The Rational Animal: A Rereading of Gregory of Nyssa's de Hominis Opificio

The Rational Animal: A Rereading of Gregory of Nyssa's De
hominis opificio
John Behr
Journal of Early Christian Studies, Volume 7, Number 2, Summer 1999, pp.

219-247 (Article)
Published by Johns Hopkins University Press

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1353/earl.1999.0021
For additional information about this article

https://muse.jhu.edu/article/10021
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BEHR/THE RATIONAL ANIMAL 219
The Rational Animal:

A Rereading of Gregory of
Nyssa’s De hominis opificio1
JOHN BEHR
This article, through a close reading of Gregory of Nyssa’s De hominis

opificio, challenges the usual synthetic presentation of Gregory of Nyssa’s
anthropology, particularly his understanding of human sexuality,
characteristically built up by combining various elements from different works.
Instead of an anthropology articulated in terms of a dual creation, in which
sexuality is added as an economic measure “in view of the Fall,” we see how
Gregory explores the existence of human beings as rational animals,
embracing the extremes of creation in their own being, the asexual rational,
that which is in the image of God, and the irrational sexual, that which
humans share with the animals. These two aspects of human existence enables
Gregory to see a potential in creation for ascent, gracing that which is
irrational with a rational employment, or descent, assimilating the rational to
the irrational.
At some things my treatise will hint; on some it will linger; some it will
merely mention. It will try to speak imperceptibly, to exhibit secretly and to
demonstrate silently.2
This is perhaps the clearest indication, within early patristic literature, that
we are not always told the true thought of a particular author in explicit
terms. It is both a warning and an exhortation: to understand a text
adequately we must carefully follow the hints that the author provides.
This is especially true of Gregory of Nyssa, whose writings, particularly
those dealing with sexuality, have been consistently misinterpreted. In
1. I would like to thank M. Hart for his valuable comments on an earlier version
of this paper.
2. Clement of Alexandria, Stromata 1.1.15.1. ed. O. Stählin (GCS 52; Berlin,
1960).
Journal of Early Christian Studies 7:2, 219–247 © 1999 The Johns Hopkins University Press
220 JOURNAL OF EARLY CHRISTIAN STUDIES
examining Gregory’s anthropology, I am indebted to the pioneering work

done by Mark Hart who, through a careful reading of Gregory of Nyssa’s
treatise De virginitate, sensitive to Gregory’s use of rhetoric and the
employment of certain genres or modes, such as tragedy or irony, has shed
new light on Gregory’s thought on marriage and sexuality.3
Hart’s interpretation challenges us to rethink radically what Gregory
says on the question of human sexuality. As Hart notes,4 the principal
objection to his interpretation of De virginitate is likely to be based upon
the notorious passages of De hominis opificio (chs. 16–17, 22), in which
Gregory appears to speculate about a double creation and a prelapsarian
angelic mode of reproduction. According to the generally accepted
“synthetic” presentation of his anthropology, interpreting these passages
from De hominis opificio by reference to passages from other texts,
Gregory teaches a “dual creation”: first, the human being (meaning the
whole of humankind) made in the image; and second, the additional
distinction of male and female, which has no reference to the divine
Archetype, but was added by God in foresight of the Fall. Although this
is the order of God’s intended creation, its temporal realization occurs in
reverse order: for Gregory, unlike Philo and Origen, the human being (or
the whole of humankind) created in the image of God (and neither male
nor female) pre-exists the actual appearance of humankind as male and
female only in the perfection of God’s (fore)knowledge and will be finally
realized only at the end of time. However, whilst humankind was male
and female in Paradise, this sexuality was not operative but latent, “in
view of the Fall.” Prior to the Fall, human beings would have multiplied
as the angels. Human sexuality, this kinship with the mortal, irrational
animals, only became operative with the postlapsarian addition of the
“garments of skin” (Gen 3.21). These garments of skin, provided by
God, are more remedial than punitive in character: they enable human
3. The various contradictions, exaggerations, misquotations, and specious argu-

ments used in De virginitate, Hart claims, are deliberate and are intended as clues,
through a close examination of which we are led to Gregory’s true thought—that the
highest embodiment of virtue is the life which combines both leitourg¤a and
contemplation, either in marriage or in celibacy (of which the model for Gregory is
Basil), bringing a wholeness to human life. “Reconciliation of Body and Soul:
Gregory of Nyssa’s Deeper Theology of Marriage,” TS 51 (1990): 450–78; “Gregory
of Nyssa’s Ironic Praise of the Celibate Life,” Heythrop Journal 33 (1992): 1–19.
These studies are based on his unpublished doctoral work: Marriage, Celibacy and
the Life of Virtue: An Interpretation of Gregory of Nyssa’s “De virginitate” (Boston
College, 1987).
4. “Reconciliation of Body and Soul,” 477n. 97; “Gregory of Nyssa’s Ironic
Praise,” 17n. 17.
beings to continue in existence in exile from Paradise, alienated from

their true nature to an animal environment, and, through the disgust
produced by their experience of evil and the mortality of this world,
freely to desire to return to God. Moreover, it is through these garments
of skin that humankind now reaches the foreordained number appointed
by God, and so human sexuality has a significant and meaningful role to
play in this fallen world, bringing humankind to its true existence as the
image of God. In the final consummation, when the fullness of human-
kind has been reached, God’s originally intended creation will be
realized, and humankind will exist as the true image of God, without the
“economic” addition of the distinction between male and female.5
If such an interpretation of Gregory’s anthropology is correct, then the
traditional reading of De virginitate is certainly to be preferred: while
marriage still has an important role to play in increasing humankind to
the foreordained number, it is essentially secondary, an “economic” state
conditioned by the fallen world, to be transcended in the higher states of
virtue, fully realised in “literal” virginity and celibacy, which re-establish
5. This is a composite account of Gregory’s anthropology, as it has been interpreted

since Hans Urs von Balthasar, Présence et pensée (Paris: Beauchesne, 1952, 1988),
esp. 25–29, 47–52, and Jean Daniélou, Platonisme et théologie mystique (Paris:
Aubier, nouvelle édition, 1954), esp. 48–60. While most of the abundant literature
touches upon the question of anthropology and the place of human sexuality, for
more specific consideration, see F. Floeri, “Le sens de la ‘division des sexes’ chez
Grégoire de Nysse,” RSR 27 (1953): 105–11; G. Ladner, “The Philosophical
Anthropology of Saint Gregory of Nyssa,” DOP 12 (1958): 59–94; J. Daniélou, “Les
tuniques de peau chez Grégoire de Nysse,” in G. Müller and W. Zeller, eds., Glaube,
Geist, Geschichte (Leiden: Brill, 1967), 355–67; S. de Boer, De Anthropologie van
Gregorius van Nyssa (Assen: Van Gorcum, 1968); Ton H. C. van Eijk, “Marriage and
Virginity, Death and Immortality,” in J. Fontaine and C. Kannengiesser, eds.,
Epektasis: Mélanges patristiques offerts au Cardinal Jean Daniélou (Paris: Beauchesne,
1972), 209–35; M. Naldini, “Per una esegesi de De hominis opificio di Gregorio
Nisseno (Cap. V e XVI),” Studi italiani di filologia classica 45 (1973): 88–123;
E.␣ Corsini, “Plérôme humaine et plérôme cosmique chez Grégoire de Nysse,” in
M.␣ Harl, ed., Écriture et culture philosophique dans la pensée de Grégoire de Nysse
(Leiden: Brill, 1981), 111–26; P. Pisi, Genesis e phthora: Le motivazioni protologica
della virginita in Gregorio di Nissa e nella tradizione dell’enkrateia (Roma: Ateneo,
1981); Hans J. Oesterle, “Probleme der Anthropologie bei Gregor von Nyssa: Zur
Interpretation seiner Schrift De hominis opificio,” Hermes (Wiesbaden) 113 (1985):
101–14; V.␣ Harrison, “Male and Female in Cappadocian Theology,” JTS n.s. 41
(1990): 441–71. Scholars have continued to emphasize different aspects or draw other
conclusions, which, while interesting, are nevertheless elaborated within the same
fundamental framework as that presented by Balthasar and Daniélou. Note should
also be made of P. Nellas, Deification in Christ (New York: Saint Vladimir’s Seminary
Press, 1987), 23–104, who develops a synthetic theological anthropology, based on
the Greek Fathers and centered on the idea of the “garments of skin.”
humankind’s original paradisiacal state in anticipation of the resurrection.

