RELIGIOUS ENCYCLOPEDIA
John of Basel John of Damascus
when Leo had deposed the Patriarch Germanus, the third may have been written or revised after John became a monk; it is to some extent a compilation of the other two. The " Demonstrative Treatise about the Images " (MPG, xcv. 309 sqq.), the " Letter to Theophilus " (MPG, xcv. 345 sqq.), and the tract in MPG, xcvi. 1348 sqq., are not genuine.
John was no mystic, and he hardly touched the problems which later agitated the mystagogic theology (see Mystagogic Theology); but nearly all
fruitful and instructive theological
Chief questions were treated by him, and his
Dogmatic treatment is definitive for the East.
Work. In the West, too, his influence has been
considerable, but here men like Peter Lombard and Thomas Aquinas surpassed and displaced him. For the East his great work, the " Fount of Knowledge " (MPG, xciv. 521 sqq.) became the standard. It is commended by substantial merits in the author. He is pious and scientific, deferential to authority but learned and acute, able to accept the current body of dogmas and yet give it new significance and spiritual vitality. If he never rises above the level of a good average excellence, he never falls below it. He had no ideas of his own and so never disturbed the peace of the Church or fell under suspicion as an unsafe leader. For modern times he presents a convenient and instructive summary of what the ancient Greek Church accomplished in the field of dogma — a sum total of holy concepts enigmatical in character and supernaturally perceived. The work is dedicated to John's brother by adoption, Cosmas, at one time a monk of Mar Saba, later (743 ?) bishop of Majumas (the port of Gaza). John explains this plan as threefold. First, he will present " the best things of the wise among the Greeks " and, like a bee, " will gather salvation from the enemy " (i.e., the philosophers, especially Aristotle). Then he will set forth " the vaporings of heresies hated by God." Thirdly, he will exhibit the truth in the words of "the God-inspired prophets and the God-taught fishermen and the God-filled \theophoros] shepherds and teachers "; that is, by quotations from the Bible and the Fathers, the latter receiving much the greater consideration. The "Philosophical Chapters" (part i.; 68 chapters in Le Quien and Migne; a shorter edition in 15 may be earlier) comprise a comprehensive treatise on dialectics and are cited under this title. In the second part John follows Epiphanius for the older time (the first 80 heresies), then Theodoret and others, and finally makes some independent . remarks, especially concerning Mohammedanism. Some codices give 100 heresies, others a few more. The third part (" Exposition of the Orthodox Faith "; Eng. transl. in NPNF, 2d ser., ix.) was divided by John himself into 100 chapters. Later and in the West it was made up in four books, of which the first treats of the God-head (the Trinity), the second of the created universe (heaven and earth, angels, devils, mankind, freedom of the will, providence), the third chiefly of the person of Christ, then the mysteries, images, church festivals and customs, and the like, finally of Antichrist and the VI.-14
resurrection. Manuscripts often contain only parts i. and iii., part ii. being less important and copied separately.
John writes clearly and concisely, speaking for the most part in the words of his sources, but seldom names his authorities, the chief His of whom are Gregory Nazianzen, Basil, Teaching. Dionysius the Areopagite, and Leontius. As philosopher he is an Aristotelian of the fifth and sixth centuries, that is, with a strong infusion of Neoplatonism. Philosophy furnishes the first principles, but it is unable to apprehend and develop them aright especially as concerns the true knowledge of God, being but the handmaiden of faith, which is the queen. In final analysis, philosophy for John is merely the teacher of the right terminology, theology is nothing more than a working over of the opinions of " the holy fathers," who have first been able to understand the terms correctly. It is the juristic method applied to dogmatics — in fact, scholasticism in general is the incursion of jurisprudence into the field of theology. John's conception of God stops short of making him a person. It is true he ascribes personal attributes to the supreme being and herein influenced appreciably the Eastern Church; but, notwithstanding, he attained to no other idea of fellowship and communion with God than a physical blending through theoria, " vision." Herein is the religiously significant motive of the image question. More extended analysis of John's idea of God will be found in F. Kattenbusch, Vergleichende Konfessionskunde, i. 310 sqq., Freiburg, 1892. For his doctrine of the Trinity and Christology the histories of dogma mentioned in the bibliography must be consulted; that by Bach (i. 49 sqq.) is particularly instructive. John does not allegorize the Scriptures, and he propounds no doctrine of the Church or the hierarchy. He refrains from discussion of the creed and characterizes the formula of faith ("Orthodox Faith," iv. 11) as a simple and inartistic composition, showing that he had the creed before him. His section on the creation (" Orthodox Faith," ii.) is a whole treatise on astronomy and geography with the science of water, air, and fire. His doctrine of the Eucharist deserves mention because it is one of the few vital questions on which he did not speak the final word for his Church, although he gave the direction to later thought (cf. Steitz, Die Abendmahlslehre der griechischen Kirche in Jahrbiicher fur deutsche Theologie, xii. 275 sqq., Gotha, 1867; Kattenbusch, Konfessionskunde, ut sup., i. 415 sqq.). The chief points are three: (1) that there is a real change (metabole) and remaking (metapoiesis) ; (2) that the eucharistic body which results from the change is that born of the Virgin Mary; (3) that the change is analogous to that by which food is assimilated and changed into our flesh. He disclaims the doctrine that Christ's body comes again to earth in any manner in the eucharistic form, and teaches not transubstantiation, but " transformation " through " assumption." The " Fount of Knowledge " was brought to the West in the twelfth century and was translated into Latin by Burgundio of Pisa in the time of Pope Eugenius III. (1144-53). Neither
John of Damascus John Frederick