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THE FATHERS OF THE CHURCH A NEW TRANSLATION VOLUME 58 THE FATHERS OF THE CHURCH A NEW TRANSLATION EDITORIAL BOARD Roy JOSEPH DEFERRARI The Catholic University ot America Editorial Director MSGR. JAMES A. MAGNER BERNARD M. PEEBLES The Catholic University of America The Catholic University of America MARTIN R. P. MCGuIRE REV. THOMAS HALTON The Catholic University of America The Catholic University of America ROBERT P. RUSSELL,O.S.A. WILLIAM R. TONGUE Villanova University The Catholic University ot America HERMIGILD DRESSLER, O.F.M. REv. PETER J. RAHILL The Catholic University ot America The Catholic University ot America SISTER M. JOSEPHINE BRENNAN, I.H.M. Marywood College SAINT GREGORY OF NYSSA ASCETICAL WORKS Translated by VIRGINIA WOODS CALLAHAN Howard University Washington, DC. THE CATHOLIC UNIVERSITY OF AMERICA PRESS Washington, D.C. 20017 NIHIL OBSTAT: JOHN C. SELNER, S.S. Censor Librorum IMPRIMATUR: + PATRICKA. O'BOYLE, D.D. Archbishop of Washington The Nihil obstat and Imprimatur are official declarations that a book or pamphlet is free of doctrinal or moral error. No implication is contained therein that those who have granted the Nihil obstat and Imprimatur agree with the contents, opinions, or statements expressed. Copyright © 1967 THE CATHOLIC UNIVERSITY OF AMERICA PRESS All rights reserved Reprinted 1990 First short-run reprint 1999 Library of Congress Catalog Card No.: 66-30561 ISBN 0-8132-0969-2 To the dear memory of the great scholar WERNER JAEGER who taught us to know and understand St. Gregory of Nyssa this volume is affectionately and gratefully dedicated. CONTENTS Page INTRODUCTION IX Preface XX ON VIRGINITY 3 ON WHAT IT MEANS TO CALL ONESELF A CHRISTIAN 79 ON PERFECTION 93 ON THE CHRISTIAN MODE OF LIFE 125 THE LIFE OF SAINT MACRINA . . 161 ON THE SOUL AND THE RESURRECTION 195 INDICES 275 vii INTRODUCTION f'!'IlI"!!:.'!'l;l'1!i F THE THREE CAPPADOCIAN FATHERS of the Church, St. Basil, St. Gregory of N azianzus, and St. Gregory of Nyssa, the last is the least well-known and until re cently the most neglected. His brother, St. Basil, called the Great, is famous as the founder of monasticism in the East and as a forceful opponent of the Arian heresy. Their close friend, St. Gregory of Nazianzus, is renowned for the glory of his eloquence and the sweetness of his poetry. And yet at the Ecumenical Council of 787, St. Gregory of Nyssa was given the title 'Father of the Fathers.' Modern writers agree that 'he sur passed the other Cappadocians as a philosopher and the ologian,'l that he was 'more learned and profound'2 than the others, that he was 'possibly the most versatile theologian of the century,'3 and that 'as a speculative theologian and mystic he is certainly the most gifted of the three:4 The importance of St. Gregory of Nyssa is attested to particularly by the fact that Werner Jaeger, the great Hellenist of our time, devoted much of the last twenty years of his life to the editing of the first critical edition of his complete works and that the distin guished theologian, Jean Danielou, S.]., has returned again and again to a consideration of his life and work. In the Christian world of the fourth century, the family of St. Gregory of Nyssa was distinguished for its leadership in civic and religious affairs in the region of the Roman Empire known as the Pontus. Cardinal Newman, in an essay on the 1 B. Altaner, Patrology (New York 1960) 352. 2 J. M. Campbell, The Greek Fathers (New York 1963) 62. 3 H. V. Campenhausen, The Fathers of the Greek Church (New York 1955) 109. 4 J. Quasten, Patrology 3 (Westminster 1963) 254. IX