How did the early Church understand the relation between grace, salvation, and the person of Christ? This study shows that, despite intense theological controversy, there was a very strong consensus in the fifth century about what salvation was and who Christ needed to be in order to save people.

New research - impact on understanding of the christological and Pelagian controversies

Challenges common scholarly assumptions concerning christology in the early church

Unprecedented views on Cassian's christology

Deals with issues at the heart of Christianity

Was there a genuine theological consensus about Christ in the early Church? Donald Fairbairn's persuasive study uses the concept of grace to clarify this question. There were two sharply divergent understandings of grace and christology. One understanding, characteristic of Theodore and Nestorius, saw grace as God's gift of co-operation to Christians and Christ as the uniquely graced man. The other understanding, characteristic of Cyril of Alexandria and John Cassian, saw grace as God the Word's personal descent to the human sphere so as to give himself to humanity. Dealing with, among others, John Chrysostom, John of Antioch, and Leo the Great, Fairbairn suggests that these two understandings were by no means equally represented in the fifth century: Cyril's view was in fact the consensus of the early Church.