heresy posed a real threat27 – but this does nothing to invalidate other possible reasons for their appearance. Considering the depths which Benoît suggests the theme actually extends to in the Adversus haereses, it is not at all unreasonable to suppose that the full implications were understood by the author of the Laterculus. The second instance is more elaborate than the first. In this case, we have a conventional trinitarian exegetical treatment of the gifts of the magi, but with an unequivocal statement of the Trinity’s essential unity affixed to the end, along with a statement as to how this one godhead was to be known universally: Sed et uictimae sepulturam murram dicitur adtributam, ut per trina species munerum, id est aurum regi, thus ut Deo, murra ut morituro, tamquam unam deitatem patris et filii ‘Irenaean Influence’, chapter 4, section 2.3. See the full quotation above, chapter 4, n. 52. 26 ‘All things were done in full humanity with God,’ LM, 12, p. 136/7. 27 J. Siemens, ‘A survey of the christology of Theodore of Tarsus,’ p. 217. 24 25

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ac spiritus sancti sancta et indiuidua trinitas adoraretur in Christo, crederetur in mundo, praedicaretur in gentibus.28 It is as if, by employing this motif, Theodore’s purpose has actually been not to comment on the gifts of the magi, but to assert God’s unity and that unity’s relationship to the world: a relationship that hinges on Christ, the very locus of unity. The remaining three instances follow on the second, and reflect very much the same spirit and intent, constituting categorical declarations of the reality of the three persons of the Trinity, as well as their absolute unity.29 All four of these latter examples, and especially the 28 ‘For it is said that myrrh was brought for the burial of the victim, so that through the three kinds of gifts, that is, gold to a king, incense to a God, myrrh to one about to die, one Godhead of Father, Son, and Holy Spirit in the holy and undivided Trinity might be adored in Christ, believed in the world, and preached among the peoples,’ LM, 15, p. 140/1. In her commentary on the text, Stevenson identifies both Irenaeus and Ephrem as having used this motif, which would place them among the earliest who did. But John Chrysostom, Augustine of Hippo, and Gregory the Great all used it as well, as pointed out in J. Siemens, ‘A survey of the christology of Theodore of Tarsus’, n. 16, p. 217. 29 1) . . . ut inter ipsa fluenta Iordanis super unum mediatorem Dei et hominum sanctae trinitatis declararetur auctoritas, dum Deus pater in uoce, filius in hominem, spiritus sanctus in columbe speciae demonstrator diuinitas, et unam constans indiuisa deitas adque magestas. (‘. . . and in that flood of Jordan, the authority of the Holy Trinity was declared in one mediator between God and man, when God the Father in his voice, the Son in his manhood, and the Holy Spirit in the form of a dove, showed forth divinity and a single constant and undivided majesty and godhead.’), LM, 18, pp. 144/5‒146. 2) Haec autem omnia dona operator Deus et Christus in eundem sanctum spiritum, qui est plenitudo unius deitatis adque substantiae, quia tres personas et tres subsistensias unam cognuscitur esse deitatem adque essentiam (‘In all these gifts God and Christ work through this same Holy Spirit, who is the fullness of a single godhead and one substance, since three persons and three substances are seen to be a single deity and essence.’), LM, 22, p. 152/3. 3) . . . Et ne quis carnaliter arbitrans putet, aliquid scire patrem quod nesciat filius, et in aeresim inuolutus incidat, sed magis hoc significare uoluit Dominus, quia filius in patre manens, cum eo uniuersa cognoscet; quidquid enim operatur pater, unum est cum filio et spiritu sancto, sine quibus non operator; et quidquid operatur filius, unum est cum patre et spiritu sancto sine quibus non operator; et quidquid operatur spiritus sanctus, unum est cum patre et filio sine quibus non operatur. Ergo et quidquid scit pater simul et filius et spiritus sanctus cum eo pariter cuncta cognoscunt. Quia scilicet pater et filius et spiritus sanctus una adque inseparabilis deitas, in semetipsa ineffabiliter constans omnia nouit et cuncta cognoscit (‘And lest, thinking carnally, someone should conclude the Father to know something which the Son did not know, and tangled up, fall into heresy, this is rather what God wished to signify: that the Son remaining in the Father knows all things together with him, whatsoever the Father does, he is one with the Son and the Holy Spirit, without whom it is not done. And whatsoever the Son does he is one with the Father and the Holy Spirit, without whom it is not done; and whatsoever the Holy Spirit does, it is one with the Father and the Son, without whom it is not done. Therefore, whatever the Father knows, the Son and the Holy Spirit know all of it equally at the same time, since it is understood that Father and Son and Holy Spirit are one and inseparable godhead, standing ineffably united in themselves, and they know all things, and understand everything.’), LM, 24, p. 154/5.

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last, could have been drawn from the trinitarian theology of Augustine, but in the context of the Laterculus, correspond conveniently with the dominant theme of restoration.30 In the Laterculus, Theodore clearly reflects the same belief as Irenaeus: that the many find their true substance in singularity, a belief that applies both to the economy of the godhead and to people. There are three persons of the godhead communicated to the many in the one Christ; there are many people drawn together into one Church, with unity of belief, communicated back to the godhead through the same, singular Christ. André Benoiˆt once again summarises this concisely in terms of how Irenaeus works it out: ‘En conclusion de son exposé de la gnose ptoléméenne, Irénée rappellera à nouveau son thème par un véritable hymne à l’unité . . . . Ainsi cette unité qui procède de Dieu rejaillit sur l’Église qui la manifeste dans le monde entier.’31 Of course, Irenaeus is by no means alone in believing this. Nor would Theodore, in the Laterculus, be alone in proliferating it. The unity of God and the unity of the church were constant themes in patristic literature, 30 C. C. Pecknold provides a helpful synopsis and discussion of Augustine’s trinitarian theology, setting it in historical theological context, as well as taking into account recent insights, in his article ‘How Augustine used the Trinity: Functionalism and Development of Doctrine’, pp. 127‒42. Pecknold’s following statement may reveal something of Theodore’s understanding of the fundamental ‘unity in diversity’ of the Trinity: ‘From the economic theologians Augustine learned that it was a mistake to distinguish the persons by their function and stayed true to the doctrine of inseparable operations. From the Arian controversy he learned that it was a mistake to distinguish the persons by their attributes. And from the Greeks he learned that the distinction of persons must reside in terms of communal relationship,’ p. 130. 31 A. Benoît, Saint Irénée, p. 205. These words serve to frame a long quotation from Irenaeus, which Benoit collates and describes as a ‘hymn’: Ecclesia enim per uniuersum orbe usque ad fines terrae disseminata, et ab Apostolis et discipulis eorum accepit eam fidem quae est in unum Deum . . ., et in unum Christum Jesum Filium Dei, incarnatum pro nostra salute, et in Spiritum Sanctum . . . Hanc praedicationem cum acceperit, et hanc fidem quemadmodum praediximus, Ecclesia in uniuersum mundum disseminata, diligenter custodit, quasi unam domum inhabitans, et similiter credit iis, uidelicet, quasi unam animam habens et unam cor, et consonanter haec praedicat, et docet et tradit, quasi unum possidens os. Nam esti in mundo loquelae dissimiles, sed tamen uirtus traditionis una et eadem est (‘The church, dispersed throughout the world to the ends of the earth, received from the apostles and their disciples the faith in one God . . ., and in one Christ Jesus the Son of God, incarnate for our salvation, and in the Holy Spirit . . . . The church, having received this preaching and this faith, as we have just said, though dispersed in the whole world, diligently guards them as living in one house, believes them as having one soul, an done heart, and consistently preaches, teaches, and hands them down as having one mouth. For if the languages of the world are dissimilar, the power of the tradition is one and the same.’), Adv.haer., 1, 10, 1, 1‒2 &10, 2, 90‒92, trans. R. Grant, in Irenaeus of Lyons, pp. 70‒71.

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stressed to a greater or lesser degree by any number of writers, especially – as far as the unity of God was concerned – in the first four centuries.32 What is significant about the theme of unity finding its way into the Laterculus of Theodore, influenced as it is by Irenaeus, is how logically consistent it is with the idea that otherwise dominates the work of both writers: restoration. This relationship between ideas is nowhere more apparent in the Laterculus than at the end of chapter thirteen where we read, Deus ergo . . . omnem humani generis massa in unam fidei fermentando coagulauit consparsio.33 In the context of a chapter dedicated to extending Theodore’s metaphor of the rebuilding of the temple by means of recapitulating it in his body, this conclusion at first seems somewhat incongruous; then, of course, its significance emerges as a summary of Christ’s restorative work, the effect of which is to unify the human race into a single family of faith.34 But this is often the case with recapitulation. The work of Christ is such that the one takes on himself the afflictions of the many so that the afflictions of the many may be remedied. We see this again in Theodore’s treatment of Herod’s murder of the infants: Milia pauolorum in persona unius infantis impius et crudelis mactauit.35 This unity from diversity, as it relates to Christ’s recapitulative work, is dramatically concluded in chapter twenty-two, where Theodore proclaims that whatever Christ did – and here he evokes very clearly Christ’s recapitulative acts – he did so in augmentum filiorum Dei.36 The end of 32 The whole story of the pre-Nicene church, even to Augustine and his treatise De Trinitate, is one of Christian philosophers applying their trade to the question of God’s essential oneness. By comparison to later arguments around the question of Christ’s relationship with the God the Father, Irenaeus’ assertions of unity between the two seem less developed. 33 Stevenson translates this phrase as, ‘God therefore . . . coagulated the whole lump of humankind into a single faith with scattered leaven,’ LM, 13, p. 138/9. It seems, for our purposes at least, that by translating the phrase with the emendations Stevenson allows in her critical apparatus, we arrive at something more sensible. Deus ergo . . . omnem humani generis massam in unam fidei fermentando coagulauit consparsionem, may be rendered, ‘Therefore God . . . coagulated the whole lump of humankind into singleness of faith by leavening the dough.’ 34 Theodore’s use of bread imagery here is also evocative of the Eucharist and Ephrem’s agricultural imagery, discussed above, chapter 3, section 1.4. Of especial interest are the words of Tanios Bou Mansour, cited there at n. 41. 35 ‘And the impious and cruel man murdered a thousand babies in the guise of a single infant,’ LM, 15, p. 142/3. 36 LM, 22, p. 152/3. The actual text reads augmento, but Stevenson provides the accusative augmentum in the critical apparatus.

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restoration, the ‘increase of the sons of God’, is made possible because in the course of his work, Christ has gathered all God’s children together into one family; the many children’s true substance has been revealed as unity, and so the nature of their increase is to be like the Trinity itself.

5.4 The Laterculus and Bede: the Church and Sacraments Directly related to Bede’s interest in unity, and the theme of ‘oneness’ generally, is what he writes about the church. One gets the impression that, had Theodore’s impact on the organisation of the church in Britain not been so dramatic, whatever else he might have done, Bede’s interest in him would not have been nearly so great. Whether such speculation is accurate or not, however, there can be no question that what Bede reports of Theodore’s time in Britain is heavily focused on his dealings with church organisation. Indeed, if William Reany’s pious history of Theodore37 is any sort of gauge of general perception of the archbishop prior to the work undertaken since Bernhard Bischoff ’s discovery of the Canterbury Commentaries in 1936,38 it would be reasonable to assert that it was Theodore’s efforts in specifically ecclesiastical matters that took most people’s notice.39 Yet, this imbalance in favour of the church’s external affairs when it comes to the history of Theodore need not be regarded as problematic, for in more or less obvious ways, it reveals a great deal of what mattered to him theologically, and particularly what he understood concerning the person and work of Christ. It is true that one might expect Theodore to be occupied with the business of overseeing his church, especially in light of the conditions placed on his appointment in the first place, as well as conditions he

W. Reany, St Theodore of Canterbury, St. Louis, 1944. Discussed at length in chapter one. 39 For all Theodore’s scholarship is attested to by Bede, the lack of knowledge of any extant work from Theodore’s hand (or one linked closely to him), means that the few writers who did attempt to deal with Theodore’s life were essentially limited to the evidence of Bede’s Historia. For this reason, it is understandable that Reany’s narrative dedicates only thirteen pages to his scholarship and teaching, while eighty-four pages are dedicated to telling the story of his organisation. 37 38

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would have perceived upon his arrival in England.40 In this respect, simply taking care of the business at hand may not exactly constitute a well-considered christology; but as we have seen with the idea of unity as manifest in his pastoral work and the Laterculus together, the task of clarifying the role of bishops and setting the church in order is something that Theodore would most likely have pursued out of theological motivation anyway. Probably the most striking examples of this are Theodore’s encounters with Chad, whom he appoints bishop of the Mercians. Bede tells us, first of all, that: . . . Theodore journeyed to every district, consecrating bishops in suitable places and, with their help, correcting whatever he found imperfect. Among these he made it clear to Bishop Chad that his consecration had not been regular, whereupon the latter humbly replied, ‘If you believe that my consecration was irregular, I gladly resign from the office; indeed I never believed myself to be worthy of it. But I consented to receive it, however unworthy, in obedience to the commands I received.’ When Theodore heard his humble reply, he said that he ought not to give up his office; but he completed his consecration a second time after the catholic manner.41

There is a great deal of meaning apparent in this brief passage, but two items in particular stand out: one illustrating a general idea, and the other a particular ecclesiological concern. That one of Theodore’s first acts as archbishop of Canterbury was to make a visitation to the whole church in order to correct ‘imperfections’ can not be too heavily emphasised. Bede is not specific as to what he was referring with the adjective minus perfecta, but in light of the context,42 it would seem

40 The conditions of his appointment referred to would include the expectation of ‘worthiness’ suggested by Hadrian’s double refusal to take on the task himself, the expectation that he [Theodore] would not introduce anything ‘Greek’ [presumably heretical – that is, monothelete] into this Latin mission and, as evidenced by the question of Theodore’s tonsure, that he would not scandalize the church under his care with any exotic eccentricities, however legitimate they might be elsewhere. Upon arrival, these conditions would have been compounded with a situation in which the church’s faith was represented by few bishops, as well as being fraught with irregularities of practice and observance, HegA, 4, 1 & 2. 41 HegA, 4, 2, Colgrave and Mynors, p. 335. 42 Immediately before this pericope Bede writes, ‘From that time also the knowledge of sacred music, which had hitherto been known only in Kent, began to be taught in all the English churches,’ HegA, 4, 2, Colgrave and Mynors, p. 335.

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that he was talking generally about sacramental and liturgical issues. Hence the account of Chad’s re-ordination, which raises the particular question about the importance of rite. But we begin with the fact that the proper performance of liturgical and sacramental rites must have been generally important to Theodore. While Theodore does not speak directly about such matters as rites and sacraments in the Laterculus, they are certainly referred to. In Ephremic fashion, he alludes to the Eucharist in chapter fourteen, as he treats the Lucan nativity narrative.43 This says nothing about the importance of rite, of course, but it does place the Eucharist firmly in the sphere of Theodore’s thought. Otherwise, this central sacrament is mentioned only once again, as part of Theodore’s version of the ordines Christi.44 When he does finally say something explicit about rites and sacraments it comes almost abruptly, concluding as it does a theological statement regarding Christ’s fundamental unity with the Father and the Holy Spirit. It is a powerful soteriological ending to a great christological assertion. Theodore says: Quidquid igitur in natiuite, quid in aetate, quidquid in praedicatione, quidquid in passione, quidquid in resurrectione Christi, quidquid in ascensione Domini, quidquid in diuinis spiritus omnium linguarum elucutione, in sacramento uel ministerio sanctae catholicae ecclesiae gesta sunt, adque in augmento filiorum Dei peracta sunt.45

In light of our discussion of these same words above,46 the connection between the meaning of unity and of the church’s sacramental ministry is made clear, and it is profoundly christological. We find all of this borne out in the specific case of the re-ordination of Chad. In Bede’s first mention of Chad’s ordination, we detect a

43 Chapter fourteen is treated at length in J. Siemens, ‘The Restoration of Humankind in the Laterculus Malalianus, 14’, pp. 18‒28. Of greatest relevance to us here are pp. 22‒3 on which Theodore’s eucharistic allusions are discussed in detail. 44 Discussed above, in chapter 3, sections 1.6 and 2.1 and chapter 4, section 3. 45 ‘Whatsoever in his birth, whatsoever in his adult age, whatsoever in his preaching, whatsoever in his Passion, whatsoever in the Resurrection of Christ, whatsoever in the ascension of the Lord, whatsoever in the holy speech through the Spirit in all languages, and in the sacraments and ministry of the holy Catholic church is done and performed for the increase of the sons of God,’ LM, 22, p. 152/3. 46 The conclusion of section 3, this chapter.

