the sacred languages’. A brief conclusion tries to make more of the concept ofmonastic humanism and unite these separate careers, especially emphasising theirinvolvement in the study of Greek, Hebrew, and Latin as sacred languages providinga route to the pure biblical text and its meaning.In each case the approach is very firmly biographical, and it is no surprise to

discover that some of the chapters are expanded versions of contributions tobiographical dictionaries and other encyclopedic texts. (Others derive frombiographical discussions in academic journals). This gives a clear focus oninformation for its own sake, rather than analysis and argument, with each life verymuch a self-contained unit. This is sometimes disappointing, as there are clearresonances between the chapters, and it would certainly have been helpful to have agreater sense of argument about the precise identity and cohesion of ‘monastichumanism’ as a force – or at least an identifiable entity – in the broader context of theRenaissance in Germany. While Posset stresses the linguistic and classical elements,and makes much of the correspondence, none of his subjects was a particularlyprolific author (which seems to challenge the rationale of the project as an analysis of‘works’), while some of them – especially the poets – have an air of hackery aboutthem. Indeed, none seems particularly impressive as a central figure in the advance ofhumanism in sixteenth-century Germany. While there are connections between someof them, nothing really unites them as a group, unless perhaps it is their associationwith the controversy over the activities of Reuchlin around 1510–15. At times it feelsas though Posset really wanted to write his book about that issue: it crops uprepeatedly, and is a dominant issue in some of the biographies (the chapter onEllenbog deals in detail with little beyond his correspondence with Reuchlin).These men do not come across as cultural leaders, but they did contribute to the

spread of Renaissance ideas in sixteenth-century Germany. As monks, most of themwere fated to witness the changes of the Reformation (Leontorius and Chelidoniusdied before it really took hold), but their responses to it are not treated in detail.Posset’s main interest is in their ‘humanistic’ side, to the virtual exclusion of all else.The book will certainly get into footnotes, as a work of reference. Within its field, it

will be a welcome and useful volume, simply by fleshing out the lives of these men.There may be more to be said on them, but Posset gives the impression that these‘monastic humanists’ are themselves little more than footnotes to a bigger history.

University of Birmingham, UK R. N. Swanson

The Copts and the West 1439–1822: The European Discovery of the Egyptian Church(Oxford-Warburg Studies 200). By Alastair Hamilton. Pp. 338, Oxford UniversityPress, 2006, $175.00.

In the fourth century the Church of Alexandria was second only to Rome. Its leaderswere the successors of St Mark and included the luminaries Athanasius and Cyril,who had led the struggle against Arianism. It was the church of martyrdom andmonasticism and fiercely proud of its independence. A century later, however,Alexandria became engulfed in perhaps the most significant controversy of the EarlyChurch. The teaching of Bishop Dioscurus (444–451) on the nature of Christ wascondemned at the Council of Chalcedon (451) and the head of the AlexandrianChurch was deposed and exiled. Rather than resolving the matter, Chalcedon split theEgyptian church, most of which rejected the authority of Rome and Constantinopleand adhered to a theology that became known as monophysitism. As AlastairHamilton argues in this meticulously researched and beautifully crafted book, thestory was greatly more complicated than the polemical victors at Chalcedon would

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have us believe. Far from being rude heretics, the Coptic Church was anextraordinarily sophisticated and diverse body that continued to flourish followingthe Arab conquest of Egypt in the seventh century. With its ancient language andliturgies this remote and supposedly heretical church fascinated Western EuropeanChristians.Hamilton’s book is a study of relations between the West and the Copts from the

Council of Florence in 1439 to the early nineteenth century. The story has manydimensions: the enduring need of the West to come to terms with the EasternChristians, the appropriation of Coptic into the scholarly world of the Renaissance,missionary efforts to convert the Egyptians to Roman Catholicism, and confessionalbattles between Protestant and Catholics over the heritage of the east. While theCopts attended the Council of Florence and signed the union, this was never ratifiedand there was little enthusiasm in Egypt to end a thousand years of independence. Thecontact made at the Council, however, put the Copts on the mental map of theWestern Church. Early Western visitors quickly discovered the Copts had an entirelydifferent attitude towards the Bible and the nature of the sacraments, and wereappalled to find that the animal laws of the Old Testament were maintained. Duringthe sixteenth and seventeenth centuries there was an extraordinary series of missionsto Egypt. First the Jesuits and then the Franciscans, fired by a zeal to restore the unityof the Church, attempted to reclaim the lost Christians, whom they regarded with amixture of admiration and contempt. There were conversions, but these proved falseharbingers of reconciliation under Roman authority; brief moments of success wereinevitably followed by bitter disappointment. The central issue was not theology. Themissionaries struggled with the language and with a culture that was little inclined toaccept Western ideas and discipline. Hamilton demonstrates the chasm ofmisunderstanding as Renaissance Rome had little idea about the character of theCoptic Church. Recognizing that Arabic-speaking missionaries were required, forexample, Rome sent Marionites, oblivious to the hostility between these two branchesof the Eastern Church, and the results were disastrous.Nevertheless, the sixteenth century was a turning point inWestern understanding of

