PRELIMINARY ENQUIRIES INTO THE PLACE OF THE LATERCULUS MALALIANUS AMONG THE CHRONICLES OF LATE ANTIQUITY 

and to return to this site to comment.

The Christology of Theodore of Tarsus

Aside from the obvious, more practical contributions enumerated by Bede, including the consolidation of authority in the office of the Archbishop of Canterbury, the reduction in size of dioceses and the consecration of appropriate bishops, the establishment of an exceptional school in Canterbury, and the application of a conciliar model for decision-making, I suggest that what Theodore brought to bear on the Church here was a theological perspective on christological matters that was aligned more closely with the Greek, and particularly Antiochene, tradition than with the Latin tradition, an exegetical approach that again was more rigorously Antiochene than anything else, and an application of certain sources, such as Ephrem the Syrian and Irenaeus of Lyons, that would colour the British theological and ecclesiastical landscape for generations to come.

For the sake of time, I will skip over the substantial insights to be gleaned from the Canterbury Commentaries – biblical glosses gathered from the lectures of Theodore and Hadrian at the school, discovered by the German palaeographer Bernard Bischoff and edited by both he and Michael Lapidge – in favour of those to be drawn from the Laterculus Malalianus.

First of all, I want to comment on the style of the Laterculus. Jane Stevenson, whose work on the text first brought it to public notice in 1994, has provided us with a great deal of commentary on it, including numerous suggestions without which I would not have been able to undertake my own work. One of the most important things she accomplished with the text, however, was to identify its hermeneutical style, which she showed to be strongly Antiochene in orientation. That this is the case is born out across each chapter, as Theodore employs typology and a rigorous analysis of historical detail to different aspects of the life of Christ. This approach to Scripture differs from its ‘rival’ Alexandrian approach by the avoidance of allegory – that is, the exposition of a biblical text according to an extra-biblical, spiritual meaning. It is an important difference, especially since a great deal of suspicion was levelled at the Antiochene exegetical method in light of the christological controversies that dominated the fourth and fifth centuries. But the particular hermeneutic of the Laterculus is only a part of the picture, as it is proffers only the beginning of any insight into what Theodore was to bring to the British Church in his time. The rest, while related to hermeneutic, held greater meaning for theology.

I was in the midst of reading a paper by William Ralston in a small volume on Christian anthropology when the key to reading Theodore’s Laterculus virtually fell into my lap. It struck me just how much Theodore uses the terminology of restoration in his work, and how much his meaning seemed to correspond to the meaning of recapitulation set forward by Irenaeus, the second-century bishop of Lyons.

Scholars are virtually universal in their judgment that the doctrine of recapitulation, which would act as the nucleus around which the Greek Christian tradition’s primary christological attitude would develop, is the theological brainchild of this early Christian apologist. Using the Apostle Paul’s statement from Ephesians 1:9-10, that ‘[God] has made known to us in all wisdom and insight the mystery of his will, according to his purpose which he set forth in Christ as a plan for the fullness of time, to unite all things in him, things in heaven and things on earth,’ as his starting point, Irenaeus interpreted the Greek verb anakefalaiosasthai, literally as ‘to re-head’, thereby portraying the purpose of God’s Incarnation as the ‘re-heading’ (or the ‘summing up’) of all creation. The implications of this idea are immense, and were certainly not lost on the Fathers who came after Irenaeus, as they set their minds to even deeper considerations of the meaning and purpose of the Incarnation.

Recapitulation begins with the idea that humankind was created in the image and likeness of God. As the story goes, shortly after humanity’s creation, we succumbed to the sin of disobedience, thereby losing God’s likeness. The head of our race, Adam, intended to be our prototype, became instead the means by which order was rendered into disorder, life was turned into death. The solution to this problem was for a second Adam to come and take up our cause and be our champion. The disorder could only be set right if God took on the clothes of Adam, and re-ordered those things which had come to afflict us as a result of the first transgression. This is what he did in the Logos. God the Word took on flesh, lived through every aspect of what it is to be human, and thereby put to right everything that was wrong with us. He liberated us from death, and by becoming this new, triumphant prototype, made it possible for humankind to once again bear his likeness, just as he bore ours. By this exchange, Irenaeus taught that God ‘recapitulated’ us; that is, he gave us a new head in the second Adam. A brief summary of this divine work he set out in the phrase, ‘God became what we are in order that we might become what he is.’
Other theologians of the Church – most notably Athanasius – would take up this theme and develop it further, eventually establishing as the Incarnation’s primary purpose the deification of human beings; what the Greeks call theosis.

