Saint Gregory of Nyssa Ascetical Works

313 Pages·1999·22.981 MB·English

by  St. Gregory of Nyssa, Virginia Woods Callahan (Translator)

THE FATHERS
OF THE CHURCH
A NEW TRANSLATION
VOLUME 58
THE FATHERS
OF THE CHURCH
A NEW TRANSLATION
EDITORIAL BOARD
Roy JOSEPH DEFERRARI
The Catholic University ot America
Editorial Director
MSGR. JAMES A. MAGNER BERNARD M. PEEBLES
The Catholic University of America The Catholic University of America
MARTIN R. P. MCGuIRE REV. THOMAS HALTON
The Catholic University of America The Catholic University of America
ROBERT P. RUSSELL,O.S.A. WILLIAM R. TONGUE
Villanova University The Catholic University ot America
HERMIGILD DRESSLER, O.F.M. REv. PETER J. RAHILL
The Catholic University ot America The Catholic University ot America
SISTER M. JOSEPHINE BRENNAN, I.H.M.
Marywood College
SAINT GREGORY
OF NYSSA
ASCETICAL WORKS
Translated by
VIRGINIA WOODS CALLAHAN
Howard University
Washington, DC.
THE CATHOLIC UNIVERSITY OF AMERICA PRESS
Washington, D.C. 20017
NIHIL OBSTAT:
JOHN C. SELNER, S.S.
Censor Librorum
IMPRIMATUR:
+
PATRICKA. O'BOYLE, D.D.
Archbishop of Washington
The Nihil obstat and Imprimatur are official declarations that a book or
pamphlet is free of doctrinal or moral error. No implication is contained
therein that those who have granted the Nihil obstat and Imprimatur
agree with the contents, opinions, or statements expressed.
Copyright © 1967
THE CATHOLIC UNIVERSITY OF AMERICA PRESS
All rights reserved
Reprinted 1990
First short-run reprint 1999
Library of Congress Catalog Card No.: 66-30561
ISBN 0-8132-0969-2
To the dear memory of the great scholar
WERNER JAEGER
who taught us to know and understand St.
Gregory of Nyssa this volume is affectionately
and gratefully dedicated.

CONTENTS
Page
INTRODUCTION IX
Preface XX
ON VIRGINITY 3
ON WHAT IT MEANS TO CALL
ONESELF A CHRISTIAN 79
ON PERFECTION 93
ON THE CHRISTIAN MODE OF LIFE 125
THE LIFE OF SAINT MACRINA . . 161
ON THE SOUL AND THE RESURRECTION 195
INDICES 275
vii

INTRODUCTION
f'!'IlI"!!:.'!'l;l'1!i F THE THREE CAPPADOCIAN FATHERS of the Church, St.
Basil, St. Gregory of N azianzus, and St. Gregory of
Nyssa, the last is the least well-known and until re
cently the most neglected. His brother, St. Basil, called the
Great, is famous as the founder of monasticism in the East and
as a forceful opponent of the Arian heresy. Their close friend,
St. Gregory of Nazianzus, is renowned for the glory of his
eloquence and the sweetness of his poetry. And yet at the
Ecumenical Council of 787, St. Gregory of Nyssa was given the
title 'Father of the Fathers.' Modern writers agree that 'he sur
passed the other Cappadocians as a philosopher and the
ologian,'l that he was 'more learned and profound'2 than the
others, that he was 'possibly the most versatile theologian of
the century,'3 and that 'as a speculative theologian and mystic
he is certainly the most gifted of the three:4 The importance of
St. Gregory of Nyssa is attested to particularly by the fact that
Werner Jaeger, the great Hellenist of our time, devoted much
of the last twenty years of his life to the editing of the first
critical edition of his complete works and that the distin
guished theologian, Jean Danielou, S.]., has returned again
and again to a consideration of his life and work.
In the Christian world of the fourth century, the family of
St. Gregory of Nyssa was distinguished for its leadership in
civic and religious affairs in the region of the Roman Empire
known as the Pontus. Cardinal Newman, in an essay on the
1 B. Altaner, Patrology (New York 1960) 352.
2 J. M. Campbell, The Greek Fathers (New York 1963) 62.
3 H. V. Campenhausen, The Fathers of the Greek Church (New York
1955) 109.
4 J. Quasten, Patrology 3 (Westminster 1963) 254.
IX