the Copts. Colleges for Eastern Christians were established in Rome and, moresignificantly, manuscripts were collected, opening the door to further study. TheCopts, on the whole, were reluctant travellers: only a few colourful individuals cameto the West and their influence was both disproportionate and distorting. In addition,the accounts of the growing number of travellers to Egypt stirred great interest amongCatholics and Protestants, particularly German Lutherans and Anglicans. It was inCatholic France, however, that the most significant scholarship took place, thoughonce more controversy was not far away as the study of Coptic sources becameenmeshed in the Jansenist struggle. France possessed the greatest collection of Copticsources, and Hamilton explains the advances in linguistic and textual studies made bysuch notable figures as Eusebe Renandot, Guillaume Bonjour, and Stefano Borgia.For the Catholics the study of Coptic literature and traditions was an essential part ofestablishing the historical continuities of Rome with the ancient churches of the East.Protestants, having first seen in Alexandria justification for the rejection of papalauthority and transubstantiation, cooled in their interest during the eighteenthcentury as it became apparent that there were more similarities between the Copts andRome than first supposed. In the final part of the book Hamilton offers a fascinatingstudy of the attempts in theWest to understand Coptic as one of the ancient languagesof the Bible. He places this endeavour within the growing debate over Biblicallanguages in the decades leading to the advent of critical interpretation of thenineteenth century. As a biblical language, Coptic turned out to have limited value,but in their transmission of learning, the Coptic manuscripts were a treasure trove.This book is a fascinating study of the growth of scholarship in its many forms and

with its numerous false turns. Hamilton places the West’s engagement with the

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Egyptian church in its various historical contexts, and with his detailed study of awide range of sources he brings to life the characters and mentalities that animate thisstory. This is a book of great depth and importance that illuminates the manner inwhich ideas were appropriated and transmitted in early-modern Europe.

University of St. Andrews Bruce Gordon

Wisdom from Above: A Primer in the Theology of Father Sergei Bulgakov. By AidanNichols, O.P. Pp. xii, 317, Leominster, Gracewing, 2005, $33.00.

This is the first ever monograph in English on Fr Sergii Bulgakov, increasinglyregarded as one of the greatest Orthodox theologians of the twentieth century, indeedby some the greatest theologian – or at least most original – tout court in that century.It comes at a most opportune moment, as Bulgakov’s time seems to have come at last.Translations of his most important works, not least by the indefatigable Boris Jakim,are now, or will shortly be, available, and there is a fine introduction to Bulgakov’stheology by the reigning Archbishop of Canterbury, which provides extensive extractsin translation with a kind of running commentary. Sergii Bulgakov was one of theintellectual emigres, deported from Russian in 1922 on Lenin’s orders. Like many ofthese emigres, he eventually found his way to Paris, where he became professor ofdogmatic theology and later dean of the Institut St-Serge, the theological academy setup by the emigres to continue the theological tradition that was being destroyed inRussia by the triumphant Communists. Bulgakov proved controversial. Central tothe theology was the notion of the Wisdom of God, Sophia, and for his speculationsover this he was condemned in the 1930s as a heretic by the two Russian jurisdictionsto which he did not belong – the Moscow Patriarchate and their most extremeopponents, the White Russian Church in Exile – though spared by his ownjurisdiction, the exarchate that had sought refuge under the OecumenicalPatriarchate. After the war, Russian emigre theology followed the ‘Neopatristic’stars of Lossky and Florovsky, and Bulgakov’s ideas languished (he had diedin 1944).Before the revolution, Bulgakov, born in 1871 the son of a priest, had lost his faith,

embraced Marxism and become a professor of economics, only returning to the faith,along with other members of the intelligentsia in the first decade of the twentiethcentury, accepting ordination in 1918. Like many of his generation he was influencedby the extraordinary genius of Vladimir Solov’ev, who died at the end of thenineteenth century in 1900; he was also a friend of the no less extraordinary genius, FrPavel Florensky, whose scientific interests prevented his exile in 1922 and who died,shot by the NKVD, in 1937. Bulgakov’s earlier writings are political, economic,literary, but from his arrival in Paris it was mostly as a theologian that he wrote,composing two trilogies, the ‘little’ trilogy, consisting of The Burning Bush, on theMother of God, The Friend of the Bridegroom, on St. John the Baptist, and Jacob’sLadder, on the angels, which can be seen as a commentary on the principal figures ofthe ‘Wisdom’ icon of the Mother of God, and his ‘great’ trilogy, ‘On Godmanhood’(the same title as a famous set of lectures delivered by Solov’ev), consisting of TheLamb of God, on Christ, The Comforter, on the Holy Spirit, and The Bride of theLamb, on the Church and eschatology.It is with these two trilogies that this book by Aidan Nichols is principally

concerned. Fr Nichols has already written several important articles on Bulgakov, towhich he modestly makes scarcely a reference in his bibliography, as well as books onmodern Orthodox, especially Russian Orthodox, theology (which he does admit to).In his articles Nichols drew attention to the philosophical background of Bulgakov’s

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