This book presents St Macrina the Younger (c. 327-379), eldest sister of Ss Basil the Great and Gregory of Nyssa. All the sources of Macrina's life are gathered together, translated afresh into English, and provided with up-to-date introductions and notes. Documents include: Testimonies of St Basil, St Gregory Nazianzen's epigrams on Macrina and her siblings; Gregory of Nyssa's letter 19 which appears in English for the first time; The Life of Macrina, a jewel of fourth-century Christian biography; and the dialogue On the Soul and Resurrection in which Macrina appears as the Teacher expounding Christian doctrine with reasoned argument. The introductory shows how Macrina gradually changed the family household of Annisa into the proto-monastic community that became model of the monasticism that has come down under Basil's name. A specially commissioned icon, a map of Central Anatolia, and a report of the author's expeditions to ancient Pontus are included.

This book presents St Macrina the Younger (c. 327-379), eldest sister of Ss Basil the Great and Gregory of Nyssa. All the sources of Macrina's life are gathered together, translated afresh into English, and provided with up-to-date introductions and notes. Documents include: Testimonies of St Basil, St Gregory Nazianzen's epigrams on Macrina and her siblings; Gregory of Nyssa's letter 19 which appears in English for the first time; The Life of Macrina, a jewel of fourth-century Christian biography; and the dialogue On the Soul and Resurrection in which Macrina appears as the Teacher expounding Christian doctrine with reasoned argument. The introduction shows how Macrina gradually changed the family household of Annisa into the proto-monastic community that became model of the monasticism that has come down under Basil's name. A specially commissioned icon, a map of Central Anatolia, and a report of the author's expeditions to ancient Pontus are included. 'In contrast with those works that seek to translate the ancient texts into colloquial English with a pedestrian tone, Silvas' translations have a grand and noble quality about them that is fully fitting Gregory's rhetoric and that conveys to the reader the seriousness of the lofty subject. Silvas does not "over translate"; her translation preserves those points of ambiguity in Nyssen's writing that should be resolved (if possible) not in the translation itself but in scholarly debate'. Warren Smith, Duke University

Here is an award-winning, new translation that brings to light Gregory's complex identity as an early mystic. Gregory (c. 332-395) was one of the Greek Cappadocian Fathers, along with St. Basil the Great and St. Gregory Nazianzen. +

One of the most fascinating women saints of the early Church, Macrina was the elder sister and mentor of two of the great Cappadocian Fathers, Bishop Basil the Great, and Gregory of Nyssa. She was also described as "father, teacher, guide, and mother" to her youngest brother, Bishop Peter of Sebaste, the posthumous child of St. Basil the Elder. Macrina, having tragically lost her fiancee, remained a virgin, true to his memory, never leaving the side of her mother, St. Emmelia. Deeply philosophic, she inspired her brothers to become leaders in the early church and to love the intellectual life and the pursuit of perfection through her teaching. She founded one of the first monastic communities for women and is the patroness of breast cancer victims. Macrina and her family of saints and martyrs lived through challenging age of the Great Persecution of the Christians in the Roman Empire and experienced the golden age of the Emperor Constantine the Great.

St. Gregory of Nyssa (c 335 – after 394) was a Christian bishop and saint. He was a younger brother of Basil the Great and a good friend of Gregory of Nazianzus. His significance has long been recognized in the Eastern Orthodox, Oriental Orthodox, Eastern Catholic and Roman Catholic branches of Christianity. Some historians identify Theosebia the deaconess as his wife, others hold that she, like Macrina the Younger, was actually a sister of Gregory and Basil. Gregory along with his brother Basil of Caesarea and Gregory of Nazianzus are known as the Cappadocian Fathers. They attempted to establish Christian philosophy as superior to Greek philosophy. You can purchase other religious works directly from Wyatt North Publishing.

Set Me as a Seal Upon Thy Heart: Constructions of Female Sanctity in Late Antiquity, the Middle Ages, and the Early Modern Period is a collection of essays focusing on saintly women's representations both in Eastern and Western Christianity starting from Late Antiquity to the High Middle Ages and Early Modernity. The volume discusses two different categories in relation to the conceptualization of female sanctity: the context of their construction in hagiographic sources and the emergent power rendered by their martyrdoms. It offers a transdisciplinary perspective on the present research carried out in the fields of hagiography, history, and art history.