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polemical purpose consistent with the Historia generally.47 That this should be the case, when Bede was talking about a figure whose Roman credentials were initially suspect by virtue of having consorted with the ‘uncorrected’ British, comes as no surprise, although it does appear that, in this instance, more may have been at stake.48 Whatever the case, though, it is Theodore that sets everything right by appearing on the scene, examining the situation, and confecting on this occasion whatever was lacking the first time. For however irregular Chad’s orders might have been, there is no question that, according to Bede’s account, the man’s personal sanctity was ever in dispute. Here was a worthy representative of the Roman ideal if ever there was one. In Bede’s mind, as well as Theodore’s, all that was required was his being brought into catholic regularity by being re-ordained according to the Roman rite, and by an indisputable Roman bishop. But what we are concerned with here, above all, is Theodore’s mind. It may be that Bede was using Theodore’s actions as a means to an end, and it may be that that end was entirely consistent with Theodore’s own, but in light of what we know about Theodore’s christological beliefs generally, we can conclude 47 HegA, 3, 28: ‘As Wilfrid lingered abroad for his consecration, King Oswiu . . . sent a holy man, modest in his ways, learned in the scriptures, and zealous in carrying out their teachings, to Kent, to be consecrated bishop of the church of York. This was a priest named Chad . . . . When they reached Kent, they found that Deusdedit had died and no other archbishop had been appointed in his place. From there they went to the kingdom of the West Saxons where Wine was bishop. The latter consecrated Chad with the assistance of two bishops of the British race who as has repeatedly been said, keep Easter Sunday, according to their rule, from the fourteenth to the twentieth day of the moon; but there was not a single bishop in the whole of Britain except Wine who had been canonically ordained. So Chad was consecrated bishop . . . (Colgrave and Mynors, p. 317). The issue of the British bishops’ adherence to their eccentric dating of Easter appears to be an obstacle to their being treated by Bede with the same dignity afforded those who followed the Roman practice even if the latter are seen as guilty of simony, as Wine was (HegA, 3, 7). 48 I am still inclined to believe that Bede’s principal concern is Chad’s association with ‘uncanonical’ British bishops. However, it is important to note that there is also the problem of King Oswiu’s apparent impatience at Wilfrid’s ‘lingering abroad’. A note in Colgrave and Mynors points this out: ‘Chad, brother of Cedd and disciple of Aidan, became abbot of Lastingham after the death of Cedd. It is not easy to understand why Oswiu appointed Chad, apparently in Wilfrid’s place,’ p. 316. This same note reveals the complexity of issues involved, as well as some uncertainty as to what concerns Bede himself was addressing in his account, as it continues: ‘It may be that [Chad] was appointed to assist rather than replace Wilfrid. But his consecration, carried out by Wine, a bishop who was later accused of simony, and two unorthodox British bishops, could certainly not have been considered satisfactory by the Roman party. If Wine had been strictly orthodox, he would not have been likely to have accepted the co-operation of British bishops in the ceremony,’ pp. 316‒17.

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with some confidence that he would have been consciously aware of the need to act in Chad’s situation for the sake of unity and sacramental validity: two things that must lead to the ‘increase of the sons of God.’ That a bishop was a bearer of the sacraments – the instruments of humanity’s divine increase – and even a sacrament himself, may be at issue in Theodore’s later insistence that Chad ride a horse instead of going everywhere on foot.49 It is stated in Colgrave and Mynors that, ‘[r]iding on horseback was the privilege of the noble classes in Ireland; so the Irish saints, in their humility, and doubtless also prompted by ascetic reasons, generally avoided this means of travel,’50 and for Theodore this posed a problem. Mayr-Harting presents a very helpful treatment of the subject in The Coming of Christianity to Anglo-Saxon England, at one point addressing the question of the Irish insistence on going around on foot directly: As against all this, Theodore’s ideas of the episcopal office fit precisely with those of Gregory the Great. If we speak of Gregory it will be possible to see a rationale behind Theodore’s actions. There was no intrinsic conflict between Gregory’s ideals and those of the Gaulish bishops, but there was certainly possibility of an important divergence of emphasis. To Gregory the problem presented itself like this. On the one hand a pastor must take care of external matters otherwise he neglects his flock; he must uphold a certain external appearance and not be too humble or depreciate himself too much, otherwise he loses the authority to restrain and discipline those under him. On the other hand he must not indulge in outward show to gratify his self-importance; he must not grow cold amidst external works for want of internal humility or the fire of contemplation. This is also how the problem presented itself to Theodore. To his mind, the bishops trained in the Irish tradition had failed to strike a balance. Where St Martin of Tours refused to ride anything better than an ass, these bishops even insisted on going round on foot; they neglected their external dignity; they had to be made to ride horses.51

The necessary balance Mayr-Harting refers to concerned the extreme practice of the Irish bishops and what he describes as the grandeur of Gaulish practice – especially as it related to Wilfrid.52 But what is most important in his description of both, as well as Gregory the Great’s Bede warmly recounts the occasion in HegA, 4, 3. Colgrave and Mynors, n. 2, p. 226. 51 H. Mayr-Harting, The Coming of Christianity, pp. 135‒6. 52 Discussed on pp. 130‒5 of The Coming of Christianity to Anglo-Saxon England. 49 50

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(and so Theodore’s) synthesis, is how the different models of episcopal practice still reflected some christological dimension of the office. With respect to the first, Gaulish, tradition, there is the obvious iconography inherent in Wilfrid’s ordination liturgy: ‘Most significant of all in this respect was Wilfrid’s triumphalist episcopal consecration by Agilbert at Compiègne, at which twelve bishops participated, and the new bishop was carried into the sanctuary on a golden chair. A newly consecrated bishop surrounded by twelve colleagues: the symbolism was clearly that of Christ and his apostles.’53 The innate imagery of the Irish practice was equally obvious, derived as it was from the example of Christ’s humility in the gospels. In the Gregorian synthesis, on the other hand, both the humble shepherd imagery and the exalted Christ imagery are present at the same time – a fact that is in harmony with the sacraments as manifestations of a divine reality, into which all earthly reality is to be transformed. Bede’s account of the acts of Theodore makes it plain, then, that what was of greatest concern to the archbishop was the faithful representation of Christ in terms of the unity of the church both within itself and with Rome, and in terms of the comportment of its bishops both in internal, or spiritual, matters and external, political matters. Because for Theodore the restoration of humankind as a result of the Incarnation is of such importance, and because this restoration has ramifications for every dimension of life, especially ecclesiastical life, it must be equally important that the community of the restoration (the church) and the ministers of the restoration (its bishops) present accordingly. It may be convenient that the events through which Theodore’s views are communicated reflect the sort of emphasis that his chronicler Bede was seeking to propagate, but in light of what we encounter of Theodore’s thought in the Laterculus, we can be sure that this in no way undermines the authenticity of the record or its essential correspondence to his christological thought as expressed elsewhere.

5.5 Christological elements in the Canterbury Commentaries Next to the Laterculus Malalianus itself, we have examined the most traditional, and bountiful, source for Theodore’s christological thought – in the form of Bede’s account of his time as archbishop of 53

H. Mayr-Harting, The Coming of Christianity, p. 132.

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Canterbury in the Historia – and found that the two are essentially consistent. While the Laterculus manifests a wealth of diverse references, what it sets out christologically is a coherent picture of Christ as restorer, with all the implications such a picture suggests; and some of those implications are what we find manifest in Theodore’s activities as Bede describes them. In the meantime the Canterbury Commentaries, to which reference has been made throughout this work, offer a great deal in terms of specific christological insight on Theodore’s part. And while they certainly warrant a thorough examination for christological doctrine in their own right, how they relate to the Laterculus is the question that must occupy us at this point.54 As fragmented as they are, the Canterbury Commentaries present the reader with a great deal of theology to consider; but this is especially so if read in conjunction with the Laterculus. Both chapters three and four, above, mention the points of contact between the commentaries and the Laterculus in terms of sources cited and, albeit somewhat less definitively, underlying christological ideas. At the same time, while it is true that explicit allusion is not made in the commentaries to the Laterculus’ interest in the theme of restoration, the very different nature of the two works makes the fact that there is still a manifest commonality of thought between them all the more gratifying. In any case, any ostensible disparity can be readily explained.55 Most importantly though, the more time one spends with both works, the more apparent their common characteristics become. But while certain christological ideas in the commentaries have already been enumerated as being reminiscent of the sort of thought with which the Laterculus is chiefly concerned,56 there is more to account for within the commentaries than that. In PentI 24 for example,57 there is a reference to Christ as light, in the midst of an explanation of why it is that 54

The number of christological statements and allusions in the commentaries worthy of their own analysis would make dealing with them here an unwieldy task. It must suffice to say that upon reading the Canterbury Commentaries in their entirety, there is nothing within them to contradict the Laterculus, and a lot to support it. This being the case, the material to be discussed here will bear direct relation to issues expressed in the Laterculus, especially if such material can be seen to enhance what is being said there. Such necessary selectivity should in no way serve to minimize the importance of what picture might be proffered by the Canterbury texts on their own. 55 As discussed, alongside certain points of contact that exist, above, chapter 4, section 4. 56 See above, n. 54. 57 PentI 24, pp. 304/5‒6/7.

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evening is to be counted before morning in the reckoning of time. In this comment, Theodore gives his sources as Gregory of Nazianzen and (an ambiguous) Theophilus, but clearly sees the point as one worth making himself, first to clarify an uncertain point in the biblical text, and then to show how God’s actions in Christ are prefigured in the Old Testament. Of course, such a method characterizes Theodore’s modus operandi through the whole of the commentaries, but as an indication of how his understanding of Christ’s person and work is derived and conveyed – that is, by means of the scriptures and the teaching of the orthodox fathers – and the cosmic connotations of his mission, PentI 24 is a good example. It appears quite natural, then, that only a few lines later in PentI 28, we should come across a bold statement regarding the nature and destiny of humankind, not unlike the sort of statement to be found in the Laterculus, such as Theodore saying that Christ accomplished what he did for ‘the increase of the sons of God.’58 In both instances, the teacher is asserting God’s purpose in light of the view that the human race’s purpose is to serve as God’s image by virtue both of its creation and the re-creation brought about by Christ. According to the commentaries, as with the Laterculus, Theodore’s is not a particularly moralistic christology; it is, rather, a view of Christ concerned first with the broader anthropological and spiritual application. There are two other statements in the commentaries that may shed light on the christology of the Laterculus. Both echo issues of importance in the Laterculus, and likewise reflect the sorts of things that Bede draws out in the Historia. The first concerns the nature of bishops, while the second concerns the question of orthodoxy in the church – especially as respecting the Trinity. Together with PentI 31, PentI 3259 constitutes a discussion of Adam’s nature in light of God having breathed into him. In these lines, Theodore asserts an interpretation of what it was for Adam to have been created in the image of God: a question which in turn reminds us of Irenaeus, and his concern with the creation of humanity in God’s image and likeness.60 In this case, Theodore says that it is the soul which instils humankind with God’s likeness, and that the soul is in fact God’s breath. According to Theodore, God’s breath is what gives life to Adam, and this breath is to be understood as the Holy Spirit. Cited above, n. 45. Canterbury Commentaries, M. Lapidge, ed., p. 308/9. 60 Discussed above in chapter 4, section 2.1, and especially at n. 34. 58 59

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Every human being, then, is imbued with the Holy Spirit; save that it was precisely this gift that was lost through sin. The apostles, however, were different insofar as they were double recipients of the Spirit, as when Christ bestowed it upon them according to the Gospel.61 The significance of this discussion is really two-fold: first in terms of what it suggests is Theodore’s interest in the question of what it means to have been created in God’s image; and second, in terms of what it suggests about the nature of the apostolic ministry. We have already seen in Bede’s account of Theodore’s ministry in Britain that the bishop had particular responsibility to serve as the locus of unity, and the image of Christ’s presence. We see, too, in the Laterculus, that the role of the bishop was an area of concern for Theodore, especially for his being a successor of the apostles with supreme responsibility for shepherding the flock.62 Between PentI 31 and 32, these questions may not be treated in detail, but they are present in the commentaries as intimations of the sorts of things that occupied Theodore’s theological mind. That Theodore exhibits a particular concern for delineating the bounds of orthodoxy is evident in the Laterculus and in the testimony of Bede.63 And that this is an abiding concern is affirmed by the presence in the Canterbury Commentaries of PentI 36: an observation on the tree of Genesis.64 This gloss begins with what might be described as ‘negative recapitulation’, as Theodore describes how, because the first sin was committed through a lone fig tree, Christ curses the fig tree as he does in Matthew’s gospel.65 Theodore then goes on to say that God is the tree of life and of good and evil, and that if one understands God properly, it becomes for one a source of life. By extension, misunderstanding results in a fall. Theodore is explicit here in mentioning the Trinity as the doctrine that requires right understanding, exhibiting the same concern that characterized his ministry as bishop and writer. Again, the evidence of

John 20:22 LM, 14. This subject is treated in detail in J. Siemens, ‘Christ’s restoration’, pp. 18‒28. 63 Concerning the Laterculus, see above, chapter 4, n. 86. For Bede, see the concluding remarks to section 2 of this chapter, above. 64 Gen. 2: 9: ‘And out of the ground the Lord God made to grow every tree that is pleasant to the sight and good for food, the tree of life also in the midst of the garden, and the tree of the knowledge of good and evil.’ 65 Matt. 21: 19: ‘And seeing a fig tree by the wayside he went to it, and found nothing on it but leaves only. And he said to it, “May no fruit ever come from you again!” And the fig tree withered at once.’ 61

62

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Theodore’s acts as archbishop of Canterbury, his words as a teacher at the school there, recorded as they are in the Canterbury Commentaries, and what he commits to the pages of the Laterculus agree. He was interested in the origin and destiny of humanity in light of God’s actions at creation and in the Incarnation, he saw right doctrine as being intrinsic to this economy, and he emphasized the role of the bishop in delivering it.

5.6 Christological elements in the Pœnitentiale Theodori In light of everything that has been said about the acts of Theodore as described by Bede, as well as Theodore’s own teaching in the Canterbury Commentaries, we might expect to draw the same conclusions we have already drawn from other works of Theodore’s hand, including the penitential that bears his name.66 For this reason, Theodore’s Pœnitentiale, a substantial compilation that figures prominently within the genre, is the next work that needs to be analyzed for the light it may shed on our consideration of the christology of the Laterculus Malalianus.67 While Bede’s Historia hardly needs any introduction, the same can not be said of the Pœnitentiale Theodori or even penitential literature more generally. For this reason, a brief description of the nature of penitentials, and Theodore’s Pœnitentiale in particular, is appropriate.68 Whereas the tradition in the church to the sixth century had generally been of an unrepeatable public penance, in which the penitent confessed Pœnitentiale Theodori, Haddan and Stubbs, pp. 173‒213. As with the Canterbury Commentaries, it is not within the scope of this present work to exhaustively examine Theodore’s Pœnitentiale. While our primary purpose is to establish the nature of the thought to be found specifically in the Laterculus, however, the Pœnitentiale presents problems that make it both an interesting and potentially very fruitful subject for further investigation. A great deal of work by other scholars has already gone into examining different aspects of the Pœnitentiale, much of which has a lot of light to shed on this christological investigation. But the treatment it will receive here will be necessarily limited. 68 As with the Pœnitentiale, a significant amount of scholarly work has been done on the penitentials as a form, as well as on other specific penitentials that gained prominence through the Middle Ages. Theodore’s own penitential has been remarked upon – sometimes in depth – by numerous commentators, but the work that exists tends to be interested either in its place within the genre as a whole, or concerned with questions of transmission. For all this, the evidence remains quite opaque, especially with respect to questions of transmission, as Frank Stenton suggests in Anglo-Saxon England, p. 140. Many of the major sources for information on Theodore’s penitential are cited over the course of this present work, especially in the following section. 66 67

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and was thereafter enrolled in an ‘order of penitents’ to be readmitted to the communion of the church at some later date, the tradition in the far West, chiefly Ireland and, later, Anglo-Saxon Britain, came to include specific manuals to be used by a confessor in the course of a penitent’s private confession of sin.69 Henry Mayr-Harting positively attributes this divergence of tradition to monastic influence,70 but these manuals appear to have garnered few devotees among historians, chiefly due to the systemization they imposed on the darkest aspects of human behaviour. Indeed, as Thomas Charles-Edwards points out, a negative attitude toward penitentials extends back at least as far as the Carolingian period, to which Theodulf of Orléans attests by saying, ‘. . . many faults are read in the penitential which it is not becoming for the man to know.’71 In spite of the distaste with which they may have sometimes been beheld however, an array of penitentials has survived ranging from the oldest, Irish examples, to the later, Carolingian forms, although their production virtually ceases after the twelfth century.72 More than one work of the sort was ascribed to Theodore through the course of the Middle Ages, some of which were actually original compositions by other writers, and some of which incorporated extracts from the original text. In the end, though, there is only one, true penitential belonging to Theodore.73 It is a work comprised of two books, the first of which contains fifteen chapters of counsel for 69 This information is to be found among the numerous works on the history and theology of penance as practiced by the church through various ages. A helpful synopsis of developments in the practice of penance in the church, however, can be found in the two entries on the subject, ‘Penance’ and ‘Penitential Books’, in ODCC, pp. 1250‒51. 70 The Coming of Christianity to Anglo-Saxon England, p. 258. 71 As cited by Thomas Charles-Edwards in ‘The Penitential of Theodore and the Iudicia Theodori’, in AT, p. 141. Charles-Edwards goes on in the same paragraph to cite Plummer’s verdict which is even more negative: ‘The penitential literature is in truth a deplorable feature of the medieval church . . . . It is hard to see how anyone could busy himself with such literature and not be the worse for it,’ (originally found in Venerabilis Baedae Opera Historica, C. Plummer, ed., 2 vols., Oxford, 1896). Yet in spite of such a tradition of unfavourable reception, it seems that more recent observations are not nearly so negative. It is interesting to note for example that, in a review for TS, (57, 2, June 1996, pp. 347‒49), James Dallen says of Hugh Connolly’s work, The Irish Penitentials and Their Significance for the Sacrament of Penance Today, (Four Courts Press, Portland, Ore., 1995), that ‘[i]n contrast with the usual evaluations of Celtic penance, Connolly puts forward a theological study of the Irish penitentials that is almost totally positive.’ 72 ‘Penitential Books’ in ODCC, p. 1251. 73 The history of Theodore’s text is traced in Haddan and Stubbs, pp. 174‒5. It is this edition that will be referred to throughout the present work.

