Cappadocians, Fathers

CAPPADOCIANS, FATHERS. - Cappadocia gave to the Church of the 4th century some of its most eminent figures, bound to one another by their common homeland, by ties of kinship and friendship, and by their common work: St. Basil and his brother St. Gregory of Nyssa, St. Gregory of Nazianzus, the intimate friend of Basil, St. Amphilochius of Iconium, a star of lesser magnitude, cousin of Gregory of Nazianzus. The doctrine of the Cappadocian Fathers is considered by some as a compromise, especially in exegesis, between the Alexandrian and the Antiochene schools: in reality, it is difficult to recognize in the Cappadocian Fathers a characteristic doctrinal orientation other than the common foundation of the orthodoxy of the 4th century, supremely respectful of tradition and yet not averse to the speculative clarifications of the revealed datum. They dealt principally with Trinitarian and Christological doctrine.

Moreover, the three great Cappadocians display clearly marked personal tendencies and gifts. Basil emerges as a man of action and government, who plays a leading role in the defense of Nicene orthodoxy even outside his jurisdiction as metropolitan of Caesarea and gives extraordinary impetus to Christian life, to charitable work, to monasticism. Gregory of Nazianzus is the born orator, who shapes elaborate theological thought into a classical form, skilled in all the resources of the art, the poet of delicate and profound vibrations, pervaded by an incurable nostalgia for solitude and peace amid the struggles in which he is called to live. Gregory of Nyssa is the most speculative mind, who in the elaboration of dogma goes so far as to make some excessive bold assertions in an Origenist sense.

Michele Pellegrino