Theodore does not use Athanasius’ language of deification, but his appeal to the restorative side of recapitulation is indubitable. By some means, Irenaeus has taken a firm hold on Theodore’s theological imagination, and influenced the way he interpreted and taught concerning the person and work of Christ.

Now, I say ‘by some means’ partly because it has not yet become clear to me just how it is that Theodore encountered Irenaeus. One possible channel is Ephrem the Syrian, whom I introduced you to earlier. The christological imagery Ephrem uses in his poetry is often reminiscent of Irenaeus, and sometimes even directly evocative of a question originally raised by him. A parallel drawn between the Virgin Mary and virgin earth, for example, used originally by Irenaeus to illustrate the role Mary played in God’s work of recapitulation, is taken up by Ephrem almost word for word. This being the case, it is possible that Theodore actually took his cue from the Syriac father whom he so explicitly revered.

That Theodore took more from Ephrem is certain. I have already mentioned Theodore’s interest in medicine in terms of his having studied it when at Constantinople. This interest in reflected in the Laterculus by means of the attention paid to gestational theory, and the meaning he was able to draw from it as it related to his greater purpose of restoration. But this interest also extended to medicine as a metaphor for Christ’s work among human beings. The idea of Christ as a Physician of souls is one we may take for granted now, but the way it was employed by Ephrem in the fourth century was quite original. Others, such as Ambrose and Augustine used it to describe how Christ acted on human sins. Ephrem used it much more broadly, and in terms of what the Incarnate Logos did for wounded humanity. It is this latter use that Theodore makes of the image, as if seeing the particular way in which it fit with his programme of portraying Christ as restorer.

Together, I suggest that it is these two figures, Irenaeus and Ephrem, who act as Theodore’s greatest influences. Of course there are others whom he cites in the Laterculus, and there are still others whom we can identify as sources for something he says. Yet in one way or another, either in overarching theme or formative metaphors, Irenaeus and Ephrem loom large over Theodore’s work.

So now we ask the question: what does all of this have to do with a distinctive British Church on the crux of late antiquity / the early middle ages?

If posterior history is anything to go by, the answer is a great deal.

Scholars like J.D.A. Ogilvy and J.T. Dempsey both discuss the strong Antiochene strains in Bede’s approach to exegesis, while earlier in the last century, Beryl Smalley said in The Study of the Bible in the Middle Ages, that ‘Much of the Antiochene material was irretrievably lost to the medieval Latin student…. On the other hand, enough material existed in the early middle ages to enable a Latin reader to learn at least the principles of Antiochene exegesis and to experiment with them for himself, if he wished. We shall see that some of the early Irish scholars availed themselves of the opportunity. But they were alone in doing so. The Antiochenes in fact were generally neglected.’ Could it be, then, if the Antiochene method of exegesis was not so widely disseminated through Western Europe in the early middle ages, that Bede’s familiarity with it was something inherited from Theodore and his school at Canterbury of a generation earlier? I, myself, have identified at least one place where Bede’s own exegesis of a passage is alone in being strikingly similar to Theodore’s, and I have suggested that this may be because he had access to the Laterculus. At the very least, it seems, the great historian and venerable doctor of the Church was inspired by a technique for reading Scripture that was not shared by many of his contemporaries in the West, and which we know came to Britain just a generation earlier with the archbishop from the East.

With some confidence, we can conclude that one of Theodore’s lasting contributions to the British Church in his time and after was the Antiochene Scriptural hermeneutic; something that appears to have been further perpetuated by Bede and so preserved in Western tradition. But I cautiously propose that what he also left behind – again, in addition to the obvious, more practical considerations recorded by Bede – was an unparalleled exposure to a series of somewhat eclectic sources, including the already-discussed Ephrem the Syrian, and the imagery that Theodore gleaned from him. But as I have already recounted, Theodore was most likely acquainted with Maximus the Confessor too, and while Maximus takes up the idea of exchange that lies behind Christ’s work of restoration in an intricate, philosophical way – a way, it has to be said, that Theodore’s approach in no way replicates – the importance of restoration is present in both, and it would not be unreasonable to suggest that Theodore represents something of Maximus the Confessor as well.

