Dialogi sex de processione Spiritus Sancti

The “Dialogi sex de processione Spiritus Sancti” by Niketas, the metropolitan of Thessalonike, once known unproperly as “of Maroneia”, is one of the most outstanding polemical works against the Latins, written in form of a dialogue, of the Comnenian era. Niketas (first half of the 12th c.) is commonly considered a “latinophron” theologian, since he was “prepared to accept the Latin wording” (A. KAZHDAN, Change in Byzantine Culture in the Eleventh and Twelfth Centuries, Berkeley 1985, p. 189), and his Dialogi are the only Byzantine twelfth-century writings on the discussions with the Latin Church, where Greek and Latin speakers reach an agreement on the procession of the Holy Spirit “through the Son”, and where the Latin’s arguments turn out to be ultimately longer and more persuasive than the Greek’s mostly brief and provocative replies. The critical edition of these influential six dialogues, edited for the first time in their complete form, offer to the reader one of the most original and innovative text on the Filioque discussion and witness to the existence in the twelfth century of an uncommon way of interpreting the inter-Trinitarin relationship and to the usage of Aristotelic philosophy for interpreting the procession of the Holy Spirit.

The critical edition Nicetae Thessalonicensis Dialogi sex de processione Spiritus Sancti (Corpus Christianorum Series Graeca 92, Turnhout: Brepols, 2021), edited by Alessandra Bucossi and Luigi D’Amelia, presents the first complete and methodologically rigorous publication of Niketas of Thessalonica’s Dialogues, one of the key twelfth-century works on the Filioque controversy. Structured in six logoi, the work stages a theological exchange between a Greek and a Latin interlocutor, marked by a conciliatory tone and precise logical argumentation. Based on the full examination of the manuscript tradition, the edition reconstructs three textual branches and corrects numerous errors of previous partial editions, supported by multiple critical apparatuses (apparatus fontium et parallelorum, apparatus criticus, apparatus collationum fontium et excerptorum) that elucidate the relationship between Niketas’s patristic sources and his theological reasoning. The comprehensive introduction, divided into biographical and philological sections, clarifies the author’s mediating role in the theological dialogue between East and West and his place within Komnenian theology.

L’edizione critica Nicetae Thessalonicensis Dialogi sex de processione Spiritus Sancti (Corpus Christianorum Series Graeca 92, Turnhout: Brepols, 2021), a cura di Alessandra Bucossi e Luigi D’Amelia, offre la prima pubblicazione completa e filologicamente rigorosa dei Dialoghi di Niceta di Tessalonica, una delle testimonianze più significative del XII secolo sulla controversia del Filioque. L’opera, articolata in sei logoi, mette in scena un dialogo teologico tra un interlocutore greco e uno latino, caratterizzato da un tono conciliante e da un approccio argomentativo di grande finezza. Basata sull’analisi integrale della tradizione manoscritta, l’edizione ricostruisce tre rami testuali e corregge numerosi errori presenti nelle edizioni precedenti, integrando diversi apparati critici (apparatus fontium et parallelorum, apparatus criticus, apparatus collationum fontium et excerptorum) che consentono di valutare con precisione il rapporto tra le fonti patristiche e la riflessione teologica di Niceta. L’ampia introduzione, articolata in una sezione biografica e una filologica, chiarisce il ruolo dell’autore come mediatore nel dialogo teologico tra Oriente e Occidente e la sua posizione nel quadro della teologia comnena.