Faith, Reason, and Theosis ed. by Aristotle Papanikolaou and George E. Demacopoulos (review)

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Reviewed by:

• Faith, Reason, and Theosis ed. by Aristotle Papanikolaou and George E. Demacopoulos
• Joseph Loya O.S.A.

Faith, Reason, and Theosis, Orthodox Christianity and Contemporary Thought. Edited by Aristotle Papanikolaou and George E. Demacopoulos. New York: Fordham University Press, 2023. Pp. 292. $40.00, paper.

In the Preface of Book Five of his Adversus Haereses, St. Ireneaus of Lyons directed readers to follow the Divine Logos Who became what we are, that He might bring us to be even what He is Himself; has the transcendent rationale [End Page 284] for the Incarnation ordered to such a specified profound effect ever been more substantially and succinctly rendered? The contributors to this volume quickened their intellects to claim, investigate, and extend the dimensions of theosis construed minimalistically as participation in the divine life. In their Introduction, the editors note that, in former times, Catholics and Protestants had pretty much conceded the Orthodox claim to theosis as being wholly of Orthodox provenance and "ownership." They also rightly state that Orthodox cudgeling non-Orthodox with that claim should be no more. Readers' attention is focused on how historical theologians of all three Christian traditions have recently been complexifying, stretching, and shifting heretofore common narratives and thoughts about theosis amid an "ecumenical celebration of the gift of participation in the life of God." This collection of essays testifies to the fruit of this achievement to date.

David Bentley Hart, in summoning the convictions of Nicholas of Cusa and Gregory of Nyssa, affirms that creation, incarnation, salvation, and deification are of God's one gracious act in calling the creature to realize its divine vocation: "Creation … is, in fact, theogony." Jean Porter, in agreeing with Andrew Louth that those who attempt to espy Orthodox theosis in Aquinas are liable to Westernize the very concept—and the same can be said about his doctrine of grace—avers that ecumenical dialogue can and should be initiated from respectful acknowledgement of difference.

Philip Kariatlis delineates the Christification theme in the thought of Panayiotis Nellas unto a vision of Life in Christ in and for the world. Carolyn Chau's reflection on theosis-as-kenosis highlights the Balthasarian shift from essences to the divine freedom that summons human freedom into a grace-informed communion exceeding all human imagining. Kirsi Stjerna's Luther, through the theologizing of the late Finnish scholar Tuomo Mannermaa (1937–2015), affirms justifying faith as that which endows finite and sinful humans with the ability to see, as if through God's own eyes, the design and telos of existence—Christ being the lens, reason, epistemic ground, and faith's very content for union with God.

Michele Watkins, prescinding from deluded consciousness of the self and the other, predicates theosis as a holistically redemptive experience that counteracts against all powers endeavoring to perpetuate the disfigurement of humanity, requiring radical self-love, mimesis, penance, and reconciliation with both the living and the ancestral community. For William Abraham, securing theological truth-claims and attaining to the full contours of Christian belief involves marshalling the critical place of the truth of divine revelation. In doing [End Page 285] so, two Wesleyan affirmations should not be neglected: the struggle against sin and evil are important elements in the healing of our spiritual senses, and it is God, not ourselves, who ultimately brings about conspicuous sanctity.

Andrew Prevot bids us not to be suspicious, daunted, or fearful in facing new insights proposed by modern and postmodern treatments of theosis, the occasion of hope for another possible world that it is. Robert Glenn Davis presents Vladimir Lossky's reading of Eckhart's dialect of distinction and identity as anticipatory of a new vision of selfhood that, as grounded in theotic reality, cuts across the putative division of Western individualism and Eastern relationality. Peter Bouteneff, in his characteristically lucid writing style, highlights points in the Dionysian corpus that constellate around the core goal of divine/human communion, a communion derived from a process that entails a radical redirection of the human mind that is both subject and agent of that redirection.

Ashly Purpura presents—via Simeon the New Theologian and Nicholas Cabasilus—a mode of knowing and speaking to God and...