The mass -- one is reluctant to say ‘wealth’ -- of early Church writings is simply astounding. This mass is as fascinating as it is boring, frequently dealing with hot topics and issues that are no longer of interest or relevance to us. What is fascinating is the extent to which these ponderings, exhortations, disquisitions and discourses take place within a larger and completely pagan context.
Unlike their Protestant counterparts plus a thousand years later, these Christians are not out and about monotonously pounding tribal Jewish texts. The Old Testament gets used as a collection of moral metaphors and to provide a theory of divine historicity for Christian Faith. But the conversation that is really taking place is with pagan participants and counterparts.
The Fathers quote pagan philosophers, pagan laws, pagan poetry, pagan theology pagan myths and legends as if it was yesterday’s news. And not just “quote” -- the engagement is with the larger antecedent culture in all respects. The early church doctors were not out cavilling in the Judean desert to a bunch of Israelite shepherds. That was Jesus’s mission. These men were cavilling in Rome, Constantinople, Milan and Alexandria.
This cultural tradition was so ancient and familiar that issues could almost be (and in a certain sense were) argued by the numbers. One could say, Plotinus Enniad 7 ... Ah yes.. but Lucretius De Rerum Natura. And so when Church Fathers said “ius bellum” -- everyone understood, Ah Yes, Cicero ... but Socrates to Polemarchus.
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