Gregory the Great

Description

A group of renowned North American scholars gathered at the University of Notre Dame in 1993 for a symposium on Pope Gregory the Great (550-604). The essays collected in this volume are arranged in the order in which they were delivered, and several additional contributions are included as well. In these essays Gregory emerges as a figure both interpreting and interpreted: interpreting the past, receiving, synthesizing, and developing the teachings of earlier writers, and, by this very process, presenting a persuasive theological and pastoral agenda which itself inspires ongoing projects of interpretation and development in later periods up to and including our own.

Sujets

• Religion
• Christianisme
• Christian Theology
• Philosophie et théologie
• Catholicism
• Theology
• Catholic
• Christianity
• History
• Pope

Informations

• Publié par: University of Notre Dame Press
• Date de parution: 15 avril 2001
• Nombre de lectures: 0
• EAN13: 9780268077075
• Langue: English
• Poids de l'ouvrage: 2 Mo

Extrait

GREGORY THE GREAT
Notre Dame Studies in Theology Volume 2 Lawrence S. Cunningham GENERAL EDITOR
The image on the cover of this volume is the historiated initial that opens the long chapter on Gregory the Great in the manuscript of Bede s Ecclesiastical History known as the Leningrad manuscript (St. Petersburg, Public Library, Q.v.I.18, fol. 26v). This manuscript dates from before 746 and may have been made during Bede s lifetime (d. 735). The name Augustinus was written within the halo, but scientific analysis has shown this name to be a later addition. We know from the Life of Gregory by the ninth-century Roman John the Deacon that Gregory had caused a portrait of himself, together with portraits of his father and mother, to be painted in his family home on the Coelian Hill, the home he had turned into a monastery and dedicated to St. Andrew, and where he had dwelled until he was elected bishop of Rome. In his description of the portrait, John the Deacon tells us that Gregory was shown holding the Gospel Book in his left hand and a kind of cross in his right hand. This is precisely what we see in this initial. We know from Bede that members of his monastic community had visited Rome, and they almost certainly had gone to pray at Gregory s monastery. The image in the Leningrad manuscript was probably inspired by the portrait that the Anglo-Saxon monks had seen on their visit to Rome. See Paul Meyvaert, Bede and Gregory the Great (Jarrow Lecture, 1964), reprinted in Benedict, Gregory, Bede and Others (London, 1977), pp. 2-4.
JOHN C. CAVADINI
Editor
GREGORY THE GREAT
A Symposium
University of Notre Dame Press
NOTRE DAME AND LONDON
Copyright 1995 by
John C. Cavadini
All Rights Reserved
Published by University of Notre Dame Press
Notre Dame, Indiana, 46556
http://www.undpress.nd.edu
Published in the United States of America
Paper Edition printed in 2001
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Gregory the Great / edited by John C. Cavadini.
p. cm. - (Notre Dame studies in theology ; v. 2)
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN 0-268-01030-7 (hardcover : alk. paper)
1. Gregory I, Pope, ca. 540-604. 2. Church history-Primitive and early church, ca. 30-600. I. Cavadini John C. II. Series.
BX1076.G76 1995
270.2 092-dc20
95-18780
CIP
ISBN 9780268077075
The paper used in this publication meets the minimum requirements of the American National Standard for Information Sciences-Permanence of Paper for Printed Library Materials, ANSI Z39.49-1984 .
This e-Book was converted from the original source file by a third-party vendor. Readers who notice any formatting, textual, or readability issues are encouraged to contact the publisher at [e-mail] .
Contents
List of Abbreviations
Preface
1. The Jew as a Hermeneutic Device: The Inner Life of a Gregorian Topos
ROBERT A. MARKUS
2. Purity and Death
CAROLE STRAW
3. Expertise and Authority in Gregory the Great: The Social Function of Peritia
CONRAD LEYSER
4. The Holiness of Gregory
JAMES J. O DONNELL
5. La dialectique Parole-Chair dans la christologie de Gr goire le Grand
RODRIGUE B LANGER
6. A Letter of Pelagius II Composed by Gregory the Great
PAUL MEYVAERT
7. Pope Gregory the Great s Knowledge of Greek
G. J. M. BARTELINK
Translated by PAUL MEYVAERT
Translator s Appendix: Gregory the Great and Astronomy
8. Contemplation in Gregory the Great
BERNARD MCGINN
9. Exegesis and Spirituality in the Writings of Gregory the Great
GROVER A. ZINN, JR .
10. Memory, Instruction, Worship: Gregory s Influence on Early Medieval Doctrines of the Artistic Image
CELIA CHAZELLE
11. Gregory the Great in the Twelfth Century: The Glossa Ordinaria
E. ANN MATTER
Abbreviations
Gregory s Works
Cant .
In canticum canticorum
Dial .
Dialogues
Ep .
Registrum epistolarum
Hom.Ev .
Homiliae in Evangelia
Hom.Ez .
Homiliae in Ezechielem
Mor .
Moralia in lob
Reg .
In I Lib. Regum
RP
Regula pastoralis
Other Abbreviations
ACO
Acta conciliorum oecumenicorum
CCCM
Corpus Christianorum continuatio medievalis
CCSL
Corpus Christianorum series latina
CollCist
Collectanea cisterciensia
CNRS
Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique
CSEL
Corpus scriptorum ecclesiasticorum latinorum
DSp
Dictionnaire de spiritualit
Ep .
Epistola
GCS
Griechischen Christlichen Schriftsteller
HTR
Harvard Theological Review
JEH
Journal of Ecclesiastical History
JThS
Journal of Theological Studies
Mansi
