Theopedia

John of Damascus

“By thinking He creates, and, with the Word fulfilling and the Spirit perfecting, the object of His thought subsists.”

— John of Damascus, Orthodox Faith 2.2

Overview

John of Damascus (ca. 665-ca. 750), also called John Damascene, was a Greek-speaking theologian of the Eastern church, author of the Exposition of the Orthodox Faith and Source of Knowledge.1 Herman Bavinck places his work at the close of the patristic era, immediately before what he calls “the great period of Byzantium.”1 He is remembered chiefly as a defender of icon veneration during the Byzantine Iconoclast controversy, and for a mediating formula on the Holy Spirit’s procession from the Father “through the Son” that has remained Eastern Orthodoxy’s position ever since.12

Life and Ministry

John of Damascus lived from about 665 to about 750, in the final generation of the Greek patristic era.1 His public ministry fell during the Byzantine Iconoclast controversy: in 726 Emperor Leo III issued an edict forbidding the religious use of images, a position a council at Constantinople formally ratified in 754.3 Bavinck identifies him as “a strong defender of the veneration of images” against this imperial policy, the stand for which he remained best known.1 The controversy outlived him: in 787 Empress Irene convened the Second Council of Nicaea, which reversed Leo’s edict and sanctioned the veneration of icons, distinguishing the honor owed an image from the worship (latria) owed to God alone.3 The council’s decision was not received in the West. Charlemagne commissioned the Libri Carolini to refute it, and a synod at Frankfurt in 794, attended by delegates from Britain, France, Germany, Italy, and two legates of the Bishop of Rome, formally rejected the council’s decrees.3

Theological Contribution

The Exposition of the Orthodox Faith

John of Damascus earned the name Chrysorrhoas, “golden-stream,” for his eloquence, and Pictet credits him as “the first among the Greek Fathers who reduced Theology to some method.”4 His major work, the Exposition of the Orthodox Faith, organized Christian doctrine into four books: the first treating God, the Trinity, and the divine nature and attributes; the second, creation and the various kinds of creatures; the third, the incarnation of Christ and the hypostatic union of his two natures, along with Christ’s life, death, and descent into hell; and the fourth, Christ’s resurrection and ascension, faith, and the sacraments.4 Unusually, he treated the Trinity before God’s other attributes, an ordering Bavinck notes was later followed by Bonaventure.5

Christology

Leontius of Byzantium had argued that Christ’s human nature is not impersonal but “in-personal,” finding its personal subsistence in the person of the Son. Building on this, John of Damascus brought the Christology of the East, in Louis Berkhof’s judgment, to its “highest development.”6 He added the idea of a circumincession (perichoresis) of the divine and human natures in Christ, a communication of divine attributes to the human nature such that it is deified, “and we may also say that God suffered in the flesh.”6 Berkhof cautions that John “shows a tendency to reduce the human nature to the position of a mere organ or instrument of the Logos,” while still affirming a real cooperation of both natures, in which the one person acts and wills through each nature, the human will remaining “always subject to the divine.”6

The Spirit’s procession

On the Holy Spirit’s procession, John of Damascus took a position between the Western and Eastern extremes then developing. He held that the Spirit “is also the Spirit of the Son, since he is revealed and communicated by the Son,” and that the Spirit “proceeds from the Father through the Son,” while “expressly rejecting the idea that he is from the Son and receives his existence from him.”2 Van Mastricht records the same formula, grouping John of Damascus with Basil and Theophylact as holding that the Spirit proceeds from the Father through the Son “the same way the particles ἐκ, διά, and εἰς seem to be employed in Romans 11:36.”7 This mediating position, distinct from both the West’s filioque and the bare Eastern formula, “has remained the doctrine of the Greek Orthodox Church ever since.”2

Historical Significance

The Second Council of Nicaea’s 787 endorsement of icon veneration, the position John of Damascus had defended, has remained the settled teaching of Eastern Orthodoxy.1 The 1689 Second London Baptist Confession rejects it:

“The acceptable way of worshipping the true God is instituted by himself, and so limited by his own revealed will, that he may not be worshipped according to the imagination and devices of men, nor the suggestions of Satan, under any visible representations, or any other way not prescribed in the Holy Scriptures.”8

Apart from that disagreement, Reformed theologians have continued to draw directly on John of Damascus’s formulations of the doctrine of God and the person of Christ. Bavinck, Berkhof, Van Mastricht, and Matthew Barrett all cite him on the Trinity, creation, and Christology,9 and Bavinck groups his Exposition of the Orthodox Faith with Pseudo-Dionysius’s writings as the last works of real dogmatic importance the Greek-speaking church produced before the rise of Byzantium.1 Pictet, in turn, places him at the start of a line of theological method that runs through Peter Lombard to the medieval Scholastics.4

