The anthropological implications of 1 Thess. 5:23 have long bemused both Paul's interpreters and the interpreters of Paul's earliest readers, such as Irenaeus. Though consensus has emerged on Irenaeus' interpretation and use of 1 Thess. 5:23, certain of his passages defy the standard narrative. Taking these as a starting point, the present article employs a fresh approach by offering a diachronic reading of Irenaeus' reception of 1 Thess. 5:23. First, it shows that Irenaeus did not express his "mature" understanding of the verse-the one which most scholars take as his normative view-until after he completed Book 2 and its various discussions of philosophical anthropology. Then, it uses insights from this diachronic analysis to offer new solutions to some of the most notoriously difficult passages amongst Irenaeus' anthropological discussions. In so doing, it provides a more cogent reading of Against Heresies, the processes by which early Christians developed their thought, and a fresh lens for viewing one of the most widely analyzed anthropological remarks in the scriptures.

The anthropological implications of 1 Thess. 5:23 have long bemused both Paul’s interpreters and the interpreters of Paul’s earliest readers, such as Irenaeus. Though consensus has emerged on Irenaeus’ interpretation and use of 1 Thess. 5:23, certain of his passages defy the standard narrative. Taking these as a starting point, the present article employs a fresh approach by offering a diachronic reading of Irenaeus’ reception of 1 Thess. 5:23. First, it shows that Irenaeus did not express his “mature” understanding of the verse – the one which most scholars take as his normative view – until after he completed Book 2 and its various discussions of philosophical anthropology. Then, it uses insights from this diachronic analysis to offer new solutions to some of the most notoriously difficult passages amongst Irenaeus’ anthropological discussions. In so doing, it provides a more cogent reading of Against Heresies , the processes by which early Christians developed their thought, and a fresh lens for viewing one of the most widely analyzed anthropological remarks in the scriptures.

Scholars have largely neglected Irenaeus's philosophical psychology and related sub-fields, including his philosophical epistemology. This study argues that Irenaeus in fact implemented philosophical epistemology throughout his writings. To demonstrate this thesis, the article first introduces two approaches to epistemology that were current in Irenaeus's era. The first approach is intellect-based epistemology (noesis), which held that truth is attainable by means of the mind's contemplation of intelligible realities. The second approach is sense-based epistemology (aisthesis), which held that the human being can attain knowledge through a complex process. In this process the soul's sense-perceptive faculty acquires data through the fleshly organs of sense perception. This data is stored as memory within the soul and subsequently sorted and analyzed in successive phases of pre-rationale and rationale analysis, which yield knowledge. Having outlined these ancient approaches to epistemology the article examines potential evidence of both in Irenaeus's extant writings. It finds that there is little reason to conclude that Irenaeus accepted noetic epistemology. However, there is plentiful evidence to corroborate the thesis that Irenaeus accepted a form of sense-based epistemol-ogy, which he deploys in relatively sophisticated and complex arguments at multiple points throughout his corpus.

Scholars have long maintained that Irenaeus rejected the use of Hellenic resources in Christian theology. While recent decades have seen better recognition of Irenaeus’ philosophical and rhetorical knowledge, Irenaeus’ use of poetic literature, especially Homer, has received little attention. The present article rectifies this deficiency. First, it defines the role of Homeric material in Irenaeus’ broader theological project. Then, studying Irenaeus’ use of a unique Homeric word, proprocylindomene ( Haer. 1.11.4), it demonstrates that Irenaeus appropriates Homer to his theological project with the facility that Quintilian associates with a practiced and skillful rhetorician. In light of this, the article concludes by contending that Irenaeus likely composed the Homeric cento in Haer. 1.9.4 himself. If this is the case, Haer. 1.9.4 constitutes perhaps Irenaeus’ most skillful appropriation of Homer to his theological project. It best illustrates how for Irenaeus the poet could be used in a Christian theological project.

In AH 2,13,2 Irenaeus describes the activity of the mind as unfolding in a five-stage process, with each stage having a distinct name: ennoia, enthym & emacr;sis, phron & emacr;sis, boul & emacr;, and dialogismos. His account manifestly draws on philosophical psychology and epistemology, which has led scholars to assume he is using a source written by a member of one of the classical schools, a Stoic, Platonist, etc., whence he also derives his terms for the mind's activity. This article argues to the contrary that Irenaeus drew the terminology for the five stages of the mind's movement from his opponents. The terms themselves better fit a Jewish or Christian milieu than as technical terms of philosophical psychology. Such was the milieu of Irenaeus' opponents, and indeed, nearly identical psychologies appear in cognate Nag Hammadi texts as well as later Christian texts, such as the Acts of Thomas, and as the Manichaean five-powers tradition. It is possible to arrange these sources so as to explain the presence of the five-powers tradition in each, including Irenaeus, without appealing to an unknown philosophical antecedent. Having established this, the article concludes by answering objections to the thesis and offering a prospectus for further research.

