Partaking in Divine Nature: Deification and Communion.

Meconi, David Vincent

PARTAKING IN DIVINE NATURE: DEIFICATION AND COMMUNION. By Paul M. Collins. New York: T. & T. Clark, 2010. Pp. vi + 222. $110.

Sometime back in the late fifth or early sixth century, Dionysius the Areopagite became the first to provide a definition of what Christianity means by the human person's becoming divine: "theosis is the attaining of likeness to God and union with him so far as is possible" (Ecclesiastical Hierarchy 1.3; PG 3.376A). While such transformative union with God was arguably the most pervasive soteriological image, theosis, or deification, was a metaphor gradually abandoned by the West, especially absent in the post-Tridentine world. Polemic between denominations won over participating in divinity and Christianity suffered, dwindling into vague legalisms or mere moralisms. This is now changing as more and more scholars are rediscovering the beauty and allure of the ancient doctrine of deification. Among the more recent studies worth noting is Paul Collins's latest book. C. is a priest in the Church of England and a reader in theology at the University of Chichester. He has produced a very fine presentation of what is at stake when Christianity begins to see itself as a creed of relationship and divine union. He draws from not only the very rich patristic sources but also the best of modern theology.

C. divides this work into six chapters. Chapter 1 (1-11) serves as a helpful introduction, laying out the various Christian contexts in which deification has waxed or waned, providing elucidating examples, and offering the methodological approach used throughout. Chapter 2 (12-48) gives the scriptural and philosophical bases for Christian deification: the Jewish roots and the Hellenic soil. Chapter 3 (49-73) is a brief yet accurate sketch of deification from pre-Nicene theologies up through Cyril of Alexandria (d. 444). Chapter 4 (74-110) focuses on the centrality of theosis in Orthodox thought, ancient and contemporary, while chapter 5 (111-70) takes the reader through some surprising terrain, "the architecture of the metaphor in the West," showing how deifying elements can be found in Scholasticism, medieval mysticism, many of the Reformers, as well as in the Oxford and the Holiness Movements.

C. covers a lot of ground but does so judiciously and correctly. He develops a clear arc between a Christian protology and soteriology: the same God who creates is the same God who saves, working from within the natural order to elevate and transform those made in God's divine image. Also stressed throughout is the communal nature of such transformation. Christ has become human not simply to save disparate individuals but to establish a new family of like brothers and sisters. The church thus emerges as the locus deificandi, the place where human persons can call their Creator "Abba" and be filled with his gift of the Spirit. This filial boldness is translated often in very prayerful and scriptural terms, with C. at times bordering on the poetic. The selections and emphases throughout these pages also highlight the cosmic nature of deification, especially drawing from the Eastern traditions. Essential to C.'s explication of these themes and the theologians behind them is, of course, the doctrine of participation in divinity (see 2 Pt 1:4): the Christian never realizes godliness without incessant and absolute dependence upon the shared life of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.

For some readers, this will be familiar terrain, as the better-known theologians of deification (e.g., Irenaeus, Athanasius, the Cappadocians, Cyril, and Symeon the New Theologian) are treated in turn. Refreshing, however, is C.'s care to include those who may not be readily associated with a theology of Christian deification but who nonetheless rely on central themes of theosis for presenting the Christian story: Henry Scougal (d. 1678), Dom Thomas Merton (d. 1968), David Knowles (d. 1974), and Chinese evangelist Witness Lee (d. 1997), to name but a few. C.'s treatment of such figures is limited to a few paragraphs only: he nonetheless finds in their writings a robust appreciation of what the earliest Christian thinkers knew well: God became human, willing not only to reveal God's own life but to allow others to appropriate and participate in it so humans could become God. As such, this is a very worthwhile volume for serious scholars and searching students alike.

DAVID VINCENT MECONI, S.J.

St. Louis University