To continue from my previous post (#177)...
Just finished Bouteneff's Beginnings. I'm glad someone pushed me to read the whole thing! Some notes I took...
1.) I thought Bouteneff did a very good job presenting the complexities of Patristic exegesis, and supplying their context in time and space. To let sources speak for themselves is important, as is supplying background context, and Bouteneff's presentation of both was objective and judicial.
2.) The book demonstrates with due evidence that one trend in the Patristic exegetical approach to Genesis was decisively christological. In other words, Christ is essential to how we understand Genesis. To this end, St. Irenaeus argued that "Christ- the crucified Christ- is the one by whom we rightly read the Scriptures" and that the crucified and risen Christ actually precedes Adam, so that Adam is "made in the image of the incarnate Christ (AH 4.33.4)." The exegesis of other fathers is characterized by a similar typology.
3.) An exception to this christological focus is Theophilus of Antioch, who argues for the strictly factual character of Genesis. Theophilus uses this argument as a rebuttal to polytheistic mythology, and with an understanding that "myth" carried a connotation of falsity or duplicity.
4.) The later Cappadocian fathers resisted radical allegory, e.g. the type promoted by Origen which disassociated Genesis entirely from any grounding in physical reality (exasperated, Basil comments that "Grass is grass!") and "where the original word bears no perception to its alleged true (spiritual) meaning." Nevertheless spiritual edification remains the ultimate goal for Basil and he "interpreted more literally, typologically, practically, or allegorically depending on his hearers and on the needs of the moment." The biblical narrative, he insists, is "not about physical science"; in fact, "it is enough to say, 'God created heaven and earth.'"
5.) An important distinction is drawn between allegory and typology. On the nature of typology there seems to be little consensus: Melito of Sardis "spoke consistently of the obsolescence of the type," while Tertullian believed that "something used figuratively to express some other thing must have a prior existence for itself (De res. 30)." Bouteneff aptly points out, however, that "types can be found in entirely fictional persons and events, even characters in parables. And in the liturgical and prayer life of the church, figures from historical chronicles often exist side by side with manifestly fictional ones. A fourth-century prayer attributed to Basil and used in the Orthodox Church to this day features the line 'Receive me, O Christ, who loves all, as you received the prostitute, the thief, the publican, and the prodigal.' The first two appear in the NT as participants in Christ's early life; the second two are characters in his parables. But they are invoked together in one breath, playing identical roles in evoking a single attitude of prayer."
There is much more to discuss in the book but this is all I have time to comment on for now. I apologize if what I wrote is excessive or confusing, but having finally read the entire book, I once again highly, highly recommend it. It will give you much to consider, especially if you are new to this topic!
6.) Regarding a six-day sequence of creation, Bouteneff describes the ways in which Basil took this "quite literally, drawing implications for what can be seen empirically" according to "ideas about the natural world [that] are often dependent on Aristotle." Nevertheless, Basil "insists at the beginning that neither his homilies nor the scriptural account are about science. Instead, the details of the narrative show that 'the world was not devised at random or to no purpose, but to contribute to some useful end and to the great advantage of all beings...' (In Hex. 1.6). ... For him, the primary message of creation in all its beauty and order is that the Craftsman is great beyond measure." Thus, while Basil "appears to take for granted that the days of creation were twenty-four hour periods, yet he follows with a discussion of ages and eras: 'Therefore, whether you say 'day' or 'age' you will express the same idea. If, then, that condition should be called 'day,' it is one and not many, or if to my should be named 'age,' it would be unique and not manifold. In order, therefore, to lead our thoughts to a future life, he called that day 'one,' which is an image of eternity; the beginning of days, the contemporary of Light, the holy Lord's day, the day honored by the Resurrection of the Lord.'" Irenaeus, meanwhile, as observed earlier, upsets a standard chronological interpretation in favor of christological typology.
