The Orthodox Understanding of Salvation: "Theosis" in Scripture and Tradition

The Orthodox Understanding of Salvation brings together some of Dr. Veniamin's talks and articles, hitherto available in relatively little-known theological journals and periodicals, which pertain to the fundamental question of the purpose of human existence, to Salvation, as understood in the age-old and unbroken tradition of the Orthodox Christian Faith - the faith of the Patriarchs, Prophets, Apostles, Martyrs and Saints of our Lord, God and Saviour, Jesus Christ. This work aims to initiate the reader into the basic theological presuppositions of Patristic theology. The juxtaposition of works delivered to diverse audiences is deliberate, inasmuch as it is designed to demonstrate that the same principles are applicable to the sermon and theological treatise alike, that in the Orthodox Christian tradition there is no separation between ethics and doctrine, but rather that Christian living and theology are one indivisible reality, because Christ, the measure of all things human and divine, created and uncreated, is One. Divided into two parts, Praxis and Theoria, this book covers a wide range of topics, based on key Scriptural passages and the writings of some of the greatest masters of the Christian spiritual life, all of which are held together by criteria which are born not of speculation but of the face to face encounter with the living God.

Dr. Christopher Veniamin was born and raised in London, England, of Greek Cypriot parents, is a spiritual child of Elder Sophrony of Essex, and Professor of Patristics at St. Tikhon s Seminary, in Pennsylvania, USA. He is a graduate of the School of Theology in the University of Thessalonica, and holds the doctorate in Theology from Oxford University, where he studied under the Most Revd Dr. Kallistos Ware, Metropolitan of Diokleia. His doctoral thesis, The Transfiguration of Christ in Greek Patristic Literature: From Irenaeus of Lyons to Gregory Palamas, was a diachronic study of the meaning of the Transfiguration in Patristic theology, spanning a period of some thirteen centuries. Professor Veniamin has produced numerous articles ranging in subject from the Apocryphal writings of the New Testament to Euthanasia, he is the publisher of the seminal works of Archimandrite Zacharias Zacharou (The Enlargement of the Heart, The Hidden Man of the Heart, and Remember Thy First Love), and has edited and translated, from the original Greek into English, the first complete edition of the sermons of Gregory Palamas (Saint Gregory Palamas: The Homilies), for which he also wrote the introduction and detailed scholia.