Fulgentius of Ruspe and the Scythian Monks: Correspondence on Christology and Grace
Overview
St. Fulgentius of Ruspe was perhaps the most brilliant North African theologian in the era after St. Augustine’s death. He wrote widely on theological and moral issues. Between the years AD 519 and 523, Fulgentius engaged in correspondence with a group of Latin-speaking monks from Scythia, and that correspondence is translated into English—almost all of it for the first time—in this volume.
The correspondence is significant because it stands at the intersection of two great theological discussions: the primarily Eastern Christological controversies between the Fourth Ecumenical Council in 451 and the Fifth in 553, and the largely Western Semi-Pelagian controversy, which ran from 427 to the Second Synod of Orange in 529. Contemporary Western scholars normally treat these controversies over Christ and grace separately, but there were noteworthy points of contact between the two discussions, and Fulgentius and the Scythian monks were the ones who drew the connections between Christology and grace most strongly.
These connections suggest that we today may do well to treat Christology and grace more as two sides of the same coin than as separate theological issues. Both sets of issues deal fundamentally with the relation between God and humanity: Christological questions ask how the divine and human are related in the person of the Savior, and grace-related questions ask how the divine and human are linked in the conversion, Christian life, and final salvation of each Christian. Thus, Fulgentius’s correspondence with the Scythian monks can do more than simply aid understanding of sixth-century Byzantine/Roman theology. It can also contribute to our contemporary thinking on the relation between two of the Christian faith’s most central doctrines.
For The Fathers of the Church series in its entirety, see Fathers of the Church Series (127 vols.).
Key Features
- Connects theology regarding Christ to the doctrines of grace
- Theologically charged correspondence on timeless topics
- One of 127 published volumes in a well-respected series on the Church Fathers
Top Highlights
“‘For the law brings about wrath, and where there is no law there is no transgression,’94 and: ‘Scripture has shut up all things under sin so that justification might be given to believers by the faith of Jesus Christ.’95 Therefore, the law without grace can point to the sickness, but it cannot heal it. It shows the wounds, but it does not administer the medicine. But grace inwardly administers help so that one may fulfill the precept of the law. And just as the law reveals guilt, grace grants forgiveness.” (Pages 153–154)
“And who advised Cornelius the centurion when an angel was sent to instruct him to summon the Apostle Peter,32 if not the one who freely imparted to the same centurion the gift of both fearing God and acting worthily? But so that God might remember Cornelius’s prayers and alms, he earlier remembered Cornelius himself, not for some good work that Cornelius had done, but for his own pleasure, so that he might impart to him the gift of fearing God, by which gift he inspired in him a zeal for alms and a love of holy prayer. Therefore, the one who found in Cornelius that which was pleasing in his sight was God himself, who granted Cornelius the grace to please him.” (Pages 136–137)
“In fact, what was chosen and loved in Jacob was not human works but the divine gifts. On the contrary, since ‘our wickedness highlights God’s righteousness,’15 there is no doubt that the wickedness of human iniquity was condemned in Esau. In that, to be sure, God shows in Jacob the free beneficence of his mercy, by which beneficence he saw fit to adopt Jacob by his free grace. For he did not choose him because of the merits of any future good work, but instead he foreknew that both faith and good works were going to be given to him.” (Page 112)
- Title: Fulgentius of Ruspe and the Scythian Monks: Correspondence on Christology and Grace
- Authors: Fulgentius of Ruspe, Scythian Monks
- Series: The Fathers of the Church
- Volume: 126
- Publisher: Catholic University of America
- Print Publication Date: 2013
- Logos Release Date: 2014
- Pages: 260
- Era: era:byzantine
- Language: English
- Resources: 1
- Format: Digital › Logos Research Edition
- Subjects: Fulgentius, Saint, Bishop of Ruspa, 468-533 › Correspondence; Jesus Christ › Person and offices--Early works to 1800; Free will and determinism › Early works to 1800; Grace (Theology) › Early works to 1800
- ISBNs: 9780813201269, 0813201268
- Resource ID: LLS:FLGNTSSCYTHNMNK
- Resource Type: text.monograph.letters
- Metadata Last Updated: 2024-03-25T19:43:38Z
About Fulgentius
Fulgentius of Ruspe (460-533 AD) was bishop of the city of Ruspe, North Africa, in the 5th and 6th century.