7.) Bouteneff ties this to the typological idea of recapitulation, wherein "Christ joined the end to the beginning, recapitulating all nations, languages, and generations in himself. ...The nature of recapitulation, which puts Christ at the center of the human trajectory from creation to salvation, is therefore such that Iraneaus can speak of Adam as being made in the image of the Incarnate Christ (AH 4.33.4)." This "trajectory of thinking, which cannily stands temporal chronology on its head, was definitive for the Patristic era and right on through the fourteenth century in Nicholas Cabasilas, who puts it this way: 'It was for the New Man that human nature was created at the beginning...It was not the old Adam who was the model for the new, but the new Adam for the old...' ...Typology must be understood against the backdrop of this reconfiguration of history, which, then, began not in some calendrically datable time five thousand, six thousand, or even 13.7 billion years ago, but with Christ and his incarnation, and, even more, with his passion. Indeed, to the extent we dwell with the fathers in this perspective, the significance of the age of the world is entirely limited to the sphere of science and bears no theological significance whatsoever."
8.) The use of Adam, Bouteneff notes, was initially genealogical. Yet "for the Scriptural authors as well as some of the Second Temple writers examined here, Adam played the role alternately of first patriarch and, more commonly, of first human- and, as such, a symbol of 'human nature.' The latter concept- nascent, at most, in the Bible- grew in significance as the early Christian writers elaborated on Adam as forefather. Yet still more than being identified as originator and therefore a symbol of humanity, Adam- now not so much as genealogical forebear but as a kind of emblem-comes to stand for fallen humanity. ... From Paul onward- even if the Gospel authors did not fully catch on- Adam represents humanity of the old dispensation; he is the old man that is to be put off in order to put on the new man, Christ [this returns to the notion of christological typology]. ...In Patristic and liturgical expression alike, "Adam," as a term taken on to to own, primarily signified humanity redeemed in Christ."
9.) A final note on the earlier-discussed nature of typology: "Tertullian's insistence on the concrete historicity of the type was unique up to his time. It found further expression later among the Antiochene exegetes, notably Diodore of Tarsus and Theodore of Mopsuestia, who were concerned with the validity of the OT on its own terms and not solely on a collective prefiguration of Christ. ...Generally, however, the insistence on the concrete was nearly always a
reactive tendency, whether against Origen, as we find, for example, in Eustathius, or against other trends. (It is not clear whether the so-called Antiochene reaction arose against an exaggerated concept of Alexandrian allegory or against the emperor Julian's assertion that Christianity was mere mythos.) Yet in the end, the perceived necessity of the type's (or symbol's) correctness is, as it were, a recessive gene in the Eastern Christian's DNA. It is certainly not reflected in the church's liturgical dimensions. Young summarizes Patristic exegesis (including that of the Antiochenes) thus: "It is not the 'historical event' as such which makes typology what it is; it is the sense of recapitulation, the 'impress' of one narrative or symbol on another, 'fulfilling' it and so giving it meaning." The need for a symbol or type to be concrete is hardly a foregone conclusion. As typology functions, the type is, at any rate, fulfilled and given its true sense in the person, thing, or event that it typifies. With allegory the situation is more variable. Genesis 1, however its details are interpreted and however one translates them (or not) into science and history, concerns the physical earth, water, flora, and fauna that we know. The Song of Songs, however, derives its entire significance as a story of God's love for us rather than as a Canaanite wedding hymn."
Bouteneff's conclusion is therefore as follows: "...
The point is not, then, whether the fathers took the seven “days” or Adam
to be historical. For the fathers, as for us, the historicity question has much
more to do with how narrative, and scriptural narrative specifically, works to
convey its message—something that both the fathers and we understand in
a variety of ways. As to the end result, however, none of the fathers‘ strictly
theological or moral conclusions—about creation, or about humanity and its
redemption, and the coherence of everything in Christ—has anything to tlo
with the datable chronology of the creation of the universe or with the physical
existence of Adam and Eve.
...
If we follow the fathers, we will see the Genesis creation accounts as God’s
uniquely chosen vehicle to express his truth about cosmic and human origins and
the dynamics of sin and death, all recapitulated and cohering in the person of
Christ. However we might reckon the narratives' relationship to the unfolding of
events in historical time, our gaze will he fixed decidedly on the New Adam."
As we have seen in the above points, this conclusion is well-substantiated in the Patristic focus on christological typology. The Patristic emphasis was clearly on the implications of the narrative, specifically through typology, rather than the historicity of the narrative in itself.
I apologize again for the length!
