Ancient Christian Ecopoetics: Cosmologies, Saints, Things

Virginia Burrus. (2019). Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press.

Comprising three main sections and employing a range of literary theories, Burrus’ book is a study of how Christianity in Late Antiquity engaged with the environment around it and how that engagement can relate to and inform on the modern ecological and environmental crisis.  Part 1 focusses on the khora, a concept first introduced by Plato in the Timaeus which recurs in later philosophical and theological thought (referencing the works of Philo, Origen, Athanasius and Augustine) and is understood by Burrus as ‘something like the nature of nature – so long as we understand that this “nature” is less of a grounding than an abysmal ungrounding and that we ourselves are in the thick of it’ (p. 12). Part 2 turns to hagiography and how ecocritical theory can be combined with other literary theories (queer theory, disability theory, animal studies) to examine saints as part of their landscapes and ecosystems. Part 3 is concerned with the concept of new materialism and the ways in which early Christians interacted with physical objects in the forms of icons and relics. Throughout the book, there is a focus on moving away from religious anthropocentrism and on the works of John Sallis, Timothy Morton and Jane Bennett.