"In whose name I write": John Henry Newman;s reading of the Alexandrian fathers

Abstract

The history of doctrine has been shaped by its historiographers. Prominent among nineteenth-century historiographers is John Henry Newman (1801-1890), apatristic scholar whose interest among historians today normally lies in his writings ondoctrinal development or in his own story of conversion. It is the purpose of this thesis to show that historians of theology, particularly of the patristic era, should also be interested in Newman's engagement with Origen, Athanasius and Cyril of Alexandria. In turn, this should interest all those who know the Apologia, for as an Anglican and as a Catholic Newman held different views of these Fathers. This thesis provides an examination of the changes that occur in Newman's reading of, and writing on, the Alexandrians Fathers across the years. Overall, three things will be seen. First, comparing his first book, The Arians of the Fourth Century (1833), with his later works, reveals a flattening out of Newman's account of history occurring just when he was propounding that doctrine is dynamic. Secondly, analysis of his sermons of the 1830s and 1840s shows an Alexandrian christology ("Monophysite" in Cyril's sense, as Newman explains it) in tension with his claims at the time, that he was leaving the Anglican Church because it held an analogous position to the Monophysites of the fifth century. Thirdly, contrasting his translations of Athanasius in the Library ofthe Fathers (1842-4) with his "free translation" (1881), reveals the effect thirty-five years of reading Catholic scholastic theology had on Newman.