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the penitent and the second of which contains fourteen chapters reporting Theodore’s judgements on ecclesiastical and general disciplinary matters. Mayr-Harting’s description of the work is perhaps the most concise, as he distils a diverse array of information on the iudicia attributed to the archbishop down to the Pœnitentiale Theodori, and concludes that ‘[f ]or all its problems of text and transmission . . . there is no doubt that it represents for the most part genuine traditions of Theodore’s teaching.’74 This being the case, the text should represent an abundant source for possible christological discoveries in relation to the Laterculus Malalianus and its author. As Mayr-Harting suggests, a great deal of discussion has been generated by the question of who the scribe of the Pœnitentiale Theodori was and how closely the work reflects the thought of the man whose name it bears, but there is general agreement that it is possible to know something of Theodore’s own thought in the Pœnitentiale even if it has been subject to redaction.75 The place to begin in evaluating such a work, however, lies not in the content – redacted or otherwise – but in the form itself. For surely the passive assent to, or active creation of, a medium such as a manual for individual confession must say something about the place penance has in the community of Christ. And of course we see across the sources that it does, making a brief assessment of it essential.

H. Mayr-Harting, The Coming of Christianity, pp. 258‒59. This is a problem comprehensively dealt with in the aforementioned paper by Thomas Charles-Edwards, ‘The Penitential of Theodore and the Iudicia Theodori’, pp. 141‒174, and also discussed by way of introduction to the text in Haddan and Stubbs, pp. 173‒176. In an article that deals with Theodore’s penitential at length, ‘The ‘baptism of tears’ in early Anglo-Saxon sources’, Thomas O’Loughlin and Helen ConradO’Briain tell us that ‘[t]he concept which Theodore found [in Britain] was radically different from the Greek tradition of his youth or, we may well suspect, from the circumstances he had found in Italy, but as a practical man of great adaptability, he not only suited his own penitential teaching to the familiar insular form, which clearly answered the needs of the people who were in his care, but gave his approval [. . .] to an Irish penitential libellus. ‘Thanks to the attempt of the discipulus umbrensium to give in his preface some account of the origin of the material he tried to put into usable form, we can enter some way into the minds of Theodore and his students as the archbishop attempted [ . . . ] to clarify problems of discipline and penitence,’ ASE, 22, p. 82. So according to O’Loughlin and Conrad-O’Briain, far from being obscured by the redaction work of the Northumbrian disciple, Theodore’s mind is still accessible in the text that has come down to us in the form of the Pœnitentiale. 74 75

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The advent of the penitentials corresponds with the twilight of the earliest penitential practice of the church. John McNeill’s description of what he terms ‘the decline of ancient penance’ portrays an increasingly impractical and unrealistic approach to the issue on the part of the early church, especially, it seems, in the West.76 After tracing the evolution over time of different approaches to penance by the church in different places, McNeill depicts a western church that, by the fifth century, was in need of a new way of addressing the question of individual sin. As he says: ‘The new barbarized society could not be subjected to the old discipline which had already proved too severe for the Roman Christians. After much ground had been lost and public penance had been almost extinguished, a new system was to develop, more workable in this turbulent state of society and more applicable to its needs.’77 This new system would take the form of the penitentials, of which Theodore’s is one, and of which McNeill goes on to say: ‘When all similarities between the penitentials and earlier writings on penance have been recognized, it is still evident that the emergence of the series marks a new departure . . . From the inception of the use of these manuals arises a new era in the history of penance.’78 This ‘new era’ may be attributed in large part to the influence of John Cassian who, according to Thomas O’Loughlin, should not be underestimated as one of the primary contributors to the ‘post-patristic theology of sin’; while the influence of Gregory Nazianzen, representing eastern thought more generally, can also be discerned.79 From at least the mid-fifth century on, then, there is a gradual move away from rigorous public forms of penance to

J. T. McNeill, Medieval Handbooks of Penance, p. 20ff. McNeill, Handbooks of Penance, p. 22. 78 McNeill, Handbooks of Penance, p. 23. 79 T. O’Loughlin, ‘Penitentials and pastoral care’ in A History of Pastoral Care, G. Evans, ed., pp. 95‒6. The second matter – that of Gregory Nazianzen’s influence – is explored at length by O’Loughlin and Conrad-O’Briain in their article, ‘The ‘baptism of tears’ in early Anglo-Saxon sources’, (cited above, n. 75), although Michael Lapidge would qualify the input of Gregory by suggesting that there is an almost identical parallel between the statement in the Iudicia on the ‘baptism of tears’ and a sentence in one of John Chrysostom’s nine Homiliae de penitentia (Hom. de eleemosyna 3, 4) ‘. . . where the second type of baptism is said to be that of tears.’ Lapidge concludes: ‘This wording agrees so closely with that in the Iudicia as to raise the suspicion that Theodore, quoting here from memory, had misremembered where he had read the description of the baptism of tears,’ Biblical Commentaries, pp. 152‒3. In any event, both of O’Loughlin’s articles are of immense importance for any investigation into the development of the penitentials from both an historical and theological point of view. 76 77

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individual, prescriptive ones, influenced in time by certain eastern sources and resulting in the manuals for penance, called penitentials. Now, seeing as their thought bears so heavily on the development of the penitentials as a genre, the substance of John Cassian’s and Gregory Nazianzen’s contributions must be the point of departure for our inquiry. As O’Loughlin suggests, penance came to be seen not as punishment, but medicine, with all the metaphorical implications this shift in emphasis entails. In christological terms, this would make penance one remedy in an arsenal of remedies, which is in turn individuated by the application of specialized treatments for specific sins. This being the case, even bearing in mind our earlier distinction between the view of Christ as the physician of individual souls and Christ as the physician of fallen humanity,80 it is possible to see the relationship between how this view of penance portrays Christ and how he is portrayed by someone like Ephrem the Syrian and, subsequently, Theodore. After all, such pastoral techniques counselled by Cassian as the administration of contraries against the vices, specific as they are toward the individual sinner and individual sin, represent on the individual level the idea that Christ is likewise the true and ultimate source of all sin’s healing. But whereas it was important, when we were establishing Theodore’s use of Ephrem the Syrian in the Laterculus Malalianus, to maintain (on the basis of them representing different rhetorical and theological starting points) the difference between the Christus medicus who heals a common wound, and the Christ who heals every person’s sin by the ministry of formally reconciling that person with the church in terms of penitential practice, now it is propitious that the two views should be considered together. For in this context, a manual of penance used in the treatment of sin becomes a sign of the work that Christ extends to all creation: the penitential form broadens the scope of reconciliation for sinners. Gregory Nazianzen’s idea of compunction extends this universalizing idea further. That tears of sorrow shed for sins committed might constitute a means of reconciliation with God, to the point of warranting its comparison with baptism, suggests a more liberal application of penance than that envisioned by, for example, Tertullian and other

This distinction is discussed in chapter 3 of the present work, section 2.2. Tertullian, as one representative of the early via reconciliationis, supports a much more rigorous approach to the commission of sin after baptism than that signalled by the notion that the shedding of tears by a penitent could count towards his or her 80 81

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early commentators on the subject.81 Not that Gregory’s idea is the only alternative to the strict practice of what McNeill calls ‘ancient penance’; but in bearing a strong influence over the development of the penitentials, it is conceivable that the idea moved the practice of penance in a direction that made reconciliation more accessible to the Christian community. Certainly, the whole notion that an individual might feel moved to reflect on his sin in such detail as to produce tears suggests a fundamentally introspective and personal approach that could lead, conceivably, to a personal dialogue over the matter between the minister of penance and the penitent. So in general, as a result of Gregory Nazianzen’s contribution to the thought surrounding penance, its incorporation into the western development of penitentials, and the shift in focus brought about by John Cassian toward penance – from something punitive to something medicinal – it may be said that the system of penance as manifest in the form of penitentials represented an idea of universal remissibility for sin, and the fundamentally therapeutic nature of penance as a practice. But just as an overview of the penitential genre was required in order to understand the theology behind Theodore’s specific penitential, so an examination of that particular penitential is essential if we are to use it as a means to determine as full a picture as possible of the archbishop’s christology in the Laterculus. Conveniently, what we have just described of the theology of the penitential form corresponds with what we have established so far of the christology of the Laterculus, and so we begin by assuming those characteristics to be a part of what we are seeking to establish of Theodore’s Pœnitentiale. That we can do so with relative confidence is in part due to fact that there is nothing in the Pœnitentiale that contradicts (or even diverges from) the christological assumptions discussed above. But what is more, there is at least one unequivocal link between a particular contributing factor to the penitential genre, and Theodore’s actual work. This would be the specific idea of baptismum lacrimarum, derived from Gregory Nazianzus.

reconciliation with the church. See, for example, his Apologeticus, 39, and De poenitentia, 7 & 9. O’Loughlin, in agreement with McNeill, identifies Cyprian, Ambrose, Jerome, and Augustine as others who proffer comment on the nature of penance, in most cases consistent in line with Tertullian (‘Penitentials and pastoral care’, pp. 94‒5). Ambrose, for example, is cited by McNeill as a supporter of unrepeatable reconciliation, informing us at the same time that there is a difference between East and West in this regard: the East, beginning with Chrysostom in particular, being more relaxed with respect to penance (Handbooks, p. 14).

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In this respect, Gregory represents both a general source for an aspect of the penitentials, and a specific source for Theodore.82 Now, it could be argued that this correspondence might be seen to imply an overt intention on the part of the discipulus umbrensium, the editor of Theodore’s Pœnitentiale, to connect his master’s words with the theology of the penitential form, meaning that it would say nothing about Theodore’s theological intent; but considering the unlikelihood that the discipulus knew anything about Gregory of Nazianzus, let alone enough to make the connection between the words he was working with and the conventions out of which these words had grown,83 it is most reasonable to assume that the link was intentional on Theodore’s part. On this basis alone we can say that the theology of Theodore’s particular penitential begins with the theology of the genre. Unfortunately for the purposes of this work, however, it may be that beyond this auspicious beginning little more can be said. For all that can be determined from Theodore’s Pœnitentiale by setting it among its equals in the genre, there is actually little that can obviously be determined about his understanding of the person and work of Christ as manifest in the specific content. Theodore certainly seems to take a somewhat liberal approach to the sorts of questions faced by those whose vocation it was to be restored in the likeness of Christ, which is in itself indicative of 82 Compare O’Loughlin’s appraisal of Gregory Nazianzen’s influence on the development of the penitential tradition: ‘Another Eastern development addressing the problem of public penance was that which in Greek was referred to as ‘the baptism of tears’. Building on a series of biblical images of repentance, a number of fourthcentury writers, most notably Gregory Nazianzen, had stressed that the essential element in forgiveness after baptism was that the sinner was truly sad for his or her sins . . .’ (‘Penance and pastoral care’, p. 96), with his and Conrad-O’Briain’s identification of Nazianzen’s manifest deployment in Theodore’s iudicia. In discussing whether or not Gregory’s term baptismum lacrimarum refers to baptism at all, they identify how and where the term has been used in the iudicia, including its attribution there to Gregory himself: ‘Gregorius Nazanzenus dixit secundum baptismum esse lacrimarum’ (‘The baptism of tears’, pp. 68‒9). 83 T. O’Loughlin & H. Conrad-O’Briain, ‘The baptism of tears’, p. 68. 84 This sort of generous pastoral economy, reflective as it is of a broad view of God’s work in Christ, is remarked on by Frank Stenton in a passage that likewise reflects Theodore’s pan-Mediterranean formation: ‘The whole tenor of [Theodore’s] canons shows his anxiety that a moral life should not be made impossible [. . .]. He had the humanity of a man who had known many countries and the customs of many churches,’ Anglo-Saxon England, p. 141. Stenton’s assessment is flagged first by MayrHarting in The Coming of Christianity, p. 250, and confirmed by Charles-Edwards at the beginning of his discussion of the question of remarriage, when he draws the connection between Basil’s more lenient approach to the issue and Theodore’s (in ‘The Penitential of Theodore and the Iudicia Theodori,’ p. 159).

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a certain theological perspective,84 but the christological vocabulary one would normally look for is just not present in the text.85 Other than by implication then, Theodore’s penitential is not a christological document per se. Happily, the type of document it is reveals much, but the content sheds little further light on what the figure whose counsel it contains thought about Christ’s person and work. This means that the possibility of determining something more about Theodore’s christology as manifest in the Laterculus Malalianus by examining other sources is for now exhausted. Unlike the acts of Theodore recorded by Bede, the Canterbury Commentaries, the Pœnitentiale, or the Laterculus itself, the use of other Theodoran works for the purpose of determining as faithfully as possible the christology of the Laterculus, is mitigated against.86 At the same time, it is true to say that we encounter the Laterculus in a context of supporting work whose overwhelming nature suggests an understanding of the incarnate Logos that is consistent in its richness, textured in its insight, and broad in its application.

85 One exception to this may be what Charles-Edwards describes in ‘The Penitential of Theodore’ as Theodore’s concern for heresy. In examining the authenticity of a particular set of statements in the Pœnitentiale, Charles-Edwards says: ‘Both of these clauses concern heretics, a topic which is immensely more important in Theodore’s Penitential than it is in any of the Irish ones,’ (emphasis mine) p. 164. It is not that a lot is said about Theodore’s theology, but these words do reflect a consistent concern with right thinking about Christ. 86 In coming to terms with Theodore’s thought on the person and work of Christ, especially as manifest beyond the Laterculus, it will undoubtedly be necessary to take more thorough account of Theodore’s iudicia, as well as the Passio sancti Anastasii, and the octosyllabic poems ascribed to him by Michael Lapidge. In the case of the iudicia, it was deemed that in relation to this present work, the text could yield little more to illumine our insight into the Laterculus, while in the case of the Passio, the fact that it is by its nature a derivative work mitigated against its consideration beyond what Carmela Franklin provides in her paper, ‘Theodore and the Passio S. Anastasii’ (in AT, pp. 175‒203). Lapidge’s poems, discussed at length in his paper, ‘Theodore and Anglo-Latin octosyllabic verse’ (in AT, pp. 260‒80), present another challenge altogether. Their explicit christological content will require a separate analysis. But while their author may have drawn on some of the same sources for inspiration as those that appear in the Laterculus and elsewhere (see, for example, Lapidge’s comment regarding Gregory of Nazianzus and Sophronius of Jerusalem, p. 273), Theodore the poet draws upon entirely different imagery than Theodore the exegete and theological commentator – meaning that further work will need to be done if Theodore’s legacy is to be accounted for in its entirety.

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5.7 Theodore’s Christology: A Summary The primary purpose of this work is to identify Theodore’s concept of the person and work of Christ as manifest in the only complete, coherent piece of original writing so far attributable to the seventh century archbishop of Canterbury. Certainly there is much to be gleaned from the account of Theodore’s ministry in Britain rendered by Bede, but this history alone has not been enough to say anything precise about Theodore’s mind on the christological questions that were being debated at the time. Then, once the biblical commentaries were revealed to the world by Bernhard Bischoff and Michael Lapidge, together with all the biographical and textual work they included, we had the first real taste of the sort of thought we could expect from such an accomplished and cosmopolitan figure as Theodore. So this, together with other work that has since been undertaken on Theodore’s legacy, including all that has been said about his penitential and, ultimately, the edition of the Laterculus Malalianus itself, has meant that it is now possible, in a way it has never been before, to say something about the christology of this remarkable figure. Now, in light of these other works, but more especially in light of the Laterculus, we will attempt to do just this.87 From the outset, it is clear that Theodore has no greater desire than to represent the orthodox line on matters concerning Christ and the Trinity. We can only speculate as to why he felt the need to assert this so strongly, but it is reasonable to assume that the theological environment out of which he emerged will have shaped his approach to such matters. Perhaps for this same reason, he can not really be described as a speculative thinker. Yet, while it may be that caution subdued his speculative instincts, his creativity was certainly not affected. For Theodore, formed as he was by so diffuse a range of influences, was as good at weaving them together as circumstances demanded. And of Theodore, circumstances demanded a lot. Born in Tarsus, presumably educated at Antioch, followed by Constantinople, with time in between spent in Syriac-speaking Edessa, and ultimately, with what he might have expected to be final settlement in a Greek-speaking Roman monastery, Theodore’s formation was as cross-cultural and multi-lin-

87

While all the information in this summary is taken from this and the two foregoing chapters, a separate, initial, evaluation of Theodore’s christology can be found in J. Siemens ‘A survey of the christology of Theodore of Tarsus in the Laterculus Malalianus’.

