Alain Le Boulluec: The Early Christian heresies can be interpreted as forms of elitism

1. Entity type Lemma
2. Original titleAlain Le Boulluec: Ereziile crestinismului timpuriu se pot interpreta ca forme de elitism
3. Language term Romanian
4. lemma author Stavinschi, Alexandra
5. lemma category Orthodox theological tradition and practice > Patristic studies - Orthodox theological tradition and practice - Concepts of knowledge and modes of reasoning
6. Publication date 24-1-2017
7. lemma work Bădiliţă, Cristian [Author]. Alain Le Boulluec: The Early Christian heresies can be interpreted as forms of elitism.
8. lemma manifestations Stiinta dragoste credinta. Convorbiri cu patrologi europeni. [Science faith love. Conversations with European patrologists]
9. Keywords Early Church Fathers - patristic tradition - heresies - Greek philosophy - schism - Canon law
10. Citations
    1. 112-120
11. Lemma body

    1. This is an interview that Cristian Badilita had with the French theologian Alain Le Boulluec. Le Boulluec, born in 1941, is Professor of History of Early Christianity at the Ecole Pratique des Hautes Etudes in Paris, in the "Patristics and history of dogma" department. For the past few decades he has been editing, translating and annotating for Sources chrétiennes the Stromata of Clement of Alexandria. In ancient Greek, the word hairesis designates only a doctrine or a school. Le Boulluec tries to explain how the semantic shift of the term came about. While it was initially neutral, as early as the second century it appeared to have acquired a pejorative meaning. Badilita challenges his guest to comment on W. Bauer’s work. Bauer considered that in the beginning orthodoxy was just a heresy like many others. His thesis contradicts the opinion of the Fathers of the Church (Irenaeus and Tertullian in particular), according to whom the heresies emerged only after orthodoxy, and attributes a central role to the Church of Rome, which is thought to have imposed orthodoxy throughout the Empire. In what follows, Le Boulluec sheds light on the early history of the "Christian tradition", an expression that is very differently understood and interpreted by the three major Christian denominations. He then goes on to comment on the relationship between the emergence of the antiheretic treaties and the creation of the canon. He also discusses to what extent and in what way at the end of the second century the institutionalization of Christianity and the emergence of the monoepiscopate contributed towards a tightening of the measures against the "heretics". Another difference he clarifies is that between heresy and schism, in the beginnings of Christianity. To complete the picture, the Frech theologian is invited to expand on the relationship between Christianity and pagan philosophy.