Table Of ContentExegesis and Spiritual Pedagogy
in Maximus the Confessor
An Investigation of the
Quaestiones ad Thalassium
by
Paul M. Blowers
University of Notre Dame Press
Notre Dame, Indiana
Copyright © 1991 by
University of Notre Dame Press
Notre Dame, Indiana 46556
All rights reserved
Manufactured in the United States of America
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Blowers, Paul M., 1955-
Exegesis and spiritual pedagogy in Maximus the Confessor: an investi-
gation of the Quaestiones ad Thalassium / Paul M. Blowers,
p. cm. — (Christianity and Judaism in Antiquity ; v. 7)
Includes bibliographical references and indexes.
ISBN 0-268-00927-9
1. Maximus, Confessor, Saint, ca. 580-662. Quaestiones ad
Thalassium. I. Title. II. Series.
BR65.M39676B46 1991
220.6—dc20 90-50973
CIP
To the Memory of
Dean Everest Walker
(1898-1988)
... going round and surveying us, as it were, with the skill of an husbandman,
and not taking notice merely of what is obvious to everyone and superficial,
but digging into us more deeply, and probing what is most inward in us, he
put us to the question, and proposed things to us, and listened to our replies.
For whenever he detected anything in us not wholly unprofitable and useless
and ineffectual, he would start clearing the soil, and turning it up and watering
iL He would set everything in motion, and apply the whole of his skill and
attention to us so as to cultivate us.
Gregory Thaumaturgus
Panegyric on Origen
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS ..................................................................... xi
ABBREVIATIONS ............................................................................... xiii
INTRODUCTION ..................................................................................... 1
The Current State of Maximian Studies...................................... i
The Context and Purview of the Quaestiones ad Thalassium .....__.... 2
Maximus’ Monastic Formation ................................................. 3
The Historical Foreground of the Ad Thalassium.........................6
The Immediate Occasion of the Ad Thalassium....................... 9
The Critical and Interpretative Problem
of the Quaestiones ad Thalassium................................................. 13
Notes ........ 17
CHAPTER 1. THE QUAESTIONES AD THALASSIUM:
GENRE AND CONTEXT IN THE BYZANTINE
MONASTIC PEDAGOGICAL TRADITION.................. 28
The Aporiai Tradition of Patristic Exegetical “Questions and
Responses” and the Literary Genre of the Ad Thalassium.................29
Hie Quaestio-Responsio, Scriptural Aporiai, and Spiritual
Pedagogy in the Byzantine Monastic Tradition before Maximus........36
The Apophthegmata patrum .......... 37
The Monastic Regulae of Basil of Caesarea..............................39
The Collationes of John Cassian...............................................40
The Spiritual-Doctrinal Writings of Pseudo-Macarius,
Mark the Hermit, and Isaac the Syrian............................. 42
A Return to the Pragmatism of the Desert: The Quaestiones
et responsiones of the Palestinians Barsanuphius and John .........47
The Quaestiones et responsiones of Anastasius Sinalta...............49
The Quaestio-Responsio in Maximus* Earlier Monastic Writings......52
Hie Quaestiones ad Thalassium in the Tradition of Monastic
Pedagogical Quaestiones et responsiones....................................... 56
Monastic Topoi in the Ad Thalassium.................................... 57
Scriptural Aporiai and Spiritual Pedagogy
in Maximus’ Responses to Thalassius..................................... 61
Recapitulation: Scriptural Aporiai, Monastic Use of Scripture,
and the Quaestiones ad Thalassium ...............................................69
Notes ..................................................................................................73
CHAPTER 2. DIABASIS: THE THEOLOGICAL AND
HERMENEUTICAL FRAMEWORK OF MAXIMUS’
EXEGESIS OF SCRIPTURE IN THE QUAESTIONES
AD THALASSIUM ......................................................................... 95
The Terminological and Thematic Significance
of Diabasis in the Quaestiones ad Thalassium................................96
The Objective and Macrocosmic Dimensions of the Diabasis:
Access to the Logos-Christ through Creation and Scripture........... 100
Creation, Scripture, and the Symbolic Structure
of the Diabasis ................................................... 102
A Locus Classicusr. Ambiguum 10.............................. 102
The Logoi of Scripture and Maximus’ Notion
of Accommodation in the Ad Thalassium .................... 106
A Diabasis from Letter to Spirit in Scripture..........................112
The Christological Skopos of Creation and Scripture:
The Mystery of the Incarnate Logos-Christ....................................117
The Three Laws and the Three Incarnations.............................117
The Mystery of the Incarnation and the Eschatological
Scope of Scriptural Symbols .................................................. 122
The Subjective and Microcosmic Dimensions of the Diabasis:
The Integration of the Spiritual Life.............................................131
npdftff—Beapla—OeoAoyla in the Ad Thalassium............ 133
Natural (ipvat/af) and Scriptural (ypafaiaf) Contemplation......137
Recapitulation: Communion with the Incarnate Logos-Christ
as the Goal of the Spiritual Diabasis.................................. 145
Notes ............................................................ 149
CHAPTER 3. ANAGOGICAL EXEGESIS AS A THEOLOGICAL
AND PEDAGOGICAL USE OF SCRIPTURE IN THE
QUAESTIONES AD THALASSIUM ........................................... 184
Anagoge and Multiple Meanings of Scripture
in Maximus’ Exegesis .................................................................. 185
Anagogical Exegesis as a Use of Scripture
in the Quaestiones ad Thalassium................................................ 192
Forms of Anagogy In the Quaestiones ad Thalassium......................196
Typology, Allegory, and Tropology...................... 197
Etymology ........... 203
Arithmology ........ 211
Extrapolations from Biblical Terms or Language ......................219
Notes ............................................................................................... 228
CONCLUSION ..................................................................................... 249
Notes ..................................... 256
BIBLIOGRAPHY ................................................................................. 259
GENERAL INDEX............................................................................... 273
INDEX OF THE WORKS OF MAXIMUS THE CONFESSOR.............279
INDEX OF BIBLICAL REFERENCES ................................................283
Acknowledgments
This study is the fruit of many years of interest and research in the
thought and writings of Maximus the Confessor. In substance it is the
revision of a doctoral dissertation submitted to the Department of Theology of
the University of Notre Dame in the summer of 1988. A special word of
thanks must go to Charles Kannengiesser, Huisking Professor of Theology,
for his kind supervision and encouragement, and to another esteemed teacher,
Robert L. Wilken, now of the University of Virginia, who helped me define
my interests in patristic studies. I also want to express my deep appreciation
to Harry Attridge for his advice on a few aporiai in Maximus the Confessor’s
Greek text, to Jean Laportc for his assistance with a number of bibliographical
resources, and finally to George Berthold of Sl Anselm College, a specialist
in Maximian studies, who kindly agreed to serve as a visiting reader of the
original dissertation. I am also greatly indebted to Jeannette Morgenroth
Sheerin of the University of Notre Dame Press for her critical expertise and
thoughtful interest in editing my manuscript.
Certainly my gratitude goes out to my wife Polly, and to my children
Leslie and Colin, for exercising much patience during the long term of my
research, writing, and rewriting. And to my parents back in Indianapolis, my
thanks for many a daily prayer for their son.
Emmanuel School of Religion Paul M. Blowers
Johnson City, Tennessee June, 1991
