Macrina the Younger: Philosopher of God, Gregory of Nyssa,The Life of Macrina, On the Soul and the Resurrection

280 Pages·2008·2.03 MB·French

by  Anna M. Silvas

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MACRINA THE YOUNGER,
PHILOSOPHER OF GOD
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MEDIEVAL WOMEN: TEXTS AND CONTEXTS
Editorial Board under the auspices of the
Centre for Medieval Studies, University of Hull
Renate Blumenfeld-Kosinski, University of Pittsburgh
Juliette Dor, Université de Liège
Constant J. Mews, Monash University
Anneke Mulder-Bakker, Rijksuniversiteit Groningen
Barbara Newman, Northwestern University
Gabriella Signori, Universität Konstanz
Nicholas Watson, Harvard University
Jocelyn Wogan-Browne, Fordham University
Previously published volumes in this series are listed at the back of this book.
VOLUME 22
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MACRINA THE YOUNGER,
PHILOSOPHER OF GOD
Anna M. Silvas
H
F
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British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data
Macrina the Younger, philosopher of God. – (Medieval women : texts and contexts ; v. 22)
1. Macrina, the Younger, Saint, ca. 330-379 or 380 2. Macrina, the Younger, Saint, ca.
330-379 or 380 – Sources 3. Christian women saints – Biography – Sources 4. Christian
saints – Biography – Sources
I. Gregory, of Nyssa, Saint, ca. 335–ca. 394 II. Silvas, Anna
230.1'4'092
ISBN-13: 9782503523903
© 2008, 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/2008/0095/30
ISBN: 978-2-503-52390-3
Printed in the E.U. on acid-free paper
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(cid:97)
Dedicated to Barbara Shea,
a dear friend and sister in the Lord
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CONTENTS
Preface and Acknowledgments ix
Abbreviations xii
General Introduction 1
Testimonies of St Basil the Great 55
Epigrams of St Gregory the Theologian 79
Gregory of Nyssa, Letter 19 83
The Life of Macrina, Introduction 93
Gregory of Nyssa, The Life of Macrina 109
On the Soul and the Resurrection, Introduction 149
Gregory of Nyssa, On the Soul and the Resurrection 171
Macrina, A Letter Writer? 247
Bibliography 249
General Index 257
Index of Scriptural Citations and Allusions 260
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PREFACE AND ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
‘He became renowned everywhere under the sun and by his reputation
eclipsed all those who were illustrious for virtue’ (VSM 8.4). So
Gregory of Nyssa describes his brother, St Basil the Great, hinting that
in his shadow were others of outstanding virtue who deserved to be better known.
Macrina their eldest sister was one of them. He begins The Life of Macrina by
describing her as one ‘who had raised herself by philosophy to the highest summit
of human virtue’, and that if her life were to remain ‘veiled in silence’, it would
have passed by ineffectually (VSM 1.5). He resolved therefore to bring into the
light by means of his literary craft the life of virtue and the Christian intellectual
calibre of his remarkable sister, St Macrina (c. 327–79), called the Younger to
distinguish her from her grandmother, St Macrina the Elder (c. 275–c. 340s).
The aim of the present book is to renew Gregory’s purpose again for an English-
speaking readership, by gathering all the documents relating to Macrina, trans-
lating them afresh, and supplying scholarly commentary.
In 1998 the author presented to an English-speaking readership a comprehen-
sive collection of the biographical sources concerning two great women of the
twelfth century in Jutta and Hildegard: The Biographical Sources. In the succeeding
years her attention turned to the beginnings of Christian monasticism in fourth-
century AD Asia Minor. This research culminated in a comprehensive study pub-
lished as The Asketikon of St Basil the Great. The probing of Basil’s personal devel-
opment as a Christian ascetic and the earliest development of his teaching on the
ascetic life soon highlighted the figure of his elder sister, Macrina, and the transfor-
mations of the family household at Annisa under her guidance. The more one
looked into it, the clearer it became that this household was not less than the
crucible of those changes in Basil’s thinking that took place between 358, when he
began his ascetic life in the retreat by the river Iris, and 365/66, when he was
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x Preface and Acknowledgments
presenting an already well worked out doctrine of ‘cenobitic’ or ‘common life’
monasticism in his Small Asketikon. Credit must be given to Macrina, that woman
‘illustrious for virtue’, who anticipated and led the way for Basil and has a just claim
thereby to be called ‘Mother of Greek Monasticism’.
Atttention also turned to the person of Macrina’s younger brother and biog-
rapher, resulting in my book St Gregory of Nyssa: The Letters. Especially important
for our understanding of Gregory’s chronology is his Letter 19, which is also the
earliest documentation of Macrina’s existence, written less than a year after her
death. This important letter had never before appeared in English. It seemed timely
that the author attempt to do for Macrina what had been done for Jutta and
Hildegard. The opportunity came, thanks to an Australian Research Council
Postdoctoral Fellowship.
The result is the present book in which all the sources of Macrina’s life have
been collected for the first time, translated afresh from Greek into English, and
supplemented with up-to-date introductions and notes. The sources include
1. testimonies of St Basil, who, though his surviving works never mention
Macrina by name, attests Macrina’s influence in his vigorous defence of female
asceticism;
2. the Epigrams of Gregory Nazianzen on Macrina and her family which attest
Macrina’s existence and her outstanding qualities independently of Gregory of
Nyssa;
3. Gregory of Nyssa’s Letter 19, here presented for the first time in English and
accompanied by a detailed consideration of chronology;
4. Gregory of Nyssa’s The Life of Macrina, a jewel of fourth-century Christian
biography; and
5. the dialogue On the Soul and the Resurrection in which Macrina appears as ‘the
Teacher’ expounding Christian doctrine with reasoned argument.
Introducing the book is a study of Macrina’s life and family, the contemporary
history of the Church, and the emergence of Christian monasticism in Asia Minor.
It describes the gradual transformation of the family household of Annisa into the
proto-monastic community that is reflected in Basil’s Small Asketikon (c. 365).
Macrina’s title of ‘Philosopher’ deserves comment. It is intended here in the
sense that it was used in Christian circles in Macrina and Gregory’s day. This sense
of it began with Socratic teaching that it is futile to seek truth through dialectical
reasoning without a commitment to seeking the good through the cultivation of
virtue at the same time. Traditional Hellenism used ‘philosopher’ to mean some-
one who has committed himself to a way of life involving both intellectual and
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