As scholars have come to appreciate Irenaeus' use of philosophy, emphasis has fallen on his use of pre-Socratic traditions. This emphasis stands in stark contrast to the typical emphasis scholars place on Platonic themes in second-century Christian theologies. This article argues that Platonic resources, the definition of God as simple and incomposite, the Platonic viae, and reasoning from 'oneness' to 'unlimitedness', play a key role in Irenaeus' theology, governing his interpretation of pre-Socratic materials, including Irenaeus' version of the well-known Xenophanes quotation (fr. 24) and materials Irenaeus apparently draws from Pseudo-Aristotle's On Melissus, Xenophanes, and Gorgias. Irenaeus, furthermore, draws a logical connection between God's simplicity and the doctrine that there is one God to the exclusion of others, as he says, thereby pressing Platonic doctrine into the service of his distinctly Christian theological convictions. The upshot of all this is a deeper appreciation first for the sophistication of Irenaeus' own theology, and second for Irenaeus' role in engaging and advancing Christian philosophical theology.

Scholars often suggest that Wisdom of Solomon contains disparate approaches to impiety in chs. 1–9 and chs. 10–19. The earlier chapters approach impiety and impious individuals from an ethical perspective, but the latter chapters approach impiety with an ethnocentric and/or nationalistic perspective. In chs. 10–19, Wisdom presents righteousness as characteristic of the Jewish people and impiety as characteristic of Gentiles. This article argues that Wisdom’s approach to impiety is more consistent and coherent than this narrative implies. A philosophically informed moral psychology of the impious is discernable in chapters 1–2 and in two distinct images of the Impious from chs. 10–19. In each case, impiety is rooted in the misorientation of the soul, which results in errant reasoning (sometimes influenced by passions), and finally bodily impiety. This article further suggests these philosophically informed images of the impious can be understood as functioning as part of a two-ways ethical protreptic.

Liberius of Rome is often portrayed as Athanasius' strongest ally in the Latin West. His support for Athanasius is said to have begun by the end of his first year in office, when a synod in Rome accepted an Egyptian council's vindication of Athanasius against an Eastern council's excommunication. This article argues that the Roman synod did not ratify the Egyptian council's decisions but rather called for an appeals trial. In so doing Liberius did not defend Athanasius but preserved what he saw as the traditional duties and authority of the Roman see in matters of ecclesiastical discipline.

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Liberius is often viewed as Athanasius’ ally in the mid-350s, but his own writing, contemporary testimony, and the pagan historian Ammianus Marcellinus suggest otherwise. Rather than defending Athanasius at the councils of Arles and Milan and in Constantius II’s court, Liberius attempted to establish acceptable conditions for peace in the Church by trading Athanasius’ excommunication, which he saw as justified by Athanasius’ refusal to comply with traditional ecclesial-judicial procedures, for doctrinal concessions from certain Eastern bishops whom Liberius suspected of sympathizing with heretical doctrine.

The Coptic Apocryphon of John's Father Discourse with its distinctive apophaticism is often regarded as 'standard' or 'stereotyped' Middle Platonism, but closer analysis reveals that the Platonism in the text is subordinate to a theology which defines God as the Christian God by means of Christian texts (e.g. Eph. 4:6, 1 Corinthians 15, and John 4:24) and uses the polemical monotheism prominent in second-century Christian apologies to assert the supremacy and oneness of the Christian Father against other pretenders to deity. It is this polemical monotheism and not Platonic reasoning that provides the logic of the negations in the discourse. Platonic reasoning is often ignored and even criticized. Thus, the author of the Father Discourse like the writers of second-century Christian apologies does not present stereotyped Platonism, but a Christian theology that incorporates materials from Platonism and uses them to a different end than did second-century Platonic philosophers.

David Hionides, Against “Irenaean” Theodicy: A Refutation of John Hick’s Use of Irenaeus (Gorgias Studies in Early Christianity and Patristics 73), Piscataway, NJ: Gorgias Press 2019, xiii + 199 pp., ISBN 978-1-4632-4071-4, US$ 146 (hb).This book is a refutation and overthrow of Irenaean theodicy, as falsely so-called by John Hick. Or rather, it is an argument that the theodicy that Hick represents as “Irenaean” diverges from the theodicy offered by the second-century bishop of Lyons on crucial points. As Hionides explains (37–46), in Hick’s Evil and the God of Love (1966) and subsequent

Victorinus of Pettau is often read either as one of many binitarian Latin theologians in the ante-Nicene era or as a simple exegete whose imprecise comments on the relationship between the Word and Spirit are characteristic of his time. This study argues that recent research on “angelomorphic” theology in sources like Revelation and Clement of Alexandria and the reinterpretation of those traditions in Origen offers a new context in which to situate Victorinus. Read in this context, Victorinus’ comments on the Spirit of sevenfold power and the Word imply a more sophisticated and coherent understanding of the Holy Spirit and the Spirit’s relationship with the Word than is usually thought.