However, as Hart also notes,6 Gregory, in De hominis opificio, directs us
to read his comments with all due care and attention:
The cause of this device [of the distinction between male and female], only
those who were eyewitnesses of the truth and ministers of the Word can
indeed know. But we, as far as possible, imagining the truth by conjectures
and images, do not expose that which comes to mind straightforwardly, but
will set it forth in the form of an exercise for those who consider prudently
what they hear.7
While other scholars have noted this and other such comments in De
hominis opificio, they have generally undermined the force of these
passages by understanding them as Gregory’s indication that his words are
only to be taken as his own speculations and conjectures, rather than as an
exhortation to read his words with particular care. But Gregory’s warning
should keep our attention focussed on the text in question, attempting to
understand what he has written here, before looking further afield for
confirmation or corroboration, building up larger and more comprehen-
sive pictures. It is necessary, of course, to understand any work within the
context of the author’s larger corpus and his or her historical context more
generally; the work of interpretation is always circular, embracing also our
own situation.8 Yet it must be remembered that the overall picture,
6. “Reconciliation of Body and Soul,” 477 n. 97; “Gregory of Nyssa’s Ironic

Praise,” 17 n. 17.
7. De hominis opificio (=HO) 16.15, PG 44:185a: TØn d¢ afit¤an t∞w toiaÊthw
§pitexnÆsevw mÒnoi m¢n ín efide›en ofl t∞w élhye¤aw aÈtÒptai ka¤ Íphr°tai toË lÒgou˚
≤me›w d¢, kay«w §sti dunatÚn, diå stoxasm«n tinvn ka‹ efikÒnvn fantasy°ntew tØn
élÆyeian, tÚ §p‹ noËn §lyÚn oÈk épofantik«w §ktiy°meya, éllÉ …w §n gumnas¤aw e‡dei
to›w eÈgn≈mosi t«n ékrovm°nvn prosyÆsomen. I am following Migne’s text, except
when the reading suggested by the remarkable edition of G. H. Forbes (Burntisland,
1855) seems preferable, and using the translation of W. Moore and H. A. Austin
(NPNF 5), modifying it as necessary. I shall refer to the chapter divisions found in
Migne, with the subsections used by Forbes (for the Greek text) and the English
translation.
8. Acknowledging that the interpreter’s own context forms an inescapable part of
the hermeneutic circle lays one open to the charge of simply reading modern concerns
and perspectives into ancient texts. However, if the interpretation of De hominis
opificio proposed here is similar to some aspects of modern thought, this is not a
sufficient case against it, any more than a dissimilarity would substantiate it or
demonstrate a disinterested objectivity. The grotesque figures who populated a certain
genre of Victorian literature, such as the “hideous, sordid and emaciated maniac . . .
spending his life in a long routine of useless and atrocious self-torture and quailing
before the ghastly phantoms of his delirious brain,” are scholarly fantasies despite
being, or perhaps as, totally other (the description is from W. E. H. Lecky, History of
European Morals, 3rd rev. ed. [New York: Appleton, 1985], 2:107).
whether of any given writer’s “theology” or of “Late Antiquity,” is one

which we have constructed. And it is salutary to reflect on how different
such pictures have been. A pertinent example is the radical change in the
evaluation of “Late Antiquity” over the last three decades, from E. R.
Dodds’ Pagans and Christians in an Age of Anxiety, to the much more
nuanced and sensitive sketches drawn by Peter Brown in his Body and
Society.9 But no matter how convincing (or accepted) any picture might
be, it cannot be allowed to override the integrity of any particular part. Yet
this is precisely what has happened with these chapters of De hominis
opificio (16–17, 22): Gregory’s comments here have been interpreted
through the idea of the “garments of skin,” an idea which is not even
alluded to in De hominis opificio.10 While it is legitimate to use other texts
to help unpack significant terms and ideas, these supporting texts should
not, however, become the basis for the interpretation itself. In part this is
a result of the manner in which the “synthetic” view of Gregory’s
anthropology has been drawn up, the methodology of an older style of
dogmatic patristics which treated patristic texts as a collection of self-
subsisting, independent statements which can be combined with state-
ments from other works to form a structure which might not be there in
any particular work, but built, instead, according to our own blueprint. A
more convincing reading may surely be obtained if we examine each text
on its own terms, before comparing it to other texts, especially when we
are expressly told to consider prudently what is said therein.
So the question naturally arises: how does the anthropology of De
hominis opificio appear when it is expounded within its own terms and
framework? This is the question, which, I believe, has not yet been
adequately treated and which this article will address.11 This article will
9. A further relevant example is the recent work by M. A. Williams, Rethinking

“Gnosticism”: A Case for the Dismantling of a Dubious Category (Princeton:
Princeton University Press, 1996), which suggests that the “Gnostics” had a far more
sophisticated, and even, in their own way, positive, attitude to the world and the body
than has been acknowledged by earlier scholars with their interpretation of Gnostic
mythology as anticosmic and antibody alienation, an interpretation which owes more
than a little to contemporary existential philosophy.
10. Daniélou notes that Gregory does not “explicitement” mention the garments of
skin in HO, and suggests that this is due to the current (perhaps Origenist) controversy
surrounding the exegesis of the phrase (“Les tuniques de peau,” 362). Nevertheless,
Daniélou interprets HO 16–22 in terms of the garments of skin mentioned in other
texts, and then uses the conjectures of HO to fill out the details of fundamental
anthropology behind the use of garments of skin in those other texts (ibid., 356).
11. Ladner’s admirable article (“The Philosophical Anthropology of St. Gregory of
Nyssa”) does indeed treat the full scope of HO, but it does not avoid explaining what
explore how Gregory of Nyssa elaborates an anthropology in terms of

the potential inherent in creation for ascent or descent, elevation or dis-
integration, a movement which turns, uniquely, upon the choice of the
human being, the rational animal. While sexuality belongs to the
irrational aspect of human existence, it is nonetheless an integral part of
humankind’s dual nature as the midpoint of creation. Human beings,
encompassing all lower levels of existence, are to raise, in themselves, all
of these dimensions of creation to their true dignity, gracing that which
is merely irrational by a rational employment. The Fall consists in the
freely chosen reversal of the ascending dynamic—an epistrophe—to a
descending movement. This descent does not result simply in the use by
human beings of the sexual dimensions of their existence, but in the
irrational, bestial use of this and other faculties, likening human beings
to the irrational animal and so distorting their properly rational
character.12 In this perspective, when Gregory speculates about the
possibility of human generation in an “angelic mode,” he is not sug-
gesting that human beings could have multiplied in paradise by means of
an asexual, angelic reproduction. Rather, he is hinting at the possibility,
once the mind is free from passion and vice, for a restored use of human
sexuality, an exercise of sexuality under the full autonomy of reason, in
an angelic mode, in which the human being fulfills its purpose in creation
of uplifting and integrating the life of the body and the senses with
reason and the divine. Such a reading of this text clearly stands at odds
with the “synthetic” reading of Gregory. Yet if its interpretation is sound,
Gregory has to say about sexuality in chapters 16–22 in terms of the garments of skin,
and so fails to provide a fully integrated interpretation of HO itself. Similarly, Corsini
notes the scarcity of studies which have systematically examined this treatise, in its
legitimate context, but nevertheless concentrates his attention on chapters 16–22,
and, apart from inferring a few valuable insights, does not do much to change the
accepted interpretation (“Plérôme humaine,” 111, 122–23). I should point out that
the aim of this article is to describe Gregory’s anthropology as it is presented in HO
itself, and so I will not be considering its relation to other treatises, nor will I be
especially concerned with its points of contact with other philosophical or theological
traditions: the latter has already been documented; the former depends upon a prior
adequate understanding of each text—the point at issue.
12. Clement of Alexandria makes the same point, when discussing the views of
Cassian, Marcion and Valentinus, whom he charges for holding a position remark-
ably like the “synthetic” view attributed to Gregory: “They say, ‘Man became like the
beasts when he came to practice sexual intercourse.’ But it is when a man in his
passion really wants to go to bed with a strange woman that in truth such a man has
become a wild beast—‘wild horses were they become, each man whinnied after his
neighbor’s wife’ (Jer 5.8).” Strom. 3.17.102; trans. J. E. L Oulton and H. Chadwick,
Alexandrian Christianity (Philadelphia: Westminster, 1954).
then it corroborates what Hart thinks he has found in De virginitate, so

adding to the case that it is the “synthetic” picture which has misunder-
stood the evidence as we actually have it, at least as regards Gregory’s
understanding of anthropology and sexuality.
I: CHAPTERS 1–15: THE ASCENDING ORDER

OF CREATION
Gregory’s work De hominis opificio, written in 379 c.e., was meant to

complete Basil’s Hexaemeron by presenting a considered anthropology:
Gregory picks up where Basil left off. The opening two chapters of De
hominis opificio describe the beauty of the world as it was created by
God, but a beauty which was as yet incomplete, “for there was none to
share it” (HO 1.5, 132c). The creation of the world culminates in the
creation of the first human being, who is not simply another part of the
world, but is called to be its lord and sovereign. God had adorned the
world to be a “royal lodging” for His creature (HO 2.1, 132d), so that,
beholding some of the wonders therein, and ruling others, humankind
“might, through its enjoyment, have knowledge of the Giver” (HO 2.1,
133a). The human role in creation was “not the acquiring of what was
not there, but the enjoyment of the things which were there,” and for this
assignment, God fashioned humankind with the instincts of a twofold
being, “blending the divine with the earthy, that by means of both,
humankind may be naturally and properly disposed to each enjoyment,
enjoying God by means of its more divine nature, and the good things of
the earth by the sense that is akin to them” (HO 2.2, 133b).
Human dignity is, moreover, clearly shown in the fact that the human
being was the only one for whom God took counsel with Himself prior
to His creative activity (HO 3, 133c–136a). The significance of this event
announces that something completely new has been introduced into
creation: God’s own image. Gregory, unlike other Fathers, does not
differentiate between the “image” and the “likeness.” Although our
ımo¤vsiw t“` ye“` (likeness to God) has been lost in the Fall and must be
regained, the ımo¤vsiw was fully realized in the original created efik≈n
(“image”).13 Gregory describes the created human being as an ¶mcuxow
efik≈n, “a living image, partaking with the Archetype in both rank and in
name,” who is clothed in virtue, planted in immortality and crowned
with righteousness as natural characteristics (HO 4, 136cd). With these
13. Cf. H. Merki, ‘Omo¤vsiw ye“ (Fribourg: Paulusdruck, 1952), 138–46.

