Newman and the Alexandrian Fathers: Shaping Doctrine in Nineteenth-Century England (review)

Blessed Cardinal John Henry Newman’s enthusiasm for the Fathers of the Alexandrian Church is well known, but in-depth study has been lacking in this area. Benjamin John King now has rectified this omission, examining Newman’s relationship with the Alexandrian Fathers in painstaking detail.

He presents Newman’s understanding of these Fathers as passing through various phases. He explores first Newman’s composition of Arians of the Fourth Century in the early 1830s, then examines the patristic background to Newman’s sermons on Christ during the rest of that decade. He moves to expounding Newman’s views on the Trinity between 1840 and 1858. He concludes by considering what Newman had to say when he returned to these matters in later life, from 1864 to 1881. King not only pays close attention to Newman’s approach and use of his patristic sources but also weaves in the way the work of other writers can be detected in what he says, especially the Anglican scholarship of George Bull, William Cave, and Ralph Cudworth. It is evident from the stages in Newman’s writings that he has identified that he has moved far beyond any simple consideration of an Anglican Newman and a Catholic Newman.

He illustrates Newman’s movement from a static to a more dynamic view of the formulation of doctrines and indicates shifts in his sympathies, notably with regard to Origen. He also argues that, when Newman was in Rome to prepare for Catholic priesthood, his Latin treatises written there reflect a position more in tune with Roman Scholasticism. King claims that after Newman had become a cardinal and was reworking his Select Treatises of Saint Athanasius (1842) into a free translation, he was now reading his great Alexandrian hero through the neo-Thomistic lens that the new pope, Leo XIII, was encouraging.

King has done this area of Newman scholarship a real service. His book will be indispensable for future students who want to investigate these matters. His attention to detail is formidable. However, its very density of detail raises the question of the wood versus the trees. For example, did Newman really move into the Scholastic camp or seek to embrace neo-Thomism? Or was he just attempting to express himself in ways that his readers could understand? Do his writings present evidence of change in him or his pastoral instinct?

Newman is famous for the rarity of his footnotes, yet he read extensively. Perhaps it was less a matter of his failure to acknowledge his sources and influences than a consequence of the originality of his approach. What he read nurtured his understanding. He described portions of Alexandrian teaching as “like music to my inward ear.”¹ He was recognizing what he already knew more than he was learning something fresh. What was truly novel—his new learning or his shifts of emphasis that King highlights so well? Were these rather further elements that were being integrated into Newman’s overarching vision? These are the fundamental questions that this fine book prompts.