St. Maximus‘ Logosology as a Synthesis of Ontology and Ethics

Authors:

Pages: 44-58
DOI: https://doi.org/10.54664/AJSA6523

Abstract:

St Maximus the Confessor’s theological synthesis offers a teaching about the logoi (logosology) which opens up realms for existentially relating ontology to ethics. As God’s personal good intentions and wills in creation, the logoi are not only ontological principles of creaturely existence, but also suggestions which need to be actively realized through man’s free (αὐτεξούσιον or self-determining) response in synergy with divine grace. In this way, logosology constitutes an operative/active and dialogical ontology which presupposes the existential achievement of virtue as ethical praxis manifesting the truth about being. The logoi are the topos in which ethical praxis is brought in being, and virtues are thus paths and ways of realizing the deepest meaning of the existence in Christ through the grace of the Holy Spirit. From this perspective, ethics can be understood as an internalization of ontology – not, however, within the framework of metaphysical or postmetaphysical thinking, but as imparting truth to existence and life. For St Maximus, ethics is constituted by the applicability of ontology whose horizon is the truth of the eucharistic mode of existence in Christ found in the ethos of the Church.

Keywords:

St Maximus the Confessor, logos, logosology, ontology, virtue, aretology, ethics

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