virtues, the human soul has no other lord, but is autocratic and self-
governing (136b), and so is “perfectly like the archetypal Beauty in all
that belongs to the dignity of royalty” (136d). Furthermore, “the very
form of the human body” has been fashioned to be eminently suitable
for this royal existence (136b). Again, in chapter 5, Gregory asserts that
it is nothing other than “purity, freedom from passion, blessedness,
alienation from all evil, and all such things, through which the likeness to
the divine is formed in men,” and, moreover, mind, reason, and love
(HO 5.1–2, 137bc). All of these characteristics together constitute
humankind as the image of God; and conversely, the lack of any one of
these, in particular love, destroys that image (137c). Humankind’s
similarity to God is not a static ontological given, but is manifested in the
free exercise of virtue.
From chapters 6 to 15, Gregory analyzes the composition of human-
kind in its created state, concentrating on the question of the nature of
the soul/mind and its relationship to the body.14 Gregory interweaves an
account of the relationship between the mind and the body with a
description of the evolution of three kinds of soul. Both of these accounts
emphasize the unity in being and function of the material and spiritual
aspects of human beings: that they are woven together reinforces the
point. According to Gregory, God’s act of creation was instantaneous
and Moses’ account of creation shows the gradual process of the
unfolding of God’s creative act.15 Moses’ account of the successive
appearance of plants, animals, and finally human beings “teaches us that
the power of life and soul may be considered in three distinctions” (§n
tris‹ diafora›w: HO 8.4, 144d). The first is solely the “power of
increase and nutrition” (aÈjhtikÆ . . . yreptikØ) that is common to all
bodies. Second, is the “activity of sense and perception” that is found in
irrational but sentient beings. And finally, the “perfect bodily life [which]
is seen in the rational (I mean the human) nature, which is both
nourished and endowed with sense, and also partakes of reason and is
14. For recent discussion of Gregory’s understanding of the nature of the soul and
its relation to the senses and the body, see J. P. Cavarnos, “The Relation of Body and
Soul in the Thought of Gregory of Nyssa,” in H. Dörrie, M. Altenburger, and
U.␣ Schramm, eds., Gregor von Nyssa und die Philosophie (Leiden: Brill, 1976), 61–
78; A. Meredith, “The Concept of Mind in Gregory of Nyssa and the Neoplatonists,”
SP 22 (1989): 35–51.
15. For the relation of this aspect of HO to the near-contemporary work of
Gregory, Apologia in Hexaemeron, and to Philo’s idea of a simultaneous creation in
De opificio mundi, 13, 28, and 67, see Ladner, “Philosophical Anthropology,” 72–76.
ordered by mind.”16 In this way, “nature makes the ascent, as it were, by

steps, I mean the various properties of life, from the smaller things to
that which is perfect.”17
In chapter 8 Gregory suggests that each level of soul incorporates the
previous level in a manner suitable to it:
For this rational animal, humankind, is compounded (katakirnçtai) of
every form of soul: it is nourished by the vegetative species of soul;18 to the
faculty of increase there grew that of sensation, which stands midway
between the intellectual and the more material nature . . . then takes place a
certain appropriation and blending (ofike¤vs¤w te ka‹ énãkrasiw) of the
intellectual essence to the subtle and enlightened element of the sensitive
nature; so that humankind consists of these three. (HO 8.5, 145c)
This classification of the powers of the soul is a somewhat simplified

version of the various philosophical discussions on the soul.19 However,
Gregory’s purpose is not to integrate different philosophical schemata,
but to explain the unfolding of creation as it is described in the opening
verses of Genesis, and to connect this to the various trichotomic concepts
used in Scripture. Paul’s terms “body, soul, and spirit” (I Thess 5.23)
apply to the nutritive, the sensitive, and the intellectual aspects respec-
tively, as do Christ’s use of “heart, soul, and mind” (e.g., Mk 12.30; HO
8.5, 145cd).
The idea that the rational soul does not merely include the previous
levels of soul, but also appropriates their function, is clarified when
Gregory resumes the argument in chapters 14–15:
Since our argument discovered three distinctions of the vital faculty—the
nutritive, which has no sensation; the nutritive and sensitive,20 but without
16. HO 8.4, 145a: ≤ d¢ tele¤a §n s≈mati zvØ §n tª logikª, tª ényrvp¤n˙ l°gv,

kayorçtai fÊsei, ka‹ trefom°nh ka‹ afisyanom°nh ka‹ lÒgou met°xousa ka‹ n“
dioikoum°nh.
17. HO 8.7, 148b: . . . kayãper diå baym«n ≤ fÊsiw, t«n t∞w zv∞w l°gv fidivmãtvn,
épÚ t«n mikrot°rvn §p‹ tÚ t°leion poie›tai tØn ênodon. For the relation of this picture
of the universe ascending in steps to a possible Posidonian source, see Ladner,
“Philosophical Anthropology,” 71.
18. Here, as in the passage 144d–145a, I am following the English translators,
taking Forbes’ alternative reading of futikÒn rather than fusikÒn.
19. On the question of Gregory’s psychology and its consistency, in addition to the
material already cited, see also H. F. Cherniss, “The Platonism of Gregory of Nyssa,”
University of California Publications in Classical Philology 11.1 (1930): 1–92.
20. Reading afisyanom°non, with Forbes, rather than Migne’s aÈjanom°non, for
consistency with HO 8.4, 144d–145a.
a share in the rational activity; and the rational and perfect, coextensive
with the whole faculty . . . . (HO 14.2, 176a)
Although Gregory speaks here of the “vital faculty” rather than the
“soul,” he goes on to specify that we are not to imagine the compound
nature of humankind as three different types of soul welded together
(sugkekrot∞syai), each active within their own limits, for “the true and
perfect soul is one by nature, the intellectual and immaterial, which
mingles with our material nature by means of the senses” (HO 14.2,
176b). In chapter 15 Gregory explains himself more clearly:
Thus, as the soul has its perfection in that which is intellectual and rational,
everything that is not so may indeed share in the name of “soul,” but is not
really soul, but a certain vital energy associated with the appellation “soul.”
(HO 15.2, 176d–177a)
If the vegetative and sensitive “souls” cannot really be called souls, it is

only in reference to the perfection of the intellectual and rational soul as
the culmination of creation. As Gregory pointed out earlier in chapter 3,
the appearance of humankind, the rational animal, in the world, was
something completely new: it was the introduction of the image of God,
creatures who manifest their similarity to God through the nobility and
freedom of their existence and the exercise of this freedom in a virtuous
life. If these are “ensouled” beings, then plants and animals cannot be
said to have “souls,” but only vital energy. For this reason Gregory uses
the terms “mind” and human “soul” effectively as synonyms.21
But the important point of what Gregory is trying to show in the
passages under consideration is that the rational soul of the human
being, as something new within creation, both fulfils the inferior levels of
the nutritive and sensitive souls, and also encompasses these inferior
souls: humankind’s rational and perfect soul is described as blended
(sugkraye¤h: HO 8.5, 145b; katakirnçtai: 145c) with the other types of
soul, or alternatively as “co-extensive with the whole faculty” (HO 14.2,
176a). The completion, and yet novelty, of the ascending process of
nature in humankind means that all the previous levels of life or soul,
without losing any of their own characteristics, find their true existence,
their rationale, in humankind’s existence as the image of God.
The unity of the soul (or mind) and body is shown by the relationship
in which they stand to each other. In chapters 12–14 Gregory argues for
the independence and omnipresence of the soul throughout the body: the
human soul does not reside in the heart, nor in the highest part of a
21. Cf. Meredith, “Concept of Mind,” 35.

human being, the head, but is rather present throughout the whole body:
ı noËw diÉ ˜lou toË Ùrgãnou diÆkvn (HO 12.8, 161b; cf. HO 15.3, 177b).
Gregory does not state explicitly how the incorporeal mind communi-
cates with the body, except to say that the “communion” (koinvn¤a)
between the two is a “connection (sunãfeian) unspeakable and incon-
ceivable” (HO 15.3, 177b). The relationship between mind and body is
most clearly seen, not so much from an abstract ontological perspective,
but rather in their mode of functioning, which demonstrates their
essential connectedness through the operation of the senses. Gregory
categorically states that without the body the mind would remain
isolated, in a state of impotence:
Now since the mind is a thing intelligible and incorporeal, its grace (xãrin)
would have been incommunicable (ékoin≈nhton) and isolated, if its motion
were not manifested by some contrivance. For this cause there was need of
this instrumental formation, that it might, like a plectrum, touch the vocal
organs and indicate by the quality of the notes struck, the motion within.
(HO 9.1, 149bc)
As chapters 6 and 10 show, this dependence of the mind upon the body
is not solely one of self-expression. In chapter 6, Gregory goes through
all the different senses to demonstrate how, through each sense organ,
the mind takes in something that is necessary for its functioning. In
chapter 10, Gregory concludes that it is through the senses that:
. . . the mind apprehends those things which are external to the body, and
draws to itself the images of phenomena, marking in itself the impressions
of the things which are seen. (HO 10.3, 152c)
In chapter 11.1, Gregory points out that the mind is not to be identified
with the operation of the senses, but is rather present in all the various
workings of the body (153cd). The communion (koinvn¤a) of the mind
and the body, which allows the mind to remain single in all its diverse
operations, remains “inconceivable,” and so gives a further, apophatic
dimension to humankind’s existence as the image of the incomprehen-
sible God (cf. HO 11.3, 156ab).
However, in Gregory’s presentation, something more is indicated than
simply the interdependence and cofunctioning of mind and body. The
body is, in a very real sense, the physical manifestation of persons in their
own unique particularity. It is the sphere in which human beings reveal
themselves, are known by others, and themselves know others. Gregory
has no doctrine to account for knowledge which would be similar or
analogous to Plotinus’ introversion and the idea of the immanence of the
cause in the effect,22 nor does he have recourse to a Socratic maieutics,

