Divine Incomprehensibility and Human Faith in John Chrysostom

Although often considered a moralist, John Chrysostom frequently discusses the incomprehensibility of God. This paper both contextualizes his teaching on divine incomprehensibility within a pro-Nicene tradition and demonstrates what is particular to his own theology. It puts forward two major arguments. First, Chrysostom expands upon a pro-Nicene discourse of divine incomprehensibility – as also seen in Basil of Caesarea and Gregory of Nazianzus – to include not only the incomprehensibility of God’s essence but also the incomprehensibility of God’s economies. Second, Chrysostom’s apparently simplistic biblicism and doctrine of faith are in fact theological corollaries of this doctrine of divine incomprehensibility. In these ways, Chrysostom’s moral teaching is seen to have a robust theological basis.