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gual – as truly ecumenical – as could be conceived. The ability to creatively synthesize would have been precisely what Theodore needed in order to deal with his experience, and the Laterculus, along with all the other evidence, points to his having had just this ability. The first indication in the Laterculus one notices of this ability resides in Theodore’s use of sources. Over the course of the work, he cites only two by name – Epiphanius of Cyprus88 and Ephrem the Syrian,89 a Greek and a Syrian – reflecting the fact either that in composing the Laterculus his memory must have defaulted to an earlier time lived in the East, or that the works in front of him while he was writing included these specific references. The latter instance is the less likely of the two, however, as neither citation is drawn from an identifiable source attributable to either of the two authors, even though, as Jane Stevenson reminds us, works by both authors were likely held at Canterbury.90 In addition to these eastern references, of course, is the fact that the Laterculus is itself based on an original text by the Antiochene author John Malalas. So these are the first observable sources, representing at least two traditions. Lest one assume that Theodore has neglected the Latin tradition entirely, however, the influence of Caelius Sedulius can be discerned in the pages of the Laterculus on at least ten occasions.91 Even if this influence is not obvious, it is significant both for its quantity and for the fact that in at least one point in Sedulius’ poetry, there is agreement between the imagery he uses and an exegetical motif used by Ephrem the Syrian and Irenaeus of Lyons which is also of great importance to the Laterculus: the parallel between the virgin earth out of which the first Adam is created, and the Virgin Mary, out of whom the new Adam is born.92 So Theodore’s synthesis of influences in the Laterculus extends from those that are immediately plain to the reader to those LM, 7. LM, 19. 90 J. Stevenson, The School of Archbishop Theodore, p. 183: ‘The Biblical Commentaries contain evidence that books by both Epiphanius and Ephrem were in the library at Canterbury.’ 91 Stevenson identifies all ten instances of direct correlation between the words of Sedulius and those of Theodore in the Laterculus, and discusses them at length in her commentary on the text. She is emphatic that Caelius Sedulius should be known as the biggest Latin influence on the Laterculus, and that his influence extended to a considerable degree. See J. Stevenson, The School of Archbishop Theodore, pp. 70‒1. 92 The Virgin Mary/virgin earth motif, appearing in Carmen Paschale, 2, 30, is cited above, chapter 3, n. 92. 88 89

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requiring closer examination, and spans the full breadth of his experience from the Syriac and Greek East to the Latin West. What these sources yield is another matter, and as we have seen above, this can be predominantly located in Theodore’s regard for Ephrem, and his absorption of Irenaeus’ primary soteriological principle of recapitulation. At least in the Laterculus, all other sources appear as ancillary to these in terms of what they have to offer. There are other significant christological themes in the Laterculus, and while they bear great importance in their own right, they too appear there only in a secondary capacity. For at its heart, the Laterculus is a work about the restoration of the human race to its rightful place as an image of the Godhead, as accomplished by Christ. In it, Christ is portrayed as the divine healer who undertakes his medical mission by assuming human form and undergoing every experience that his patients themselves must undergo, so that no dimension of their lives may be overlooked and the whole person may be healed. The medicine is comprised primarily in Christ’s kenotic acts, but also in the church he institutes and its sacraments. In doing all this, Christ effectively provides a new prototype for every human state and every human endeavour, from gestation in the womb to the sacramental priesthood, indicating at the same time to what it was humanity is to be conformed. This is the singular Godhead, of which the incarnate Christ is an indelible constituent together with the Father and the Holy Spirit. In the Laterculus, Theodore focuses on Christ’s humanity, but he leaves no doubt that this human nature coexists with a divine nature. He is resolute in having his readers understand that the Christ of whom he writes is the second person of the Trinity, thereby magnifying his own assertions and so demanding an urgent response. This is entirely appropriate if he believed, as we suppose he did, that until the human race (and more particularly, those under Theodore’s pastoral care) responded to Christ’s restorative work, a person’s life remained unconformed and their existence purposeless. Theodore of Tarsus, in the Laterculus Malalianus and throughout his work, portrays a generous Christ whose work is to restore humanity’s divine purpose, and to provide all that people need to get there.

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6. the later evidence Considering the esteem in which Theodore is held by Bede, and the accomplishments he attributes to him in the Historia,1 one might expect Theodore’s legacy to have been both enduring and widespread. In spite of this, and as we have already seen, it was only in the nineteennineties that editions of some of his work first became available, and any attention paid to the genuinely ‘Theodoran’ characteristics of otherwise well-worn texts such as the Pœnitentiale Theodori. Yet, over the last number of years, scholars in some fields have at least made tentative suggestions that Theodore might have been the means of transmission of some or other idea that they can not account for otherwise, or that he would not have been considered a candidate for before.2 Presumably this is due to the slowly emerging awareness that enough has gone into HegA, 4, 2. In terms of the transmission of Ephremic, or more broadly Syriac ideas, see D. Ganz, ‘Knowledge of Ephraim’s Writings in the Merovingian and Carolingian Age,’ and A. Palmer, ‘The Influence of Ephraim the Syrian.’ Otherwise, S. Gwara, ed., Latin Colloquies from Pre-Conquest Britain, records: ‘The Hermeneutica Pseudodositheana may have been introduced into England by Archbishop Theodore of Canterbury . . . . Records of Theodore and Hadrian’s teaching at Canterbury appear in related glossaries of the so-called ‘Leiden’ family, the principal representative of which is the ‘Leiden Glossary,’ Bibliotheek der Rijksuniversiteit, Voss. lat. Q. 69, 20r–36r. The forty-seventh batch of glossae collectae in this compilation consists entirely of entries from the Hermeneutica. Given the presumed rarity of this work and its status as a Latin grammar for speakers of Greek, Theodore and Hadrian are its likeliest proponents. 1 2

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establishing the authentic background of Theodore in the last two decades to warrant recognizing his potential role in contributing to the early medieval Latin Church, especially in the Northwest of Europe. There are many potential areas in which Theodore might have exerted his influence beyond his years as archbishop of Canterbury, although we are most concerned here with what of his theology, and particularly his christology, might have been transmitted and taken up by others. Even if it is done only cursorily, however, enumerating all possible areas of influence seems a worthwhile task, particularly because where Theodore’s influence appears to have been exerted in one way only, (for example, by means of introducing a particular exegetical technique to his students), there is always the possibility that such an influence signals another stream deeper down.3 In any case, even if our capacity to identify all avenues of influence is limited now, the way may lay open for future exploration of the question.4 ‘From the time of Theodore and Hadrian, dialogue literature in England, of which the scholastic or didactic colloquy constituted a distinctive genre, enjoyed some popularity . . . ,’ pp. 13–4. Although George Dempsey’s 1987 paper, ‘Aldhelm of Malmesbury and the Paris Psalter: A Note of the Survival of Antiochene Exegesis’ precedes the 1990 symposium on Theodore, it does follow Michael Lapidge’s 1986 publication of ‘The School of Theodore and Hadrian,’ in which many of the ideas that would come out with the later edition of the Canterbury Commentaries were first discussed, so it is worth considering what he says in his introduction: ‘Any survival of the Antiochene tradition of literal Biblical exegesis into the Middle Ages is of inherent interest. Active use of this tradition in seventh and eighth century Anglo-Saxon England would be of especial interest, for it would (perhaps first among its many significant implications) indicate that Archbishop Theodore of Canterbury may not have been alone in his devotion to this tradition, but that he may have been able to establish, however modest, a school of Antiochene exegesis. We do possess evidence of such use,’ (emphasis mine) p. 368. Finally, Cyril Mango in 1972 (and so after Bischoff ’s ‘Wendepunkte’, but before Lapidge had published on the matter), records his observations on Theodore’s possible influence as a Greek in Anglo-Saxon England in measured but positive tones, in ‘La Culture Grecque et l’Occident au VIIIe Siècle’, pp. 684–690. 3 It is important to note that the work of this chapter will be necessarily cursory by comparison with the preceding chapters. This is partly because the question – that is, the question as to how Theodore might have influenced the work and thought of others who came after him – no matter how deserving of attention, is by nature secondary to the established aim of this present work as a whole. More importantly, however, many of the issues to be raised in this chapter constitute topics deserving of coverage in their own right, and so present the danger of demanding more attention than they should rightly be given in the context of a work dedicated to elucidating the nature of a particular kind of thought discernible in one particular text. 4 Michael Lapidge has already done some of this work, particularly in his paper ‘The School of Theodore and Hadrian,’ pp.46–53, and especially in terms of tracing

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There are at least four different areas in which it might be expected that Theodore held some sway beyond his time: 1) the legacy of his school, especially as it might be discerned in Aldhelm and the British church after 690 and, further a-field, in Alcuin and the Carolingian court; 2) in terms of the transmission of Syriac ideas, and particularly the knowledge of Ephrem; 3) in Bede’s exegesis both in terms of general technique and more specifically the ideas behind certain exegetical motifs, including the rebuilding of the temple in forty six days of John’s gospel5 and the Lucan nativity narrative; and finally, 4) other Anglo-Saxon evidence, including liturgy, and the content of such written works as the Blickling Homilies. Of course, doing this task thoroughly would require far more space than can be afforded here, but our purpose will be to highlight areas for further inquiry, at least.

6.1 The Legacy of the Canterbury School In appraising the Canterbury school and the place it had in contributing to the mind of its students in the long and short term, the place to start would be Bede’s Historia. There are a few important mentions of the school here. The first is the oft-quoted compliment paid to Theodore and Hadrian’s teaching at the very beginning of the account of Theodore’s time as archbishop;6 while the others are all occasions on which Bede identifies a character as having been a beneficiary of Theodore and Hadrian’s teaching: Tobias, Albinus, Oftfor, and John of Beverley. Ironically, Bede does not mention Aldhelm as a student, but we know that he was based on a letter he sent to Hadrian;7 equally we might have surmised it from the vigorous apology for the school Aldhelm makes to Heahfrith, just back from studying in Ireland.8 It is Aldhelm alone who left any record that could possibly be examined, in terms of both prose and poetic works.

Theodore’s influence in the literature of the period. We propose to take a different tack, however, by considering Theodore’s influence especially in light of the themes present in the Laterculus. 5 John 2: 20. 6 HegA, 4, 2, cited above, chapter 2, n. 8. 7 Indicated by Michael Lapidge in ‘The School of Theodore and Hadrian,’ p. 46. 8 Aldhelm, Opera Omnia, R. Ehwald, ed., in MGH: Auctores Antiquissimi, 15, and translated by M. Lapidge and M. Herren in Aldhelm: The Prose Works, pp. 160–64.

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But determining the sort of legacy Aldhelm took with him from the Canterbury school is not an easy task to undertake, and to pretend that it would be possible to accomplish it here with any satisfactory result would be unrealistic.9 There are, however, a few details from Aldhelm’s life that hold out hope for one seeking to trace Theodore’s legacy, and while it is not possible to say with certainty that anything we know of Aldhelm is derived from Theodore, at any rate the coincidences can at least be pointed out for further investigation. In the meantime, the particulars include John Wallace-Hadrill’s use of Michael Winterbottom to show that the origins of Aldhelm’s prose style were not to be attributed to Ireland via Malmesbury, but rather ‘to Theodore and Hadrian, his Canterbury masters,’10 as well as David Howlett’s recognition of Aldhelm and Theodore as fellow pioneers in poetic style: ‘Among Anglo-Latin poets the first to compose octosyllabic verse may have been Theodore and Aldhelm. Their compositions are not stanzaic but continuous.’11 Further evidence of a correlation between the two seventh century figures12 consists of an issue that can be raised more than once in looking for traces of a Theodoran legacy: that of Aldhelm and the Paris Psalter. The connection between the eleventh century Paris Psalter and late-seventh century Aldhelm is explored in detail by George Dempsey in his somewhat diminutively-titled paper ‘Aldhelm of Malmesbury and the Paris Psalter: A Note on the Survival of Antiochene Exegesis.’13 Dempsey’s work in this essay traces textual and manuscript evidence backward from the text of the title, through the Liber Bedae de titulis Psalmorum to Theodore of Mopsuestia and then back to Aldhelm, and in doing so, touches on the inevitable part that Theodore of Tarsus had to play in transmitting Theodore of 9

In comparing the character of Bede to that of Aldhelm, and so providing a picture of how the two have been perceived in some fields of study, George Anderson radically opposes them by setting Aldhelm firmly within an undefined Theodoran tradition: ‘Naturally, there were no fundamental schisms in Britain; but the Oriental color of some writer like Aldhelm is in sharp contrast to the simple occidentalism of Bede, and what is true of the respective protagonists of the south and north is true in general of the schools they represent,’ The Literature of the Anglo-Saxons, p. 225. 10 A Historical Commentary, p. 190. The Winterbottom work cited by WallaceHadrill is ‘Aldhelm’s Prose Style and its Origins,’ in ASE, 6, 1977, pp. 39–76. 11 Aldhelmi Carmen Rhythmicum, p. 130. Here, Howlett refers to his own work, British Books in Biblical Style, chapter 2, as the source for this idea. 12 Aldelm died in 709. 13 JTS, NS, 38. pt. 2, pp. 368–86.

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Mopsuestia to Aldhelm. The key text involved was a copy of Junilius’s Latin version of a short introduction to reading Scripture by one Paul the Persian, entitled Instituta regularia diuinae legis.14 Its unambiguous embodiment of the exegetical teaching of Theodore of Mopsuestia is said by Dempsey to be the single most important medium for transmission of Theodore of Mopsuestia’s form of exegesis into the Middle Ages,15 a belief confirmed by Max Laistner.16 It is also proposed as having been brought to England by Theodore of Tarsus.17 If accurate, then the implications for Theodore of Tarsus’ influence are substantial. It would suggest, first of all, that while Aldhelm certainly cut his own path in terms of writing style and literary interests,18 he respected what he took from Theodore and his Canterbury experience enough to have deliberately incorporated it into his own work. This is in spite of the fact that he was not normally an exegete, but rather an author of more diverse interests. Another implication involves the possibility that Theodore brought something to England that spread through the northwest of Europe via the Liber Bedae de titulis psalmorum – something that characterized his own exegetical inclinations – and ended up being incorporated into the eleventh century Paris Psalter; if accurate, it would set Theodore up as a one of the major protagonists in the use of the Antiochene exegetical method in the Latin West19 as well as vindicate those scholars who have suspected this over the last century.

M. L. W. Laistner, ‘Antiochene Exegesis in Western Europe,’ p. 23. ‘Aldhelm of Malmesbury,’ p. 378. 16 ‘Antiochene Exegesis,’ p. 28: ‘The substantial number of manuscripts containing the Instituta or extracts from them affords the clearest proof for Junilius’ popularity in the Middle Ages.’ Laistner does, however, place conditions on too enthusiastic an embrace of the idea, saying that ‘Traces of the Instituta in extant medieval authors are far less common than might have been expected,’ p. 29. 17 Dempsey follows Laistner in suggesting this. See ‘Aldhelm of Malmesbury,’ p. 381. 18 ‘Aldhelm, unlike Bede, did not produce a strictly exegetical work. However, he did produce one piece of work susceptible to the sort of analysis necessary to deduce Aldhelm’s exegetical stance. This is the piece on the number seven at the beginning of Aldhelm’s Epistola ad Acircium,’ ‘Aldhelm of Malmesbury,’ p. 381. See M. Lapidge, ‘Anglo-Latin Literature,’ p. 11–14, for a complete list of Aldhelm’s work with a brief description of some of the more important aspects of it. 19 The story of the use of Junilius’ Instituta across Europe would, on its own, mitigate against overstatement in describing Theodore of Tarsus’ role in transmitting Theodore of Mopsuestia’s ideas in the Latin West; our purpose here is merely to put him forward as one means whose importance may not have been fully considered in the past, but of whose general contributions we can be more certain now. 14 15

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The case of Alcuin and Charlemagne’s school at Aachen, of which Alcuin was the chief exponent,20 is a difficult one about which to say anything at all. One could begin by imagining that there was somehow a relationship between what Alcuin must have known took place at Canterbury a century before, and what developed under his direction, but any such assumption would be merely fanciful without substantiation from the sources. And beyond the most general connections, there simply does not appear to be any relationship. John Wallace-Hadrill tantalizes us with a reference to Charles Jones’ mention of ‘the direct line from Theodore’s instruction to Charlemagne’s educational programme,’21 but in terms of measurable evidence, there is no suggestion anywhere, for example, that the form of exegesis Alcuin employed in his work was anything like what had been proliferated at Canterbury and taken up to some extent by Aldhelm and, later, Bede.22 Furthermore, Cyril Mango goes out of his way to deny a link between whatever Greek knowledge that had been imparted at Canterbury and what Alcuin took to the Carolingian court.23 Finally, even in a genre where we know Theodore’s name to have been perpetuated – that of the penitentials – there appears to have been no appeal to the Greek archbishop’s authority by Alcuin.24 There is just one, general theological correlation between Alcuin’s thought and Theodore’s, and one minor textual connection worth mentioning. The textual connection comes via one of the octosyllabic poems identified by Michael Lapidge as probably having come from Theodore’s hand,25 and its use by Alcuin. It is the second of the poems, which Lapidge calls A Hymn to Christ, and which begins

20 Lapidge calls Alcuin, ‘the architect of the Carolingian Renaissance,’ in ‘AngloLatin Literature,’ p. 27. 21 J. M. Wallace-Hadrill, A Historical Commentary, p. 138. The reference is to C. W. Jones, ‘Bede’s Place in Medieval Schools,’ in Famulus Christi, G. Bonner, ed., pp. 261–85. 22 For an examination of Bede’s exegetical method, see this chapter below, section 3. 23 C. Mango, ‘La culture grec et l’occident au xiiie siècle’, p. 690 : ‘Une dernière remarque concernant l’Angleterre. La connaissance du grec engendrée par Théodore et Hadrien semble s’être évanouie avec la génération de Bède. A nôtre connaissance, il n’y a aucun lien entre ce phénomène et le renouveau du grec à la cour carolingienne. Alcuin ignorait la langue de Byzance.’ 24 See, for example, J. T. McNeill, Medieval Handbooks of Penance, pp. 397–8. 25 M. Lapidge, ‘Theodore and Anglo-Latin octosyllabic verse,’ pp. 276–77. Discussed above, chapter 2, section 5.

