Georges Florovsky (1893-1979) was one of the most prominent Orthodox theologians and ecumenists of the twentieth century. His call for a return to patristic writings as a source of modern theological reflection had a powerful impact not only on Orthodox theology in the second half of the twentieth century, but on Christian theology in general. Florovsky was also a major Orthodox voice in the ecumenical movement for four decades and he is one of the founders of the World Council of Churches. This book is a collection of major theological writings by George Florovsky. It includes representative and widely influential but now largely inaccessible texts, many newly translated for this book, divided into four thematic sections: Creation, Incarnation and Redemption, The Nature of Theology, Ecclesiology and Ecumenism, and Scripture, Worship and Eschatology. A foreword by Metropolitan Kallistos Ware presents the theological vision of Georges Florovsky and discusses the continuing relevance of his work both for Orthodox theology and for modern theology in general. The introduction by the Editors provides a theological and historical overview of Florovsky theology in teh context of his biography. The book includes explanatory notes, translation of patrisitc citations and an index.

Chesterton's classic explanation of the essentials of the Christian faith and of his pilgrimage to belief. Written in 1908, it displays all the intellectual clarity and literary skill of one of this century's greatest and most thoughtful authors.

JCSSS is a refereed journal published annually by the Canadian Society for Syriac Studies Inc. (CSSS), located at the Department of Near and Middle Eastern Civilizations, University of Toronto, Toronto, Ontario, Canada. JCSSS contains the transcripts of public lectures presented at the CSSS and possibly other articles and book reviews. JCSSS focuses on the vast Syriac literature, which is rooted in the same soil from which the ancient Mesopotamian and biblical literatures sprung; on Syriac art that bears Near Eastern characteristics as well as Byzantine and Islamic influences; and on archaeology, unearthing in the Middle East and the rest of Asia and China the history of the Syriac-speaking people: Assyrians, Chaldeans, Maronites and Catholic and Orthodox Syriacs. Modern Syriac Christianity and contemporary vernacular Aramaic dialects are also the focus of JCSSS. The languages of the Journal are English, French and German, and quotations from ancient sources are given in the original languages and in translation. The articles are interdisciplinary and scholarly; the Editorial Committee brings together scholars from four American, Canadian, and European universities. The CSSS that publishes JCSSS was founded in 1999 at the University of Toronto, Department of Near and Middle Eastern Civilizations, as part of the latter's academic programme in Aramaic and Syriac languages and literatures. It was incorporated under the Canada Corporations Act in January 23, 1999. This volume includes articles by Alain Desreumaux, Alexander Treiger, Reagan Patrick, Narmin Muhammad Amin 'Ali, Amir Harrak, and Sihaam Khan.

This volume highlights three intertwined aspects of the global context of Orthodox Christianity: religion, politics, and human rights. The chapters in Part I address the challenges of modern human rights discourse to Orthodox Christianity and examine conditions for active presence of Orthodox churches in the public sphere of plural societies. It suggests theoretical and empirical considerations about the relationship between politics and Orthodoxy by exploring topics such as globalization, participatory democracy, and the linkage of religious and political discourses in Russia, Greece, Belarus, Romania, and Cyprus. Part II looks at the issues of diaspora and identity in global Orthodoxy, presenting cases from Switzerland, America, Italy, and Germany. In doing so, the book ties in with the growing interest resulting from the novelty of socio-political, economic, and cultural changes which have forced religious groups and organizations to revise and redesign their own institutional structures, practices, and agendas.

This book is a classic in the history of the Oriental Churches, which are sometimes portrayed as heretical in general church history books, if mentioned at all. Written by a Copt, it portrays the history of the faith of these non-Chalcedonian Churches with first-hand knowledge of their traditions. The author covers Alexandrine Christianity (the Copts and the Ethiopians), the Church of Antioch (Syriac Orthodox), the "Nestorian" Church of the East, the Armenian Church, the St. Thomas Christians of South India, the Maronite Church, as well as the Vanished Churches of Carthage, Pentapolis, and Nubia.

St Maximus the Confessor (c. 580-662) beautifully expounds the meaning of the Divine Liturgy in this work, which had a profound influence on the subsequent tradition, beginning with St Germanus of Constantinople (PPS 8). Maximus' vision of the liturgy contemplates the interpenetrating relationships of all things with each other and with Christ, in whom all things cohere. The church building and the human being and the cosmos are all mutually related and symbolically reflect each other. Further, in the liturgy we enter into the mystery of Christ. As St Maximus puts it, "Let us not be absent from the holy Church of God because she contains such great mysteries of our salvation according to... and she reveals the gift of adoption that is given through holy baptism in the Holy Spirit and that perfects each one into the image of Christ."

The Xi'an Stele, erected in Tang China's capital in 781, describes in both Syriac and Chinese the existence of Christian communities in northern China. While scholars have so far considered the Stele exclusively in relation to the Chinese cultural and historical context, Todd Godwin here demonstrates that it can only be fully understood by reconstructing the complex connections that existed between the Church of the East, Sasanian aristocratic culture and the Tang Empire (617-907) between the fall of the Sasanian Persian Empire (225-651) and the birth of the Abbasid Caliphate (762-1258). Through close textual re-analysis of the Stele and by drawing on ancient sources in Syriac, Greek, Arabic and Chinese, Godwin demonstrates that Tang China (617-907) was a cosmopolitan milieu where multiple religious traditions, namely Buddhism, Zoroastrianism, Manichaeism and Christianity, formed zones of elite culture. Syriac Christianity in fact remained powerful in Persia throughout the period, and Christianity - not Zoroastrianism - was officially regarded by the Tang government as 'The Persian Religion'.Persian Christians at the Chinese Court uncovers the role played by Syriac Christianity in the economic and cultural integration of late Sasanian Iran and China, and is important reading for all scholars of the Church of the East, China and the Middle East in the medieval period.