explaining knowledge by reference to the pre-existence of a disembodied
soul. The only knowledge we have of others and of the world is an
experiential knowledge, gained through the medium of the body. This
brings us back to the opening chapters of De hominis opificio, where
humanity’s relationship to God is “physical,” one of enjoyment and
thanksgiving in the munificence of God’s goodwill.23 For Gregory, the
human being is emphatically a psychosomatic whole, and is created as
such in the image of God.
This brings us to the human body itself. Gregory explains the fact that
humans are born devoid of natural weapons and covering, inferior in
this respect to animals, by explaining how this apparent bodily weakness
contributes to humankind’s role as king: for “they would have neglected
their rule over the other creatures if they had no need of the cooperation
of their subjects” (HO 7.2, 141b). More importantly, Gregory links the
upright formation of humans, the mark of their royal dignity, directly to
the “ministration of hands” which “is a special property of the rational
nature” (HO 8.2, 144b), and is therefore the basis for language. As
human beings stand upright, they do not need forelegs, and so could
develop hands. Because they have hands, their mouths and throats could
be adapted for the articulation of words rather than to the need to graze
or tear meat apart:
If, then, the body had no hands, how could articulate sounds be formed in
it, seeing that the form of the parts of the mouth would not have had the
configuration proper for the use of speech? So that humankind must have
either bleated or “baaed” or barked . . . or uttered some bestial sound. But
22. Cf. Meredith (“Concept of Mind,” 44), who notes as a possible exception De
virginitate 12.
23. It is worth noting that the typical pattern for the spiritual life outlined in
Gregory’s other works, and the Greek Fathers more generally, following Origen, is
not primarily one of turning aside from the material world to embark on a purely
inward journey, as it might be for Augustine, but one which progresses through
natural contemplation, to the level of rational contemplation, and ultimately union
with God. For an introductory account, see A. Louth, The Origins of the Christian
Mystical Tradition (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1981), who emphasizes that for
Gregory, at the second level, represented by the book of Ecclesiastes, “The purified
soul does not simply learn the vanity of all created things, but also learns to see in
them a manifestation of the glory of God” (p. 85). The important point, clearly, is
that the soul should no longer find her stability in the transitory world but in God,
and that, when anchored in God, she can appreciate the world as the gift of God
which it is. On the inward turn of Augustine, see C. Taylor, The Sources of the Self:
The Making of the Modern Identity (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1989),
127–42.
now, as the hand is made part of the body, the mouth is at leisure for the
service of the reason. Thus the hands are shown to be the property of the
rational nature, the Creator having thus devised by their means a facility for
the reason. (HO 8.8, 149a)
Thus the very corporeal formation of human beings is fashioned for their
exercise of reason. The terms lÒgow and logikÒw are always difficult to
translate adequately, but, given the implications that Gregory draws out
here, it would seem appropriate to render his description, at the
beginning of this passage, of the human being as logikÒn ti z“on (148c),
as “a word-bearing animal.”
In chapters 1–15 of De hominis opificio we are, therefore, presented
with an ascending, or anabatic, anthropology: humankind appears as the
culmination of creation’s “ascent by steps from the smaller things to that
which is perfect.” As rational animals, human beings encompass all the
previous levels of existence. Yet, while maintaining their proper charac-
teristics, as something new within creation humans are to fulfil the
potential of all lower levels: all animals have the power of movement,
but human beings, with their “rational soul,” can make this capacity for
movement, together with the other powers of the soul(s), by virtue of the
excellence of their bodily form, “word-bearing.”
II: EPISTROPHE
It is this directedness of creation that forms the heart of Gregory’s vision,

and at the same time constitutes the possible turning point or crux. In
chapter 12, when Gregory discusses how the mind operates through the
bodily senses, he asserts that the mind only has an effect upon those parts
which have remained in their natural condition, for “the mind is somehow
naturally adapted to have a close relation with that which is in a natural
condition, but to be alien from that which is removed from nature” (HO
12.8, 161b). It is in this context that Gregory explains the origin of evil. All
things that have a desire (¶fesiw) for the beautiful incline towards the
Divine as the supreme beauty (HO 12.9, 161c). The mind is adorned, as a
mirror, by its likeness to the archetypal Beauty, and itself adorns the body,
which stands as a “mirror of the mirror” (HO 12.9, 161cd). So long as
each level keeps in touch with the other, true beauty is communicated
through the whole series: creation becomes theophanic. The ascending
direction of creation, which we have seen, has, as a corresponding
movement, the descent of divine beauty. But if there is an interruption of
this movement, or if the superior comes to follow the inferior, then matter,
no longer adorned by the mind, manifests its own misshapen character,
“for in itself matter is a thing without form or structure,” and the ugliness
of matter is then conveyed to the mind which has chosen to follow it, so
that “the image of God is no longer seen in the character of the creature”
(HO 12.10, 161d–164a). This is the origin of evil (HO 12.11, 164ab).
Gregory continues:
Now such a condition as this does not arise except when there takes place
an overturning (§pistrofÆ) of nature to the opposite state, in which the lust
(§piyum¤a) does not incline to the beautiful, but rather to that which is in
need of being adorned. For it is altogether necessary that that which is
made like to the matter destitute of its own form, is transformed
(summetamorfoËsyai) in respect of the absence of form and of beauty. . . .
(HO 12.12, 164b)
Gregory’s point is straightforward: if we fail to follow the ascending

direction of creation, to assimilate ourselves to the divine archetypal
Beauty, we can only be assimilating ourselves to the lower levels of
existence, and degenerating to the shapelessness of matter. Epistrophe, in
Gregory’s presentation, is not the Plotinian turning of a disintegrating
emanation towards its source, but the revolt of humankind away from
God, which has resulted in our present condition. Thus Gregory again
emphasizes that human beings, in their natural state, are endowed with
all the divine characteristics. It is not a supernatural grace bestowed
upon humankind that likens it to God; rather, humankind, after its
choice to turn towards the inferior, is in an unnatural state, a life subject
to corruption.
So, in the first 15 chapters of De hominis opificio, Gregory presents us
with a picture of the “evolutionary” dynamics of creation, its ascent
through the three distinctions of soul, and the appearance of humankind,
who, as the rational animal, is the culmination of this ascending
movement, and who, as the image of God, is nevertheless incommensu-
rate with this unfolding of creation itself. Humankind’s rational soul is
coextensive with all its other faculties, making them, and its very body,
“word-bearing.” The basis of this ascending perspective is the desire
(¶fesiw) which all things have for the good and beautiful, and ultimately
for God Himself. This upward movement is counterbalanced by a
downward theophanic manifestation: if the mind (our rational nature)
maintains its likeness to the Divine, it will adorn our body as a mirror of
the mirror. If, however, human beings do not incline in their desire
(¶fesiw) towards God, but turn towards the lower levels in their lust
(§piyum¤a), they are transformed by the shapelessness of that which
should be adorned by them. In this way, the whole structure is
overthrown, and the rational animal, humankind, is no longer able to

manifest the image of God.
III: CHAPTERS 16–22: A DESCENDING ANTHROPOLOGY
This discussion of the epistrophe of nature to its opposite state, a

digression (164bd) in chapter 12, is picked up in chapter 16 and
succeeding chapters as the foundation for Gregory’s investigation into
how the passible and mortal human being may be called the image of the
impassible and immortal God. The burning question for Gregory in these
passages is how human␣ beings, who now exist in misery, can be called
like God, Who exists in blessedness; for although Scripture asserts that
humankind was created in the image, there is clearly no similarity
between humankind’s present existence and that of God (HO 16.3–4,
180bd). It is these chapters (16, 17, and 22) that have caused the most
discussion amongst scholars; but it is also here that Gregory warns us
that he is not going to state what comes to mind straightforwardly, but
will set it forth “in the form of an exercise for those who consider
prudently what they hear” (HO 16.15, 185a).24
That humankind encompasses all levels of creation has caused some to
praise the human being as a “microcosm” (HO 16.1, 177d). Such a
description, for Gregory, is not sufficient for the true dignity of
humankind. Of what, Gregory asks, does the greatness of humankind
consist “according to the doctrine of the Church?” and answers, “not in
its likeness to the created world, but in its being in the image of the
nature of the Creator” (HO 16.2, 180a). An image is so called as long as
it keeps its resemblance to the prototype; if the likeness is perverted, it is
no longer an image (HO 16.3, 180b). But if we examine Scripture,
Gregory suggests, we find that the account of the creation of the first
human being includes within it a certain departure from the divine
Prototype. In chapter 16, Gregory examines the account of the creation
of human beings given in Gen 1.27, aligning the play between the clauses
to human similarity to, and difference from, God. This gives the creation
of humankind a twofold character:
24. Gregory repeats his warning several times, even within chapter 16 (e.g., 16.4,
180c). These chapters, like the rest of this work, are characterized by numerous
warnings and digressions, as Gregory circles around his subject. See the introduction
of J. Laplace (SC 6; Paris: Cerf, 1943), 7–19.
We must, then, examine the words carefully: for we find, if we do so, that
that which was made “in the image” is one thing, and that which is now
manifested in wretchedness is another. “God created man,” it says, “in the
image of God created He him.” There is the end of the creation (kt¤siw) of
that which was made “in the image”:25 then it makes a resumption of the
account of the formation (kataskeuØn), and says, “male and female created
He them.” I presume that it is known to everyone that this is to be thought
of as outside the Prototype: for “in Christ Jesus,” as the Apostle says,
“there is neither male nor female.” Yet the Word declares that humankind is
thus divided. Thus the formation (kataskeuÆ) of our nature is in a sense
twofold:26 one made like to God, one divided according to this distinction;
for something like this the passage intimates by its arrangement, where it
first says, “God created man, in the image of God created He him,” and
then, adding to what has been said, “male and female created He them”—a
thing which is alien from our conceptions of God. (HO 16.7–8, 181ab)
While the male/female distinction has no reference to the divine Archetype,