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Sancte sator, suffragator.26 In a discussion of the poem’s transmission on the continent, Lapidge specifically mentions Alcuin, ‘. . . who paraphrases several of its verses in one of his rhythmical poems.’27 The general theological correlation is more complex, but can be summarized as an acute interest in the notion of oneness or unity, both in terms of God’s internal unity and in terms of unity as a mark of the catholic faith: a theme that can be easily identified in the writings of Alcuin, and of Bede before him, but also in the Laterculus, in a form reminiscent of Irenaeus.28 So the connections to be found between Theodore’s Canterbury and Alcuin’s Aachen either do not exist or are very tenuous. For all that, we might consider a deeper exploration into the question based on the idea of Robert Boenig that Alcuin, ‘[w]hile at the Carolingian court . . . helped foster Anglo-Saxon learning throughout the empire . . .,’29 or Frank Stenton’s statement that ‘Alcuin’s career is of particular interest as a link between the phase of English scholarship which culminated in the work of Bede and the revival of western learning under Charlemagne.’30

6.2 The Syriac Legacy Determining the nature and extent of Theodore’s Syriac legacy is made easier by the fact that so much work has been done on the question already.31 This is particularly so in terms of the specific influence of Ephrem as discerned in an Anglo-Saxon context and in northwestern 26 Lapidge provides the full text of the poem, in Latin and English parallel, in ‘Anglo-Latin octosyllabic verse,’ p. 276. 27 M. Lapidge, ‘Anglo-Latin octosyllabic verse,’ p. 277. 28 Discussed at length above, chapter 5, section 3. Jaroslav Pelikan offers a helpful summary of the issue as it arises in Bede and Alcuin: ‘“To agree with the catholic consensus in every respect” was a mark of Christian modesty, according to a seventh-century manual. Bede made an effort to set forth “the meaning of . . . the catholic fathers” in his commentaries, and he spoke of “the unanimous consensus of all in the catholic faith.” By the time of Alcuin it was customary to refer to “the total unanimity of the catholic church” as the criterion of orthodox doctrine. This true doctrine of the gospel, taught and preached unanimously by the church, was “shining brightly through the whole world,” ’ The Growth of Medieval Theology, pp. 9–10. 29 R. Boenig, Anglo-Saxon Spirituality, p. 12. 30 F. Stenton, Anglo-Saxon England, pp. 188–89. 31 As seen above, chapter 2, section 8: Syriac studies is one field in which the work that had been done on Theodore in the 1990s continued to be noticed for some time afterward.

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Europe more generally, although in the latter case it is important to understand that by means of various Ephremic or pseudo-Ephremic texts the name of the most prominent Syriac father, if not his precise words, found receptive soil on the continent quite apart from anything Theodore may have contributed.32 For this reason, we will limit ourselves to remarking on the occasions when Theodore’s name has been mentioned explicitly with respect to knowledge of the Syriac tradition, and more precisely, Ephrem. There is, of course, always the special case of Bede, but he will be looked at separately. Evidence that Ephrem was known in the Anglo-Saxon world after Theodore is something that had been raised as long ago as 1895 in relation to Bede,33 while more recently – but still before the publication of material around Theodore’s Canterbury work – Ephrem’s presence in Anglo-Saxon literature was also being discussed.34 The different facets of Ephrem’s possible influence in these areas go beyond what we encounter of Ephrem in the Laterculus and even the Canterbury Commentaries, and therefore must imply that either awareness of Ephrem arrived in Britain by a different means than Theodore, or that Theodore brought with him to Canterbury a library more substantial than has most often been acknowledged.35 32

See S. Griffith, ‘A Spiritual Father for the Whole Church’; A. Palmer, ‘The Influence of Ephrem the Syrian’; and D. Ganz, ‘Knowledge of Ephrem’s writings in the Merovingian and Carolingian Age,’ for discussion of this knowledge of Ephremic sources in Europe. A prominent example of the attachment of Ephrem’s name to a widely-known work is the Sermo asceticus, from the corpus of pseudo-Ephremic texts in Greek. Sidney Griffith informs us that the Sermo asceticus, ‘ . . . in the form in which it survives in Greek, is to be found translated into almost all the languages of early and medieval Christianity,’ (in ‘A Spiritual Father for the Whole Church,’ p. 10). The wide distribution of this work, in the Latin West at least, was partly due to a work by Defensor of Ligugé, whose Liber scintillarum quoted from it extensively, and which itself enjoyed extensive use in monasteries in the West, ‘A Spiritual Father for the Whole Church,’ p. 10. 33 ‘More than a century ago, in 1895, J. Rendel Harris noted “some curious” coincidences between the Ephrem Commentary [on the Diatessaron] and the Commentaries of the Venerable Bede, which suggest that the extreme East and West are in contact at some unknown Patristic point”,’ W. Petersen, ‘Ephrem Syrus and the Venerable Bede: Do East and West Meet?’, p. 443. 34 T. H. Betsul, ‘Ephraim the Syrian and Old English Poetry,’ pp. 1–24. 35 Comments have been made by numerous scholars as to the unlikelihood that Theodore brought with him any substantial number of works, whether in Syriac, Greek, or Latin. Jane Stevenson points out in ‘Ephraim the Syrian in Anglo-Saxon England,’ p. 10, that ‘[T. H.] Betsul simply dismisses the possibility that Theodore brought with him “a library of Greek authors”, ’ while in ‘La culture grec et l’occident au viiie siècle’, p. 690, Cyril Mango says, ‘Quelques savants supposent qu’il y fut apporté par Théodore, ce qui est bien possible quoique nous n’ayons aucune preuve que Théodore importât des livres en Angleterre.’

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Jane Stevenson makes a strong argument for the latter case.36 The attribution in recent times of the Passio s. Anastasii and the Laterculus Malalianus to Theodore, together with the evidence of the Canterbury Commentaries, lends itself to the substantiation of Stevenson’s point; but so does the notion that Theodore brought with him to Britain a copy of Junilius’ Instituta regularia diuinae legis.37 Assuming, then, that Theodore did import more writings than we even have evidence for in the Theodoran oeuvre (such as it is), it is possible to attribute a great deal of the transmission of Ephrem’s work to Theodore’s influence – or at least his textual mediation. Yet even so, a great deal of caution would be warranted, so that which Stevenson employs in cataloguing indications of Ephremic manifestations in Anglo-Saxon works after Theodore is particularly judicious.38 Naming the aforementioned Sermo asceticus, she also includes the presence of a prayer attributed by name to Ephrem in the Book of Cerne; another prayer preseved in a book similar to that of Cerne;39 a literary device identified by Patrick Sims-Williams in a vision of the monk Wenlock as reported by Boniface; and concludes with a series of specific literary works, such as the ‘Soul and Body’ poems,40 a poem known as ‘Christ III,’ and possible influence on Elene and Guthlac. Even as Stevenson lists these examples, however, it should be noted that, while she is proposing Theodore as a possible vehicle for their source material, she does not state that he certainly was the vehicle; and it is on that tentative basis that her work is summarized here. For all the carefulness required in approaching Anglo-Saxon, or any, literature in search of Ephremic strains which can then be attributed to Theodore’s influence, there does seem to be some willingness J. Stevenson, ‘Ephraim the Syrian in Anglo-Saxon England,’ p. 10. Her argument is too long to cite here in full, but centres around the idea that many scholars have been too quick to dismiss the possibility that Theodore brought a library with him to Canterbury due to a fundamental misconstrual of his mission as a personal one instead of an authorised one for which great preparation took place: ‘It took about two years to get Theodore on the road to Canterbury . . . . I think that to dismiss the possibility that Theodore and Hadrian arrived with a substantial library quite so cavalierly is to misinterpret the concept of an authorised mission.’ 37 See section 1, immediately above. 38 All of the following information, including all references to the works concerned are to be found in Stevenson’s paper, ‘Ephraim the Syrian in Anglo-Saxon England,’ p. 9. 39 Preserved in London, BL Harley 7653. 40 Stevenson explains that the ‘Soul and Body’ poems are ‘Old English versions of an Ephremic prototype, redacted through an unknown set of intermediaries,’ p. 9. 36

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on the part of scholars to do so. And if their intimations can be trusted, then it could well be that following the trail of Theodore’s influence via Ephremic transmission takes one further down the road into the Middle Ages than many other avenues might allow. Andrew Palmer, for instance, says that, [t]he Latin Ephraim had a certain influence on German literature in the eighth and ninth centuries; and later it seems, on Hildegard of Bingen. And something of the original Ephraim was preserved in Latin. For example, Ephraim’s predilection for the name of ‘Physician’ in referring to Christ. This apparently entered Anglo-Saxon usage through Latin Ephraim-texts.41

David Ganz, meanwhile, in a discussion of the spread of Ephrem in Germany, bolsters Stevenson’s argument for a broad awareness of Ephrem among the Anglo-Saxons, by stating that, ‘[t]he popularity of Ephraim in Bavaria may reflect a sense that the sermons were particularly fitting in an area of more recent Christianization, or suggest the legacy of the Anglo-Saxon missionaries and so supplement the evidence for knowledge of Ephraim in Anglo-Saxon England presented by Jane Stevenson . . . .’42 Now it remains for further scholarship to follow these paths, as yet only hinted at, in order to establish just how far it is legitimate to say Theodore’s contribution to western learning, in terms of Syriac sources, extended.

6.3 Theodore’s influence on Bede The case of Bede, as suggested above, is an important enough one to be treated separately from all other concerns. This is because the whole question of what Theodore might have contributed to Bede involves at least three lines of inquiry: the general techniques employed by Bede in his exegesis; the specific question of Bede’s exegesis of the Lucan nativity narrative; and finally, the degree to which Bede’s emphasis on unity and oneness in the church might have been affected by Theodore. We will begin by expanding on the last of these issues.

41 A. Palmer, ‘The Influence of Ephraim the Syrian’, p. 3. With regard to his statement about Hildegard, Palmer cites Nabil el-Khoury, ‘Die Interpretation der Welt bei Ephraem dem Syrer’, in Tübinger theologische Studien, 6, Mainz, 1976. 42 D. Ganz, ‘Knowledge of Ephraim’s Writings,’ p. 3.

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Jaroslav Pelikan, in The Growth of Medieval Theology, presents a picture of Alcuin, whom he says was following Bede,43 as pledging his theological nous to the idea that oneness with the tradition of the church, as represented by the fathers and embodied in the See of Peter, was an indispensable hallmark of catholic orthodoxy.44 In his systematic treatment of the question, Pelikan conveys the sense that this growth in overt deference to the writings of the fathers, acknowledgment of the primacy of Rome as both the source and mark of orthodoxy, and the eventual interchangeability between the definitions of ‘faith’ and ‘doctrine’ that would arise as a result, was simply an inevitable development in the face of doctrinal challenges to the church’s creedal definitions of Christ and the Trinity from without, as well as the natural development of a theology of unity from within. What in the seventh century may be seen as a reaction to Greek debates over the person of Christ,45 by Alcuin’s time becomes a central topos of catholic theology, and the main impetus behind Charlemagne’s drive to consolidate the faith of his empire.46 Almost literally at the midway point between Theodore and Alcuin was Bede, who had taken up the idea of unity (unity of faith; unity with Rome; unity with the fathers) and used it to drive the Historia,47 as well as having let it inform his approach to exegesis at the most fundamental level.48 On this basis, Bede would have been loathe to see himself as an The Growth of Medieval Theology, p. 10. See especially pp. 9–15 of The Growth of Medieval Theology. 45 The enduring monothelete controversy would be a case in point. It would be wrong to overemphasize this point, however, for to suggest that the interest in unity and oneness to be found in the Laterculus is merely a reaction to the issues of the time would be to demote the positive aspect to be found in the Irenaean concern with the same theme. See above, chapter 4, section 2.3. 46 J. Pelikan, Medieval Theology, p. 15. 47 Some scholars have argued that the Historia’s main purpose is the promotion of greater unity between the English church and Rome. This can certainly be discerned from the text, but Pelikan (citing M. T. A. Carroll, The Venerable Bede: His Spiritual Teachings, Washington, 1946) provides a concise summary of the idea (Medieval Theology, p. 14): ‘In Bede’s England, the conflict between the universal and the particular . . . did involve the issue of catholicity so that “in the Ecclesiastical History his short sketches of men and women are concerned mainly with two problems: Are they ‘Catholici’ and do their works conform to their belief?” ’ 48 Bede is implied in Pelikan, Medieval Theology, p. 15, when it is said, ‘To Alcuin, as to his predecessors in the seventh and eighth centuries, this “truth of the church” was that which had been defined by the fathers of the church. What has been called “the self-effacement of Alcuin in relation to the fathers” was the dominant theme and method of his theology.’ 43 44

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original thinker; rather his whole desire was to compile without addition to, or subtraction from, what he found in the fathers. So it is in light of this that our question arises as to how Theodore might have contributed to, or enhanced, this sense within him. For example, Bede’s admiration for Gregory the Great is well-documented,49 but the reasons seem very often assumed. Was it the fact that Gregory was apostle to the English? Was it the fact that he struck an ideal image as bishop of Rome? Or was it the fact that his concern for unity among Christian people was such that he committed himself to bringing the British church into conformity with Roman practice? It is probably reasonable to assume that the cause of Bede’s admiration was a combination of the three; whatever the case, whether this admiration informed his consciousness first, or it was the example and written legacy of Theodore that inspired him, might be questioned. After all, as Laistner reminds us, ‘[w]hen Bede was born neither of the two monastic houses with which his name is so closely linked was yet founded; only four or five years had passed since Theodore of Tarsus had landed in England.’50 It is surely possible that the young Bede was impressed enough by the presence in his homeland of a cosmopolitan figure like Theodore, who was so well-regarded by kings and ecclesiastics, so erudite, so concerned with orthodoxy, that he might have encountered the archbishop’s teaching in some form and been inspired by it. This is almost impossible to state with certainty. Tracing sources when there are no direct citations with which to substantiate them is difficult enough; suggesting that one figure may have been an influence over another in so abstract a way is simply unfeasible. This is especially so when contemporaries of the supposed source share the same ideas as, for example, Wilfrid so obviously did with Theodore.51 But Wilfrid’s Romanism was not exclusive to him either, which makes the suggestion

As in M. L. W. Laistner, ‘Bede as a Classical and a Patristic Scholar,’ p. 72. M. L. W. Laistner, ‘Bede as a Classical and a Patristic Scholar,’ p. 70. 51 Witness Wilfrid’s regard for Roman custom even before Theodore’s arrival in England, and his good sense in travelling to France for episcopal ordination as opposed to staying in sacramentally-suspect Britain (HegA 3, 28). [It should be noted that, while Bede records the latter event as having been decided by Alhfrith alone, and Eddius Stephanus by Alhfrith and Oswiu together, (Vita, chapters 12–14), Henry Mayr-Harting’s discussion of the issue reflects a more active than passive Wilfrid in the process. See The Coming of Christianity, pp. 129–30.] Neither is Wilfrid the only example of an Insular player who shares this interest. Mayr-Harting draws on Kathleen Hughes (The English Church and the Papacy in the Middle Ages, C. H. Lawrence, ed., pp. 15–20) to say that ‘ . . . appeal to the pope in important ecclesiastical matters was regarded as a normal course of action even in seventh-century Ireland,’ The Coming of 49 50

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that Theodore might have somehow inspired Bede’s developed interest in a single faith, embodied singularly in the see of Rome, and manifest in the doctrine of the apostles and their successors, little more than informed optimism. The facts remain, though, that Theodore’s work in the Laterculus pays great heed to the theological imperative of oneness, his work as recounted by Bede is very much characterized by the propagation of Roman norms in theological and liturgical matters (a mark of oneness), while Bede himself learns this from somewhere and makes it his own. Fortunately the inquirer into Theodore’s possible influence on Bede is not at the mercy of broad concepts alone. Rather, Bede’s exegesis, a subject much commented on by scholars, proffers numerous possibilities for direct comparison. But here, we will be most concerned with general observations on his technique, followed by a specific look at his exegesis of the Lucan nativity narrative. The message regarding the nature of Bede’s exegesis from the scholarly community is a mixed one. It is possible to find commentators who will claim that Bede’s scriptural hermeneutic differs in significant ways from that of the prevalent hermeneutic of the time, while others say that it is simply reflective of the common approach to biblical texts in western Europe contemporaneous with him. So, for example, John Wallace-Hadrill says in a detailed comment on the Historia, book four, chapter two: ‘Theodore’s scriptural teaching seems to have relied more on the Greek fathers than on the Latin and stood somewhat apart from the main western allegorical tradition in being more obviously factual and literal. This was to have little effect on Bede’s own exegesis.’52 In a similar vein, Max Laistner says of Bede, who would in all likelihood have known Junilius’ Instituta (that vessel of the Antiochene exegetical teaching of Theodore of Mopsuestia), that he can find no Christianity, p. 144. Such a point may be construed as merely political, but it also (I think) implies a regard for Rome and the papacy that saw them as central for the faith. If Adomnan can be seen as one such seventh century Irish figure – as referred to by Hughes – then what Thomas O’Loughlin says about Adomnan’s De locis sanctis (composed approximately 680) gives credence to the suggestion that an Insular assumption of oneness, no matter how that was expressed, extended well beyond Wilfrid, and probably stood quite independent of Theodore’s arrival in Britain: ‘The reader of De locis sanctis is led to imagine that all Christians, from those at the centre of things in Jerusalem, Alexandria, Constantinople, and Rome, to those out on the edge of the inhabited world on Iona, have a single faith, form one group, and share one cult and liturgy,’ ‘Palestine in the Aftermath of Arab Conquest,’ p. 81. 52 J. M. Wallace-Hadrill, A Historical Commentary, p. 138.

