Patristic Cosmopolitanism: The Idea of Universal Order beyond Empire in Late Antiquity

The topic of this research project will be cosmopolitan theory in late-antique philosophy, with a special focus on patristic cosmopolitanism, i.e. on cosmopolitan theory as it is advanced by Christian writers and orators of the first centuries ce. New ground is continually being broken in terms of the history of cosmopolitan theory. Given the salience of cosmopolitan themes in contemporary political theory, this historical work has the potential to impact researchers who work outside of its subfields and fields. Numerous studies published within the last decade attest to the vibrancy of research into cosmopolitan theories in classical antiquity, and in the Hellenistic period. It is only within the last decade that the field of ‘medieval cosmopolitanism’ has begun to emerge. And finally, the interface of cosmopolitan theory and empire in antiquity is only now becoming a topic of systematic enquiry. Notable for its absence is the question of patristic cosmopolitanism. In order to fill this lacuna, a research project will be written which begins to address the following questions:

• How did early theorists of a ‘universal’ faith – in the context of a Roman imperial order, and within the immensely diverse Mediterranean oecumene which it sustained – treat cosmopolitan concepts and themes?
• Is the church itself conceived as a cosmopolis, a ‘world city’, by Christian thinkers in late antiquity?
• If so, how is this reflected in patristic anthropology – including concepts of race?
• And how is the patristic concept of a ‘world city’ deployed in early Christian legitimations (and de-legitimations) of the Roman imperial ideology?

Following on from a KU Leuven dissertation which treats cosmopolitan themes in the philosophical anthropology of one late-antique bishop, Nemesius of Emesa (fl. ca 390), a broader investigation of cosmopolitan theories in patristic literature will be drawn up in the PDM year, and submitted to a range of funding bodies.