‘Yet not as I will, but as you will’: On the Development of Partitive Exegesis in the Early Arian Controversy

Abstract John Behr and others have argued that partitive exegesis is central to ‘Nicene’ theology, especially when considering writers such as Athanasius of Alexandria, Gregory of Nazianzus, and Cyril of Alexandria. But few have surveyed the employment of this exegetical strategy immediately around Nicaea. This article explores how two opposing exegetical strategies—Trinitarian (univocal) and Christological (partitive) exegesis—were employed to interpret Christ’s prayer in Gethsemane in the earliest stage of the Arian controversy, with particular focus on Asterius the Sophist, Eusebius of Caesarea, Eustathius of Antioch, and Marcellus of Ancyra. Despite some common exegetical approaches between these figures, radically divergent theological perspectives are found among them which reveal that partitive exegesis was developed in an ad hoc fashion. Further, partitive exegesis cannot be considered ‘Nicene’ without consideration of broader theological assumptions.