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traces of Junilius in him: ‘[Bede] would certainly have disapproved of it strongly for more than one reason. His devotion to allegorical interpretation . . . would have made him frown on a literalist like Junilius.’53 Jack Ogilvy, on the other hand, expresses almost the opposite point of view when he says that, ‘[a]lthough Bede accepted the fourfold exposition of Scripture and practiced it with skill, the natural tendency of his mind – if I sense it aright – was toward the factual and historical. Certainly his commentaries are full of bits of factual exposition . . . . For this sort of information he relied heavily on Jerome . . . and Adamnan’s De locis sanctis. The Theodore glosses would have been a welcome addition to this store of this sort of knowledge . . . .’54 With such an apparent contradiction, perhaps the reality is most closely represented by a middle way: the path taken by Trent Foley in his introduction to Bede: A Biblical Miscellany.55 There is a sense here, in Foley’s comments on Bede’s treatment of Tobias, that while the exegete’s emphasis is on the allegorical nature of the book, it is not as straightforward as saying he is simply following a western, or allegorical, convention. Indeed, Foley provides a description of Bede’s appeal to both the literal and allegorical meaning of the text that display, in his deliberate utilization of methods assumed by some to be mutually exclusive, a kind of divided loyalty that could be seen to reflect a twosided inheritance, equally revered.56 Certainly, there is something in Bede’s conscious acknowledgement of what the two different approaches to the text could yield, that is reminiscent of a child trying to please two equally-regarded parents: not unlike the reverence in which he holds all his worthy intellectual and spiritual forebears. In any case, it is clear that in Bede’s exegesis is some sense of debt to an unnamed source which gives him respect for the literal and historical meaning of Scripture, even if he draws more obviously and often on the predominant tradition of his time and place – an unnamed source that looks and sounds like something within the tradition of Antioch. In the midst of Foley’s introduction to Bede, though, he flags another exegetical coincidence with Theodore that moves beyond the 53 M. L. W. Laistner, ‘Antiochene Exegesis in Western Europe during the Middle Ages,’ p. 29. The observations of Wallace-Hadrill and Laistner are consistent with the view of Bernhard Bischoff in ‘Wendepunkte’. 54 J. D. A. Ogilvy, ‘The Place of Wearmouth and Jarrow in Western Cultural History,’ p. 240. 55 W. T. Foley, Bede: A Biblical Miscellany, pp. xxvii-xxxii. 56 See Foley, Bede: A Biblical Miscellany, pp. xxix-xxx.

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general and into the specific, and which corresponds directly, like Bede’s interpretation of the Lucan nativity narrative, with a significant aspect of the Laterculus Malalianus. It concerns Bede’s exegesis of one verse in John’s gospel. Talking about the way in which Bede applies his scriptural insights to history, Foley says: . . . [I]t has been argued that the division of both of Bede’s Cuthbert Lives is no accident, but derives from Bede’s exegesis of John 2:20. In his Homilies on the Gospels (Hom. 2,1 [CCSL 122: 189, 178‒190, 210]) Bede explains that in this verse the number forty-six denotes not only the number of years that it took to rebuild the temple, but also the number of days that it took to complete or perfect the Lord’s body, or ‘temple’ in the womb of Mary. If forty-six denotes for Bede the perfection of completion of the Lord’s body, then his division of both Cuthbert’s Lives into forty-six chapters and the fact that he describes his Prose Life of Cuthbert as a ‘complete’ or ‘perfect work’ (perfecto operi) would suggest that he views Cuthbert’s life as one that was perfected in accordance with the model that Christ embodied.57

What emerges from these remarks is an understanding of Bede’s conception of the perfecting of the person according to the pattern of Christ as taking forty six days; this is exactly analogous with Theodore’s remarkable exercise in computation in chapter thirteen of the Laterculus, which sets out to prove the same thing. Considering a reading of this verse in the Gospel of John and the number forty six, prior to Theodore in the Laterculus, is expounded upon in this way by no other commentator save Augustine,58 it can well be imagined that Theodore was not just a vague inspiration behind Bede’s reading of the verse, but a principal textual source.59 Meanwhile, Bede’s exegesis of

57

W. T. Foley, Bede: A Biblical Miscellany, p. xxviii. Stevenson discusses Augustine’s approach to the verse (in The School of Archbishop Theodore, in her notes on chapter thirteen, and especially n. 112, p. 196), explaining that his treatment of it is to be found in the short passage entitled De annis quadraginta sex aedificandi templi in De diuersis quaestionibus. To date, I have been unable to locate any other commentator who treats John 2:19 this way, and while it is clear that Bede uses Augustine’s words almost exactly in at least one instance, he also employs ideas that are not derived from Augustine’s work but do appear in the Laterculus. 59 A much closer analysis of the homily in question will be required in order to say more about this shared reading. In the meantime, the correlation between the two comments certainly seems to imply that the Laterculus was one of the texts pertaining to the library at Jarrow. 58

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the Lucan nativity narrative reflects almost identical sorts of parallels.60 The content of the work suggests that Bede had read and reflected on the spiritual implications of the Laterculus, processing what he had found there for his own use; respecting the intent of the original, but making adjustments suited to his own purpose. Ultimately, the evidence that Theodore influenced Bede’s worldview, especially touching on the question of exegesis – both in terms of method and in terms of specific ideas – is relatively consistent. As we see with his approach to exegesis generally, Bede can not be easily associated with a sole tradition. His sympathies are too comprehensive of all his orthodox forebears to see him choose one attitude to the exclusion of the other; hence the difficulty in locating consensus among latter-day Bede scholars as to the nature of his exegesis. Concerning his specific perspective on the two biblical texts just considered, Bede appears to respectfully appropriate what he finds most edifying in his predecessor’s work and applies it anew according to his own view of how the text is best expounded. And if it can be shown that his angle on the Lucan nativity narrative and his use of the number forty six from John’s gospel is in fact derived from the Laterculus, then the implication for scholarship on both Theodore and Bede is that it stands to benefit immensely.

6.4 Other Anglo-Saxon Evidence The final area in which one might look to find evidence of Theodore’s influence is not so much a single domain as it is a wide field with numerous aspects. This field might be described as ‘aesthetic’ or ‘artistic,’ but includes the liturgy, visual art, and such literary artefacts as the Blickling Homilies, one of the Vercelli Homilies, and Beowulf. As with the preceding fields of inquiry, the treatment of these must be necessarily selective and cursory, except where coincidences between them and Theodore’s work look most promising. Due to the constraints inherent in our primary concern though,61 a superficial treatment will have to suffice until such time as any promising suggestions are taken up and a more rigorous case made on their behalf.

60 61

Discussed above, chapter 3, section 3. Described earlier in this chapter, n. 3.

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The first foray into the liturgy after Theodore has already been made by Christopher Hohler in his paper ‘Theodore and the liturgy,’62 and there is little we have to add to his study. A short recapitulation of his efforts is worth making here, however, as we can suppose that the liturgy would have been the first repository of Theodore’s contributions to the British church, even if he did not intend to impose any change. It is hardly possible to imagine a Greek monk, having lived for some time with the liturgical rigours of the monastery and having only recently made the change over to western practice,63 restraining himself from undertaking the liturgy in a slightly more familiar manner. Yet Hohler introduces his subject by saying that this was indeed the case.64 Hohler’s basic premise is that one can not expect Theodore to have added anything to what he found when he arrived in England, and that the only real area where a discernible difference might have been made is to the calendar of saints: a fact that we find reflected in such sources as Bede’s Martyrologium, and the Calendar of St Willibrord. The first step Hohler takes is to identify the most likely saints that Theodore might have had especial regard for; something he does in the figures of Cirycus and Julitta, before locating them in both Bede and the Old English Martyrology.65 The circumstances under which the two saints appear in Bede are different to those of his other entries, leading Hohler to suspect that, rather than taking their information from a passio as he was wont to do with the other martyrs that make up his compilation, Bede has simply come across them as a short entry in a calendar of some sort. Most remarkable, however, is the appearance of Mary Magdalene in Bede’s Martyrologium, as it is her first

C. Hohler, ‘Theodore and the liturgy,’ in AT, pp. 222–35. Another interesting paper, with few direct implications for our study, but much obliquely pertinent information is that of Christopher Jones, entitled, ‘The Book of the Liturgy in Anglo-Saxon England,’ in Speculum, 73. 3, pp. 659–702. 63 As per Bede, HegA 4, 1: Qui subdiaconus ordinates quattuor exspectauit menses, donec illi coma cresceret, quo in coronam tondi posset; habuerat enim tonsuram more orientalium sanct apostoli Pauli. ‘So he was ordained subdeacon, waiting for four months until his hair grew, in order that he might receive the tonsure in the shape of a crown; for he had received the tonsure of the holy apostle Paul, after the Eastern manner,’ Haddan and Stubbs, p. 330/1. 64 ‘[Theodore] is unlikely to have contributed anything novel himself, unless he had a devotion to particular saints, and introduced their feasts into the liturgical calendar at Canterbury,’ ‘Theodore and the liturgy,’ p. 222. 65 ‘Theodore and the liturgy,’ pp. 223–4. 62

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appearance outside of the Bible in the West, and the date on which she is listed is the same as that of Byzantine liturgical sources.66 Hohler goes on to list many more saints, but ultimately explains that the best way of establishing which are Theodore’s most likely contributions is to compare Bede’s Martyrologium to the Martyrologium Hieronymianum and the ‘Synaxarion of Constantinople’; where the names concerned are in the Synaxarion but not in the Hieronymianum, then they are most likely to have originated with Theodore.67 But Hohler’s work is not limited to saints’ calendars, and so touches latterly on actual liturgical practice. In this respect, he does not say in any absolute way that Theodore would not have imported certain Greek practices by means of his presidency over the Latin liturgy; only that it would be impossible to determine what. Private liturgy, on the other hand, is a different matter; and to this end, Hohler provides the (tenuous) example of a Greek prayer book of the seventh century making its way into subsequent Anglo-Saxon written sources, including the Book of Cerne.68 The most recent work on this ‘hypothetical’ prayer book is enumerated by Hohler, and it altogether suggests an intriguing area for further investigation. Investigation into the evidence for Theodore’s influence on the liturgy – that is, work both undertaken and reported by Christopher Hohler – has clearly not been exhausted to date.69

‘Theodore and the liturgy,’ p. 224. ‘Theodore and the liturgy,’ pp. 228–9. An interesting support for Theodore’s sojourn in the Syriac-speaking East rests in a small detail concerning the feast Bede provides for Ephrem. Hohler says: ‘[W]hereas most . . . are entered at the same dates as in the Synaxarion, St Ephrem the Syrian is given by Bede as on 9 July, whereas the Constantinopolitan feast is 28 January. St Ephrem’s feast is, however, entered in one of the Syrian calendars printed by Nau, and only one, on 9 July . . .,’ p. 229. He concludes from this detail, coupled with a list of other discrepancies between Bede’s work and the Synaxarion, that ‘[u]nder the circumstances it seems certain that some Syrian – rather than Constantinopolitan or Athenian – document was drawn on by Bede,’ p. 230. Later, he concludes that ‘[i]t seems thus that we have to accept that two Syrian documents were in England, one in Syriac and in the hands of someone who could put it into Latin (or Old English) . . .,’ pp. 230–1. Again, the evidence from one area of inquiry strengthens that of another: in this case, liturgical evidence confirming that Theodore was almost certainly in Syria and himself heavily influenced by the experience. 68 ‘Theodore and the liturgy,’ pp. 232–3. 69 Much of what Hohler describes is corroborated by Veronica Ortenberg, in The English Church and the Continent in the Tenth and Eleventh Centuries, especially chapter 6 ‘Byzantium and the East,’ pp. 197–217. In stressing the artistic dimension of the liturgy, Ortenberg both reinforces some of what Hohler says, and hints at other avenues that might be explored in determining how much is owed to Theodore’s influence. 66 67

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Related to the liturgy, but not absolutely contiguous with it, is the question of Anglo-Saxon written output, including work ranging from the Blickling Homilies, to one homily in particular from Vercelli, to Beowulf. Of course, nothing substantial can realistically be said about any of these works or their correspondence to that of Theodore without a great deal more attention. Yet again, the only purpose in mentioning them here is to indicate possible points of contact and the fact that they represent opportunities for further investigation. And so we will briefly consider what might be imagined as residual suggestions of Theodore. The first of these are among the Vercelli homilies,70 in homily six, for Christmas Day.71 In this homily is one motif shared with Theodore’s Laterculus – that of the destruction of the idols upon the arrival of the holy family in Egypt – and one similarity of approach to the figure of the emperor Augustus. Of these, the apocryphal story of the holy family arriving in Egypt and, at the presence of Christ, all of the idols in the temples there turning to dust, is first to be found, as Jane Stevenson informs us, ‘ . . . in [chapter twenty-three] of the gospel of ps.-Matthew . . . and in a similar infancy-gospel preserved in Arabic and probably translated from a Syriac original.’ Stevenson goes on to list the various places in which the story can be located, including the work of Ephrem. But, as she also points out, ‘ . . . the most conspicuous place where this story is found is in the extremely wellknown sixth-century Greek Akathistos hymn on the Virgin.’72 So to find it in the Laterculus,73 then, is not really a surprise. It is worth noting, however, that before we encounter the same story in a different form in homily six of the Vercelli homilies,74 another version is again to be found in one of Bede’s homilies, for the feast of the Ascension.75 70 The Vercelli Homilies are to be found in the Vercelli Book, a manuscript traditionally dated to the late-tenth century, found in Vercelli, Italy. Its contents include twentythree homilies, addressing different moments in the Christian year. The Vercelli Homilies are available as an edition of the Early English Text Society, 1992, by Donald Scragg. 71 As found in Anglo-Saxon Spirituality: Selected Writings, pp. 93–5. 72 This is all set out by Stevenson in her notes to the Laterculus, in The School of Archbishop Theodore, n. 63, pp. 182–84. In this note, she suggests that the wording in which it appears that Theodore’s most closely approximates, is that of Ephrem. The Greek Akathistos hymn is found in PG 92, 1335–48, at 1341. 73 See LM, 7, pp. 128/9–130/1. 74 In Anglo-Saxon Spirituality, p. 95. 75 Cited by Barbara Raw in Trinity and Incarnation in Anglo-Saxon art and thought, n. 12, p. 56, as Bede, Homiliae 2, 15.

