Antioch, Nicaea, and the Synthesis of Constantinople: Revisiting Trajectories in the Fourth-Century Christological Debates

Antioch, Nicaea, and the Synthesis of Constantinople: Revisiting Trajectories in the Fourth-Century Christological Debates. Studies in the History of Christian Traditions, 200. By Dragos Andrei Giulea. Brill, 2024. 309 pp., $167.00. 

In this monograph, Dragoș Andrei Giulea undertakes an ambitious revisioning of the intellectual landscape of the fourth-century theological debates. Challenging traditional narratives and building on recent scholarship, Giulea maps the complex interplay of ideas that shaped this pivotal era in Christian thought. By positioning the Council of Constantinople (381) as a culmination of earlier theological paradigms—specifically those emerging from Antioch (268) and Nicaea (325), Giulea offers a fresh perspective on the development of Trinitarian and Christological doctrines. 

A key strength of Giulea’s work is its methodological precision. Giulea clarifies and shows the value of consistently employing careful definitions of notions like “theological grammar” and intellectual “trajectory.” Traditional analysis focused almost exclusively on theological claims as a way to navigate the teeming labyrinth of third and fourth century debates. Giulea builds on and sharpens recent research that accounts for a broader array of philosophical and social factors. In particular, Giulea focuses on specific technical terms, the patterns of usage among certain groups, and the metaphysical commitments that are embedded in a given pattern of use (i.e., a “grammar”). 

In this historiographical paradigm, a trajectory names “those doctrinal visions belonging either to individual authors or to specific councils sharing a theological grammar with a common understanding of its basic concepts” (7). The tenets of faith in a trajectory “secure continuity within the Christian tradition,” while the metaphysical concepts “function as regulators of logical consistency and linguistic and metaphysical novelty” (7; see also 172–74; 270–82). 

Significantly, trajectories are not “static theoretical systems.” Rather, they “evolve toward a more internal coherence by clarifying their metaphysical concept and integrating them within a specific theological vision” (7; 13–19). Each of these components of a trajectory are important for the modified map that Giulea draws of the fourth century theological landscape.

Following from this method, Giulea identifies five key streams of thought in the third and fourth centuries that represent genuine trajectories with a consistent theological grammar: Antiochene, Arian, Nicene, Homoian, and pro-Nicene. Against the current consensus, Giulea argues that the broad category of “Eusebian” is insufficient to characterize the theological diversity of the major non-Nicene position before and after the council at Nicaea (so too “Origenism”). 

Instead, Giulea prefers to identify this trajectory as “Antiochene” because its central terms were formally articulated at the council of Antioch in 268. At Antioch, theologians affirmed the use of the term hypostasis understood as an individual substance (distinguishing themselves from the Nicene position) but also rejected the notion that the Son was a created being (distinguishing themselves from the Arian position). 

In the Antiochene trajectory, then, there were a variety of theological positions and formulations (e.g., relating to the nature of the subordination of the Son and the degrees of his “likeness” to the Father). Giulea thus includes theologians like Eusebius, the council at Antioch, and the later Homoiousians in the stream that consistently affirms the theological tenets and metaphysical vocabulary that was articulated at Antioch. 

Giulea also sees the Arian trajectory as a coherent stream of thought rather than a catchall term for any opponent of Nicaea or a line of thinking limited only to Arius himself (70–78.). The distinctive Arian claim relates to a single “first principle” (identified exclusively with the Father) and the nature of the Son’s creaturehood (which invariably denies his deity). This position applies to Arius but also to later fourth century theologians like Aetius and Eunomius. Arian or neo-Arian teaching, then, maintains a position that represents the opposite pole of the Nicene position toward both the beginning and end of the fourth century (89–106).

Before Constantinople in 381, there was also a conciliatory attempt by Emperor Constantius to mandate reproachment and consolidation between the various non-Nicene groups. This “homoian” position affirmed a general “likeness” between the Father and the Son but intentionally omitted any use of the critical but contested terms ousia and hypostasis (which were synonymous for the Nicene position and distinguished in the Antiochene view). Giulea characterizes this position as coherent but ultimately unsuccessful because of the theological and philosophical ambiguity incidentally introduced by omission of the debated terms (128–32).

These historical observations inform Giulea’s central concluding argument that the pro-Nicene consensus achieved at Constantinople in 381 was not merely an internal development within the Nicene trajectory or a simple re-affirmation of the Nicene creed but more fundamentally a thoughtful synthesis of the most effective metaphysical elements of the Antiochene and Nicene trajectories. 

In this vein, Giulea champions Basil of Caesarea as the first theologian to recognize the strengths and weaknesses of both the Nicene and Antiochene ways of using the key terms ousia and hypostatis. Giulea first argues for the authenticity of Basil’s contested early correspondence with Apollinarius of Laodicea. Though viewed by most scholars as spurious (partly because of its use of Antiochene terminology), Giulea views this correspondence as exploratory for Basil and in line with the early phase of the gradual maturing of Basil’s theological thinking (187–204). In his writing and correspondence across his earlier and later ministry, Basil gradually discerned and combined the most valuable insights from Antioch and Nicaea.

In the progression of Bail’s thought, Giulea suggests, one can see the underlying dynamic of the eventual pro-Nicene position that emerges among the Cappadocians. The Nicene formulation viewed ousia as a common divine substance that is shared by the divine persons (and used it interchangeably with hypostasis). This was able to rule out the Arian subordination of the Son, but it was not quite able to secure the distinction among the Father, Son, and Spirit. The Antiochene formulation viewed hypostasis as an individual substance. This was able to rule out Sabellian modalism, but it was not quite able to secure the co-equality of the divine persons. 

By synthesizing these two metaphysical terms/concepts, Basil is able to articulate a theological grammar that marks the pro-Nicene position and becomes the general consensus of the churches. In the ensuing ecclesial discussions, the new theological idiom of one common ousia in three distinct hypostaseis will become an established formulation that gains increasing assent. Although Basil was not the first one to achieve this formulation (likely a benchmark of the Meletians), he was “the one who had the intuition of its metaphysical efficacy and articulated a metaphysical and theological synthesis of the two grammars” (270).

Because of the wide-ranging and ambitious scope of Giulea’s study, there are several areas where specialists in the field will object to his newly fashioned formulations (e.g., his arguments about the viability of specific categories or his take on the authenticity of certain writings). However, this volume resonates with recent historiography of this period in prioritizing primary sources, employing nuanced interpretive categories, and maintaining measured conclusions. For these reasons, Giulea’s work merits careful consideration from scholars and students of this theologically formative historical period.

Also in Reviews of Biblical and Early Christian Studies (2025)