The fact is, the Greek monk who would travel through Syria to Constantinople, then establish himself in Rome before becoming Archbishop of Canterbury – that is, Theodore of Tarsus – bears in his person the influences of the whole Christian tradition to his time. This is an incredible claim, I know; but the facts of his life, along with the still-emerging evidence, together suggest that he is one of very few people in Christian history that not only passed through, but actually lived in and absorbed (through the critical eyes of a scholar) so many Christian cultures and traditions.

For all his obvious scholarship and wisdom, he was not a speculative theologian like his more famous contemporary Maximus; but neither was he someone without sound views and the means to express them. He was, fundamentally, a teacher and a pastor; but an intellectually rigorous one for all that. His reform of the British Church through diocesan reorganisation, conciliar structures, and pastoral discipline, is renowned. Yet his influence on theology, in terms of hermeneutics and christology is only now being appraised. We can suppose that Bede was a beneficiary, as, perhaps, was Aldhelm. The Irish students that we know attended the school at Canterbury, and who enjoyed Theodore’s tutelage, may also have carried on something of what they learned. In this regard, at least, we can be sure that Theodore’s influence extended well beyond his own time and into the Middle Ages. But there are signs his significance was greater still. Pope Agatho would not have sought to enlist an elderly Theodore’s aid if he did not think it worthwhile. In Theodore, the British Church had a remarkable man her midst: A philosopher, theologian, teacher, and pastor. His understanding of the person and work of Christ was unlike anything else being considered in the West at the time, and the exegetical methods he used were of a tradition that would otherwise have been forgotten here.

I will conclude by saying that if Theodore of Tarsus did nothing else, by the close of his life at the end of the seventh-century, the province of the Church that was placed under his authority was a well-educated, well-connected, well-respected institution that could eventually be looked on as one of the great contributors to an emerging new Europe.

‘Theodore of Tarsus and the formation of a distinctive British Church, 668-690’

Before launching into today’s discussion of Theodore of Tarsus, let me begin by expressing my thanks to Daveth Frost for asking me on your behalf, and to all of you for having me speak this [morning] on a subject that is of immense importance to me. I trust you know what you have got yourselves in for, as I consider Theodore of Tarsus to be one of the most remarkable figures in the history of the British Church, but also one of the least represented. This means, of course, seeing as you are a captive audience, it is inevitable in the course of this talk that I should make up for all Theodore’s inadequate coverage, and give you as much information as I possibly can, without regard for the clock. So you better make yourselves comfortable.

Allow me now to introduce myself and what it is that drew me to the study of Theodore of Tarsus in the first place.

I am currently writing up my doctoral thesis at the University of Wales, Lampeter, under the supervision of Professor Thomas O’Loughlin, on the subject of Theodore’s understanding of the person and work of Christ, as manifest especially in a text entitled Laterculus Malalianus. The particular work I am concentrating on is coincidental to the fact that I first found myself drawn in by Theodore due to the cosmopolitan, truly ecumenical silhouette he cast against the background of late antiquity (or the early medieval period), and for what I thought he might have contributed to the formation of the British theological tradition at the time. In fact, as we shall see, Theodore was not known to have left much writing behind, so the Laterculus Malalianus, which was only attributed to him in the mid-1990s by Dr. Jane Stevenson, became my chief text almost by default – although, I have to say, it has ultimately proven a well-spring of complex theological motifs and references. I am indebted to Dr. Stevenson for the invaluable work she put into deciphering the text.

The man who would become Archbishop of Canterbury for more than two decades of the seventh-century, was born, as the appellation by which he is most commonly known suggests, in Greek-speaking Tarsus in the year 602, a son of the very city that gave St Paul to the Church. We do not know anything about his childhood, except that it is most likely he left Tarsus early for foundational studies in Antioch. This is significant for a number of reasons, for although Antioch’s importance as a hotbed of Biblical exegesis and theology had largely waned by the seventh century, it still retained a school of consequence, and was undoubtedly the most important centre of its kind in the region. In any case, it was most likely in Antioch that Theodore’s theological formation began to take place; after all, his Scriptural hermeneutic was rigorously Antiochene in orientation, as evidenced both by the Canterbury Commentaries and the Laterculus, and, as we shall see, there is an element of what John Meyendorff (echoing Florovsky) calls ‘anthropological maximalism’ in his thought that we can take as characteristic of Antiochene theology generally. In leaving Tarsus for Antioch, Theodore went to the birthplace of a tradition in biblical exegesis and christology that found expression in such a towering figure as St John Chrysostom, and rooted himself firmly in its soil.

