Oleg Nogovitsin. “Definition” of nature as an argument in the Christological controversies of the VI century: μία φύσις, δύο φύσεις and the order of being according to Leontius of Byzantium and John Philoponus. Vol. 5. No. 1-2. 2020

Publication Details

“Definition” of nature as an argument in the Christological controversies of the VI century: μία φύσις, δύο φύσεις and the order of being according to Leontius of Byzantium and John Philoponus
Title in the language of publication: «Определение» природы как аргумент в христологической полемике VI века: μία φύσις, δύο φύσεις и порядок сущего у Леонтия Византийского и Иоанна Филопона
Author:
Oleg Nogovitsin
PhD in Philosophy, Senior Researcher.
Sociological institute of the Federal Center of Theoretical and Applied Sociology of the Russian Academy of Sciences.
Address: 25/14 7-ya Krasnoarmeyskaya str., St. Petersburg 190005, Russia.
Issue:
P. 143–187.
Language: Russian
Document type: Research Article
Acknowledgments:  The reported study was funded by the RFBR, project number 19-011-00778 “Leontium of Byzantium and Patristics”
DOI https://doi.org/10.31119/essephts.2020.5.1-2.7
 

Abstract

The article represents a study of the specifics of use of toolkit of philosophy in the theological dogmatic and polemical discourse of the first half — middle of the VI century. The vast introduction of models of philosophical argumentation in the course of Christological controversies of that period is associated, in the first turn, with the names of Leontius of Byzantium and John Philoponus. As different to the traditional organization model of theological discourse oriented to definition in concordance with the presence of the concepts applied in the Christological formulas in the word use of the Scriptures and limited by the polemics about strictness of their application and correctness of meanings enclosed there, in the theological polemical writings belonging to Leontius and John, the key theological concepts of “nature”, “essence” and “hypostasis” are introduced into the circle of philosophical definition and, thus shaped, are transferred into the sphere of theological argumentation and conceptualization of doctrinal theses of Christology. Within this philosophizing theology, the conceptual content and application models for philosophical concepts in argumentation and cognition, proper to the contemporary schools of Neoplatonic tradition of commentaries on the corpus of works of Aristotle, become constructive elements of development of theological and polemical arguments-objections provided to the adversary side along with the responses to such objections. As such, in the article, the application of the pivotal philosophical concept of “definition” (λόγος, ὄρος, ὁρισμός) of particular being by its common nature in the polemical argumentation by Leontius and Philoponus is considered. This study is performed in the context of analysis of controversy on the status of dogmatic formulas of “two natures in Christ” and “one complex nature of Christ” between diophysites advocated by Leontius of Byzantium and monophysites, followers of Severus of Antioch, whose position John Philoponus defended in his Christological writings.

Keywords

Leontius of Byzantium, John Philoponus, Christology, triadology, definition, nature, essence, hypostasis, μία φύσις, δύο φύσεις.

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© Oleg Nogovitsin, 2020

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