Basil of Caesarea

The “Cappadocian Fathers” brought the best gift of all: a powerful scriptural defense of the Trinity and Christ’s divinity against the Arian heretics.

Basil of Caesarea (“the Great”) Pugnacious saint and theologian of the Spirit

Mention the “church fathers” to a Western Christian, and Basil the Great is not usually the first name to come to mind. Nevertheless, even for the Roman Catholic Church, Basil ranks with his friend Gregory of Nazianzus and John Chrysostom as one of the great propounders and defenders of the faith.

Born around 330, Basil grew up in a world where Christianity was recognized by the Roman government but divided between those who believed in the full divinity of Christ and the Arians, who did not. For much of the fourth century, the Arians would enjoy the support of the emperors. The struggle between Christianity and the empire had not ended with Constantine.

After his studies in Athens ended in 356, the young Basil returned to his native city of Caesarea in Cappadocia (southeastern Asia Minor). Though he appeared to have a brilliant secular career before him, instead Basil chose to follow the path of his sister Macrina, renouncing his share in the family property and living an ascetic life with a few companions.

Thus, Basil was one of the first to establish a monastic community in Asia Minor, and the rules he drew up are still normative for Orthodox monks today.

In 370 he became the archbishop of Caesarea, which brought him into conflict with the Arian emperor Valens. In an attempt to intimidate the stubborn bishop, Valens sent the prefect of the imperial guard, Modestus, to threaten him with punishment. Basil answered that he was ready and eager to die for Christ, and that he had so few possessions that banishment, confiscation, or imprisonment would mean nothing to him.

When Modestus complained that no one had ever talked to him like that, Basil answered that perhaps he had never met a bishop before: “When the interests of God are at stake, we care for nothing else.”

The emperor eventually backed down after his young son took sick and died, but the controversy with the Arians continued for the rest of Basil’s life.

In 374 Basil wrote a treatise On the Holy Spirit, which fleshed out the orthodox doctrine of the divinity of the Spirit.

It was while Basil was at Caesarea that the doxology “Glory be to the Father, and to the Son, and to the Holy Spirit” was first used, placing all three Persons of the Trinity on an equal footing. Basil also authored a liturgy still used by the Orthodox Church.

Basil’s major work of biblical interpretation was the Hexameron, his homilies on the six days of creation. He refused to allegorize away the literal meaning of the text, and is often classed with the “Antiochene” school of exegesis. Along with scientific speculation and theological argument, however, the Hexameron also interprets animal behavior as symbolic of various human characteristics, in order to offer moral instruction. Comparing an unhappy couple to a viper mating with a lamprey surely does not count as “literal exegesis.”

Basil was a difficult man to deal with, even for his friends. He made his friend Gregory of Nazianzus and his own brother Gregory of Nyssa miserable by forcing them to accept positions as bishops of small rural towns, positions for which they were not suited. He was accused of harshness or pride in his defense of the truth. Yet as bishop he devoted immense energy to feeding the hungry and caring for the poor, and his courage and devotion are beyond doubt. Basil’s life showed that the heroic, counter-cultural power of the gospel had not been stifled by government recognition of Christianity, and that even in a state-sponsored church there would always be found those willing to die for Christ.[1]

[1]Christian History Magazine-Issue 80: The First Bible Teachers (Carol Stream, IL: Christianity Today, 2003).