Beauty engages fourth-century bishop Gregory of Nyssa to address beauty's place in theology and the broader world. With the recent resurgence of attention to beauty among theologians, questions still remain about what exactly beauty is, how it is perceived, and whether we should celebrate its return. If beauty fell out of favor because it was seen to distract from the weightier concerns of poverty and suffering--because it can even be a tool of oppression--why should we laud it now? Gregory's writings offer surprisingly rich and relevant reflections that can move contemporary conversations beyond current impasses and critiques of beauty. Drawing Gregory into conversation with such disparate voices as novelist J. M. Coetzee and art theorist Kaja Silverman, Beauty displays the importance of beauty to theology and theology to beauty in a discussion that bridges ancient and modern, practical and theoretical, secular and religious.

In the early 1600s, Francis Bacon could encompass all knowledge of both the physical and the metaphysical in a single term: natural philosophy. Over the next two hundred years, however, natural philosophy gradually split into philosophy--the study of first causes and ways of knowing--and science--the study of the material world, based on direct observation and verifiable experiment. Science was not initially an exclusively masculine domain. During the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, women received doctorates in physics and taught at universities. They corresponded with Descartes and dared to question his premises and conclusions. In astronomy, they worked side-by-side with men to make observations and calculate cometary orbits. They not only translated and illustrated scientific works but published original syntheses and reports based on their own research. Gradually, however, as access to the new knowledge became institutionalized, women were excluded, and by the beginning of the nineteenth century, the roles open to women were deemed secondary to those of men. Women's ideas or discoveries were subsumed under the names of male colleagues, dismissed as the work of amateurs, or viewed as marginal and easily forgotten. This subtle combination of changed circumstances gave the new science a gendered dimension. Men, Women, and the Birthing of Modern Science traces the division of natural philosophy into the modern categories of philosophy and science and the gradual marginalization of women as intellectuals. Here, ten scholars of gender, women's history, and the history of philosophy and science write on these twin themes, allowing the opportunity for cross-cultural analysis and yielding insights into the history of both science and women.

This book addresses a particular and little-known form of writing, the prose dialogue, during the Late Antique period, when Christian authors adopted and transformed the dialogue form to suit the new needs of religious debate. Connected to, but departing from, the dialogues of Classical Antiquity, these new forms staged encounters between Christians and pagans, Jews, Manichaeans, and "heretical" fellow Christians. At times fiction, at others records of, or scripts for, actual debates, the dialogues give us a glimpse of Late Antique rhetoric as it was practiced and tell us about the theological arguments underpinning religious differences. By offering the first comprehensive analysis of Christian dialogues in Greek and Syriac from the earliest examples to the end of the sixth century CE, the present volume shows that Christian authors saw the dialogue form as a suitable vehicle for argument and apologetic in the context of religious controversy and argues that dialogues were intended as effective tools of opinion formation in Late Antique society. Most Christian dialogues are little studied, and often in isolation, but they vividly evoke the religious debates of the time and they embody the cultural conventions and refinements that Late Antique men and women expected from such debates.

Relevant questions about prayer answered from the whole witness of Scripture Praying is often the most common yet least understood practice of Christian spirituality. In 40 Questions about Prayer, scholar and teacher Joseph C. Harrod shares biblical insight on the nature and practice of Christian prayer. Harrod's emphasis on searching the Scriptures results in a trustworthy, practical guide to a vital aspect of Christian belief and behavior, equally appropriate for seminary courses, Bible studies, and personal understanding. The accessible question-and-answer format of 40 Questions about Prayer allows readers to explore the issues they care most about, such as these: • Does prayer change God's mind? • Does God hear the prayers of unbelievers? • What does it mean to pray in Jesus's name? • How does prayer affect evangelism, spiritual awakening, and revival? • What does it mean to pray "without ceasing" (1 Thess. 5:17)? • Do physical postures affect prayer?