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Cyprian’s Use of Philippians: To Live Is Christ and to Die Is Gain [Augustinianum]
Abstract
Cyprian’s appropriation of Scripture and his theological emphases
are closely connected with the circumstances of his congregation. As
a case study in Cyprian’s biblical interpretation, this article considers
all his quotations of and allusions to Philippians through the lens of
his pastoral concerns: the unity of the Church; care for the poor and
captive; discipline and repentance; and divine truth and eternal
glory. The reading strategies Cyprian uses can be categorized as
contextual exegesis, model, image, direct application, and prophetic
fulfilment. The study provides a fresh perspective on patronage and
almsgiving in Cyprian, deepens our understanding of the reception
of Paul, and elucidates the interplay of text, context and theology in
an important exponent of early Latin exegesis.
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Virgins were held in high regard in the North African churches of the third century. Much can be learned about how Cyprian of Carthage operated as bishop by examining his pastoral care of virgins. An analysis of every reference to virgins in his writings reveals that he considered ecclesiastical discipline particularly important for them in that they lived as symbols of the purity of the Church itself. De habitu uirginum, written in Cyprian's earliest years as bishop, indicates an uncompromising stance: those virgins who indulged in an excessive beauty regime were infected and diseased, and a contagion to the rest of the community. They had to be cut off from the Church. Several years later, after the Decian persecution, we find in Epistula 4 a more lenient Cyprian: virgins who had not been sexually intimate with the men with whom they had lived could be readmitted to communion. In the years from 251, penance rather than excommunication became the way for Cyprian to cure those infections which threatened the purity of the Church for all those who submitted to his authority.
Cyprian's Care for the Poor
- G D Dunn
As proposed by G. D. Dunn, Cyprian's Care for the Poor, 364-365.
Note that the allusion to Mt. 5, 45, which Dunn recognises as present in eleem. 25, linking it to vit
- G D Dunn
G. D. Dunn, Cyprian's Care for the Poor, 367-368. Note that the allusion
to Mt. 5, 45, which Dunn recognises as present in eleem. 25, linking it to vit.
Cypr. 9, is replicated in domin. orat. 17.
Cyprian cites love of patrimony as the cause of the downfall of the lapsed; giving alms will therefore wash away the sin and heal the wound, demonstrating true repentance. See the comments by M. Poirier in La mise en oeuvre littéraire: des thèmes récurrents
- Likewise
Likewise, in Cypr., laps. 35 (CCSL 3, 240-241), Cyprian cites love of
patrimony as the cause of the downfall of the lapsed; giving alms will therefore wash away the sin and heal the wound, demonstrating true repentance.
See the comments by M. Poirier in La mise en oeuvre littéraire: des thèmes
récurrents, in G. W. Clarke -M. Poirier, Cyprien de Carthage: Ceux qui sont
tombés, Paris 2012, 58-61.
For a discussion of dating, see
- G W Clarke
For a discussion of dating, see G. W. Clarke, The Letters of St. Cyprian,
vol. 4, 277-278.
Citing transformauerit instead of transformauit
- G W See
- Clarke
Citing transformauerit instead of transformauit. See G. W. Clarke, The
Letters of St. Cyprian, vol. 4, 283, note 11.
Kirchenbuße und Exkommunikation bei Cyprian
- See
- S Example
- Hübner
See, for example, S. Hübner, Kirchenbuße und Exkommunikation bei
Cyprian, in Zeitschrift für katholische Theologie 84 (1962), 49-84;
Nostra autem conuersatio, inquit, in caelis est, unde et Dominum expectamus Iesum Christum qui transformabit corpus humilitatis nostrae conformatum corpori claritatis suae
- Paulo
Paulo apostolo praedicante: "Nostra autem conuersatio, inquit, in caelis est,
unde et Dominum expectamus Iesum Christum qui transformabit corpus humilitatis
nostrae conformatum corpori claritatis suae." Cypr., mortal. 22 (CCSL 3A, 28).