Overthrowing the Serpent: Gregory of Nazianzus & Philanthropy
Christian philanthropy is no modern Christian invention or conviction. For early church theologian Gregory of Nazianzus (329/30–390/91), the eternal welfare of one’s body and soul hinges upon one’s loving care for the poor and oppressed.[1] Gregory is convinced that loving care for another’s physical needs, be they paupers or lepers, is a binding obligation on the believer. A failure to care for the oppressed is to have lost “sight of the fact that we are flesh and compassed in a lowly body.”[2] In other words, neglect of the poor stems from a refusal to recognize one’s own vulnerability.
Furthermore, the one who neglects the disabled fails to acknowledge the original purpose and state of the created order. Gregory argues that poverty and disease find their origins in the Fall, and at some point will touch the mortal body of every man. Yet as Gregory notes in citing Matthew 5:45, “from the beginning it was not so.”[3] The continued existence of poverty, as well as a general disdain for the poor and disabled, stems from “the deceitful tyranny of the serpent [Satan], which seduces us with lewd pleasures and incites the more audacious against the weaker.”[4] In contrast, to lovingly care for the poor is to resist the serpent’s tyranny, and thereby spur on the sanctification of both the caretaker and the oppressed.
What has been stated thus far is an attempt at summarizing Gregory’s theology of philanthrōpia (philanthropy), which is the focus of his Oration 14, On Love for the Poor. Philanthrōpia was a supreme virtue in classical Greek literature, but it became little more than a dormant cultural ideal by Gregory’s time. Notice the way in which Julian the Apostate (pagan emperor of Rome) rebukes the pagan High Priest of Galatia for the lack of philanthrōpia among pagan priests in contrast with Christians:
Why do we not observe that it is their [the Christian’s] benevolence to strangers, their care for the graves of the dead and the pretended holiness of their lives, that have done the most to increase atheism? I believe that we ought really and truly to practice every one of these virtues.[5]
Philanthrōpia was a largely unpracticed classical Greek virtue.[6] However, Christians believed that love for the poor and oppressed was a divine command, recorded in Scripture, and practiced by many Christians. Even so, when an outbreak of leprosy arose in the Roman Empire, Gregory was concerned that Christians were neglecting lepers. So he set out to stir Christians’ hearts and minds to care for those stricken by the ravaging disease.
Gregory builds his argument on two key biblical doctrines, and shows how our own understanding of love for neighbor (or the poor) flows from the implications of these teachings.
Philanthrōpia and the Imago Dei
First, Gregory is concerned that Christians have failed to realize the significance of the image of God (imago Dei) that every person bears. In order to make this doctrine both clear and powerful, he applies it to lepers. In doing so, Gregory moves seamlessly between the physical oneness of humans and the spiritual oneness of Christians as bearers of God’s image. He refers to lepers as “our brothers in God . . . whose share in nature is the same as ours; who are formed of the same clay from the time of our first creation, knit together with bones and sinews just as we are, clothed with skin and flesh like everyone else.”[7] This is true, Gregory rebukingly remarks, “whether you like it or not.”[8]
Furthermore, they have also been given the same spiritual benefits. Christian lepers’ “inner nature has put on the same Christ,” and they have “been entrusted with the same guarantee of the Spirit as we.” They “have been given to share with us the same laws, prophets, testaments, liturgies, sacraments, hopes.”[9] What is more? Gregory speaks of lepers as those “for whom Christ, who takes away the sin of the world, died just as he did for us; who are fellow heirs of the life in heaven, even if they are met with such misfortune here on earth.”[10] And, finally, eternal bliss is secured for those lepers “who are buried with Christ and raised with him, provided they suffer with him in order that they may also be glorified with him.”[11]
Careful readers will note that Gregory links both leprosy and the greed of those who ignore it to the Fall. Due to the Fall, everything has changed regarding wealth and poverty, and sickness and health. Gregory elaborates on the fallen world: “But ever since [the Fall], there have been jealousies and dissensions and the deceitful tyranny of the serpent which constantly seduces us with lewd pleasures and incites the more audacious against the weaker.”[12] By recognizing the Fall and the continual “tyranny of the serpent,” Gregory calls on his hearers to treat the poor and lepers as equals—in a word, to practice philanthrōpia. He exhorts them, “But as for you, I ask you to look to that original egalitarian status, not the latter-day discrimination; not to the law of the tyrant, but that of the Creator.”[13] To practice philanthrōpia, then, is to act in the world as it is on the basis of what God intended it to be.
