This book has grown out of the Martin D'Arcy Lectures which Brian Daley delivered in Oxford in 2001. It takes its departure from the monumental collection Das Konzil von Chalkedon: Geschichte und Gegenwart, edited by H. Bacht and A. Grillmeier between 1951 and 1954, and A. Grillmeier's Christ in Christian tradition of 1965. The first chapter of the book (pp. 1–28) is dedicated to the history of this ‘Chalcedon scholarship in the post-war years’ (p. 1), which has shaped Christological scholarship for the last three generations. But, Daley argues, while this scholarship has highlighted the ‘achievement of Chalcedon’ (p. 10), it has also exposed its limitations. Rather than bringing about unity among divided factions the council of 451 generated more divisions and splits, and the complexity of the formula, ingenious as it may be, did not always turn out to be helpful. It could also be a hindrance in contexts in which inspiration for Christological thinking was drawn from pre-Chalcedonian (early Christian) and directly from biblical sources. Daley therefore identifies the need for ‘rethinking Chalcedon’ (p. 22). The present book is intended as a contribution to this new process. In a further eight chapters (in addition to the one already mentioned, and an epilogue) Daley revisits areas of Christological thinking before and after Chalcedon, which he hopes to present in a new light, not just as preliminary stages in a process progressing towards and culminating in Chalcedon, or as derivative developments post-Chalcedon, but as genuine, ‘full’, contributions in their own right, which can be even better understood in the light of Chalcedon. He begins in the second century and the emergence of a conception of Christ as ‘the Word with us’ (pp. 28–64). Further chapters are on Irenaeus and Origen: ‘A Christology of manifestation’ (pp. 65–93); the early Arian controversy: ‘Christology in search of a mediator’ (pp. 94–125); Apollinarius, Gregory of Nazianzus and Gregory of Nyssa: ‘Towards a Christology of transformation’ (pp. 126–49); Augustine of Hippo: ‘Christology as the “Way”’ (pp. 150–73); Antioch and Alexandria: ‘Christology as reflection on God's presence in history’ (pp. 174–199); After Chalcedon: ‘A Christology of relationship’ (pp. 200–31); and the Iconoclastic Controversy: ‘Christology and images’ (pp. 232–65). An epilogue on ‘Christology and the councils’ (pp. 266–80) completes the chapters. It is followed by a bibliography (pp. 281–90) and an index of names and subjects (pp. 291–4).

It is one of the main concerns of this book to bring together, selectively but also in a synopsis, some of the most diverse early types of Christology and to learn from them in their often hardly compatible particularity. ‘We need to keep in our sights the balanced, analytical picture Chalcedon drew of’ Christ, Daley writes, ‘but we also need to recover … the whole conciliar tradition, from Nicaea I to Nicaea II and beyond, and the whole theological and exegetical and homiletic and spiritual tradition of the first centuries’ (p. 26). As a patristic scholar of great critical acumen Daley is aware that this approach comes at a price. Each of the texts and authors that he discusses has a context of its own. But in a study of such breadth as this much of this inevitably cannot be taken into account. For example in chapter ii the controversy around the dating and provenance of the Ignatian corpus is hardly mentioned. Without much discussion the corpus is dated early in the second century and situated in Antioch (pp. 37–43). Or, in chapter iv, as Daley himself readily points out, his depiction of the debates about Arius’ theology involving (for example) Marcellus of Ancyra, Eusebius of Caesarea and Athanasius of Alexandria offers anything but ‘a complete picture of the understanding of Christ that these early fourth-century theologians present to us in their writings’ (p. 123). Yet one should perhaps not measure this book against specialist studies of individual patristic texts or authors, or critical issues. Rather, the value of this book is perhaps best recognised if, for example, the chapter on Augustine's Christology were compared with the equivalent chapter in Grillmeier's Christ in Christian tradition. Grillmeier depicted Augustine's Christology as deficient in the light of Chalcedon. For Daley, it represents a contribution in its own right to the early Christian understanding of Christ regardless of Chalcedon. It is only in the run-up to the council itself from the early 430s on that Daley discusses Christology with direct reference to the council (pp. 200–3) pointing out the innovative character of the formula, which put Christ centre-stage as a person in relationship with the world and with each individual human being. The authors of the ‘formula’, he concedes, may not even have been aware of this (p. 203), but it came to light in the reception. Here Daley is on home ground in his specialist area as he succinctly sets out, in chapter viii, the distinct positions developed on this question by Leontius of Byzantium, Maximus the Confessor and John of Damascus. And in chapter ix, on the Iconoclastic debate, he rounds off this theme explaining how it is constitutive for a ‘substantial relationship’ as that between Christ and each human being (as well as humanity and the world as a whole) that each side of the relationship has an ‘image’ of the other.

Once more, a volume such as this cannot meet the standards of critical scholarship in each of its parts. However, its whole meets a purpose which would not be easy to fulfil by any critical study with a narrower scope. It offers those who are new to the subject a comprehensive overview, if only selective, of the universe that is the Christology of the Early Church, while it reminds specialist patristic scholars and theologians generally of one of the deeper purposes of the discipline. It can therefore be recommended to all of these groups of potential readers. This reviewer's personal recommendation would be to read the book as a companion volume to Grillmeier's Christ in Christian tradition.