but belongs to our created nature, this in itself does not detract from the
dignity of God’s creation.27 Gregory continues, stating his views cate-
gorically:
25. Following the English translation, and Corsini’s comment, against Laplace’s
translation, that t°low ¶xei has the sense of termination, rather than “attaining its
perfection.” Cf. Corsini, “Plérôme humaine,” 115 n. 1.
26. This duality (dipl∞) pertains not so much to two separated acts of creation (first
a “virtual” creation of humankind in the image, and then of an actual human being),
but to two aspects of the same creative activity. There is one point at which Gregory
seems to indicate a dual creation: after citing Gen 1.27a, Gregory comments:
“Accordingly, the image of God, which we behold in the universal humanity, had its end
then; but Adam as yet was not” (HO 22, 204cd). For a systematic attempt to interpret
Gregory in terms of a “dual” creation, differentiating between the levels of Being and
Becoming, see Balthasar’s Présence et pensée. But as Ladner points out (“Philosophical
Anthropology,” 90 n. 141): “for God the virtual creation of the pleroma of mankind in
the spiritual image of God and of the spirit-like uncorrupted and passionless body of the
first individual man are one. It is therefore not advisable to distinguish sharply . . .
between the ‘original supra-historical image of God’ (i.e., the pleroma of mankind) and
the ‘original historical image of God’ (i.e., man’s state in Paradise). . . . It is essential to
recognize that in Gregory’s view, while spirit remains supreme, the body—but not sex—
was not an ‘afterthought’ of God.” Ladner’s point, apart from his qualification, is surely
correct. Corsini points out the significance, in this respect, of Gregory’s vocabulary: “Il
me semble pouvoir envisager une nuance de sens entre les deux mots employés
d’habitude par Grégoire dans le De Hom. op. pour indiquer la notion de création:
kt¤siw, kataskeuÆ. Le deuxième me paraît avoir un sens moins abstrait et Grégoire
l’emploie de préférence pour indiquer la ‘deuxième création’, c’est-à-dire le développement
de l’acte divin instantané le long du temps.” “Plérôme humaine,” 115 n. 2.
27. Cf. Corsini (“Plérôme humaine,” 115): “Il ne dit nullement qu’il a eu deux
créations pour les deux aspects: il dit tout simplement qu’il y a deux expressions de
l’Écriture pour indiquer que l’acte créateur de Dieu s’est porté sur deux aspects
I think that by these words Holy Scripture conveys to us a great and lofty
dogma; and the dogma is this: the human is the midpoint (m°son §st‹ tÚ
ényr≈pinon) of two of the things separated from each other as extremes—
the divine and incorporeal nature, and the irrational and bestial life (t∞w
élÒgou ka‹ kthn≈douw zv∞w). For in the human composite (ényrvp¤nƒ
sugkr¤mati) a part of both of the [things] spoken of may be seen: the
rational and intelligent [part] of the divine, which does not admit the
distinction between male and female, and the bodily formation
(kataskeuØn) and structure of the irrational, which is divided into male and
female. For each of these is certainly in all that partakes of human life. (HO
16.9, 181bc)
That the human being is a rational animal, partaking of both the rational
and irrational, the divine and the bestial element is, for Gregory, a dogma;
it is essential to humankind’s God-given role as the midpoint of creation.
This point is absolutely essential for a proper understanding of Gregory’s
anthropology: human beings are not and never were, nor were ever meant
to be, solely intellectual beings, as the angels, but they embrace both
dimensions of creation, the asexual rational part and the sexual irrational.
Yet there is a priority between them, indicated by the Scriptural account of
the creation. Gregory continues:
But that the intellectual element precedes the other we learn as from one
who gives in order an account of the making of humankind; for the
community and kindred with the irrational is added to humankind.28 For he
says first that “God created man in the image of God,” showing by these
words, as the Apostle says, that in such a being there is no male or female:
then he adds the particular characteristics of human nature, “male and
female created He them.” (HO 16.9, 181c)
Gregory, commenting on Gen 1.26–27, is speaking in an unambiguously

prelapsarian context; there is not even a hint of considerations pertaining
to a Fall, even one that is as yet only divinely foreseen. Humankind, the
différents de l’homme. Grégoire ne dit pas, non plus, que l’homme ‘à l’image’ n’avait
pas de sexe: il veut dire que dans l’archétype (Dieu) il n’y a pas de sexe et que le sexe
est, en conséquence, exclu du katÉ efikÒna.”
28. éllå protereÊein tÚ noerÚn, kay«w parå toË tØn ényrvpogon¤an §n tãjei
diejelyÒntow §mãyomen˚ §pigennhmatikØn d¢ e‰nai t“ ényr≈pƒ tØn prÚw tÚ êlogon
koinvn¤an te ka‹ sugg°neian. I have followed Laplace’s translation of §pigennhmatikÆ,
which follows the Latin version given in Migne, rather than the English version of the
NPNF which follows the Latin version in Forbes: the NPNF gives “provision for
reproduction,” a translation not found in either LSJ nor Lampe’s Patristic Greek
Lexicon, both of which suggest “adventitious,” “added secondarily.” The context is
certainly “first-second,” bearing in mind the necessary qualifications of the sense of
“secondary.” Cf. notes 26, 27.
image of God, was created male and female, which has no reference in
the Archetype, but is part of its “community and kinship” (koinvn¤an
. . . sugg°neian) with the irrational animals. Although, following the
order of Gen 1.27, humankind’s “community and kinship” with the
irrational animals is described as succeeding the creation in the image,
there is no sense of it being “economic,” nor is it limited to the function
of procreation—it is simply the “particular characteristics of human
nature” (t∞w ényrvp¤nhw fÊsevw tå fidi≈mata) as distinct from the divine
Nature. This addition is a necessary part of humankind’s medial
position, essential to their divinely ordained function, and therefore,
unquestionably prelapsarian. It is important, furthermore, to note that
this “addition” to the human being is not said to unbalance the pre-
eminence ascribed to the intellectual aspect (tÚ noerÚn) of the human
being: the “community and kinship” with the irrational animals, human-
kind’s existence as male and female, is not, in this passage, presented as
a human appropriation to the irrational nature in an epistrophic or
catabatic manner.
Gregory goes on to examine more closely the nature of the image in
humankind. According to Gregory, God created human beings from His
bountiful goodness, and so did not begrudge humankind a share of His
own goodness:
The Word therefore expressed it all concisely, by a comprehensive phrase, in
saying that humankind was made “in the image of God”: for this is to say
that He made human nature a participant in all good; for if the Deity is the
fullness of all good, and this is His image, then the image finds its similarity
to the Archetype in being filled with all good. Thus there is in us the form
of all good, all virtue and wisdom, and every higher thing that we conceive.
One of all these is to be free from necessity, not in bondage to any natural
power, but self-determining, having jugement to what we choose; for virtue
is a voluntary thing, subject to no dominion. . . . (HO 16.10–11, 184b)
This description of humankind’s character as the image of God is, in

substance, identical with that described in chapters 4–5. The image of
God in human beings consists in their noble, autocratic freedom,
through which they manifest and participate in the goodness of God.
While sharing all these characteristics with God, the image is funda-
mentally different from the Prototype. For Gregory, this difference
between God and humankind does not simply lie in the fact that
humankind was created male and female, but, underlying this distinc-
tion, is the fact that:
One is uncreated, while the other exists through creation: and the
distinction of such a property again entails a sequence of other properties;
for it is very certainly acknowledged that the uncreated Nature is also
immutable and always remains the same, while the created nature cannot
exist without change (êneu élloi≈sevw); for its very passage from
nonexistence to existence is a certain motion and change of the nonexistent
transformed by the divine will into being. (HO 16.12, 184c)
Human beings, as the image, are like God, but they are not God; while
the attributes of God and humankind may be similar, underlying these
attributes is a radically different nature, created rather than uncreated
(HO 16.13, 184d), a difference which implies a sequence of other
properties, such as humankind’s existence as male and female. But,
significantly, the aspect which Gregory focuses on, and in terms of which
he goes on to provide further reflections on humankind’s creation as
male and female, is not sexuality itself, but the inherent instability and
movement of created nature.
Although Gregory has already stated explicitly that humankind was
created male and female, it is through this inherently unstable character
and movement of humanity that Gregory goes on to explore further, in
three aetiological passages, “in the form of an exercise for those who
consider prudently what they hear,” the reason why God should have
“added” the distinction between male and female to the creature in His
image. In the first of these passages, Gregory argues that God:
. . . perceiving beforehand by His power of foreknowledge towards what
the movement inclines, according to the independence and self-
determination of the human will, as He saw what would be, He devised
(§pitexnçtai29) for His image the distinction of male and female, which no
longer looks to the divine Archetype, but, as has been said, has been
appropriated to the more irrational nature. (HO 16.14, 185a)30
In this passage Gregory refers us back to HO 16.9, where the distinction

