I~n: A t.IOI.

OGrCAL ACCOUNT
.Mf1!N\*,,* •
a'J2
INTERLUDE ON CHRISTOLOGY AND RACE 2 33

contemporaries and fellow champions of Nicene orthodoxy-I am thinking creation at the same time that Basil maintains an "orthodox" theology of
here ofhis elder brother Basil ofCae sa rea and his friend Gregory of Nazianzus, creation. Indeed, his orthodox theology of creation gives him a grammar to
who became known simply as "the Theologian"-were also theological readers articulate and thus read Scripture theologically but yet within the social order. 9
of Scripture and interpreters of reality, who in contrast to Gregory accepted In short, both Basil and Gregory of Nazianzus, as did Augustine in the West,
slavery as a part of the social order.
made their peace with the ancient institution of slavery and with "the sinful
Gregory of Nazianzus advanced a theological position on slavery that was distinction," as Gregory of Nazianzus calls it, between some persons who are
basically identical to the position Augustine in the Christian West develops in slaves and some who are free, some to be bodies of obedience and others to be
his magnum opus, City of God: slavery, Gregory of Nazianzus says, is a sinful bodies to be obeyed.
distinction. 4 It is a distinction that arises because of sin, and therefore-and Gregory of Nyssa as abolitionist intellectual theologically refuses this
here is the problem-it is a distinction to be accepted as part of the present settlement, whereas his Cappadocian comrades read Scripture in such a way as
reality.5 The esteemed Basil says the same thing: "In this world, then, it is thus to theologically-yes, theologically-accept it. This presents a disturbing situa­
that men are made slaves, but they who have escaped poverty or war, or do not tion for those who advocate reading the Scriptures theologically, a situation
require the tutelage of others, are free."6 Slavery, Gregory and Basil are saying, that can no longer be evaded; namely, that one can read Scripture within the
is, simply put, just the way things are. But Basil goes even further, for while theological grammar of the Christian faith and yet do so in such a way as to
affirming that "no one is a slave by nature" as a part of the argument he works read within and indeed theologically sanction, if not sanctifY, as Michel Fou­
out in defense ofthe divinity of the Holy Spirit against the Pneumatomachians cault says, "the order of things."l0
(those who fought against the Spirit's codivinity with the Father and the eternal This all begs the question that I ultimately want to get at in what follows:
Son), Basil nevertheless says the following in his theological interpretation of What is the deeper moment within Gregory of Nyssa's theological interpre­
Noah's statement in Genesis 9:25 ("Curse be Canaan; a servant of servants tation of Scripture that causes him to read against rather than within the social
shall he be unto his brother"):
order? For all theological interpretations of Scripture are not alike-as the
Men are either brought under a yoke of slavery by conquest; ... or formation of modern biblical scholarship from the eighteenth into the nine­
they are enslaved on account of poverty; ... or, by a wise and myste­ teenth century, that moment when the modem theological interpretation of
rious dispensation, the worst children are by their fathers' order Scripture as linked to cultural and nationalist ambitions intellectually took off,
condemned to serve the wiser and the better; and this any righteous makes abundantly clear. 11 What is it about Gregory's practice of reading
inquirer into the circumstances would declare to be not a sentence of Scripture theologically that makes him an abolitionist intellectual? What
condemnation but a benefit. For it is more profitable that the man compels him to argue for the unqualified manumission of all slaves, a stance
who, through lack of intelligence, has no natural principle of rule that distinguishes him not only from nontheological readers but also from
within himself, should become the chattel [ktcmaJ of another, to the other would-be theological readers of Scripture? It is this question that must be
end that, being guided by the reason of his master, he may be like a answered. And so, let me begin answering it with an exploration of Gregory's
chariot with a charioteer, or a boat with a steersman seated at the exegetical imagination in the locus classicus of his position against slavery:
tiller [an allusion to Plato's Repuhlicr Homily IV on Ecclesiastes. From there I look more closely at the theological
imagination fueling Gregory's practice of reading Scripture. Central here will
Having said this, Basil then tries to sand down the jagged edges of his state­ be his complex Christological understanding of the image of God, which ad­
ment by enlisting a problematic theology of creation: "Even though one man mittedly is far from exhaustively though I hope adequately dealt with here.
be called master and another servant," he says, "nevertheless, both in view of
our mutual equality of rank and as chattels of our Creator, we are all fellow
slaves.,,8
The Exegetical Imagination: Gregory's
Thus Basil employs a model of mastery and slavery to understand the Fourth Homily on Ecclesiastes
relationship between the Creator and the creation. Insofar as this is the case,
the sociopolitical logic Basil employs, the logic of the body (politic), is, po­ Gregory's homilies On Ecclesiastes were a part of the earlier commentaries he
tentially at least, tied to his broader understanding of the identity of the wrote on the ascetical and spiritual life of the Christian reader of Scripture. 12
Creator. Basil's vision of the social order, in other words, in which necessarily For Gregory, the goal of the ascetical and spiritual life was the same as the goal
some are slaves and others are free, functions as a substitute for the doctrine of of the theologico.intellectual life: the contemplation of God's activity in the

~j~"".,.",."~.'."",,~ .. ~J,,."""'~"-~"L"~,a~'- ... ,.w..""....t o _..........." .• _._~ .•. ,_'--' ..... ~~ ....'" .".J ..... ~~.u.<.>.« ...... ""'--~<.-"-""'-~ ...... ........L.."'"""'""'""'-'-' _ _ ............ ~ ~,.~_ ,.~~~__ .a"