Nyssa’s Corpus

The Works of Gregory of Nyssa

Gregory of Nyssa

The philosopher of the three. Still working after the council had gone home.

Catch rate: Not found in the wild
Base research: 186
Stat total: 318

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.

Stamina78

Contend86

Defend78

Popularity76

Total318

Why these numbers

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

Stamina 78

The whole Gregory: two long books against Eunomius, the Great Catechism, On the Making of Man, On the Soul and the Resurrection, the life of his sister, and the letters. Very deep Stamina.

Contend 86

The youngest of the three Cappadocians and the one still arguing when the others had stopped. He is the voice that carried the case at Constantinople in 381, and the creed the church says on Sundays is the outcome.

Defend 78

A strong Greek tradition, and the works that matter most are the ones copied most. A few of the minor treatises are thinner, which is what keeps this short of the top.

Popularity 76

Read wherever the Trinity is argued about, and read again wherever anyone asks what a human being actually is. It usually takes the floor first.

Cited for this book

Basil organised, Gregory of Nazianzus preached, and Gregory of Nyssa thought. He was the least practical of the three — Basil once had him made a bishop of a town so small it looked like an insult — and he is the one the philosophers still read. His sister Macrina taught the whole family, and he wrote a book to say so.

Development

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

Against Eunomius→
Lv 31

Nyssa’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
31	Not Three Gods	Theology Proper	Argument	88	100%	10
33	Affirm	—	Status	—	—	1
36	The Teacher	History	Argument	72	100%	10
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.

“Every operation which extends from God to the Creation, and is named according to our variable conceptions of it, has its origin from the Father, and proceeds through the Son, and is perfected in the Holy Spirit.”
Gregory of Nyssa, On "Not Three Gods" (to Ablabius) (trans. Moore & Wilson, NPNF² 5, public domain).public domain

Not Three Gods

Theology ProperArgument · power 88 · 100% accurate

In the gamePeter, James and John share one nature and we call them three men — so why is the Father, Son and Spirit not three Gods? Because those three never act apart. There is one work, and it starts at the Father, runs through the Son, and is finished in the Spirit.

“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.

“Basil, great amongst the saints, had departed from this life to God; and the impulse to mourn for him was shared by all the churches. But his sister the Teacher was still living.”
Gregory of Nyssa, On the Soul and the Resurrection, opening (trans. Moore & Wilson, NPNF² 5, public domain). (trimmed quote — the sentence continues “and so I journeyed to her,” cut short of a footnote number CCEL prints inside it.)public domain

The Teacher

HistoryArgument · power 72 · 100% accurate

In the gameBasil died in 379 and Gregory went to his sister Macrina to grieve. The family called her the Teacher. She was dying herself, and she spent the day arguing him through the case that the soul outlasts the body. He went home and wrote down her side of it.