The Apollinarian Christologies

Book excerpt: "The christological writings of Apollinarius of Laodicea and what has been written about them present us with something of a contradiction. The style of Apollinarius' exposition and his intellectual reputation indicate that he taught a clear, logical and systematic doctrine of Christ and on this the commentators tend to agree: 'The brilliance and thoroughgoing logic of Apollinarius' system are undeniable'; 'This was a brilliant and logical system destined to exercise an enormous influence'; '...it stands as a complete and elaborate system of doctrine to which all his writings make their contribution'. Yet when it comes to specifying the precise nature of this doctrine his interpreters, both ancient and modern, offer divergent opinions and strongly disagree with one another. It is this apparent contradiction which first attracted me to re-examine the Apollinarian texts as collected by Hans Lietzmann in his 1904 edition and to reconsider what has been said about them, for it suggests that the interpretative discussion may not be closed since the contradiction would appear to have two possible causes: either the existing interpretations have been variously less than successful at delineating the precise nature of Apollinarian doctrine, or Apollinarius' teaching was, in fact, less clear, logical and systematic than his style and reputation suggests and his interpreters assume."--