The Alexandrian School in the History of Christian Thought

The study guide presents a course of lectures the author read at the philosophy and history faculties of Lomonosov Moscow State University in 1997–2009. The book introduces the reader to the Alexandrian School – a historical and philosophical concept, embracing a whole range of crucial issues of the late Antique and early Christian worldview. Closely connected with the reflection of religious thought, the development of philosophical ideas can be traced throughout centuries – from the emergence of the Alexandrian School to its eclipse and qualitative regeneration into the intellectual tradition of ‘The Golden Age’ inherent in Christian patristic thought. As a cultural world center, Alexandria competed with Rome and led the way in the field of philosophical education. It gave the world Plotinus and Origen, made a decisive contribution to overcoming Gnosticism as the first temptation of Christian philosophical thought.

It was from here that Arianism and Origenism began to spread, but it was also here that the Orthodox dogmas and doctrine were formulated by SS Athanasius the Great and Cyril of Alexandria. The history of the Alexandrian School continued to cause fundamental disputes until after the end of the Middle Ages. Even today Alexandrian philosophy has not lost its relevance associated with such fields of humanitarian knowledge as hermeneutics and exegetics, semiotics, metaphysics, ontology, anthropology and the philosophy of religion.

For teachers, senior and postgraduate students of philosophy faculties.