Related Doctrines

References

  1. Herman Bavinck, Reformed Dogmatics: Abridged in One Volume, ed. John Bolt (Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2011), chap. 2, “The History and Literature of Dogmatic Theology”: “The orthodox summary works of John of Damascus (ca. 665-ca. 750; Exposition of the Orthodox Faith; Source of Knowledge). The Damascene was also a strong defender of the veneration of images, a key and controversial element of Eastern Orthodox Christianity. Thus began the great period of Byzantium, lasting from the ninth century until the capture of Constantinople by the Turks in 1453.” ↩ ↩2 ↩3 ↩4 ↩5 ↩6 ↩7

  2. Bavinck, Reformed Dogmatics, chap. 9, “The Triune God and His Counsel”: “John of Damascus states that the Spirit is also the Spirit of the Son, since he is revealed and communicated by the Son, and goes on to say that the Spirit proceeds from the Father through the Son. But he expressly rejects the idea that he is from the Son and receives his existence from him… And this has remained the doctrine of the Greek Orthodox Church ever since.” ↩ ↩2 ↩3

  3. Charles Hodge, Systematic Theology, vol. 3 (New York: Charles Scribner and Company, 1873), chap. 19, “The Law,” 294-95: “In A.D. 726 the Emperor Leo III. issued an ordinance forbidding the use of images in churches as heathenish and heretical. To support his action a council was called, which met in Constantinople A.D. 754… In A.D. 787, however, the Empress Irene… called a council… at Nice, by which image-worship was fully sanctioned… not indeed with λατρεία, or the reverence due to God, but with ἀσπασμὸς καὶ τιμητικὴ προσκύνησις. The decisions of this Council, although sanctioned by the Pope, gave offence to the Western Churches. The Emperor Charlemagne not only caused a book to be written (entitled ‘Libri Carolini’) to refute the doctrines inculcated, but also summoned a council to meet at Frankfort on the Main A.D. 794, at which delegates from Britain, France, Germany, Italy, and even two legates from the Bishop of Rome, were present; where the decrees of the so-called General Council of Nice were ‘rejected,’ ‘despised,’ and ‘condemned.’” ↩ ↩2 ↩3

  4. Benedict Pictet, Christian Theology, trans. Frederick Reyroux (Philadelphia: Presbyterian Board of Publication, 1845), author’s preface, v: “In the eighth century, John of Damascus, called Chrysorrhoas (i.e. golden-stream,) from his eloquence, was the first among the Greek Fathers who reduced Theology to some method, in his four books concerning ‘the Orthodox Faith,’ in the first of which he treats of God, the Trinity, the divine nature and attributes; in the second, of the creation, and the various kinds of creatures, in the third, of the incarnation of Christ, and the hypostatical union of his two natures, of Christ’s life, death, and descent into hell; in the fourth, of Christ’s resurrection and ascension, of faith, and the sacraments.” ↩ ↩2 ↩3

  5. Bavinck, Reformed Dogmatics, chap. 8, “Living, Acting God”: “Although some theologians (John of Damascus; Bonaventure) treat the Trinity before the general attributes of God…” ↩

  6. Louis Berkhof, Systematic Theology (London: Banner of Truth Trust, 1969), 291-92: “John of Damascus, in whom the Christology of the East reached its highest development, added the idea that there is a circumincession of the divine and the human in Christ, a communication of the divine attributes to the human nature, so that the latter is deified and we may also say that God suffered in the flesh. He shows a tendency to reduce the human nature to the position of a mere organ or instrument of the Logos, yet he admits that there is a co-operation of the two natures, and that the one person acts and wills in each nature, though the human will is always subject to the divine.” ↩ ↩2 ↩3

  7. Petrus van Mastricht, Theoretical-Practical Theology, vol. 2, ed. Joel R. Beeke, trans. Todd M. Rester (Grand Rapids: Reformation Heritage Books, 2019), chap. 9, “Unity”: “The Holy Spirit proceeds from the Father through the Son, the same way the particles ἐκ, διά, and εἰς seem to be employed in Romans 11:36, just as Basil, Theophylact, John of Damascus, and others have said.” ↩

  8. The Second London Baptist Confession of Faith (1689), chap. 22, “Of Religious Worship and the Sabbath Day,” para. 1. ↩

  9. Matthew Barrett, None Greater: The Undomesticated Attributes of God (Grand Rapids: Baker Books, 2019), chap. 10, “Is God All-Powerful, All-Knowing, and All-Wise? Omnipotence, Omniscience, and Omnisapience,” quoting John of Damascus, Orthodox Faith 2.2: “By thinking He creates, and, with the Word fulfilling and the Spirit perfecting, the object of His thought subsists.” ↩