Between Byzantium and Paris: Christos Yannaras and personalism of Russian religious philosophy

The paper deals with the influence of Russian religious and philosophical thought on the theological system of the Greek theologian, classic of Orthodox personalism, professor Christos Yannaras. The paper examines developments of theology historians. It is concluded that although the influence of Russian thought on C. Yannaras is a common place in historiography, a detailed analysis of this influence has not yet been carried out. The paper presents the autobiographical testimony of C. Yannaras, indicating that even in his youth, the Greek thinker was ‘initiated’ by the works of Nikolai Berdyaev. It is shown that these works may well have laid the foundation for the doctrine of the personality of C. Yannaras. However, the main focus of the paper is on the source analysis of the earliest major treatise C. Yannaras ‘Metaphysics of the body’, which contains all the main points of his teaching about personality. The most significant influence on Yannaras at this stage was the Russian theologian Vladimir Lossky, and to a lesser extent other representatives of emigrant theology, such as Pavel Evdokimov. The conclusion is made that Russian thought not only suggested C. Yannaras made specific theological theses, although the same theses were offered to him by secular existentialism, but also proved the appropriateness of using the personalistic conceptual apparatus in the Orthodox context.