But the intellectually-adventurous Theodore would not remain there. As his vocabulary and cultural references suggest, at some point he travelled further East to Syriac-speaking Edessa. We do not know how long he spent there, but it was surely long enough for him to have become familiar with the language, to have fallen under the influence of its great fourth-century theologian-poet Ephrem, and to have been impressed by certain features of life in this city beyond the Greek pale. Again as we shall see, what Theodore absorbs of Syriac tradition would become a prominent ingredient in his contribution to the British Church; in which case, a brief comment on the content of this oft-neglected tributary of the basin of Christian thought is probably warranted.

In talking about the Syriac tradition in relation to Theodore of Tarsus, it should be noted that what we are referring to is, in fact, the fruits it bore before the Council of Ephesus in 431. To date, the importance of this tradition to the wider Catholic Church has failed to make an impression on popular ecclesiological conceptions, yet the influence of at least one of its exponents can hardly be exaggerated. St Ephrem the Syrian, writing in the fourth century, has been identified as both an inspiration and an authority for writers East and West, Greek and Latin, from his own time to the present, to the extent that in 1920, he was declared a Doctor of the Church by Pope Benedict XV. He was an exegete and poet of note, with most of his writing taking the form either of hymns or sermons; yet by his own admission, he had no interest in a systematic presentation of the great theological mysteries. In spite of this, however, it is not difficult to discern a reasoned and consistent presentation of God and the Logos over the course of his writings. When we are considering Syriac influences on Theodore, then, what we are mainly dealing with – though not exclusively – are figures and metaphors for Christ as drawn from the work of Ephrem. Otherwise, the evidence in the Commentaries and the Laterculus attests to a general regard for the poet, the presence of a few images shared across the Syriac tradition, and recollections of life in Edessa. Having paid a brief visit to the Syriac East, however, if we are to continue drawing our sketch of Theodore’s life, we must return to more familiar territory. For from Edessa, we follow the future archbishop to Constantinople.

As one can imagine, considering the time and place of Theodore’s formation, he would have personally experienced the effects of great upheaval. Between the years 613 and 627, the Persian Empire expanded to include most of Syria, the decade following which was characterised by the Muslim Arab expansion in the direction of Asia Minor. For this reason, Theodore would most likely have been only one among many Christian students who left the region in the 630s; and so we find him in Constantinople by 637, studying medicine, law, and philosophy.

We don’t know precisely how long he spent in the great city, but we do know what effect his time there had on him, for it is attested to in the wide scope of his learning. That Theodore was learned in medicine, for example, comes across in various dedicated passages in both the Canterbury Commentaries and the Laterculus Malalianus. Likewise, there are medical references in the Penitential that bears his name, and that most certainly derive from him. In fact, his interest in the subject of medicine is one of the only pieces of personal information about Theodore mentioned by the Venerable Bede in the Historia. Otherwise, we can imagine that the adeptness with which he administered the British Church, and the confidence he displayed in making both pastoral and administrative decisions, was a result of his legal training. As someone who lived and studied in the Church’s greatest centres, at the very time that some of the most significant theological upheavals in the history of the Church were unfolding, it can only follow that with an intellect as substantial as his, Theodore would have learned a great deal from the mix of formal instruction and observation. Furthermore, that he was able to set his ministry in a cast of theological orthodoxy, as attested to by the Laterculus Malalianus and the decrees of the synods he oversaw, attests to a certain philosophical dexterity, the likes of which he would most likely have developed in an intellectual environment such as that provided by a significant stay in seventh-century Constantinople. Beside the fact that he would have been there at a time when the unparalleled Hagia Sophia would still have been a fresh wonder to behold, like a glittering beacon to the rest of the Christian world, we can assume that Theodore’s time in Constantinople was extremely fruitful.

