In this video from the Online Edinburgh Byzantine Book Festival, Professor Peter Adamson explores Byzantine and Renaissance philosophy: https://youtu.be/HESAGPYsrMA?si=bz64b49bvtV6VWVS  ..read more

In the sixth volume of A History of Philosophy Without Any Gaps, Byzantine and Renaissance Philosophy, Peter Adamson introduces the thinkers and movements of Byzantium and the Italian Renaissance. Adamson focuses on John of Damascus in the eighth century and the late Byzantine scholars of the fifteenth century. Insofar as the philosophers of Byzantium sparked the humanist movement in Italy. Figures such as Christine de Pizan, Niccolò Machiavelli, Giordano Bruno, and Galileo are examined alongside lesser known figures, including Lorenzo Valla, Girolamo Savonarola, and Bernardino Telesio. M ..read more

An exciting new project known as the Sourcebook of Byzantine Philosophy (SBPh) is underway, led by Katerina Ierodiakonou, Pantelis Golitsis, Ioannis Papachristou and Dafni Argyri. According to the SBPh team, Byzantine philosophy is still overlooked by the history of philosophy. For Byzantine philosophy to be properly studied and appreciated, a SBPh, which collects the key texts of Byzantine thinkers in an accessible edition, is essential. The SBPh will contain selected Byzantine philosophical texts in the original and in English translation, and will place these texts in their historical conte ..read more

  A fascinating excerpt from John Panteleimon Manoussakis, The Ethics of Time: A Phenomenology and Hermeneutics of Change (Bloomsbury Press, 2017). The antinomic unity of heaven and hell was first introduced by Origen in one of his early writings, the Exhortation to Martyrdom, and was further developed in his refutation of Celsus. In the Exhortation to Martyrdom we meet the idea of the self ’s division (διαίρεσις) and separation (χωρισμός) from itself, or at least from a part of itself. Already at this nascent stage, this theory is invoking the scriptural passage of 1 Cor. 3:10–15. Later ..read more

An intriguing excerpt from Professor Torstein Theodor Tollefsen’s introduction to his monograph, St Theodore the Studite’s Defence of the Icons: Theology and Philosophy in Ninth-Century Byzantium (Oxford University Press, 2018). From Theodore the Studite’s polemics there emerges a philosophy of images, a doctrine that demonstrates the theological relevance of images in Christianity. The icons are memorials of events of salvation history. On a deeper level the contemplation of images together with the hearing of the word of God facilitate access to the realities of faith, and both contemplatio ..read more

Hymns, Homilies and Hermeneutics in Byzantium, ed. Sarah Gador-Whyte and Andrew Mellas (Leiden: Brill, 2020). The collection of papers in Hymns, Homilies and Hermeneutics explores the literature of Byzantine liturgical communities and provides a window into lived Christianity in this period. The papers reflect a growing interest in the social aspects of the liturgy, begun by pioneering scholars like Mary Cunningham, Pauline Allen, Susan Ashbrook Harvey, and Wendy Mayer. The research questions addressed within are vital for understanding the impacts of the liturgy on the lives and religious und ..read more

With the kind permission of Dr Ken Parry, here is an excerpt from his article, ‘Theodore the Stoudite: The Most “Original” Iconophile?’ published in Jahrbuch der Österreichischen Byzantinistik (2018), 261-75. In countering the accusation of idolatry, as well as justifying their re-reading of the Exodus prohibition against images, the iconophiles drew a distinction between an icon and an idol. They utilized a distinction inherent in philosophical discussions of nominal definitions. In his Posterior Analytics Aristotle proposed the compound “goat-stag” (τραγέλαφος) as the name of a n ..read more

With the kind permission of Dr Ken Parry, here is an excerpt from his article, ‘Theodore the Stoudite: The Most “Original” Iconophile?’ published in Jahrbuch der Österreichischen Byzantinistik (2018), 261-75. In countering the accusation of idolatry, as well as justifying their re-reading of the Exodus prohibition against images, the iconophiles drew a distinction between an icon and an idol. They utilized a distinction inherent in philosophical discussions of nominal definitions. In his Posterior Analytics Aristotle proposed the compound “goat-stag” (τραγέλαφος) as the name of a n ..read more

In the sixth volume of A History of Philosophy Without Any Gaps, Byzantine and Renaissance Philosophy, Peter Adamson introduces the thinkers and movements of Byzantium and the Italian Renaissance. Adamson focuses on John of Damascus in the eighth century and the late Byzantine scholars of the fifteenth century. Insofar as the philosophers of Byzantium sparked the humanist movement in Italy. Figures such as Christine de Pizan, Niccolò Machiavelli, Giordano Bruno, and Galileo are examined alongside lesser known figures, including Lorenzo Valla, Girolamo Savonarola, and Bernardino Telesio. M ..read more

With the kind permission of Dr Ken Parry (Senior Research Fellow, Macquarie University), below is an extract from his chapter “Fate, Free Choice, and Divine Providence from the Neoplatonists to John Of Damascus” in The Cambridge Intellectual History of Byzantium, edited by Anthony Kaldellis , Niketas Siniossoglou (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2017), 341–60. The history of the concepts of fate (εἱμαρμένη / heimarmene), free choice (προαίρεσις / prohairesis), and divine providence (θεία πρόνοια / theia pronoia) between the fifth and the eighth centuries exemplifie ..read more