14
D. SARISKY
on what for Basil is a logically prior point, as he makes clear even in that con-
text, that is, Scripture’s role in the course of human sanctification.2 The discus-
sion that follows revolves not around the question of which interpretive tech-
niques Basil applies to the Bible; rather, it focuses on the Cappadocian’s
construal of the hearer’s identity in terms that are both dynamic and theological.3
II
Basil provides an initial orientation to what is required to understand Genesis
in the introduction to his first sermon. The necessity of purification is a function
of the subject matter on which he preaches. The first sermon is a discourse on
the words ‘in the beginning God made the heaven and the earth.’ Naturally
enough, Basil opens his exposition with a gloss of his main theme: ‘I am about
to speak’, he says, ‘of the creation of heaven and earth, which was not sponta-
neous, as some have imagined, but drew its origin from God.’4 He preaches,
alternative explanations for Basil’s language. Richard Lim concludes that the exigencies of the
situation in which Basil spoke are the primary issue. Allegorical readings are fitting for a mature
audience, but the congregation to which Basil delivered this address was immature: Richard Lim,
‘The Politics of Interpretation in Basil of Caesarea’s Hexaemeron’, VC 44 (1990), 351-70, 361f.
For his part, Stephen Hildebrand does not find this convincing. While he agrees with Lim that the
Genesis sermons were not addressed to an advanced audience, he points to evidence that the same
holds for many of the sermons on the Psalms, in which Basil does seem to engage in allegorical
interpretations of the Psalter. Hence, a supposed difference in audience does not explain Basil’s
varying ways of handling the scriptural text. See Stephen M. Hildebrand, The Trinitarian Theol-
ogy of Basil of Caesarea: A Synthesis of Greek Thought and Biblical Truth (Washington, 2007),
137f. Hildebrand’s counterproposal is, first, that Genesis is intrinsically less open to spiritual
interpretation than are other scriptural texts; and, second, that Basil becomes more alert to poten-
tial abuses of allegory later in his life. Especially in this first respect, Hildebrand’s reading is a
contemporary defense of the judicious line taken in Manlio Simonetti, Lettera e/o allegoria: Un
contributo alla storia dell’esegesi patristica (Rome, 1985), 143f.
2
Hexaemeron sermons 1-9 are indisputably by Basil. A number of scholars also accept that
Basil composed two additional sermons, Hexaemeron 10-1: see the editorial introduction to Basil,
Sur l’origine de l’homme: Hom. X et XI de l’‘Hexaéméron’, ed. Alexis Smets and Michel van
Esbroeck, SC 160 (Paris, 1970), 13-26, 81-126. Be that as it may, in this paper, I deal with only
sermons 1-9.
3
For helpful historical background on preachers and audiences in the fourth century, see
Jaclyn L. Maxwell, Christianization and Communication in Late Antiquity: John Chrysostom and
His Congregation in Antioch (Cambridge, 2006), 11-41; Isabella Sandwell, Religious Identity in
Late Antiquity: Greeks, Jews, and Christians in Antioch (Cambridge, 2007). For specific consid-
eration of Basil and the other Cappadocians, see the still useful Jean Bernardi, La prédication des
Pères Cappadociens: Le prédicateur et son auditoire (Paris, 1968).
4
Hex. 1.1. I use, and often modify on the basis of the original Greek text, the English transla-
tions of Basil’s Hexaemeron from Basil: Letters and Select Works, ed. Philip Schaff and Henry
Wace, vol. 8 of Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers of the Christian Church (Edinburgh, 1975). The
critical edition of the sermons is: Basil, Homilien zum Hexaemeron, ed. Emmanuel Amand de
Mendieta and Stig Y. Rudberg, GCS 2 (Berlin, 1997).