Published before the deluge of titles that will no doubt greet the milleseptuacentennial of the Council of Nicaea in 2025, this fresh entry into the Cambridge Companions series will delight scholars of late antiquity. Often these multi-authored volumes can be something of a curate's egg – or else, through lack of an overriding thesis or governing argument, they can end up rather less than the sum of their parts. By contrast, the editor, Young Richard Kim, has not only gathered around him an impressive range of contributors, but has ensured that their chapters hang together exceptionally well. One finishes the book satisfied that the council has been examined thoroughly and from all angles, rather like a precious stone slowly turned in the light by expert jewellers.

Kim reminds us, in his clear and lively introduction, that the legend of Nicaea has grown in spite of (or perhaps, because of) the somewhat limited and tricky historical evidence for its proceedings. The council, in this sense, has become an easily malleable servant of various fanciful or facile narratives, whether Dan Brown's ‘Nicaea as conspiracy’ (in which the council deceitfully invented Christ's divinity), or an ecclesial ‘Nicaea as confirmation’ (in which the council simply rubber-stamped what all sensible bishops already believed). Kim, by comparison, seeks to understand Nicaea both as an event by no means immune from the dynamics of power and politics, and yet also arising from a sincere effort to define and protect the parameters of right belief.

The first two essays in the collection – by Raymond Von Dam (‘Imperial fathers and their sons’) and Rebecca Lyman (‘Arius and Arianism’) – provide judicious accounts of the historical and theological contexts for Nicaea. Seven articles then cover the details of the council itself. Ine Jacobs gives an illuminating guide to the material needs of the council, pointing out that this was, by some distance, the largest ecclesiastical assembly that had ever taken place (especially when each bishop's accompanying priests and deacons are taken into account). This necessitated meeting in the imperial palace, which must have only enhanced the potent mix of flattery, persuasion and intimidation that Constantine sought to exert upon the bishops who gathered there. David Gwynn (‘Reconstructing the Council of Nicaea’) carefully assesses the peculiar patchwork of later reminiscences from bishops present at the council, and so tries to assemble the most likely order of events. The very fact that Eusebius, Athanasius, Eustathius and others had to rely on their memories of what transpired, rather than being able to appeal to an official record of proceedings, nicely illustrates how novel the whole process was, and sets the paucity of Nicaea's documentation in stark contrast to the minutely detailed acta of fifth-century councils. Hal Drake, Aaron Johnson and Daniel McCarthy give reliable guides to the particular roles that Constantine, Eusebius and the controversy over Easter played at Nicaea, but perhaps the finest two essays in the whole volume belong to Mark Edwards (on the Nicene Creed) and Andreas Weckwerth (on the Nicene canons). Both give hugely impressive distillations of forests of scholarship, shot through with authoritative insight. It seems, however, that the tradition which saw Marcellus of Ancyra's distinctive fingerprints all over the text of the Creed has rather fallen into disfavour. I must confess I still find such an interpretation of the Creed rather persuasive, and a perceived Marcellan taint was certainly a major reason for the widespread hesitations over the Creed during the mid-fourth century.

A set of four chapters then cover the early reception of Nicaea to 381. Sara Parvis makes a spirited case for a significant early struggle over Nicaea (something largely dismissed since the work of R. P. C. Hanson). Mark DelCogliano and Daniel Williams cover the crucial period from the 350s to the 370s. Kelley McCarthy Spoerl gives a superb analysis of Apollinarius’ creative use of the Nicene Creed, and makes the striking claim that he was the first meaningfully to explore the implications of Nicaea's doctrine for Christology. There is still a story to be written about how the avowedly and self-consciously ‘Nicene’ Apollinarius could come to be condemned in 381, in the very same breath that the Nicene Creed was emphatically re-confirmed.

The volume closes with two longer-term perspectives on Nicaea, one focusing on its Roman Catholic reception (by Geoffrey Dunn) and one on its legacy in the Orthodox tradition (by Paul Gavrilyuk). Gavrilyuk's piece stands out as a perceptive study on how the Nicene Creed could come to be affirmed as authoritative and sufficient, yet also be capable of legitimate modification over time. If the latter contention is conceded, of course, it helps to explain how the West could regard the addition of the filioque as not only preferable, but necessary. For the sake of completeness, it is regrettable that there is no chapter on the legacy of Nicaea among the Protestant Churches – perhaps this could be included in a second edition.