Nazianzen’s Corpus

The Works of Gregory of Nazianzus

Gregory of Nazianzus, called the Theologian

The Theologian, who kept trying to leave, and eventually did.

Catch rate: Not found in the wild
Base research: 192
Stat total: 322

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.

Stamina76

Contend88

Defend74

Popularity84

Total322

Why these numbers

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

Stamina 76

Forty-five orations, some two hundred and fifty letters, and around seventeen thousand lines of verse — he went on writing poetry after he had stopped doing anything else. Deep Stamina.

Contend 88

Very high. The Eastern church calls only three men the Theologian, and Gregory is one. The creed said on Sundays uses his words, and he was in the room when it was written, until he walked out.

Defend 74

Quoted so relentlessly by everyone after him that the text can be checked against a thousand borrowings. A strong Greek tradition and an early Latin one.

Popularity 84

In every anthology of the fathers there is, and the funeral oration for Basil is the portrait everybody has read. It takes the floor first almost anywhere.

Cited for this book

Gregory of Nazianzus did not want to lead. He ran away from his own ordination. He was sent to Constantinople, where every church belonged to the Arians, and preached the Nicene faith in a small borrowed room until the city changed. At the council of 381 his own position became the argument, so he resigned and went home to write poetry.

Development

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

Theological Orations→
Lv 33

Nazianzen’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
33	You Have Not Met a Bishop	History	Argument	82	100%	10
36	Word Made Flesh	Christology	Argument	70	100%	6
37	Affirm	—	Status	—	—	1
40	Farewell, My Throne	Ecclesiology	Argument	76	100%	15
50	Speak Greek	History	Status	—	100%	5

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.

“‘No one has ever yet spoken thus, and with such boldness, to Modestus.’ ‘Why, perhaps,’ said Basil, ‘you have not met with a Bishop, or in his defence of such interests he would have used precisely the same language.’”
Gregory of Nazianzus, Oration 43.50, the funeral oration on Basil (trans. Browne & Swallow, NPNF² 7, public domain).public domain

You Have Not Met a Bishop

HistoryArgument · power 82 · 100% accurate

In the gameThe prefect Modestus told Basil what the empire could do to him: confiscation, banishment, torture, death. Basil answered that a man who owns a few books cannot be robbed, that he counts no country his own, and that his body had stopped being reachable some time ago. Gregory preached the whole exchange at his funeral.

“the renewal of creation has been the work of the self-same Word that made it at the beginning. For it will appear not inconsonant for the Father to have wrought its salvation in Him by Whose means He made it.”
Athanasius, On the Incarnation 1.4 (trans. Archibald Robertson, NPNF² 4, public domain).public domain

Word Made Flesh

ChristologyArgument · power 70 · 100% accurate

In the gameFrom Athanasius: only the Creator can recreate.

Strong against

×4One Nature After the Unionan argument · why?

It holds the flesh in place — which is the one thing his union cannot do.

×4The Ugly Broad Ditchan argument · why?

Lessing’s ditch says history can never carry necessary truth. The claim on the table is that it did, once, on purpose — the Word made flesh, a fact about a Tuesday.

×3The Many Faiths, One Realan argument · why?

Hick says the faiths are level roads to one summit. Athanasius answers with a fact and not a view: God himself became a man. That cannot be one road among several, because it is not a road at all. It is an arrival.

×2Changeable by Naturean argument · why?

The Word who became flesh is the Word who made the world. He was truly tempted, but he was never a creature who might have gone the other way.

×2Devout Man Onlyan argument · why?

A devout man can teach, but he cannot remake the world. The Word who made creation became flesh to renew it, and that is why he is worshipped.

×2Exalted Creaturean argument · why?

Athanasius’ answer: only the one who made the world can remake it. A creature, however high, cannot save creation, because it is part of creation.

×2God by Gracean argument · why?

Athanasius says the Word who renews creation is the same Word who made it. That is who the Son is, not a title he was lent.

×2The Thaliaan argument · why?

The Word who became flesh is the Word through whom everything was made, time included. The one who made time did not begin within it.

×2The True Word: On the Godsan argument · why?

The Word who came down is the Word who made the world. Coming into his own creation does not change the Creator.

×2Thirty Aeonsan argument · why?

The thirty levels exist to keep God away from matter. John 1 answers that he came down all of them himself — the Word, made flesh.

“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.

“Farewell, my throne, envied and perilous height… Farewell, East and West, for whom and against whom I have had to fight; He is witness, Who will give you peace, if but a few would imitate my retirement.”
Gregory of Nazianzus, Oration 42, the last farewell, delivered before the hundred and fifty bishops at Constantinople in 381 (trans. Browne & Swallow, NPNF² 7, public domain). (trimmed quote)public domain

Farewell, My Throne

EcclesiologyArgument · power 76 · 100% accurate

In the gameConstantinople, 381. Gregory had been brought in to win the council and his own seat became the thing the bishops were fighting about, so he resigned in the middle of it and preached this on the way out. The book’s own Defend may rise as it says so.

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.

Believes Where He Pleases×2.5

Gregory and Basil put this very passage of Origen’s into the Philocalia, their anthology of his work. Gregory sent a copy to a friend.

Judge and Determine×2.5

Gregory and Basil put this very passage of Origen’s into the Philocalia, in its chapter on free will.