between male and female was presented (with no conjectured reference
29. Corsini’s comments are again valuable: “§pitexnçtai: il y a à la fois le sens

d’inventer et d’ajouter. Ce qu’il faut voir bien clairement, du moment qu’il s’agit d’une
action de Dieu, c’est qu’il n’y a pas idée de succession chronologique.” “Plérôme
humaine,” 117 n. 1.
30. Gregory goes on to explain that in the creation of humankind, Scripture
indicates, by the indefinite character of the term “humankind,” that God embraced
the entire fullness of humanity by His knowledge and power (HO 16.16–18, 185bd).
This is clearly the reverse side of Gregory’s earlier description of an instantaneous
creation (encompassing, in foreknowledge, all that would come to be), followed by a
gradual unfolding of His creative act.
to humanity’s fall) as humankind’s community and kinship with the

irrational animals, in accordance with “the great and lofty dogma” of
Scripture which describes humankind as the midpoint of creation. What
is new in HO 16.14 is that Gregory suggests that the distinction between
male and female was added in view of what would happen. But it is
important to note that this distinction is now described as humankind’s
appropriation to the more irrational nature (tª élogvt°r& prosƒke¤vtai
fÊsei); we are now presented with a descending, or catabatic, anthropol-
ogy. This is, as Gregory has made clear, an epistrophe, an overturning of
the proper directedness of creation, in which the image (the rational
human being) is now appropriated to the irrational nature.
This subtle change in perspective is significant, and that Gregory does
not state his thought straightfowardly is more so. While previously in HO
16 Gregory referred, in a nonpejorative manner, to the addition of the
irrational and bestial (t∞w élÒgou ka‹ kthn≈douw: 181b) aspects to the
rational creature, to indicate thereby the fact that the bodily and irrational
does not have a divine archetype, he is now using the same terms to
describe the overturning of the divine order by the human appropriation to
the irrational. The “irrational and bestial” aspect of the “human compo-
sition” (181c) is being used to play two distinct roles: one natural, the
other “passionate.” Later in HO Gregory differentiates clearly between
the movements natural to bodily existence and those “passions” which are
more properly vices. The latter are not caused by the mere presence of the
“irrational and bestial” aspects, but by the mind becoming irrationally
attached to these bodily realities: it is the “evil husbandry of the mind”
that perverts all the irrational motions, making them passions (HO 18.4,
193b). If the reader does not keep a clear distinction between these two
meanings, it would seem as if Gregory is straightforwardly saying that our
kinship with the irrational is simply an addition to human nature in the
light of the Fall, a view which would contradicts the whole prior thrust of
his treatise, including his statement of the “Scriptutal dogma” in the first
part of HO 16, with its emphasis that the link with the irrational belongs
to the raison d’être of human beings. It is, perhaps, the ability to appreciate
this distinction while reading the text that Gregory, by writing “in the form
of an exercise,” demands of his readers. This demand on the reader also
effectively obscures Gregory’s thought on the matter from those who are
not able to distinguish between the passions and the natural movements of
their bodily natures.
The descending, epistrophic movement, touched upon in HO 16.14, is
brought out more explicitly in the second aetiological passage, from the
second part of chapter 17, where Gregory develops this line of thought:
He Who brought all things into being and fashioned humankind as a whole
by His own will to the divine image, did not wait to see the number of
souls made up to its proper fullness (plÆrvma) by the gradual additions of
those coming after; but while contemplating the whole nature of humankind
together, by its fullness, through the activity of His foreknowledge, and
honoring it with a lot (lÆjei) exalted and equal to the angels, since He saw
beforehand, by His power of vision, the will not keeping a direct course to
the good, and, because of this, the falling away from the angelic life, in
order that the multitude of human souls might not be curtailed, falling from
that mode (trÒpou) by which the angels were increased to a multitude—for
this reason, He formed in [our] nature that design of increase (tØn . . . t∞w
aÈjÆsevw §p¤noian §gkataskeuãzei tª fÊsei) appropriate for those who
would fall into sin, implanting in humankind, instead of the angelic nobility,
that bestial and irrational mode of succeeding one another (tÚn kthn≈dh te
ka‹ êlogon t∞w §j éllÆlvn diadox∞w trÒpon §mfuteÊsaw tª ényrvpÒthti).
Hence it seems to me that the great David, pitying the misery of humans,
mourns over their nature with such words as these, that “humankind being
in honor knew it not,” meaning by “honor” the equality with the angels;
therefore he says, “it is compared to the beasts that have no understanding,
and made like unto them” [Ps 44.13]. For the one, who received in [their]
nature this mode of generation subject to flux, truly became bestial on
account of the inclination to the material (ˆntvw går kthn≈dhw §g°neto ı tØn
=o≈dh taÊthn g°nesin tª fÊsei paradejãmenow diå tØn prÚw tÚ Íl«dew
=opÆn). (HO 17.4–5, 189c–192a)
Although humankind was created in a state equal to the angels, God

foresaw that human beings would not keep their will directed to the
good. Such a fall from this angelic state, and the mode of increase
appropriate to it, to the level of animals, would have curtailed the
completion of the human race, for human(kind) (at this stage of
Gregory’s explanation) would have had no essential kinship with the
animals. So God implanted the bestial mode of succession in human
nature, a mode which is suited to the state of those in sin, those who no
longer look to the good, even though human(kind) has not as yet fallen.
But God’s own providential act, implanting “the bestial and irrational
mode of succession” in human nature, does not make human beings
bestial. Rather it is their own inclination to the merely material that
renders human beings truly bestial. Here Gregory is clearly playing upon
the two senses of the category “irrational” noted early. The transfer of
the “animal and irrational mode of succession” to the rational creation,
as we have seen, is part of God’s original design for the human being as
the midpoint of all creation, uniting the extremities of creation in
themselves and raising the irrational to the rational. The one who has
become “truly bestial” is not the one who has received the “mode of
generation subject to flux” in his or her nature, but the one who has
inclined towards the material. It is the human epistrophe, the fall to the
merely material, that renders human beings “truly bestial,” subjecting
the mind to the irrational urges.
That, in HO 17.4–5, it is not the addition of this irrational and bestial
mode of generation that renders human beings bestial, is important, for
it indicates that the stage of God’s activity to which this “addition” refers
is not the postlapsarian addition of the “garments of skin,” but the
second of the two aspects of God’s original creative activity, the interplay
between the two clauses of Gen 1.27, viewed now from a different
perspective to that earlier employed by Gregory, dogmatically, in HO 16.
The question which Gregory’s veiled thought in HO 17.4–5 raises, but
does not answer clearly, is whether, prior to their inclination to the
material, their epistrophe, human beings would have multiplied using the
dynamics of the irrational mode of increase implanted by God in their
nature but in a mode appropriate to their rational, or “angelic,” dignity,
or whether any utilization of these irrational dynamics already consti-
tutes an epistrophe so that humans would have multiplied in paradise
using other means. Gregory’s comments on the angelic mode of increase,
in the first part of chapter 17, and the third aetiological passage, in
chapter 22, give clearer indications of his enigmatically couched thought.
Gregory appears to suggest, in the first part of chapter 17, that there
was no marriage in Paradise.31 Gregory’s rhetorical opponents argue
that, as there is no account of marriage in Paradise, the fall into mortality
(and sexuality) was necessary for the multiplication of the race: “for the
human race would have remained in the pair of the first-formed, had not
the fear of death impelled their nature to provide succession” (HO 17.1,
188b). Their reasoning is revealing, and sets the framework for Gregory’s
answer. A mind driven by the fear of death, the sting of a transitory
world, is impassioned indeed, knowing not the stability to be found in
God, but attempting to create its own immortality though succession.
Gregory does not directly address the root of the problem, the fear of
death and the all-too-human attempts to ensure continuity that it
engenders, but instead points to the analogous situation of the levirate
marriage. To the Sadducees, who had brought the “woman of many
marriages” to Christ to ask Him whose wife she would be in the
31. Floeri, disregarding the argument of chapter 17, points out that in HO,
although the distinction between male and female existed before the fall, the term
“marriage” is only used after the fall of Adam and Eve (“Le sens de la ‘division des
sexes,’” 108).
resurrection, Christ answered “‘in the resurrection they neither marry

nor are given in marriage, neither can they die any more, for they are
equal to the angels, and are the children of God, being the children of the
resurrection’” (HO 17.2, 188c; cf. Mt 22.30–31, Lk 20.35–36). As,
Gregory asserts, the resurrection is a restoration to our ancient state, so
in our ancient state there was “a kind of angelic mode of life” (b¤ow
éggelikÒw tiw: HO 17.2, 188d).32 Since the angels exist in countless
myriads without marriage, so too:
. . . if there had not come upon us as the result of sin a change for the
worse, and removal of equality with the angels, neither should we have
needed marriage that we might multiply, but whatever the mode of increase
in the nature of angels is (unspeakable and inconceivable by human
conjectures, except that it assuredly exists), this would have operated also in
the case of human beings, “made a little lower than the angels” [Ps 8.6],
increasing humankind to the measure determined by its Maker. (HO 17.2,
189a)
Gregory retains the sense of the term “marriage” as it is used by his

