Identity and gender remain important subjects of inquiry among scholars of Late Antiquity, and the writings of the Cappadocian Fathers—Basil of Caesarea (d. 379), Gregory of Nazianzus (d. 390), and Gregory of Nyssa (d. 394)—have received their fair share of attention in this regard. Howard's approach is a departure, however, and in two critical ways. First, his book does not emphasize the Christianization of this period or its promotion of novel or subordinate forms of masculinity; instead, it insists upon the continued significance of Greek ideas about manliness (andreia) and manly excellence (arete), classical ideals that were intimately tied to learning (paideia), competition (agon), and sound leadership in the minds of elite eastern Romans, who shared an identity as upright and learned men (agathoi and pepaideumenoi, respectively), regardless of religious affiliation. Second, the book attempts to demonstrate how these ideas played a role in the theological controversies of the period, arguing that classical manliness could be weaponized by the Cappadocian Fathers, who disparaged non-Nicene Christians for failing to live up to its ideals: their theological rivals, in other words, were maligned as unlearned, inexperienced, unvirtuous, unmanly, and ultimately dangerous to the community.

The book begins with a lengthy introduction, which describes the classical masculine ideal, its component parts, and its development as a performative and rhetorical strategy into the Second Sophistic and beyond. Howard is keen to note that, while Christianity did pose certain challenges to classical norms, the two were not mutually exclusive: classical agonism, for instance, found parallels in scripture and could be appropriated for the spiritual and real-world struggles of contemporary Christians. The introduction then turns to a discussion of the book's principal sources, the Cappadocian Fathers’ letters and an assemblage of encomia, funeral orations, and lives, collectively described as “hagiographic biography” (56), before concluding with a synopsis of its chapters. Chapter one focuses on epistolary exchange as a form of mutually beneficial competition and locus for exhibiting manliness. Derived from sweat and toil, the fourth-century pepaideumenos’ eloquent language and classical erudition marked him as an authentic man among his educated peers, while the letters he exchanged offered a medium for demonstrating his hard-earned arete. These letters were imbued with agonism, from the tasks of writing, reading, and judging them, to their coded contents, which demanded both knowledge and reciprocity, to their circulation in deliberately arranged collections. Letters like these reached across religious and theological divides, yet, importantly, they were only addressed to men and thus reinforced a particular male identity within their limited audience. Chapter two continues Howard's study of epistolary exchange by focusing on the rhetoric of friendship. Letters, it is argued, created a virtual encounter between like-minded individuals, revealing a correspondent's inner man. In keeping with classical and Christian thought, friends were described as kindred souls, longed for and desired by the Cappadocian Fathers, who regularly appealed to sensory rhetoric in their correspondence: to sight, hearing, and touch, for which Howard provides many examples. Letters, finally, harkened to ancient ideas of gift-giving: they were a source of honor and celebration for their recipients, who were called upon and obliged to respond in kind. Chapter three shifts to the Cappadocians’ hagiographic biographies, which were intended for a larger, more general, and typically Christian audience. The lives of five individuals are analyzed here, with an eye to how their biographies and biographers shaped conceptions of Christian manhood within the context of fierce theological debate. Both Gregory Thaumaturgus and Caesarius of Nazianzus, Howard demonstrates, were depicted as hardened athletes and manly men. The former successfully contended against evil spirits, temptation, and non-Nicene Christianity; the latter, a model Christian pepaideumenos, driven by faith, could see through the emperor Julian's sophistry and verbal trickery, besting and emasculating the emperor in the process. Basil of Caesarea, in contrast, was a learned and brave warrior, the manly fusion of a hoplite and a philosopher, who held fast against heresy and was likened to biblical prophets and the Greek heroes of old. Gorgonia and Macrina, finally, triumphed over their bodily suffering with fortitude, composure, and resolve, offering models of piety, self-control, and sacred arete within an appropriately familial and domestic sphere. Chapter four likewise focuses on hagiographic biographies, arguing that Nazianzen used the examples of Athanasius of Alexandria and Basil of Caesarea to associate pro-Nicene Christianity with rigorous training, expertise, and proper ascetism. Nyssen's Macrina, on the other hand, served as a model of spiritual excellence, self-control, and wisdom for her brothers, tempering their traditional paideia through her pious example. Such qualities, Howard asserts, were intended to legitimize pro-Nicene Christians as the heirs of classical learning, whose spiritual and physical agones purified them and thus authorized their understanding of the divine: they were holy pepaideumenoi and Christian agathoi, embodiments of traditional manliness who defended the truth; their non-Nicene rivals were the opposite. The book then concludes with a brief epilogue, which restates its chapters’ conclusions and offers some suggestions as to the legacy of this form of masculinity into the Middle Byzantine Period.

This book is not always an easy read and may strike some, especially the nonspecialist, as something akin to agon in and of itself. Nevertheless, it is an important study, not just of the Cappadocian Fathers and their rhetoric, but also of the influence and pervasiveness of classical ideas about masculinity in an increasingly Christian world. Howard insists that such notions were inherently Greek and thus eastern, but one wonders the extent to which analogues might be found among contemporary Latin authors, who did not live in an intellectual vacuum. The letters of Ambrose, Jerome, and Augustine readily come to mind, as do a number of Christian biographies.