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Of course, the fact that it is in a different form in the Laterculus than in either of the two later texts may represent a strong hint of independence; on the other hand, the fact that the story is recounted with different details than any of the sources before it, may suggest a tradition of variability in its use that would not preclude it having been inspired in Anglo-Saxon literature by the Laterculus. The common portrayal between the sixth Vercelli homily and the Laterculus of the emperor Augustus, is something picked up first by Robert Boenig; it centres on the sympathy with which Augustus is viewed as a player in the nativity story and the association with him of a prophetic vision of Christ. In the case of the Laterculus, Theodore retains the words of Malalas, respectfully recounting how the pagan Augustus responded to the prophecy by building an altar to the foretold child, only adding a few details about Rome into the retelling.76 Alternatively, the Vercelli homily animates Augustus, putting words into his mouth in reverent response to the sign of Christ which he has beheld, but also, like the Laterculus, portraying him as committing to the approval of a cult in answer to the prophecy. Of the incident Boenig says: The Emperor Augustus’s sympathy for Christ’s birth might be explainable by the fact that people in the Middle Ages often interpreted the poet he patronized, Virgil, as in effect a prophet who foretold Christ’s birth in his Fourth Ecologue. He is also credited with a sibylline vision of the birth of an unknown Jewish divinity, one recounted in the Laterculus Malalianus . . . ,77

citing Stevenson’s notice of it in Theodore’s work.78 Admittedly, the connection is a tenuous one without establishing the history of transmission of this representation of Augustus, but alongside the shared use of the destruction of the Egyptian idols motif, the possibility that the composer of the Vercelli homily for Christmas Day had at some point come across the Laterculus Malalianus surely exists. The remaining two examples of Theodore’s potential influence over Anglo-Saxon literary output are suggested by Barbara Raw and Albert Cook, concerning the theme of restoration in Anglo-Saxon

LM, 8, p. 130/1. Anglo-Saxon Spirituality, p. 284. 78 Here, Boenig refers to both The School of Archbishop Theodore, n. 69, p. 186, and ‘Theodore and the Laterculus Malalianus,’ p. 213. 76 77

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theology, including the Blickling homilies,79 and the Greek origins of a prefix for ‘king’ in Beowulf,80 respectively. In the latter instance, the retrospective reference to Theodore is entirely unexpected. Following a discussion in which Cook introduces the use of the prefix ‘He¯ah’ for cyning (as meaning ‘high king’), in Beowulf 1039, he turns his attention to its use in ecclesiastical circles, suggesting (somewhat obliquely) that it was through use of the title he¯ahbiscop (archbishop) that it makes its way into other Anglo-Saxon writing. ‘Whenever he¯ah-, then, occurs as a prefix in the designation of an individual, it is fair to presume that it stands, or originally stood, as an equivalent of the Greek ἀρχι- If we apply this canon to he¯ahcyning, we should naturally suppose that it stood for ἀρχιβασιλεύς.81 That this could have anything to do with Theodore rests in what Cook says next. It is a rather striking confirmation [ . . .] of this hypothesis that the Greek word is actually found in a document of the year 619, or a little later. This was a petition drawn up in diplomatic, if not obsequious, terms, requesting, on the part of the Byzantine government . . .safe conduct and immunity for certain envoys to Chosroes II, King of Persia (590‒628).82

Not without considering other possibilities, Cook concludes by determining that Theodore of Tarsus, acquainted as he must have been (or so Cook thinks) with ‘the salient facts in the life of Heraclius’ (the Byzantine emperor at the time of Chosroes II), is the most likely source.83 It is a tantalizing proposal. Yet as intriguing as many of these coincidences are between Theodore and some of the work that came after him, however, there is little to suggest any theological dimension. Even the similarities identified between the Vercelli homily for Christmas Day and the Laterculus can hardly be said to express much of significance about the work of Christ as we have considered it over the course of this present work. There is the view of Barbara Raw to consider, though, which sees the theme of humanity’s restoration running through Anglo-Saxon B. Raw, Trinity and incarnation in Anglo-Saxon art and thought, pp. 43–45. A. S. Cook, ‘Beowulf 1039 and the Greek ἀρχι-’ in Speculum, 3.1, 1928, pp. 75–81. 81 A. S. Cook, ‘Beowulf 1039,’ pp. 77–8. 82 A. S. Cook, ‘Beowulf 1039,’ p. 78. 83 A. S. Cook, ‘Beowulf 1039,’ p. 79. 79 80

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sources after Theodore, including Bede and the Blickling Homilies, even if she never once mentions the archbishop as a possible source for this phenomenon. Instead (and surprisingly, I think), her mind goes first to Augustine and De Trinitate.84 In any case, more important than who she believes to be the inspiration for this impulse in Anglo-Saxon theology, is the fact that she cites Bede as manifesting the same interest,85 as she does the Blickling Homilies, of which it is said: ‘The Blickling Homilies talk of the exchange by which man, created in the image of God, was restored to his original nature when Christ clothed his divine nature in human body and became man in order that men should become gods.’86 While such language could surely have found its own way to Britain and the Anglo-Saxons prior to the composition of the tenth century Blickling homilies at the very least, in light of the prominence of restoration in the Laterculus, it must equally be considered a possible fountainhead for the later works.

6.5 Conclusion But like so much of the evidence related to Theodore’s time in Britain as archbishop of Canterbury, much that can be said about his influence after 690 is, at this stage, simply conjectural. In spite of this, it is important when attending a document like the Laterculus, that a possible legacy be considered, both with respect to the author and the work itself. This is because to some extent we should expect the author (in this case, Theodore), as a pastor, to have reflected some aspect of the interests represented by his text in his acts, and vice versa. Happily, this is borne out in the few samples of postTheodoran Anglo-Saxon Britain we have looked at here. Not that we

84 Ironically, the passage Raw draws from De Trinitate (7.3.5) says very little about restoration with its deifying potential, and more about the moral benefits to be gained from conforming to Christ. The last quotation she provides in her notes (n. 57) is much more convincing: Filius enim Dei particeps mortalitatis effectus est, ut mortalis homo fiat particeps diuinitatis, Augustine, Enarrationes in psalmos, Ps. 52, 6, although the context in which Augustine sets his comment differs from many of the other fathers’ treatment of the same theme. 85 B. Raw, Trinity and Incarnation, p. 43. The works of Bede Raw looks to by way of examples include Homiliae, 1.7, 1.8, and 1.15. 86 Raw cites homilies 1, 2 and 5 as being representative of this interest in restoration, Trinity and incarnation, p. 44.

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have sought to establish that various resonances of the Greek archbishop’s work in later Anglo-Saxon life can be attributed to him with certitude; at least not at this preliminary stage, anyway. We have, however, sought to present the avenues that may be worthwhile exploring for more tangible connections; and in this we have not been unsuccessful. In almost every instance above, other scholars have already asked one or more of the key questions regarding a source that can now, in light of everything that has been said about Theodore, the Laterculus, and all the other work attributable to him, begin to get answered. Knowing what we do about the school at Canterbury under Theodore and Hadrian’s direction; knowing about Theodore’s background and what that probably means for what he brought with him to Britain; knowing especially about the Laterculus Malalianus and the theology that underpins it, all makes these questions easier to answer. The evidence after 690 appears to have a great deal to say about Theodore that has, as yet, remained unsaid.

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I set out at the beginning of this work to establish what it was that Theodore of Tarsus had to say about the person and work of Christ in the Laterculus Malalianus. This task was undertaken by means of tracing his life and acts in light of the most recent scholarship, enumerating and evaluating the available evidence as it related to our central concern, identifying and exploring the two most prominent influences over the Laterculus, drawing our conclusions, and indicating a few areas where the influence of Theodore and his thought might have borne fruit in the generations after his death. Yet for all that, there is clearly a great deal still to be done. To begin with, it would be instructive, textually, to examine the vocabulary and grammar of the Passio s. Anastasii alongside that of the Laterculus with a view to understanding better the nature of Theodore’s authorship. There also remain exegetical links to be explored and verified, such as those between the Laterculus and Bede’s commentary on Luke’s gospel, and the matter of determining the value of those indications of possible Theodoran influence on later developments in northwestern Europe described in the last chapter of this work. Perhaps most importantly, though, – as it applies to Theodore at least – there is the matter of enhancing what has now been established regarding his theology, by relating it both to his other works, and to the wider theological world in which he was working. Theodore of Tarsus needs to be further understood, and set more comfortably in, the context of the early medieval theological world. In the meantime, the christology to be found within the work we have considered so far must surely earn him a more prominent place in

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the minds of modern students of theology than he currently holds. For Theodore’s is no mere imitation of others’ work, nor is it a naïve reiteration of official doctrine. The christology of Theodore of Tarsus as manifest in the Laterculus Malalianus, rather, is very much a creative synthesis of one major Irenaean concept with theological imagery drawn from the Syriac East. This results in the fact that, in the Laterculus, he engages a great number of exegetical and theological motifs to present humanity as a collectively wounded race in need of healing. For Theodore, the incarnate Logos is Christus medicus, whose work it is to restore humankind to its proper place as an icon of God. This is implied over and over again throughout the work as he uses the language of restoration in much the same way as would Irenaeus, with the further implication that humanity’s original purpose was to live in the ‘image and likeness’ of God. It is true that Theodore does not set these ideas in mystical or speculative language; but his more grounded, almost physical, style is consistent with his formation in the Semitic world of the eastern Mediterranean, and the ideas are no less significant for it. Ultimately, Theodore’s view of Christ’s work is shared most especially among various Greek writers to his time, consummated as it is in the doctrine of deification, and championed – significantly – by Theodore’s immediate contemporary, Maximus the Confessor. That ‘grounded, almost physical, style’ seems to be derived from Theodore’s Antiochene exegetical bias, and is a characteristic that can be easily reconciled with the regard in which he held Ephrem the Syrian. For this reason, when Theodore resorts to detailed embryological computations to lay the ground work for the Incarnation, agricultural terms to describe what happened in the manger at Bethlehem, and medical metaphors to summarize what Christ does for humankind, not only is it possible to locate his primary theological interest in recapitulation – and so the strong flavour of Irenaean soteriology – so too is it possible to meet Ephrem, and encounter something of the poetic language that lent such abiding and universal appeal to his name. It is not, of course, that there are no other influences present in the Laterculus Malalianus; it is just that christologically, those that stand out most prominently also carry significant weight across the whole text. It is remarkable that, for centuries, scholars appear to have accepted Bede’s account of Theodore’s contribution to the church in Britain without wondering where the traces of his legacy might be found. Whatever the reason for this, in the wake of our ever-increasing knowledge surrounding his life and his written work, it is now possible to address the

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issue with earnestness. Such questions as whether or not Bede had access to the Laterculus Malalianus when he was composing his commentary on Luke’s gospel, for example, can now reasonably be asked. To what degree Theodore contributed to the idea of the importance of unity and oneness, particularly in terms of doctrinal orthodoxy and ecclesiological organisation as it developed to the time of Charlemagne, represents another such question. Less dramatic, maybe, but still warranting investigation might be the matter of Theodore’s contribution to Anglo-Saxon iconography, liturgy, and art. After all, it is unthinkable that, having come from where he did, and having worked in Britain for twenty-two years as archbishop of Canterbury, he left no discernible trace in these fields. So, equipped as we now are with his biographical details and a greater sense of his theological perspective, the way forward in relation to Theodore of Tarsus lies, at least partly, in attending to these topics. At this stage in our investigation, then, Theodore of Tarsus presents as a figure more fascinating than he did when our acquaintance with him was limited to Bede’s Historia. He is very much the philosopher described by Pope Agatho in that remarkable lament over the fact that Theodore was going to be unable to attend the sixth ecumenical council, and Theodore’s hunger for wisdom is something he appears never to have lost, even in extreme old age. As someone whose formation took place across two continents and numerous important centres of learning; as someone whose experience was such that he had to have spoken at least two languages (Greek and Latin), and would have been at least functional in a third (Syriac) – not including the languages he obviously would have encountered in his work as archbishop (AngloSaxon and Irish) – Theodore was as cosmopolitan a figure as could be hoped for, and the resultant theology reflects that. With discernible sources comprised of a host of Greek, and at least two Latin, writers, and the major investment in Ephrem and Irenaeus that is evident in his work, there is a vast amount of material to link Theodore of Tarsus to a theological tradition that began with the second century apologists and lasted at least until the end of the conciliar period in the eighth century and the beginning of the Holy Roman Empire. Indeed, it may not do justice to Theodore to limit the tradition to which he belonged to a period of time like that. For what Theodore of Tarsus had to say on many issues – not least the person and work of Christ – may well be determined to have value significantly beyond.

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Patterson, L. G., (2001) ‘Pleroma: The human plenitude, from Irenaeus to Gregory of Nyssa,’ SP, 34; 529‒540. Pease, A. S. (1914) ‘Medical Allusions in the Works of St Jerome,’ HSCP, 25; Pecknold, C. C., (2003) ‘How Augustine used the Trinity: Functionalism and Development of Doctrine,’ ATR (winter), 127‒42. Pelikan, J., (1971) The Emergence of the Catholic Tradition (100‒600); CT, 1; Chicago. — (1974) The Spirit of Eastern Christendom (600‒1700); CT, 2; Chicago. — (1978) The Growth of Medieval Theology (600‒1300); CT, 3; Chicago. Petersen, W. L., (2001) ‘Ephrem Syrus and the Venerable Bede: Do East and West Meet?’ SP, 34; Louvain; 443‒52. Possekel, U., (1999) Evidence of Greek Philosophical Concepts in the Writing of Ephrem the Syrian; CCO, 580; subsidia 102; Louvain. Raw, B., (1990) Anglo-Saxon Crucifixion Iconography and the Art of the Monastic Revival; Cambridge. — (1997) Trinity and Incarnation in Anglo-Saxon Art and Thought; CSAE, 21; Cambridge. Ray, R. D., (1976) ‘Bede, the Exegete, as Historian,’ Famulus Christi: Essays in Commemoration of the birth of the Venerable Bede; G. Bonner, ed.; London; 125‒40. Reany, W., (1944) St Theodore of Canterbury; St Louis. Reynolds, R., (1978) The Ordinals of Christ from their Origins to the Twelfth Century; New York. Riedinger, R., ed., (1990) Concilium Vniversale Constantinopolitanum Tertium, Concilii Actiones I-XI, in ACO, 2nd ser. 2.1; Berlin. Rilliet, F., ‘Ephrem the Syrian,’ EEC, vol. 1; A. Di Berardino, ed., A. Walford, trans.; Cambridge; 276‒77. Rousseau, A., Doutreleau, L., (2002) Irénée de Lyon: Contre les Hérésies, Livre III, tome I, Introduction, Notes Justificatives, Tables ; SC, 210; repr., Paris. — (2002) Irénée de Lyon: Contre les Hérésies, Livre III, tome II, Édition critique, Texte et Traduction ; SC, 211; repr., Paris. Russell, N., (1998) ‘“Partakers of the Divine Nature” (2 Peter 1:4) in the Byzantine Tradition,’ ΚΑΘΗΓΗΤΡΙΑ: Essays Presented to Joan Hussey for her 80th Birthday; Camberley. — (2004) The Doctrine of Deification in the Greek Patristic Tradition; OECS; Oxford. Russell, P. S., (2002) ‘The Image of the Infant Jesus in Ephrem the Syrian’ in Hugoye, 5, 1. Sellers, R. V., (1953) The Council of Chalcedon: A Historical and Doctrinal Survey; London. Ševčenko, I., (1992) ‘The Search for the Past in Byzantium around the Year 800’ in Homo Byzantinus: Papers in Honor of Alexander Kazhdan; DOP, 46; 279‒93.

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Shemunkasho, A., (2004) Healing in the Theology of Saint Ephrem; GD, 1; NES 1; Piscataway. Siemens, J., (2007) ‘Christ’s restoration of humankind in the Laterculus Malalianus, 14,’ in HJ, 48.3; 18‒28. — (2007) ‘A survey of the christology of Theodore of Tarsus in the Laterculus Malalianus’ in SJT, 60.2; 213‒225. Simonetti, M., (1994) Biblical Interpretation in the Early Church; Edinburgh. Sims-Williams, P., (1985) ‘Thoughts on Ephrem the Syrian in Anglo-Saxon England,’ Learning and Literature in Anglo-Saxon England: Studies presented to Peter Clemoes on the occasion of his 65th birthday; M. Lapidge, H. Gneuss, eds.; Cambridge; 205‒26. Smalley, B., (1952) The Study of the Bible in the Middle Ages; Oxford. Steenberg, M. C., (2004) ‘Children in Paradise: Adam and Eve as “Infants” in Irenaeus of Lyons,’ JECS, 12.1; 1‒22. Stenton, F. (1971) Anglo-Saxon England; Oxford: 3rd edn. Stevenson, J., (1995) The ‘Laterculus Malalianus’ and the School of Archbishop Theodore; CSAE, 14; Cambridge. — (1995) ‘Theodore and the Laterculus Malalianus,’ M. Lapidge, ed., AT; CSAE, 11; Cambridge; 204‒221. — (1998) ‘Ephraim the Syrian in Anglo-Saxon England’ in Hugoye, 1, 2. Todt, K-P., (1996) ‘Theodor von Canterbury,’ BBKL; http://www.bautz.de/ bbkl; 23 September 2007. Walker, G. S. M., ed., (1970) Sancti Columbani Opera; SLH, 2; Dublin. Wallace-Hadrill, D. S., (1982) Christian Antioch: A Study of Early Christian Thought in the East; Cambridge. Wallace-Hadrill, J. M., (1988) Bede’s Ecclesiastic History of the English People: A Historical Commentary; Oxford. Watts, E., (2004) ‘Justinian, Malalas, and the End of the Athenian Philosophical Teaching in A.D. 529,’ JRS, 94; 168‒82. Weinandy, T. G., (2003) ‘St Irenaeus and the Imago Dei: The Importance of Being Human,’ Logos, 6, 4; 15‒34. Wingren, G., (1959) Man and the Incarnation: A Study in the Biblical Theology of Saint Irenaeus; R. Mackenzie, trans.; Philadelphia. Winterbottom, M., (1996) Book Review: J. Stevenson, The ‘Laterculus Malalianus’ and the School of Archbishop Theodore; Notes and Queries, 43, 4; 457‒50.

urls Biographisch-Bibliographisches Kirchenlexikon, http://www.bautz.de/bbkl`

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INDEXES Biblical Index Genesis

1: 1 (38) 2: 7 (119) 2: 9 (155) 8: 5 (39) 28: 10–22 (83, 85) Exodus 13: 4 (39) Numbers 11: 5 (75) Ezra 1 (49) Psalm 52: 6 (188) Matthew 13: 46 (76) 21: 19 (85, 155) 21: 33–44 (85) 21: 42 (85)

Mark Luke John

12: 10 (85) 2: 11–14 1: 48 (85) 2: 20 (169) 20: 22 (155) Ephesians 1: 9–10

General Index Aachen 172, 173 Adam 49, 65, 68n, 69, 73, 77, 79–83, 85–87, 100, 103–09, 114, 116–122, 125, 129n, 133, 136, 140n, 154, 165 Adamnan 180 Æthelred (king of Mercia) 3, 19n, 24, 32, 40, 54, 64n Agatho (pope) 11n, 14, 19n, 38, 193 Ages of the world (see sex aetates mundi) agriculture, agricultural imagery 52, 64, 66–69, 72, 74, 90–91, 146n, 192 Alcuin 169, 172, 173, 177 Aldhelm 16–17, 22n, 24, 27n, 31, 33, 35, 42, 54, 168n, 169–71 Altus Prosator, 42 Ambrose 50n, 79–80, 161n ἀνακεφαλαίωσις, ἀνακεφαλαιώσασθαι, 99n, 100, 102 (see also restoration)