opponents: a means of succession impelled by the fear of death, a
distortion of the proper use of our irrational and animal nature by a
mind which has itself become impassioned, subject to irrational fears,
bestial. This is also the sense of Christ’s answer to the Sadducees: equal
to the angels and so no longer dying, the children of the resurrection will
have no need for a marriage governed by the necessity of succession to
the point of submerging the personal (“word-bearing”) element within
marriage—marrying seven times for the sake of descendants. This is the
context of Gregory’s answer: “neither should we have needed [such]
marriage that we might multiply.” Gregory does not attempt to redefine
“marriage,” but does firmly assert that there was another mode in which
the human race might have increased.
But what is the actual significance of his remarks concerning an
angelic mode of multiplication? Does it make sense, in the terms of De
hominis opificio, to speak of human beings, the midpoint of creation
embracing both extremes, having been created male and female before
their fall, but to consider that their reproduction would not have taken
place by means of this created and prelapsarian sexuality, even if in a
32. Here, as when I later cite HO 22.2, 204c, I have have translated b¤ow as “mode
of life,” to bring out the contrast with zvÆ, which I have translated “life,” following
the definition given for b¤ow in LSJ: “life, i.e., not animal life (zvÆ), but a course of life,
manner of living, . . . .” This point is emphasized by Gregory’s use of the particle tiw—
it is not an identity, but a similarity.
different mode than it is presently employed?33 Are the very dynamics of

this created sexuality brought into action by humanity’s fall, rather than
by God’s own creative act, or does the epistrophic assimilation to the
irrational modify the mode in which human beings employ their
formation (kataskeuÆ) fashioned by God?
The third aetiological passage, in chapter 22, is more specific. Here
Gregory is answering those who ask why it is that the transformation of
our “painful mode of life” (toË luphroË b¤ou) does not happen at once,
but that we must wait, in our “heavy and corporeal life” (≤ bare›a ka¤
svmat≈dhw . . . zvÆ), before human life (≤ ényrvp¤nh zvÆ) is set free and
can attain the “blessed and impassible mode of life” (tÚn makãrion ka‹
épay∞ b¤on: HO 22.2, 204c [emphases mine]).34 Gregory begins his
explanation from the beginning:
Taking up my first text again, I say—God says “Let us make man in our
image, after our likeness, and God created man, in the image of God
created He him.” Accordingly, the image of God, which we behold in the
whole human nature, had its end then; but Adam as yet was not. . . .
Humankind, then, was made in the image of God; that is, the universal
nature, the thing like God; not part of the whole but all the fullness of the
nature together was so made by the omnipotent Wisdom. . . . As He
perceived in our figure (plãsmati) the inclination towards the worse, and
that, voluntarily falling from equality of honor with the angels, it would
appropriate the fellowship to the lower nature (tØn prÚw tÚ tapeinÚn
koinvn¤an prosoikei≈setai), He mingled (kat°mije), for this reason, with
His own image something of the irrational. The distinction of male and
female is not in the divine and blessed nature; but transferring the attribute
(metenegk∆n tÚ fid¤vma) of the irrational formation (kataskeu∞w) to
humankind, He bestowed, not according to the lofty character of our
creation, the power of increase upon our race (tÚn pleonasmÚn t“ g°nei
xar¤zetai); for it was not when He made that which was in His own image
that He bestowed on humankind the power of increase and multiplying (tØn
33. So Floeri (“Le sens de la ‘division des sexes,’” 108): “Il apparaît donc
clairement qu’il faut distinguer avec soin ‘division des sexes’ et ‘instinct sexuel.’ Adam
et Ève innocents avaient la distinction des sexes, mais pas encore l’instinct de
procréation.” See also Balthasar, Présence et pensée 52 n. 5; Ladner takes up Floeri’s
reading, (“Philosophical Anthropology,” 90–91). Similarly Corsini: “L’homme a été
créé par Dieu déjà doué de sexe et situé dans un état de perfection qui rendait possible
le non-usage de ce sexe, étant donné la possibilité d’une multiplication angélique,
d’une fécondité toute spirituelle, dont un écho est la fécondité spirituelle de la Vierge
Marie et des vierges en général (comme on peut le voir dans le De virginitate). Le
corps, lui aussi, était différent de l’actuel, parce qu’il n’était pas encore revêtu des
dermãtinoi xit«`new.” “Plérôme humaine,” 122.
34. Cf. supra note 32.
toË aÈjãnesyai ka‹ plhyÊnesyai dÊnamin); but when He divided it by the

distinction between male and female, then He said, “Increase and multiply,
and replenish the earth” [Gen 1.28]. For this is not a property of the divine
Nature, but of the irrational, as the history indicates when it narrates that
these words were first spoken by God in the case of the irrational creatures;
since we may be sure that, if He had bestowed on humankind, before laying
upon our nature the distinction of male and female, the power for increase
conveyed by this utterance, we should not have needed this form of
generation by which the irrational [animals] are generated (…w, e‡ ge prÚ toË
§pibale›n tª fÊsei tØn katå tÚ êrren ka‹ y∞lu diaforån tØn diå t∞w fvn∞w
taÊthw dÊnamin efiw tÚ aÈjãnesyai tª ényr≈pƒ pros°yhken, oÈk ín toË
toioÊtou t∞w gennÆsevw e‡douw prosedeÆyhmen, diÉ o gennçtai tå êloga).
(HO 22.3–4, 204c–205b)
Again, in this passage, as in the two other aetiological passages, Gregory

suggests that God “mixed” part of the irrational nature to His own
image in foreknowledge of humanity’s fall. But in this passage this line of
thought is more fully and clearly stated. While it was humankind’s free
decision to fall from equality with the angels, and so to appropriate itself
to fellowship with the irrational, it was God who “transferred” an
element of the irrational to His image, laying upon it the distinction of
male and female, and by this (and only this) granting to humankind the
power of multiplying. Gregory specifically denies that human beings ever
had any means for multiplying other than through their existence as
male and female: if God had in fact given human beings another means
for increase, they would not have needed this animal form of generation.
Moreover, this ability to increase and multiply is linked not to the
“image” status of human beings, but to their being male and female. In
the terms of this passage, therefore, this divine act is not solely
determined by the foreseen fall, but it marks the completion of God’s act
of fashioning the being in whom His image is manifested:35 this is the
appearance of Adam, of humankind as actual human beings, male and
female. Had humankind not had this property of the irrational form of
existence “transferred,” ontologically, to its purely intellectual existence,
a fall from that rational existence would have prevented humankind
from reaching its fullness, for such a fall would only have appropriated
a fellowship (koinvn¤a) with the irrational and not the property of
sexuality itself, which is explicitly stated to be the only means of human
increase.
Gregory continues by repeating that it was “the inclination (§p¤klhsiw)
of our nature to the lowly [that] made such a form of generation
35. Cf. supra notes 25, 27.

absolutely necessary for humankind” (HO 22.5, 205c). God not only
foresaw this requirement of humankind, but also made time itself
suitable for humankind’s increase to its fullness. When this growth is
completed, and time itself has come to an end, then the restitution
(énastoixe¤vsiw) of all things will take place, and, along with the
universal reformation (tª metabolª toË ˜lou), humankind will also be
transformed (sunameify∞nai) from the corruptible and earthy to the
impassible and eternal (HO 22.5, 205c). Again Gregory claims that it is
“in view of humankind’s fall” that humankind would require the
irrational form of generation; but he does not suggest that humankind
ever had any other means for increase. Nor, when finally answering (at
205c) the question posed at the beginning of this inquiry (204c), why,
that is, we must wait in our “heavy and corporeal life (zvÆ)” before
attaining “the blessed and impassible mode of life (b¤ow),” does Gregory
suggest that human beings will shed the characteristics with which God
fashioned them, their existence as rational animals, male and female,
mediating between the rational and the irrational. Although, when the
fullness of humankind is reached, humans will have no need to employ
the animal and irrational aspects of their being for procreation, these are
not somehow shed. Were this to happen, human beings would become
less than human, for as we have seen, human life and nature definitely
participates both in the divine and rational and in the irrational; and the
latter is manifested in the bodily characteristics of male and female (cf.
HO 16.9, 181c). Rather it is the subjection of the mind to the irrational
that will be transformed; it is, as Gregory puts it, the mode of life (b¤ow)
that will change, becoming impassible and blessed.36
It is in this sense that Gregory can assert, in the three aetiological
passages, that God’s act of bestowing on humankind the attributes of
irrational existence is in foresight of humanity’s fall, while equally
maintaining both that it is not this fall which results in the appearance of
the human as a “sexed” being, and also that humankind’s only mode of
multiplication lies in that created, prelapsarian sexuality. Human beings
never had the possibility to multiply in the way that the angels do, but
rather they could have increased in a manner (trÒpow) similar to the
36. It is also noteworthy that in the Scriptural texts referred to by Gregory to

