MAXIMUS THE CONFESSOR, Saint. - Born in Constantinople in 580, died in exile on 13 Aug. 662. He is also called Maximus of Chrysopolis, from the place where he became a monk. The title of Confessor means that he endured tortures for the faith, without however dying from them immediately.
I. LIFE
He pursued very deep studies (in particular of Aristotle); around 610 he was called to the court of Heraclius as first secretary, but he soon abandoned that office (613-14) to become a monk at Chrysopolis (Scutari) on the Asian coast, facing Constantinople. Forced to flee in the face of the Persian invasion of 626, he was probably never able to return to his monastery. From 626 to 646 he lived in proconsular Africa. In 646 he was in Rome, whence he was seized by the imperial police, like Pope Martin I, on the pretext of having betrayed the interests of the Empire, in reality to obtain from him by force that he betray Roman orthodoxy and subscribe to the Monothelite doctrines. After a first interrogation, M. was condemned on 14 September to exile and detention at Perbera. Brought back to the capital in 662, since he remained firm in his faith, his tongue and right hand were cut off, and he was then condemned to perpetual exile. He died the same year, a prisoner in the castle of Schemari, in the land of the Lazi (now the region of Batum in Transcaucasia). Feast on 13 August.II. WRITINGS
The list of his works (about 60) does not include any synthetic treatise. If he intended to write one (cf. PG 90, 252 C), he nevertheless did not carry it out. Almost everything is controversy, commentary, or ascetic exegesis. 1) Controversy against Monophysitism, before the Monothelite dispute: eleven opuscules or letters (see the titles in DThC, X, 1, col. 451); against Monothelitism, about twenty opuscules (cf. ibid.), the most important of which is the Disputatio cum Pyrrho (PG 91, 287-354). 2) Commentaries: a) Questiones ad Thalassium in locus Sacrae Scripturae difficile (ibid., 90, 234-786): it is his most important work together with b) the Ambigua in Gregorium Nazianzenum (ibid., 1061-1418); c) Scholia in beati Dionysii libros, printed together with the works of pseudo-Dionysius (ibid., 4, 14-576); most of these scholia, moreover, especially in content, belong to John of Scythopolis (H. U. von Balthasar, Das Scolienwerk des J. von S., in Scholastik, 15 [1940], p. 17 ff.); d) The Mystagogia, a symbolic explanation of the liturgy (PG 91, 657-718); e) Orationis Dominicae brevis expositio (ibid., 90, 871-910); f) Centuries (ibid., 959-1426): four centuries De charitate, the work of Maximus most often copied, and even translated into Arabic (G. Graf, Geschichte der christlichen arabischen Literatur, I, p. 372); two centuries on the Trinity and the Incarnation, to which is added a century published by Epifanović (see the work cited in the bibliography); as for the five centuries of the Diversa capita ad theologiam etoeconomiam spectantia, deque virtute et vitio, these were extracted by an unknown person (perhaps Anthony Melissa?), in the 11th century, from the authentic works of M., along with other elements taken from elsewhere (Th. M. Disdier, in Echos d'Orient, 30 [1931], pp. 168-78); the Alía capita ex Vaticano that follow are by Elias Ecdicus and are found under his name in PG 127, 1129-76 (Th. M. Disdier, in Echos d'Orient, 31 [1932], pp. 17-43); the Loci communes (PG 91, 721-1017) are no longer considered authentic (cf. V. EHRHARD, ALBERT, Zu den « Sacra Parallele » des J. Damascenus u. den « Florilegium » des Maximus, in Byz. Zeitschrift, 10 [1901], pp. 394-415). One may add the Liber asceticus (PG 90, 911-56): a dialogue between a young monk and his spiritual father; and the Brevis enarratio Christiani Paschatis, or Ecclesiastical Computation (ibid., 19, 1217-80).
III. DOCTRINE
Despite this dispersion of his literary work, there is in the thought of M. the Confessor a unity, or at least a center, around which everything is grouped: namely Christology, not only because the majority of his writings refer to the Monophysite or Monothelite controversy, but because these very disputes provided him with the occasion to define precisely (often resorting to Aristotle) metaphysical and theological notions and principles that he would later use in other fields.Then, drawing the final conclusions from the doctrine of Chalcedon, he established that the true union does not dissolve the components into a superior "confused" essence, but rather perfection in their own entity. In this way the transcendence of God and his immanence are preserved, which excludes pantheism; the hypostatic unity of Christ and his two natures; and it is the negation of Monophysitism; the dualism of the will and action of the incarnate Word in the absolute moral harmony of the φύσις and the γνώμη; which refutes Monothelitism; and since the spiritual life of the Christian is an imitation of that of Christ, these same principles make it possible to develop a doctrine of deification up to "identity through Grace" without falling into the isochristism of certain Origenists. In all this M. proves himself at the same time a profound philosopher, a subtle dialectician, a theologian endowed with a keen sense of orthodoxy, and, by the very lucidity of his distinctions, an eminently conciliatory genius. This last trait appears especially in the question of the procession of the Holy Spirit, in which M., precursor of the Council of Florence, affirms the identity of meaning of the Greek formula ex Patre per Filium and the Latin ex Patre et Filio (PG 91, 133 ff.). Finally, the most brilliant of the Byzantines is also a convinced defender of the primacy of the Pope.
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