Philanthrōpia as Service to Christ
For Gregory, to serve the poor and afflicted is also to serve Christ Himself. Believers must serve the poor because they have bountifully received God’s mercies in Christ. And by serving the poor, they render service to Christ. Christians ought to act in accordance with the mercy they have received. Gregory implores:
Recognize the source of your existence, [the source] of your breath [the source] of your life, [the source of] your knowledge of God. . . . [the source of] your hope of gaining the heavenly kingdom…recognize that you have become a son of God, fellow heir with Christ . . . Where did you obtain these things? From whom? . . . Who made you lord and king of everything on earth? Who, without listing them individually, endowed you with all the things that lift man above the rest of creation? Is it not he who now in return and exchange for all asks that you show kindness to your fellow man? . . . He who is God and Lord does not shrink from being called our Father; shall we for our part deny our own kinsmen?[14]
In this way, Gregory makes it exceedingly clear that philanthrōpia is the necessary response to every good gift that God has bestowed upon the believer. Gregory pushes the point further as he plants the roots of philanthrōpia deeply in the soil of service to Christ. He exclaims:
If, then, you place any credence in what I say . . . let us visit Christ, let us heal Christ, let us feed Christ, let us clothe Christ, let us welcome Christ, let us honor Christ, not with food alone, like some; nor with ointments, like Mary; nor with tomb alone, like Joseph of Arimathea; nor with obsequies, like Nicodemus, who loved Christ in half measure; nor with gold and frankincense and myrrh as the Magi did before these others. Rather, since the Lord of all will have mercy . . . this let us offer to him through the poor who are today downtrodden, so that when we depart this world they may receive us into the habitations in Christ himself, our Lord.[15]
For Gregory, to neglect the poor is to neglect Christ Himself, and to serve the poor is to serve Christ.[16]
Conclusion: Philanthrōpia & Eternity
For Gregory, the natural conclusion is this: believers’ eternal welfare hinges upon their practice of philanthrōpia.[17] Gregory asks his hearers, “Do you think that compassion is not an obligation upon you but a matter of choice? Not rule but recommendation?” Gregory is unwilling to allow his hearers to draw such conclusions, so he presses further with a moving sense of honesty and conviction: “This is what I myself also should very much like to think, but I stand in terror of his left hand, and the goats, and the rebukes leveled against them by the one who has summoned them.” Lest his hearers misunderstand his logic to its intended conclusion, Gregory makes his case explicit: “They [those on Christ’s left hand at the judgment] are condemned to take their places on the left not because they stole, or committed sacrilege, or fornicated, or violated any other taboo, but because they did not serve Christ through the poor.”[18]
Gregory is not advocating what we might call “works salvation.” Instead, he is advocating for the believer’s radical conversion that results in active service to Christ through the poor and afflicted. Put another way, Gregory’s theology of salvation requires much more than mere mental assent to a given set of doctrines. Certainly, it is not a rejection of biblical doctrine, but a recognition that theology leads to action. Again, by no means is Gregory denying that one’s right standing with God comes through faith in Jesus Christ. He is, however, rejecting a bare faith devoid of works—the very message of Christ and His apostles. May we heed their call, proclaim their message, and follow their example (Mt. 5:42; Mk. 12:31; 1 Jn. 3:17; James 2:14-26).
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[1] Gregory of Nazianzus, On Love for the Poor, 14.8 (Vinson, 44). Unless otherwise noted, quotations from Oration 14: On Love for the Poor are taken from St. Gregory of Nazianzus, Select Orations, trans. Martha Vinson (Washington, D.C: The Catholic University of America Press, 2003).
[2] Gregory of Nazianzus, On Love for the Poor, 14.10 (Vinson, 45)
[3] Gregory of Nazianzus, On Love for the Poor, 14.25 (Vinson, 58).
[4] Gregory of Nazianzus, On Love for the Poor, 14.26 (Vinson, 59).
[5] Cited in Brian E. Daley, “Building a New City: The Cappadocians and the Rhetoric of Philanthropy,” Journal of Early Christian Studies 7, no. 3 (Fall 1999), 437.
[6] Demetrius J. Constantelos describes the all-encompassing nature of philanthrōpia in ancient Greek culture: “[A] citizen’s love toward his equals and a king’s benevolence to his subjects, society’s concern for the orphans and the aged, the sick and the strangers, were succinctly described as philanthropia.” Demetrius J. Constantelos, Byzantine Philanthrophy and Social Welfare (New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers University Press, 1968), 5.
[7] Gregory of Nazianzus, On Love for the Poor, 14.14 (Vinson, 48).
[8] Gregory of Nazianzus, On Love for the Poor, 14.14 (Vinson, 48).
[9] Gregory of Nazianzus, On Love for the Poor, 14.14 (Vinson, 49).
[10] Gregory of Nazianzus, On Love for the Poor, 14.14 (Vinson, 49).
[11] Gregory of Nazianzus, On Love for the Poor, 14.14 (Vinson, 49). At this point, Gregory is clearly using language that identifies at least some of these lepers as Christians. This certainly intensifies Gregory’s rebuke of those Christians who have neglected them. It seems unlikely, however, that Gregory is claiming that every leper in the region is a Christian. Therefore, Gregory begins his discussion of lepers by noting that all men, including lepers, bear the image of God. Then he moves to a discussion of those lepers who are believers.
[12] Gregory of Nazianzus, On Love for the Poor, 14.26 (Vinson, 58–59).
[13] Gregory of Nazianzus, On Love for the Poor, 14.26 (Vinson, 59).
[14] Gregory of Nazianzus, On Love for the Poor, 14.23 (Vinson, 55–56).
[15] Gregory of Nazianzus, On Love for the Poor, 14.40 (Vinson, 70–71).
[16] Though the passage is not directly cited, it is evident that Gregory is alluding to Matthew 25:35–40, and sees this as the natural interpretation of the passage.
[17] There is much similarity between Nyssen and Nazianzen on this point. See Hans Boersma, Embodiment and Virtue in Gregory of Nyssa: An Anagogical Approach (Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press, 2013) 146–177.
[18] Gregory of Nazianzus, On Love for the Poor, 14.39 (Vinson, 70).
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