support his position at this point (HO 22.5–8, 205c–209a), he does not include such
texts as Gal 3.28 or Lk 20.35–36, which might support the assumption that he asserts
that human beings will no longer be male and female, “sexed” beings; rather he only
cites such texts as I Cor 15.51–52 and I Thess 4.17, which speak of the coming, and
instantaneous, “transformation” to incorruptibility (e.g., HO 22.6, 208a; cf. I Cor
15.53).
angels, employing their medial nature, partaking in both the rational and
irrational, in a properly human manner. It therefore remains within
human beings’ own determination whether to use this kinship with the
irrational in an angelic, that is, rational, truly human or “word-bearing”
manner, or to overturn this order by becoming truly, or merely, bestial,
and so limit their use of their sexuality to the bestial need, for instance,
to provide succession or any of the other perversions dreamt up by the
“evil husbandry of the mind” (HO 18.4, 193b) in its impassioned
attachment to the irrational. For Gregory, then, human(kind)’s existence
and life as male and female, as a mediating rational animal, is in no sense
“economic”: it is not brought into operation by humanity’s fall, nor is it
abandoned in the final transformation.
After a discussion concerning the origin of matter and the possibility
of the resurrection, arguing against those who teach the pre-existence of
souls, Gregory again picks up the ascending movement of creation,
described in the first fifteen chapters, and applies it to the formation of
each individual human person. The cause of both body and soul of each
person is one and the same, and encompassed in the power of God’s
foreknowledge (HO 29, 233d–240b). In the gradual formation of the
body, and in the gradual development of the power of growth and
nutrition, followed by sensation and finally the power of reason, the
development of each person follows the pattern Gregory describes as the
sequence of creation itself. Again, however, this ascending motion of the
formation of the human being is contrasted with a description of
descent. That the divine image, our rational character, does not appear at
the beginning of our formation, Gregory suggests, is due to the Fall, our
assimilation to the irrational mode of generation (HO 30.30, 254d–
256a). Gregory’s examination of the formation of the embryo and the
growth of the body and soul, which unfortunately go beyond the scope
of this article, give a concrete reality to his discussions concerning the
gradual unfolding of creation and the origin of humankind, presented in
the first half of De hominis opificio.
IV: CONCLUSION
Gregory of Nyssa, in chapters 16–22 of De hominis opificio, presents us

with a very sophisticated understanding of human sexuality. Humankind
has always existed as male and female, a characteristic of human beings
which has no reference to the divine Archetype, but is part of their
kinship and community with the irrational animals. This clearly corre-
sponds with Gregory’s account of the appearance of the rational soul as
the completion and fulfilment of the nutritive and sensitive souls: the
rational form of life, human beings, encompasses all previous forms of
life, and, without being restricted by the limited use that irrational
animals make of their life, for human beings are something new within
creation, humankind is to give true existence to all other levels of
creation, making all rational or “word-bearing.”
But, as inherently unstable, human beings have the potential to turn
towards the lower instead of the higher, to assimilate themselves to the
irrational, and so to confine their kinship with the irrational, their
existence as male and female, to the bestial need to provide succession. The
attributes and motions of the irrational nature, which, for the animals, are
the essential means of self-preservation, when transferred to human life,
become the passions (HO 18.1, 192ab). It is primarily to the “animal
mode of generation” that Gregory ascribes the origin of all passions and
enslavement to pleasures, and so explains the present pitiable plight of
humankind (ibid.). But it is, however, “the evil husbandry of the mind”
that perverts all the irrational motions, making them passions (HO 18.4,
193b). If reason were to govern these motions, they would assuredly be
transformed into virtues (HO 18.5, 193b), and manifest the divine image
within: “every such motion, when elevated by loftiness of mind, is
conformed to the beauty of the divine image.”37 Here we have a glimpse
of the dignity which Gregory regards created human reality, including
sexuality, called to manifest in a truly word-bearing or angelic use.
That the “angelic mode” of multiplication is consistently contrasted to
the irrational, animal mode of generation, suggests that Gregory, when
ascribing an “angelic mode” of multiplication to prelapsarian human-
kind (which he describes as incorporating and raising all the characteris-
tics of the irrational soul), is not referring to some asexual form of
multiplying, but to a truly human, rational, or “word-bearing” use of
our created sexuality. Furthermore, when Gregory asserts that, had we
retained this equality with the angels, “neither we should have needed
marriage that we might multiply” (HO 17.2, 189a), he is contrasting this
“word-bearing” use of our God-given sexuality with the “dynastic”
form of marriage governed by death (188b). He repeats what he
considers to be the intent of Christ’s words (Lk 20.35–36), and remains
deliberately open, or apophatic, with regard to the possibility of an
alternative form of marriage in Paradise.
Gregory, according to Hart, uses rhetoric in De virginitate to bring
about an effect in his audience. Why should Gregory deliberately speak
37. HO 18.5, 193c: . . . pçn tÚ toioËton k¤nhma t“ Íchl“ t∞w diano¤aw

sunepairÒmenon, t“ katå tØn ye¤an efikÒna kãllei susxhmat¤zetai.
“in the form of an exercise for those who prudently listen” in chapters
16–22 of De hominis opificio? It is noticeable that, despite the unity of
fundamental vision between chapters 1–15 and 16–22, of the ascending
and descending directedness of creation, of the capacity for elevation or
degeneration, pivoted upon the crux of epistrophe, Gregory does not
speak about the distinction between male and female in the former
section.38 However, when he does speak about this distinction in the
latter section, it is almost invariably in terms of a descending anthropol-
ogy, that is, in terms of our assimilation to the irrational creatures and
our use of a bestial mode of procreation impelled by the fear of death—
almost invariably, that is, because, as we have seen, if read carefully,
Gregory provides glimpses of an alternative possibility: the male/female
distinction as a part of our kinship with the irrational, a characteristic
truly belonging to human beings, which is, nevertheless, not confined to
a bestial, species-preserving procreation, but which should be elevated to
their rational existence, and so be truly “word-bearing.” This suggests
that Gregory did not want those who would read his treatise superficially
to equate what is too often thought of as the function and expression of
the male/female distinction (i.e., in its merely bestial or impassioned
usage), with what this human reality is intended to be (i.e., “word-
bearing”). But this is speculation; Gregory tells us that he is deliberately
writing enigmatically for us to investigate his words with care, and his
reasons for doing this are his own.
If this reading of De hominis opificio is correct, it reinforces Mark
Hart’s reading of De virginitate, and so indicates the need to reread
Gregory’s other works more carefully in order to achieve a more complete
understanding of this remarkable and subtle thinker. Hans Urs von
Balthasar noted that, in 1941, “Seuls un très petit nombre d’initiés ont lu
et connaissent Grégoire de Nysse, et ils ont gardé jalousement leur
secret.”39 The question must be asked: have we since been limited by the
synthetic reading of these initiates in our understanding of Gregory of
Nyssa?
John Behr is Assistant Professor of Patristics at St. Vladimir’s

Orthodox Theological Seminary, New York
38. He does, however, speak in the first half of the power of increase (aÈjhtikÆ:
e.g., HO 8.4–5, 144d, 145a), using similar terms as those employed in the second half
to describe the purpose of the distinction between male and female, i.e., so that
mankind might multiply (aÈjãnesyai: HO 22.4, 205a); although, in the first half this
power is assigned to all forms of life, while in the second half it is associated with the
irrational animals.
39. Balthasar, Présence et pensée, xv.

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The Rational Animal: A Rereading of Gregory of Nyssa's De

Journal of Early Christian Studies, Volume 7, Number 2, Summer 1999, pp.

Published by Johns Hopkins University Press

For additional information about this article

The Rational Animal:

This article, through a close reading of Gregory of Nyssa’s De hominis

examining Gregory’s anthropology, I am indebted to the pioneering work

3. The various contradictions, exaggerations, misquotations, and specious argu-

beings to continue in existence in exile from Paradise, alienated from

5. This is a composite account of Gregory’s anthropology, as it has been interpreted

humankind’s original paradisiacal state in anticipation of the resurrection.

6. “Reconciliation of Body and Soul,” 477 n. 97; “Gregory of Nyssa’s Ironic

whether of any given writer’s “theology” or of “Late Antiquity,” is one

9. A further relevant example is the recent work by M. A. Williams, Rethinking

explore how Gregory of Nyssa elaborates an anthropology in terms of

then it corroborates what Hart thinks he has found in De virginitate, so

I: CHAPTERS 1–15: THE ASCENDING ORDER

Gregory’s work De hominis opificio, written in 379 c.e., was meant to

13. Cf. H. Merki, ‘Omo¤vsiw ye“ (Fribourg: Paulusdruck, 1952), 138–46.

ordered by mind.”16 In this way, “nature makes the ascent, as it were, by

This classification of the powers of the soul is a somewhat simplified

16. HO 8.4, 145a: ≤ d¢ tele¤a §n s≈mati zvØ §n tª logikª, tª ényrvp¤n˙ l°gv,

If the vegetative and sensitive “souls” cannot really be called souls, it is

21. Cf. Meredith, “Concept of Mind,” 35.

cause in the effect,22 nor does he have recourse to a Socratic maieutics,

It is this directedness of creation that forms the heart of Gregory’s vision,

Gregory’s point is straightforward: if we fail to follow the ascending

overthrown, and the rational animal, humankind, is no longer able to

III: CHAPTERS 16–22: A DESCENDING ANTHROPOLOGY

This discussion of the epistrophe of nature to its opposite state, a

While the male/female distinction has no reference to the divine Archetype,

Gregory, commenting on Gen 1.26–27, is speaking in an unambiguously

This description of humankind’s character as the image of God is, in

In this passage Gregory refers us back to HO 16.9, where the distinction

29. Corsini’s comments are again valuable: “§pitexnçtai: il y a à la fois le sens

to humanity’s fall) as humankind’s community and kinship with the

Although humankind was created in a state equal to the angels, God

resurrection, Christ answered “‘in the resurrection they neither marry

Gregory retains the sense of the term “marriage” as it is used by his

different mode than it is presently employed?33 Are the very dynamics of

toË aÈjãnesyai ka‹ plhyÊnesyai dÊnamin); but when He divided it by the

Again, in this passage, as in the two other aetiological passages, Gregory

35. Cf. supra notes 25, 27.

36. It is also noteworthy that in the Scriptural texts referred to by Gregory to

Gregory of Nyssa, in chapters 16–22 of De hominis opificio, presents us

37. HO 18.5, 193c: . . . pçn tÚ toioËton k¤nhma t“ Íchl“ t∞w diano¤aw

John Behr is Assistant Professor of Patristics at St. Vladimir’s

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