Sacrorum conciliorum nova et amplissima collectio
MGH
Monumenta Germaniae historica
PG
Patrologia graeca
PL
Patrologia latina
RechA
Recherches augustiniennes
RechSR
Recherches de science religieuses
RHE
Revue d histoire eccl siastique
RTAM
Recherches de th ologie ancienne et m di vale
RvB n
Revue b n dictine
RvEAnc
Revue des tudes anciennes
RvEAug
Revue des tudes augustiniennes
SC
Sources chr tiennes
StudMon
Studia monastica
TR
Theologische Revue
Short Titles of Frequently Cited Works
Butler, Western Mysticism Cuthbert Butler, Western Mysticism: The Teaching of Augustine, Gregory, and Bernard on Contemplation and the Contemplative Life . 2nd ed. New York: Harper and Row, 1966.
Courcelle, Lettres Pierre Courcelle, Les lettres grecques en Occident . Paris: Hachette, 1948.
Dagens, Gr goire Claude Dagens, Saint Gr goire le Grand: Culture et exp rience chr tiennes . Paris: Etudes Augustiniennes, 1977.
Dudden, Gregory F. Homes Dudden, Gregory the Great: His Place in History and Thought . 2 vols. London: Longmans, Green, 1905.
Fontaine et al., Gr goire J. Fontaine, R. Gillet, and S. Pellistrandi, eds., Gr goire le Grand . Paris: CNRS, 1986.
Markus, End Robert A. Markus, The End of Ancient Christianity . Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1990.
Matter, Voice E. Ann Matter, The Voice of My Beloved: The Song of Songs in Western Medieval Christianity . Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 1990.
Meyvaert, Benedict Paul Meyvaert, Benedict, Gregory, Bede and Others . London: Variorum Reprints, 1977.
Richards, Consul Jeffrey Richards, Consul of God: The Life and Times of Gregory the Great . London: Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1980.
Straw, Gregory Carole Straw, Gregory the Great: Perfection in Imperfection . Berkeley: University of California Press, 1988.
Preface
With this volume, the reader is welcomed as an honored participant in the deliberations of a symposium on Gregory the Great, held on the campus of the University of Notre Dame in March 1993, occasioned by Robert Markus s tenure as visiting professor in the Department of Theology for the spring of 1993. Anticipating that Markus s seminar on Gregory would become a focal point of discussion among students and faculty in theology and related disciplines, we began even before his arrival to plan for a small gathering of North American scholars working on Gregory to complement and supplement our internal exchanges. The result was a cordial synergy of forces, a weekend of overlapping conversations sparked by the formal presentations of invited speakers and continuing informally into the breaks between sessions, and, as befits a symposium, over lunch and dinner as well.
The papers presented in this volume are arranged in the order in which they were delivered at the symposium, with the addition of several related contributions. In these presentations Gregory emerges as a figure both interpreting and interpreted: interpreting the past; receiving, synthesizing, and developing the teachings of earlier writers; and by this process presenting a persuasive theological and pastoral agenda which itself inspired on-going projects of interpretation and development in later periods, up to and including our own. In this respect Robert Markus s paper sets the tone by showing how the inner life of a Gregorian topos, once revealed, allows us a way of articulating the profound but elusive difference between two intellectual worlds, that of Augustine and that of Gregory, both of which seem so similar-so Augustinian -on the exterior.
Carole Straw continues the exposition of the relationship between Gregory and his cultural forebears by focusing a lively discussion on the topic of death and mortality, demonstrating how Gregory reworked themes from both pagan and Christian sources into a unique synthesis firmly anchored in the pastoral concerns of his own day. Conrad Leyser then takes up the question of Gregory s relationship to his ascetic sources, revealing in a way the exterior life of a Gregorian topos. He shows how Gregory s constant complaint that administration has usurped contemplation in his life, and his corresponding advice on the necessity of tempering ascetic expertise with the practice of charity, has deep roots in Augustine and Cassian-but precisely as interpreted and developed from Gregory s position as an ascetic with an embattled hold on the papacy, traditionally a stronghold of the nonascetic Roman clerical establishment. James J. O Donnell, for his part, shows us how a contemporary, non-Gregorian topos of interpretation, that of the holy, has not always served us well as an instrument of understanding Gregory or other ancient ascetics. In Gregory s case, use of a preconstructed category has obscured how he self-consciouly defied topoi of the rarity of holiness or of its narrow localization in special persons or things. A new appreciation of Gregory s greatness (perhaps the most uncannily enduring Gregorian topos of all), would involve our willingness to reexamine the indebtedness of modern analytical categories to the topoi that Gregory would subvert.
The next paper, by Rodrigue B langer, is a treat for those weary of clich s about Gregory s lack of doctrinal innovation, for it shows Gregory at work in a dialectic of his own, appropriating and developing the christology of Augustine and Leo by giving it special and crucial links to his own ex