{"product_id":"suffering-of-impassible-god-oecs-ncs-paper-the-dialectics-of-patristic-thought-oxford-early-christian-studies","title":"SUFFERING OF IMPASSIBLE GOD OECS:NCS PAPER: The Dialectics of Patristic Thought (Oxford Early Christian Studies)","description":"\u003cp\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eBook info:\u003c\/strong\u003e SUFFERING OF IMPASSIBLE GOD OECS:NCS PAPER: The Dialectics of Patristic Thought (Oxford Early Christian Studies) (Paperback, 223 pages) – Oxford University Press, 2006. Language: English.\u003c\/p\u003e\n This book provides a major reconsideration of the issue of divine suffering and divine emotions in the early Church Fathers. Patristic writers are commonly criticized for falling prey to Hellenistic philosophy and uncritically accepting the claim that God cannot suffer or feel emotions. Gavrilyuk shows that this view represents a misreading of evidence. In contrast, he construes the development of patristic thought as a series of dialectical turning points taken to safeguard the paradox of God's voluntary and salvific suffering in the Incarnation.  \n        From the Back Cover   'The book provides a major reconsideration of the notion of divine impassibility in patristic thought. The question whether, in what sense, and under what circumstances suffering may be ascribed to God runs as a golden thread through such major controversies as Docetism, Patrispassianism, Arianism, and Nestorianism. It is commonly claimed that in these debates patristic theology fell prey to the assumption of Hellenistic philosophy about impassibility of God and departed from the allegedly biblical view, according to which God is passible. As a result, patristic theology is presented as claiming that only the human nature of Christ suffered, while the divine nature remained unaffected. \u003cbr\u003ePaul Gavrilyuk argues that this standard view misrepresents the tradition. In contrast, he construes the development of patristic thought as a series of turning points taken to safeguard the paradox of God's voluntary suffering in the flesh. For the Fathers the attribute of divine impassibility functioned in a restricted sense as an apophatic qualifier of all divine emotions and as an indicator of God's full and undiminished divinity. The Fathers at the same time admitted qualified divine passibility of the Son of God within the framework of the Incarnation.\u003cbr\u003eGavrilyuk shows that the Docetic, Arian and Nestorian alternatives represent different attempts at dissolving the paradox of the Incarnation. These three alternatives are alike in that they start with the presupposition of God's unrestricted impassibility: the Docetic view proposes to give up the reality of Christ's human experiences; the Arian position sacrifices Christ's undiminished divinity; while the Nestorian alternative isolates the experiences and sufferings of Christ's humanity from his Godhead. In contrast to these alternatives, the mind of the Church succeeded in keeping God's transcendence and undiminished divinity in tension with God's intimate involvement in human suffering. It is precisely because God's divinity and transcendence are never lost in suffering that the Incarnation becomes a genuine act of divine compassion, capable of transforming and healing the human condition.'           About the Author   Paul L. Gavrilyuk is the Aquinas Chair in Theology and Philosophy at the Theology Department of the University of St. Thomas in St Paul, Minnesota, USA. He is the author or editor of five books, including Georges Florovsky and the Russian Religious Renaissance (Oxford, 2013) and The Spiritual Senses: Perceiving God in Western Christianity (Cambridge, 2011), co-edited with Sarah Coakley. The Suffering of the Impassible God has been translated into Spanish and Romanian and will appear in Brasilian Portuguese in 2014.      ","brand":"Paul L. GAVRILYUK","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":46069055848682,"sku":"9780199297115","price":63.71,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0714\/5301\/6298\/files\/61jfzu4XR3L._SL1500.jpg?v=1781199190","url":"https:\/\/textbookme.store\/products\/suffering-of-impassible-god-oecs-ncs-paper-the-dialectics-of-patristic-thought-oxford-early-christian-studies","provider":"TextbookMe","version":"1.0","type":"link"}