Damascene’s Corpus

The Works of John of Damascus

John of Damascus, monk of Mar Saba

The last of the Greek fathers, catalogued in the desert, under a caliph, in three parts.

Catch rate: Not found in the wild
Base research: 224
Stat total: 314

Base stats

Every stat is a checkable fact about the actual book, not a designer's mood. Bars are drawn against the highest value any book reaches.

Stamina86

Contend82

Defend86

Popularity60

Total314

Why these numbers

The game's own explanation, as a reader sees it in the backpack.

Stamina 86

The Fount of Knowledge entire — the philosophy, the heresy catalogue and the Exposition — with the three treatises on images beside it.

Defend 86

The doctrinal textbook of the Greek church for a thousand years, and Aquinas quotes it as an authority in the Latin one. Very hard to knock over.

Cited for this book

John of Damascus built his Fount of Knowledge in three parts: philosophy, a catalogue of heresies, and an exposition of the faith. His last chapter on heresies is the earliest detailed Christian account of Islam by a named writer. John had served in a caliph’s treasury. Reformed Christians part from him on images.

Development

A book develops as it is read — the fragment becomes the work, the work becomes the corpus.

On Holy Images→
Lv 48

Damascene’s Corpus

Moves learned

By levelling up. A book that develops keeps what it knew and learns the rest on its new schedule.

Lv	Move	Type	Cat.	Pwr	Acc	PP
48	Two Perfect Natures	Christology	Argument	80	100%	10
48	God Is Not Wordless	Theology Proper	Argument	72	100%	10
50	Speak Greek	History	Status	—	100%	5
52	The Image of the Invisible	Christology	Argument	84	100%	10
56	Affirm	—	Status	—	—	1
56	The Word and the Spirit	Theology Proper	Argument	66	100%	15

The quotes behind its moves

How to read these. In Scholar’s Dream, books argue with each other. Each thing a book can do in a debate is a move, and most moves carry a real quotation — the words the book puts on the table when it uses that move.

Strong against lists the opposing books and arguments a move was written to answer. Used against one of them, it hits much harder than usual: ×2 means twice the normal force, ×4 four times. It is the game’s way of saying: this is the sentence that answers that argument. Open an entry to read why.

“So then this one and only God is not Wordless. And possessing the Word, He will have it not as without a subsistence, nor as having had a beginning, nor as destined to cease to be.”
John of Damascus, An Exact Exposition of the Orthodox Faith 1.6 (trans. Salmond, NPNF² 9, public domain).public domain

“For there never was a time when God was not Word: but He ever possesses His own Word, begotten of Himself.”
John of Damascus, An Exact Exposition of the Orthodox Faith 1.6 (trans. Salmond, NPNF² 9, public domain). The sentence answers Arius in Arius’ own words — “there was when he was not.”public domain

God Is Not Wordless

Theology ProperArgument · power 72 · 100% accurate

In the gameReason its way toward the Trinity instead of asserting it: a God who is living and rational was never without his Word, and a Word with no beginning is not a creature.

“We hold that there has been a union of two perfect natures, one divine and one human… without change or confusion or alteration or difference or separation.”
John of Damascus, An Exact Exposition of the Orthodox Faith 3.3 (trans. Salmond, NPNF² 9, public domain), eliding the list of names he refuses in between.public domain

Two Perfect Natures

ChristologyArgument · power 80 · 100% accurate

In the gameChalcedon, held steady against the error on either side of it — the union that blurs the two, and the union so loose it is only an agreement.

Strong against

×2.5Summa Theologiaea book · why?

Aquinas cites John of Damascus for this teaching again and again in the Summa (III, q.2): two natures, one person.

“Therefore I venture to draw an image of the invisible God, not as invisible, but as having become visible for our sakes through flesh and blood. I do not draw an image of the immortal Godhead. I paint the visible flesh of God.”
John of Damascus, On Holy Images 1 (trans. Mary H. Allies, 1898, public domain).public domain

The Image of the Invisible

ChristologyArgument · power 84 · 100% accurate

In the gameJohn of Damascus argues from the Incarnation. He is not painting God; he is painting the flesh God took. Whether that answers the second commandment is the real question, and this is his case at its strongest.

“For in him we live, and move, and have our being. As some of your own poets have said.”
Acts 17:28 (WEB) — Paul at the Areopagus, quoting the Athenians’ own poets back to them.

Affirm

Status

In the gamePick the part of the opponent’s case that is true and affirm it. That point can no longer be used against you, and the opponent’s Defend falls sharply. It deals no damage. Affirm something false and you have only agreed with an error.

“Moreover the Word must also possess Spirit. For in fact even our word is not destitute of spirit.”
John of Damascus, An Exact Exposition of the Orthodox Faith 1.7 (trans. Salmond, NPNF² 9, public domain). Distinct from Timothy I’s sun/light/heat: this one reasons from the arguer’s own mind rather than from the sky.public domain

The Word and the Spirit

Theology ProperArgument · power 66 · 100% accurate

In the gameYour own thinking is the analogy: a mind, the word it forms, and the breath that carries it. Faint, and not nothing.

What answers it

The specific move or chapter of Scripture that cuts through this one, and why. The number is how much harder it hits than usual — ×4 is four times the normal force.

What Is Not Assumed×2.5

John of Damascus gives this very rule in the Exposition (3.18): what is not assumed is not remedied. He read Gregory the Theologian closely and quotes him by name.