While we do not know exactly when he moved from New Rome to the old, there are many reasons to believe that Theodore was in Italy – and resident in the Greek monastery of Saint Anastasias – by the time of the Lateran Council of 649. That this should be the case is of immense interest to us, for were Theodore to have been at the council, then it is most likely he was acquainted with that defender of orthodoxy and theologian of renown, St Maximus the Confessor. Such a connection is not inconsequential, for it indelibly binds the development of the Church in these islands to that of the Universal Church, and challenges any inclination we might have to construe the British Church as some kind of eccentric and provincial construct. Two facts make Theodore’s presence in Rome at the time distinctly possible: 1) the roll of names appended to the acta of the Lateran Council includes one ‘Theodorus monachus’, otherwise unidentified; and 2) Pope Agatho’s categorical appeal to ‘the archbishop and philosopher’ Theodore (of far-flung Britain) for advice on the Monothelete heresy, as the pope made preparation for the 6th Œcumenical Council of 680. Together, this suggests that not only was Theodore a member of one of the Greek monastic communities around Rome by the mid-7th century; he was an émigré of great consequence.

It seems characteristic of the life of Theodore that precisely when he might have raised his own recognition-factor in the Church, he retired instead to quiet study and prayer in his monastery. This would be conjecture only, but it is not unreasonable to suppose. That the legacy of his work in later life hardly gets a mention outside of Bede’s Historia certainly suggests this, but so does the fact that Pope Vitalian, when seeking to appoint an archbishop to the vacant see of Canterbury, needed to be introduced to Theodore by the Greek-speaking African, Hadrian. In other words, the profile we might have expected from someone with as extensive an education, as diverse a background, and as much to offer the Church at a time of theological turmoil does not correspond with that attested to by the secondary-source documents. If I could be permitted a personal observation on the man: I can not help but imagine him as an introverted sort, who, by force of learning and able mind, garnered the respect of those around him. I can see him working on his languages, spending time on translations and editions, but otherwise getting on with his life as a monk. And I can see him bearing all such qualities with him into whatever assignment he was presented with. In any case, the chance came when, in 667, he was called before Pope Vitalian for appointment to Canterbury.

And so we come to the part of the story I suspect you are already [at least somewhat] familiar with, as it is recorded by Bede in the History. The African Hadrian was called by Vitalian to go to Canterbury to fill the vacant archbishopric; but Hadrian refused, promising to find a better candidate. He then proposed Theodore, whom Pope Vitalian agreed to, on the condition that Hadrian accompany him anyway, at least partly to act as a theological guardian for the then unknown Greek. After some months more spent in Rome, in order – as Bede reports – to grow out his Greek-style tonsure and to be re-tonsured in the Roman-style, Theodore left with Hadrian for Britain. So it is that, by 669, Theodore was present in his new country, and set to become ‘the first archbishop that the whole country obeyed’, and one of the greatest that Britain has ever known.

I hope to post the text of the address on this site by the end of the week.

The true and authentic consensus was that which reflected the mind of the Catholic and Universal Church [...]. Patriarch Sophronius of Jerusalem, a contemporary of Maximus, summarized this idea of patristic consensus in a similar way: “An apostolic and ancient tradition has prevailed in the holy churches throughout the world, so that those who are inducted into the hierarchy sincerely refer everything they think and believe to those who have held the hierarchy before them. For…all their running would be in vain if an injustice were to be done to the faith in any respect” (Soph. Ep.syn. (PG 87:3149-52). Sophronius’s formula, “an apostolic and ancient tradition,” did not mean that everything “ancient” was therefore automatically “apostolic.” All the orthodox theologians knew that in some instances “antiquity means foolishness.” Even Irenaeus had erred in teaching the idea of the millenium. But while all that was ancient was not apostolic or orthodox, all that was orthodox had to have been apostolic and was therefore ancient. True doctrine, as Theodore of Studios was to assert, was “the excellence of the apostles, the foundation of the fathers, the keys of the dogmas, the standard of orthodoxy,” and anyone who contradicted it, even if he were an angel, was to be excommunicated and anathematized.

from J. Pelikan, The Spirit of Eastern Christendom, 600-1700 (The Christian Tradition series, Vol. 2), University of Chicago Press, Chicago, 1974, p. 22.

