FR JOHN BEHR ON GREGORY OF NYSSA'S "ON THE HUMAN IMAGE OF GOD"
HTML-код
- Опубликовано: 13 сен 2023
- The Houston Centre for Humanity and the Common Good will present a public talk on September 14 by Fr John Behr, Regius Professor of Humanity at the University of Aberdeen. Fr John has published the first English-language translation of Gregory of Nyssa’s classic text De hominis opificio (On the Human Image of God) since the 1800s. In this public lecture, Fr John will expound St Gregory’s anthropology and its ongoing relevance for the central question of what it means to be human. Dr. Harry O. Maier, Professor of New Testament and Early Christian Studies at the Vancouver School of Theology, will offer a response to Fr Behr. There will be an opportunity to ask questions during the Q&A. This event will be held onsite in the Regent College Chapel and online via rgnt.net/live. WATCH LIVE ON SEPT 14 To learn more, please visit The Houston Centre website or email the Houston Centre at houstoncentre@regent-college.edu. ABOUT THE SPEAKERS Fr John Behr is Regius Professor of Humanity at the University of Aberdeen in Scotland, and was previously Dean of St. Vladimir's Orthodox Theological Seminary where he taught for twenty-five years and edited the Popular Patristics Series. An avid translator and theologian, Fr John has refreshed the texts of a number of seminal patristic works in new translations for contemporary English readers, including Origen's On First Principles, Irenaeus' On the Apostolic Preaching, and Athanasius' On the Incarnation. Among his books, articles, and other publications is his most recent book-length project, 2019's John the Theologian and his Paschal Gospel, which puts the ancient readers of John in conversation both with the latest in biblical scholarship and the French phenomenologist Michel Henry. Fr John is currently working on a new edition of the complete works of Irenaeus. Dr. Harry O. Maier is Professor of New Testament and Early Christian Studies at the Vancouver School of Theology. In addition to his publications across a range of scholarly interests (the representation of violence in Antiquity; ancient and contemporary apocalyptic theology; ecotheology and the New Testament; and more), Dr. Maier has served two parishes of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in Canada in Victoria and Delta, British Columbia. ABOUT THE HOUSTON CENTRE The Houston Centre for Humanity and the Common Good is a five-year initiative of Regent College, grounded in Dr. James M. Houston’s comprehensive vision of integrative scholarship. Its main task is to foster interdisciplinary and interreligious dialogue on the central question of the late-modern world: what does it mean to be human? Inviting a range of philosophical perspectives through collaboration with the University of British Columbia and other institutions, the Centre explores a holistic understanding of humanity that accounts for the unique social, political, and theological issues of our time. Comprising a community of leading scholars, the Centre generates dialogue across disciplines-theology, philosophy, biology, cognitive science, political studies, and more-in order to navigate the mystery of the human person. Through public lectures, seminars, and a variety of publications, the Houston Centre helps others engage theological questions of humanity for the common good.
Enjoyed this, great insight*
There are not many teachers in Christ today at the lofty level of John Behr.
Brilliant! Thank you for posting this!
I happen to be Lutheran, and yet find Fr. Beher's orientation much more appealing. I experience something, sometimes numbing in certain aspects of some Lutheran thinking. Perhaps I'm in the wrong spot. I ask myself this question far more often than I'd like. Oh well, we soldier on with questions questioning questions........
Absolutely loved this. Is there a transcript?
it's under the video description at the very bottom
Fr Behr, I listened to the talk and thought about it for months. And with all due respect, I think it's mostly nonsense. You probably know that according to tradition, the Virgin appeared in a the splendour of a queen to St. Basil in a vision, and told him straight up that he would never reveal the mystery of the Sixth Day of Creation before he died. So, we can assume that St Gregory's well meaning attempt to complete the book was destined to fall far short, since Heaven didn't desire the fullness of the mystery to be revealed. And I think the main problem comes down to the premise that there will only be a limited number of saved souls, and that will be the end for all eternity of new men coming to be. And why this is problematic is that in the resurrection, the human body of Jesus Christ was witnessed to be tangible, warm, and to enjoy eating and drinking. Meaning that the evidence demonstrates that in his glorified state, man remains a creature of flesh and of the earth, and lives in a way not too dissimilarly from how he currently does in terms of food, drink, rest and so forth. Therefore, in the New Earth conditions for life must be something like they are now, with food growing and the need for natural resources to make things for living. This implies that man must continue to live in a natural world capable of supplying those needs, which it can only do by growing them somehow. And a growing world is a dynamically changing one, which is good. Because the inference taken from St Gregory's ideas would be that nature would also have an exact number of plants and animals, and nothing new would ever come to exist. The more you think about it, the more improbable and actually bleak it sounds. St. Gregory imagjnes a finite number of people living in a perfect city, but this really just sounds like a projection of Greek philosophy onto an unknown future reality. It's beautifully cogent, like a symphony, but ultimately of a dubious wisdom according to reality. The ides has an almost Gnostic quality in its need to deny the natural created order any place in eternity, and replace it with a world of perfect forms and satisfyingly complete answers. It's almost certainly BS. And it's inconsistent with the evidence we see in Christ's body, and in the Prophet Isaiah, which depict something much more like Creation as we know it, but released from the evils of the Fall of Man so that it is restored to its fullness and true beauty. Not some vaugue imaginary and sterile realm of perfect intellect detached from the embodied reality of our connection to the land. I'm not just trolling here, I think that this deserves to be answered, if not here than in some broader way in your s scholarship. Thank you.
😂🤣
Actually, my question is why the mind of the Apostles is being described through the teachings of the “ Mishnah “ ? The Mishnah was written by Jews who refused to accept Christ as Messiah after the temple was destroyed
Actually, now that I think about it, God is finite. There is only One Triune Creator so it makes sense