On the Christian Profession

De professione Christiana · Πρὸς Ἁρμόνιον, τί τὸ Χριστιανῶν ὄνομα ἢ ἐπάγγελμα

237Gregory opens a long letter to a friend, meant to repay many missed letters, by recalling their conversations about virtue.
239Gregory proposes to ask what the Christian profession is, so that Christians may truly be what they are called, and begins the story of a dancing ape in Alexandria.
241As the ape was exposed by sweets, so false Christians are exposed by the devil's enticements; the name Christ means king and gathers up all the names that describe God.
243Christians share the name of Christ and so must share all the qualities it contains; Christianity is defined as an imitation of the divine nature, a return to the image in which man was made.
245A Christian who lives badly misrepresents God as a bad painter misrepresents a king; Christ's command to be perfect like the Father means imitating God's good activities by keeping free from evil.
247Heaven is not God's separate dwelling, since God is everywhere; to imitate the heavenly Father is to be free of earthly passions, which is done by choice, not by changing place, and so is easy for one who wishes.
249The devil ruins the soul like moth, rust and thieves, but treasure stored with God is safe and multiplied, for God repays small gifts with great and eternal ones; the letter closes with a greeting.

About this work

Author: Gregory of Nyssa
Attribution: authentic · Accepted as Gregory's.
Standing: Honoured by the Catholic, Orthodox, and Protestant traditions. Honoured as a saint or in a church calendar by: Catholic, Orthodox, Protestant.
Date: ca. 379-394 (approximate) · Not securely dated.
Written at: Cappadocia (disputed)
Addressed to: Harmonius
Language: Greek
Genre: treatise
Reference system: Migne page (two columns): each part is one printed page of PG 46, numbered by its left-hand column (e.g. 893 = columns 893-894); Migne prints no chapter numbers in this work.
SBL abbreviation: Prof. Chr.Not yet checked
Clavis: CPG (number not yet checked)
Text from: J.-P. Migne, ed., Patrologiae cursus completus, Series Graeca 46 (Paris: Migne, 1863), cols. 237-249 (Printed edition in the public domain; Greek text from the OCR of the Bavarian State Library scan (bsb10800772) of PG 46 (Greek lines only; Migne's Latin translation not used))
Critical editions: Virginia Woods Callahan, ed., Gregorii Nysseni Opera Ascetica, Gregorii Nysseni Opera 8.1 (Leiden: Brill, 1952) (cited only; not reproduced) (cited, not reproduced)