Overview
The theology of creation interconnected with virtually every aspect of early Christian thought, from Trinitarian doctrine to salvation to ethics. Paul M. Blowers provides an advanced introduction to the multiplex relation between Creator and creation as an object both of theological construction and religious devotion in the early church. While revisiting the polemical dimension of Christian responses to Greco-Roman philosophical cosmology and heterodox Gnostic and Marcionite traditions on the origin, constitution, and destiny of the cosmos, Blowers focuses more substantially on the positive role of patristic theological interpretation of Genesis and other biblical creation texts in eliciting Christian perspectives on the multifaceted relation between Creator and creation. Greek, Syriac, and Latin patristic commentators, Blowers argues, were ultimately motivated less by purely cosmological concerns than by the urge to depict creation as the enduring creative and redemptive strategy of the Trinity. The 'drama of the divine economy', which Blowers discerns in patristic theology and piety, unfolded how the Creator invested the 'end' of the world already in its beginning, and thereupon worked through the concrete actions of Jesus Christ and the Holy Spirit to realize a new creation.
Full Product Details
Author: Paul M. Blowers (Dean E. Walker Professor of Church History, Emmanuel Christian Seminary, Johnson City, TN)
Publisher: Oxford University Press
Imprint: Oxford University Press
Dimensions:
Width: 16.20cm
, Height: 2.90cm
, Length: 24.10cm
Weight: 0.784kg
ISBN: 9780199660414
ISBN 10: 0199660417
Pages: 442
Publication Date: 11 October 2012
Audience:
College/higher education
,
Undergraduate
,
Postgraduate, Research & Scholarly
Format: Hardback
Publisher's Status: Active
Availability: To order
Stock availability from the supplier is unknown. We will order it for you and ship this item to you once it is received by us.
Reviews
Blower has responded to the need for an overarching and articulate treatment of early Christian doctrines of creation. The book he has produced shows us that a sound knowledge of these doctrines is crucial to thinking about theology more generally, both ancient and modern. Thomas E. Hunt, Theology An eloquent epilogue ... recapitulates the main theme rounding off a fine book. ... I do not think that it could be much better composed. Lionel Wickham, Journal of Ecclesiastical History
An eloquent epilogue ... recapitulates the main theme rounding off a fine book. ... I do not think that it could be much better composed. Lionel Wickham, Journal of Ecclesiastical History
Author Information
Paul M. Blowers holds the Ph.D. in patristics and early Christian studies from the University of Notre Dame, and since 1989 has taught church history and historical theology at Emmanuel Christian Seminary in Johnson City, Tennessee, where he is currently the Dean E. Walker Professor of Church History. He is principally a scholar of Greek and Byzantine patristics, and particularly of the theology of Maximus the Confessor, but he has also taught broadly in the field of church history and Christian thought. He is a Past President of the North American Patristics Society and is currently an Associate Editor of the Journal of Early Christian Studies. Author, editor, or translator of six books in early church history, he has published numerous journal articles.
