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The myth of Pelagianism. By Ali Bonner. (A British Academy Monograph.) Pp. xviii + 342. Oxford–New York: Oxford University Press (for The British Academy), 2018. £80. 978 0 19 726639 7
As set out in the acknowledgements this monograph is the outcome of many years of doctoral and postdoctoral research. Its argument is ‘that “Pelagianism” never existed’ except as ‘a composite fiction created for polemical purposes’ (p. xiii). This argument is developed in seven chapters. Chapter i outlines how Pelagius’ teaching was distorted and reduced to a caricature by polemical authors and his person vilified to undermine his credibility (pp. 1–28). Chapters ii and iii both carry the self-explanatory title ‘Pelagius did not invent anything: all the teachings in his writings had already been widely disseminated in ascetic paraenesis’. The chapters demonstrate in intricate detail how most of the tenets that were attacked as heretical in Pelagius’ writings (for example, the innate goodness of human nature and human ability to do good out of free will even after the Fall) can also be found in such orthodox (ascetic paraenetic) works as Athanasius’ Life of Antony, which circulated in several Latin versions, and in some of Jerome's biblical commentaries (pp. 29–196). Chapter iv sets out that no organised ‘Pelagian’ movement ever existed and that no single individual ever stood for all the teachings that were identified as ‘Pelagian’ (pp. 197–217). As mentioned in the introduction, ‘Pelagianism’, especially in the official documents that condemned it, for example the canons of the African bishops of the end of April 418, or Zosimus’ Tractoria of June 418, from all we know about the latter, was a ‘composite’ entity, not a coherent, systematic, body of doctrines developed by a single teacher and followed by an organised group, or church. It is therefore, as chapter v discusses, difficult to classify as ‘Pelagian’ writings that were not already classified as such during the controversy around 418. However, due to the disparity of that material,...