Let's hear it for Gregory of Nyssa

Who was the first person in recorded history to condemn slavery as an institution?

Chances are, you have never heard of him. So let’s hear it for Gregory of Nyssa — 335–394 — who argued: “You are condemning to slavery human beings whose nature is free.”

Radical stuff for the fourth century.

Gregory was a bishop in what is now central Turkey. I had a vague understanding of him as one of the so-called Cappadocian Fathers — those three great theologians who helped shape our understanding of God as Trinity, and who took on the Arians. But that, I’m afraid, is about it.

Then this week, thanks to Rowan Williams and his book Being Christian, I came across Gregory once again. Not only was Gregory a prolific writer, but wonderfully you can buy some of his writings in translation on Kindle for less than £2 — one of them even comes with pictures.

That’s my kind of theologian.

And more to the point, Gregory is wonderfully down-to-earth, as truly spiritual people invariably are.

Rowan Williams introduced me to Gregory’s teaching on the Lord’s Prayer: a short series of five sermons. Essentially, Gregory says that because of Jesus — and only because of Jesus — we may speak to God in a wholly new way. We may call him “our Father.” As we pray, through sheer grace, we stand where Jesus stands.

Gregory is struck by the sheer daring of calling God Father. We should not say it lightly. To call God Father means we must bear some family likeness to him: goodness, mercy, purity, holiness. Gregory argues that it is a contradiction to call the Holy One “Father” while deliberately living in evil.

That is a powerful pastoral point: the prayer does not flatter us; it converts us.

So when we pray, “Give us this day our daily bread,” we are not asking for bread just for me, but for us — indeed, for everyone. This is a prayer for justice. It is what Jesus wants for his world.

Hence Gregory’s principled opposition to slavery. Human beings are made in the image of God, free by nature, and therefore cannot rightly be bought, sold, or mastered by another human being.

I’ve blogged about this before, but the precise translation of Luke’s Gospel is: “Forgive us our sins, as we have forgiven those who have sinned against us.” What Gregory says here — and this is truly radical — is that we are asking God to imitate us.

As Rowan Williams suggests, Gregory was probably the first Christian teacher, at least the first we know about, to develop this key teaching of Jesus in such depth as the most difficult part of the Lord’s Prayer.  As we pray, we have forgiven those indebted to us.

It is as if God offers his forgiveness and then steps back and says: “Now then, you show me.”

This reveals so clearly what we are meant to do with the freedom God gives us. We are to show the family likeness of the man who forgave those who were hammering nails into his wrists.

Above all, as Gregory himself writes: “The effect of prayer is union with God.”

Such prayer takes us into heaven. It gives us direct access, in Christ, to the Father. Here we are equal to the angels — perhaps even more than equal, because God’s glory is opened to us in Christ.

For Gregory, the Lord’s Prayer is not a list of requests but a pattern of transformation. It teaches us to become the kind of people who can truthfully say, “Our Father.” Such prayer changes things — and above all, it changes us, so that when people see us, they see something of Jesus.

Truly humbling.

So to pray the Lord’s Prayer is to share in God’s power. And as we share in God’s power, we can go and do miracles. Yes, miracles - like forgiving our neighbours, and even giving our property away to the poor. Because, as Gregory teaches, this is how God exercises his power: not through domination, but through relationships.

After all, it was the devil who suggested to Jesus that he turn stones into bread — into material wealth.

Above all, for Gregory, prayer is constant growth: a continual movement into the endless mystery of God. We keep moving. There is always more to discover. Like a scientist exploring cosmology, the more we discover, the more we realise how little we know. Through prayer, we are encountering the Creator of this remarkable cosmos.

As Gregory writes in The Life of Moses: “This truly is the vision of God: never to be satisfied in the desire to see him. But one must always, by looking at what he can see, rekindle his desire to see more.”

And he continues:  “Thus, no limit would interrupt growth in the ascent to God, since no limit to the Good can be found, nor is the increasing of desire for the Good brought to an end because it is satisfied.”

To pray the Lord’s Prayer is to dare to become what we say.