Anastasius 13, 15, 29–31, 55n, 76n, 131n Anatolios, Khaled 115 Anthropology 102, 105n, 135n Antioch 4–8, 12, 20, 30, 48, 131, 164, 180 Antiochene tradition (christology; exegesis) 6–9, 22n, 35–36, 38, 40, 44, 50, 61, 77, 107, 125–27, 131–35, 165, 168n, 170–71, 179, 180n, 192 Aphrahat 61–64, 73n, 84, 85n Arab conquest 10 Astrology 11n, 12 Astronomy 11n, 12, 20, 23n Athanasius 75n, 106n, 114–15, 118, 129n, 132, 135 Athens 5n, 10n, 55 Augustine (of Hippo) 27, 66, 79–80, 85n, 139n, 144n, 145, 146n, 161n, 181, 188

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Baptism 50n, 160, 162n Baptism of Tears (see baptismum lacrimarum) baptismum lacrimarum 27n, 158n, 159n, 161, 162n Basil (of Caesarea) 26, 27n, 162n Bede 29–31, 35, 37, 39, 46, 50n, 54, 57, 59, 88–92, 130, 140–52 Benedict XV (Pope) 94 Benedict Biscop 30, 31 Benoît, André 103, 109n, 110, 112, 143, 145 Beowulf 182, 185, 187 Bible (see also Scripture(s)) 34n, 40, 102n, 107, 184 Biblical commentaries, Canterbury (see Canterbury Commentaries) Biblioteca Ambrosiana 21, 34, 54 Bischoff, Bernard xi, xii, 2–3, 21, 24, 34–36, 46n, 54–55, 57, 74, 88, 92, 130n, 147, 164, 168n, 180n Blickling Homilies 169, 182, 185, 187–88 Boniface 5n, 55, 175 Book of Cerne 34, 175, 184 Bou Mansour, Tanios 68, 146n Bray, Gerald 1 Britain 2, 4, 16, 17, 18, 22n, 24, 28, 48, 88, 91, 147, 150n, 155, 157, 164, 170n, 174, 175, 178n, 179n, 188, 189, 192 Brock, Sebastian 8, 11n, 13n, 15n, 59n, 62n, 71n, 82, 114n Burkitt, Francis 60, 61n, 62n, 63n, 71n, 72n, 73n

Canterbury (city) x, xi, xii, 2, 3, 5n, 11, 12, 13, 16–20, 24, 31, 34n, 35–36, 39, 40, 42, 47, 54, 57, 74, 88, 89, 92, 118, 119, 128, 141, 165, 169–73 Canterbury (archbishop of ) xiii, 14–17, 58, 140, 148, 156, 164, 168, 188, 193 Canterbury Commentaries 3n, 4, 5n, 7n, 9, 15, 21n, 24n, 25n, 34–40, 41, 42, 48, 51n, 55, 59n, 74, 75, 76, 78, 84, 87, 88, 89, 91, 118, 119, 130n, 132n, 147, 152–56, 163, 168n, 174, 175 Carmen Paschale 82, 165n Carmina Nisibena 68, 69 Carolingian 157, 169, 172, 173 Cerne (see Book of Cerne) Chad (bishop of Mercia) 18, 24n, 148–51 Chalcedon (Council of ) 6n, 12n, 59n Chalcedonian definition 1 Charlemagne 172, 173, 177, 192 Charles-Edwards, Thomas 3n, 25, 26n, 27n, 28, 157, 158n, 162n, 163n Christ Christ, Corner Stone 52n, 83, 85n, 123 Christ, Good Shepherd 52, 69–70 Christ, Liberator 120, 122, 123 Christus medicus, 51, 64, 66, 73, 80, 139, 160, 192 Christ, Victor 101, 108–10, 122 Christmas 89n, 185, 186, 187 Chronicle of John Malalas 43, 53 Chronographia (see Chronicle of John Malalas) Chronography 17n, 46n

Caelius Sedulius 45, 82, 129n, 137, 165 Calendar of St Willibrord 2n, 183

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INDEXES

Chronology xii, 37n, 39, 53 Church 12, 14, 15, 16, 18, 19, 20, 27, 28, 34n, 50, 57–62, 64, 66–69, 73, 85, 89n, 94, 99, 101, 110, 112, 113, 115, 126, 136, 140n, 141–43, 145, 146n, 147–52, 176, 177, 178, 183, 192 Clement (of Alexandria) 35, 53, 109n, 132n, 135n Columba 42n Confession 26, 157, 158 Conrad-O’Briain, Helen 27n, 158n, 159n, 162n Constantinople xi, 5n, 9–13, 20, 37, 39, 51, 59n, 131, 164, 179n, 184 Corner-stone 52n, 83, 85n, 123 Creation 43, 52, 54, 70n, 77, 85, 104, 106, 154, 156, 160 Cubitt, Catherine 18n, 19n, 142n Cuthbert 181 Cyril (of Alexandria) 45, 129, 132 Cyril (of Jerusalem) 49

Eden (garden of ) 77n, 86, 116, 124, 133, 136 Edessa 5n, 6–9, 12, 20, 35, 51, 58–60, 61n, 75, 77, 87, 93, 131, 164 Egypt 44, 120, 185 Ephesians (epistle to) 99, 102 Ephesus (council of, 431) 59, 132n Ephrem the Syrian (also Ephraim) xii, xiii, 7n, 8, 9, 12, 22n, 35, 42, 44–45, 49–51, 52n, 56–58, 61–65, 66–95, 114n, 115n, 116–17, 123, 125–27, 128n, 129n, 133–34, 136–37, 138n, 139, 144, 146n, 160, 165–67, 169, 173–6, 185n, 192, 193 Epiphanius of Cyprus 35, 44, 45, 78n, 128, 165 Epiphanius of Salamis 72n Eucharist 52, 67, 68, 72n, 90, 94, 146n, 149 Eusebius (of Caesarea) 97n, 114n, 115n Evagrius Scholasticus 6n Eve, second Eve 49, 65, 67, 77n, 81–82, 86–87, 104, 106, 114, 116–18, 121, 122, 124, 125, 129, 133, 136 Exchange formula 114, 115, 118, 128, 129n, 132n, 135 Exegesis 7, 8, 22n, 36, 41, 44, 46n, 50, 63, 64n, 83–84, 93, 101–02, 107, 114, 119, 125, 130n, 131, 132n, 134, 139, 168n, 169, 171, 172, 176–77, 179–82 Exodus (book of ) 36, 39n, 63 Ezra (book of ) 49

Daniélou, Jean 49n, 50n, 53, 54n De locis sanctis 179n, 180 Deification 50n, 105–06, 109, 110, 115, 116, 118, 129n, 132n, 135, 137, 192 Dempsey, George 22n, 168n, 170, 171 Deuteronomy (book of ), 36 Diatessaron 61, 63, 88n, 174n discipulus Umbrensium 3n, 26, 28, 158n, 162 Diodore (of Tarsus) 6, 131n Dionysius (the Areopagite) 105n Easter 18, 39n, 53, 89n, 100n, 142, 150n Ecclesiology 73, 105n Eddius Stephanus 4n, 16, 19n, 23, 24, 32, 54, 178n

Fig tree 155 Franklin, Carmela Vircillo 44n, 47, 48, 55, 76n, 130n, 138n, 163n

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Gaul 43, 97, 98 Genesis (book of ) 36, 38, 63, 69, 76, 77n, 81–83, 85n, 107, 119, 131n, 155 Gnosticism 81, 98–101, 135 Gospels 34, 36, 61, 152, 181 grades of office (see ordines Christi) Grant, Robert 97–98, 105n, 112 Gregory I, Pope (the Great) 27n, 30n, 144, 151, 178 Gregory (of Nazianzus) 27n, 33, 35, 106, 154, 159–62, 163n, Gregory (of Nyssa) 106, 129n Gregory (Palamas) 106n Griffith, Sidney 58n, 77n, 93, 174n Grillmeier, Aloys 6n, 99, 131n

Iona 179n Irenaeus xiii, 9, 45, 49, 52n, 53, 54, 58, 73, 74n, 75n, 77n, 81–83, 85n, 87, 94, 96–137, 143, 144n, 145, 146, 154, 165, 166, 173, 192, 193 Ireland / Irish 16, 17n, 18, 24, 26, 27, 42, 46n, 47n, 141n, 151, 152, 157, 158n, 163n, 169, 170, 178n, 179n, 193 Jacob (see Corner-stone) Jacob (of Sarug) 45 Jerome 27n, 36, 85n, 161n, 180 Jerusalem (temple of ) 49, 121n John (apostle) 97 John (the Baptist) 70n, 71n John (bishop of Hexham) 37 John (Cassian), 26n, 27, 159–61 John (Chrysostom) 6, 35, 45, 85n, 131n, 144n, 159n, 161n John (Gospel of ) 36, 85n, 104n, 155n, 169, 181, 182 John (Malalas) 6n, 43–44, 48, 52–53, 165, 186 Justin Martyr 100, 111

Hadrian 2, 3, 18–19, 23, 34, 35n, 59n, 148n, 167n, 168n, 169, 170, 175n, 189 Hæddi (bishop of Winchester) 4, 17n, 28n, 33 Harris, J. Rendel 57n, 88, 174n Hatfield (Council of ) (see also Hæthfeld) 19, 142 Heaven 8n, 38n, 53, 54, 80n, 83n, 99, 110, 113, 121n, 122, 126n, 140n Heraclius (emperor) 11, 14n, 187 Herren, Michael 46n Hertford (Council of ) 18, 19, 142 Hildegard (of Bingen) 93, 176 Hippolytus (of Rome) 45, 135n Historia Abbatum 31n Historia ecclesiastica gentis Anglorum (Historia) x, xiii, 2, 4n, 13n, 16, 17, 23, 24, 29, 37n, 54, 140–43, 147n, 150, 153, 154, 156, 167, 177, 179, 193 Hohler, Christopher 17n, 183–84 Holy Family 44, 91, 120, 185 Hugoye 22n, 56, 58, 62n, 89n Hymns on Paradise 67, 70, 77n

Kelly, John N. D. 87n, 100, 102 Kelly, Joseph F. 50n, 89n, 91 Kenosis 49, 81, 89n, 135n Laistner, Max 171, 178, 179 Lapidge, Michael xi, xii, 3, 4n, 5n, 6n, 9–10, 11n, 12, 14–56, 58n, 59n, 74, 75, 76, 88, 92, 130n, 138n, 159n, 163n, 164, 168n, 169n, 172–73 Lateran Council (649) xi, 12n, 13, 14, 15, 19n Lawson, John 100, 101, 102n, 103n, 107, 108, 109, 110, 131n Leiden Glossary 34n, 167 Leontius (of Jerusalem) 105n, 129

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Letter to Æthelred 3, 19, 24, 32, 40, 54, 64n Leviticus (book of ) 36 libellus Scottorum 28 Liturgy 19, 152, 169, 179n, 182, 183, 184, 192 Logos 50, 84, 89n, 90, 94, 115, 125, 126n, 137, 163, 191 Lossky, Vladimir 129n Louth, Andrew 12n, 15n Luke (Gospel of ) 36, 50, 79, 89–92, 191, 193

Monotheletism 14n, 19n, 121, 142 Murray, Robert 7n, 8, 57n, 58n, 60–64, 69, 70n, 71n, 73n, 77, 78, 84n, 114n

Mai, Angelo 41n, 130 Malalas (see John Malalas) Mango, Cyril 12n, 168n, 172, 174n Mark (Gospel of ) 36, 85n Martin I (pope) 19n Martin (of Tours) 151 Martyrologium 183, 184 Mary (Magdalene) 183 Mary (the Virgin) 49, 76n, 77, 81–83, 91, 100, 104n, 116, 117, 121, 122, 126, 129, 133, 165, 181 Matthew (Gospel of ) 36, 76n, 85n, 155, 185 Maximus the Confessor xi, 14–15, 19n, 106n, 129n, 135, 192 Mayr-Harting, Henry 18n, 19n, 28, 141, 151, 157, 158, 178 McNeill, John 26, 28, 159, 161 Medical imagery 12, 50, 51, 66, 78, 79, 80n, 81n Medicine (study of) 11n, 12, 20, 37, 38, 51, 64n, 121n, 160, 166 Melito (of Sardis) 100n Mesopotamia 43, 60 Meyendorff, John 105, 125, 129n, 132n Mommsen, Theodor 41, 42, 44 Monastery 13, 14, 15, 30, 31, 141, 164, 183

Octosyllabic Poems 3n, 17n, 25n, 32–34, 40, 163n, 170, 172–73 οἰκουμενικὸς διδάσκαλος 11n O’Keefe, John 8n Old English Martyrology 183 Old Testament 7n, 61n, 107, 108, 119n, 154 O’Loughlin, Tom 27n, 107, 158n, 159, 160, 161n, 162n, 179n Oneness, unity 110–13, 132n, 141, 142, 143–47, 148, 149, 151, 152, 155, 173, 176–79, 193 Orders (see ordines Christi) Orders of Christ (see ordines Christi) ordines Christi 9, 44, 45n, 47n, 58n, 65, 72–74, 75, 77–78, 114, 116, 118, 126, 127, 134, 136, 149 Origen 115n, 132n

Narsai 45, 77 Nielsen, Jan 100, 101, 111n New Testament 7n, 8n, 44, 60, 61, 102, 110 Nisibis 70, 77 Number theory 48, 64n, 121n, 127 Numbers (book of ) 36, 75n

Palmer, Andrew 62n, 63n, 64n, 93, 176 Passio sancti Anastasii 4, 29, 44, 130, 138, 163 Paris Psalter 170–71 Paul (apostle) 77n, 99, 100, 102, 107, 113, 183n Pelikan, Jaroslav 6n, 81, 103, 105, 173n, 177

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Penitential of Theodore (see Pœnitentiale) Penitentials 27n, 54, 156, 157, 159–62 Pentateuch 34n, 36 Peshitta 61n Petersen, William 57n, 88–89 Pœnitentiale xiii, 3n, 17, 19, 20, 21, 25–28, 32, 34, 37n, 54, 64n, 156–63, 167 Possekel, Ute 73n, 75, 114n Priesthood 16n, 65, 70n, 71, 108, 166 Proba 45

Shemunkasho, Aho 64n, 65, 66, 67, 73n–74, 79n six ages (see sex aetates mundi) Sophronius (of Jerusalem) 14, 15n, 33n, 35, 163n Soteriology 58, 69, 73, 75n, 102, 106n, 128, 135, 192 Steenberg, Matthew 87n, 117, 124 Stephen (of Alexandria) 5n, 11, 12 Stephen (of Ripon) (see Eddius Stephanus) Stevenson, Jane x, xi, xii, 4n, 5n, 7n, 8n, 12n, 15n, 17n, 22n, 31, 37, 41, 42–43, 44–45, 46–48, 51n, 52, 55, 57, 59n, 64n, 65n, 76, 77, 81–82, 83–84, 85–86, 92–94, 107n, 117n, 118, 121n, 123n, 124n, 125, 127, 130n, 131n, 138, 139, 144n, 146n, 165, 174n, 175–76, 181n, 185, 186 Synaxarion of Constantinople 184 Syria 7, 10, 57n, 58, 59n, 61, 98, 184n Syriac Church 60–61, 94

Rabanus Maurus 27n, Raw, Barbara 185–88 Reaney, William 147 recapitulation (see restoration) Regino of Prüm 27n Restoration xii, 9, 15, 49–54, 68, 73, 74, 81, 82, 86, 87, 94, 96, 100–08, 109, 110, 111, 114, 116, 118, 120, 121, 122, 123, 124, 125n, 126, 128, 129, 132n, 133, 134, 135, 136, 137, 140, 145, 146, 147, 152, 153, 155, 166, 183, 186, 187, 188, 192 Rome xi, 5, 11n, 12, 13–16, 18, 30–32, 48, 97, 98, 101, 113, 135, 141, 152, 177, 178, 179, 186 Russell, Norman 8n, 15n, 50n, 129n, 132n, 135n

Tarsus 4, 7n, 20, 31 Tertullian 49n, 160, 161n Theodore (of Mopsuestia) 6, 45, 50n, 125, 126n, 131n, 170, 171, 179 Theodore’s Penitential (see Pœnitentiale) Theophilus (of Alexandria) 53 Theophilus (of Antioch) 52, 53, 54n, 100n, 124n, 154 Theosis (see deification) Thomas Aquinas 90n Todt, Klaus-Peter 46n, 55 Tonsure 13, 141, 148n, 183n Trinity 125, 126n, 143, 144, 145n, 147, 154, 155, 164, 166, 177

sacrament, sacraments 149, 151 Scripture(s) 6n, 7, 23n, 37, 60, 61, 63, 70, 78n, 102, 106, 107, 108, 113, 131, 150n, 154, 171, 180 Sellers, Robert 6n, 126n Sergius (Patriarch) 14n sex aetates mundi 50, 52, 120

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Typology 81–82, 107, 114, 116, 117, 133

Wilfrid (of York) 16, 18, 19, 23n, 24, 32, 54, 150n, 151, 152, 178, 179n Winterbottom, Michael 46–47n, 170 world age (see sex aetates mundi)

unity (see oneness) Vercelli Homilies 182, 185–87 vita sancti Wilfridi 4n, 16, 19, 23, 24, 32

Χρονογραφία (see Chronicle of John Malalas)

Wallace-Hadrill, David 107n Wallace-Hadrill, John 18n, 19n, 24n, 30n, 170, 172, 179, 180n

Zacharias (pope) 5n, 10n, 55, Zerubbabel 49, 121n, 122

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