Hoc namque loco licet inspicere quicquid pertulerit Christus salus et redemptio nostra, omnia gesta esse in homine pleno cum Deo. Nam quod Christus per angelum Virgini nuntiatur, ad evacuandum consilium serpentis ad Evam in paradiso. Quod autem de Virgine natus est, propter protoplastum Adam, quam de virgine terra et impolluta ad suam fecit imaginem; qui cum suadente diabolo mortis incurrisset exitium, a solo Domino Christo rerum reparatore et conditore ejus corporis et animae, per immortalitatem Christi, restauraretur domicilium. Quod autem decimi mensis limitem tetigisset in Virginis utero, id est dies VI supra mense nono perficiens, quod nullus ex filiis hominum tangit metrum nascendo per semen, nisi solus Christus verus Filius Dei et hominis sine semine natus ex virgine; ita ut fiant dies in una collectione constricti CCLXXVI, qui fiunt allegorice vel per typicam quaestionem; quod ipse affatus in Evangelio ait: Solvite templum hoc, et ego in tribus diebus suscitabo illud. Sed Judaei ignorantes capitulum rationis, protulerunt testimonium veritatis, et ita Domino respondentes aiunt: XL et VI annos aedificatum est templum hoc, et tu in tribus diebus suscitabis illud? Ille autem, inquit evangelista, dicebat de templo corporis sui, cujus dispensationem adprehendere nequiverunt Judaei, ideoque numerum annorum aedificationis templi, quod veri templi formam gerebat, Domino protulerunt: quem numerum non sub Salomone conditore ejusdem templi, sed sub Zorobabel, qui et Esdras, restauratore contigisse perlegitur; eo quod gentes, quae in circuitu erant, opus praepedibant. Nam Salomon annis VII complevit opus aedificii templi Domini.

‘To locate volumes of the Patrologia Graeca on Google Books, use the search “cursus completus series” (without the quotes). To get volumes of the Patrologia Latina as well, leave out the term “series”. NB: It is important to sepcify “full view”, otherwise nothing much comes back….

‘I find that the online displayed copies often seem to be missing pages; but the PDF available for download for them all does not.’

None of the bibliographies posted here can pretend to be exhaustive, and so it is with secondary sources on Theodore of Tarsus. Since the mid-1990s, a great number of references to Theodore have appeared in academic sources, at least partly due to the work of Bernard Bischoff, Michael Lapidge and Jane Stevenson. Significantly, alot of these references have appeared in discussions surrounding the proliferation of the Syriac Christian tradition, and more particularly, the work of Ephrem the Syrian.

Pange, lingua, gloriosi proelium certaminis
et super crucis tropaeo dic triumphum nobilem,
qualiter redemptor orbis immolatus vicerit.

De parentis protoplasti fraude factor condolens,
quando pomi noxialis morte morsu corruit,
ipse lignum tunc notavit, damna ligni ut solveret.

Hoc opus nostrae salutis ordo depoposcerat,
multiformis perditoris arte ut artem falleret
et medelam ferret inde, hostis unde laeserat.

Quando venit ergo sacri plenitudo temporis,
missus est ab arce patris natus orbis conditor
atque ventre virginali carne factus prodiit.

Vagit infans inter arta conditus praesaepia,
membra pannis involuta virgo mater adligat,
et pedes manusque crura stricta pingit fascia.

Lustra sex qui iam peracta tempus implens corporis,
se volente, natus ad hoc, passioni deditus,
agnus in crucis levatur immolandus stipite.

Hic acetum, fel, arundo, sputa, clavi, lancea;
mite corpus perforatur; sanguis, unda profluit,
terra pontus astra mundus quo lavantur flumine.

Crux fidelis, inter omnes arbor una nobilis,
nulla talem silva profert flore, fronde, germine,
dulce lignum dulce clavo dulce pondus sustinens.

Flecte ramos, arbor alta, tensa laxa viscera,
et rigor lentescat ille quem dedit nativitas,
ut superni membra regis mite tendas stipite.

Sola digna tu fuisti ferre pretium saeculi
atque portum praeparare nauta mundo naufrago,
quem sacer cruor perunxit fusus agni corpore.